評論
打印
The spoken words that are inaudible among the flying spindles; those same words are plainly heard without the walls, bursting from the opened casements. Thereby have villainies been detected. Ah, mortal! then, be heedful; for so, in all this din of the great world's loom, thy subtlest thinkings may be overheard afar.
在疾馳如飛的錠子聲中，說話是聽不到的；可是這種說話，卻教墻外的人聽得一清二楚，因為它打敞開的窗子里沖了出去。因此，丑惡的事情難免要被發覺。人呀！要小心謹慎呀；因為，你們那些最微妙的思想，在這個大千世界的紡織機的喧鬧聲中，也許會在老遠就給人們偷聽去。
Now, amid the green, life-restless loom of that Arsacidean wood, the great, white, worshipped skeleton lay lounging—a gigantic idler! Yet, as the ever-woven verdant warp and woof intermixed and hummed around him, the mighty idler seemed the cunning weaver; himself all woven over with the vines; every month assuming greener, fresher verdure; but himself a skeleton. Life folded Death; Death trellised Life; the grim god wived with youthful Life, and begat him curly-headed glories.
且說這只受人崇拜的、巨大的白骷髏——這個巨大的懶漢！就悠閑地躺在阿薩西提的樹林里那架碧綠而從不停止活動的紡織機中。而且，由于在它周圍始終是交錯地嗡響著那些織個不停的翠綠的經緯線，弄得這個大懶漢就象個巧妙的織工；它全身都織滿著葡萄藤；每時每刻都顯得更旺盛，更青翠，可它自己卻是架骨胳。生命籠罩著死亡；死亡支撐著生命；嚴酷的神配上朝氣蓬勃的生命，賦予它以鬈發的美容。
Now, when with royal Tranquo I visited this wondrous whale, and saw the skull an altar, and the artificial smoke ascending from where the real jet had issued, I marvelled that the king should regard a chapel as an object of vertu. He laughed.
這時，我跟王族的托朗郭一起去拜謁這條奇妙的大鯨，看到那祭壇似的腦袋，和那人工的煙霧正從那曾經發出真正的噴水的地方高高冒起，我不禁驚嘆這位國王竟把個教堂當作件骨董了。他笑了笑。
But more I marvelled that the priests should swear that smoky jet of his was genuine. To and fro I paced before this skeleton— brushed the vines aside—broke through the ribs—and with a ball of Arsacidean twine, wandered, eddied long amid its many winding, shaded colonnades and arbors.
可是，更叫我詫異的是，那些僧人竟賭神發咒地說，它那煙噴嘴的噴水是真的。我在這個骷髏前面踱來踱去——撩開葡萄藤——朝肋骨里擠了進去——手里拿著一只阿薩西提的麻線球，在它那曲折蜿蜒陰涼的柱廊和喬木叢中旋來轉去地徜徉了好久。
