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He left home with his mother's hasty kiss on his cheek and her fervent Catholic blessing in his ears, and his father's parting admonition, “Remember who ye are and don’t be taking nothing off no man.” His five tall brothers gave him good-by with admiring but slightly patronizing smiles, for Gerald was the baby and the little one of a brawny family.
離家出走時(shí)，母親在他臉上匆匆吻了一下，并貼著耳朵說了一聲天主教的祝福，父親則給了臨別贈(zèng)言，"要記住自己是誰，不要學(xué)別人的樣。"他的五位高個(gè)子兄弟羨慕而略帶關(guān)注地微笑著向他道了聲再見，因?yàn)榻芾瓲柕略趶?qiáng)壯的一家人中是最小和最矮的一個(gè)。
His five brothers and their father stood six feet and over and broad in proportion, but little Gerald, at twenty-one, knew that five feet four and a half inches was as much as the Lord in His wisdom was going to allow him. It was like Gerald that he never wasted regrets on his lack of height and never found it an obstacle to his acquisition of anything he wanted. Rather, it was Gerald’s compact smallness that made him what he was, for he had learned early that little people must be hardy to survive among large ones. And Gerald was hardy.
他父親和五個(gè)哥哥都身六英尺以上，其粗壯的程度也很相稱，可是２１歲的小個(gè)子杰拉爾德懂得，五英尺四英寸半便是上帝所能賜給他的最大高度了。對杰拉爾德來說，他從不以自己身材矮小而自怨自艾，也從不認(rèn)為這會(huì)阻礙他去獲得自己所需要的一切。更確切些不如說，正是杰拉爾德的矮小精干使他成為現(xiàn)在這樣，因?yàn)樗缇兔靼装〉娜吮仨氃诟叽笳咧虚g頑強(qiáng)地活下去。而杰拉爾德是頑強(qiáng)的。
His tall brothers were a grim, quiet lot, in whom the family tradition of past glories, lost forever, rankled in unspoken hate and crackled out in bitter humor. Had Gerald been brawny, he would have gone the way of the other O’Haras and moved quietly and darkly among the rebels against the government But Gerald was “l(fā)oud-mouthed and bullheaded,” as his mother fondly phrased it, hair trigger of temper, quick with his fists and possessed of a chip on his shoulder so large as to be almost visible to the naked eye. He swaggered among the tall O’Haras like a strutting bantam in a barnyard of giant Cochin roosters, and they loved him, baited him affectionately to hear him roar and hammered on him with their large fists no more than was necessary to keep a baby brother in his proper place.
他那些高個(gè)兒哥哥是些冷酷寡言的人，在他們身上，歷史光榮的傳統(tǒng)已經(jīng)永遠(yuǎn)消失，淪落為默默的仇恨，爆裂出痛苦的幽默來了。要是杰拉爾德也生來強(qiáng)壯，他就會(huì)走上向奧哈拉家族中其他人的道路，在反政府的行列中悄悄地、神秘地干起來。可杰拉爾德像他母親鐘愛地形容的那樣，是個(gè)"高嗓門，笨腦袋"，嬤嬤暴躁，動(dòng)輒使拳頭，并且盛氣凌人，叫人見人怕。他在那些高大的奧哈拉家族的人中間，就像一只神氣十足的矮腳雞在滿院子大個(gè)兒雄雞中間那樣，故意昂首闊步，而他們都愛護(hù)他，親切地慫恿地高聲喊叫，必要時(shí)也只伸出他們的大拳頭敲他幾下，讓這位小弟弟不要太得意忘形了。
