雙語小說連載:《董貝父子》第四章 Part 1

In which some more First Appearances are made on the Stage of these Adventures.

Though the offices of Dombey and Son were within the liberties of the City of London, and within hearing of Bow Bells, when their clashing voices were not drowned by the uproar in the streets, yet were there hints of adventurous and romantic story to be observed in some of the adjacent objects. Gog and Magog held their state within ten minutes' walk; the Royal Exchange was close at hand; the Bank of England, with its vaults of gold and silver 'down among the dead men' underground, was their magnificent neighbour. Just round the corner stood the rich East India House, teeming with suggestions of precious stuffs and stones, tigers, elephants, howdahs, hookahs, umbrellas, palm trees, palanquins, and gorgeous princes of a brown complexion sitting on carpets, with their slippers very much turned up at the toes. Anywhere in the immediate vicinity there might be seen pictures of ships speeding away full sail to all parts of the world; outfitting warehouses ready to pack off anybody anywhere, fully equipped in half an hour; and little timber midshipmen in obsolete naval uniforms, eternally employed outside the shop doors of nautical Instrument-makers in taking observations of the hackney carriages.

雖然董貝父子公司的營業所位於倫敦城的轄區之內，鮑教堂①的鐘所發出的響亮聲音在沒有被街道的喧囂淹沒時，在這裡是可以聽得見的，但在鄰近某些地方仍然可以看得見英勇冒險、情節離奇的傳說的遺蹟。高格和馬高格②的尊嚴神態，在十分鐘步行的距離之內就可以看見；倫敦皇家交易所就在近旁；英格蘭銀行是它最巨集偉的近鄰，它地下的保險庫中，“在下面的空瓶子中間③”，裝滿了金銀。在街道拐角上矗立著富有的東印度公司④，它使人接連不斷地聯想起貴重的織物、寶石、老虎、象、象轎⑤、水煙筒、雨傘、棕櫚樹、四人或六人抬的大轎，還有那面板褐色、坐在地毯上的豪華的王子們，他們的便鞋前端是高高翹起的。在鄰近的任何地方都可以看到畫著張滿風帆、飛速駛向世界各地的船舶的圖畫，也可以看到旅行用品倉庫，它們可以在半小時之內把任何人到任何地方去所需要的旅行用品裝備齊全；還可以看到在航海儀器製造商人的店門外有一些小小的、木製的海軍軍官候補生，穿著陳舊過時的海軍制服，永遠在監視著出租馬車。

註釋：magnificent adj. 高尚的；壯麗的；華麗的；巨集偉的
例句：
1. He was a magnificent commander.
他是一位威嚴的指揮官。
2. The celebrations provided a magnificent spectacle.
慶祝活動呈現一派巨集偉的景象。

①鮑教堂（BowChurch）：位於倫敦市中心；它的鐘聲所及之處，就是倫敦市的市區。
②高格和馬高格（GogandMagog）：是倫敦市政廳門前的兩個木雕巨像；相傳馬格是過去的君王，馬高格是另一位傳說中的英雄。
③這是古老的祝酒詞中的話語。
④東印度公司（EastIndiaHouse）：存在於1600年至1858年的英國貿易公司。公司長期壟斷了對印度的貿易，並操縱了這個國家最重要的管理職能。
⑤象轎：馱在象背上可供數人乘坐的涼亭狀座位。

Sole master and proprietor of one of these effigies - of that which might be called, familiar!y, the woodenest - of that which thrust itself out above the pavement, right leg foremost, with a suavity the least endurable, and had the shoe buckles and flapped waistcoat the least reconcileable to human reason, and bore at its right eye the most offensively disproportionate piece of machinery - sole master and proprietor of that Midshipman, and proud of him too, an elderly gentleman in a Welsh wig had paid house-rent, taxes, rates, and dues, for more years than many a full-grown midshipman of flesh and blood has numbered in his life; and midshipmen who have attained a pretty green old age, have not been wanting in the English Navy.

有些海軍軍官候補生的模擬像我們可以不客氣地稱為最像木頭那樣死板的，它們以一種使人極難以忍受的謙恭有禮的神氣，伸出右腿，矗立在人行道上；它們的鞋釦和帶翻領的背心的式樣是人們的理智最難以接受的；它們還拿了一件儀器，放在右眼附近，那儀器的大小十分不合比例，使人看了極為不快。在這些模擬像當中，有一個模擬像的唯一的主人與所有者，也就是說那個海軍軍官候補生的唯一的主人與所有者（他以他而感到自豪），是一位上了年紀、帶威爾士假髮的、有身份的先生；他支付房租、稅金和應付費用的時間比許多有血有肉、完全長大成人的海軍軍官候補生的年齡還長；在英國海軍中，年富力強的海軍軍官候補生是並不缺少的。

The stock-in-trade of this old gentleman comprised chronometers, barometers, telescopes, compasses, charts, maps, sextants, quadrants, and specimens of every kind of instrument used in the working of a ship's course, or the keeping of a ship's reckoning, or the prosecuting of a ship's discoveries. Objects in brass and glass were in his drawers and on his shelves, which none but the initiated could have found the top of, or guessed the use of, or having once examined, could have ever got back again into their mahogany nests without assistance. Everything was jammed into the tightest cases, fitted into the narrowest corners, fenced up behind the most impertinent cushions, and screwed into the acutest angles, to prevent its philosophical composure from being disturbed by the rolling of the sea. Such extraordinary precautions were taken in every instance to save room, and keep the thing compact; and so much practical navigation was fitted, and cushioned, and screwed into every box (whether the box was a mere slab, as some were, or something between a cocked hat and a star-fish, as others were, and those quite mild and modest boxes as compared with others); that the shop itself, partaking of the general infection, seemed almost to become a snug, sea-going, ship-shape concern, wanting only good sea-room, in the event of an unexpected launch, to work its way securely to any desert island in the world.

這位老先生的存貨包括精密計時錶、晴雨表、望遠鏡、羅盤、航海圖、地圖、六分儀、象限儀，以及用於確定船舶航線、進行船舶計算、研究船舶所在地的各種儀器的樣品。在他的抽屜中和架子上存放著銅製的與玻璃制的物品；除了那些具有初步知識的人以外，誰也不能找出它們的頂部，或猜出它們的使用方法，或在看過它們之後，在沒有幫助的情況下，能放回到它們桃花心木製的老窩裡去。每一件東西都被塞進最緊湊的箱子中，裝到最狹窄的角落裡，後面用最不得當的軟墊防護著，並用螺絲擰緊到最尖銳的角中，以防止它那像哲學家般的沉著鎮靜被海洋的滾滾波濤所擾亂。在所有的情況下都採取了這種不同尋常的預防措施，以便節省地方，把東西擺得緊湊。一切都適合於實際航行的要求，都用軟墊防護，並都緊緊擰進每個箱子中（不論它們像有些箱子那樣，是普通的四角形箱子，還是像另一些箱子那樣，有些像三角帽、有些像海星的東西，或者是那些與其他箱子比較起來比較溫柔和不大的箱子）；因此，在這種總的氣氛的影響下，這個店鋪本身似乎幾乎都要變成一個溫暖舒適、適於航海的、船舶形狀的商店了，在突然下水的情況下，所缺少的只是足夠行船的水面，能使它安全行駛到世界上任何一個荒島上去。

註釋：philosophical adj. 哲學的（等於philosophic）；冷靜的
例句：
1. Such philosophical subtleties are beyond my reach.
這種深奧的哲理我可無法理解。
2. She seemed fairly philosophical about the loss.
她對所受損失似乎很看得開。

Many minor incidents in the household life of the Ships' Instrument-maker who was proud of his little Midshipman, assisted and bore out this fancy. His acquaintance lying chiefly among ship-chandlers and so forth, he had always plenty of the veritable ships' biscuit on his table. It was familiar with dried meats and tongues, possessing an extraordinary flavour of rope yarn. Pickles were produced upon it, in great wholesale jars, with 'dealer in all kinds of Ships' Provisions' on the label; spirits were set forth in case bottles with no throats. Old prints of ships with alphabetical references to their various mysteries, hung in frames upon the walls; the Tartar Frigate under weigh, was on the plates; outlandish shells, seaweeds, and mosses, decorated the chimney-piece; the little wainscotted back parlour was lighted by a sky-light, like a cabin.

這位對他的小海軍軍官候補生感到自豪的船舶儀器製造商的家庭生活中的許多細小情節，也加深和突出這樣一種幻覺。他的熟人主要是船具商之類的人，所以他在餐桌上經常擺放著許多真正在船上吃的餅乾。餐桌上也經常有肉乾和舌幹，散發出繩子麻線的氣味；酸菜是用很大的批發的罈子端到餐桌上來的，罈子上貼著印有“經銷船上各種食品”字樣的標籤；烈酒是用沒有瓶頸的方瓶子端上的。牆上掛著的畫框中是描繪船舶的老版畫，船舶上的字母是指明各種祕密的；盤子上畫著在前進中的韃靼快速帆船；壁爐架上裝飾著奇異的貝殼、海藻和苔蘚；裝有護壁板的小後客廳，像船艙一樣，光線是從天窗中射進來的。

Here he lived too, in skipper-like state, all alone with his nephew Walter: a boy of fourteen who looked quite enough like a midshipman, to carry out the prevailing idea. But there it ended, for Solomon Gills himself (more generally called old Sol) was far from having a maritime appearance. To say nothing of his Welsh wig, which was as plain and stubborn a Welsh wig as ever was worn, and in which he looked like anything but a Rover, he was a slow, quiet-spoken, thoughtful old fellow, with eyes as red as if they had been small suns looking at you through a fog; and a newly-awakened manner, such as he might have acquired by having stared for three or four days successively through every optical instrument in his shop, and suddenly came back to the world again, to find it green. The only change ever known in his outward man, was from a complete suit of coffee-colour cut very square, and ornamented with glaring buttons, to the same suit of coffee-colour minus the inexpressibles, which were then of a pale nankeen. He wore a very precise shirt-frill, and carried a pair of first-rate spectacles on his forehead, and a tremendous chronometer in his fob, rather than doubt which precious possession, he would have believed in a conspiracy against it on part of all the clocks and watches in the City, and even of the very Sun itself. Such as he was, such he had been in the shop and parlour behind the little Midshipman, for years upon years; going regularly aloft to bed every night in a howling garret remote from the lodgers, where, when gentlemen of England who lived below at ease had little or no idea of the state of the weather, it often blew great guns.

他像小商船的船長一樣，和他的外甥沃爾特住在這裡，沒有別的人。沃爾特是一位十四歲的男孩子，他那副神態活像是一位海軍軍官候補生，這也進一步加深了上述總的印象。但事情到這裡也就完結了，因為所羅門·吉爾斯本人（人們通常更喜歡管他叫老所爾），根本沒有一位航海人員的外貌。他那威爾士假髮自然不消說了，那是威爾士假髮中最普通、最難梳理的，他帶上它看上去一點也不像海盜。從其他方面來看，他是個慢條斯理，講話平平靜靜，並喜愛思考的老人；他的眼睛紅紅的，彷彿是穿過迷霧看著您的小太陽；他的神態像是剛剛被喚醒的樣子，如果他通過店中每一架光學儀器連續凝視三、四天之後，突然重新回到周圍的世界上，發現它一片綠色的話，那麼他就可能呈現出這樣的神態。他的外表中唯一可以看到的變化是，他原來全身上下穿著一套咖啡色的服裝，裁剪得寬鬆肥大，上面裝飾著發亮的扣子，現在則仍舊穿著那同樣咖啡色的上衣，但褲子卻換成顏色較淡的本色布做的了。他襯衫的褶邊整整齊齊；前額上架著一副最上等的眼鏡；褲上的表袋中裝著一隻很大的精密計時錶，他寧肯相信倫敦城裡所有的鐘表，甚至太陽都共同密謀來跟它作對，也決不會對他這個寶貴的財產產生懷疑。他現在就像過去一樣，年復一年地這樣待在這個小小的海軍軍官候補生身後的店鋪中和客廳裡；每天夜裡他定時爬上遠離其他房客的一個淒涼的頂樓中去睡覺，當安安逸逸住在下面的英國的先生們很少想到，或根本沒有想到天氣怎樣的時候，這頂樓上卻常常颳大風。

註釋：conspiracy n. 陰謀；共謀；陰謀集團
例句：
1. Like most conspiracy stories, "13 Bankers" contains a kernel of truth.
與多數陰謀故事一樣，《13位銀行家》也蘊含真相。
accidents can be explained by cock-up rather than conspiracy theory.
大多數意外是碰巧撞上而不是蓄意的。