The sturdy English and the rubicund3 and heavier Dutch had mingled4 to produce a prosperous, prudent5 and yet lavish6 society. To “do things handsomely” had always been a fundamental principle in this cautious world, built up on the fortunes of bankers, India merchants, ship-builders and ship-chandlers. Those well-fed slow-moving people, who seemed irritable7 and dyspeptic to European eyes only because the caprices of the climate had stripped them of superfluous8 flesh, and strung their nerves a little tighter, lived in a genteel monotony of which the surface was never stirred by the dumb dramas now and then enacted9 underground. Sensitive souls in those days were like muted key-boards, on which Fate played without a sound.
In this compact society, built of solidly welded blocks, one of the largest areas was filled by the Ralstons and their ramifications10. The Ralstons were of middle-class English stock. They had not come to the Colonies to die for a creed11 but to live for a bank-account. The result had been beyond their hopes, and their religion was tinged12 by their success. An edulcorated Church of England which, under the conciliatory name of the “Episcopal Church of the United States of America,” left out the coarser allusions13 in the Marriage Service, slid over the comminatory passages in the Athanasian Creed, and thought it more respectful to say “Our Father who” than “which” in the Lord’s Prayer, was exactly suited to the spirit of compromise whereon the Ralstons had built themselves up. There was in all the tribe the same instinctive14 recoil15 from new religions as from unaccounted-for people. Institutional to the core, they represented the conservative element that holds new societies together as seaplants bind16 the seashore.
Compared with the Ralstons, even such traditionalists as the Lovells, the Halseys or the Vandergraves appeared careless, indifferent to money, almost reckless in their impulses and indecisions. Old John Frederick Ralston, the stout17 founder18 of the race, had perceived the difference, and emphasized it to his son, Frederick John, in whom he had scented19 a faint leaning toward the untried and unprofitable.
“You let the Lannings and the Dagonets and the Spenders take risks and fly kites. It’s the county-family blood in ’em: we’ve nothing to do with that. Look how they’re petering out already — the men, I mean. Let your boys marry their girls, if you like (they’re wholesome20 and handsome); though I’d sooner see my grandsons take a Lovell or a Vandergrave, or any of our own kind. But don’t let your sons go mooning around after their young fellows, horse-racing, and running down south to those d —— d Springs, and gambling21 at New Orleans, and all the rest of it. That’s how you’ll build up the family, and keep the weather out. The way we’ve always done it.”
Frederick John listened, obeyed, married a Halsey, and passively followed in his father’s steps. He belonged to the cautious generation of New York gentleman who revered22 Hamilton and served Jefferson, who longed to lay out New York like Washington, and who laid it out instead like a gridiron, lest they should be thought “undemocratic” by people they secretly looked down upon. Shopkeepers to the marrow23, they put in their windows the wares24 there was most demand for, keeping their private opinions for the back-shop, where through lack of use, they gradually lost substance and colour.
The fourth generation of Ralstons had nothing left in the way of convictions save an acute sense of honour in private and business matters; on the life of the community and the state they took their daily views from the newspapers, and the newspapers they already despised. The Ralstons had done little to shape the destiny of their country, except to finance the Cause when it had become safe to do so. They were related to many of the great men who had built the Republic; but no Ralston had so far committed himself as to be great. As old John Frederick said, it was safer to be satisfied with three per cent: they regarded heroism25 as a form of gambling. Yet by merely being so numerous and so similar they had come to have a weight in the community. People said: “The Ralstons” when they wished to invoke26 a precedent27. This attribution of authority had gradually convinced the third generation of its collective importance, and the fourth, to which Delia Ralston’s husband belonged, had the ease and simplicity of a ruling class.
Within the limits of their universal caution, the Ralstons fulfilled their obligations as rich and respected citizens. They figured on the boards of all the old-established charities, gave handsomely to thriving institutions, had the best cooks in New York, and when they travelled abroad ordered statuary of the American sculptors28 in Rome whose reputation was already established. The first Ralston who had brought home a statue had been regarded as a wild fellow; but when it became known that the sculptor29 had executed several orders for the British aristocracy it was felt in the family that this too was a three per cent investment.
Two marriages with the Dutch Vandergraves had consolidated30 these qualities of thrift31 and handsome living, and the carefully built-up Ralston character was now so congenital that Delia Ralston sometimes asked herself whether, were she to turn her own little boy loose in a wilderness32, he would not create a small New York there, and be on all its boards of directors.
Delia Lovell had married James Ralston at twenty. The marriage, which had taken place in the month of September, 1840, had been solemnized, as was then the custom, in the drawing-room of the bride’s country home, at what is now the corner of Avenue A and Ninety-first Street, overlooking the Sound. Thence her husband had driven her (in Grandmamma Lovell’s canary-coloured coach with a fringed hammer-cloth) through spreading suburbs and untidy elm-shaded streets to one of the new houses in Gramercy Park, which the pioneers of the younger set were just beginning to affect; and there, at five-and-twenty, she was established, the mother of two children, the possessor of a generous allowance of pin-money, and, by common consent, one of the handsomest and most popular “young matrons” (as they were called) of her day.
She was thinking placidly33 and gratefully of these things as she sat one afternoon in her handsome bedroom in Gramercy Park. She was too near to the primitive34 Ralstons to have as clear a view of them, as for instance, the son in question might one day command: she lived under them as unthinkingly as one lives under the laws of one’s country. Yet that tremor35 of the muted key-board, that secret questioning which sometimes beat in her like wings, would now and then so divide her from them that for a fleeting36 moment she could survey them in their relation to other things. The moment was always fleeting; she dropped back from it quickly, breathless and a little pale, to her children, her house-keeping, her new dresses and her kindly37 Jim.
She thought of him today with a smile of tenderness, remembering how he had told her to spare no expense on her new bonnet38. Though she was twenty-five, and twice a mother, her image was still surprisingly fresh. The plumpness then thought seemly in a young wife stretched the grey silk across her bosom39, and caused her heavy gold watch-chain — after it left the anchorage of the brooch of St. Peter’s in mosaic40 that fastened her low-cut Cluny collar — to dangle41 perilously42 in the void above a tiny waist buckled43 into a velvet44 waist-band. But the shoulders above sloped youthfully under her Cashmere scarf, and every movement was as quick as a girl’s.
Mrs. Jim Ralston approvingly examined the rosy45-cheeked oval set in the blonde ruffles46 of the bonnet on which, in compliance47 with her husband’s instructions, she had spared no expense. It was a cabriolet of white velvet tied with wide satin ribbons and plumed48 with a crystal-spangled marabout — a wedding bonnet ordered for the marriage of her cousin, Charlotte Lovell, which was to take place that week at St. Mark’s-in-the-Bouwerie. Charlotte was making a match exactly like Delia’s own: marrying a Ralston, of the Waverly Place branch, than which nothing could be safer, sounder or more — well, usual. Delia did not know why the word had occurred to her, for it could hardly be postulated49, even of the young women of her own narrow clan50, that they “usually” married Ralstons; but the soundness, safeness, suitability of the arrangement, did make it typical of the kind of alliance which a nice girl in the nicest set would serenely51 and blushingly forecast for herself.
Yes — and afterward52?
Well — what? And what did this new question mean? Afterward: why, of course, there was the startled puzzled surrender to the incomprehensible exigencies53 of the young man to whom one had at most yielded a rosy cheek in return for an engagement ring; there was the large double-bed; the terror of seeing him shaving calmly the next morning, in his shirt-sleeves, through the dressing-room door; the evasions54, insinuations, resigned smiles and Bible texts of one’s Mamma; the reminder55 of the phrase “to obey” in the glittering blur56 of the Marriage Service; a week or a month of flushed distress57, confusion, embarrassed pleasure; then the growth of habit, the insidious58 lulling59 of the matter-of-course, the dreamless double slumbers60 in the big white bed, the early morning discussions and consultations61 through that dressing-room door which had once seemed open into a fiery62 pit scorching63 the brow of innocence64.
And then, the babies; the babies who were supposed to “make up for everything,” and didn’t — though they were such darlings, and one had no definite notion as to what it was that one had missed, and that they were to make up for.
Yes: Charlotte’s fate would be just like hers. Joe Ralston was so like his second cousin Jim (Delia’s James), that Delia could see no reason why life in the squat65 brick house in Waverly Place should not exactly resemble life in the tall brown-stone house in Gramercy Park. Only Charlotte’s bedroom would certainly not be as pretty as hers.
She glanced complacently66 at the French wall-paper that reproduced a watered silk, with a “valanced” border, and tassels67 between the loops. The mahogany bedstead, covered with a white embroidered68 counterpane, was symmetrically reflected in the mirror of a wardrobe which matched it. Coloured lithographs69 of the “Four Seasons” by Leopold Robert surmounted70 groups of family daguerreotypes in deeply-recessed gilt71 frames. The ormolu clock represented a shepherdess sitting on a fallen trunk, a basket of flowers at her feet. A shepherd, stealing up, surprised her with a kiss, while her little dog barked at him from a clump72 of roses. One knew the profession of the lovers by their crooks73 and the shape of their hats. This frivolous74 time-piece had been a wedding-gift from Delia’s aunt, Mrs. Manson Mingott, a dashing widow who lived in Paris and was received at the Tuileries. It had been entrusted75 by Mrs. Mingott to young Clement76 Spender, who had come back from Italy for a short holiday just after Delia’s marriage; the marriage which might never have been, if Clem Spender could have supported a wife, or if he had consented to give up painting and Rome for New York and the law. The young man (who looked, already, so odd and foreign and sarcastic) had laughingly assured the bride that her aunt’s gift was “the newest thing in the Palais Royal”; and the family, who admired Mrs. Manson Mingott’s taste though they had disapproved77 of her “foreignness,” had criticized Delia’s putting the clock in her bedroom instead of displaying it on the drawing-room mantel. But she liked, when she woke in the morning, to see the bold shepherd stealing his kiss.
Charlotte would certainly not have such a pretty clock in her bedroom; but then she had not been used to pretty things. Her father, who had died at thirty of lung-fever, was one of the “poor Lovells.” His widow, burdened with a young family, and living all year round “up the River,” could not do much for her eldest78 girl; and Charlotte had entered society in her mother’s turned garments, and shod with satin sandals handed down from a defunct79 aunt who had “opened a ball” with General Washington. The old-fashioned Ralston furniture, which Delia already saw herself banishing80, would seem sumptuous81 to Chatty; very likely she would think Delia’s gay French timepiece somewhat frivolous, or even not “quite nice.” Poor Charlotte had become so serious, so prudish82 almost, since she had given up balls and taken to visiting the poor! Delia remembered, with ever-recurring wonder, the abrupt83 change in her: the precise moment at which it had been privately84 agreed in the family that, after all, Charlotte Lovell was going to be an old maid.
They had not thought so when she came out. Though her mother could not afford to give her more than one new tarlatan dress, and though nearly everything in her appearance was regrettable, from the too bright red of her hair to the too pale brown of her eyes — not to mention the rounds of brick-rose on her cheek-bones, which almost (preposterous thought!) made her look as if she painted — yet these defects were redeemed85 by a slim waist, a light foot and a gay laugh; and when her hair was well oiled and brushed for an evening party, so that it looked almost brown, and lay smoothly86 along her delicate cheeks under a wreath of red and white camellias, several eligible87 young men (Joe Ralston among them) were known to have called her pretty.
Then came her illness. She caught cold on a moonlight sleighing-party, the brick-rose circles deepened, and she began to cough. There was a report that she was “going like her father,” and she was hurried off to a remote village in Georgia, where she lived alone for a year with an old family governess. When she came back everyone felt at once that there was a change in her. She was pale, and thinner than ever, but with an exquisitely88 transparent89 cheek, darker eyes and redder hair; and the oddness of her appearance was increased by plain dresses of Quakerish cut. She had left off trinkets and watch chains, always wore the same grey cloak and small close bonnet, and displayed a sudden zeal90 for visiting the indigent91. The family explained that during her year in the south she had been shocked by the hopeless degradation92 of the “poor whites” and their children, and that this revelation of misery93 had made it impossible for her to return to the light-hearted life of her young friends. Everyone agreed, with significant glances that this unnatural94 state of mind would “pass off in time”; and meanwhile old Mrs. Lovell, Chatty’s grandmother, who understood her perhaps better than the others, gave her a little money for her paupers95, and lent her a room in the Lovell stables (at the back of the old lady’s Mercer Street house) where she gathered about her, in what would afterward have been called a “day-nursery,” some of the destitute96 children of the neighbourhood. There was even, among them, the baby girl whose origin had excited such intense curiosity two or three years earlier, when a veiled lady in a handsome cloak had brought it to the hovel of Cyrus Washington, the Negro handy-man whose wife Jessamine took in Dr. Lanskell’s washing. Dr. Lanskell, the chief medical practitioner97 of the day, was presumably versed98 in the secret history of every household from the Battery to union Square; but, though beset99 by inquisitive100 patients, he had invariably declared himself unable to identify Jessamine’s “veiled lady,” or to hazard a guess as to the origin of the hundred dollar bill pinned to the baby’s bib.
The hundred dollars were never renewed, the lady never reappeared, but the baby lived healthily and happily with Jessamine’s piccaninnies, and as soon as it could toddle101 was brought to Chatty Lovell’s day-nursery, where it appeared (like its fellow paupers) in little garments cut down from her old dresses, and socks knitted by her untiring hands. Delia, absorbed in her own babies, had nevertheless dropped in once or twice at the nursery, and had come away wishing that Chatty’s maternal102 instinct might find its normal outlet103 in marriage. The married cousin confusedly felt that her own affection for her handsome children was a mild and measured sentiment compared with Chatty’s fierce passion for the waifs in Grandmamma Lovell’s stable.
And then, to the general surprise, Charlotte Lovell engaged herself to Joe Ralston. It was known that Joe had “admired her” the year she came out. She was a graceful104 dancer, and Joe, who was tall and nimble, had footed it with her through many a reel and schottische. By the end of the winter all the match-makers were predicting that something would come of it; but when Delia sounded her cousin, the girl’s evasive answer and burning brow seemed to imply that her suitor had changed his mind, and no further questions could be asked. Now it was clear that there had, in fact, been an old romance between them, probably followed by that exciting incident, a “misunderstanding”; but at last all was well, and the bells of St. Mark’s were preparing to ring in happier days for Charlotte. “Ah, when she has her first baby,” the Ralston mothers chorused . . .
“Chatty!” Delia exclaimed, pushing back her chair as she saw her cousin’s image reflected in the glass over her shoulder.
Charlotte Lovell had paused in the doorway105. “They told me you were here — so I ran up.”
“Of course, darling. How handsome you do look in your poplin! I always said you needed rich materials. I’m so thankful to see you out of grey cashmere.” Delia, lifting her hands, removed the white bonnet from her dark polished head, and shook it gently to make the crystals glitter.
“I hope you like it? It’s for your wedding,” she laughed.
Charlotte Lovell stood motionless. In her mother’s old dove-coloured poplin, freshly banded with narrow rows of crimson106 velvet ribbon, an ermine tippet crossed on her bosom, and a new beaver107 bonnet with a falling feather, she had already something of the assurance and majesty108 of a married woman.
“And you know your hair certainly IS darker, darling,” Delia added, still hopefully surveying her.
“Darker? It’s grey,” Charlotte suddenly broke out in her deep voice. She pushed back one of the pommaded bands that framed her face, and showed a white lock on her temple. “You needn’t save up your bonnet; I’m not going to be married,” she added, with a smile that showed her small white teeth in a fleeting glare.
Delia had just enough presence of mind to lay down the bonnet, marabout-up, before she flung herself on her cousin.
“Not going to be married? Charlotte, are you perfectly109 crazy?”
“Why is it crazy to do what I think right?”
“But people said you were going to marry him the year you came out. And no one understood what happened then. And now — how can it possibly be right? You simply CAN’T!” Delia incoherently cried.
“Oh — people!” said Charlotte Lovell wearily.
Her married cousin looked at her with a start. Something thrilled in her voice that Delia had never heard in it, or in any other human voice, before. Its echo seemed to set their familiar world rocking, and the Axminster carpet actually heaved under Delia’s shrinking slippers110.
Charlotte Lovell stood staring ahead of her with strained lids. In the pale brown of her eyes Delia noticed the green specks111 that floated there when she was angry or excited.
“Charlotte — where on earth have you come from?” she questioned, drawing the girl down to the sofa.
“Come from?”
“Yes. You look as if you had seen a ghost — an army of ghosts.”
The same snarling112 smile drew up Charlotte’s lip. “I’ve seen Joe,” she said.
“Well? — Oh Chatty,” Delia exclaimed, abruptly113 illuminated114, “you don’t mean to say that you’re going to let any little thing in Joe’s past —? Not that I’ve ever heard the least hint; never. But even if there were . . . ” She drew a deep breath, and bravely proceeded to extremities115. “Even if you’ve heard that he’s been . . . that he’s had a child — of course he would have provided for it before . . . ”
The girl shook her head. “I know: you needn’t go on. ‘Men will be men’; but it’s not that.”
“Tell me what it is.”
Charlotte Lovell looked about the sunny prosperous room as if it were the image of her world, and that world were a prison she must break out of. She lowered her head. “I want — to get away,” she panted.
“Get away? From Joe?”
“From his ideas — the Ralston ideas.”
Delia bridled116 — after all, she was a Ralston! “The Ralston ideas? I haven’t found them — so unbearably117 unpleasant to live with,” she smiled a little tartly118.
“No. But it was different with you: they didn’t ask you to give up things.”
“What things?” What in the world (Delia wondered) had poor Charlotte that any one would want her to give up? She had always been in the position of taking rather than of having to surrender.
“Can’t you explain to me, dear,” Delia urged.
“My poor children — he says I’m to give them up,” cried the girl in a stricken whisper.
“Give them up? Give up helping119 them?”
“Seeing them — looking after them. Give them up altogether. He got his mother to explain to me. After — after we have children . . . he’s afraid . . . afraid our children might catch things . . . He’ll give me money, of course, to pay some one . . . a hired person, to look after them. He thought that handsome,” Charlotte broke out with a sob120. She flung off her bonnet and smothered121 her prostrate122 weeping in the cushions.
Delia sat perplexed123. Of all unforeseen complications this was surely the least imaginable. And with all the acquired Ralston that was in her she could not help seeing the force of Joe’s objection, could almost find herself agreeing with him. No one in New York had forgotten the death of the poor Henry van der Luydens’ only child, who had caught small-pox at the circus to which an unprincipled nurse had surreptitiously taken him. After such a warning as that, parents felt justified124 in every precaution against contagion125. And poor people were so ignorant and careless, and their children, of course, so perpetually exposed to everything catching126. No, Joe Ralston was certainly right, and Charlotte almost insanely unreasonable127. But it would be useless to tell her so now. Instinctively128, Delia temporized129.
“After all,” she whispered to the prone130 ear, “if it’s only after you have children — you may not have any — for some time.”
“Oh, yes, I shall!” came back in anguish131 from the cushions.
Delia smiled with matronly superiority. “Really, Chatty, I don’t quite see how you can know. You don’t understand.”
Charlotte Lovell lifted herself up. Her collar of Brussels lace had come undone132 and hung in a wisp on her crumpled133 bodice, and through the disorder134 of her hair the white lock glimmered135 haggardly. In her pale brown eyes the little green specks floated like leaves in a trout-pool.
“Poor girl,” Delia thought, “how old and ugly she looks! More than ever like an old maid; and she doesn’t seem to realize in the least that she’ll never have another chance.”
“You must try to be sensible, Chatty dear. After all, one’s own babies have the first claim.”
“That’s just it.” The girl seized her fiercely by the wrists. “How can I give up my own baby?”
“Your — your —?” Delia’s world again began to waver under her. “Which of the poor little waifs, dearest, do you call your own baby?” she questioned patiently.
Charlotte looked her straight in the eyes. “I call my own baby my own baby.”
“Your own —? Take care — you’re hurting my wrists, Chatty!” Delia freed herself, forcing a smile. “Your own —?”
“My own little girl. The one that Jessamine and Cyrus — ”
“Oh — ” Delia Ralston gasped136.
The two cousins sat silent, facing each other; but Delia looked away. It came over her with a shudder137 of repugnance138 that such things, even if they had to be said, should not have been spoken in her bedroom, so near the spotless nursery across the passage. Mechanically she smoothed the organ-like folds of her silk skirt, which her cousin’s embrace had tumbled. Then she looked again at Charlotte’s eyes, and her own melted.
“Oh, poor Chatty — my poor Chatty!” She held out her arms to her cousin.
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simplicity
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| n.简单，简易；朴素；直率，单纯 | |
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affluence
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| n.充裕，富足 | |
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rubicund
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| adj.(脸色)红润的 | |
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mingled
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| 混合，混入( mingle的过去式和过去分词 )； 混进，与…交往[联系] | |
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prudent
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| adj.谨慎的，有远见的，精打细算的 | |
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lavish
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| adj.无节制的；浪费的；vt.慷慨地给予，挥霍 | |
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irritable
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| adj.急躁的；过敏的；易怒的 | |
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superfluous
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| adj.过多的，过剩的，多余的 | |
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enacted
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| 制定（法律），通过（法案）( enact的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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ramifications
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| n.结果，后果( ramification的名词复数 ) | |
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creed
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| n.信条；信念，纲领 | |
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tinged
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| v.（使）发丁丁声( ting的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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allusions
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| 暗指，间接提到( allusion的名词复数 ) | |
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instinctive
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| adj.(出于)本能的；直觉的；(出于)天性的 | |
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recoil
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| vi.退却，退缩，畏缩 | |
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bind
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| vt.捆，包扎；装订；约束；使凝固；vi.变硬 | |
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Founder
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| n.创始者，缔造者 | |
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scented
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| adj.有香味的；洒香水的；有气味的v.嗅到(scent的过去分词) | |
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wholesome
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| adj.适合；卫生的；有益健康的；显示身心健康的 | |
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gambling
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revered
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| v.崇敬，尊崇，敬畏( revere的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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marrow
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wares
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heroism
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| n.大无畏精神，英勇 | |
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invoke
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| v.求助于(神、法律)；恳求，乞求 | |
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precedent
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| n.先例，前例；惯例；adj.在前的，在先的 | |
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sculptors
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sculptor
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| n.雕刻家，雕刻家 | |
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consolidated
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| a.联合的 | |
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thrift
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| adj.节约，节俭；n.节俭，节约 | |
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wilderness
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placidly
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| adv.平稳地，平静地 | |
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primitive
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| adj.原始的；简单的；n.原(始)人，原始事物 | |
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tremor
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| n.震动，颤动，战栗，兴奋，地震 | |
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fleeting
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| adj.短暂的，飞逝的 | |
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kindly
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| adj.和蔼的，温和的，爽快的；adv.温和地，亲切地 | |
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38
bonnet
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| n.无边女帽；童帽 | |
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39
bosom
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| n.胸，胸部；胸怀；内心；adj.亲密的 | |
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40
mosaic
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| n./adj.镶嵌细工的，镶嵌工艺品的，嵌花式的 | |
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41
dangle
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| v.(使)悬荡，(使)悬垂 | |
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42
perilously
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| adv.充满危险地，危机四伏地 | |
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43
buckled
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| a. 有带扣的 | |
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44
velvet
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| n.丝绒，天鹅绒；adj.丝绒制的，柔软的 | |
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45
rosy
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| adj.美好的，乐观的，玫瑰色的 | |
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46
ruffles
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| 褶裥花边( ruffle的名词复数 ) | |
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47
compliance
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| n.顺从；服从；附和；屈从 | |
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48
plumed
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| 饰有羽毛的 | |
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49
postulated
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| v.假定，假设( postulate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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50
clan
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| n.氏族，部落，宗族，家族，宗派 | |
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51
serenely
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| adv.安详地，宁静地，平静地 | |
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52
afterward
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| adv.后来；以后 | |
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53
exigencies
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| n.急切需要 | |
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54
evasions
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| 逃避( evasion的名词复数 )； 回避； 遁辞； 借口 | |
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55
reminder
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| n.提醒物，纪念品；暗示，提示 | |
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56
blur
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| n.模糊不清的事物；vt.使模糊，使看不清楚 | |
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57
distress
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| n.苦恼，痛苦，不舒适；不幸；vt.使悲痛 | |
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58
insidious
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| adj.阴险的，隐匿的，暗中为害的，（疾病）不知不觉之间加剧 | |
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59
lulling
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| vt.使镇静，使安静（lull的现在分词形式） | |
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60
slumbers
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| 睡眠，安眠( slumber的名词复数 ) | |
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61
consultations
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| n.磋商（会议）( consultation的名词复数 )；商讨会；协商会；查找 | |
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62
fiery
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| adj.燃烧着的，火红的；暴躁的；激烈的 | |
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63
scorching
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| adj. 灼热的 | |
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64
innocence
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| n.无罪；天真；无害 | |
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65
squat
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| v.蹲坐，蹲下；n.蹲下；adj.矮胖的，粗矮的 | |
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66
complacently
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| adv. 满足地, 自满地, 沾沾自喜地 | |
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67
tassels
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| n.穗( tassel的名词复数 )；流苏状物；（植物的）穗；玉蜀黍的穗状雄花v.抽穗， （玉米）长穗须( tassel的第三人称单数 )；使抽穗， （为了使作物茁壮生长）摘去穗状雄花；用流苏装饰 | |
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68
embroidered
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| adj．绣花的 | |
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69
lithographs
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| n.平版印刷品( lithograph的名词复数 ) | |
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70
surmounted
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| 战胜( surmount的过去式和过去分词 )； 克服（困难）； 居于…之上； 在…顶上 | |
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71
gilt
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| adj.镀金的；n.金边证券 | |
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72
clump
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| n.树丛，草丛；vi.用沉重的脚步行走 | |
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73
crooks
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| n.骗子( crook的名词复数 )；罪犯；弯曲部分；（牧羊人或主教用的）弯拐杖v.弯成钩形( crook的第三人称单数 ) | |
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74
frivolous
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| adj.轻薄的；轻率的 | |
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75
entrusted
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| v.委托，托付( entrust的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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76
clement
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| adj.仁慈的；温和的 | |
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77
disapproved
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| v.不赞成( disapprove的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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78
eldest
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| adj.最年长的，最年老的 | |
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79
defunct
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| adj.死亡的；已倒闭的 | |
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80
banishing
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| v.放逐，驱逐( banish的现在分词 ) | |
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81
sumptuous
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| adj.豪华的，奢侈的，华丽的 | |
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82
prudish
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| adj.装淑女样子的，装规矩的，过分规矩的；adv.过分拘谨地 | |
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83
abrupt
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| adj.突然的，意外的；唐突的，鲁莽的 | |
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84
privately
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| adv.以私人的身份，悄悄地，私下地 | |
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85
redeemed
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| adj. 可赎回的，可救赎的 动词redeem的过去式和过去分词形式 | |
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86
smoothly
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| adv.平滑地，顺利地，流利地，流畅地 | |
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87
eligible
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| adj.有条件被选中的；(尤指婚姻等)合适(意)的 | |
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88
exquisitely
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| adv.精致地；强烈地；剧烈地；异常地 | |
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89
transparent
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| adj.明显的，无疑的；透明的 | |
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90
zeal
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| n.热心，热情，热忱 | |
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91
indigent
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| adj.贫穷的，贫困的 | |
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92
degradation
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| n.降级；低落；退化；陵削；降解；衰变 | |
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93
misery
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| n.痛苦，苦恼，苦难；悲惨的境遇，贫苦 | |
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94
unnatural
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| adj.不自然的；反常的 | |
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95
paupers
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| n.穷人( pauper的名词复数 )；贫民；贫穷 | |
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96
destitute
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| adj.缺乏的；穷困的 | |
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97
practitioner
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| n.实践者，从事者；(医生或律师等)开业者 | |
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98
versed
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| adj. 精通，熟练 | |
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99
beset
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| v.镶嵌；困扰，包围 | |
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100
inquisitive
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| adj.求知欲强的，好奇的，好寻根究底的 | |
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101
toddle
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| v.（如小孩）蹒跚学步 | |
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102
maternal
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| adj.母亲的，母亲般的，母系的，母方的 | |
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103
outlet
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| n.出口/路；销路；批发商店；通风口；发泄 | |
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104
graceful
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| adj.优美的，优雅的；得体的 | |
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105
doorway
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| n.门口，(喻)入门；门路，途径 | |
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106
crimson
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| n./adj.深(绯)红色(的)；vi.脸变绯红色 | |
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107
beaver
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| n.海狸，河狸 | |
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108
majesty
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| n.雄伟，壮丽，庄严，威严；最高权威，王权 | |
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109
perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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110
slippers
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| n. 拖鞋 | |
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111
specks
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| n.眼镜；斑点，微粒，污点( speck的名词复数 ) | |
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112
snarling
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| v.（指狗）吠，嗥叫， （人）咆哮( snarl的现在分词 )；咆哮着说，厉声地说 | |
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113
abruptly
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| adv.突然地，出其不意地 | |
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114
illuminated
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| adj.被照明的；受启迪的 | |
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115
extremities
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| n.端点( extremity的名词复数 )；尽头；手和足；极窘迫的境地 | |
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116
bridled
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| 给…套龙头( bridle的过去式和过去分词 )； 控制； 昂首表示轻蔑（或怨忿等）； 动怒，生气 | |
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117
unbearably
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| adv.不能忍受地，无法容忍地；慌 | |
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118
tartly
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| adv.辛辣地，刻薄地 | |
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119
helping
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| n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的 | |
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120
sob
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| n.空间轨道的轰炸机；呜咽，哭泣 | |
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121
smothered
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| （使）窒息， （使）透不过气( smother的过去式和过去分词 )； 覆盖； 忍住； 抑制 | |
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122
prostrate
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| v.拜倒，平卧，衰竭；adj.拜倒的，平卧的，衰竭的 | |
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123
perplexed
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| adj.不知所措的 | |
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124
justified
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| a.正当的，有理的 | |
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125
contagion
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| n.(通过接触的疾病)传染；蔓延 | |
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126
catching
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| adj.易传染的，有魅力的，迷人的，接住 | |
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127
unreasonable
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| adj.不讲道理的，不合情理的，过度的 | |
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128
instinctively
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| adv.本能地 | |
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129
temporized
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| v.敷衍( temporize的过去式和过去分词 )；拖延；顺应时势；暂时同意 | |
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130
prone
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| adj.(to)易于…的，很可能…的；俯卧的 | |
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131
anguish
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| n.(尤指心灵上的)极度痛苦，烦恼 | |
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132
undone
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| a.未做完的，未完成的 | |
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133
crumpled
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| adj. 弯扭的, 变皱的 动词crumple的过去式和过去分词形式 | |
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134
disorder
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| n.紊乱，混乱；骚动，骚乱；疾病，失调 | |
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135
glimmered
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| v.发闪光，发微光( glimmer的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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136
gasped
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| v.喘气( gasp的过去式和过去分词 )；喘息；倒抽气；很想要 | |
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137
shudder
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| v.战粟，震动，剧烈地摇晃；n.战粟，抖动 | |
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138
repugnance
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| n.嫌恶 | |
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