Once during my clerkship I had an invitation to Crimsworth Hall; it was on the occasion of a large party given in honour of the master’s birthday; he had always been accustomed to invite his clerks on similar anniversaries, and could not well pass me over; I was, however, kept strictly25 in the background. Mrs. Crimsworth, elegantly dressed in satin and lace, blooming in youth and health, vouchsafed26 me no more notice than was expressed by a distant move; Crimsworth, of course, never spoke27 to me; I was introduced to none of the band of young ladies, who, enveloped28 in silvery clouds of white gauze and muslin, sat in array against me on the opposite side of a long and large room; in fact, I was fairly isolated29, and could but contemplate30 the shining ones from affar, and when weary of such a dazzling scene, turn for a change to the consideration of the carpet pattern. Mr. Crimsworth, standing31 on the rug, his elbow supported by the marble mantelpiece, and about him a group of very pretty girls, with whom he conversed32 gaily33 — Mr. Crimsworth, thus placed, glanced at me; I looked weary, solitary34, kept down like some desolate35 tutor or governess; he was satisfied.
Dancing began; I should have liked well enough to be introduced to some pleasing and intelligent girl, and to have freedom and opportunity to show that I could both feel and communicate the pleasure of social intercourse36 — that I was not, in short, a block, or a piece of furniture, but an acting37, thinking, sentient38 man. Many smiling faces and graceful39 figures glided40 past me, but the smiles were lavished41 on other eyes, the figures sustained by other hands than mine. I turned away tantalized42, left the dancers, and wandered into the oak-panelled dining-room. No fibre of sympathy united me to any living thing in this house; I looked for and found my mother’s picture. I took a wax taper43 from a stand, and held it up. I gazed long, earnestly; my heart grew to the image. My mother, I perceived, had bequeathed to me much of her features and countenance44 — her forehead, her eyes, her complexion45. No regular beauty pleases egotistical human beings so much as a softened46 and refined likeness47 of themselves; for this reason, fathers regard with complacency the lineaments of their daughters’ faces, where frequently their own similitude is found flatteringly associated with softness of hue48 and delicacy49 of outline. I was just wondering how that picture, to me so interesting, would strike an impartial50 spectator, when a voice close behind me pronounced the words —
“Humph! there’s some sense in that face.”
I turned; at my elbow stood a tall man, young, though probably five or six years older than I— in other respects of an appearance the opposite to common place; though just now, as I am not disposed to paint his portrait in detail, the reader must be content with the silhouette51 I have just thrown off; it was all I myself saw of him for the moment: I did not investigate the colour of his eyebrows52, nor of his eyes either; I saw his stature53, and the outline of his shape; I saw, too, his fastidious-looking retrousse nose; these observations, few in number, and general in character (the last excepted), sufficed, for they enabled me to recognize him.
“Good evening, Mr. Hunsden,” muttered I with a bow, and then, like a shy noodle as I was, I began moving away — and why? Simply because Mr. Hunsden was a manufacturer and a millowner, and I was only a clerk, and my instinct propelled me from my superior. I had frequently seen Hunsden in Bigben Close, where he came almost weekly to transact55 business with Mr. Crimsworth, but I had never spoken to him, nor he to me, and I owed him a sort of involuntary grudge56, because he had more than once been the tacit witness of insults offered by Edward to me. I had the conviction that he could only regard me as a poor-spirited slave, wherefore I now went about to shun57 his presence and eschew58 his conversation.
“Where are you going?” asked he, as I edged off sideways. I had already noticed that Mr. Hunsden indulged in abrupt59 forms of speech, and I perversely60 said to myself —
“He thinks he may speak as he likes to a poor clerk; but my mood is not, perhaps, so supple61 as he deems it, and his rough freedom pleases me not at all.”
I made some slight reply, rather indifferent than courteous62, and continued to move away. He coolly planted himself in my path.
“Stay here awhile,” said he: “it is so hot in the dancing-room; besides, you don’t dance; you have not had a partner to-night.”
He was right, and as he spoke neither his look, tone, nor manner displeased63 me; my amour-propre was propitiated64; he had not addressed me out of condescension65, but because, having repaired to the cool dining-room for refreshment66, he now wanted some one to talk to, by way of temporary amusement. I hate to be condescended67 to, but I like well enough to oblige; I stayed.
“That is a good picture,” he continued, recurring68 to the portrait.
“Do you consider the face pretty?” I asked.
“Pretty! no — how can it be pretty, with sunk eyes and hollow cheeks? but it is peculiar69; it seems to think. You could have a talk with that woman, if she were alive, on other subjects than dress, visiting, and compliments.”
I agreed with him, but did not say so. He went on.
“Not that I admire a head of that sort; it wants character and force; there’s too much of the sen-si-tive (so he articulated it, curling his lip at the same time) in that mouth; besides, there is Aristocrat70 written on the brow and defined in the figure; I hate your aristocrats71.”
“You think, then, Mr. Hunsden, that patrician72 descent may be read in a distinctive73 cast of form and features?”
“Patrician descent be hanged! Who doubts that your lordlings may have their ‘distinctive cast of form and features’ as much as we —— shire tradesmen have ours? But which is the best? Not theirs assuredly. As to their women, it is a little different: they cultivate beauty from childhood upwards74, and may by care and training attain75 to a certain degree of excellence76 in that point, just like the oriental odalisques. Yet even this superiority is doubtful. Compare the figure in that frame with Mrs. Edward Crimsworth — which is the finer animal?”
I replied quietly: “Compare yourself and Mr. Edward Crimsworth, Mr Hunsden.”
“Oh, Crimsworth is better filled up than I am, I know besides he has a straight nose, arched eyebrows, and all that; but these advantages — if they are advantages — he did not inherit from his mother, the patrician, but from his father, old Crimsworth, who, my father says, was as veritable a —— shire blue-dyer as ever put indigo77 in a vat54 yet withal the handsomest man in the three Ridings. It is you, William, who are the aristocrat of your family, and you are not as fine a fellow as your plebeian78 brother by long chalk.”
There was something in Mr. Hunsden’s point-blank mode of speech which rather pleased me than otherwise because it set me at my ease. I continued the conversation with a degree of interest.
“How do you happen to know that I am Mr. Crimsworth’s brother? I thought you and everybody else looked upon me only in the light of a poor clerk.”
“Well, and so we do; and what are you but a poor clerk? You do Crimsworth’s work, and he gives you wages — shabby wages they are, too.”
I was silent. Hunsden’s language now bordered on the impertinent, still his manner did not offend me in the least — it only piqued79 my curiosity; I wanted him to go on, which he did in a little while.
“This world is an absurd one,” said he.
“Why so, Mr. Hunsden?”
I wonder you should ask: you are yourself a strong proof of the absurdity80 I allude81 to.”
I was determined82 he should explain himself of his own accord, without my pressing him so to do — so I resumed my silence.
“Is it your intention to become a tradesman?” he inquired presently.
“It was my serious intention three months ago.”
“Humph! the more fool you — you look like a tradesman! What a practical business-like face you have!”
“My face is as the Lord made it, Mr. Hunsden.”
“The Lord never made either year face or head for X—— What good can your bumps of ideality, comparison, self-esteem, conscientiousness83, do you here? But if you like Bigben Close, stay there; it’s your own affair, not mine.”
“Perhaps I have no choice.”
“Well, I care nought84 about it — it will make little difference to me what you do or where you go; but I’m cool now — I want to dance again; and I see such a fine girl sitting in the corner of the sofa there by her mamma; see if I don’t get her for a partner in a jiffy! There’s Waddy — Sam Waddy making up to her; won’t I cut him out?”
And Mr. Hunsden strode away. I watched him through the open folding-doors; he outstripped85 Waddy, applied86 for the hand of the fine girl, and led her off triumphant87. She was a tall, well-made, full-formed, dashingly-dressed young woman, much in the style of Mrs. E. Crimsworth; Hunsden whirled her through the waltz with spirit; he kept at her side during the remainder of the evening, and I read in her animated88 and gratified countenance that he succeeded in making himself perfectly89 agreeable. The mamma too (a stout90 person in a turban — Mrs. Lupton by name) looked well pleased; prophetic visions probably flattered her inward eye. The Hunsdens were of an old stem; and scornful as Yorke (such was my late interlocutor’s name) professed91 to be of the advantages of birth, in his secret heart he well knew and fully1 appreciated the distinction his ancient, if not high lineage conferred on him in a mushroom-place like X—— concerning whose inhabitants it was proverbially said, that not one in a thousand knew his own grandfather. Moreover the Hunsdens, once rich, were still independent; and report affirmed that Yorke bade fair, by his success in business, to restore to pristine92 prosperity the partially93 decayed fortunes of his house. These circumstances considered, Mrs. Lupton’s broad face might well wear a smile of complacency as she contemplated94 the heir of Hunsden Wood occupied in paying assiduous court to her darling Sarah Martha. I, however, whose observations being less anxious, were likely to be more accurate, soon saw that the grounds for maternal95 self-congratulation were slight indeed; the gentleman appeared to me much more desirous of making, than susceptible96 of receiving an impression. I know not what it was in Mr. Hunsden that, as I watched him (I had nothing better to do), suggested to me, every now and then, the idea of a foreigner. In form and features he might be pronounced English, though even there one caught a dash of something Gallic; but he had no English shyness: he had learnt somewhere, somehow, the art of setting himself quite at his ease, and of allowing no insular97 timidity to intervene as a barrier between him and his convenience or pleasure. Refinement98 he did not affect, yet vulgar he could not be called; he was not odd — no quiz — yet he resembled no one else I had ever seen before; his general bearing intimated complete, sovereign satisfaction with himself; yet, at times, an indescribable shade passed like an eclipse over his countenance, and seemed to me like the sign of a sudden and strong inward doubt of himself, his words and actions-an energetic discontent at his life or his social position, his future prospects99 or his mental attainments100 — I know not which; perhaps after all it might only be a bilious101 caprice.
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1 fully | |
adv.完全地,全部地,彻底地;充分地 | |
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2 diligently | |
ad.industriously;carefully | |
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3 inquiries | |
n.调查( inquiry的名词复数 );疑问;探究;打听 | |
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4 landlady | |
n.女房东,女地主 | |
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5 lodgings | |
n. 出租的房舍, 寄宿舍 | |
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6 contrived | |
adj.不自然的,做作的;虚构的 | |
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7 savings | |
n.存款,储蓄 | |
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8 abhorrent | |
adj.可恶的,可恨的,讨厌的 | |
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9 pecuniary | |
adj.金钱的;金钱上的 | |
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10 obviate | |
v.除去,排除,避免,预防 | |
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11 exigency | |
n.紧急;迫切需要 | |
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12 miser | |
n.守财奴,吝啬鬼 (adj.miserly) | |
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13 consolation | |
n.安慰,慰问 | |
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14 repulsed | |
v.击退( repulse的过去式和过去分词 );驳斥;拒绝 | |
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15 lodge | |
v.临时住宿,寄宿,寄存,容纳;n.传达室,小旅馆 | |
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16 rascal | |
n.流氓;不诚实的人 | |
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17 piety | |
n.虔诚,虔敬 | |
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18 covert | |
adj.隐藏的;暗地里的 | |
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19 sneers | |
讥笑的表情(言语)( sneer的名词复数 ) | |
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20 blasphemous | |
adj.亵渎神明的,不敬神的 | |
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21 sarcasms | |
n.讥讽,讽刺,挖苦( sarcasm的名词复数 ) | |
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22 indifference | |
n.不感兴趣,不关心,冷淡,不在乎 | |
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23 ammunition | |
n.军火,弹药 | |
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24 shafts | |
n.轴( shaft的名词复数 );(箭、高尔夫球棒等的)杆;通风井;一阵(疼痛、害怕等) | |
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25 strictly | |
adv.严厉地,严格地;严密地 | |
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26 vouchsafed | |
v.给予,赐予( vouchsafe的过去式和过去分词 );允诺 | |
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27 spoke | |
n.(车轮的)辐条;轮辐;破坏某人的计划;阻挠某人的行动 v.讲,谈(speak的过去式);说;演说;从某种观点来说 | |
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28 enveloped | |
v.包围,笼罩,包住( envelop的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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29 isolated | |
adj.与世隔绝的 | |
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30 contemplate | |
vt.盘算,计议;周密考虑;注视,凝视 | |
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31 standing | |
n.持续,地位;adj.永久的,不动的,直立的,不流动的 | |
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32 conversed | |
v.交谈,谈话( converse的过去式 ) | |
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33 gaily | |
adv.欢乐地,高兴地 | |
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34 solitary | |
adj.孤独的,独立的,荒凉的;n.隐士 | |
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35 desolate | |
adj.荒凉的,荒芜的;孤独的,凄凉的;v.使荒芜,使孤寂 | |
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36 intercourse | |
n.性交;交流,交往,交际 | |
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37 acting | |
n.演戏,行为,假装;adj.代理的,临时的,演出用的 | |
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38 sentient | |
adj.有知觉的,知悉的;adv.有感觉能力地 | |
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39 graceful | |
adj.优美的,优雅的;得体的 | |
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40 glided | |
v.滑动( glide的过去式和过去分词 );掠过;(鸟或飞机 ) 滑翔 | |
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41 lavished | |
v.过分给予,滥施( lavish的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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42 tantalized | |
v.逗弄,引诱,折磨( tantalize的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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43 taper | |
n.小蜡烛,尖细,渐弱;adj.尖细的;v.逐渐变小 | |
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44 countenance | |
n.脸色,面容;面部表情;vt.支持,赞同 | |
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45 complexion | |
n.肤色;情况,局面;气质,性格 | |
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46 softened | |
(使)变软( soften的过去式和过去分词 ); 缓解打击; 缓和; 安慰 | |
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47 likeness | |
n.相像,相似(之处) | |
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48 hue | |
n.色度;色调;样子 | |
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49 delicacy | |
n.精致,细微,微妙,精良;美味,佳肴 | |
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50 impartial | |
adj.(in,to)公正的,无偏见的 | |
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51 silhouette | |
n.黑色半身侧面影,影子,轮廓;v.描绘成侧面影,照出影子来,仅仅显出轮廓 | |
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52 eyebrows | |
眉毛( eyebrow的名词复数 ) | |
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53 stature | |
n.(高度)水平,(高度)境界,身高,身材 | |
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54 vat | |
n.(=value added tax)增值税,大桶 | |
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55 transact | |
v.处理;做交易;谈判 | |
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56 grudge | |
n.不满,怨恨,妒嫉;vt.勉强给,不情愿做 | |
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57 shun | |
vt.避开,回避,避免 | |
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58 eschew | |
v.避开,戒绝 | |
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59 abrupt | |
adj.突然的,意外的;唐突的,鲁莽的 | |
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60 perversely | |
adv. 倔强地 | |
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61 supple | |
adj.柔软的,易弯的,逢迎的,顺从的,灵活的;vt.使柔软,使柔顺,使顺从;vi.变柔软,变柔顺 | |
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62 courteous | |
adj.彬彬有礼的,客气的 | |
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63 displeased | |
a.不快的 | |
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64 propitiated | |
v.劝解,抚慰,使息怒( propitiate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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65 condescension | |
n.自以为高人一等,贬低(别人) | |
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66 refreshment | |
n.恢复,精神爽快,提神之事物;(复数)refreshments:点心,茶点 | |
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67 condescended | |
屈尊,俯就( condescend的过去式和过去分词 ); 故意表示和蔼可亲 | |
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68 recurring | |
adj.往复的,再次发生的 | |
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69 peculiar | |
adj.古怪的,异常的;特殊的,特有的 | |
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70 aristocrat | |
n.贵族,有贵族气派的人,上层人物 | |
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71 aristocrats | |
n.贵族( aristocrat的名词复数 ) | |
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72 patrician | |
adj.贵族的,显贵的;n.贵族;有教养的人;罗马帝国的地方官 | |
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73 distinctive | |
adj.特别的,有特色的,与众不同的 | |
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74 upwards | |
adv.向上,在更高处...以上 | |
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75 attain | |
vt.达到,获得,完成 | |
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76 excellence | |
n.优秀,杰出,(pl.)优点,美德 | |
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77 indigo | |
n.靛青,靛蓝 | |
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78 plebeian | |
adj.粗俗的;平民的;n.平民;庶民 | |
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79 piqued | |
v.伤害…的自尊心( pique的过去式和过去分词 );激起(好奇心) | |
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80 absurdity | |
n.荒谬,愚蠢;谬论 | |
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81 allude | |
v.提及,暗指 | |
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82 determined | |
adj.坚定的;有决心的 | |
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83 conscientiousness | |
责任心 | |
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84 nought | |
n./adj.无,零 | |
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85 outstripped | |
v.做得比…更好,(在赛跑等中)超过( outstrip的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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86 applied | |
adj.应用的;v.应用,适用 | |
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87 triumphant | |
adj.胜利的,成功的;狂欢的,喜悦的 | |
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88 animated | |
adj.生气勃勃的,活跃的,愉快的 | |
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89 perfectly | |
adv.完美地,无可非议地,彻底地 | |
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91 professed | |
公开声称的,伪称的,已立誓信教的 | |
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92 pristine | |
adj.原来的,古时的,原始的,纯净的,无垢的 | |
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93 partially | |
adv.部分地,从某些方面讲 | |
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94 contemplated | |
adj. 预期的 动词contemplate的过去分词形式 | |
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95 maternal | |
adj.母亲的,母亲般的,母系的,母方的 | |
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96 susceptible | |
adj.过敏的,敏感的;易动感情的,易受感动的 | |
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97 insular | |
adj.岛屿的,心胸狭窄的 | |
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98 refinement | |
n.文雅;高尚;精美;精制;精炼 | |
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99 prospects | |
n.希望,前途(恒为复数) | |
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100 attainments | |
成就,造诣; 获得( attainment的名词复数 ); 达到; 造诣; 成就 | |
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101 bilious | |
adj.胆汁过多的;易怒的 | |
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