DEDICATION TO HARRY HOOTON

When I sat down at the “Dolau Cothi Arms” this evening I remembered my dedication¹ to you. You said I could dedicate this book to you if I would make a real dedication, not one of my shadowy salutes³ befitting shadows rather than men and women. It seems odd you should ask thus for a sovereign’s worth of—shall I say—English prose from a writer by trade. But though I turn out a large, if insufficient⁴, number of sovereigns’ worths, and am become a writing animal, and could write something or other about a broomstick, I do not write with ease: so let that difficulty give the dedication its value.

It is right that I should remember you upon a walk, for I have walked more miles with you than with anyone else except myself. While I walked you very often danced, on the roads of Kent, Sussex, Surrey, and Hampshire. This evening when I went out on the Sarn Helen everybody was in chapel⁵, I think, unless it was the Lord, for he also seemed to me to be walking in the cool. I was very much alone, and glad to be. You were a ghost, and not a man of fourteen stone, and I[vi] thought that perhaps after all that shadowy salute² would be fittest. But I have put my pen to paper: I have set out and I will come to an end; for, as I said, I am a writing animal. In the days of those old walks I could have written a dedication in Norfolk jacket style, all about “the open road,” and the search for something “over the hills and far away”: I should have reminded you at some length how Borrow stayed at this inn, and that Dolau Cothi is the house where he could have lived with satisfaction “if backed by a couple of thousands a year.” To-day I know there is nothing beyond the farthest of far ridges⁶ except a signpost to unknown places. The end is in the means—in the sight of that beautiful long straight line of the Downs in which a curve is latent—in the houses we shall never enter, with their dark secret windows and quiet hearth⁷ smoke, or their ruins friendly only to elders and nettles—in the people passing whom we shall never know though we may love them. To-day I know that I walk because it is necessary to do so in order both to live and to make a living. Once those walks might have made a book; now they make a smile or a sigh, and I am glad they are in ghostland and not fettered⁸ in useless print. This book for you was to have been a country book, but I see that it has turned out to be another of those books made out of books founded on other books. Being but half mine it can only be half yours, and I owe you an apology as well as a dedication. It is, however, in some ways a fitting book for me to write. For it is about a road which begins[vii] many miles before I could come on its traces and ends miles beyond where I had to stop. I could find no excuse for supposing it to go to Wales and following it there into the Ceidrych Valley, along the Towy to Caermarthen, and so to St. David’s which is now as holy as Rome, though once only a third as holy. Apparently⁹ no special medi?val use revived it throughout its course, or gave it a new entity¹⁰ like that of the Pilgrims’ Way from Winchester to Canterbury that you and I walked on many a time—by the “Cock” at Detling, the “Black Horse” at Thurnham, the “King’s Head” (once, I believe, the “Pilgrims’ Rest”) at Hollingbourne, above Harrietsham, past Deodara Villas¹¹, above Lenham and Robert Philpot’s “Woodman’s Arms,” and so on to Eastwell; always among beech¹² and yew¹³ and Canterbury bells, and always over the silver of whitebeam leaves. I could not find a beginning or an end of the Icknield Way. It is thus a symbol of mortal things with their beginnings and ends always in immortal¹⁴ darkness. I wish the book had a little more of the mystery of the road about it. You at least will make allowances—and additions; and God send me many other readers like you. And as this is the bottom of the sheet, and ale is better than ink, though it is no substitute, I label this “Dedication,” and wish you with me inside the “Dolau Cothi Arms” at Pumpsaint, in Caermarthenshire.

EDWARD THOMAS.

1 dedication   

n.奉献，献身，致力，题献，献辞

参考例句：

• We admire her courage,compassion and dedication.我们钦佩她的勇气、爱心和奉献精神。
• Her dedication to her work was admirable.她对工作的奉献精神可钦可佩。

2 salute   

vi.行礼，致意，问候，放礼炮；vt.向…致意，迎接，赞扬；n.招呼，敬礼，礼炮

参考例句：

• Merchant ships salute each other by dipping the flag.商船互相点旗致敬。
• The Japanese women salute the people with formal bows in welcome.这些日本妇女以正式的鞠躬向人们施礼以示欢迎。

3 salutes   

n.致敬，欢迎，敬礼( salute的名词复数 )v.欢迎，致敬( salute的第三人称单数 )；赞扬，赞颂

参考例句：

• Poulengey salutes, and stands at the door awaiting orders. 波仑日行礼，站在门口听侯命令。 来自辞典例句
• A giant of the world salutes you. 一位世界的伟人向你敬礼呢。 来自辞典例句

4 insufficient   

adj.(for，of)不足的，不够的

参考例句：

• There was insufficient evidence to convict him.没有足够证据给他定罪。
• In their day scientific knowledge was insufficient to settle the matter.在他们的时代，科学知识还不能足以解决这些问题。

5 chapel   

n.小教堂，殡仪馆

参考例句：

• The nimble hero,skipped into a chapel that stood near.敏捷的英雄跳进近旁的一座小教堂里。
• She was on the peak that Sunday afternoon when she played in chapel.那个星期天的下午，她在小教堂的演出，可以说是登峰造极。

6 ridges   

n.脊( ridge的名词复数 )；山脊；脊状突起；大气层的)高压脊

参考例句：

• The path winds along mountain ridges. 峰回路转。
• Perhaps that was the deepest truth in Ridges's nature. 在里奇斯的思想上，这大概可以算是天经地义第一条了。

7 hearth   

n.壁炉炉床，壁炉地面

参考例句：

• She came and sat in a chair before the hearth.她走过来，在炉子前面的椅子上坐下。
• She comes to the hearth,and switches on the electric light there.她走到壁炉那里，打开电灯。

8 fettered   

v.给…上脚镣，束缚( fetter的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• We reverence tradition but will not be fettered by it. 我们尊重传统，但不被传统所束缚。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》
• Many people are fettered by lack of self-confidence. 许多人都因缺乏自信心而缩手缩脚。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》

9 apparently   

adv.显然地；表面上，似乎

参考例句：

• An apparently blind alley leads suddenly into an open space.山穷水尽，豁然开朗。
• He was apparently much surprised at the news.他对那个消息显然感到十分惊异。

10 entity   

n.实体，独立存在体，实际存在物

参考例句：

• The country is no longer one political entity.这个国家不再是一个统一的政治实体了。
• As a separate legal entity,the corporation must pay taxes.作为一个独立的法律实体，公司必须纳税。

11 villas   

别墅，公馆( villa的名词复数 )； （城郊）住宅

参考例句：

• Magnificent villas are found throughout Italy. 在意大利到处可看到豪华的别墅。
• Rich men came down from wealthy Rome to build sea-side villas. 有钱人从富有的罗马来到这儿建造海滨别墅。

12 beech   

n.山毛榉；adj.山毛榉的

参考例句：

• Autumn is the time to see the beech woods in all their glory.秋天是观赏山毛榉林的最佳时期。
• Exasperated,he leaped the stream,and strode towards beech clump.他满腔恼怒，跳过小河，大踏步向毛榉林子走去。

13 yew   

n.紫杉属树木

参考例句：

• The leaves of yew trees are poisonous to cattle.紫杉树叶会令牛中毒。
• All parts of the yew tree are poisonous,including the berries.紫杉的各个部分都有毒，包括浆果。

14 immortal   

adj.不朽的；永生的，不死的；神的

参考例句：

• The wild cocoa tree is effectively immortal.野生可可树实际上是不会死的。
• The heroes of the people are immortal!人民英雄永垂不朽！