The spring had laid upon this great rolling common a beauty of its own. Everywhere, on thorns and furze and briars, the touch of the new life had hung emeralds to bedeck and hide the dun waste of winter. The ashen-gray carpets of old mosses3 were veined with the vivid green of young growths; out from the dry brown litter of lifeless ferns and bracken were rising the malachite croziers of fresh fronds4. The brilliant yellow of broom and gorse blooms caught the eye in all directions, blazing above the vernal outburst of another year’s vegetation, and the hum of the bees in the sunlight, and the delicately mingled5 odors in the May air were a delight to the senses. But under this exuberance6 of re-awakened nature, welcome though it might be, somehow the landmarks7 of last autumn seemed to have disappeared.
The path which had led along the wall, for example, was now nowhere discernible. Or had there really been a path at any time?
It was clear enough, at all events, that his course for some distance lay beside this massive line of ancient masonry8, even if no track was marked for him. At some farther point it would be necessary to turn off at a right angle toward the Mere9 Copse—and here he could recall distinctly that there had been a path. But then he came upon several paths, or vaguely10 defined grassy11 depressions which might be paths, and the divergent ways of these were a trouble to him. At last, he decided12 to strike out more boldly into the heath, independently of paths, and try to get a general view of the landscape. He made his way through creepers and prickly little bushes toward an elevation13 in the distance, realizing more and more in his encumbered14 progress that his quest was like that of one who should search the limitless sea for a small boat. There seemed no boundaries whatever to this vast tract15 of waste land.
As he began at length the ascent16 of the mound17 toward which his course had been directed, he scanned the moor near and far, but no human figure was visible. No signs could he discover of any beaten track across it; of the several patches of woodland beyond, in the distance to the left, he could not even be sure which was the Mere Copse. Below, on the edge of the sky-line at the right, he could see the tops of the towers and chimneys of Caermere. Wheeling round from this point, then, he endeavored to identify that portion of the hill, on the opposite side of the river-chasm, which Kathleen had pointed18 out to him from the terrace. But, viewed from here, there were so many hills! The hopelessness of his errand became more apparent with each glance round. Despondently19, he sauntered up the few remaining yards to the top.
He stood upon the ridge20 of a grass-grown wall of stones and earth, which in a somewhat irregular circle enclosed perhaps a quarter-acre of land. This wall on its best preserved side, where he found himself, was some dozen feet in height. Across the ring it seemed lower, and at three or four points was broken down altogether. He realized that he was surveying a very ancient structure—no doubt, prehistoric21. Would it have been a fortress22 or a temple, or the primitive23 mausoleum of some chieftain-ruler in these wilds? One of the openings seemed to suggest by its symmetry an entrance to the enclosure. It was all very curious, and he promised himself that very soon he would examine it in detail. Some vague promptings of a nascent24 archaeological spirit impelled25 him now, upon second thoughts, to walk round on the crest26 of the wall to the other side.
Suddenly he stopped, stared sharply downward with arrested breath, and then, while his face wreathed itself with amused smiles, tip-toed along a few paces farther. Halting here, his eyes dancing with suppressed gaiety, he regarded at his leisure the object of his expedition.
Upon the sunny outer side of the sloping embankment, only a few feet below, was seated Frances Bailey. Her face was turned from him, and she was apparently27 engrossed28 in the study of a linen-backed sectional map spread on her knees. A small red book lay in the grass at her side, and he was so close that he could decipher the legend “Shropshire and Cheshire” on its cover.
After a minute’s rapturous reflection he turned and noiselessly retraced29 his steps, till he could descend30 from the wall without being seen. There was a kind of miniature dry moat surrounding it at this point, and this he lightly vaulted31. Then, straightening himself, he strolled forward with as fine an assumption of unsuspecting innocence32 as he could contrive33. It occurred to him to whistle some negligent34 tune35 very softly as he came, but, oddly enough, his lips seemed recalcitrant—they made no sound.
At the obtrusion36 of his shadow upon the map she was examining she looked swiftly up. For a moment, with the afternoon sun in her eyes, she seemed not to recognize him. There followed another pause, infinitesimal in duration, yet crowded with significance, in which she appeared clearly at a loss what to say or do, now that she realized the fact of his presence. Then she smiled at him with a kind of superficial brightness and tossed the map aside.
“I am fortunate indeed to find you,” he said, as he came up, and they shook hands formally. A few moments before, when he had looked down upon her from the mound, he had been buoyantly conscious of his control of the situation; but now that he stood before her it was she who looked down upon him from her vantage-ground on the side of the bank, and somehow this seemed to make a great deal of difference. The sound of his voice in his own ears was unexpectedly solemn and constrained37. He felt his deportment to be unpleasantly awkward.
She ignored the implication that he had been looking for her. “I suppose this must be the place that is marked ‘tumulus’ on the map here,” she observed, with what seemed to be a deliberately38 casual tone. “But I should think it is more like a rath, such as one reads about in Ireland—a fortified39 place to defend one’s herds40 and people in. As I understand it, a tumulus was for purposes of burial, and this seems to be a fort rather than a tomb. What is your idea about it?” She rose to her feet as she put the question, and turned to regard the earthworks above and about her with a concentrated interest.
He tried to laugh. “I’m afraid I’m more ignorant about them than anybody else,” he confessed. “I have never been here before. I suppose all one can really say is that the people who did these things knew what they were for, but that since they had no alphabet they could not leave a record to explain them to us, and so we are free to make each his own theory to suit himself.”
“That is a very indolent view to take,” she told him over her shoulder. “Scientists and archaeologists are not contented41 with that sort of reply. They examine and compare and draw deductions42, and get at the meaning of these ancient remains43. They do not sit down and fold their hands and say, ‘Unfortunately those people had no alphabet.’ Why don’t you dig this thing up and find out about it?”
He smiled to himself doubtfully, “I have only been in possession of it for about three hours,” he reminded her. Then an inspiration came to, him. “Would you like to dig it up?” he asked, with an effect of eagerness shining through the banter44 of his tone. “I mean, to superintend the excavations45. You shall have forty men out here with picks and shovels46 to-morrow if you say the word.” Instead of answering, she stooped to get her book and map, and then moved with a preoccupied47 air to the top of the bank. After an instant’s hesitation48 he scrambled49 up to join her.
“I suppose that would have been the entrance there,” she observed, pointing across the circle. “And in the center, you see, where the grass is so thin, there are evidently big stones there. That does suggest interment after all, doesn’t it? Yet the Silurians are said to have buried only in dolmens. It is very curious.”
“I do not find that I care much about Silurians this afternoon,” he ventured to say. There was a gentle hint of reproach in his voice.
“Why, you’re one yourself! That is the principal point about the Torrs; that is what makes them interesting.”
“But what good does it do me to be a Silurian and interesting,” he protested with a whimsical gesture, “if I—if I do not get what I want most of all in the world?”
“It seems to me that you have got more things already than most people on this planet.” She went on reflectively: “I had no idea at all what it meant till I saw these hills and the valleys below them, and the forests and the villages and the castle, and the people coming out from heaven knows what holes in the rocks—all with your collar round their necks. I should think it would either send you mad with the sense of power or frighten you to death.”
“I am really very humble51 about it, I think,” he assured her simply. “And there is not so much power as you seem to imagine. It is all a great organized machine, like some big business. The differences are that it works very clumsily and badly as it is at present managed, and that it hardly pays any dividend52 at all. The average large wholesale53 grocer’s or wine merchant’s estate would pay a bigger succession duty than my grandfather’s. He died actually a poor man.” The intelligence did not visibly impress her. “But it was not because he helped others,” she remarked. “Those about him grew poorer also. It is a hateful system!”
“There is something you do not know,” he began with gravity. “I said that my grandfather died a poor man. But since his death a tremendous thing has happened. A great gift has been made to me. The enormous debts which encumbered his estates have been wiped out of existence. It is Lord Julius and Emanuel who have done this—done it for me! I do not know the figures yet—to-morrow Mr. Soman is to explain them to me—but the fact is I am a very rich man indeed. I do not owe anybody a penny. Whatever seems to be mine, is mine. There are between seventy-five and eighty thousand acres. By comparison with other estates, it seems to me that there will be a yearly income of more than fifty thousand pounds!”
She drew a long breath and looked him in the face. “I am very sorry for you,” she said soberly.
“Ah, no; I resist you there,” he exclaimed. “I quote your own words to you: ‘It is an indolent view to take.’ There is a prodigious54 responsibility! Yes! But all the more reason why I should be brave. Would you have me lose my nerve, and say the task is too great for me? I thought you did not like people who solved difficulties by turning tail and running away. Well, to confess oneself afraid—that is the same thing.”
She smiled thoughtfully, perhaps at the quaint55 recurrence56 to foreign gestures and an uncertain, hurried use of book-English which her company seemed always to provoke in him. “I meant only that it was a terrible burden you had had fastened upon your shoulders,” she made answer softly. “I did not suggest that you were afraid of it. And yet I should think you would be!”
“I think,” he responded, with a kind of diffident conviction, “I think that if a man is honest and ambitious for good things, and has some brains, he can grow to be equal to any task that will be laid upon him. And if he labors57 at it with sincerity58 and does absolutely the best that there is in him to do, then I do not think that his work will be wasted. A man is only a man after all. He did not make this world, and he cannot do with it what he likes. It is a bigger thing, when you come to think of it, than he is. At the end there is only a little hole in it for him to be buried in and forgotten, as these people who raised this wall that we stand on are forgotten. They thought in their day that the whole world depended upon them; when there was thunder and lightning, they said it was on their account, because their gods in the sky were angry with them. But to us it is evident that they were not so important as they supposed they were. We look at the work of their hands here, and we regard it with curiosity, as we might an ant’s nest. We do not know whether they made it as a tomb for their chief or as a shelter for their cows. And if they had left records to explain that, and it does not matter how much else, it would be the same. We learn only one thing from all the numberless millions who have gone before us—that man is less important than he thinks he is. I have a high position thrust upon me. Eh bien! I am not going to command the sun to stand still. I am not going to believe that I ought to revolutionize human society before I die. There will be many men after me. If one or two of them says of me that I worked hard to do well, and that I left things a trifle better than I found them, then what more can I desire?”
She nodded in musing59 abstraction, but answered nothing. Her gaze was fastened resolutely60 upon the opposite bank.
“I am truly so fortunate not to have missed you!” he repeated after a small interval61 of silence.
“Why should you say that?” she asked almost with petulance62. “You make too much of me! I do not belong in this gallery at all. I am very angry with myself for being here. I ought not to have allowed Mrs. Emanuel to persuade me against my own judgment63. It did not enter into my head that I should be seen by anybody. I was on my vacation—I take it early, because some of the girls like to get away at Whitsuntide—and at Bath I saw in a paper some reference to the state with which your grandfather would be buried, and the whim50 seized me to see the funeral. I came on my bicycle most of the way, till the hills got too bad. I thought no one would be the wiser for my coming and going. And one thing—you must not ask me to come into the castle again. I am going to the inn to get my machine, and go down to Craven Arms or Clun for the night. I have looked both roads out on my map. Is Clun interesting, do you know?”
“I have not the remotest idea. In fact, there is only one idea of any sort in my mind just now. It is that you are not to be allowed to go away. Have you seen the dungeons64 in which we fasten up people whose presence is particularly desired, and who will not listen to reason?”
The jesting tone of his words was belied65 by the glance in his eyes. She frowned a little. “No, there is no reason in it at all. What have I to do with these people? They are not my kind. It is the merest accident that you and I happen to be acquainted. If you did not know me now, nothing is more certain than that we should never meet in the world. And our seeming to each other like friends on those other occasions—that had nothing to do with the present. The circumstances are entirely66 different. There is nothing in common between us now, or hardly anything at all. You ought to understand that. And I look to you to realize how matters are altered, and not to insist upon placing me in a very undignified and unpleasant position.” She had spoken with increasing rapidity of utterance68, and with rising agitation69. “Not that your insisting would make any difference!” she added now, almost defiantly70.
He looked at her in silence. The face half turned from him, with its broad brow, its shapely and competent profile, the commanding light in its gray eyes, the firm lips drawn71 into tightened72 curves of proud resistance to any weakness of quivering—it was the face that had made so profound an impression upon him at the outset of that wonderful journey from Rouen. The memory became on the instant inexpressibly touching73 to him. She was almost as she had been then—it might well be the same sober gray frock, the same hat, save that the ribbon now was black instead of fawn74. She would have no varied75 wardrobe, this girl who earned her own bread, and gave her mind to the large realities of life. But this very simplicity76 of setting, how notably77 it emphasized the precious quality of what it framed! He recalled that in his first rapt study of this face it had seemed to him like the face of the young Piedmontese bishop78 who had once come to his school—pure, wise, sweet, tender, strong. And now, beholding79 it afresh, it was beyond all these things the face which woke music in his heart—the face of the woman he loved.
With gentle slowness he answered her: “The position I seek to place you in does not seem to me undignified. I should like to hope that you would not find it unpleasant. You know what I mean—I offered it to you in advance, before it was yet mine to give. I beg you again to accept it, now when it is mine to give. If you will turn, you can see Caermere from where you stand. It has had in all its days no mistress like you. Will you take it from my hands?”
She confronted him with a clear, steady gaze of disapproval80. “All this is very stupid!” she said, peremptorily81. “Last week—it had its pretty and graceful82 side then perhaps, but it is not nice at all now. It does not flatter me; it does not please me in any way to-day. I told you then, I had my own independence, my own personal pride and dignity, which are dearer to me than anything else. If I had them then, I have them very much more now. What kind of idea of me is this that you have—that I am to change my mind because now you can talk of fifty thousand a year? I like you less than I did when you had nothing at all! For then we seemed to understand each other better. You would not have rattled83 your money-box at me then! You had finer sensibilities—I liked you more!”
He returned her gaze with a perplexed84 smile. “But I am asking you to be my wife,” he pointed out.
She sniffed85 with a suggestion of contempt at the word. “Wife!” she told him stormily. “You do not seem to know what the word ‘wife’ means! You are not thinking of a ‘wife’ at all. It is a woman to play Duchess to your Duke that you have in mind, and you feel merely that she ought to be presentable and intelligent, and personally not distasteful to you; we’ll even say that you prefer a woman towards whom you have felt a sort of comrade’s impulse. But that has nothing to do with a ‘wife.’ And even on your own ground how foolish you are! In heaven’s name, why hit on me of all women? There are ten thousand who would do it all vastly better, and who, moreover, would leap at the chance. You have only to look about you. England is full of beauties in training for just such a place. They know the ways of your set—the small talk, the little jokes, the amusements and social duties and distinctions, and all that. Go and find what you want among them. What have I to do with such people? They’re not in my class at all.”
Christian sighed, and then sought her glance again with a timid, whimsical smile. “Ah, how you badger86 me always!” he said. “But I have still something more to say.”
“Let me beg that it be left unsaid!” She folded up the map, and began moving along the ridge as she spoke67. “It is all as distressful87 to me as can be. You cannot understand—or will not understand—and it puts me in an utterly88 hateful position. I do not like to be saying unpleasant things to you. I had only the nicest feelings towards you when we last parted; and this noon, when I saw you in the church, you made a picture in my mind that I had quite—quite a tenderness for. But now you force me into disagreeable feelings and words, which I don’t like any more than you do. I seem to be never myself when I am with you. I have actually never seen you but three times, and you disturb me more—you make me hate myself more—than everything else in the world.”
The exigencies89 of the path along the summit of the mound forced Christian to walk behind her. In the voice which carried these words backward to him the quavering stress of profound emotion was more to him than the words themselves. He put out his hand and laid it lightly upon her arm.
“It is because you feel in your heart of hearts that I love you,” he said in a low, tremulous voice. “Can you not see? It is that that has made all our meetings disturbed, full of misunderstandings as well as pleasure. You wrong me, dear—or no, you could not do that, but it is that you do not comprehend. I have loved you from that first day. Oh, I have loved you always, since I can remember—long years before I saw you. There is not any memory in my life, it seems, but of you—for all the sweet things were a foretaste of you, and all the bitter are forgotten because of you. And shall there not be an end now to our hurting each other? For where you go I follow you, and I must always be longing90 for you—and I do not believe that in your heart you hold yourself away from me, but only in your mind.”
She had drawn her sleeve from his touch, and irresolutely91 quickened her steps. She perforce paused now at a broken gap in the bank, and with books and gathered skirts in one hand, lifted the other in instinctively92 balancing preparation for a descent. He took this hand, and she made no demur93 to his leading her down the steep slope to the level outer ground. He retained the hand reverently94, gently in his own as they walked in silence across the heath. It seemed ever as if she would take it from him, and that he consciously exerted a magic through his touch which just sufficed to hold it.
With a bowed head, and cheek at once flushed and white, she began to speak. “You are very young,” she said, lingering over the words with almost dejection in her tone. “You know so little of what life is like! You have such a place in the affairs of men to fill, and you come to it with such innocent boyish good faith—and men are so little like what you think they are. And as you learn the lesson—the hardening, disillusionizing lesson of the world—and the soft, youthful places in your nature toughen, and you are a man holding your own with other men, and lording it over them where you can, then you will hate the things which hamper95 you, and you will curse encumbrances96 that you took on you in your ignorance. And you are all wrong about me! It is because you do not know other women that you think well of me. I am a very ordinary girl, indeed. There are thousands like me, and better than me, with more courage and finer characters, and you do not know them, that is all. And there are the young women of your own little world, who are born and reared to be the wives of men in your place, and you will see them——”
“I have seen them,” he interposed softly. “But it is not fair!” she hurried on breathlessly. “It is the duty of a friend to hold a man back when he is bent97 on a folly98. And we pledged ourselves to be true friends, and I implore99 you—or no, I insist! I will not have it. It is too cruelly unfair to you—and—I am going now—no, not that way; in the other direction. We will say good-bye.”
He would not relinquish100 the hand she strove to drag away. All the calmness of confident mastery was in his hold upon this hand, and in the gravely sweet cadence101 of his voice. “I love you,” he said. “I shall love no one in my life, or in another life, but you. I will not live without you. I will not willingly spend a day in all my years away from you. You are truly my other half—the companion, the friend, the love, the wife, without whom nothing exists for me. I am not young as you say I am, and I shall never be old—for in this love there is no youth or age for either of us. Try to look backward now! Can you see a time when we did not love each other? And forward! Is it thinkable that we can be parted?” Slowly she lifted her head.
“Look at me!” she bade him in a voice he seemed never to have heard before.
THE END
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收听单词发音
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1
Christian
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| adj.基督教徒的；n.基督教徒 | |
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moor
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| n.荒野，沼泽；vt.(使)停泊；vi.停泊 | |
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mosses
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| n. 藓类, 苔藓植物 名词moss的复数形式 | |
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fronds
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| n.蕨类或棕榈类植物的叶子( frond的名词复数 ) | |
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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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exuberance
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| n.丰富；繁荣 | |
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landmarks
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| n.陆标( landmark的名词复数 )；目标；（标志重要阶段的）里程碑 ~ (in sth)；有历史意义的建筑物（或遗址） | |
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masonry
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| n.砖土建筑；砖石 | |
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mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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vaguely
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| adv.含糊地，暖昧地 | |
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grassy
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| adj.盖满草的；长满草的 | |
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decided
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| adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的 | |
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elevation
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| n.高度；海拔；高地；上升；提高 | |
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encumbered
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| v.妨碍，阻碍，拖累( encumber的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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tract
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| n.传单，小册子，大片(土地或森林) | |
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ascent
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| n.(声望或地位)提高；上升，升高；登高 | |
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mound
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| n.土墩，堤，小山；v.筑堤，用土堆防卫 | |
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pointed
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| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
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despondently
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| adv.沮丧地，意志消沉地 | |
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ridge
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| n.山脊；鼻梁；分水岭 | |
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prehistoric
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| adj.（有记载的）历史以前的，史前的，古老的 | |
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fortress
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| n.堡垒，防御工事 | |
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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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nascent
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| adj.初生的，发生中的 | |
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impelled
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| v.推动、推进或敦促某人做某事( impel的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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crest
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| n.顶点；饰章；羽冠；vt.达到顶点；vi.形成浪尖 | |
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apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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engrossed
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| adj.全神贯注的 | |
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retraced
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| v.折回( retrace的过去式和过去分词 )；回忆；回顾；追溯 | |
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descend
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| vt./vi.传下来，下来，下降 | |
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vaulted
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| adj.拱状的 | |
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innocence
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| n.无罪；天真；无害 | |
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contrive
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| vt.谋划，策划；设法做到；设计，想出 | |
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negligent
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| adj.疏忽的；玩忽的；粗心大意的 | |
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tune
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| n.调子；和谐，协调；v.调音，调节，调整 | |
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obtrusion
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| n.强制，莽撞 | |
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constrained
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| adj.束缚的,节制的 | |
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deliberately
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| adv.审慎地；蓄意地；故意地 | |
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fortified
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| adj. 加强的 | |
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herds
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| 兽群( herd的名词复数 )； 牧群； 人群； 群众 | |
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contented
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| adj.满意的，安心的，知足的 | |
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deductions
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| 扣除( deduction的名词复数 )； 结论； 扣除的量； 推演 | |
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remains
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| n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹 | |
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banter
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| n.嘲弄，戏谑；v.取笑，逗弄，开玩笑 | |
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excavations
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| n.挖掘( excavation的名词复数 )；开凿；开凿的洞穴（或山路等）；（发掘出来的）古迹 | |
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shovels
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| n.铲子( shovel的名词复数 )；锹；推土机、挖土机等的)铲；铲形部份v.铲子( shovel的第三人称单数 )；锹；推土机、挖土机等的)铲；铲形部份 | |
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preoccupied
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| adj.全神贯注的，入神的；被抢先占有的；心事重重的v.占据（某人）思想，使对…全神贯注，使专心于( preoccupy的过去式) | |
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hesitation
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| n.犹豫，踌躇 | |
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scrambled
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| v.快速爬行( scramble的过去式和过去分词 )；攀登；争夺；（军事飞机）紧急起飞 | |
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whim
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| n.一时的兴致，突然的念头；奇想，幻想 | |
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humble
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| adj.谦卑的，恭顺的；地位低下的；v.降低，贬低 | |
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dividend
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| n.红利，股息；回报，效益 | |
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wholesale
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| n.批发；adv.以批发方式；vt.批发，成批出售 | |
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prodigious
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| adj.惊人的，奇妙的；异常的；巨大的；庞大的 | |
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quaint
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| adj.古雅的，离奇有趣的，奇怪的 | |
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recurrence
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| n.复发，反复，重现 | |
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labors
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| v.努力争取(for)( labor的第三人称单数 )；苦干；详细分析；（指引擎）缓慢而困难地运转 | |
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sincerity
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| n.真诚，诚意；真实 | |
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musing
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| n. 沉思，冥想 adj. 沉思的, 冥想的 动词muse的现在分词形式 | |
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resolutely
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| adj.坚决地，果断地 | |
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interval
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| n.间隔，间距；幕间休息，中场休息 | |
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petulance
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| n.发脾气，生气，易怒，暴躁，性急 | |
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judgment
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| n.审判；判断力，识别力，看法，意见 | |
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dungeons
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| n.地牢( dungeon的名词复数 ) | |
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belied
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| v.掩饰( belie的过去式和过去分词 )；证明（或显示）…为虚假；辜负；就…扯谎 | |
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entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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spoke
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| 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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utterance
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| n.用言语表达，话语，言语 | |
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agitation
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| n.搅动；搅拌；鼓动，煽动 | |
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defiantly
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| adv.挑战地，大胆对抗地 | |
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drawn
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| v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的 | |
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tightened
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| 收紧( tighten的过去式和过去分词 )； （使）变紧； （使）绷紧； 加紧 | |
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touching
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| adj.动人的，使人感伤的 | |
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fawn
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| n.未满周岁的小鹿；v.巴结，奉承 | |
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varied
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| adj.多样的，多变化的 | |
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simplicity
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| n.简单，简易；朴素；直率，单纯 | |
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notably
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| adv.值得注意地，显著地，尤其地，特别地 | |
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bishop
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| n.主教，（国际象棋）象 | |
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beholding
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| v.看，注视( behold的现在分词 )；瞧；看呀；（叙述中用于引出某人意外的出现）哎哟 | |
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disapproval
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| n.反对，不赞成 | |
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peremptorily
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| adv.紧急地，不容分说地，专横地 | |
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graceful
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| adj.优美的，优雅的；得体的 | |
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rattled
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| 慌乱的，恼火的 | |
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perplexed
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| adj.不知所措的 | |
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85
sniffed
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| v.以鼻吸气，嗅，闻( sniff的过去式和过去分词 )；抽鼻子（尤指哭泣、患感冒等时出声地用鼻子吸气）；抱怨，不以为然地说 | |
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badger
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| v.一再烦扰，一再要求，纠缠 | |
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distressful
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| adj.苦难重重的，不幸的，使苦恼的 | |
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utterly
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| adv.完全地，绝对地 | |
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89
exigencies
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| n.急切需要 | |
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longing
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| n.（for）渴望 | |
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irresolutely
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| adv.优柔寡断地 | |
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instinctively
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| adv.本能地 | |
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93
demur
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| v．表示异议，反对 | |
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reverently
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| adv.虔诚地 | |
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hamper
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| vt.妨碍，束缚，限制；n.(有盖的)大篮子 | |
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encumbrances
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| n.负担( encumbrance的名词复数 )；累赘；妨碍；阻碍 | |
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bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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98
folly
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| n.愚笨，愚蠢，蠢事，蠢行，傻话 | |
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99
implore
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| vt.乞求，恳求，哀求 | |
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100
relinquish
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| v.放弃，撤回，让与，放手 | |
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101
cadence
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| n.（说话声调的）抑扬顿挫 | |
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