Mr. Jordan had invited a large party of people to meet the Dowager Countess; but the greatness of the leading light, which was to illustrate1 his house, had blinded him to the companion stars that were to twinkle in her company. The principal people about had consented graciously to be reviewed by her ladyship, who, once upon a time, had been a very great lady and fashionable potentate2. A very little fashion counts for much on the shores of the Holy Loch, and the population was moved accordingly. But the young ladies, who accompanied the dowager,{70} were less carefully provided for. When Miss Frankland, who was unquestionably the beauty of the party, cast a glance of careless but acute observation round her, after all the gentlemen had returned to the drawing-room, she saw nobody whom she cared to distinguish by her notice. Most of the men about had a flavour of commerciality in their talk, or their manner, or their whiskers. Most of them were rich, some of them were very well bred and well educated, though the saucy4 beauty could not perceive it; but there was not an individual among them who moved her curiosity or her interest, except one who stood rather in the background, and whose eyes kept seeking her with wistful devotion.
Colin had improved during the last year. He was younger than Miss Frankland, a fact of which she was aware, and he was at the age upon which a year tells mightily5. Looking at him in the background, through clouds of complacent6 people who felt themselves Colin’s superiors, even an indifferent spectator might have distinguished7 the tall youth, with those heaps of brown hair overshadowing the forehead which might have been apostrophized as “domed for thought” if anybody could have seen it; and in his eyes that gleam of things miraculous8, that unconscious surprise and admiration9 which would have given a touch of poetry to the most commonplace countenance10. But Miss Matty was not an indifferent spectator. She was fond of him in her way as women are fond of a man whom they never mean to love—fond of him as one is fond of the victim who consents to glorify11 one’s triumph. As she looked at him, and saw how he had improved, and perceived the faithful allegiance with which he watched every movement she made, the heart of the beauty was touched. Worship is sweet, even when it is only a country boy who bestows13 it—and perhaps this country boy might turn out a genius or a poet. Not that Matilda cared much for genius or poetry, but she liked everything which bestows distinction, and was aware that in the lack of other titles, a little notability, even in society, might be obtained if one was wise, and knew how to manage it, even by such means. And besides all this, honestly and at the foundation, she was fond of Colin. When she had surveyed all the company, and had made up her mind that there was nobody there in the least degree interesting, she held up her fan with a pretty gesture, calling him to her. The lad made his way through the assembly at that call with a smile and glow of exultation14 which it is impossible to describe. His face was lighted up with a kind of celestial15 intoxication16. “Who is that{71} very handsome young man?” the Dowager Countess was moved to remark as he passed within her ladyship’s range of vision, which was limited, for Lady Hallamshire was, like most other people, shortsighted. “Oh, he is not a handsome young man, he is only the tutor,” said one of the ladies of the Holy Loch; but, notwithstanding, she too looked after Colin, with aroused curiosity. “I suppose Matty Frankland must have met him in society,” said the Dowager, who was the most comfortable of chaperones, and went on with her talk, turning her eyeglass towards her pretty charge. As for the young men, they stared at Colin with mingled17 consternation18 and wrath19. What was he? a fellow who had not a penny, a mere20 Scotch21 student, to be distinguished by the prettiest girl in the room? for the aspiring22 people about the Holy Loch, as well as in the other parts of Scotland, had come to entertain that contempt for the national universities and national scholarship which is so curious a feature in the present transition state of the country. If Colin had been an Oxford23 man the west-country people would have thought it quite natural, but a Scotch student did not impress them with any particular respect.
“I am so glad to meet you again!” said Matty, with the warmest cordiality, “but so surprised to see you here. What are you doing here? why have you come away from that delicious Ramore, where I am sure I should live for ever and ever if it were mine? What have you been doing with yourself all this time? Come and tell me all about it; and I do so want to know how everything is looking at that dear castle and in our favourite glen. Don’t you remember that darling glen behind the church, where we used to gather basketfuls of primroses—and all the lovely mosses24? I am dying to hear about everything and everybody. Do come and sit down here, and tell me all.”
“Where shall I begin?” said Colin, who, utterly25 forgetful of his position, and all the humilities incumbent26 on him in such an exalted28 company, had instantly taken possession of the seat she pointed29 out to him, and had placed himself according to her orders directly between her and the company, shutting her into a corner. Miss Matty could see very well all that was going on in the drawing-room, but Colin had his back to the company, and had forgotten everything in the world except her face.
“Oh, with yourself, of course,” said Matty. “I want to know all about it; and, first of all, what are you doing among these sort of people?” the young lady continued, with a little{72} nod of her head towards the assembled multitude, some of whom were quite within hearing.
“These sort of people have very little to say to me,” said Colin, who suddenly felt himself elevated over their heads; “I am only the tutor;” and the two foolish young creatures looked at each other, and laughed, as if Colin of Ramore had been a prince in disguise, and his tutorship an excellent joke.
“Oh, you are only the tutor?” said Miss Matty—“that is charming. Then one will be able to make all sorts of use of you. Everybody is allowed to maltreat a tutor. You will have to row us on the loch, and walk with us to the glen, and carry our cloaks, and generally conduct yourself as becomes a slave and vassal30. As for me, I shall order you about with the greatest freedom, and expect perfect obedience,” said the beauty, looking with her eyes full of laughter into Colin’s face.
“All that goes without saying,” said Colin, who did not like to commit himself to the French. “I almost think I have already proved my perfect allegiance.”
“Oh, you were only a boy last year,” said Miss Matty, with some evanescent change of colour, which looked like a blush to Colin’s delighted eyes. “Now you are a man and a tutor, and we shall behave to you accordingly. How lovely that glen was last spring, to be sure,” continued the girl, with a little quite unconscious natural feeling; “do you remember the day when it rained, and we had to wait under the beeches31, and when you imagined all sorts of things in the pattering of the shower? Do you ever write any poetry now? I want so much to see what you have been doing—since—” said the siren, who, half-touched by nature in her own person, was still perfectly32 conscious of her power.
“Since!” Colin repeated the word over to himself with a flush of happiness which, perhaps, no real good in existence could have equalled. Poor boy! if he could but have known what had happened “since” in Miss Matty’s experience—but, fortunately, he had not the smallest idea what was involved in the season which the young lady had lately terminated, or in the brilliant winter campaign in the country, which had brought adorers in plenty, but nothing worthy33 of the beauty’s acceptance, to Miss Matty’s feet. Colin thought only of the beatific34 dreams, the faithful follies35 which had occupied his own juvenile36 imagination “since.” As for the heroine herself, she looked slightly confused to hear him repeat the word. She had meant it to produce its effect, but then she was thinking solely37 of a male{73} creature of her own species, and not of a primitive38, innocent soul like that which looked at her in a glow of young delight out of Colin’s eyes. She was used to be admired and complimented, and humoured to the top of her bent27, but she did not understand being believed in, and the new sensation somewhat flattered and embarrassed the young woman of the world. She watched his look, as he replied to her, and thereby39 added doubly, though she did not mean it, to the effect of what she had said.
“I never write poetry,” said Colin, “I wish I could—I know how I should use the gift; but I have a few verses about somewhere, I suppose, like everybody else. Last spring I was almost persuaded I could do something better; but that feeling lasts only so long as one’s inspiration lasts,” said the youth, looking down, in his turn, lest his meaning might be discovered too quickly in his eye.
And then there ensued a pause—a pause which was more dangerous than the talk, and which Miss Matty made haste to break.
“Do you know you are very much changed?” she said. “You never did any of this society-talk last year. You have been making friends with some ladies somewhere, and they have taught you conversation. But, as for me, I am your early friend, and I preferred you when you did not talk like other people,” said Miss Matty, with a slight pout40. “Tell me who has been forming your mind?”
Perhaps it was fortunate for Colin at this moment that Lady Hallamshire had become much bored by the group which had gathered round her sofa. The dowager was clever in her way, and had written a novel or two, and was accustomed to be amused by the people who had the honour of talking to her. Though she was no longer a leader of fashion, she kept up the manners and customs of that remarkable41 species of the human race, and when she was bored, permitted her sentiments to be plainly visible in her expressive42 countenance. Though it was the member for the county who was enlightening her at that moment in the statistics of the West Highlands, and though she had been in a state of great anxiety five minutes before about the emigration which was depopulating the moors43, her ladyship broke in quite abruptly45 in the midst of the poor-rates with a totally irrelevant46 observation—
“It appears to me that Matty Frankland has got into another flirtation47; I must go and look after her,” said the Dowager; and she smiled graciously upon the explanatory member, and{74} left him talking, to the utter consternation of their hostess. Lady Hallamshire thought it probable that the young man was amusing as well as handsome, or Matty Frankland, who was a girl of discretion48, would not have received him into such marked favour. “Though I daresay there is nobody here worth her trouble,” her chaperone thought as she looked round the room; but anyhow a change was desirable. “Matty, mignonne, I want to know what you are talking about,” she said, suddenly coming to anchor opposite the two young people; and a considerable fuss ensued to find her ladyship a seat, during which time Colin had a hundred minds to run away. The company took a new centre after this performance on the part of the great lady, and poor Colin, all at once, began to feel that he was doing exactly the reverse of what was expected of him. He got up with a painful blush as he met Mr. Jordan’s astonished eye. The poor boy did not know that he had been much more remarked before: “flirting openly with that dreadful little coquette Miss Frankland, and turning his back upon his superiors,” as some of the indignant bystanders said. Even Colin’s matronly friends, who pitied him and formed his mind, disapproved49 of his behaviour. “She only means to make a fool of you, and you ought not to allow yourself to be taken in by it,” said one of these patronesses in his ear, calling him aside. But Fate had determined50 otherwise.
“Don’t go away,” said Lady Hallamshire. “I like Matty to introduce all her friends to me; and you two look as if you had known each other a long time,” said the dowager, graciously; for she was pleased, like most women, by Colin’s looks. “One would know him again if one met him,” she added, in an audible aside; “he doesn’t look exactly like everybody else, as most young men do. Who is he, Matty?” And Miss Frankland’s chaperone turned the light of her countenance full upon Colin, quite indifferent to the fact that he had heard one part of her speech quite as well as the other. When a fine lady consents to enter the outer world, it is to be expected that she should behave herself as civilized51 people do among savages52, and the English among the other nations of the world.
“Oh, yes! we have known each other a long time,” said Matty, partly with a generous, partly with a mischievous53, instinct. “My uncle knows Mr. Campbell’s father very well, and Harry54 and he and I made acquaintance when we were children. I am sure you must have heard how nearly Harry was drowned once when we were at Kilchurn Castle. It was Mr. Campbell who saved his life.{75}”
“Oh!” said Lady Hallamshire; “but I thought that was”—and then she stopped short. Looking at Colin again, her ladyship’s experienced eye perceived that he was not arrayed with that perfection of apparel to which she was accustomed; but at the same moment her eye caught his glowing face, half pleased, half haughty55 with that pride of lowliness which is of all pride the most defiant56. “I am very glad to make Mr. Campbell’s acquaintance,”—she went on so graciously that everybody forgot the pause. “Harry Frankland is a very dear young friend of mine, and we are all very much indebted to his deliverer.”
It was just what a distinguished matron would have said in the circumstances in one of Lady Hallamshire’s novels; but, instead of remaining overcome with grateful confusion, as the hero ought to have done, Colin made an immediate57 reply.
“I cannot take the credit people give me,” said the lad, with a little heat. “He happened to get into my boat when he was nearly exhausted—that is the whole business. There has been much more talk about it than was necessary. I cannot pretend even to be a friend of Mr. Frankland,” said Colin, with the unnecessary explanatoriness of youth, “and I certainly did not save his life.”
With which speech the young man disappeared out of sight amid the wondering assembly, which privately58 designated him a young puppy and a young prig, and by various other epithets59, according to the individual mind of the speaker. As for Lady Hallamshire, she was considerably60 disgusted. “Your friend is original, I dare say; but I am not sure that he is quite civil,” she said to Matty, who did not quite know whether to be vexed61 or pleased by Colin’s abrupt44 withdrawal62. Perhaps on the whole the young lady liked him better for having a mind of his own, notwithstanding his devotion, and for preferring to bestow12 his worship without the assistance of spectators. If he had been a man in the least eligible63 as a lover, Miss Frankland might have been of a different opinion; but, as that was totally out of possibility, Matty liked, on the whole, that he should do what was ideally right, and keep up her conception of him. She gave her head a pretty toss of semi-defiance, and went across the room to Mrs. Jordan, to whom she was very amiable64 and caressing65 all the rest of the evening. But she still continued to watch with the corner of her eye the tall boyish figure which was now and then to be discerned in the distance, with those masses of brown hair heaped like clouds upon the forehead, which Colin’s height made visible over the heads of many very superior people.{76} She knew he was watching her and noted66 every movement she made, and she felt a little proud of the slave, who, though he was only the tutor and a poor farmer’s son, had something in his eyes which nobody else within sight had any inkling of. Matty was rather clever in her way, which was as much different from Colin’s as light from darkness. No man of a mental calibre like hers could have found him out; but she had a little insight, as a woman, which enabled her to perceive the greater height when she came within sight of it. And then poor Colin, all unconsciously, had given her such an advantage over him. He had laid his boy’s heart at her feet, and, half in love, half in imagination, had made her the goddess of his youth. If she had thought it likely to do him any serious damage, perhaps Matty, who was a good girl enough, and was of some use to the rector and very popular among the poor in her own parish, might have done her duty by Colin, and crushed this pleasant folly67 in the bud. But then it did not occur to her that a “friendship” of which it was so very evident nothing could ever come, could harm anybody. It did not occur to her that an ambitious Scotch boy, who knew no more of the world than a baby, and who had been fed upon all the tales of riches achieved and glories won which are the common fare of many a homely68 household, might possibly entertain a different opinion. So Matty asked all kinds of questions about him of Mrs. Jordan, and gave him now and then a little nod when she met his eye, and generally kept up a kind of special intercourse69 far more flattering to the youth than ordinary conversation. Poor Colin neither attempted nor wished to defend himself. He put his head under the yoke70, and hugged his chains. He collected his verses, poor boy! when he went to his own room that night—verses which he knew very well were true to her, but in which it would be rather difficult to explain the fatal stroke—the grievous blow on which he had expatiated71 so vaguely72 that it might be taken to mean the death of his lady rather than the simple fact that she did not come to Kilchurn Castle when he expected her. How to make her understand that this was the object of his lamentations puzzled him a little; for Colin knew enough of romance to be aware that the true lover does not venture to address the princess until he has so far conquered fortune as to make his suit with honour to her and fitness in the eyes of the world.
It was thus that the young tutor sat in his bare little room out of the way, and, with eyes that glowed over his midnight candle, looked into the future, and calculated visionary dates at{77} which, if all went with him as he hoped, he might lay his trophies73 at his lady’s feet. It is true that Matty herself fully3 intended by that time to have daughters ready to enter upon the round of conquest from which she should have retired74 into matron dignity; but no such profanity ever occurred to Colin. Thus the two thought of each other as they went to their rest—the one with all the delusions75 of heroic youthful love, the other with no delusions at all, but a half gratitude76, half affection—a woman’s compassionate77 fondness for the man who had touched her heart a little by giving her his, but whom it was out of the question ever to think of loving. And so the coils of Fate began to throw themselves around the free-born feet of young Colin of Ramore.
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illustrate
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| v.举例说明，阐明；图解，加插图 | |
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potentate
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| n.统治者；君主 | |
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fully
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| adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地 | |
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saucy
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| adj.无礼的；俊俏的；活泼的 | |
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mightily
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| ad.强烈地；非常地 | |
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complacent
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| adj.自满的；自鸣得意的 | |
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distinguished
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| adj.卓越的，杰出的，著名的 | |
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miraculous
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| adj.像奇迹一样的，不可思议的 | |
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admiration
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| n.钦佩，赞美，羡慕 | |
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countenance
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| n.脸色，面容；面部表情；vt.支持，赞同 | |
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glorify
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| vt.颂扬，赞美，使增光，美化 | |
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bestow
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bestows
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| 赠给，授予( bestow的第三人称单数 ) | |
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exultation
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| n.狂喜，得意 | |
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celestial
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intoxication
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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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consternation
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wrath
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mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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scotch
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| n.伤口，刻痕；苏格兰威士忌酒；v.粉碎，消灭，阻止；adj.苏格兰(人)的 | |
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aspiring
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Oxford
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mosses
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utterly
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incumbent
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bent
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exalted
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pointed
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vassal
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beeches
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perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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worthy
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| adj.(of)值得的，配得上的；有价值的 | |
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beatific
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follies
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| 罪恶，时事讽刺剧； 愚蠢，蠢笨，愚蠢的行为、思想或做法( folly的名词复数 ) | |
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juvenile
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solely
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primitive
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thereby
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pout
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remarkable
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| adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的 | |
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expressive
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| adj.表现的，表达…的，富于表情的 | |
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moors
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abrupt
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| adj.突然的，意外的；唐突的，鲁莽的 | |
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abruptly
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| adv.突然地，出其不意地 | |
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irrelevant
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| adj.不恰当的，无关系的，不相干的 | |
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flirtation
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| n.调情，调戏，挑逗 | |
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discretion
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| n.谨慎；随意处理 | |
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disapproved
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| v.不赞成( disapprove的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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determined
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| adj.坚定的；有决心的 | |
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civilized
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| a.有教养的，文雅的 | |
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savages
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| 未开化的人，野蛮人( savage的名词复数 ) | |
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mischievous
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| adj.调皮的，恶作剧的，有害的，伤人的 | |
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harry
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| vt.掠夺，蹂躏，使苦恼 | |
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haughty
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| adj.傲慢的，高傲的 | |
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defiant
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| adj.无礼的，挑战的 | |
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immediate
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| adj.立即的；直接的，最接近的；紧靠的 | |
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privately
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| adv.以私人的身份，悄悄地，私下地 | |
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epithets
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considerably
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| adv.极大地；相当大地；在很大程度上 | |
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vexed
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| adj.争论不休的；（指问题等）棘手的；争论不休的问题；烦恼的v.使烦恼( vex的过去式和过去分词 )；使苦恼；使生气；详细讨论 | |
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62
withdrawal
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| n.取回，提款；撤退，撤军；收回，撤销 | |
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63
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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64
amiable
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| adj.和蔼可亲的，友善的，亲切的 | |
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65
caressing
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| 爱抚的，表现爱情的，亲切的 | |
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66
noted
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| adj.著名的，知名的 | |
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67
folly
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| n.愚笨，愚蠢，蠢事，蠢行，傻话 | |
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68
homely
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| adj.家常的，简朴的；不漂亮的 | |
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69
intercourse
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| n.性交；交流，交往，交际 | |
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70
yoke
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| n.轭；支配；v.给...上轭，连接，使成配偶 | |
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71
expatiated
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| v.详述，细说( expatiate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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72
vaguely
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| adv.含糊地，暖昧地 | |
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73
trophies
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| n.（为竞赛获胜者颁发的）奖品( trophy的名词复数 )；奖杯；（尤指狩猎或战争中获得的）纪念品；（用于比赛或赛跑名称）奖 | |
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74
retired
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| adj.隐退的，退休的，退役的 | |
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75
delusions
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| n.欺骗( delusion的名词复数 )；谬见；错觉；妄想 | |
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76
gratitude
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| adj.感激，感谢 | |
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77
compassionate
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| adj.有同情心的，表示同情的 | |
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