When they entered the lighted room he saw that his father seemed older—many years older—than when he had said good-bye to him two months before. His skin was very transparent17, his lips were tremulous, his eyes, after the first long look at his son, shifted feebly to the fire, the table, and the floor.
‘My dear son,’ he said, ‘I thank God that I have got you safe home again. Indeed, it is good to see you again, Hyacinth, for it has been very lonely while you were away. I have not been able to do very much lately or to go out to the seashore, as I used to. Perhaps it is only that I have not cared to. But I have tried hard to get everything ready for your coming.’
He looked round the room with evident pride as he spoke18. Hyacinth followed his gaze, and it was with a sense of deep shame that he found himself noticing the squalor of his home. The table was stained, and the books which littered half of it were thick with dust and grease-spotted. The earthen floor was damp and pitted here and there, so that the chairs stood perilously19 among its inequalities. The fine white powder of turf ashes lay thick upon the dresser. The whitewash20 above the fireplace was blackened by the track of the smoke that had blown out of the chimney and climbed up to the still blacker rafters of the roof. Hyacinth remembered how he, and not his father, had been accustomed to clean the room and wash the cups and plates. He wondered how such matters had been managed in his absence, and a great sense of compassion21 filled his eyes with tears as he thought of the painful struggle which the details of life must have brought upon his father. He noted the evident preparations for his coming. There were two eggs lying in a saucer ready to be boiled, a fresh loaf—and this was not the day they got their bread—and a small tin of cocoa beside his cup. The hearth22 was piled with glowing turf, and the iron tripod with a saucepan on it stood surrounded with red coals. Some sense of what Hyacinth was feeling passed into his father’s mind.
‘Isn’t it all right, my son? I tried to make it very nice for you. I wanted to get Maggie Cassidy up from the village for the day, but her baby had the chin-cough, and she couldn’t come.’
He took Hyacinth’s hand and held it while he spoke.
‘Perhaps it looks poor to you,’ he went on, ‘after your college rooms and the houses your friends live in; but it’s your own home, son, isn’t it?’
Hyacinth made a gulp23 at the emotion which had brought him near to tears.
‘It’s splendid, father—simply splendid. And now I’m going to boil those two eggs and make the cocoa, and we’ll have a feast. Hallo! you’ve got some jam—jam and butter and eggs, and this is the month of December, when there’s hardly a hen laying or a cow milking in the whole parish!’
He held up the jam-pot as he spoke. It was wrapped in dingy24 red paper, and had a mouldy damp stain on one side. Hyacinth recognised the mark, and remembered that he had seen the identical pot on the upper shelf of Rafferty’s shop for years. Its label bore an inscription25 only vaguely26 prophetic of the contents—‘Irish Household Jam.’
‘That’s right, father, you are supporting home manufacture. I declare I wouldn’t have tasted it if it had come from England. You see, I’m a greater patriot27 than ever.’
Old Mr. Conneally smiled in a feeble, wavering way. He seemed scarcely to understand what was being said to him, but he found a quiet pleasure in the sound of his son’s voice. He settled himself in a chair by the fireside and watched contentedly28 while Hyacinth put the eggs into the saucepan, hung the kettle on its hook, and cut slices of bread. Then the meal was eaten, Hyacinth after his long drive finding a relish29 even in the household jam. He plied30 his father with questions, and heard what the old man knew of the gossip of the village—how Thady Durkan had broken his arm, and talked of giving up the fishing; how the police from Letter-frack had found, or said they found, a whisky-still behind the old castle; how a Gaelic League organizer had come round persuading the people to sing and dance at the Galway Féis.
After supper Hyacinth nerved himself to tell the story of his term in college, and his determination to leave the divinity school. More than once he made an effort to begin, but the old man, who brightened a little during their meal, relapsed again into dreaminess, and did not seem to be listening to him. They pulled their chairs near to the fire, and Mr. Conneally sat holding his son’s hand fast. Sometimes he stroked or patted it gently, but otherwise he seemed scarcely to recognise that he was not alone. His eyes were fixed31 on the fire, but they stared strangely, as if they saw something afar off, something not in the room at all. There was no response in them when Hyacinth spoke, and no intelligence. From time to time his lips moved slightly as if they were forming words, but he said nothing. After awhile Hyacinth gave up the attempt to tell his story, and sat silent for so long that in the end he was startled when his father spoke.
‘Hyacinth, my son, I have somewhat to say unto you.’ Before Hyacinth could reply to him he continued: ‘And the young man answered and said unto him, “Say on.” And the old man lifted up his voice and said unto his son, “He that hath ears to hear, let him hear.”’
He spoke as if he were reading out of a book some narrative32 from the Bible. Hyacinth realized suddenly that the communication which was to be made to him had been rehearsed by his father alone, again and again, that statement, question and reply, would follow each other in due sequence from the same lips. He felt that his father was still rehearsing, and had forgotten the real presence of his son. He grasped the hand that held him and shook it, saying sharply:
‘Father, father, I am here. Don’t you know me?’
‘Yes, yes, my son. Surely I know you. There is something I want to tell you. I have wanted to tell it to you for many days. I am glad that you are here now to listen to it.’
He paused, and Hyacinth feared that he would relapse again into dreamy insensibility; but he did not.
‘I think,’ he said, ‘that I should like to pray before I speak to you.’
He knelt down as Hyacinth had seen him kneel a thousand times before, facing the eastward-looking window, now a black, uncurtained square in the whitewashed33 wall. What he said was almost unintelligible34. There was no petition nor even any sequence of ideas which could be traced. He poured forth35 a series of ejaculations expressive36 of intense and rapturous delight, very strange to listen to in such a place and from an old man’s lips. Then the language he spoke changed from English into Gaelic, and there came a kind of hymn37 of adoration38. His sentences followed each other in metrical balance like the Latin of the old liturgies39, and suited themselves naturally to a subdued40 melody, half chant, half cry, like the mourning of the keeners round a grave. At last, rising from his knees, he spoke, and his voice became wholly unemotional, devoid41 of fervour or excitement. He told his story as a man might relate some quite commonplace incident of daily life.
‘One evening I was sitting here by the fire, just as I always sit. I remember that the lamp was not lit, and that the fire was low, so that there was not much light in the room. It came into my mind that it was just out of such gloom that the Lord called “Samuel, Samuel,” and I wished that I was like Samuel, so innocent that I could hear the voice of the Lord. I do not remember what I thought of after that. Perhaps for a time I did not think at all. Then I felt that there were arms about my neck; but not like your arms, Hyacinth, when you were a child and clung to me. These were arms which held me lovingly, strongly, protectingly, like—do you remember, Hyacinth?—“His right hand is under my head; His left hand doth embrace me.” I sat quite still, and did not move or speak or even breathe, lest He should go away from me. Then, after a long time—I knew afterwards that the time was long, though then it seemed only a minute for the joy that I had in it—He told me—I do not mean that I heard a voice or any words; I did not hear, I felt Him tell me—the things that are to be. The last great fight, the Armageddon, draweth very near. All that is good is on one side in the fight, and the Captain over all. What is bad is on the other side—all kinds of tyranny and greed and lust42. I did not hear these words, but I felt the things, only without any fear, for round me were the everlasting43 arms. And the battlefield is Ireland, our dear Ireland which we love. All these centuries since the great saints died He has kept Ireland to be His battlefield. I understood then how our people have been saved from riches and from power and from the opportunities of lust, that our soil out of all the world might be fit for the feet of the great Captain, for the marching of His horsemen and His chariots. Not even when I knew all this did I desire to share in the conflict. I am old and feeble, but that is not the reason why there was no desire on me, for strength is in His power to give to whom He wills. I did not desire it, because I was quite happy, being safe with Him.’
For a long time after he ceased speaking there was silence, for Hyacinth had no comment to offer. At last the old man spoke again.
‘That is all. I have no other word of revelation. But I have wondered since how men are to be disentangled from their parties and their churches and their nations, and gathered simply into good and bad. Will all men who are good just know the Captain when they see Him and range themselves with Him? But why should we think about such things as these? Doubtless He can order them. But you, Hyacinth—will you be sure to know the good side from the bad, the Captain from the enemy?’
For a long time after he had gone to bed Hyacinth lay awake haunted by his father’s prophecy of an Armageddon. There was that in his nature which responded eagerly to such a call to battle. In the presence of enthusiasm like his father’s or like Augusta Goold’s, Hyacinth caught fire. His mind flamed with the idea of an Independent Ireland resplendent with her ancient glories. He embraced no less eagerly the thought of his father’s battle and his own part in it. Groping for points of contact between the two enthusiasms, he caught at the conception of the Roman Church as the Antichrist and her power in Ireland as the point round which the fight must rage. Then with a sudden flash he saw, not Rome, but the British Empire, as the embodiment of the power of darkness. He had learned to think of it as a force, greedy, materialistic45, tyrannous, grossly hypocritical. What more was required to satisfy the conception of evil that he sought for? He remembered all that he had ever heard from Augusta Goold and her friends about the shameless trickery of English statesmen, about the insatiable greed of the merchants, about the degraded sensuality of the workers. He recalled the blatant46 boastfulness with which English demagogues claimed to be the sole possessors of enlightened consciences, and the tales of native races exploited, gin-poisoned, and annihilated47 by pioneers of civilization advancing with Bibles in their hands.
But with all his capacity for enthusiasm there was a strain of weakness in Hyacinth. More than once after the glories of an Independent Ireland had been preached to him he had found himself growing suddenly cold and dejected, smitten48 by an east wind of common-sense. At the time when he first recognised the loftiness of his father’s religion he had revolted against being called upon to adopt so fantastic a creed49. So now, when his mind grew weary with the endeavour to set an Armageddon in array, he began to wish for a life of peaceful monotony, a place to be quiet in, where no high calls or imperious demands would come to threaten him. He ceased to toss to and fro, and gradually sank into a half-conscious sleep. It seemed to him at the time that he was still awake, held back from slumber50 by the great stillness of the country, that silence which disturbs ears long accustomed to the continuous roar of towns. Suddenly he started into perfect wakefulness, and felt that he was in possession of all his faculties51. The room where he lay was quite dark, but he strained his eyes to see something in it. He listened intently, although no sound whatever met his ears. A great overmastering fear laid hold on him. He tried to reason with himself, insisting that there was nothing, and could be nothing, to be afraid of. Still the fear remained. His lips grew stiff and painfully hot, and when he tried to moisten them his tongue was dry and moved across them raspingly. He struggled with the terror that paralyzed him, and by a great effort raised his hand to his forehead. It was damp and cold, and the hair above it was damp. He had no way of knowing how much of the night had passed, or even how long he lay rigid53, unable to breathe without a kind of pain; but suddenly as it had come the terror left him, left him without any effort on his part or any reason that he recognised. Then the window of his room shook, and he heard outside the low moan of the rising wind. Some heavy drops of rain struck audibly on the roof, and the first gust44 of the storm carried to his ears the sound of waves beating on the rocks. His senses strained no more. His eyes closed, and he sank quietly into a long dreamless sleep.
It was late when he woke, so late that the winter sky was fully52 lit. The wind, whose first gusts54 had lulled55 him to sleep, had risen to a gale56, and the rain, mixed with salt spray, beat fiercely against his window and on the roof. He listened, expecting to hear his father moving in the room below, but within the house there was no sound. He rose, vaguely anxious, and without waiting to dress went into the kitchen. Everything lay untouched, just as he had left it the night before. The lamp and the remnants of the meal were on the table. The two chairs stood side by side before the hearth, where the fire which he had covered up smouldered feebly. He turned and went to his father’s room. He could not have explained how it was, but when he opened the door he was not surprised to see the old man lying quite still, dead, upon the bed. His face was turned upwards57, and on it was that strange look of emotionless peace which rests very often on the faces of the dead. It seemed to Hyacinth quite natural that the soul as it departed into unknown beatitude should have printed this for the last expression on the earthly habitation which it left behind. He neither wondered nor, at first, sorrowed very much to see his father dead. His sight was undimmed and his hands steady when he closed the eyes and composed the limbs of the body on the bed. Afterwards it seemed strange to him that he should have dressed quietly, arranged the furniture in the kitchen, and blown the fire into a blaze before he went down into the village to tell his news and seek for help.
They buried ?neas Conneally beside his wife in the wind-swept churchyard. The fishermen carried his coffin58 into the church and out again to the grave. Father Moran himself stood by bareheaded while the clergyman from Clifden read the prayers and sprinkled the coffin-lid with the clay which symbolized59 the return of earth to earth and dust to dust. In the presence of death, and, with the recollection of the simple goodness of the man who was gone, priest and people alike forgot for an hour the endless strife60 between his creed and theirs.
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1
surmounted
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| 战胜( surmount的过去式和过去分词 )； 克服（困难）； 居于…之上； 在…顶上 | |
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2
trot
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| n.疾走，慢跑；n.老太婆；现成译本；(复数）trots:腹泻（与the 连用）；v.小跑，快步走，赶紧 | |
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3
dwindled
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| v.逐渐变少或变小( dwindle的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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4
ragged
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| adj.衣衫褴褛的，粗糙的，刺耳的 | |
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5
crimson
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| n./adj.深(绯)红色(的)；vi.脸变绯红色 | |
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6
cinders
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| n.煤渣( cinder的名词复数 )；炭渣；煤渣路；煤渣跑道 | |
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7
toddle
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| v.（如小孩）蹒跚学步 | |
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greasy
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| adj. 多脂的，油脂的 | |
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rattled
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| 慌乱的，恼火的 | |
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10
twilight
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| n.暮光，黄昏；暮年，晚期，衰落时期 | |
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11
stump
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| n.残株，烟蒂，讲演台；v.砍断，蹒跚而走 | |
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12
pier
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| n.码头；桥墩，桥柱；[建]窗间壁，支柱 | |
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13
deserted
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| adj.荒芜的，荒废的，无人的，被遗弃的 | |
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14
noted
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| adj.著名的，知名的 | |
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15
fumble
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| vi.笨拙地用手摸、弄、接等，摸索 | |
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16
accomplished
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| adj.有才艺的；有造诣的；达到了的 | |
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17
transparent
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| adj.明显的，无疑的；透明的 | |
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18
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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19
perilously
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| adv.充满危险地，危机四伏地 | |
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20
whitewash
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| v.粉刷，掩饰；n.石灰水，粉刷，掩饰 | |
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21
compassion
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| n.同情，怜悯 | |
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22
hearth
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| n.壁炉炉床，壁炉地面 | |
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23
gulp
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| vt.吞咽，大口地吸（气）；vi.哽住；n.吞咽 | |
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24
dingy
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| adj.昏暗的，肮脏的 | |
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25
inscription
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| n.（尤指石块上的）刻印文字，铭文，碑文 | |
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26
vaguely
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| adv.含糊地，暖昧地 | |
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patriot
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| n.爱国者，爱国主义者 | |
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contentedly
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| adv.心满意足地 | |
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29
relish
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| n.滋味，享受，爱好，调味品；vt.加调味料，享受，品味；vi.有滋味 | |
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30
plied
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| v.使用（工具）( ply的过去式和过去分词 )；经常供应（食物、饮料）；固定往来；经营生意 | |
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31
fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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32
narrative
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| n.叙述，故事；adj.叙事的，故事体的 | |
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33
whitewashed
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| 粉饰，美化，掩饰( whitewash的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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34
unintelligible
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| adj.无法了解的，难解的，莫明其妙的 | |
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35
forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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36
expressive
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| adj.表现的，表达…的，富于表情的 | |
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37
hymn
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| n.赞美诗，圣歌，颂歌 | |
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38
adoration
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| n.爱慕，崇拜 | |
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39
liturgies
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| n.礼拜仪式( liturgy的名词复数 )；（英国国教的）祈祷书 | |
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40
subdued
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| adj. 屈服的，柔和的，减弱的 动词subdue的过去式和过去分词 | |
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41
devoid
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| adj.全无的，缺乏的 | |
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42
lust
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| n.性(淫)欲；渴(欲)望；vi.对…有强烈的欲望 | |
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43
everlasting
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| adj.永恒的，持久的，无止境的 | |
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44
gust
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| n.阵风，突然一阵（雨、烟等），（感情的）迸发 | |
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45
materialistic
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| a.唯物主义的，物质享乐主义的 | |
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46
blatant
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| adj.厚颜无耻的；显眼的；炫耀的 | |
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47
annihilated
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| v.（彻底）消灭( annihilate的过去式和过去分词 )；使无效；废止；彻底击溃 | |
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48
smitten
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| 猛打，重击，打击( smite的过去分词 ) | |
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49
creed
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| n.信条；信念，纲领 | |
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50
slumber
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| n.睡眠，沉睡状态 | |
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51
faculties
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| n.能力( faculty的名词复数 )；全体教职员；技巧；院 | |
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52
fully
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| adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地 | |
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53
rigid
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| adj.严格的，死板的；刚硬的，僵硬的 | |
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54
gusts
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| 一阵强风( gust的名词复数 )； （怒、笑等的）爆发； （感情的）迸发； 发作 | |
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55
lulled
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| vt.使镇静，使安静（lull的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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56
gale
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| n.大风，强风，一阵闹声（尤指笑声等） | |
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57
upwards
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| adv.向上，在更高处...以上 | |
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58
coffin
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| n.棺材，灵柩 | |
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59
symbolized
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| v.象征，作为…的象征( symbolize的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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60
strife
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| n.争吵，冲突，倾轧，竞争 | |
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