A book may be bad and yet tell you much.
Lately I came across such a book. It is surely one of the crossest books ever written. Its author fought in France, in the ranks, for a good many months of the war. He must have been one of the men who make sergeants1 grey—a "proper lawyer," as Regulars call the type which a cotton district labels as "self-acting mules4."
I seem to know that man. He was a volunteer, but he would not enlist5 until conscription came in, because of some precious doctrine6 he had about younger men without families. When he did join his first act was to ask to speak to the colonel. He was aggrieved7 because army doctors would not act, when he desired it, except as such. When anyone checked him he felt an ardent8 thirst to "explain," and the explanation was always that he who had checked was wrong. In the field he kept a diary and sternly would he note on its recording9 page that tea one day—nay, on more than one—was served "very late indeed." Heinous10!
The continued existence of war is precarious11. More than the League of Nations menaces its future. For it depends, at the last, on the infrequency of "proper lawyers." Armies can now be made, and moved about when made, only because the plain man who keeps the world going round does not stick up for the last ounce of his rights, or stick out for the joys of having the last word, so dourly12 as these. Even to keep up a game with so modest an element of voluntaryism about it as penal13 justice you have to have some little effort of co-operation all round. If your convicts will not even eat the whole thing begins crumbling14. The "suffragettes" showed us that. A pioneer still earlier, an Indian coolie, proved it in a Fijian gaol15. Were every soldier like this diarist war would have to be dropped, not because men were too good, but because they were too prickly.
II
And yet the book told something which no other book has yet succeeded in telling you. Wordy, cantankerous16, dull, repeating itself like a decimal, padded with cheap political "thoughts" gathered from old "stunts17" in bad papers—still, it came nearer than any other to showing you the way trench18 warfare19 struck a mind and soul quite commonplace in everything except a double dose of native sourness. Here was nothing of M. Barbusse's doctrinaire20 fire to make the author pervert21 or exaggerate. No thrill of drastic passion, not even the passionate22 self-pity of Dickens describing his childhood as Copperfield's, stirred the plodding23 and crabbed25 narrative26. The writer seemed too peevish27 to be at the pains to beautify or exalt28. And so his account of the bungled29 attack in which he took part is extraordinarily30 true to all that the commonplace man found to be left in almost any attack when once all the picturesque31 fluff filling the current literary pictures of it were found not to be there—the touch of bathos; the supposed heroic moment only seeming a bit of a "dud," a miscarriage32; the hugger-mugger element of confusion; the baffling way that the real thing did not so often give men obvious gallant33 things to do as irritating puzzles to solve, muddles34 to liquidate35 at short notice; the queer flashes of revelation, in contact with individual enemies, of the bottomless falsity of the cheaper kind of current war psychology37.
Advances, however, were far from being the staple38 of warfare. They caused the most losses, but still they did less than the years of less sensational39 routine to make what changes were made by the war in the minds of the men in the ranks. And here our pettish40 author found the congenial theme for his own acrid41, accurate method. His trivial reiterations succeed, in the end, in piling up in the reader's mind an image of that old trench life as the sum of innumerable dreary43 units of irksome fatigue44. This was the normal life of the infantry45 private in France. For N.C.O.'s it was lightened by the immunity46 of their rank from fatigue work in the technical sense. For the officer it was much further lightened by better quarters and the servant system. For most of his time the average private was tired. Fairly often he was so tired as no man at home ever is in the common run of his work.
If a company's trench strength was low and sentry-posts abounded47 more than usual in its sector48 a man might, for eight days running, get no more than one hour off duty at any one time, day or night. If enemy guns were active many of these hours off guard duty might have to be spent on trench repair. After one of these bad times in trenches49 a company or platoon would sometimes come out on to the road behind the communication trench like a flock of over-driven sheep. The weakest ones would fall out and drop here and there along the road, not as a rule fainting, but in the state of a horse dead-beat, to whom any amount of thrashing seems preferable to going on. Men would come out light-headed with fatigue, and ramble50 away to the men next them about some great time which they had had, or meant to have, at home. Or a man would march all right till the road fetched a bend, and then he would march straight on into the ditch in his sleep. Upon a greasy51 road with a heavy camber I have seen a used-up man get the illusion, on a night-march back to billets, that he was walking on a round, smooth, horizontal pole or convex plank52 above some fearsome sort of gulf53. He would struggle hard to recover imaginary losses of footing, pant and sweat and scrape desperately54 sideways with his feet like a frightened young horse new to harness when it leans in against the pole, with its feet skidding55 outwards56 on the setts. Down he would go, time after time, in the mud, each time as unable to rise of himself, under the weight of his pack and equipment, as any medi?val knight57 unhorsed and held down by the weight of his armour58. Hauled up again to his feet, to be driven along like one of the spent cab-horses in Naples just strong enough to move when up, but not to rise, he would in another five minutes be agonizing59 again on the greasy pole of his delirium60.
The querulist of the book took it hard, I remember, that more kind words did not come to the men. He saw his own lot very clearly, but not so clearly the lot of those other unfortunates who had to put the job through. A man who finds himself in charge of a spent horse at night, in a place where there may be no safe waiting till dawn, must do something. Ten to one he will flog or kick the horse into moving. He may feel that he, not the horse, is the beast; but still he will do it. So, too, will he bully61 and curse exhausted62 men into safety. That was what happened. Every decent N.C.O. and company officer—and far the larger part were decent—did what they could to humour and "buck63" the bad cases through the pangs64 of endurance. Some would reach the journey's end carrying whole faggots of rifles. Some would put by their own daily rations42 of rum to ginger65 beaten men through the last mile. But there would come times when only hard driving seemed to be left. Bella, horrida bella!
III
Suppose those first eight days in the front and support trenches to be the beginning of a divisional tour of sixteen days' duty in the line. For four days now the weary men would be in reserve, under enemy fire, but not in trenches; probably in the cellars of ruined houses. But these were not times of rest. Each day or night every man would make one or more journeys back to the trenches that they had left carrying some load of food, water, or munitions66 up to the three companies in trenches, or perhaps leading a pack-mule3 over land to some point near the front line, under cover of night. Even to lead a laden67 mule in the dark over waste ground confusingly wired and trenched is work; to get him back on to his feet when fallen and wriggling68, in wild consternation69, among a tangle70 of old barbed wire may be quite hard work.
In intervals71 between these journeys most men would lie in the straw in the cellars or hobble weakly about the outside of the premises72, looking as boys sometimes do when stiff with many hearty73 hacks74 sustained in a hard game of football, with a chill after it. They crawled in and out of their billets like late autumn bees, feebly scraping the eight days' plating of mud off their clothes and cleaning their jack-knives after meals with the languor75 of the elders in the Bible to whom the grasshopper76 was a burden. A few robust77 spirits, armed with craft and subtlety78 more fully79 than the rest, would strike out, whenever released, for some "just-a-minute," or estaminet, not too far off, nor yet too near, and there lie perdus, lest the Company Orderly Sergeant2 warn them for some new liturgy80. This defensive81 policy did not lighten the work of their brethren.
After four days of their labours as sumpter mules, or muleteers, the company would plod24 back for another four days of duty in trenches, come out yet more universally tired at their end, and drift back to rest-billets, out of ordinary shell-fire, for their sixteen days or so of "divisional rest." Here their work was really lighter82, but still it was work and not rest. It did not wholly wind up in most of the men the spring that had run down while they were in the line. And then the division would go again into the line, and the old cycle be worked through once more. So most of the privates were tired the whole of the time; sometimes to the point of torment83, sometimes much less, but always more or less tired.
IV
Many, of course, lost health and drifted "down the line," as it was called, to the base, where work might be light, but much of the company rather more blighting84 than any work to the spirit. Hither, to all the divisional base depots86 and into the ultimate dust-hole or sink that was called "Base Details," there gravitated most of the walking wreckage87 and wastage, physical and moral, of active warfare: convalescent, sick and wounded from hospital, men found too old or too young for trench work, broken-nerved men smuggled88 out of the way before disaster should come, and malingerers triumphant89 and chuckling90, or only semi-successful, suspect, and tediously over-acting.
There was the good man fretting91 and raging to get back to his friends and the fight, away from this tainted92 backwater in which the swelling93 flotillas of the unfit and the unwilling94 were left to rot at their moorings. There was the pallid95 and bent96 London clerk, faintly disguised in khaki but too blind to fight, now working furiously fifteen hours each day of his seven-day week in the orderly room—no Sunday here, no Saturday afternoon—for pure love of international right. There was the dug-out, the Grenadier Guards sergeant-major of sixty, the handsome and melancholy97 old boy, a Victorian survivor98 into our little vulgar age, with a careful and dignified99 manner and mighty100 memories of a radiant past in London, when all parades, for a good-conduct-man well up in his drill, were over by half-past ten in the morning and he had a permanent midnight pass into barracks and so could act as a super at one of the theatres every night except when doing a guard, and see life and move among genius and beauty, making good money. Oh, yes, he had acted with Irving and Booth, and lived the life, and heard the chimes at midnight.
But also the veteran crooks101, old dregs of the Regular Army, Queen Victoria's worst bargains, N.C.O.'s who would boast that they had not been once on parade in the last twenty years, waiters and caterers for the whole of their martial102 careers till the liquor fairly lipped over the edge of their eyelids103 and bleached104 the blue of their eyes. You would hear one of them boast that no doctor on earth could find him out to be fit when he, the tactician105, wished otherwise. Another had made pathological studies, learning up the few conjectural106 symptoms of maladies that show no outward trace; as science advanced to the point of recording detectively the true state of the heart he had deftly107 changed ground, relinquished108 rheumatism109 of that organ and done some work of research into pains in the head; much faith did he put, too, in the sciatic nerve. When a couple of these savants slept in one tent they would argue after Lights Out—was sciatica safest, or shell-shock, or general debility? "Them grey hairs should be a lot of use to you, corp.," one of them would quite feelingly say to a new man in the tent, "when you want to get swinging the lead."
While these ignoble110 presences befouled the air of a base, good things, also, were there; but you seldom quite knew which was which. All very well for the King to come out with his "Go, hang yourself, brave Crillon! We fought at Arques and you were not there." But if you, too, were not at the battle—if some unlucky effect of combustion112 compelled you to live as a messmate of Crillon, far, far from Arques when the battle was on, you would have to use tact36. Somehow the man who was undisguisedly keen to get back to the centre of things felt a slight coldness pervading113 the air about him. It was as if a workman, who might have so easily let well alone, had sinned against the trade-union spirit, helped to raise the standard of employers' expectation, forced the pace of dutifulness in a world where authority could be trusted to speed things up quite enough. Even officers tended to deprecate the higher temperatures of ardour in other ranks of base establishments. "You're out for distinction,"—one honest rationalist would advise—"that's what it is. Well, trust to me—up the line's not the place where you get it. Every time a war ends you'll find most of the decorations go to the people at G.H.Q., L. of C., and the bases. So, if you want a nice row of ribbons to show to your kiddies, stop here." And another would put it more subtly: "Isn't one's duty, as a rule, just here and now?" Some were good-natured; they were not for keeping the primrose114 path all to themselves. Others were anxious lest the taking of steep and thorny115 paths, as they thought them, should come to be "the done thing."
V
The men who could not shirk the choice of Hercules, for other people, were the doctors. The stay of every N.C.O. or man at a base depot85 was on probation116. Each had to go before a Medical Board soon after he came. It adjudged him either T.B. (Temporary Base) or P.B. (Permanent Base). If marked T.B. he went before the Board again once a week, and each time he might be marked T.B. again, or, if his disablement was thought graver or more likely to last, P.B.; or he might be marked A. (Active Service), and then he would join the next draft from home going up to his own battalion118 or another battalion of his regiment119. When once a man was marked P.B. he only went before the Board once a month, and each time he, too, might be marked either P.B., T.B., or A.
Chance relegated120 me once for some weeks to a base and gave me the job of marching parties of crocks, total and partial, real, half-real, and sham121, across the sand dunes122 to the place where the faculty123 did its endeavour to sort them. A picture remains124 of a hut with a long table in it: two middle-aged125 army doctors sitting beyond it, like dons at a Viva, and each of my party in turn taking his stand at attention, my side of the table, facing the Board, like so many Oliver Twists. The presiding officer takes a manifest pride in knowing all the guile126 and subtlety of soldier-men. No taking him in—that is proclaimed in every look and tone. He has had several other parties before him to-day, and the lamp of his faith, never dazzling while these rites127 are on, has burnt low.
"Well, my man—cold feet, I suppose?" he begins, to the first of my lamentable129 party. As some practitioners130 are said to begin all treatments with a prefatory purge131, so would this psychologist start with a good full dose of insult and watch the patient's reaction under the stimulus132.
"No, sir, me 'eart's thrutched up," says the examinee. Then, while the Board perforates him from head to foot for some seconds with a basilisk stare of unbelief, he dribbles133 out at intervals, in a voice that bespeaks134 falling hope, such ineffective addenda135 as "Can't get me sleep" and "Not a smile in me."
"Very picturesque, indeed," says the senior expert in doubting. "We'll see to that 'thrutched' heart of yours. Kardiagraph case. Next man."
The suspect, duly spat136 upon, slinks out. The next man takes his place at the table. The president gives him the Dogberry eye that means: "Masters, it is proved already that you are little better than false knaves137; and it will go near to be thought so shortly." What he says is: "Another old hospital bird? Eh? Now, hadn't you better get back to work before you're in trouble?"
The target of this consputation is almost convinced by its force that he must be guilty of something, if only he knew what it was. Still, he repeats authority's last diagnosis138 as well as he can: "Mine's Arthuritic rheumatism, sir. An' piles."
"Fall out and strip. Next man." While the next is taking his stand the presiding M.O. has been making a note, and does not look up before saying "Well, what's the matter with you—besides rheumatism?"
"No rheumatism, sir. And nothing else." The voice is as stiff as it dares.
The presiding M.O. seems taken aback. Why, here is a fellow not playing up to him! Making a nasty break in the long line of cases that fed his darling cynicism so well! Flat burglary as ever was committed. The second member of the Board comes to life and begins in a tone that savours of dissatisfaction: "Well, you're the first man——"
"I'm an N.C.O., sir." The young lance-sergeant's voice is again about as stiff as is safe. Quite safe, though, this time. For the presiding M.O. is a Regular. Verbal points of military correctitude are the law and the prophets to him. He cannot be wholly sorry when junior colleagues, temporary commissioners139, slip up on even the least of these shreds140 of orange-peel. Like Susan Nipper, he knows his place—"me being a permanency"—and thinks that "temporaries" ought to know theirs. So he amends141 the outsider's false start to: "You're the first N.C.O. or man who has come before us this morning and not said he had rheumatism."
The sergeant, whom I have known for some days as a choleric142 body, holds his tongue, having special reasons just now not to risk a court-martial. "Well," the president snaps as if in resentment143 of this self-control, "what is the matter with you?"
"Fit as can be, sir."
"What are you doing down here, then, away from your unit?"
"Obeying orders of Medical Board, sir. No. 8 General Hospital, December 8."
"Not sorry, either, I daresay," the president mutters, wobbling back towards his first line of approach to the business. "Not very keen to go back up the line, sergeant, eh?"
"It's all I want, sir, thank you." The sergeant puts powerful brakes on his tongue and says only that. But he has sadly disconcerted the faculty. A major with twenty years' service has cast himself for the fine sombre part of recording angel to note all the cowardice144 and mendacity that he can. And here is a minor145 actor forgetting his part and putting everything out. From where I am keeping a wooden face near the door I see opposition146 arising in the heart of the outraged147 psychologist beyond the table.
A sound professional instinct reinforces the personal one. Whenever a soldier goes before a Medical Board it is soon clear that he wants to be thought either less fit than he is or more fit. The doctor's first impulse, as soon as he sees which way the man's wishes tend, is to lean towards the other. And this, in due measure, is just. We all understate or overstate symptoms to our own family doctors according to what we fear or desire. The doctor rightly tries to detect the disturbing force in the patient's mind, and to discount for it duly—just like "laying-off" for a side-wind in shooting. So now the president sees light again. The Board is now out to find the lance-sergeant a crock. "Hold out your wrist," says the senior member. The pulse is jealously felt.
"Rotten!" the senior member says to the junior. Then, penetratingly, to the sergeant: "What's that cicatrix you've got on the back of your hand? Both hands! Show me here."
Two spongy, purplish-red pads of new flesh are inspected. "Burns, scarcely healed!" says the president wrathfully. "Skin just the strength of wet tissue-paper! Man alive, you've a bracelet149 of ulcers150 all round your wrists. Never wash, eh?" When liquid fire flayed151 a man's hands to the sleeve, but not further, the skin was apt to break out, as he recovered, in small, deep boils about the frontier of the new skin and the old. The sergeant does not answer. He wants no capital punishment under the Army act.
"Man's an absolute wreck," says the major. "Debility, wounds imperfectly healed, blood-poisoning likely. Not fit for the line for two months to come. P.B.—eh?" he turns to his junior.
"Next man," says the major. Before the lance-sergeant has quite stalked to the door the major calls after him "Sergeant!"
"Sir?" says the sergeant, furious and red but contained.
"You're a damned good man, but it won't do," says the major. "Good luck to you!" Great are the forces of decent human relentment after a hearty let-out with the temper.
The inquisition proceeds, still on that Baconian principle of finding out which is a man's special bent and then bending the twig153 pretty hard in the other direction; still, too, with the dry light of reason a little suffused154, as Bacon would say, with the humours of the affections, of vanity, ill-temper and impatience155. Nearly everybody is morally weary. Most of the men inspected have outlived the first profuse156 impulse to court more of bodily risk than authority expressly orders. Most of the doctors, living here in the distant rear of the war, have outlived their first generous belief in an almost universally high moral among the men. In the training-camps in 1914 the safe working presumption157 about any unknown man was that he only wanted to get at the enemy as soon as he could. Now the working presumption, the starting hypothesis, is that a man wants to stay in, out of the rain, as long as you let him. Faith has fallen lame128; generosity158 flags; there has entered into the soul as well as the body the malady159 known to athletes as staleness.
VI
The war had more obvious disagreeables, too; you have heard all about them: the quelling160 coldness of frosty nights spent in soaked clothes—for no blankets were brought up to the trenches; the ubiquitous dust and stench of corpses161 and buzzing of millions of corpse-fed flies on summer battle-fields; and so on, and so on—no need to go over the list. But these annoyances162 seemed to me to do less in the way of moulding the men's cast of mind than that general, chronic163 weariness, different from all the common fatigues164 of peace, inasmuch as each instalment of this course of exhaustion165 was not sandwiched in between heavenly contrasts of utter rest before and after—divine sleeps in a bed and dry clothes, and meals on a table, with a white tablecloth166 on it and shiny glasses. It raised some serious thoughts in professional football-players and boxers167 who had believed they were strong, and in navvies and tough mountaineers. You need to know this in order to understand the redoubled ardour with which that capital soldier, the Lancashire miner, has sought the off-day and ensued it since he came back from campaigning abroad.
You need, too, to know it in order to chart out the general post-war condition of mind with its symptoms of apathy168, callousness169, and lassitude. Something has gone to come of it if you have lain for a time in the garden of Proserpine, where the great values decline and faith and high impulse fall in like soufflés grown tepid170, and fatalistic indifference171 comes out of long flat expanses of tiring sameness.
I am tired of tears and laughter,
And men that laugh and weep;
Of what may come hereafter
For men that sow to reap:
I am weary of days and hours,
Blown buds of barren flowers,
Desires and dreams and powers
And everything but sleep.
From too much love of living,
From hope and fear set free,
We thank with brief thanksgiving,
Whatever gods may be,
That no life lives for ever;
That dead men rise up never;
That even the weariest river
Winds somewhere safe to sea.
Heaven forbid that I should impute172 any melodious173 Swinburnian melancholy, or any other form of luxious self-pity, to millions of good fellows still fighting the good fight against circumstance. They would hoot148 at the notion. But in nearly all of them hope has, at some time or other, lost her first innocence174. Time and place came when the spirit, although unbroken, went numb175: the dull mind came to feel as if its business with ardour and choric spheres and quests of Holy Grails, and everything but rest, had been done quite a long while ago. Well chained to an oar117 in the galley176, closely kept to a job in the mine, men caught a touch of the recklessness of the slave—if the world were so foul111, let it go where it chose; they would snatch what they could, when they could; drink, and let the world go round.
It is not sense to hope to reattain at will that deflowered virginity of faith. Others who have it may come in good time to be a majority of us all. Already three yearly "classes" of men who did not suffer that immense loss of experience which came with war service have come of age since the war; the new skin grows over the wounds. But we cannot write off as mere177 dream, with no after effects, the time when it was a kind of trench fashion to meet the demoded oaths of a friend with the dogma that "There is no —— God."
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sergeants
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| 警官( sergeant的名词复数 )； （美国警察）警佐； （英国警察）巡佐； 陆军（或空军）中士 | |
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sergeant
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| n.警官，中士 | |
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mule
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| n.骡子，杂种，执拗的人 | |
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mules
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| 骡( mule的名词复数 )； 拖鞋； 顽固的人； 越境运毒者 | |
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enlist
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| vt.谋取(支持等)，赢得；征募；vi.入伍 | |
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doctrine
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| n.教义；主义；学说 | |
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aggrieved
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| adj.愤愤不平的，受委屈的；悲痛的；（在合法权利方面）受侵害的v.令委屈，令苦恼，侵害( aggrieve的过去式)；令委屈，令苦恼，侵害( aggrieve的过去式和过去分词) | |
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ardent
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| adj.热情的，热烈的，强烈的，烈性的 | |
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recording
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| n.录音，记录 | |
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heinous
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| adj.可憎的，十恶不赦的 | |
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precarious
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| adj.不安定的，靠不住的；根据不足的 | |
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dourly
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penal
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| adj.刑罚的；刑法上的 | |
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crumbling
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| adj.摇摇欲坠的 | |
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gaol
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| n.(jail)监狱；(不加冠词)监禁；vt.使…坐牢 | |
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cantankerous
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| adj.爱争吵的，脾气不好的 | |
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stunts
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| n.惊人的表演( stunt的名词复数 )；（广告中）引人注目的花招；愚蠢行为；危险举动v.阻碍…发育[生长]，抑制，妨碍( stunt的第三人称单数 ) | |
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trench
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| n./v.(挖)沟，(挖)战壕 | |
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warfare
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| n.战争(状态)；斗争；冲突 | |
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doctrinaire
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| adj.空论的 | |
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pervert
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| n.堕落者，反常者；vt.误用，滥用；使人堕落，使入邪路 | |
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passionate
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| adj.热情的，热烈的，激昂的，易动情的，易怒的，性情暴躁的 | |
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plodding
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| a.proceeding in a slow or dull way | |
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plod
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| v.沉重缓慢地走，孜孜地工作 | |
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crabbed
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| adj.脾气坏的；易怒的；（指字迹）难辨认的；（字迹等）难辨认的v.捕蟹( crab的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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narrative
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| n.叙述，故事；adj.叙事的，故事体的 | |
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peevish
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| adj.易怒的，坏脾气的 | |
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28
exalt
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| v.赞扬，歌颂，晋升，提升 | |
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29
bungled
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| v.搞糟，完不成( bungle的过去式和过去分词 )；笨手笨脚地做；失败；完不成 | |
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30
extraordinarily
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| adv.格外地；极端地 | |
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31
picturesque
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| adj.美丽如画的，（语言）生动的，绘声绘色的 | |
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32
miscarriage
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| n.失败，未达到预期的结果；流产 | |
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33
gallant
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| adj.英勇的，豪侠的；(向女人)献殷勤的 | |
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34
muddles
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| v.弄乱，弄糟( muddle的第三人称单数 )；使糊涂；对付，混日子 | |
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35
liquidate
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| v.偿付，清算，扫除；整理，破产 | |
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36
tact
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| n.机敏，圆滑，得体 | |
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37
psychology
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| n.心理，心理学，心理状态 | |
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38
staple
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| n.主要产物，常用品，主要要素，原料，订书钉，钩环；adj.主要的，重要的；vt.分类 | |
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39
sensational
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| adj.使人感动的，非常好的，轰动的，耸人听闻的 | |
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40
pettish
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| adj.易怒的，使性子的 | |
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41
acrid
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| adj.辛辣的，尖刻的，刻薄的 | |
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42
rations
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| 定量( ration的名词复数 )； 配给量； 正常量； 合理的量 | |
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43
dreary
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| adj.令人沮丧的，沉闷的，单调乏味的 | |
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44
fatigue
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| n.疲劳，劳累 | |
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45
infantry
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| n.[总称]步兵(部队) | |
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46
immunity
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| n.优惠；免除；豁免，豁免权 | |
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47
abounded
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| v.大量存在，充满，富于( abound的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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48
sector
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| n.部门，部分；防御地段，防区；扇形 | |
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49
trenches
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| 深沟，地沟( trench的名词复数 )； 战壕 | |
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50
ramble
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|
| v.漫步，漫谈，漫游；n.漫步，闲谈，蔓延 | |
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51
greasy
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| adj. 多脂的，油脂的 | |
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52
plank
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| n.板条，木板，政策要点，政纲条目 | |
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53
gulf
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| n.海湾；深渊，鸿沟；分歧，隔阂 | |
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54
desperately
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| adv.极度渴望地，绝望地，孤注一掷地 | |
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55
skidding
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|
| n.曳出，集材v.（通常指车辆） 侧滑( skid的现在分词 )；打滑；滑行；（住在）贫民区 | |
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56
outwards
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| adj.外面的，公开的，向外的；adv.向外；n.外形 | |
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57
knight
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| n.骑士，武士；爵士 | |
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58
armour
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| （=armor）n.盔甲；装甲部队 | |
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59
agonizing
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| adj.痛苦难忍的；使人苦恼的v.使极度痛苦；折磨(agonize的ing形式) | |
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60
delirium
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| n. 神智昏迷,说胡话;极度兴奋 | |
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61
bully
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| n.恃强欺弱者，小流氓；vt.威胁，欺侮 | |
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62
exhausted
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| adj.极其疲惫的，精疲力尽的 | |
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63
buck
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|
| n.雄鹿，雄兔；v.马离地跳跃 | |
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64
pangs
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| 突然的剧痛( pang的名词复数 )； 悲痛 | |
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65
ginger
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| n.姜，精力，淡赤黄色；adj.淡赤黄色的；vt.使活泼，使有生气 | |
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66
munitions
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| n.军火，弹药；v.供应…军需品 | |
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67
laden
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| adj.装满了的；充满了的；负了重担的；苦恼的 | |
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68
wriggling
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| v.扭动，蠕动，蜿蜒行进( wriggle的现在分词 )；（使身体某一部位）扭动；耍滑不做，逃避（应做的事等）；蠕蠕 | |
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69
consternation
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| n.大为吃惊，惊骇 | |
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70
tangle
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| n.纠缠；缠结；混乱；v.(使)缠绕；变乱 | |
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71
intervals
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|
| n.[军事]间隔( interval的名词复数 )；间隔时间；[数学]区间；（戏剧、电影或音乐会的）幕间休息 | |
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72
premises
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| n.建筑物，房屋 | |
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73
hearty
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| adj.热情友好的；衷心的；尽情的，纵情的 | |
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74
hacks
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| 黑客 | |
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75
languor
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| n.无精力，倦怠 | |
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76
grasshopper
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| n.蚱蜢，蝗虫，蚂蚱 | |
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77
robust
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| adj.强壮的，强健的，粗野的，需要体力的，浓的 | |
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78
subtlety
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| n.微妙，敏锐，精巧；微妙之处，细微的区别 | |
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79
fully
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| adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地 | |
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80
liturgy
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| n.礼拜仪式 | |
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81
defensive
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|
| adj.防御的；防卫的；防守的 | |
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82
lighter
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| n.打火机，点火器；驳船；v.用驳船运送；light的比较级 | |
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83
torment
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|
| n.折磨；令人痛苦的东西(人)；vt.折磨；纠缠 | |
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84
blighting
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| 使凋萎( blight的现在分词 )； 使颓丧； 损害； 妨害 | |
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85
depot
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| n.仓库，储藏处；公共汽车站；火车站 | |
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86
depots
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| 仓库( depot的名词复数 )； 火车站； 车库； 军需库 | |
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87
wreckage
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| n.（失事飞机等的）残骸，破坏，毁坏 | |
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88
smuggled
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| 水货 | |
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89
triumphant
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|
| adj.胜利的，成功的；狂欢的，喜悦的 | |
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90
chuckling
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| 轻声地笑( chuckle的现在分词 ) | |
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91
fretting
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| n. 微振磨损 adj. 烦躁的, 焦虑的 | |
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92
tainted
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|
| adj.腐坏的；污染的；沾污的；感染的v.使变质( taint的过去式和过去分词 )；使污染；败坏；被污染，腐坏，败坏 | |
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93
swelling
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| n.肿胀 | |
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94
unwilling
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| adj.不情愿的 | |
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95
pallid
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|
| adj.苍白的，呆板的 | |
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96
bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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97
melancholy
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| n.忧郁，愁思；adj.令人感伤（沮丧）的，忧郁的 | |
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98
survivor
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| n.生存者，残存者，幸存者 | |
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99
dignified
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| a.可敬的，高贵的 | |
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100
mighty
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| adj.强有力的；巨大的 | |
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101
crooks
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|
| n.骗子( crook的名词复数 )；罪犯；弯曲部分；（牧羊人或主教用的）弯拐杖v.弯成钩形( crook的第三人称单数 ) | |
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102
martial
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|
| adj.战争的，军事的，尚武的，威武的 | |
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103
eyelids
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|
| n.眼睑( eyelid的名词复数 )；眼睛也不眨一下；不露声色；面不改色 | |
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104
bleached
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| 漂白的，晒白的，颜色变浅的 | |
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105
tactician
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| n. 战术家, 策士 | |
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106
conjectural
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|
| adj.推测的 | |
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107
deftly
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|
| adv.灵巧地，熟练地，敏捷地 | |
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108
relinquished
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| 交出，让给( relinquish的过去式和过去分词 )； 放弃 | |
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109
rheumatism
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| n.风湿病 | |
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110
ignoble
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| adj.不光彩的，卑鄙的；可耻的 | |
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111
foul
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|
| adj.污秽的；邪恶的；v.弄脏；妨害；犯规；n.犯规 | |
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112
combustion
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| n.燃烧；氧化；骚动 | |
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113
pervading
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| v.遍及，弥漫( pervade的现在分词 ) | |
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114
primrose
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| n.樱草，最佳部分， | |
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115
thorny
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|
| adj.多刺的，棘手的 | |
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116
probation
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| n.缓刑(期)，(以观后效的)察看；试用(期) | |
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117
oar
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| n.桨，橹，划手；v.划行 | |
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118
battalion
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| n.营；部队；大队(的人) | |
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119
regiment
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| n.团，多数，管理；v.组织，编成团，统制 | |
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120
relegated
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| v.使降级( relegate的过去式和过去分词 )；使降职；转移；把…归类 | |
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121
sham
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| n./adj.假冒(的)，虚伪(的) | |
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122
dunes
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| 沙丘( dune的名词复数 ) | |
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123
faculty
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| n.才能；学院，系；(学院或系的)全体教学人员 | |
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124
remains
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| n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹 | |
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125
middle-aged
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| adj.中年的 | |
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126
guile
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| n.诈术 | |
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127
rites
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| 仪式，典礼( rite的名词复数 ) | |
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128
lame
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| adj.跛的，(辩解、论据等)无说服力的 | |
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129
lamentable
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| adj.令人惋惜的，悔恨的 | |
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130
practitioners
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| n.习艺者，实习者( practitioner的名词复数 )；从业者（尤指医师） | |
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131
purge
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| n.整肃，清除，泻药，净化；vt.净化，清除，摆脱；vi.清除，通便，腹泻，变得清洁 | |
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132
stimulus
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| n.刺激，刺激物，促进因素，引起兴奋的事物 | |
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133
dribbles
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| n.涓滴( dribble的名词复数 )；细滴；少量（液体）v.流口水( dribble的第三人称单数 )；（使液体）滴下或作细流；运球，带球 | |
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134
bespeaks
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| v.预定( bespeak的第三人称单数 )；订（货）；证明；预先请求 | |
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135
addenda
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|
| n.附录，附加物；附加物( addendum的名词复数 )；补遗；附录；（齿轮的）齿顶（高） | |
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136
spat
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| n.口角，掌击；v.发出呼噜呼噜声 | |
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137
knaves
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| n.恶棍，无赖( knave的名词复数 )；（纸牌中的）杰克 | |
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138
diagnosis
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| n.诊断，诊断结果，调查分析，判断 | |
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139
commissioners
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|
| n.专员( commissioner的名词复数 )；长官；委员；政府部门的长官 | |
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140
shreds
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|
| v.撕碎，切碎( shred的第三人称单数 )；用撕毁机撕毁（文件） | |
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141
amends
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| n. 赔偿 | |
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142
choleric
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|
| adj.易怒的，性情暴躁的 | |
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143
resentment
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| n.怨愤，忿恨 | |
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144
cowardice
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| n.胆小，怯懦 | |
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145
minor
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| adj.较小(少)的，较次要的；n.辅修学科；vi.辅修 | |
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146
opposition
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| n.反对，敌对 | |
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147
outraged
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| a.震惊的，义愤填膺的 | |
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148
hoot
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| n.鸟叫声，汽车的喇叭声； v.使汽车鸣喇叭 | |
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149
bracelet
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| n.手镯，臂镯 | |
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150
ulcers
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|
| n.溃疡( ulcer的名词复数 )；腐烂物；道德败坏；腐败 | |
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151
flayed
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| v.痛打( flay的过去式和过去分词 )；把…打得皮开肉绽；剥（通常指动物）的皮；严厉批评 | |
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152
concurs
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| 同意（concur的第三人称单数形式） | |
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153
twig
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| n.小树枝，嫩枝；v.理解 | |
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154
suffused
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| v.（指颜色、水气等）弥漫于，布满( suffuse的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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155
impatience
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| n.不耐烦，急躁 | |
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156
profuse
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| adj.很多的，大量的，极其丰富的 | |
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157
presumption
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| n.推测，可能性，冒昧，放肆，[法律]推定 | |
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158
generosity
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| n.大度，慷慨，慷慨的行为 | |
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159
malady
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| n.病，疾病(通常做比喻) | |
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160
quelling
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| v.（用武力）制止，结束，镇压( quell的现在分词 ) | |
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161
corpses
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| n.死尸，尸体( corpse的名词复数 ) | |
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162
annoyances
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| n.恼怒( annoyance的名词复数 )；烦恼；打扰；使人烦恼的事 | |
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163
chronic
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| adj.(疾病)长期未愈的，慢性的；极坏的 | |
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164
fatigues
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| n.疲劳( fatigue的名词复数 )；杂役；厌倦；（士兵穿的）工作服 | |
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165
exhaustion
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| n.耗尽枯竭，疲惫，筋疲力尽，竭尽，详尽无遗的论述 | |
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166
tablecloth
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| n.桌布，台布 | |
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167
boxers
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| n.拳击短裤；（尤指职业）拳击手( boxer的名词复数 )；拳师狗 | |
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168
apathy
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| n.漠不关心，无动于衷；冷淡 | |
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169
callousness
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170
tepid
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| adj.微温的，温热的，不太热心的 | |
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171
indifference
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| n.不感兴趣，不关心，冷淡，不在乎 | |
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172
impute
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| v.归咎于 | |
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173
melodious
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| adj.旋律美妙的，调子优美的，音乐性的 | |
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174
innocence
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| n.无罪；天真；无害 | |
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175
numb
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| adj.麻木的，失去感觉的；v.使麻木 | |
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176
galley
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| n.（飞机或船上的）厨房单层甲板大帆船；军舰舰长用的大划艇； | |
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mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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