Chapter 1

 Everything was perfectly¹ swell².

 

There were no prisons, no slums, no insane asylums³, no cripples, no poverty, no wars.

 

All diseases were conquered. So was old age.

 

Death, barring accidents, was an adventure for volunteers.

 

The population of the United States was stabilized⁴ at forty-million souls.

 

One bright morning in the Chicago Lying-in Hospital, a man named Edward K. Wehling, Jr., waited for his wife to give birth. He was the only man waiting. Not many people were born a day any more.

 

Wehling was fifty-six, a mere⁵ stripling in a population whose average age was one hundred and twenty-nine.

 

X-rays had revealed that his wife was going to have triplets. The children would be his first.

 

Young Wehling was hunched⁶ in his chair, his head in his hand. He was so rumpled⁷, so still and colorless as to be virtually invisible. His camouflage⁸ was perfect, since the waiting room had a disorderly and demoralized air, too. Chairs and ashtrays⁹ had been moved away from the walls. The floor was paved with spattered dropcloths.

 

The room was being redecorated. It was being redecorated as a memorial to a man who had volunteered to die.

 

A sardonic¹⁰ old man, about two hundred years old, sat on a stepladder, painting a mural he did not like. Back in the days when people aged¹¹ visibly, his age would have been guessed at thirty-five or so. Aging had touched him that much before the cure for aging was found.

 

The mural he was working on depicted¹² a very neat garden. Men and women in white, doctors and nurses, turned the soil, planted seedlings¹³, sprayed bugs¹⁴, spread fertilizer.

 

Men and women in purple uniforms pulled up weeds, cut down plants that were old and sickly, raked leaves, carried refuse to trash-burners.

 

Never, never, never—not even in medieval Holland nor old Japan—had a garden been more formal, been better tended. Every plant had all the loam¹⁵, light, water, air and nourishment¹⁶ it could use.

 

A hospital orderly came down the corridor, singing under his breath a popular song:

 

If you don't like my kisses, honey,

Here's what I will do:

I'll go see a girl in purple,

Kiss this sad world toodle-oo.

If you don't want my lovin',

Why should I take up all this space?

I'll get off this old planet,

Let some sweet baby have my place.

The orderly looked in at the mural and the muralist. "Looks so real," he said, "I can practically imagine I'm standing¹⁷ in the middle of it."

 

"What makes you think you're not in it?" said the painter. He gave a satiric¹⁸ smile. "It's called 'The Happy Garden of Life,' you know."

 

"That's good of Dr. Hitz," said the orderly.

 

1 perfectly   

adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地

参考例句：

• The witnesses were each perfectly certain of what they said.证人们个个对自己所说的话十分肯定。
• Everything that we're doing is all perfectly above board.我们做的每件事情都是光明正大的。

2 swell   

vi.膨胀，肿胀；增长，增强

参考例句：

• The waves had taken on a deep swell.海浪汹涌。
• His injured wrist began to swell.他那受伤的手腕开始肿了。

3 asylums   

n.避难所( asylum的名词复数 )；庇护；政治避难；精神病院

参考例句：

• No wonder Mama says love drives people into asylums. 难怪南蛮妈妈说，爱情会让人变成疯子。 来自互联网

4 stabilized   

v.（使）稳定， （使）稳固( stabilize的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• The patient's condition stabilized. 患者的病情稳定下来。
• His blood pressure has stabilized. 他的血压已经稳定下来了。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》

5 mere   

adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过

参考例句：

• That is a mere repetition of what you said before.那不过是重复了你以前讲的话。
• It's a mere waste of time waiting any longer.再等下去纯粹是浪费时间。

6 hunched   

（常指因寒冷、生病或愁苦）耸肩弓身的，伏首前倾的

参考例句：

• He sat with his shoulders hunched up. 他耸起双肩坐着。
• Stephen hunched down to light a cigarette. 斯蒂芬弓着身子点燃一支烟。

7 rumpled   

v.弄皱，使凌乱( rumple的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• She rumpled his hair playfully. 她顽皮地弄乱他的头发。
• The bed was rumpled and strewn with phonograph records. 那张床上凌乱不堪，散放着一些唱片。 来自辞典例句

8 camouflage   

n./v.掩饰，伪装

参考例句：

• The white fur of the polar bear is a natural camouflage.北极熊身上的白色的浓密软毛是一种天然的伪装。
• The animal's markings provide effective camouflage.这种动物身上的斑纹是很有效的伪装。

9 ashtrays   

烟灰缸( ashtray的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• A simple question: why are there ashtrays in a no-smoking restaurant? 问题是：一个禁止吸烟的餐厅为什么会有烟灰缸呢？
• Avoid temptation by throwing away all cigarettes, lighters and ashtrays. 把所有的香烟，打火机，和烟灰缸扔掉以避免引诱。

10 sardonic   

adj.嘲笑的，冷笑的，讥讽的

参考例句：

• She gave him a sardonic smile.她朝他讥讽地笑了一笑。
• There was a sardonic expression on her face.她脸上有一种嘲讽的表情。

11 aged   

adj.年老的，陈年的

参考例句：

• He had put on weight and aged a little.他胖了，也老点了。
• He is aged,but his memory is still good.他已年老，然而记忆力还好。

12 depicted   

描绘，描画( depict的过去式和过去分词 )； 描述

参考例句：

• Other animals were depicted on the periphery of the group. 其他动物在群像的外围加以修饰。
• They depicted the thrilling situation to us in great detail. 他们向我们详细地描述了那激动人心的场面。

13 seedlings   

n.刚出芽的幼苗( seedling的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Ninety-five per cent of the new seedlings have survived. 新栽的树苗95%都已成活。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》
• In such wet weather we must prevent the seedlings from rotting. 这样的阴雨天要防止烂秧。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》

14 bugs   

adj.疯狂的，发疯的n.窃听器( bug的名词复数 )；病菌；虫子；[计算机]（制作软件程序所产生的意料不到的）错误

参考例句：

• All programs have bugs and need endless refinement. 所有的程序都有漏洞，都需要不断改进。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The sacks of rice were swarming with bugs. 一袋袋的米里长满了虫子。 来自《简明英汉词典》

15 loam   

n.沃土

参考例句：

• Plant the seeds in good loam.把种子种在好的壤土里。
• One occupies relatively dry sandy loam soils.一个则占据较干旱的沙壤土。

16 nourishment   

n.食物，营养品；营养情况

参考例句：

• Lack of proper nourishment reduces their power to resist disease.营养不良降低了他们抵抗疾病的能力。
• He ventured that plants draw part of their nourishment from the air.他大胆提出植物从空气中吸收部分养分的观点。

17 standing   

n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的

参考例句：

• After the earthquake only a few houses were left standing.地震过后只有几幢房屋还立着。
• They're standing out against any change in the law.他们坚决反对对法律做任何修改。

18 satiric   

adj.讽刺的，挖苦的

参考例句：

• Looking at her satiric parent she only gave a little laugh.她望着她那挖苦人的父亲，只讪讪地笑了一下。
• His satiric poem spared neither the politicians nor the merchants.政客们和商人们都未能免于遭受他的诗篇的讽刺。