—Pudd’nhead Wilson’s New Calendar.
Toward midnight, that night, there was another function. This was a Hindoo wedding—no, I think it was a betrothal1 ceremony. Always before, we had driven through streets that were multitudinous and tumultuous with picturesque2 native life, but now there was nothing of that. We seemed to move through a city of the dead. There was hardly a suggestion of life in those still and vacant streets. Even the crows were silent. But everywhere on the ground lay sleeping natives-hundreds and hundreds. They lay stretched at full length and tightly wrapped in blankets, heads and all. Their attitude and their rigidity3 counterfeited5 death.
The plague was not in Bombay then, but it is devastating6 the city now. The shops are deserted7, now, half of the people have fled, and of the remainder the smitten8 perish by shoals every day. No doubt the city looks now in the daytime as it looked then at night. When we had pierced deep into the native quarter and were threading its narrow dim lanes, we had to go carefully, for men were stretched asleep all about and there was hardly room to drive between them. And every now and then a swarm10 of rats would scamper11 across past the horses’ feet in the vague light—the forbears of the rats that are carrying the plague from house to house in Bombay now. The shops were but sheds, little booths open to the street; and the goods had been removed, and on the counters families were sleeping, usually with an oil lamp present. Recurrent dead watches, it looked like.
But at last we turned a corner and saw a great glare of light ahead. It was the home of the bride, wrapped in a perfect conflagration12 of illuminations,—mainly gas-work designs, gotten up specially13 for the occasion. Within was abundance of brilliancy—flames, costumes, colors, decorations, mirrors—it was another Aladdin show.
The bride was a trim and comely14 little thing of twelve years, dressed as we would dress a boy, though more expensively than we should do it, of course. She moved about very much at her ease, and stopped and talked with the guests and allowed her wedding jewelry15 to be examined. It was very fine. Particularly a rope of great diamonds, a lovely thing to look at and handle. It had a great emerald hanging to it.
The bridegroom was not present. He was having betrothal festivities of his own at his father’s house. As I understood it, he and the bride were to entertain company every night and nearly all night for a week or more, then get married, if alive. Both of the children were a little elderly, as brides and grooms16 go, in India—twelve; they ought to have been married a year or two sooner; still to a stranger twelve seems quite young enough.
A while after midnight a couple of celebrated17 and high-priced nautch-girls appeared in the gorgeous place, and danced and sang. With them were men who played upon strange instruments which made uncanny noises of a sort to make one’s flesh creep.
One of these instruments was a pipe, and to its music the girls went through a performance which represented snake charming. It seemed a doubtful sort of music to charm anything with, but a native gentleman assured me that snakes like it and will come out of their holes and listen to it with every evidence of refreshment18 and gratitude19. He said that at an entertainment in his grounds once, the pipe brought out half a dozen snakes, and the music had to be stopped before they would be persuaded to go. Nobody wanted their company, for they were bold, familiar, and dangerous; but no one would kill them, of course, for it is sinful for a Hindoo to kill any kind of a creature.
We withdrew from the festivities at two in the morning. Another picture, then—but it has lodged20 itself in my memory rather as a stage-scene than as a reality. It is of a porch and short flight of steps crowded with dark faces and ghostly-white draperies flooded with the strong glare from the dazzling concentration of illuminations; and midway of the steps one conspicuous21 figure for accent—a turbaned giant, with a name according to his size: Rao Bahadur Baskirao Balinkanje Pitale, Vakeel to his Highness the Gaikwar of Baroda. Without him the picture would not have been complete; and if his name had been merely Smith, he wouldn’t have answered. Close at hand on house-fronts on both sides of the narrow street were illuminations of a kind commonly employed by the natives—scores of glass tumblers (containing tapers) fastened a few inches apart all over great latticed frames, forming starry22 constellations23 which showed out vividly24 against their black backgrounds. As we drew away into the distance down the dim lanes the illuminations gathered together into a single mass, and glowed out of the enveloping25 darkness like a sun.
Then again the deep silence, the skurrying rats, the dim forms stretched everywhere on the ground; and on either hand those open booths counterfeiting26 sepulchres, with counterfeit4 corpses27 sleeping motionless in the flicker28 of the counterfeit death lamps. And now, a year later, when I read the cablegrams I seem to be reading of what I myself partly saw—saw before it happened—in a prophetic dream, as it were. One cablegram says, “Business in the native town is about suspended. Except the wailing29 and the tramp of the funerals. There is but little life or movement. The closed shops exceed in number those that remain open.” Another says that 325,000 of the people have fled the city and are carrying the plague to the country. Three days later comes the news, “The population is reduced by half.” The refugees have carried the disease to Karachi; “220 cases, 214 deaths.” A day or two later, “52 fresh cases, all of which proved fatal.”
The plague carries with it a terror which no other disease can excite; for of all diseases known to men it is the deadliest—by far the deadliest. “Fifty-two fresh cases—all fatal.” It is the Black Death alone that slays30 like that. We can all imagine, after a fashion, the desolation of a plague-stricken city, and the stupor31 of stillness broken at intervals32 by distant bursts of wailing, marking the passing of funerals, here and there and yonder, but I suppose it is not possible for us to realize to ourselves the nightmare of dread33 and fear that possesses the living who are present in such a place and cannot get away. That half million fled from Bombay in a wild panic suggests to us something of what they were feeling, but perhaps not even they could realize what the half million were feeling whom they left stranded34 behind to face the stalking horror without chance of escape. Kinglake was in Cairo many years ago during an epidemic35 of the Black Death, and he has imagined the terrors that creep into a man’s heart at such a time and follow him until they themselves breed the fatal sign in the armpit, and then the delirium36 with confused images, and home-dreams, and reeling billiard-tables, and then the sudden blank of death:
“To the contagionist, filled as he is with the dread of final causes, having no faith in destiny, nor in the fixed37 will of God, and with none of the devil-may-care indifference38 which might stand him instead of creeds—to such one, every rag that shivers in the breeze of a plague-stricken city has this sort of sublimity39. If by any terrible ordinance40 he be forced to venture forth41, he sees death dangling42 from every sleeve; and, as he creeps forward, he poises43 his shuddering44 limbs between the imminent45 jacket that is stabbing at his right elbow and the murderous pelisse that threatens to mow46 him clean down as it sweeps along on his left. But most of all he dreads47 that which most of all he should love—the touch of a woman’s dress; for mothers and wives, hurrying forth on kindly48 errands from the bedsides of the dying, go slouching along through the streets more willfully and less courteously49 than the men. For a while it may be that the caution of the poor Levantine may enable him to avoid contact, but sooner or later, perhaps, the dreaded50 chance arrives; that bundle of linen51, with the dark tearful eyes at the top of it, that labors52 along with the voluptuous53 clumsiness of Grisi—she has touched the poor Levantine with the hem9 of her sleeve! From that dread moment his peace is gone; his mind for ever hanging upon the fatal touch invites the blow which he fears; he watches for the symptoms of plague so carefully, that sooner or later they come in truth. The parched54 mouth is a sign—his mouth is parched; the throbbing56 brain—his brain does throb55; the rapid pulse—he touches his own wrist (for he dares not ask counsel of any man lest he be deserted), he touches his wrist, and feels how his frighted blood goes galloping57 out of his heart. There is nothing but the fatal swelling58 that is wanting to make his sad conviction complete; immediately, he has an odd feel under the arm—no pain, but a little straining of the skin; he would to God it were his fancy that were strong enough to give him that sensation; this is the worst of all. It now seems to him that he could be happy and contented59 with his parched mouth, and his throbbing brain, and his rapid pulse, if only he could know that there were no swelling under the left arm; but dares he try?—in a moment of calmness and deliberation he dares not; but when for a while he has writhed60 under the torture of suspense61, a sudden strength of will drives him to seek and know his fate; he touches the gland62, and finds the skin sane63 and sound but under the cuticle64 there lies a small lump like a pistol-bullet, that moves as he pushes it. Oh! but is this for all certainty, is this the sentence of death? Feel the gland of the other arm. There is not the same lump exactly, yet something a little like it. Have not some people glands65 naturally enlarged?—would to heaven he were one! So he does for himself the work of the plague, and when the Angel of Death thus courted does indeed and in truth come, he has only to finish that which has been so well begun; he passes his fiery66 hand over the brain of the victim, and lets him rave67 for a season, but all chance-wise, of people and things once dear, or of people and things indifferent. Once more the poor fellow is back at his home in fair Provence, and sees the sundial that stood in his childhood’s garden—sees his mother, and the long-since forgotten face of that little dear sister—(he sees her, he says, on a Sunday morning, for all the church bells are ringing); he looks up and down through the universe, and owns it well piled with bales upon bales of cotton, and cotton eternal—so much so that he feels—he knows—he swears he could make that winning hazard, if the billiard-table would not slant68 upwards69, and if the cue were a cue worth playing with; but it is not—it’s a cue that won’t move—his own arm won’t move—in short, there’s the devil to pay in the brain of the poor Levantine; and perhaps, the next night but one he becomes the ‘life and the soul’ of some squalling jackal family, who fish him out by the foot from his shallow and sandy grave.”
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1
betrothal
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| n. 婚约, 订婚 | |
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2
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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3
rigidity
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| adj.钢性，坚硬 | |
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counterfeit
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| vt.伪造，仿造；adj.伪造的，假冒的 | |
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counterfeited
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| v.仿制，造假( counterfeit的过去分词 ) | |
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6
devastating
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| adj.毁灭性的，令人震惊的，强有力的 | |
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7
deserted
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| adj.荒芜的，荒废的，无人的，被遗弃的 | |
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8
smitten
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| 猛打，重击，打击( smite的过去分词 ) | |
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hem
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| n.贴边，镶边；vt.缝贴边；(in)包围，限制 | |
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10
swarm
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| n.(昆虫)等一大群；vi.成群飞舞；蜂拥而入 | |
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scamper
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| v.奔跑，快跑 | |
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conflagration
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| n.建筑物或森林大火 | |
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13
specially
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| adv.特定地；特殊地；明确地 | |
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14
comely
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| adj.漂亮的，合宜的 | |
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jewelry
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| n.（jewllery）（总称）珠宝 | |
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16
grooms
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| n.新郎( groom的名词复数 )；马夫v.照料或梳洗（马等）( groom的第三人称单数 )；使做好准备；训练；（给动物）擦洗 | |
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17
celebrated
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| adj.有名的，声誉卓著的 | |
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refreshment
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| n.恢复，精神爽快，提神之事物；（复数）refreshments:点心，茶点 | |
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19
gratitude
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| adj.感激，感谢 | |
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20
lodged
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| v.存放( lodge的过去式和过去分词 )；暂住；埋入；（权利、权威等）归属 | |
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21
conspicuous
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| adj.明眼的，惹人注目的；炫耀的，摆阔气的 | |
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starry
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| adj.星光照耀的, 闪亮的 | |
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23
constellations
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| n.星座( constellation的名词复数 )；一群杰出人物；一系列（相关的想法、事物）；一群（相关的人） | |
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vividly
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| adv.清楚地，鲜明地，生动地 | |
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enveloping
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| v.包围，笼罩，包住( envelop的现在分词 ) | |
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counterfeiting
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| n.伪造v.仿制，造假( counterfeit的现在分词 ) | |
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27
corpses
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| n.死尸，尸体( corpse的名词复数 ) | |
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28
flicker
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| vi./n.闪烁，摇曳，闪现 | |
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29
wailing
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| v.哭叫，哀号( wail的现在分词 )；沱 | |
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30
slays
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| 杀死，宰杀，杀戮( slay的第三人称单数 ) | |
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stupor
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| v.昏迷；不省人事 | |
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32
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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33
dread
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| vt.担忧，忧虑；惧怕，不敢；n.担忧，畏惧 | |
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stranded
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| a.搁浅的，进退两难的 | |
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epidemic
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| n.流行病；盛行；adj.流行性的，流传极广的 | |
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delirium
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| n. 神智昏迷,说胡话;极度兴奋 | |
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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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38
indifference
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| n.不感兴趣，不关心，冷淡，不在乎 | |
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39
sublimity
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| 崇高，庄严，气质高尚 | |
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40
ordinance
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| n.法令；条令；条例 | |
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41
forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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42
dangling
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| 悬吊着( dangle的现在分词 )； 摆动不定； 用某事物诱惑…； 吊胃口 | |
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43
poises
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| 使平衡( poise的第三人称单数 )； 保持（某种姿势）； 抓紧； 使稳定 | |
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44
shuddering
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| v.战栗( shudder的现在分词 )；发抖；（机器、车辆等）突然震动；颤动 | |
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45
imminent
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| adj.即将发生的，临近的，逼近的 | |
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46
mow
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| v.割（草、麦等），扫射，皱眉；n.草堆，谷物堆 | |
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47
dreads
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| n.恐惧，畏惧( dread的名词复数 )；令人恐惧的事物v.害怕，恐惧，担心( dread的第三人称单数 ) | |
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48
kindly
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| adj.和蔼的，温和的，爽快的；adv.温和地，亲切地 | |
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49
courteously
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| adv.有礼貌地，亲切地 | |
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50
dreaded
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| adj.令人畏惧的；害怕的v.害怕，恐惧，担心( dread的过去式和过去分词) | |
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51
linen
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| n.亚麻布，亚麻线，亚麻制品；adj.亚麻布制的，亚麻的 | |
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52
labors
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| v.努力争取(for)( labor的第三人称单数 )；苦干；详细分析；（指引擎）缓慢而困难地运转 | |
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53
voluptuous
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| adj.肉欲的，骄奢淫逸的 | |
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54
parched
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| adj.焦干的；极渴的；v.（使）焦干 | |
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55
throb
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| v.震颤，颤动；(急速强烈地)跳动，搏动 | |
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throbbing
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| a. 跳动的,悸动的 | |
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57
galloping
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| adj. 飞驰的, 急性的 动词gallop的现在分词形式 | |
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swelling
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| n.肿胀 | |
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contented
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| adj.满意的，安心的，知足的 | |
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writhed
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| （因极度痛苦而）扭动或翻滚( writhe的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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61
suspense
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| n.（对可能发生的事）紧张感，担心，挂虑 | |
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gland
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| n.腺体，(机)密封压盖，填料盖 | |
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sane
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| adj.心智健全的，神志清醒的，明智的，稳健的 | |
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cuticle
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| n.表皮 | |
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glands
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| n.腺( gland的名词复数 ) | |
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66
fiery
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| adj.燃烧着的，火红的；暴躁的；激烈的 | |
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rave
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| vi.胡言乱语；热衷谈论；n.热情赞扬 | |
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slant
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| v.倾斜，倾向性地编写或报道；n.斜面，倾向 | |
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upwards
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| adv.向上，在更高处...以上 | |
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