The soul’s loneliness — My mother and her death-A mother’s love for her son — Her character-Anecdotes-A mystery and a revelation — The autumnal migration1 of birds — Moonlight vigils — My absent brother’s return — He introduces me to Darwin’s works — A new philosophy of life — Conclusion.
The mournful truth that a man — every man-must die alone, had been thrust sharply into my mind and kept there by the frequent violent attacks of my malady2 I suffered at that time, every one of which threatened to be the last. And this sense and apprehension3 of loneliness at the moment of the severance4 of all earthly ties and parting with light and life, was perhaps the cause of the idea or notion which possessed6 me, that in all our most intimate thoughts and reflections concerning our destiny and our deepest emotions, we are and must be alone. Anyhow, in so far as these matters are concerned, I never had nor desired a confidant. In this connection I recall the last words spoken to me by my younger brother, the being I loved best on earth at that time and the one I had been more intimate with than with any other person I have ever known. This was after the dark days and years had been overpass8, when I had had long periods of fairly good health and had known happiness in the solitary9 places I loved to haunt, communing with wild nature, with wild birds for company.
He was with me in the ship in which I had taken my passage “home,” as I insisted on calling England, to his amusement, and when we had grasped hands for the last time and had said our last good-bye, he added this one more last word: “Of all the people I have ever known you are the only one I don’t know.”
It was a word, I imagine, never spoken by a mother of a loved son, her insight, born of her exceeding love, being so much greater than that of the closest friend and brother. I never breathed a word of my doubts and mental agonizing10 to my mother; I spoke7 to her only of my bodily sufferings; yet she knew it all, and I knew that she knew. And because she knew and understood the temper of my mind as well, she never questioned, never probed, but invariably when alone with me she would with infinite tenderness in her manner touch on spiritual things and tell me of her own state, the consolations11 of her faith which gave her peace and strength in all our reverses and anxieties.
I knew, too, that her concern at my state was the greater because it was not her first experience of a trouble of this kind. My elder long-absent brother had scarcely ceased to be a boy before throwing off all belief in the Christian13 creed14 and congratulating himself on having got rid of old wives’ fables15, as he scornfully expressed it. But never a word did he say to her of this change, and without a word she knew it, and when she spoke to us on the subject nearest to her heart and he listened in respectful silence, she knew the thought and feeling — that was in him-that he loved her above everybody but was free of her creed.
He had been able to cast it off with a light heart because of his perfect health, since in that condition death is not in the mind — the mind refuses to admit the thought of it, so remote is it in that state that we regard ourselves as practically immortal16. And, untroubled by that thought, the mind is clear and vigorous and unfettered. What, I have asked myself, even when striving after faith, would faith in another world have mattered to me if I had not been suddenly sentenced to an early death, when the whole desire of my soul was life, nothing but life — to live for ever!
Then my mother died. Her perfect health failed her suddenly, and her decline was not long. But she suffered much, and on the last occasion of my being with her at her bedside she told me that she was very tired and had no fear of death, and would be glad to go but for the thought of leaving me in such a precarious17 state of health and with a mind distressed18. Even then she put no questions to me, but only expressed the hope that her prayers for me would be answered and that at the last we should be together again.
I cannot say, as I might say in the case of any other relation or friend, that I had lost her. A mother’s love for the child of her body differs essentially19 from all other affections, and burns with so clear and steady a flame that it appears like the one unchangeable thing in this earthly mutable life, so that when she is no longer present it is still a light to our steps and a consolation12.
It came to me as a great surprise a few years ago to have my secret and most cherished feelings about my own mother expressed to me as I had never heard them expressed before by a friend who, albeit20 still young, has made himself a name in the world, one who had never known a mother, she having died during his infancy21. He lamented22 that it had been so, not only on account of the motherless childhood and boyhood he had known, but chiefly because in after life it was borne in on him that he had been deprived of something infinitely23 precious which others have — the enduring and sustaining memory of a love which is unlike any other love known to mortals, and is almost a sense and prescience of immortality24.
In reading, nothing goes to my heart like any true account of a mother and son’s love for one another, such as we find in that true book I have already spoken of in a former chapter, Serge Aksakoff’s History of my Childhood. Of other books I may cite Leigh Hunt’s Autobiography25 in the early chapters. Reading the incidents he records of his mother’s love and pity for all in trouble and her self-sacrificing acts, I have exclaimed: “How like my mother! It is just how she would have acted!” I will give an instance here of her loving-kindness.
Some days after her death I had occasion to go to the house of one of our native neighbours — the humble26 rancho of poor people. It was not in my mind at the moment that I had not seen these people since my mother died, and on coming into the living-room the old mother of the family, who had grandchildren of my age, rose from her seat with tottering27 steps to meet me, and taking my hand in hers, with tears streaming from her eyes, cried: “She has left us! She who called me mother on account of my years and her loving heart. It was she who was my mother and the mother of us all. What shall we do without her?”
Only after going out and getting on my horse it occurred to me that the old woman’s memory went back to the time when she first knew my mother, a girl-wife, many years before I was born. She could remember numerous acts of love and compassion28: that when one of her daughters died in childbirth in that very house, my mother, who was just then nursing me, went to give them whatever aid and comfort she could, and finding the child alive, took it home and nursed it, with me, at her own breasts for several days until a nurse was found.
From the time when I began to think for myself I used to wonder at her tolerance29; for she was a saint in her life, spiritually-minded in the highest degree. To her, a child of New England parents and ancestors, reared in an intensely religious atmosphere, the people of the pampas among whom her lot was cast must have appeared almost like the inhabitants of another world. They were as strange to her soul, morally and spiritually, as they were unlike her own people outwardly in language, dress, and customs. Yet she was able to affiliate30 with them, to visit and sit at ease with them in their lowliest ranches31, interesting herself as much in their affairs as if she belonged to them. This sympathy and freedom endeared her to them, and it was a grief to some who were much attached to her that she was not of their faith. She was a Protestant, and what that exactly meant they didn’t know, but they supposed it was something very bad. Protestants, some of them held, had been concerned in the crucifixion of the Saviour32; at all events, they would not go to mass or confessional, and despised the saints, those glorified33 beings who, under the Queen of Heaven, and with the angels, were the guardians34 of Christian souls in this life and their intercessors in the next. They were anxious to save her, and when I was born, the same old dame35 I have told about a page or two back, finding that I had come into the world on St. Dominic’s Day, set herself to persuade my mother to name me after that saint, that being the religious custom of the country. For if they should succeed in this it would be taken as a sign of grace, that she was not a despiser of the saints and her case hopeless. But my mother had already fixed36 on a name for me and would not change it for another, even to please her poor neighbours — certainly not for such a name as Dominic; perhaps there is not one in the calendar more obnoxious37 to heretics of all denominations38.
They were much hurt-it was the only hurt she ever caused them-and the old dame and some of her people, who had thought the scheme too good to be dropped altogether, insisted always on calling me Dominic!
My mother’s sympathy and love for everybody appeared, too, in the hospitality she delighted to exercise. That, indeed, was the common virtue39 of the country, especially in the native population; but from all my experience during my wanderings on these great plains in subsequent years, when every night would find me a guest in a different establishment, I never saw anything quite on a par5 with my parents’ hospitality. Nothing seemed to make them happier than having strangers and travellers taking their rest with us; there were also a good number of persons who were accustomed to make periodical visits to the city from the southern part of the province who, after a night with us, with perhaps half a day’s rest to follow, would make our house a regular resting-place. But no distinctions were made. The poorest, even men who would be labelled tramps in England, travellers on foot perhaps where cattle made it dangerous to be on foot, would be made as welcome as those of a better class. Our delight as children, loving fun too well, was when we had a guest of this humble description at the supper-table. Settling down in our places at the long table laden40 with good things, a stern admonitory glance from our father would let us into the secret of the new guest’s status — his unsuitability to his surroundings. It was great fun to watch him furtively41 and listen to his blundering conversational42 efforts, but we knew that the least sound of a titter on our part would have been an unpardonable offence. The poor and more uncouth43, or ridiculous, from our childish point of view, they appeared, the more anxious my mother would be to put them at their ease. And she would sometimes say to us afterwards that she could not laugh with us because she remembered the poor fellow probably had a mother somewhere in a distant country who was perhaps thinking of him at the very time he was at the table with us, and hoping and praying that in his wanderings he would meet with some who would be kind to him.
I remember many of these chance guests, and will give a particular account of one — the guest and the evening we passed in his company — as this survives with a peculiar44 freshness in my memory, and it was also a cherished recollection of my mother’s.
I was then nine or ten years old, and our guest was a young Spanish gentleman, singularly handsome, with a most engaging expression and manner. He was on a journey from Buenos Ayres to a part in our province some sixty or seventy leagues further south, and after asking permission to pass the night at our house, he explained that he had only one horse, as he liked that way of travelling rather than the native way of driving a tropilla before him, going at a furious gallop45 from dawn to dark, and changing horses every three or four leagues. Having but one horse, he had to go in a leisurely46 way with many rests, and he liked to call at many houses every day just to talk with the people.
After supper, during which he charmed us with his conversation and pure Castilian, which was like music as he spoke it, we formed a circle before a wood fire in the dining-room and made him take the middle seat. For he had confessed that he performed on the guitar, and we all wanted to sit where we could see as well as listen. He tuned47 the instrument in a leisurely way, pausing often to continue the conversation with my parents, until at last, seeing how eager we all were, he began to play, and his music and style were strange to us, for he had no jigging48 tunes49 with fantastic flights and flourishes so much affected50 by our native guitarists. It was beautiful but serious music.
Then came another long pause and he talked again, and said the pieces he had been playing were composed by his chief favourite, Sarasate. He said that Sarasate had been one of the most famous guitarists in Spain, and had composed a good deal of music for the guitar before he had given it up for the violin. As a violinist he would win a European reputation, but in Spain they were sorry that he had abandoned the national instrument.
All he said was interesting, but we wanted more and more of his music, and he played less and less and at longer intervals52, and at last he put the guitar down, and turning to my parents, said with a smile that he begged to be excused — that he could play no more for thinking. He owed it to them, he said, to tell them what he was thinking about; they would then know how much they had done for his pleasure that evening and how he appreciated it. He was, he continued, one of a large family, very united, all living with their parents at home; and in winter, which was cold in his part of Spain, their happiest time was in the evening when they would gather before a big fire of oak logs in their solar and pass the time with books and conversation and a little music and singing. Naturally, since he had left his country years ago, the thought of that time and those evenings had occasionally been in his mind — a passing thought and memory. On this evening it had come in a different way, less like a memory than a revival53 of the past, so that as he sat there among us, he was a boy back in Spain once more, sitting by the fire with his brothers and sisters and parents. With that feeling in him he could not go on playing. And he thought it most strange that such an experience should have come to him for the first time in that place out on that great naked pampa, sparsely54 inhabited, where life was so rough, so primitive55.
And while he talked we all listened — how eagerly! — drinking in his words, especially my mother, her eyes bright with the moisture rising in them; and she often afterwards recalled that evening guest, who was seen no more by us but had left an enduring image in our hearts.
This is a picture of my mother as she appeared to all who knew her. In my individual case there was more, a secret bond of union between us, since she best understood my feeling for Nature and sense of beauty, and recognized that in this I was nearest to her. Thus, besides and above the love of mother and son, we had a spiritual kinship, and this was so much to me that everything beautiful in sight or sound that affected me came associated with her to my mind. I have found this feeling most perfectly56 expressed in some lines to the Snowdrop by our lost poet, Dolben. I am in doubt, he wrote,
If summer brings a flower so lovable
Of such a meditative57 restfulness
As this, with all her roses and carnations58.
The morning hardly stirs their noiseless bells;
Yet could I fancy that they whispered “Home,”
For all things gentle, all things beautiful,
I hold, my mother, for a part of thee.
So have I held. All things beautiful, but chiefly flowers. Her feeling for them was little short of adoration59. Her religious mind appeared to regard them as little voiceless messengers from the Author of our beings and of Nature, or as divine symbols of a place and a beauty beyond our power to imagine.
I think it likely that when Dolben penned those lines to the Snowdrop it was in his mind that this was one of his mother’s favourites. My mother had her favourites too; not the roses and carnations in our gardens, but mostly among the wild flowers growing on the pampas — flowers which I never see in England. But I remember them, and if by some strange chance I should find myself once more in that distant region, I should go out in search of them, and seeing them again, feel that I was communing with her spirit.
These memories of my mother are a relief to me in recalling that melancholy60 time, the years of my youth that were wasted and worse, considering their effect and that the very thought of that period, which is to others the fullest, richest, and happiest in life, has always been painful to me. Yet to it I am now obliged to return for the space of two or three pages to relate how I eventually came out of it.
My case was not precisely61 like that of Cooper’s Castaway, but rather like that of a fugitive62 from his ship on some tropical coast who, on swimming to the shore, finds himself in a mangrove63 swamp, waist-deep in mire64, tangled65 in rope-like roots, straining frantically66 to escape his doom67.
I have told how after my fifteenth anniversary, when I first began to reflect seriously on my future life, the idea still persisted that my perpetual delight in Nature was nothing more than a condition or phase of my child’s and boy’s mind, and would inevitably68 fade out in time. I might have guessed at an earlier date that this was a delusion69, since the feeling had grown in strength with the years, but it was only after I took to reading at the beginning of my sixteenth year that I discovered its true character. One of the books I read then for the first time was White’s Selborne, given to me by an old friend of our family, a merchant in Buenos Ayres, who had been accustomed to stay a week or two with us once a year when he took his holiday. He had been on a visit to Europe, and one day, he told me, when in London on the eve of his departure, he was in a bookshop, and seeing this book on the counter and glancing at a page or two, it occurred to him that it was just the right thing to get for that bird-loving boy out on the pampas. I read and re-read it many times, for nothing so good of its kind had ever come to me, but it did not reveal to me the secret of my own feeling for Nature — the feeling of which I was becoming more and more conscious, which was a mystery to me, especially at certain moments, when it would come upon me with a sudden rush. So powerful it was, so unaccountable, I was actually afraid of it, yet I would go out of my way to seek it. At the hour of sunset I would go out half a mile or so from the house, and sitting on the dry grass with hands clasped round my knees, gaze at the western sky, waiting for it to take me. And I would ask myself: What does it mean? But there was no answer to that in any book concerning the “life and conversation of animals.” I found it in other works: in Brown’s Philosophy — another of the ancient tomes on our shelves — and in an old volume containing appreciations70 of the early nineteenth-century poets; also in other works. They did not tell me in so many words that it was the mystical faculty71 in me which produced those strange rushes or bursts of feeling and lifted me out of myself at moments; but what I found in their words was sufficient to show me that the feeling of delight in Nature was an enduring one, that others had known it, and that it had been a secret source of happiness throughout their lives.
This revelation, which in other circumstances would have made me exceedingly happy, only added to my misery72 when, as it appeared, I had only a short time to live. Nature could charm, she could enchant73 me, and her wordless messages to my soul were to me sweeter than honey and the honeycomb, but she could not take the sting and victory from death, and I had perforce to go elsewhere for consolation. Yet even so, in my worst days, my darkest years, when occupied with the laborious74 business of working out my own salvation75 with fear and trembling, with that spectre of death always following me, even so I could not rid my mind of its old passion and delight. The rising and setting sun, the sight of a lucid76 blue sky after cloud and rain, the long unheard familiar call-note of some newly-returned migrant, the first sight of some flower in spring, would bring back the old emotion and would be like a sudden ray of sunlight in a dark place — a momentary77 intense joy, to be succeeded by ineffable78 pain. Then there were times when these two opposite feelings mingled79 and would be together in my mind for hours at a time, and this occurred oftenest during the autumnal migration, when the great wave of bird-life set northwards, and all through March and April the birds were visible in flock succeeding flock from dawn to dark, until the summer visitants were all gone, to be succeeded in May by the birds from the far south, flying from the Antarctic winter.
This annual spectacle had always been a moving one, but the feeling it now produced — this mingled feeling — was most powerful on still moonlight nights, when I would sit or lie on my bed gazing out on the prospect80, earth and sky, in its changed mysterious aspect. And, lying there, I would listen by the hour to the three-syllable call-note of the upland or solitary plover81, as the birds went past, each bird alone far up in the dim sky, winging his way to the north. It was a strange vigil I kept, stirred by strange thoughts and feelings, in that moonlit earth that was strange too, albeit familiar, for never before had the sense of the supernatural in Nature been stronger. And the bird I listened to, that same solitary plover I had known and admired from my earliest years, the most graceful82 of birds, beautiful to see and hear when it would spring up before my horse with its prolonged wild bubbling cry of alarm and go away with swift, swallow-like flight — what intensity83 and gladness of life was in it, what a wonderful inherited knowledge in its brain, and what an inexhaustible vigour84 in its slender frame to enable it to perform that annual double journey of upwards85 of ten thousand miles! What a joy it would be to live for ages in a world of such fascinating phenomena86! If some great physician, wise beyond all others, infallible, had said to me that all my doctors had been wrong, that, barring accidents, I had yet fifty years to live, or forty, or even thirty, I should have worshipped him and would have counted myself the happiest being on the globe, with so many autumns and winters and springs and summers to see yet.
With these supernatural moonlight nights I finish the story of that dark time, albeit the darkness had not yet gone; to have recalled it and related it briefly87 as I could once in my life is enough. Let me now go back to the simile88 of the lost wretch89 struggling for life in the mangrove swamp. The first sense of having set my foot on a firmer place in that slough90 of fetid slime, of a wholesome91 breath of air blown to me from outside the shadow of the black abhorred92 forest, was when I began to experience intervals of relief from physical pain, when these grew more and more frequent and would extend to entire days, then to weeks, and for a time I would become oblivious93 of my precarious state. I was still and for a long time subject to attacks, when the pain was intolerable and was like steel driven into my heart, always followed by violent palpitations, which would last for hours. But I found that exercise on foot or horseback made me no worse, and I became more and more venturesome, spending most of my time out of doors, although often troubled with the thought that my passion for Nature was a hindrance94 to me, a turning aside from the difficult way I had been striving to keep.
Then my elder brother returned, an event of the greatest importance in my life; and as he had not been expected so soon, I was for a minute in doubt that this strange visitor could be my brother, so greatly had he altered in appearance in those five long years of absence, which had seemed like an age to me. He had left us as a smooth-faced youth, with skin tanned to such a deep colour that with his dark piercing eyes and long black hair he had looked to me more like an Indian than a white man. Now his skin was white, and he had grown a brown beard and moustache. In disposition95, too, he had grown more genial96 and tolerant, but I soon discovered that in character he had not changed.
As soon as an opportunity came he began to interrogate97 and cross-question me as to my mind — life and where I stood, and expressed himself surprised to hear that I still held to the creed in which we had been reared. How, he demanded, did I reconcile these ancient fabulous98 notions with the doctrine99 of evolution? What effect had Darwin produced on me? I had to confess that I had not read a line of his work, that with the exception of Draper’s History of Civilisation100, which had come by chance in my way, I had during all those five years read nothing but the old books which had always been on our shelves. He said he knew Draper’s History, and it was not the sort of book for me to read at present. I wanted a different history, with animals as well as men in it. He had a store of books with him, and would lend me the Origin of Species to begin with.
When I had read and returned the book, and he was eager to hear my opinion, I said it had not hurt me in the least, since Darwin had to my mind only succeeded in disproving his own theory with his argument from artificial selection. He himself confessed that no new species had ever been produced in that way.
That, he said in reply, was the easy criticism that any one who came to the reading in a hostile spirit would make. They would fasten on that apparently101 weak point and not pay much attention to the fact that it is fairly met and answered in the book. When he first read the book it convinced him; but he had come to it with an open mind and I with a prejudiced mind on account of my religious ideas. He advised me to read it again, to read and consider it carefully with the sole purpose of getting at the truth. “Take it,” he said, “and read it again in the right way for you to read it — as a naturalist102.”
He had been surprised that I, an ignorant boy or youth on the pampas, had ventured to criticise103 such a work. I, on my side, had been equally surprised at his quiet way of reasoning with me, with none of the old scornful spirit flaming out. He was gentle with me, knowing that I had suffered much, and was not free yet.
I read it again in the way he had counselled, and then refused to think any more on the subject. I was sick of thinking. Like the wretch who long has tossed upon the thorny104 bed of pain, I only wanted to repair my vigour lost and breathe and walk again. To be on horseback, galloping105 over the green pampas, in sun and wind. For after all it was only a reprieve106, not a commutation of sentence — though one of a kind unknown in the Courts, in which the condemned107 man is allowed out on bail108. My pardon was not received until a few years later. I returned with a new wonderful zest109 to my old sports, shooting and fishing, and would spend days and weeks from home, sometimes staying with old gaucho110 friends and former neighbours at their ranches, attending cattle-markings and partings, dances, and other gatherings111, and also made longer expeditions to the southern and western frontiers of the province, living out of doors for months at a time.
Despite my determination to put the question off, my mind, or sub-conscious mind, like a dog with a bone which it refuses to drop in defiance112 of its master’s command, went on revolving113 it. It went to bed and got up with me, and was with me the day long, and whenever I had a still interval51, when I would pull up my horse to sit motionless watching some creature, bird or beast or snake, or sat on the ground poring over some insect occupied with the business of its little life, I would become conscious of the discussion and argument going on. And every creature I watched, from the great soaring bird circling in the sky at a vast altitude to the little life at my feet, was brought into the argument, and was a type, representing a group marked by a family likeness114 not only in figure and colouring and language, but in mind as well, in habits and the most trivial traits and tricks of gesture and so on; the entire group in its turn related to another group, and to others, still further and further away, the likeness growing less and less. What explanation was possible but that of community of descent? How incredible it appeared that this had not been seen years ago — yes, even before it was discovered that the world was round and was one of a system of planets revolving round the sun. All this starry115 knowledge was of little or no importance compared to that of our relationship with all the infinitely various forms of life that share the earth with us. Yet it was not till the second half of the nineteenth century that this great, almost self-evident truth had won a hearing in the world!
No doubt this is a common experience: no sooner has the inquirer been driven to accept a new doctrine than it takes complete possession of his mind, and has not then the appearance of a strange and unwelcome guest, but rather that of a familiar friendly one, and is like a long-established housemate. I suppose the explanation is that when we throw open the doors to the new importunate116 visitor, it is virtually a ceremony, since the real event has been already accomplished117, the guest having stolen in by some other way and made himself at home in the sub-conscious mind. Insensibly and inevitably I had become an evolutionist, albeit never wholly satisfied with natural selection as the only and sufficient explanation of the change in the forms of life. And again, insensibly and inevitably, the new doctrine has led to modifications118 of the old religious ideas and eventually to a new and simplified philosophy of life. A good enough one so far as this life is concerned, but unhappily it takes no account of another, a second and perdurable life without change of personality.
This subject has been much in men’s minds during the past two or three dreadful years, often reminding me of that shock I received as a boy of fourteen at the old gaucho’s bitter story of his soul; I have also again been reminded of the theory in which that younger and greatly-loved brother of mine was able to find comfort. He had become deeply religious, and after much reading in Herbert Spencer and other modern philosophers and evolutionists, he told me he thought it was idle for Christians119 to fight against the argument of the materialists that the mind is a function of the brain. Undoubtedly120 it was that, and our mental faculties121 perished with the brain; but we had a soul that was imperishable as well. He knew it, which meant that he too was a mystic, and being wholly preoccupied122 with religion, his mystical faculty found its use and exercise there. At all events, his notion served to lift him over his difficulties and to get him out of his mangrove swamp — a way perhaps less impossible than the one recently pointed123 out by William James.
Thus I came out of the contest a loser, but as a compensation had the knowledge that my physicians were false prophets; that, barring accidents, I could count on thirty, forty, even fifty years with their summers and autumns and winters. And that was the life I desired — the life the heart can conceive — the earth life. When I hear people say they have not found the world and life so agreeable or interesting as to be in love with it, or that they look with equanimity124 to its end, I am apt to think they have never been properly alive nor seen with clear vision the world they think so meanly of, or anything in it — not a blade of grass. Only I know that mine is an exceptional case, that the visible world is to me more beautiful and interesting than to most persons, that the delight I experienced in my communing with Nature did not pass away, leaving nothing but a recollection of vanished happiness to intensify125 a present pain. The happiness was never lost, but owing to that faculty I have spoken of, had a cumulative126 effect on the mind and was mine again, so that in my worst times, when I was compelled to exist shut out from Nature in London for long periods, sick and poor and friendless, I could yet always feel that it was infinitely better to be than not to be.
The End
收听单词发音 |
1
migration
|
|
| n.迁移，移居，（鸟类等的）迁徙 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
2
malady
|
|
| n.病，疾病(通常做比喻) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
3
apprehension
|
|
| n.理解，领悟；逮捕，拘捕；忧虑 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
4
severance
|
|
| n.离职金；切断 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
5
par
|
|
| n.标准，票面价值，平均数量；adj.票面的，平常的，标准的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
6
possessed
|
|
| adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
7
spoke
|
|
| 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 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
8
overpass
|
|
| n.天桥，立交桥 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
9
solitary
|
|
| adj.孤独的，独立的，荒凉的；n.隐士 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
10
agonizing
|
|
| adj.痛苦难忍的；使人苦恼的v.使极度痛苦；折磨(agonize的ing形式) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
11
consolations
|
|
| n.安慰，慰问( consolation的名词复数 )；起安慰作用的人（或事物） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
12
consolation
|
|
| n.安慰，慰问 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
13
Christian
|
|
| adj.基督教徒的；n.基督教徒 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
14
creed
|
|
| n.信条；信念，纲领 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
15
fables
|
|
| n.寓言( fable的名词复数 )；神话，传说 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
16
immortal
|
|
| adj.不朽的；永生的，不死的；神的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
17
precarious
|
|
| adj.不安定的，靠不住的；根据不足的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
18
distressed
|
|
| 痛苦的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
19
essentially
|
|
| adv.本质上，实质上，基本上 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
20
albeit
|
|
| conj.即使；纵使；虽然 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
21
infancy
|
|
| n.婴儿期；幼年期；初期 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
22
lamented
|
|
| adj.被哀悼的，令人遗憾的v.（为…）哀悼，痛哭，悲伤( lament的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
23
infinitely
|
|
| adv.无限地，无穷地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
24
immortality
|
|
| n.不死，不朽 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
25
autobiography
|
|
| n.自传 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
26
humble
|
|
| adj.谦卑的，恭顺的；地位低下的；v.降低，贬低 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
27
tottering
|
|
| adj.蹒跚的，动摇的v.走得或动得不稳( totter的现在分词 )；踉跄；蹒跚；摇摇欲坠 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
28
compassion
|
|
| n.同情，怜悯 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
29
tolerance
|
|
| n.宽容；容忍，忍受；耐药力；公差 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
30
affiliate
|
|
| vt.使隶(附)属于；n.附属机构，分公司 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
31
ranches
|
|
| 大农场， （兼种果树，养鸡等的）大牧场( ranch的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
32
saviour
|
|
| n.拯救者，救星 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
33
glorified
|
|
| 美其名的，变荣耀的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
34
guardians
|
|
| 监护人( guardian的名词复数 )； 保护者，维护者 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
35
dame
|
|
| n.女士 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
36
fixed
|
|
| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
37
obnoxious
|
|
| adj.极恼人的，讨人厌的，可憎的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
38
denominations
|
|
| n.宗派( denomination的名词复数 )；教派；面额；名称 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
39
virtue
|
|
| n.德行，美德；贞操；优点；功效，效力 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
40
laden
|
|
| adj.装满了的；充满了的；负了重担的；苦恼的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
41
furtively
|
|
| adv. 偷偷地, 暗中地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
42
conversational
|
|
| adj.对话的，会话的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
43
uncouth
|
|
| adj.无教养的，粗鲁的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
44
peculiar
|
|
| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
45
gallop
|
|
| v./n.(马或骑马等)飞奔；飞速发展 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
46
leisurely
|
|
| adj.悠闲的；从容的，慢慢的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
47
tuned
|
|
| adj.调谐的，已调谐的v.调音( tune的过去式和过去分词 )；调整；（给收音机、电视等）调谐；使协调 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
48
jigging
|
|
| n.跳汰选，簸选v.（使）上下急动( jig的现在分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
49
tunes
|
|
| n.曲调，曲子( tune的名词复数 )v.调音( tune的第三人称单数 )；调整；（给收音机、电视等）调谐；使协调 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
50
affected
|
|
| adj.不自然的，假装的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
51
interval
|
|
| n.间隔，间距；幕间休息，中场休息 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
52
intervals
|
|
| 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 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
53
revival
|
|
| n.复兴，复苏，（精力、活力等的）重振 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
54
sparsely
|
|
| adv.稀疏地；稀少地；不足地；贫乏地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
55
primitive
|
|
| adj.原始的；简单的；n.原(始)人，原始事物 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
56
perfectly
|
|
| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
57
meditative
|
|
| adj.沉思的，冥想的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
58
carnations
|
|
| n.麝香石竹，康乃馨( carnation的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
59
adoration
|
|
| n.爱慕，崇拜 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
60
melancholy
|
|
| n.忧郁，愁思；adj.令人感伤（沮丧）的，忧郁的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
61
precisely
|
|
| adv.恰好，正好，精确地，细致地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
62
fugitive
|
|
| adj.逃亡的，易逝的；n.逃犯，逃亡者 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
63
mangrove
|
|
| n.(植物)红树，红树林 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
64
mire
|
|
| n.泥沼，泥泞；v.使...陷于泥泞，使...陷入困境 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
65
tangled
|
|
| adj. 纠缠的，紊乱的 动词tangle的过去式和过去分词 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
66
frantically
|
|
| ad.发狂地, 发疯地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
67
doom
|
|
| n.厄运，劫数；v.注定，命定 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
68
inevitably
|
|
| adv.不可避免地；必然发生地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
69
delusion
|
|
| n.谬见，欺骗，幻觉，迷惑 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
70
appreciations
|
|
| n.欣赏( appreciation的名词复数 )；感激；评定；（尤指土地或财产的）增值 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
71
faculty
|
|
| n.才能；学院，系；(学院或系的)全体教学人员 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
72
misery
|
|
| n.痛苦，苦恼，苦难；悲惨的境遇，贫苦 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
73
enchant
|
|
| vt.使陶醉，使入迷；使着魔，用妖术迷惑 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
74
laborious
|
|
| adj.吃力的，努力的，不流畅 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
75
salvation
|
|
| n.（尤指基督）救世，超度，拯救，解困 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
76
lucid
|
|
| adj.明白易懂的，清晰的，头脑清楚的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
77
momentary
|
|
| adj.片刻的，瞬息的；短暂的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
78
ineffable
|
|
| adj.无法表达的，不可言喻的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
79
mingled
|
|
| 混合，混入( mingle的过去式和过去分词 )； 混进，与…交往[联系] | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
80
prospect
|
|
| n.前景，前途；景色，视野 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
81
plover
|
|
| n.珩，珩科鸟，千鸟 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
82
graceful
|
|
| adj.优美的，优雅的；得体的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
83
intensity
|
|
| n.强烈，剧烈；强度；烈度 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
84
vigour
|
|
| （=vigor）n.智力，体力，精力 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
85
upwards
|
|
| adv.向上，在更高处...以上 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
86
phenomena
|
|
| n.现象 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
87
briefly
|
|
| adv.简单地，简短地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
88
simile
|
|
| n.直喻，明喻 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
89
wretch
|
|
| n.可怜的人，不幸的人；卑鄙的人 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
90
slough
|
|
| v.蜕皮，脱落，抛弃 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
91
wholesome
|
|
| adj.适合；卫生的；有益健康的；显示身心健康的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
92
abhorred
|
|
| v.憎恶( abhor的过去式和过去分词 )；（厌恶地）回避；拒绝；淘汰 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
93
oblivious
|
|
| adj.易忘的，遗忘的，忘却的，健忘的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
94
hindrance
|
|
| n.妨碍，障碍 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
95
disposition
|
|
| n.性情，性格；意向，倾向；排列，部署 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
96
genial
|
|
| adj.亲切的，和蔼的，愉快的，脾气好的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
97
interrogate
|
|
| vt.讯问，审问，盘问 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
98
fabulous
|
|
| adj.极好的；极为巨大的；寓言中的，传说中的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
99
doctrine
|
|
| n.教义；主义；学说 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
100
civilisation
|
|
| n.文明，文化，开化，教化 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
101
apparently
|
|
| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
102
naturalist
|
|
| n.博物学家(尤指直接观察动植物者) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
103
criticise
|
|
| v.批评，评论；非难 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
104
thorny
|
|
| adj.多刺的，棘手的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
105
galloping
|
|
| adj. 飞驰的, 急性的 动词gallop的现在分词形式 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
106
reprieve
|
|
| n.暂缓执行（死刑）；v.缓期执行；给…带来缓解 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
107
condemned
|
|
| adj. 被责难的, 被宣告有罪的 动词condemn的过去式和过去分词 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
108
bail
|
|
| v.舀（水），保释；n.保证金，保释，保释人 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
109
zest
|
|
| n.乐趣；滋味，风味；兴趣 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
110
gaucho
|
|
| n. 牧人 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
111
gatherings
|
|
| 聚集( gathering的名词复数 )； 收集； 采集； 搜集 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
112
defiance
|
|
| n.挑战，挑衅，蔑视，违抗 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
113
revolving
|
|
| adj.旋转的，轮转式的；循环的v.（使）旋转( revolve的现在分词 )；细想 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
114
likeness
|
|
| n.相像，相似（之处） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
115
starry
|
|
| adj.星光照耀的, 闪亮的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
116
importunate
|
|
| adj.强求的；纠缠不休的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
117
accomplished
|
|
| adj.有才艺的；有造诣的；达到了的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
118
modifications
|
|
| n.缓和( modification的名词复数 )；限制；更改；改变 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
119
Christians
|
|
| n.基督教徒( Christian的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
120
undoubtedly
|
|
| adv.确实地，无疑地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
121
faculties
|
|
| n.能力( faculty的名词复数 )；全体教职员；技巧；院 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
122
preoccupied
|
|
| adj.全神贯注的，入神的；被抢先占有的；心事重重的v.占据（某人）思想，使对…全神贯注，使专心于( preoccupy的过去式) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
123
pointed
|
|
| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
124
equanimity
|
|
| n.沉着，镇定 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
125
intensify
|
|
| vt.加强；变强；加剧 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
126
cumulative
|
|
| adj.累积的，渐增的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
| 欢迎访问英文小说网 |