I belong in Cleveland, Ohio. One winter’s night, two years ago, I reached home just after dark, in a driving snow-storm, and the first thing I heard when I entered the house was that my dearest boyhood friend and schoolmate, John B. Hackett, had died the day before, and that his last utterance3 had been a desire that I would take his remains4 home to his poor old father and mother in Wisconsin. I was greatly shocked and grieved, but there was no time to waste in emotions; I must start at once. I took the card, marked “Deacon Levi Hackett, Bethlehem, Wisconsin,” and hurried off through the whistling storm to the railway station. Arrived there I found the long white-pine box which had been described to me; I fastened the card to it with some tacks5, saw it put safely aboard the express car, and then ran into the eating-room to provide myself with a sandwich and some cigars. When I returned, presently, there was my coffin-box back again, apparently6, and a young fellow examining around it, with a card in his hands, and some tacks and a hammer! I was astonished and puzzled. He began to nail on his card, and I rushed out to the express car, in a good deal of a state of mind, to ask for an explanation. But no—there was my box, all right, in the express car; it hadn’t been disturbed. [The fact is that without my suspecting it a prodigious7 mistake had been made. I was carrying off a box of guns which that young fellow had come to the station to ship to a rifle company in Peoria, Illinois, and he had got my corpse8!] Just then the conductor sung out “All aboard,” and I jumped into the express car and got a comfortable seat on a bale of buckets. The expressman was there, hard at work,—a plain man of fifty, with a simple, honest, good-natured face, and a breezy, practical heartiness10 in his general style. As the train moved off a stranger skipped into the car and set a package of peculiarly mature and capable Limburger cheese on one end of my coffin-box—I mean my box of guns. That is to say, I know now that it was Limburger cheese, but at that time I never had heard of the article in my life, and of course was wholly ignorant of its character. Well, we sped through the wild night, the bitter storm raged on, a cheerless misery11 stole over me, my heart went down, down, down! The old expressman made a brisk remark or two about the tempest and the arctic weather, slammed his sliding doors to, and bolted them, closed his window down tight, and then went bustling12 around, here and there and yonder, setting things to rights, and all the time contentedly13 humming “Sweet By and By,” in a low tone, and flatting a good deal. Presently I began to detect a most evil and searching odor stealing about on the frozen air. This depressed14 my spirits still more, because of course I attributed it to my poor departed friend. There was something infinitely15 saddening about his calling himself to my remembrance in this dumb pathetic way, so it was hard to keep the tears back. Moreover, it distressed16 me on account of the old expressman, who, I was afraid, might notice it. However, he went humming tranquilly17 on, and gave no sign; and for this I was grateful. Grateful, yes, but still uneasy; and soon I began to feel more and more uneasy every minute, for every minute that went by that odor thickened up the more, and got to be more and more gamey and hard to stand. Presently, having got things arranged to his satisfaction, the expressman got some wood and made up a tremendous fire in his stove.
This distressed me more than I can tell, for I could not but feel that it was a mistake. I was sure that the effect would be deleterious upon my poor departed friend. Thompson—the expressman’s name was Thompson, as I found out in the course of the night—now went poking18 around his car, stopping up whatever stray cracks he could find, remarking that it didn’t make any difference what kind of a night it was outside, he calculated to make us comfortable, anyway. I said nothing, but I believed he was not choosing the right way. Meantime he was humming to himself just as before; and meantime, too, the stove was getting hotter and hotter, and the place closer and closer. I felt myself growing pale and qualmish, but grieved in silence and said nothing.
Soon I noticed that the “Sweet By and By” was gradually fading out; next it ceased altogether, and there was an ominous19 stillness. After a few moments Thompson said,
“Pfew! I reckon it ain’t no cinnamon ‘t I’ve loaded up thish-yer stove with!”
He gasped20 once or twice, then moved toward the cof—gun-box, stood over that Limburger cheese part of a moment, then came back and sat down near me, looking a good deal impressed. After a contemplative pause, he said, indicating the box with a gesture,
“Friend of yourn?”
“Yes,” I said with a sigh.
“He’s pretty ripe, ain’t he!”
Nothing further was said for perhaps a couple of minutes, each being busy with his own thoughts; then Thompson said, in a low, awed21 voice,
“Sometimes it’s uncertain whether they’re really gone or not,—seem gone, you know—body warm, joints22 limber—and so, although you think they’re gone, you don’t really know. I’ve had cases in my car. It’s perfectly23 awful, becuz you don’t know what minute they’ll rise up and look at you!” Then, after a pause, and slightly lifting his elbow toward the box,—“But he ain’t in no trance! No, sir, I go bail24 for him!”
We sat some time, in meditative25 silence, listening to the wind and the roar of the train; then Thompson said, with a good deal of feeling,
“Well-a-well, we’ve all got to go, they ain’t no getting around it. Man that is born of woman is of few days and far between, as Scriptur’ says. Yes, you look at it any way you want to, it’s awful solemn and cur’us: they ain’t nobody can get around it; all’s got to go—just everybody, as you may say. One day you’re hearty and strong”—here he scrambled26 to his feet and broke a pane27 and stretched his nose out at it a moment or two, then sat down again while I struggled up and thrust my nose out at the same place, and this we kept on doing every now and then—“and next day he’s cut down like the grass, and the places which knowed him then knows him no more forever, as Scriptur’ says. Yes’ndeedy, it’s awful solemn and cur’us; but we’ve all got to go, one time or another; they ain’t no getting around it.”
There was another long pause; then,—
“What did he die of?”
I said I didn’t know.
“How long has he ben dead?”
It seemed judicious28 to enlarge the facts to fit the probabilities; so I said,
“Two or three days.”
But it did no good; for Thompson received it with an injured look which plainly said, “Two or three years, you mean.” Then he went right along, placidly29 ignoring my statement, and gave his views at considerable length upon the unwisdom of putting off burials too long. Then he lounged off toward the box, stood a moment, then came back on a sharp trot30 and visited the broken pane, observing,
“’Twould ’a’ ben a dum sight better, all around, if they’d started him along last summer.”
Thompson sat down and buried his face in his red silk handkerchief, and began to slowly sway and rock his body like one who is doing his best to endure the almost unendurable. By this time the fragrance—if you may call it fragrance—was just about suffocating31, as near as you can come at it. Thompson’s face was turning gray; I knew mine hadn’t any color left in it. By and by Thompson rested his forehead in his left hand, with his elbow on his knee, and sort of waved his red handkerchief towards the box with his other hand, and said,—
“I’ve carried a many a one of ’em,—some of ’em considerable overdue32, too,—but, lordy, he just lays over ’em all!—and does it easy Cap., they was heliotrope33 to HIM!”
This recognition of my poor friend gratified me, in spite of the sad circumstances, because it had so much the sound of a compliment.
Pretty soon it was plain that something had got to be done. I suggested cigars. Thompson thought it was a good idea. He said,
“Likely it’ll modify him some.”
We puffed34 gingerly along for a while, and tried hard to imagine that things were improved. But it wasn’t any use. Before very long, and without any consultation35, both cigars were quietly dropped from our nerveless fingers at the same moment. Thompson said, with a sigh,
“No, Cap., it don’t modify him worth a cent. Fact is, it makes him worse, becuz it appears to stir up his ambition. What do you reckon we better do, now?”
I was not able to suggest anything; indeed, I had to be swallowing and swallowing, all the time, and did not like to trust myself to speak. Thompson fell to maundering, in a desultory36 and low-spirited way, about the miserable37 experiences of this night; and he got to referring to my poor friend by various titles,—sometimes military ones, sometimes civil ones; and I noticed that as fast as my poor friend’s effectiveness grew, Thompson promoted him accordingly,—gave him a bigger title. Finally he said,
“I’ve got an idea. Suppos’ n we buckle38 down to it and give the Colonel a bit of a shove towards t’other end of the car?—about ten foot, say. He wouldn’t have so much influence, then, don’t you reckon?”
I said it was a good scheme. So we took in a good fresh breath at the broken pane, calculating to hold it till we got through; then we went there and bent39 over that deadly cheese and took a grip on the box. Thompson nodded “All ready,” and then we threw ourselves forward with all our might; but Thompson slipped, and slumped40 down with his nose on the cheese, and his breath got loose. He gagged and gasped, and floundered up and made a break for the door, pawing the air and saying hoarsely41, “Don’t hender me!—gimme the road! I’m a-dying; gimme the road!” Out on the cold platform I sat down and held his head a while, and he revived. Presently he said,
“Do you reckon we started the Gen’rul any?”
I said no; we hadn’t budged42 him.
“Well, then, that idea’s up the flume. We got to think up something else. He’s suited wher’ he is, I reckon; and if that’s the way he feels about it, and has made up his mind that he don’t wish to be disturbed, you bet he’s a-going to have his own way in the business. Yes, better leave him right wher’ he is, long as he wants it so; becuz he holds all the trumps43, don’t you know, and so it stands to reason that the man that lays out to alter his plans for him is going to get left.”
But we couldn’t stay out there in that mad storm; we should have frozen to death. So we went in again and shut the door, and began to suffer once more and take turns at the break in the window. By and by, as we were starting away from a station where we had stopped a moment, Thompson pranced44 in cheerily and exclaimed,
“We’re all right, now! I reckon we’ve got the Commodore this time. I judge I’ve got the stuff here that’ll take the tuck out of him.”
It was carbolic acid. He had a carboy of it. He sprinkled it all around everywhere; in fact he drenched45 everything with it, rifle-box, cheese and all. Then we sat down, feeling pretty hopeful. But it wasn’t for long. You see the two perfumes began to mix, and then—well, pretty soon we made a break for the door; and out there Thompson swabbed his face with his bandanna46 and said in a kind of disheartened way,
“It ain’t no use. We can’t buck9 agin him. He just utilizes47 everything we put up to modify him with, and gives it his own flavor and plays it back on us. Why, Cap., don’t you know, it’s as much as a hundred times worse in there now than it was when he first got a-going. I never did see one of ’em warm up to his work so, and take such a dumnation interest in it. No, Sir, I never did, as long as I’ve ben on the road; and I’ve carried a many a one of ’em, as I was telling you.”
We went in again after we were frozen pretty stiff; but my, we couldn’t stay in, now. So we just waltzed back and forth48, freezing, and thawing49, and stifling50, by turns. In about an hour we stopped at another station; and as we left it Thompson came in with a bag, and said,—
“Cap., I’m a-going to chance him once more,—just this once; and if we don’t fetch him this time, the thing for us to do, is to just throw up the sponge and withdraw from the canvass51. That’s the way I put it up.” He had brought a lot of chicken feathers, and dried apples, and leaf tobacco, and rags, and old shoes, and sulphur, and asafoetida, and one thing or another; and he, piled them on a breadth of sheet iron in the middle of the floor, and set fire to them.
When they got well started, I couldn’t see, myself, how even the corpse could stand it. All that went before was just simply poetry to that smell,—but mind you, the original smell stood up out of it just as sublime52 as ever,—fact is, these other smells just seemed to give it a better hold; and my, how rich it was! I didn’t make these reflections there—there wasn’t time—made them on the platform. And breaking for the platform, Thompson got suffocated53 and fell; and before I got him dragged out, which I did by the collar, I was mighty54 near gone myself. When we revived, Thompson said dejectedly,—
“We got to stay out here, Cap. We got to do it. They ain’t no other way. The Governor wants to travel alone, and he’s fixed55 so he can outvote us.”
And presently he added,
“And don’t you know, we’re pisoned. It’s our last trip, you can make up your mind to it. Typhoid fever is what’s going to come of this. I feel it acoming right now. Yes, sir, we’re elected, just as sure as you’re born.”
We were taken from the platform an hour later, frozen and insensible, at the next station, and I went straight off into a virulent56 fever, and never knew anything again for three weeks. I found out, then, that I had spent that awful night with a harmless box of rifles and a lot of innocent cheese; but the news was too late to save me; imagination had done its work, and my health was permanently57 shattered; neither Bermuda nor any other land can ever bring it back tome. This is my last trip; I am on my way home to die.
The End
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1
hearty
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| adj.热情友好的；衷心的；尽情的，纵情的 | |
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helping
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| n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的 | |
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utterance
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| n.用言语表达，话语，言语 | |
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remains
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| n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹 | |
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tacks
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| 大头钉( tack的名词复数 )； 平头钉； 航向； 方法 | |
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apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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7
prodigious
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| adj.惊人的，奇妙的；异常的；巨大的；庞大的 | |
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8
corpse
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| n.尸体，死尸 | |
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buck
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| n.雄鹿，雄兔；v.马离地跳跃 | |
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10
heartiness
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| 诚实，热心 | |
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misery
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| n.痛苦，苦恼，苦难；悲惨的境遇，贫苦 | |
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12
bustling
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| adj.喧闹的 | |
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contentedly
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| adv.心满意足地 | |
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depressed
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| adj.沮丧的，抑郁的，不景气的，萧条的 | |
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15
infinitely
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| adv.无限地，无穷地 | |
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16
distressed
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| 痛苦的 | |
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17
tranquilly
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| adv. 宁静地 | |
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18
poking
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| n. 刺，戳，袋 vt. 拨开，刺，戳 vi. 戳，刺，捅，搜索，伸出，行动散慢 | |
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19
ominous
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| adj.不祥的，不吉的，预兆的，预示的 | |
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20
gasped
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| v.喘气( gasp的过去式和过去分词 )；喘息；倒抽气；很想要 | |
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21
awed
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| adj.充满敬畏的，表示敬畏的v.使敬畏，使惊惧( awe的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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22
joints
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| 接头( joint的名词复数 )； 关节； 公共场所（尤指价格低廉的饮食和娱乐场所） （非正式）； 一块烤肉 （英式英语） | |
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23
perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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24
bail
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| v.舀（水），保释；n.保证金，保释，保释人 | |
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25
meditative
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| adj.沉思的，冥想的 | |
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26
scrambled
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| v.快速爬行( scramble的过去式和过去分词 )；攀登；争夺；（军事飞机）紧急起飞 | |
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27
pane
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| n.窗格玻璃，长方块 | |
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28
judicious
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| adj.明智的，明断的，能作出明智决定的 | |
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29
placidly
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| adv.平稳地，平静地 | |
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30
trot
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| n.疾走，慢跑；n.老太婆；现成译本；(复数）trots:腹泻（与the 连用）；v.小跑，快步走，赶紧 | |
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31
suffocating
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| a.使人窒息的 | |
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32
overdue
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| adj.过期的，到期未付的；早该有的，迟到的 | |
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33
heliotrope
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| n.天芥菜；淡紫色 | |
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34
puffed
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| adj.疏松的v.使喷出( puff的过去式和过去分词 )；喷着汽（或烟）移动；吹嘘；吹捧 | |
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35
consultation
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| n.咨询；商量；商议；会议 | |
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36
desultory
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| adj.散漫的，无方法的 | |
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miserable
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| adj.悲惨的，痛苦的；可怜的，糟糕的 | |
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38
buckle
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| n.扣子，带扣；v.把...扣住，由于压力而弯曲 | |
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39
bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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40
slumped
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| 大幅度下降，暴跌( slump的过去式和过去分词 )； 沉重或突然地落下[倒下] | |
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hoarsely
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| adv.嘶哑地 | |
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42
budged
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| v.（使）稍微移动( budge的过去式和过去分词 )；（使）改变主意，（使）让步 | |
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43
trumps
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| abbr.trumpets 喇叭；小号；喇叭形状的东西；喇叭筒v.（牌戏）出王牌赢（一牌或一墩）( trump的过去式 )；吹号公告，吹号庆祝；吹喇叭；捏造 | |
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44
pranced
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| v.（马）腾跃( prance的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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45
drenched
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| adj.湿透的；充满的v.使湿透( drench的过去式和过去分词 )；在某人（某物）上大量使用（某液体） | |
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46
bandanna
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| n.大手帕 | |
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47
utilizes
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| v.利用，使用( utilize的第三人称单数 ) | |
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48
forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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49
thawing
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| n.熔化，融化v.（气候）解冻( thaw的现在分词 )；（态度、感情等）缓和；（冰、雪及冷冻食物）溶化；软化 | |
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50
stifling
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| a.令人窒息的 | |
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51
canvass
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| v.招徕顾客，兜售；游说；详细检查，讨论 | |
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52
sublime
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| adj.崇高的，伟大的；极度的，不顾后果的 | |
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53
suffocated
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| （使某人）窒息而死( suffocate的过去式和过去分词 )； （将某人）闷死； 让人感觉闷热； 憋气 | |
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54
mighty
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| adj.强有力的；巨大的 | |
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55
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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56
virulent
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| adj.有毒的，有恶意的，充满敌意的 | |
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57
permanently
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| adv.永恒地，永久地，固定不变地 | |
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