THE ACCIDENT.

“We thought she never would ride it out, and expected her every moment to go to pieces.”—NAVAL SKETCH¹ BOOK.
“THERE you go, you villain—that’s the way to run over people! There’s a little boy in the road—you’d better run over him, for you won’t call out to him, no, not you, for a brute² as you are! You think poor people an’t common Christians,—you grind the faces of the poor, you do. Ay, cut away, do—you’ll be Wilful³ Murdered by the Crowner some day! I’ll keep up with you and tell the gentlemen on the top! Women wasn’t created for you to gallop⁴ over like dirt, and scrunch⁵ their bones into compound fractions.—Don’t get into his coach, Ma’am! he’s no respect for the sects—he’ll lay you up in the hospital for months and months, he will, the inhuman⁶ hard-hearted varmin!”
The speaker, a little active old woman, had run parallel with the coach some fifty yards, when it stopped to take up a lady who was as prompt as ladies generally are, in giving dinner instructions to the cook, and setting domestic lessons to the housemaid, besides having to pack a parcel, to hunt for her clogs⁷, to exchange the cook’s umbrella for her own, and to kiss all her seven children. Mat, thus reduced to a door-mat, was unable to escape the volley which the Virago⁸ still poured in upon him; but he kept a most imperturbable⁹ face and silence till he was fairly seated again on the box.
“There, gentlemen,” said he, pointing at the assailant with his whip;
[Pg 121]
 “that’s what I call gratitude¹⁰. Look at her figure now, and look at what it was six months ago. She never had a waist till I run over her.”
“I hope, friend, thee art not very apt to make these experiments on the human figure,” said an elderly Quaker on the roof. “Not by no means,” answered Mat; “I have done very little in the accidental line—nothing worth mentioning. All the years I’ve been on the road, I’ve never come to a kill on the spot; them sort o’things belongs to Burrowes, as drives over one with the Friend in Need, and he’s got quite a name for it. He’s called ‘Fatal Jack¹¹.’ To be sure, now I think of it, I was the innocent cause of death to one person, and she was rather out of the common.” “You fractured her limbs, p’r’aps?” inquired one of the outsides. “No such thing,” said Mat, “there was nothing fractious in the case; as to running over her limbs, it was the impossible thing with a woman born without legs and arms.” “You must allude¹² to Miss Biffin,” said the outsider—“the Norfolk phenomenon.”
“Begging your pardon,” said Mat,
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 “it was before the Phenomenon was started. It was one of the regular old long-bodied double-coaches, and I drove it myself. Very uneasy they were; for springs at that time hadn’t much spring in ’em; and nobody on earth had thought of Macadaming Piccadilly. You could always tell whether you were on the stones, or off, and no mistake. I was a full hour behind time—for coaches in them days wasn’t called by such names as Chronometers¹³ and Regulators, and good reason why. So I’d been plying¹⁴ a full hour after time, without a soul inside, except a barrel of natives for a customer down the road: at last, a hackney-coach pulls up, and Jarvey and the waterman lifts Miss Biffin into my drag. Well, off I sets with a light load enough, and to fetch up time astonished my team into a bit of a gallop—and it wasn’t the easiest thing in the world to keep one’s seat on the box, the coach jumped so over the stones. Well, away I goes, springing my rattle¹⁵ till I come to the gate at Hyde Park Corner, where one of my insides was waiting for me—and not very sorry to pull up, for the breath was almost shook out of my bellows¹⁶. Well, I opens the door, and what do I see lying together at the bottom of the coach, but Miss Biffin bruised¹⁷ unsensible, and the head out of the barrel of oysters¹⁸!”

1 sketch   

n.草图；梗概；素描；v.素描；概述

参考例句：

• My sister often goes into the country to sketch. 我姐姐常到乡间去写生。
• I will send you a slight sketch of the house.我将给你寄去房屋的草图。

2 brute   

n.野兽，兽性

参考例句：

• The aggressor troops are not many degrees removed from the brute.侵略军简直象一群野兽。
• That dog is a dangerous brute.It bites people.那条狗是危险的畜牲，它咬人。

3 wilful   

adj.任性的，故意的

参考例句：

• A wilful fault has no excuse and deserves no pardon.不能宽恕故意犯下的错误。
• He later accused reporters of wilful distortion and bias.他后来指责记者有意歪曲事实并带有偏见。

4 gallop   

v./n.(马或骑马等)飞奔；飞速发展

参考例句：

• They are coming at a gallop towards us.他们正朝着我们飞跑过来。
• The horse slowed to a walk after its long gallop.那匹马跑了一大阵后慢下来缓步而行。

5 scrunch   

v.压，挤压；扭曲（面部）

参考例句：

• The sand on the floor scrunched under our feet.地板上的沙子在我们脚下嘎吱作响。
• Her mother was sitting bolt upright, scrunching her white cotton gloves into a ball.她母亲坐得笔直，把她的白手套揉成了球状。

6 inhuman   

adj.残忍的，不人道的，无人性的

参考例句：

• We must unite the workers in fighting against inhuman conditions.我们必须使工人们团结起来反对那些难以忍受的工作条件。
• It was inhuman to refuse him permission to see his wife.不容许他去看自己的妻子是太不近人情了。

7 clogs   

木屐； 木底鞋，木屐( clog的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Clogs are part of the Netherlands national costume. 木屐是荷兰民族服装的一部分。
• Clogs are part of the Dutch traditional costume. 木屐是荷兰传统装束的一部分。

8 virago   

n.悍妇

参考例句：

• The virago vomited out curses on that tramp.那悍妇怒骂那流浪汉。
• His wife is a virago.他的妻子是母老虎。

9 imperturbable   

adj.镇静的

参考例句：

• Thomas,of course,was cool and aloof and imperturbable.当然，托马斯沉着、冷漠，不易激动。
• Edward was a model of good temper and his equanimity imperturbable.爱德华是个典型的好性子，他总是沉着镇定。

10 gratitude   

adj.感激，感谢

参考例句：

• I have expressed the depth of my gratitude to him.我向他表示了深切的谢意。
• She could not help her tears of gratitude rolling down her face.她感激的泪珠禁不住沿着面颊流了下来。

11 jack   

n.插座，千斤顶，男人；v.抬起，提醒，扛举；n.（Jake）杰克

参考例句：

• I am looking for the headphone jack.我正在找寻头戴式耳机插孔。
• He lifted the car with a jack to change the flat tyre.他用千斤顶把车顶起来换下瘪轮胎。

12 allude   

v.提及，暗指

参考例句：

• Many passages in Scripture allude to this concept.圣经中有许多经文间接地提到这样的概念。
• She also alluded to her rival's past marital troubles.她还影射了对手过去的婚姻问题。

13 chronometers   

n.精密计时器，航行表( chronometer的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Chronometers have been adjusted to the correct time. 天文钟已经调整到正确时间。 来自互联网

14 plying   

v.使用（工具）( ply的现在分词 )；经常供应（食物、饮料）；固定往来；经营生意

参考例句：

• All manner of hawkers and street sellers were plying their trade. 形形色色的沿街小贩都在做着自己的买卖。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• It was rather Mrs. Wang who led the conversation, plying Miss Liu with questions. 倒是汪太太谈锋甚健，向刘小姐问长问短。 来自汉英文学 - 围城

15 rattle   

v.飞奔，碰响；激怒；n.碰撞声；拨浪鼓

参考例句：

• The baby only shook the rattle and laughed and crowed.孩子只是摇着拨浪鼓，笑着叫着。
• She could hear the rattle of the teacups.她听见茶具叮当响。

16 bellows   

n.风箱；发出吼叫声，咆哮（尤指因痛苦）( bellow的名词复数 )；（愤怒地）说出（某事），大叫v.发出吼叫声，咆哮（尤指因痛苦）( bellow的第三人称单数 )；（愤怒地）说出（某事），大叫

参考例句：

• His job is to blow the bellows for the blacksmith. 他的工作是给铁匠拉风箱。 来自辞典例句
• You could, I suppose, compare me to a blacksmith's bellows. 我想，你可能把我比作铁匠的风箱。 来自辞典例句

17 bruised   

[医]青肿的，瘀紫的

参考例句：

• his bruised and bloodied nose 他沾满血的青肿的鼻子
• She had slipped and badly bruised her face. 她滑了一跤，摔得鼻青脸肿。

18 oysters   

牡蛎( oyster的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• We don't have oysters tonight, but the crayfish are very good. 我们今晚没有牡蛎供应。但小龙虾是非常好。
• She carried a piping hot grill of oysters and bacon. 她端出一盘滚烫的烤牡蛎和咸肉。