A HAPPY FAMILY. CHAPTER I.

 "If solid happiness we prize,

Within our breast this jewel lies.

From our own selves our joys must flow,

And peace begins at home."Cotton.

 

The family—our family, not the Happy Family—consisted of me and my brothers and sisters. I have a father and mother, of course.

 

I am the eldest¹, as I remind my brothers; and of the more worthy² gender³, which my sisters sometimes forget. Though we live in the village, my father is a gentleman, as I shall be when I am grown up. I have told the village boys so more than once. One feels mean in boasting that one is better born than they are; but if I did not tell them, I am not sure that they would always know.

 

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Our house is old, and we have a ghost—the ghost of my great-great-great-great-great-aunt.

 

She "crossed her father's will," nurse says, and he threatened to flog her with his dog-whip, and she ran away, and was never heard of more. He would not let the pond be dragged, but he never went near it again; and the villagers do not like to go near it now. They say you may meet her there, after sunset, flying along the path among the trees, with her hair half down, and a knot of ribbon fluttering from it, and parted lips, and terror in her eyes.

 

The men of our family (my father's family, my mother is Irish) have always had strong wills. I have a strong will myself.

 

People say I am like the picture of my great-grandfather (the great-great-great-nephew of the ghost). He must have been a wonderful old gentleman by all accounts. Sometimes nurse says to us, "Have your own way, and you'll live the longer," and it always makes me think of great-grandfather, who had so much of his own way, and lived to be nearly a hundred.

 

I remember my father telling us how his sisters had to visit their old granny for months at a time, and how he shut the shutters⁴ at three o'clock on summer afternoons, and made them play dummy⁵ whist by candle light.

 

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"Didn't you and your brothers go?" asked Uncle Patrick, across the dinner-table. My father laughed.

 

"Not we! My mother got us there once—but never again."

 

"And did your sisters like it?"

 

"Like it? They used to cry their hearts out. I really believe it killed poor Jane. She was consumptive and chilly⁶, but always craving⁷ for fresh air; and granny never would have open windows, for fear of draughts⁸ on his bald head; and yet the girls had no fires in their room, because young people shouldn't be pampered⁹."

 

"And ye never-r offer-r-ed—neither of ye—to go in the stead of them?"

 

When Uncle Patrick rolls his R's in a discussion, my mother becomes nervous.

 

"One can't expect boys to consider things," she said. "Boys will be boys, you know."

 

"And what would you have 'em be?" said my father. Uncle Patrick turned to my mother.

 

"Too true, Geraldine. Ye don't expect it. Worse luck! I assure ye, I'd be aghast at the brutes¹⁰ we men can be, if I wasn't more amazed that we're as good as we are, when the best and gentlest of your sex—the moulders¹¹ of our childhood, the desire of our manhood—demand so little for all that you alone [264]can give. There were conceivable uses in women preferring the biggest brutes of barbarous times, but it's not so now; and boys will be civilised boys, and men will be civilised men, sweet sister, when you do expect it, and when your grace and favours are the rewards of nobleness, and not the easy prize of selfishness and savagery¹²."

 

My father spoke¹³ fairly.

 

"There's some truth in what you say, Pat."

 

"And small grace in my saying it. Forgive me, John."

 

That's the way Uncle Patrick flares¹⁴ up and cools down, like a straw bonfire. But my father makes allowances for him; first, because he is an Irishman, and, secondly¹⁵, because he's a cripple.

 

I love my mother dearly, and I can do anything I like with her. I always could. When I was a baby, I would not go to sleep unless she walked about with me, so (though walking was bad for her) I got my own way, and had it afterwards.

 

With one exception. She would never tell me about my godfather. I asked once, and she was so distressed¹⁶ that I was glad to promise never to speak of him again. But I only thought of him the more, though all I knew about him was his portrait—such a [265]fine fellow—and that he had the same swaggering, ridiculous name as mine.

 

How my father allowed me to be christened Bayard I cannot imagine. But I was rather proud of it at one time—in the days when I wore long curls, and was so accustomed to hearing myself called "a perfect picture," and to having my little sayings quoted by my mother and her friends, that it made me miserable¹⁷ if grown-up people took the liberty of attending to anything but me. I remember wriggling¹⁸ myself off my mother's knee when I wanted change, and how she gave me her watch to keep me quiet, and stroked my curls, and called me her fair-haired knight¹⁹, and her little Bayard; though, remembering also, how lingeringly I used just not to do her bidding, ate the sugar when she wasn't looking, tried to bawl²⁰ myself into fits, kicked the nurse-girl's shins, and dared not go upstairs by myself after dark—I must confess that a young chimpanzee would have as good claims as I had to represent that model of self-conquest and true chivalry²¹, "the Knight without fear and without reproach."

 

However, the vanity of it did not last long. I wonder if that grand-faced godfather of mine suffered as I suffered when he went to school and said his name was Bayard? I owe a day in harvest to the young wag who turned it into Backyard. I gave in [266]my name as Backyard to every subsequent inquirer, and Backyard I modestly remained.

1 eldest   

adj.最年长的，最年老的

参考例句：

• The King's eldest son is the heir to the throne.国王的长子是王位的继承人。
• The castle and the land are entailed on the eldest son.城堡和土地限定由长子继承。

2 worthy   

adj.(of)值得的，配得上的；有价值的

参考例句：

• I did not esteem him to be worthy of trust.我认为他不值得信赖。
• There occurred nothing that was worthy to be mentioned.没有值得一提的事发生。

3 gender   

n.（生理上的）性，（名词、代词等的）性

参考例句：

• French differs from English in having gender for all nouns.法语不同于英语，所有的名词都有性。
• Women are sometimes denied opportunities solely because of their gender.妇女有时仅仅因为性别而无法获得种种机会。

4 shutters   

百叶窗( shutter的名词复数 )； （照相机的）快门

参考例句：

• The shop-front is fitted with rolling shutters. 那商店的店门装有卷门。
• The shutters thumped the wall in the wind. 在风中百叶窗砰砰地碰在墙上。

5 dummy   

n.假的东西；(哄婴儿的)橡皮奶头

参考例句：

• The police suspect that the device is not a real bomb but a dummy.警方怀疑那个装置不是真炸弹，只是一个假货。
• The boys played soldier with dummy swords made of wood.男孩们用木头做的假木剑玩打仗游戏。

6 chilly   

adj.凉快的，寒冷的

参考例句：

• I feel chilly without a coat.我由于没有穿大衣而感到凉飕飕的。
• I grew chilly when the fire went out.炉火熄灭后，寒气逼人。

7 craving   

n.渴望,热望

参考例句：

• a craving for chocolate 非常想吃巧克力
• She skipped normal meals to satisfy her craving for chocolate and crisps. 她不吃正餐，以便满足自己吃巧克力和炸薯片的渴望。

8 draughts   

n. <英>国际跳棋

参考例句：

• Seal (up) the window to prevent draughts. 把窗户封起来以防风。
• I will play at draughts with him. 我跟他下一盘棋吧！

9 pampered   

adj.饮食过量的，饮食奢侈的v.纵容，宠，娇养( pamper的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• The lazy scum deserve worse. What if they ain't fed up and pampered? 他们吃不饱，他们的要求满足不了，这又有什么关系？ 来自飘（部分）
• She petted and pampered him and would let no one discipline him but she, herself. 她爱他，娇养他，而且除了她自己以外，她不允许任何人管教他。 来自辞典例句

10 brutes   

兽( brute的名词复数 )； 畜生； 残酷无情的人； 兽性

参考例句：

• They're not like dogs; they're hideous brutes. 它们不像狗，是丑陋的畜牲。
• Suddenly the foul musty odour of the brutes struck his nostrils. 突然，他的鼻尖闻到了老鼠的霉臭味。 来自英汉文学

11 moulders   

v.腐朽( moulder的第三人称单数 )；腐烂，崩塌

参考例句：

• Injection moulding without rejects is the ideal moulders try to attain. 避免不良品的注射成型是很多成型工艺员努力想达到的理想。 来自互联网
• That rotting inward slowly moulders all. 让它侵蚀就逐渐糜烂一切。 来自互联网

12 savagery   

n.野性

参考例句：

• The police were shocked by the savagery of the attacks.警察对这些惨无人道的袭击感到震惊。
• They threw away their advantage by their savagery to the black population.他们因为野蛮对待黑人居民而丧失了自己的有利地位。

13 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：

• They sourced the spoke nuts from our company.他们的轮辐螺帽是从我们公司获得的。
• The spokes of a wheel are the bars that connect the outer ring to the centre.辐条是轮子上连接外圈与中心的条棒。

14 flares   

n.喇叭裤v.（使）闪耀( flare的第三人称单数 )；（使）（船舷）外倾；（使）鼻孔张大；（使）（衣裙、酒杯等）呈喇叭形展开

参考例句：

• The side of a ship flares from the keel to the deck. 船舷从龙骨向甲板外倾。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• He's got a fiery temper and flares up at the slightest provocation. 他是火爆性子，一点就着。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》

15 secondly   

adv.第二，其次

参考例句：

• Secondly,use your own head and present your point of view.第二，动脑筋提出自己的见解。
• Secondly it is necessary to define the applied load.其次，需要确定所作用的载荷。

16 distressed   

痛苦的

参考例句：

• He was too distressed and confused to answer their questions. 他非常苦恼而困惑，无法回答他们的问题。
• The news of his death distressed us greatly. 他逝世的消息使我们极为悲痛。

17 miserable   

adj.悲惨的，痛苦的；可怜的，糟糕的

参考例句：

• It was miserable of you to make fun of him.你取笑他，这是可耻的。
• Her past life was miserable.她过去的生活很苦。

18 wriggling   

v.扭动，蠕动，蜿蜒行进( wriggle的现在分词 )；（使身体某一部位）扭动；耍滑不做，逃避（应做的事等）；蠕蠕

参考例句：

• The baby was wriggling around on my lap. 婴儿在我大腿上扭来扭去。
• Something that looks like a gray snake is wriggling out. 有一种看来象是灰蛇的东西蠕动着出来了。 来自辞典例句

19 knight   

n.骑士，武士；爵士

参考例句：

• He was made an honourary knight.他被授予荣誉爵士称号。
• A knight rode on his richly caparisoned steed.一个骑士骑在装饰华丽的马上。

20 bawl   

v.大喊大叫，大声地喊，咆哮

参考例句：

• You don't have to bawl out like that. Eeverybody can hear you.你不必这样大声喊叫，大家都能听见你。
• Your mother will bawl you out when she sees this mess.当你母亲看到这混乱的局面时她会责骂你的。

21 chivalry   

n.骑士气概，侠义；（男人）对女人彬彬有礼，献殷勤

参考例句：

• The Middle Ages were also the great age of chivalry.中世纪也是骑士制度盛行的时代。
• He looked up at them with great chivalry.他非常有礼貌地抬头瞧她们。