“That!” I say belatedly. “It’s a thing in a nightmare!”
He shakes his head and smiles — exasperatingly3.
I perceive quite abruptly4 that the botanist and I have reached the limits of our intercourse5.
“The world dreams things like that,” I say, “because it suffers from an indigestion of such people as you.”
His low-toned self-complacency, like the faded banner of an obstinate6 fort, still flies unconquered. And you know, he’s not even a happy man with it all!
For ten seconds or more I am furiously seeking in my mind for a word, for a term of abuse, for one compendious7 verbal missile that shall smash this man for ever. It has to express total inadequacy8 of imagination and will, spiritual anaemia, dull respectability, gross sentimentality, a cultivated pettiness of heart. . . .
That word will not come. But no other word will do. Indeed the word does not exist. There is nothing with sufficient vituperative9 concentration for this moral and intellectual stupidity of educated people. . . .
“Er ——” he begins.
No! I can’t endure him.
With a passionate10 rapidity of movement, I leave his side, dart11 between a carriage and a van, duck under the head of a cab-horse, and board a ‘bus going westward12 somewhere — but anyhow, going in exactly the reverse direction to the botanist. I clamber up the steps and thread my swaying way to the seat immediately behind the driver.
“There!” I say, as I whack13 myself down on the seat and pant.
When I look round the botanist is out of sight.
点击收听单词发音
1 botanist | |
n.植物学家 | |
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2 triumphantly | |
ad.得意洋洋地;得胜地;成功地 | |
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3 exasperatingly | |
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4 abruptly | |
adv.突然地,出其不意地 | |
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5 intercourse | |
n.性交;交流,交往,交际 | |
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6 obstinate | |
adj.顽固的,倔强的,不易屈服的,较难治愈的 | |
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7 compendious | |
adj.简要的,精简的 | |
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8 inadequacy | |
n.无法胜任,信心不足 | |
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9 vituperative | |
adj.谩骂的;斥责的 | |
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10 passionate | |
adj.热情的,热烈的,激昂的,易动情的,易怒的,性情暴躁的 | |
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11 dart | |
v.猛冲,投掷;n.飞镖,猛冲 | |
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12 westward | |
n.西方,西部;adj.西方的,向西的;adv.向西 | |
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13 whack | |
v.敲击,重打,瓜分;n.重击,重打,尝试,一份 | |
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