When Baron Skrebensky was about forty years old, his wife died, and left him raving2, disconsolate3. Lydia had visited him then, taking Anna with her. It was when the girl was fourteen years old. Since then she had not seen him. She remembered him as a small sharp clergyman who cried and talked and terrified her, whilst her mother was most strangely consoling, in a foreign language.
The little Baron never quite approved of Anna, because she spoke4 no Polish. Still, he considered himself in some way her guardian5, on Lensky’s behalf, and he presented her with some old, heavy Russian jewellery, the least valuable of his wife’s relics6. Then he lapsed7 out of the Brangwen’s life again, though he lived only about thirty miles away.
Three years later came the startling news that he had married a young English girl of good family. Everybody marvelled8. Then came a copy of “The History of the Parish of Briswell, by Rudolph, Baron Skrebensky, Vicar of Briswell.” It was a curious book, incoherent, full of interesting exhumations. It was dedicated9: “To my wife, Millicent Maud Pearse, in whom I embrace the generous spirit of England.”
“If he embraces no more than the spirit of England,” said Tom Brangwen, “it’s a bad look-out for him.”
But paying a formal visit with his wife, he found the new Baroness10 a little, creamy-skinned, insidious11 thing with red-brown hair and a mouth that one must always watch, because it curved back continually in an incomprehensible, strange laugh that exposed her rather prominent teeth. She was not beautiful, yet Tom Brangwen was immediately under her spell. She seemed to snuggle like a kitten within his warmth, whilst she was at the same time elusive13 and ironical14, suggesting the fine steel of her claws.
The Baron was almost dotingly courteous15 and attentive16 to her. She, almost mockingly, yet quite happy, let him dote. Curious little thing she was, she had the soft, creamy, elusive beauty of a ferret. Tom Brangwen was quite at a loss, at her mercy, and she laughed, a little breathlessly, as if tempted17 to cruelty. She did put fine torments18 on the elderly Baron.
When some months later she bore a son, the Baron Skrebensky was loud with delight.
Gradually she gathered a circle of acquaintances in the county. For she was of good family, half Venetian, educated in Dresden. The little foreign vicar attained19 to a social status which almost satisfied his maddened pride.M
Therefore the Brangwens were surprised when the invitation came for Anna and her young husband to pay a visit to Briswell vicarage. For the Skrebenskys were now moderately well off, Millicent Skrebensky having some fortune of her own.
Anna took her best clothes, recovered her best high-school manner, and arrived with her husband. Will Brangwen, ruddy, bright, with long limbs and a small head, like some uncouth20 bird, was not changed in the least. The little Baroness was smiling, showing her teeth. She had a real charm, a kind of joyous21 coldness, laughing, delighted, like some weasel. Anna at once respected her, and was on her guard before her, instinctively22 attracted by the strange, childlike surety of the Baroness, yet mistrusting it, fascinated. The little baron was now quite white-haired, very brittle23. He was wizened24 and wrinkled, yet fiery25, unsubdued. Anna looked at his lean body, at his small, fine lean legs and lean hands as he sat talking, and she flushed. She recognised the quality of the male in him, his lean, concentrated age, his informed fire, his faculty26 for sharp, deliberate response. He was so detached, so purely27 objective. A woman was thoroughly28 outside him. There was no confusion. So he could give that fine, deliberate response.
He was something separate and interesting; his hard, intrinsic being, whittled29 down by age to an essentiality and a directness almost death-like, cruel, was yet so unswervingly sure in its action, so distinct in its surety, that she was attracted to him. She watched his cool, hard, separate fire, fascinated by it. Would she rather have it than her husband’s diffuse31 heat, than his blind, hot youth?
She seemed to be breathing high, sharp air, as if she had just come out of a hot room. These strange Skrebenskys made her aware of another, freer element, in which each person was detached and isolated32. Was not this her natural element? Was not the close Brangwen life stifling33 her?
Meanwhile the little baroness, with always a subtle light stirring of her full, lustrous34, hazel eyes, was playing with Will Brangwen. He was not quick enough to see all her movements. Yet he watched her steadily36, with unchanging, lit-up eyes. She was a strange creature to him. But she had no power over him. She flushed, and was irritated. Yet she glanced again and again at his dark, living face, curiously37, as if she despised him. She despised his uncritical, unironical nature, it had nothing for her. Yet it angered her as if she were jealous. He watched her with deferential38 interest as he would watch a stoat playing. But he himself was not implicated39. He was different in kind. She was all lambent, biting flames, he was a red fire glowing steadily. She could get nothing out of him. So she made him flush darkly by assuming a biting, subtle class-superiority. He flushed, but still he did not object. He was too different.
Her little boy came in with the nurse. He was a quick, slight child, with fine preceptiveness, and a cool transitoriness in his interest. At once he treated Will Brangwen as an outsider. He stayed by Anna for a moment, acknowledged her, then was gone again, quick, observant, restless, with a glance of interest at everything.
The father adored him, and spoke to him in Polish. It was queer, the stiff, aristocratic manner of the father with the child, the distance in the relationship, the classic fatherhood on the one hand, the filial subordination on the other. They played together, in their different degrees very separate, two different beings, differing as it were in rank rather than in relationship. And the baroness smiled, smiled, smiled, always smiled, showing her rather protruding41 teeth, having always a mysterious attraction and charm.
Anna realised how different her own life might have been, how different her own living. Her soul stirred, she became as another person. Her intimacy42 with her husband passed away, the curious enveloping43 Brangwen intimacy, so warm, so close, so stifling, when one seemed always to be in contact with the other person, like a blood-relation, was annulled44. She denied it, this close relationship with her young husband. He and she were not one. His heat was not always to suffuse45 her, suffuse her, through her mind and her individuality, till she was of one heat with him, till she had not her own self apart. She wanted her own life. He seemed to lap her and suffuse her with his being, his hot life, till she did not know whether she were herself, or whether she were another creature, united with him in a world of close blood-intimacy that closed over her and excluded her from all the cool outside.
She wanted her own, old, sharp self, detached, detached, active but not absorbed, active for her own part, taking and giving, but never absorbed. Whereas he wanted this strange absorption with her, which still she resisted. But she was partly helpless against it. She had lived so long in Tom Brangwen’s love, beforehand.
From the Skrebensky’s, they went to Will Brangwen’s beloved Lincoln Cathedral, because it was not far off. He had promised her, that one by one, they should visit all the cathedrals of England. They began with Lincoln, which he knew well.
He began to get excited as the time drew near to set off. What was it that changed him so much? She was almost angry, coming as she did from the Skrebensky’s. But now he ran on alone. His very breast seemed to open its doors to watch for the great church brooding over the town. His soul ran ahead.
When he saw the cathedral in the distance, dark blue lifted watchful46 in the sky, his heart leapt. It was the sign in heaven, it was the Spirit hovering47 like a dove, like an eagle over the earth. He turned his glowing, ecstatic face to her, his mouth opened with a strange, ecstatic grin.
“There she is,” he said.
The “she” irritated her. Why “she”? It was “it”. What was the cathedral, a big building, a thing of the past, obsolete48, to excite him to such a pitch? She began to stir herself to readiness.
They passed up the steep hill, he eager as a pilgrim arriving at the shrine49. As they came near the precincts, with castle on one side and cathedral on the other, his veins50 seemed to break into fiery blossom, he was transported.
They had passed through the gate, and the great west front was before them, with all its breadth and ornament51.
“It is a false front,” he said, looking at the golden stone and the twin towers, and loving them just the same. In a little ecstasy52 he found himself in the porch, on the brink53 of the unrevealed. He looked up to the lovely unfolding of the stone. He was to pass within to the perfect womb.
Then he pushed open the door, and the great, pillared gloom was before him, in which his soul shuddered54 and rose from her nest. His soul leapt, soared up into the great church. His body stood still, absorbed by the height. His soul leapt up into the gloom, into possession, it reeled, it swooned with a great escape, it quivered in the womb, in the hush55 and the gloom of fecundity56, like seed of procreation in ecstasy.
She too was overcome with wonder and awe58. She followed him in his progress. Here, the twilight59 was the very essence of life, the coloured darkness was the embryo60 of all light, and the day. Here, the very first dawn was breaking, the very last sunset sinking, and the immemorial darkness, whereof life’s day would blossom and fall away again, re-echoed peace and profound immemorial silence.
Away from time, always outside of time! Between east and west, between dawn and sunset, the church lay like a seed in silence, dark before germination61, silenced after death. Containing birth and death, potential with all the noise and transition of life, the cathedral remained hushed, a great, involved seed, whereof the flower would be radiant life inconceivable, but whose beginning and whose end were the circle of silence. Spanned round with the rainbow, the jewelled gloom folded music upon silence, light upon darkness, fecundity upon death, as a seed folds leaf upon leaf and silence upon the root and the flower, hushing up the secret of all between its parts, the death out of which it fell, the life into which it has dropped, the immortality62 it involves, and the death it will embrace again.
Here in the church, “before” and “after” were folded together, all was contained in oneness. Brangwen came to his consummation. Out of the doors of the womb he had come, putting aside the wings of the womb, and proceeding63 into the light. Through daylight and day-after-day he had come, knowledge after knowledge, and experience after experience, remembering the darkness of the womb, having prescience of the darkness after death. Then between-while he had pushed open the doors of the cathedral, and entered the twilight of both darkness, the hush of the two-fold silence where dawn was sunset, and the beginning and the end were one.
Here the stone leapt up from the plain of earth, leapt up in a manifold, clustered desire each time, up, away from the horizontal earth, through twilight and dusk and the whole range of desire, through the swerving30, the declination, ah, to the ecstasy, the touch, to the meeting and the consummation, the meeting, the clasp, the close embrace, the neutrality, the perfect, swooning consummation, the timeless ecstasy. There his soul remained, at the apex64 of the arch, clinched65 in the timeless ecstasy, consummated66.
And there was no time nor life nor death, but only this, this timeless consummation, where the thrust from earth met the thrust from earth and the arch was locked on the keystone of ecstasy. This was all, this was everything. Till he came to himself in the world below. Then again he gathered himself together, in transit40, every jet of him strained and leaped, leaped clear into the darkness above, to the fecundity and the unique mystery, to the touch, the clasp, the consummation, the climax67 of eternity68, the apex of the arch.
She too was overcome, but silenced rather than tuned69 to the place. She loved it as a world not quite her own, she resented his transports and ecstasies70. His passion in the cathedral at first awed71 her, then made her angry. After all, there was the sky outside, and in here, in this mysterious half-night, when his soul leapt with the pillars upwards72, it was not to the stars and the crystalline dark space, but to meet and clasp with the answering impulse of leaping stone, there in the dusk and secrecy73 of the roof. The far-off clinching74 and mating of the arches, the leap and thrust of the stone, carrying a great roof overhead, awed and silenced her.
But yet-yet she remembered that the open sky was no blue vault75, no dark dome76 hung with many twinkling lamps, but a space where stars were wheeling in freedom, with freedom above them always higher.
The cathedral roused her too. But she would never consent to the knitting of all the leaping stone in a great roof that closed her in, and beyond which was nothing, nothing, it was the ultimate confine. His soul would have liked it to be so: here, here is all, complete, eternal: motion, meeting, ecstasy, and no illusion of time, of night and day passing by, but only perfectly77 proportioned space and movement clinching and renewing, and passion surging its way into great waves to the altar, recurrence78 of ecstasy.
Her soul too was carried forward to the altar, to the threshold of Eternity, in reverence79 and fear and joy. But ever she hung back in the transit, mistrusting the culmination80 of the altar. She was not to be flung forward on the lift and lift of passionate81 flights, to be cast at last upon the altar steps as upon the shore of the unknown. There was a great joy and a verity82 in it. But even in the dazed swoon of the cathedral, she claimed another right. The altar was barren, its lights gone out. God burned no more in that bush. It was dead matter lying there. She claimed the right to freedom above her, higher than the roof. She had always a sense of being roofed in.
So that she caught at little things, which saved her from being swept forward headlong in the tide of passion that leaps on into the Infinite in a great mass, triumphant83 and flinging its own course. She wanted to get out of this fixed84, leaping, forward-travelling movement, to rise from it as a bird rises with wet, limp feet from the sea, to lift herself as a bird lifts its breast and thrusts its body from the pulse and heave of a sea that bears it forward to an unwilling85 conclusion, tear herself away like a bird on wings, and in open space where there is clarity, rise up above the fixed, surcharged motion, a separate speck86 that hangs suspended, moves this way and that, seeing and answering before it sinks again, having chosen or found the direction in which it shall be carried forward.
And it was as if she must grasp at something, as if her wings were too weak to lift her straight off the heaving motion. So she caught sight of the wicked, odd little faces carved in stone, and she stood before them arrested.
These sly little faces peeped out of the grand tide of the cathedral like something that knew better. They knew quite well, these little imps87 that retorted on man’s own illusion, that the cathedral was not absolute. They winked88 and leered, giving suggestion of the many things that had been left out of the great concept of the church. “However much there is inside here, there’s a good deal they haven’t got in,” the little faces mocked.
Apart from the lift and spring of the great impulse towards the altar, these little faces had separate wills, separate motions, separate knowledge, which rippled89 back in defiance90 of the tide, and laughed in triumph of their own very littleness.
“Oh, look!” cried Anna. “Oh, look how adorable, the faces! Look at her.”
Brangwen looked unwillingly91. This was the voice of the serpent in his Eden. She pointed92 him to a plump, sly, malicious93 little face carved in stone.
“He knew her, the man who carved her,” said Anna. “I’m sure she was his wife.”
“It isn’t a woman at all, it’s a man,” said Brangwen curtly94.
“Do you think so?-No! That isn’t a man. That is no man’s face.”
Her voice sounded rather jeering95. He laughed shortly, and went on. But she would not go forward with him. She loitered about the carvings96. And he could not go forward without her. He waited impatient of this counteraction98. She was spoiling his passionate intercourse99 with the cathedral. His brows began to gather.
“Oh, this is good!” she cried again. “Here is the same woman-look!-only he’s made her cross! Isn’t it lovely! Hasn’t he made her hideous100 to a degree?” She laughed with pleasure. “Didn’t he hate her? He must have been a nice man! Look at her-isn’t it awfully101 good-just like a shrewish woman. He must have enjoyed putting her in like that. He got his own back on her, didn’t he?”
“It’s a man’s face, no woman’s at all-a monk’s-clean shaven,” he said.
She laughed with a pouf! of laughter.
“You hate to think he put his wife in your cathedral, don’t you?” she mocked, with a tinkle102 of profane103 laughter. And she laughed with malicious triumph.
She had got free from the cathedral, she had even destroyed the passion he had. She was glad. He was bitterly angry. Strive as he would, he could not keep the cathedral wonderful to him. He was disillusioned104. That which had been his absolute, containing all heaven and earth, was become to him as to her, a shapely heap of dead matter-but dead, dead.
His mouth was full of ash, his soul was furious. He hated her for having destroyed another of his vital illusions. Soon he would be stark105, stark, without one place wherein to stand, without one belief in which to rest.
Yet somewhere in him he responded more deeply to the sly little face that knew better, than he had done before to the perfect surge of his cathedral.
Nevertheless for the time being his soul was wretched and homeless, and he could not bear to think of Anna’s ousting106 him from his beloved realities. He wanted his cathedral; he wanted to satisfy his blind passion. And he could not any more. Something intervened.
They went home again, both of them altered. She had some new reverence for that which he wanted, he felt that his cathedrals would never again be to him as they had been. Before, he had thought them absolute. But now he saw them crouching107 under the sky, with still the dark, mysterious world of reality inside, but as a world within a world, a sort of side show, whereas before they had been as a world to him within a chaos108: a reality, an order, an absolute, within a meaningless confusion.
He had felt, before, that could he but go through the great door and look down the gloom towards the far-off, concluding wonder of the altar, that then, with the windows suspended around like tablets of jewels, emanating109 their own glory, then he had arrived. Here the satisfaction he had yearned110 after came near, towards this, the porch of the great Unknown, all reality gathered, and there, the altar was the mystic door, through which all and everything must move on to eternity.
But now, somehow, sadly and disillusioned, he realised that the doorway111 was no doorway. It was too narrow, it was false. Outside the cathedral were many flying spirits that could never be sifted112 through the jewelled gloom. He had lost his absolute.
He listened to the thrushes in the gardens and heard a note which the cathedrals did not include: something free and careless and joyous. He crossed a field that was all yellow with dandelions, on his way to work, and the bath of yellow glowing was something at once so sumptuous113 and so fresh, that he was glad he was away from his shadowy cathedral.
There was life outside the Church. There was much that the Church did not include. He thought of God, and of the whole blue rotunda114 of the day. That was something great and free. He thought of the ruins of the Grecian worship, and it seemed, a temple was never perfectly a temple, till it was ruined and mixed up with the winds and the sky and the herbs.
Still he loved the Church. As a symbol, he loved it. He tended it for what it tried to represent, rather than for that which it did represent. Still he loved it. The little church across his garden-wall drew him, he gave it loving attention. But he went to take charge of it, to preserve it. It was as an old, sacred thing to him. He looked after the stone and woodwork, mending the organ and restoring a piece of broken carving97, repairing the church furniture. Later, he became choir-master also.
His life was shifting its centre, becoming more superficial. He had failed to become really articulate, failed to find real expression. He had to continue in the old form. But in spirit, he was uncreated.
Anna was absorbed in the child now, she left her husband to take his own way. She was willing now to postpone115 all adventure into unknown realities. She had the child, her palpable and immediate12 future was the child. If her soul had found no utterance116, her womb had.
The church that neighboured with his house became very intimate and dear to him. He cherished it, he had it entirely117 in his charge. If he could find no new activity, he would be happy cherishing the old, dear form of worship. He knew this little, whitewashed118 church. In its shadowy atmosphere he sank back into being. He liked to sink himself in its hush as a stone sinks into water.
He went across his garden, mounted the wall by the little steps, and entered the hush and peace of the church. As the heavy door clanged to behind him, his feet re-echoed in the aisle119, his heart re-echoed with a little passion of tenderness and mystic peace. He was also slightly ashamed, like a man who has failed, who lapses120 back for his fulfilment.
He loved to light the candles at the organ, and sitting there alone in the little glow, practise the hymns121 and chants for the service. The whitewashed arches retreated into darkness, the sound of the organ and the organ-pedals died away upon the unalterable stillness of the church, there were faint, ghostly noises in the tower, and then the music swelled122 out again, loudly, triumphantly123.
He ceased to fret124 about his life. He relaxed his will, and let everything go. What was between him and his wife was a great thing, if it was not everything. She had conquered, really. Let him wait, and abide125, wait and abide. She and the baby and himself, they were one. The organ rang out his protestation. His soul lay in the darkness as he pressed the keys of the organ.
To Anna, the baby was a complete bliss126 and fulfilment. Her desires sank into abeyance127, her soul was in bliss over the baby. It was rather a delicate child, she had trouble to rear it. She never for a moment thought it would die. It was a delicate infant, therefore it behoved her to make it strong. She threw herself into the labour, the child was everything. Her imagination was all occupied here. She was a mother. It was enough to handle the new little limbs, the new little body, hear the new little voice crying in the stillness. All the future rang to her out of the sound of the baby’s crying and cooing, she balanced the coming years of life in her hands, as she nursed the child. The passionate sense of fulfilment, of the future germinated128 in her, made her vivid and powerful. All the future was in her hands, in the hands of the woman. And before this baby was ten months old, she was again with child. She seemed to be in the fecund57 of storm life, every moment was full and busy with productiveness to her. She felt like the earth, the mother of everything.
Brangwen occupied himself with the church, he played the organ, he trained the choir-boys, he taught a Sunday-school class of youths. He was happy enough. There was an eager, yearning129 kind of happiness in him as he taught the boys on Sundays. He was all the time exciting himself with the proximity130 of some secret that he had not yet fathomed131.
In the house, he served his wife and the little matriarchy. She loved him because he was the father of her children. And she always had a physical passion for him. So he gave up trying to have the spiritual superiority and control, or even her respect for his conscious or public life. He lived simply by her physical love for him. And he served the little matriarchy, nursing the child and helping132 with the housework, indifferent any more of his own dignity and importance. But his abandoning of claims, his living isolated upon his own interest, made him seem unreal, unimportant.
Anna was not publicly proud of him. But very soon she learned to be indifferent to public life. He was not what is called a manly133 man: he did not drink or smoke or arrogate134 importance. But he was her man, and his very indifference135 to all claims of manliness136 set her supreme137 in her own world with him. Physically138, she loved him and he satisfied her. He went alone and subsidiary always. At first it had irritated her, the outer world existed so little to him. Looking at him with outside eyes, she was inclined to sneer139 at him. But her sneer changed to a sort of respect. She respected him, that he could serve her so simply and completely. Above all, she loved to bear his children. She loved to be the source of children.
She could not understand him, his strange, dark rages and his devotion to the church. It was the church building he cared for; and yet his soul was passionate for something. He laboured cleaning the stonework, repairing the woodwork, restoring the organ, and making the singing as perfect as possible. To keep the church fabric140 and the church-ritual intact was his business; to have the intimate sacred building utterly141 in his own hands, and to make the form of service complete. There was a little bright anguish142 and tension on his face, and in his intent movements. He was like a lover who knows he is betrayed, but who still loves, whose love is only the more intense. The church was false, but he served it the more attentively143.
During the day, at his work in the office, he kept himself suspended. He did not exist. He worked automatically till it was time to go home.
He loved with a hot heart the dark-haired little Ursula, and he waited for the child to come to consciousness. Now the mother monopolised the baby. But his heart waited in its darkness. His hour would come.
In the long run, he learned to submit to Anna. She forced him to the spirit of her laws, whilst leaving him the letter of his own. She combated in him his devils. She suffered very much from his inexplicable144 and incalculable dark rages, when a blackness filled him, and a black wind seemed to sweep out of existence everything that had to do with him. She could feel herself, everything, being annihilated145 by him.
At first she fought him. At night, in this state, he would kneel down to say his prayers. She looked at his crouching figure.
“Why are you kneeling there, pretending to pray?” she said, harshly. “Do you think anybody can pray, when they are in the vile146 temper you are in?”
He remained crouching by the beside, motionless.
“It’s horrible,” she continued, “and such a pretence147! What do you pretend you are saying? Who do you pretend you are praying to?”
He still remained motionless, seething148 with inchoate149 rage, when his whole nature seemed to disintegrate150. He seemed to live with a strain upon himself, and occasionally came these dark, chaotic151 rages, the lust35 for destruction. She then fought with him, and their fights were horrible, murderous. And then the passion between them came just as black and awful.
But little by little, as she learned to love him better, she would put herself aside, and when she felt one of his fits upon him, would ignore him, successfully leave him in his world, whilst she remained in her own. He had a black struggle with himself, to come back to her. For at last he learned that he would be in hell until he came back to her. So he struggled to submit to her, and she was afraid of the ugly strain in his eyes. She made love to him, and took him. Then he was grateful to her love, humble152.
He made himself a woodwork shed, in which to restore things which were destroyed in the church. So he had plenty to do: his wife, his child, the church, the woodwork, and his wage-earning, all occupying him. If only there were not some limit to him, some darkness across his eyes! He had to give in to it at last himself. He must submit to his own inadequacy153, aware of some limit to himself, of something unformed in his own black, violent temper, and to reckon with it. But as she was more gentle with him, it became quieter.
As he sat sometimes very still, with a bright, vacant face, Anna could see the suffering among the brightness. He was aware of some limit to himself, of something unformed in his very being, of some buds which were not ripe in him, some folded centres of darkness which would never develop and unfold whilst he was alive in the body. He was unready for fulfilment. Something undeveloped in him limited him, there was a darkness in him which he could not unfold, which would never unfold in him.
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baron
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| n.男爵；(商业界等)巨头，大王 | |
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raving
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| adj.说胡话的；疯狂的，怒吼的；非常漂亮的；令人醉心[痴心]的v.胡言乱语(rave的现在分词)n.胡话；疯话adv.胡言乱语地；疯狂地 | |
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disconsolate
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| adj.忧郁的，不快的 | |
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spoke
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| 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 | |
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guardian
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| n.监护人；守卫者，保护者 | |
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relics
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| [pl.］n.遗物，遗迹，遗产；遗体，尸骸 | |
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lapsed
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| adj.流失的，堕落的v.退步( lapse的过去式和过去分词 )；陷入；倒退；丧失 | |
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marvelled
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| v.惊奇，对…感到惊奇( marvel的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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dedicated
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| adj.一心一意的；献身的；热诚的 | |
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baroness
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| n.男爵夫人，女男爵 | |
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insidious
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| adj.阴险的，隐匿的，暗中为害的，（疾病）不知不觉之间加剧 | |
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immediate
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| adj.立即的；直接的，最接近的；紧靠的 | |
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elusive
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| adj.难以表达(捉摸)的；令人困惑的；逃避的 | |
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ironical
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| adj.讽刺的，冷嘲的 | |
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courteous
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| adj.彬彬有礼的，客气的 | |
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attentive
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| adj.注意的，专心的；关心(别人)的，殷勤的 | |
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tempted
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| v.怂恿（某人）干不正当的事；冒…的险（tempt的过去分词） | |
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torments
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| （肉体或精神上的）折磨，痛苦( torment的名词复数 )； 造成痛苦的事物[人] | |
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19
attained
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| （通常经过努力）实现( attain的过去式和过去分词 )； 达到； 获得； 达到（某年龄、水平、状况） | |
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20
uncouth
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| adj.无教养的，粗鲁的 | |
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21
joyous
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| adj.充满快乐的；令人高兴的 | |
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22
instinctively
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| adv.本能地 | |
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23
brittle
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| adj.易碎的；脆弱的；冷淡的；(声音)尖利的 | |
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wizened
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| adj.凋谢的；枯槁的 | |
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25
fiery
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| adj.燃烧着的，火红的；暴躁的；激烈的 | |
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faculty
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| n.才能；学院，系；(学院或系的)全体教学人员 | |
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27
purely
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| adv.纯粹地，完全地 | |
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28
thoroughly
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| adv.完全地，彻底地，十足地 | |
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29
whittled
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| v.切，削（木头），使逐渐变小( whittle的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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30
swerving
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| v.（使）改变方向，改变目的( swerve的现在分词 ) | |
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31
diffuse
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| v.扩散；传播；adj.冗长的；四散的，弥漫的 | |
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32
isolated
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| adj.与世隔绝的 | |
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33
stifling
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| a.令人窒息的 | |
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34
lustrous
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| adj.有光泽的；光辉的 | |
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35
lust
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| n.性(淫)欲；渴(欲)望；vi.对…有强烈的欲望 | |
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36
steadily
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| adv.稳定地；不变地；持续地 | |
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37
curiously
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| adv.有求知欲地；好问地；奇特地 | |
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38
deferential
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| adj. 敬意的，恭敬的 | |
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39
implicated
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| adj.密切关联的；牵涉其中的 | |
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40
transit
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| n.经过，运输；vt.穿越，旋转；vi.越过 | |
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41
protruding
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| v.（使某物）伸出，（使某物）突出( protrude的现在分词 )；凸 | |
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42
intimacy
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| n.熟悉，亲密，密切关系，亲昵的言行 | |
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43
enveloping
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| v.包围，笼罩，包住( envelop的现在分词 ) | |
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44
annulled
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| v.宣告无效( annul的过去式和过去分词 )；取消；使消失；抹去 | |
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45
suffuse
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| v.(色彩等)弥漫，染遍 | |
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46
watchful
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| adj.注意的，警惕的 | |
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47
hovering
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| 鸟( hover的现在分词 )； 靠近（某事物）； （人）徘徊； 犹豫 | |
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48
obsolete
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| adj.已废弃的，过时的 | |
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49
shrine
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| n.圣地，神龛，庙；v.将...置于神龛内，把...奉为神圣 | |
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50
veins
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| n.纹理；矿脉( vein的名词复数 )；静脉；叶脉；纹理 | |
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51
ornament
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| v.装饰，美化；n.装饰，装饰物 | |
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52
ecstasy
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| n.狂喜，心醉神怡，入迷 | |
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53
brink
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| n.(悬崖、河流等的)边缘，边沿 | |
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54
shuddered
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| v.战栗( shudder的过去式和过去分词 )；发抖；（机器、车辆等）突然震动；颤动 | |
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55
hush
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| int.嘘，别出声；n.沉默，静寂；v.使安静 | |
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56
fecundity
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| n.生产力；丰富 | |
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57
fecund
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| adj.多产的，丰饶的，肥沃的 | |
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58
awe
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| n.敬畏，惊惧；vt.使敬畏，使惊惧 | |
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59
twilight
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| n.暮光，黄昏；暮年，晚期，衰落时期 | |
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60
embryo
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| n.胚胎，萌芽的事物 | |
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61
germination
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| n.萌芽，发生；萌发；生芽；催芽 | |
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62
immortality
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| n.不死，不朽 | |
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63
proceeding
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| n.行动，进行，(pl.)会议录，学报 | |
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64
apex
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| n.顶点，最高点 | |
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65
clinched
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| v.（尤指两人）互相紧紧抱[扭]住( clinch的过去式和过去分词 )；解决（争端、交易），达成（协议） | |
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66
consummated
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| v.使结束( consummate的过去式和过去分词 )；使完美；完婚；（婚礼后的）圆房 | |
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67
climax
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| n.顶点；高潮；v.(使)达到顶点 | |
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68
eternity
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| n.不朽，来世；永恒，无穷 | |
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69
tuned
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| 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 | |
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70
ecstasies
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| 狂喜( ecstasy的名词复数 )； 出神； 入迷； 迷幻药 | |
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71
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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72
upwards
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| adv.向上，在更高处...以上 | |
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73
secrecy
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| n.秘密，保密，隐蔽 | |
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74
clinching
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| v.（尤指两人）互相紧紧抱[扭]住( clinch的现在分词 )；解决（争端、交易），达成（协议） | |
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75
vault
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| n.拱形圆顶，地窖，地下室 | |
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76
dome
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| n.圆屋顶，拱顶 | |
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77
perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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78
recurrence
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| n.复发，反复，重现 | |
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79
reverence
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| n.敬畏，尊敬，尊严；Reverence:对某些基督教神职人员的尊称；v.尊敬，敬畏，崇敬 | |
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80
culmination
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| n.顶点；最高潮 | |
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81
passionate
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| 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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82
verity
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| n.真实性 | |
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83
triumphant
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| adj.胜利的，成功的；狂欢的，喜悦的 | |
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84
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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85
unwilling
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| adj.不情愿的 | |
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86
speck
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| n.微粒，小污点，小斑点 | |
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87
imps
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| n.（故事中的）小恶魔( imp的名词复数 )；小魔鬼；小淘气；顽童 | |
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88
winked
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| v.使眼色( wink的过去式和过去分词 )；递眼色（表示友好或高兴等）；（指光）闪烁；闪亮 | |
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89
rippled
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| 使泛起涟漪（ripple的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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90
defiance
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| n.挑战，挑衅，蔑视，违抗 | |
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91
unwillingly
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| adv.不情愿地 | |
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92
pointed
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| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
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93
malicious
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| adj.有恶意的，心怀恶意的 | |
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94
curtly
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| adv.简短地 | |
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95
jeering
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| adj.嘲弄的，揶揄的v.嘲笑( jeer的现在分词 ) | |
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96
carvings
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| n.雕刻( carving的名词复数 )；雕刻术；雕刻品；雕刻物 | |
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97
carving
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| n.雕刻品，雕花 | |
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98
counteraction
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| 反对的行动，抵抗，反动 | |
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99
intercourse
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| n.性交；交流，交往，交际 | |
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100
hideous
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| adj.丑陋的，可憎的，可怕的，恐怖的 | |
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101
awfully
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| adv.可怕地，非常地，极端地 | |
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102
tinkle
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| vi.叮当作响；n.叮当声 | |
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103
profane
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| adj.亵神的，亵渎的；vt.亵渎，玷污 | |
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104
disillusioned
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| a.不再抱幻想的，大失所望的，幻想破灭的 | |
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105
stark
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| adj.荒凉的；严酷的；完全的；adv.完全地 | |
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106
ousting
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| 驱逐( oust的现在分词 )； 革职； 罢黜； 剥夺 | |
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107
crouching
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| v.屈膝，蹲伏( crouch的现在分词 ) | |
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108
chaos
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| n.混乱，无秩序 | |
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109
emanating
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| v.从…处传出，传出( emanate的现在分词 )；产生，表现，显示 | |
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110
yearned
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| 渴望，切盼，向往( yearn的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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111
doorway
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| n.门口，(喻)入门；门路，途径 | |
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112
sifted
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| v.筛( sift的过去式和过去分词 )；筛滤；细查；详审 | |
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113
sumptuous
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| adj.豪华的，奢侈的，华丽的 | |
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114
rotunda
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| n.圆形建筑物；圆厅 | |
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115
postpone
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| v.延期，推迟 | |
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116
utterance
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| n.用言语表达，话语，言语 | |
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117
entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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118
whitewashed
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| 粉饰，美化，掩饰( whitewash的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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119
aisle
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| n.（教堂、教室、戏院等里的）过道，通道 | |
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120
lapses
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| n.失误，过失( lapse的名词复数 )；小毛病；行为失检；偏离正道v.退步( lapse的第三人称单数 )；陷入；倒退；丧失 | |
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121
hymns
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| n.赞美诗，圣歌，颂歌( hymn的名词复数 ) | |
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122
swelled
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| 增强( swell的过去式和过去分词 )； 肿胀； （使）凸出； 充满（激情） | |
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123
triumphantly
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| ad.得意洋洋地；得胜地；成功地 | |
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124
fret
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| v.(使)烦恼；(使)焦急；(使)腐蚀，(使)磨损 | |
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125
abide
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| vi.遵守；坚持；vt.忍受 | |
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126
bliss
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| n.狂喜，福佑，天赐的福 | |
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127
abeyance
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| n.搁置，缓办，中止，产权未定 | |
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128
germinated
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| v.（使）发芽( germinate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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129
yearning
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| a.渴望的；向往的；怀念的 | |
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130
proximity
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| n.接近，邻近 | |
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131
fathomed
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| 理解…的真意( fathom的过去式和过去分词 )； 彻底了解； 弄清真相 | |
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132
helping
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| n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的 | |
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133
manly
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| adj.有男子气概的；adv.男子般地，果断地 | |
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134
arrogate
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| v.冒称具有...权利，霸占 | |
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135
indifference
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| n.不感兴趣，不关心，冷淡，不在乎 | |
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136
manliness
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| 刚毅 | |
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137
supreme
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| adj.极度的，最重要的；至高的，最高的 | |
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138
physically
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| adj.物质上，体格上，身体上，按自然规律 | |
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139
sneer
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| v.轻蔑；嘲笑；n.嘲笑，讥讽的言语 | |
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140
fabric
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| n.织物，织品，布；构造，结构，组织 | |
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141
utterly
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| adv.完全地，绝对地 | |
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142
anguish
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| n.(尤指心灵上的)极度痛苦，烦恼 | |
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143
attentively
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| adv.聚精会神地；周到地；谛；凝神 | |
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144
inexplicable
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| adj.无法解释的，难理解的 | |
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145
annihilated
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| v.（彻底）消灭( annihilate的过去式和过去分词 )；使无效；废止；彻底击溃 | |
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146
vile
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| adj.卑鄙的，可耻的，邪恶的；坏透的 | |
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147
pretence
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| n.假装，作假；借口，口实；虚伪；虚饰 | |
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148
seething
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| 沸腾的，火热的 | |
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149
inchoate
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| adj.才开始的，初期的 | |
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150
disintegrate
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| v.瓦解，解体，（使）碎裂，（使）粉碎 | |
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151
chaotic
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| adj.混沌的，一片混乱的，一团糟的 | |
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152
humble
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| adj.谦卑的，恭顺的；地位低下的；v.降低，贬低 | |
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153
inadequacy
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| n.无法胜任，信心不足 | |
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