Chapter III

MY CONVERSATIONS WITH BROTHER ASS¹ (being extracts from Pursewarden’s Notebook) WWith what a fearful compulsion we return to it again and again — like a tongue to a hollow tooth — this question of writing! Can writers talk nothing but shop then? No. But with old Darley I am seized with a sort of convulsive vertigo² for, while we have everything in common, I find I cannot talk to him at all. But wait. I mean that I do talk: endlessly, passionately³, hysterically⁴ without uttering a word aloud! There is no way to drive a wedge between his ideas which, ma foi, are thoughtful, orderly, the very essence of ‘soundness’. Two men propped⁵ on bar-stools thoughtfully gnawing⁷ at the universe as if at a stick of sugar-cane! The one speaks in a low, modulated⁸ voice, using language with tact⁹ and intuition; the other shifts from buttock to listless buttock shamefacedly shouting in his own mind, but only answering with an occasional affirmative or negative to these well-rounded propositions which are, for the most part, incontestably valuable and true! This would perhaps make the germ of a short story? (‘But Brother Ass, there is a whole dimension lacking to what you say. How is it possible for one to convey this in Oxford¹¹ English?’) Still with sad penitential frowns the man on the high bar-stool proceeds with his exposition about the problem of the creative act — I ask you! From time to time he shoots a shyish sideways glance at his tormentor¹² — for in a funny sort of way I do seem to torment¹³ him; otherwise he would not always be at me, aiming the button of his foil at the chinks in my self-esteem, or at the place where he believes I must keep my heart. No, we would be content with simpler conversational¹⁴ staples¹⁵ like the weather. In me he scents¹⁶ an enigma¹⁷, something crying out for the probe. (‘But Brother Ass, I am as clear as a bell — a sancing bell! The problem is there, here, nowhere!’) At times while he is talking like this I have the sudden urge to jump on his back and ride him frantically¹⁸ up and down Rue¹⁰ Fuad, thrashing him with a Thesaurus and crying: ‘Awake, moon-calf! Let me take you by your long silken jackass’s ears and drive you at a gallop¹⁹ through the waxworks²⁰ of our literature, among the clicking of Box Brownies each taking its monochrome snapshots of so-called reality! Together we will circumvent²¹ the furies and become celebrated²² for our depiction²³ of the English scene, of English life which moves to the stately rhythm of an autopsy²⁵! Do you hear me, Brother Ass?’ He does not hear, he will not hear. His voice comes to me from a great way off, as if over a faulty land-line. ‘Hullo! Can you hear me?’ I cry, shaking the receiver. I hear his voice faintly against the roaring of Niagara Falls. ‘What is that? Did you say that you wished to contribute to English literature? What, to arrange a few sprigs of parsley over this dead turbot? To blow diligently²⁶ into the nostrils²⁷ of this corpse²⁸? Have you mobilized your means, Brother Ass? Have you managed to annul²⁹ your early pot-training? Can you climb like a cat-burglar with loosened sphincters? But then what will you say to people whose affective life is that of hearty³⁰ Swiss hoteliers? I will tell you. I will say it and save all you artists the trouble. A simple word. Edelweiss. Say it in a low well-modulated voice with a refined accent, and lubricate it with a sigh! The whole secret is here, in a word which grows above snowline! And then, having solved the problem of ends and means you will have to face another just as troublesome — for if by any chance a work of art should cross the channel it would be sure to be turned back at Dover on the grounds of being improperly³² dressed! It is not easy, Brother Ass. (Perhaps it would be wisest to ask the French for intellectual asylum³³?) But I see you will not heed³⁴ me. You continue in the same unfaltering tone to describe for me the literary scene which was summed up once and for all by the poet Gray in the line “The lowing herd³⁵ winds slowly o’er the lea”! Here I cannot deny the truth of what you say. It is cogent³⁶, it is prescient, it is carefully studied. But I have taken my own precautions against a nation of mental grannies. Each of my books bears a scarlet³⁷ wrapper with the legend: NOT TO BE OPENED BY OLD WOMEN OF EITHER SEX. (Dear D.H.L. so wrong, so right, so great, may his ghost breathe on us all!)’ He puts down his glass with a little clock and sighing runs his fingers through his hair. Kindness is no excuse, I tell myself. Disinterested³⁸ goodness is no exoneration³⁹ from the basic demands of the artist’s life. You see, Brother Ass, there is my life and then the life of my life. They must belong as fruit and rind. I am not being cruel. It is simply that I am not indulgent! ‘How lucky not to be interested in writing’ says Darley with a touch of plaintive⁴⁰ despair in his tone. ‘I envy you’. But he does not, really, not at all. Brother Ass, I will tell you a short story. A team of Chinese anthropologists arrived in Europe to study our habits and beliefs. Within three weeks they were all dead. They died of uncontrollable laughter and were buried with full military honours! What do you make of that? We have turned ideas into a paying form of tourism. Darley talks on with slanting⁴¹ eye buried in his gin-sling. I reply wordlessly. In truth I am deafened⁴² by the pomposity⁴³ of my own utterances⁴⁴. They echo in my skull⁴⁵ like the reverberating⁴⁶ eructations of Zarathustra, like the wind whistling through Montaigne’s beard. At times I mentally seize him by the shoulders and shout: ‘Should literature be a path-finder or a bromide? Decide! Decide!’ He does not heed, does not hear me. He has just come from the library, from the pot-house, or from a Bach concert (the gravy⁴⁷ still running down his chin). We have aligned⁴⁸ our shoes upon the polished brass⁴⁹ rail below the bar. The evening has begun to yawn around us with the wearisome promise of girls to be ploughed. And here is Brother Ass discoursing⁵⁰ upon the book he is writing and from which he has been thrown, as from a horse, time and time again. It is not really art which is at issue, it is ourselves. Shall we always be content with the ancient tinned salad of the subsidized novel? Or the tired ice-cream of poems which cry themselves to sleep in the refrigerators of the mind? If it were possible to adopt a bolder scansion, a racier rhythm, we might all breathe more freely! Poor Darley’s books — will they always be such painstaking⁵² descriptions of the soul-states of … the human omelette? (Art occurs at the point where a form is sincerely honoured by an awakened⁵³ spirit.) ‘This one’s on me.’ ‘No, old man, on me.’ ‘No. No; I insist.’ ‘No. It’s my turn.’ This amiable⁵⁴ quibble allows me just the split second I need to jot⁵⁵ down the salient points for my self-portrait on a rather ragged⁵⁶ cuff⁵⁷. I think it covers the whole scope of the thing with admirable succinctness⁵⁸. Item one. ‘Like all fat men I tend to be my own hero.’ Item two. ‘Like all young men I set out to be a genius, but mercifully laughter intervened.’ Item three. ‘I always hoped to achieve the Elephant’s Eye view.’ Item four. ‘I realized that to become an artist one must shed the whole complex of egotisms which led to the choice of self-expression as the only means of growth! This because it is impossible I call The Whole Joke!’ Darley is talking of disappointments! But Brother Ass, disenchantment is the essence of the game. With what high hopes we invaded London from the provinces in those old dead days, our manuscripts bagging our suitcases. Do you recall? With what emotion we gazed over Westminster Bridge, reciting Wordsworth’s indifferent sonnet⁵⁹ and wondering if his daughter grew up less beautiful for being French. The metropolis⁶⁰ seemed to quiver with the portent⁶¹ of our talent, our skill, our discernment. Walking along the Mall we wondered who all those men were — tall hawk-featured men perched on balconies and high places, scanning the city with heavy binoculars⁶². What were they seeking so earnestly? Who were they — so composed and steely-eyed? Timidly we stopped a policeman to ask him. ‘They are publishers’ he said mildly. Publishers! Our hearts stopped beating. ‘They are on the look-out for new talent.’ Great God! It was for us they were waiting and watching! Then the kindly⁶³ policemen lowered his voice confidentially⁶⁴ and said in hollow and reverent⁶⁵ tones: ‘They are waiting for the new Trollope to be born!’ Do you remember, at these words, how heavy our suitcases suddenly felt? How our blood slowed, our footsteps lagged? Brother Ass, we had been bashfully thinking of a kind of illumination such as Rimbaud dreamed of — a nagging⁶⁶ poem which was not didactic or expository but which infected — was not simply a rationalized intuition, I mean, clothed in isinglass! We had come to the wrong shop, with the wrong change! A chill struck us as we saw the mist falling in Trafalgar Square, coiling around us its tendrils of ectoplasm! A million muffin-eating moralists were waiting, not for us, Brother Ass, but for the plucky⁶⁷ and tedious Trollope! (If you are dissatisfied with your form, reach for the curette.) Now do you wonder if I laugh a little off-key? Do you ask yourself what has turned me into nature’s bashful little aphorist⁶⁸? Disguised as an eiron, why who should it be But tuft-hunting, dram-drinking, toad-eating Me! We who are, after all, simply poor co-workers in the psyche⁷¹ of our nation, what can we expect but the natural automatic rejection⁷² from a public which resents interference? And quite right too. There is no injustice⁷³ in the matter, for I also resent interference, Brother Ass, just as you do. No, it is not a question of being aggrieved⁷⁴, it is a question of being unlucky. Of the ten thousand reasons for my books’ unpopularity I shall only bother to give you the first, for it includes all the others. A puritan culture’s conception of art is something which will endorse⁷⁵ its morality and flatter its patriotism⁷⁶. Nothing else. I see you raise your eyebrows⁷⁷. Even you, Brother Ass, realize the basic unreality of this proposition. Nevertheless it explains everything. A puritan culture, argal, does not know what art is — how can it be expected to care? (I leave religion to the bishops⁷⁸ — there it can do most harm!) No croked legge, no blered eye, no part deformed⁷⁹ out of kinde Nor yet so onolye half can be As is the inward suspicious minde. The wheel is patience on to which I’m bound. Time is this nothingness within the round. Gradually we compile our own anthologies of misfortune, our dictionaries of verbs and nouns, our copulas and gerundives. That symptomatic policeman of the London dusk first breathed the message to us! That kindly father-figure put the truth in a nutshell. And here we are both in a foreign city built of smegmatinted crystal and tinsel whose moeurs, if we described them, would be regarded as the fantasies of our disordered brains. Brother Ass, we have the hardest lesson of all to learn as yet — that truth cannot be forced but must be allowed to plead for itself! Can you hear me? The line is faulty again, your voice has gone far away. I hear the water rushing! Be bleak⁸¹, young man, and let who will be sprightly⁸², And honour Venus if you can twice nightly. All things being equal you should not refuse To ring the slow sad cowbell of the English muse⁸³! Art’s Truth’s Nonentity⁸⁴ made quite explicit⁸⁵. If it ain’t this then what the devil is it? Writing in my room last night I saw an ant upon the table. It crossed near the inkwell, and I saw it hesitate at the whiteness of a sheet of paper on which I had written the word ‘Love’; my pen faltered⁸⁶, the ant turned back, and suddenly my candle guttered⁸⁷ and went out. Clear octaves of yellow fight flickered⁸⁸ behind my eyeballs. I had wanted to start a sentence with the words ‘Proponents⁹¹ of love’ — but the thought had guttered out with the candle! Later on, just before dropping off to sleep an idea struck me. On the wall above my bed I wrote in pencil the words: ‘What is to be done when one cannot share one’s own opinions about love?’ I heard my own exasperated⁹² sigh as I was dropping off to sleep. In the morning I awoke, clear as a perforated appendix, and wrote my own epitaph on the mirror with my shaving-stick: ‘I never knew which side my art was buttered’ Were the Last Words that poor Pursewarden uttered! As for the proponents of love, I was glad they had vanished for they would have led me irresistibly⁹³ in the direction of sex — that bad debt which hangs upon my compatriots’ consciences. The quiddity! The veritable nub and quiddity of this disordered world, and the only proper field for the deployment⁹⁴ of our talents, Brother Ass. But one true, honest unemphatic word in this department will immediately produce one of those neighing and whinnying acts peculiar⁹⁵ to our native intellectuals! For them sex is either a Gold Rush or a Retreat from Moscow. And for us? No, but if we are to be a moment serious I will explain what I mean. (Cuckow, Cuckow, a merry note, unpleasing to the pigskin ear.) I mean more than they think. (The strange sad hermaphrodite figure of the London dusk — the Guardsman waiting in Ebury Street for the titled gent.) No, quite another region of enquiry which cannot be reached without traversing this terrain⁹⁶ vague of the partial spirits. Our topic, Brother Ass, is the same, always and irremediably the same — I spell the word for you: l-o-v-e. Four letters, each letter a volume! The point faible of the human psyche, the very site of the carcinoma maxima! How, since the Greeks, has it got mixed up with the cloaca maxima? It is a complete mystery to which the Jews hold the key unless my history is faulty. For this gifted and troublesome race which has never known art, but exhausted⁹⁷ its creative processes purely⁹⁸ in the construction of ethical⁹⁹ systems, has fathered on us all, literally¹⁰⁰ impregnated the Western European psyche with, the whole range of ideas based on ‘race’ and sexual containment¹⁰¹ in the furtherance of the race! I hear Balthazar growling¹⁰² and lashing¹⁰³ his tail! But where the devil do these fantasies of purified bloodstreams come from? Am I wrong to turn to the fearful prohibitions¹⁰⁴ listed in Leviticus for an explanation of the manic depressive fury of Plymouth Brethren and a host of other dismal¹⁰⁵ sectarians? We have had our testicles pinched for centuries by the Mosaic¹⁰⁶ Law; hence the wan⁹⁰ and pollarded look of our young girls and boys. Hence the mincing¹⁰⁷ effrontery¹⁰⁸ of adults willed to perpetual adolescence¹⁰⁹! Speak, Brother Ass! Do you heed me? If I am wrong you have only to say so! But in my conception of the four-letter word — which I am surprised has not been blacklisted with the other three by the English printer — I am somewhat bold and sweeping¹¹⁰. I mean the whole bloody¹¹¹ range — from the little greenstick fractures of the human heart right up to its higher spiritual connivance¹¹² with the … well, the absolute ways of nature, if you like. Surely, Brother Ass, this is the improper³¹ study of man? The main drainage of the soul? We could make an atlas¹¹³ of our sighs! Zeus gets Hera on her back But finds that she has lost the knack¹¹⁴. Extenuated¹¹⁵ by excesses She is unable, she confesses. Nothing daunted¹¹⁶ Zeus, who wise is, Tries a dozen good disguises. Eagle, ram⁷⁰, and bull and bear Quickly answer Hera’s prayer. One knows a God should be prolix¹¹⁷, But … think of all those different ! But I break off here in some confusion, for I see that I am in danger of not taking myself as seriously as I should! And this is an unpardonable offence. Moreover I missed your last remark which was something about the choice of a style. Yes, Brother Ass, the choice of a style is most important; in the market garden of our domestic culture you will find strange and terrible blooms with every stamen standing¹¹⁸ erect¹¹⁹. Oh, to write like Ruskin! When poor Effie Grey tried to get to his bed, he shoo’d the girl away! Oh, to write like Carlyle! Haggis of the mind. When a Scotsman comes to toun Can Spring be far behind? No. Everything you say is truthful¹²⁰ and full of point; relative truth, and somewhat pointless point, but nevertheless I will try and think about this invention of the scholiasts, for clearly style is as important to you as matter to me. How shall we go about it? Keats, the word-drunk, searched for resonance¹²¹ among vowel-sounds which might give him an echo of his inner self. He sounded the empty coffin¹²² of his early death with patient knuckles¹²³, listening to the dull resonances¹²⁴ given off by his certain immortality¹²⁵. Byron was off-hand with English, treating it as master to servant; but the language, being no lackey¹²⁷, grew up like tropic lianas between the cracks of his verses, almost strangling the man. He really lived, his life was truly imaginary; under the figment of the passional self there is a mage, though he himself was not aware of the fact. Donne stopped upon the exposed nerve, jangling the whole cranium. Truth should make one wince¹²⁸, he thought. He hurts us, fearing his own facility; despite the pain of the stopping his verse must be chewed to rags. Shakespeare makes all Nature hang its head. Pope, in an anguish¹²⁹ of method, like a constipated child, sandpapers his surfaces to make them slippery for our feet. Great stylists are those who are least certain of their effects. The secret lack in their matter haunts them without knowing it! Eliot puts a cool chloroform pad upon a spirit too tightly braced¹³⁰ by the information it has gathered. His honesty of measure and his resolute¹³¹ bravery to return to the headsman’s axe¹³² is a challenge to us all; but where is the smile? He induces awkward sprains¹³³ at a moment when we are trying to dance! He has chosen greyness rather than light, and he shares his portion with Rembrandt. Blake and Whitman are awkward brown paper parcels full of vessels¹³⁴ borrowed from the temple which tumble all over the place when the string breaks. Longfellow heralds¹³⁵ the age of invention for he first thought out the mechanical piano. You pedal, it recites. Lawrence was a limb of the genuine oak-tree, with the needed girth and span. Why did he show them that it mattered, and so make himself vulnerable to their arrows? Auden also always talks. He has manumitted the colloquial…. But here, Brother Ass, I break off; for clearly this is not higher or even lower criticism! I do not see this sort of fustian¹³⁶ going down at our older universities where they are still painfully trying to extract from art some shadow of justification¹³⁷ for their way of life. Surely there must be a grain of hope, they ask anxiously? After all, there must be a grain of hope for decent honest Christian¹³⁸ folk in all this rigmarole which is poured out by our tribe from generation to generation. Or is art simply the little white stick which is given to the blind man and by the help of which he tap tap taps along a road he cannot see but which he is certain is there? Brother Ass, it is for you to decide! When I was chided by Balthazar for being equivocal I replied, without a moment’s conscious thought: ‘Words being what they are, people being what they are, perhaps it would be better always to say the opposite of what one means?’ Afterwards, when I reflected on this view (which I did not know that I held) it seemed to me really eminently¹³⁹ sage⁸⁰! So much for conscious thought: you see, we Anglo-Saxons are incapable¹⁴¹ of thinking for ourselves; about, yes. In thinking about ourselves we put up every kind of pretty performance in every sort of voice, from cracked Yorkshire to the hot-potato-in-the-mouth voice of the BBC. There we excel, for we see ourselves at one remove from reality, as a subject under a microscope. This idea of objectivity is really a flattering extension of our sense of humbug¹⁴². When you start to think for yourself it is impossible to cant¹⁴³ — and we live by cant! Ah! I hear you say with a sigh, another of those English writers, eminent¹⁴⁰ jailors of the soul! How they weary and disturb us! Very true and very sad. Hail! Albion drear, fond home of cant! Pursewarden sends thee greetings scant¹⁴⁴. Thy notions he’s turned back to front Abhorring¹⁴⁵ cant, adoring **** But if you wish to enlarge the image turn to Europe, the Europe which spans, say, Rabelais to de Sade. A progress from the belly-consciousness to the head-consciousness, from flesh and food to sweet (sweet!) reason. Accompanied by all the interchanging ills which mock us. A progress from religious ecstasy¹⁴⁶ to duodenal ulcer¹⁴⁷! (It is probably healthier to be entirely¹⁴⁸ brainless.) But, Brother Ass, this is something which you did not take into account when you chose to compete for the Heavyweight Belt for Artists of the Millennium¹⁴⁹. It is too late to complain. You thought you would somehow sneak¹⁵⁰ by the penalties without being called upon to do more than demonstrate your skill with words. But words … they are only an Aeolian harp¹⁵¹, or a cheap xylophone. Even a sea-lion can learn to balance a football on its nose or to play the slide trombone in a circus. What lies beyond…? No, but seriously, if you wished to be — I do not say original but merely contemporary — you might try a four-card trick in the form of a novel; passing a common axis¹⁵² through four stories, say, and dedicating each to one of the four winds of heaven. A continuum, forsooth, embodying¹⁵³ not a temps retrouvé but a temps delivré. The curvature of space itself would give you stereoscopic narrative¹⁵⁴, while human personality seen across a continuum would perhaps become prismatic? Who can say? I throw the idea out. I can imagine a form which, if satisfied, might raise in human terms the problems of causality or indeterminacy…. And nothing very recherché either. Just an ordinary Girl Meets Boy story. But tackled in this way you would not, like most of your contemporaries, be drowsily¹⁵⁵ cutting along a dotted line! That is the sort of question which you will one day be forced to ask yourself (‘We will never get to Mecca!’ as the Tchekhov sisters remarked in a play, the title of which I have forgotten.) Nature he loved, and next to nature nudes¹⁵⁶, He strove with every woman worth the strife¹⁵⁷, Warming both cheeks before the fire of life, And fell, doing battle with a million prudes. Who dares to dream of capturing the fleeting¹⁵⁸ image of truth in all its gruesome multiplicity? (No, no, let us dine cheerfully off scraps¹⁵⁹ of ancient discarded poultice and allow ourselves to be classified by science as wet and dry bobs.) Whose are the figures I see before me, fishing the brackish¹⁶⁰ reaches of the C. of E.? One writes, Brother Ass, for the spiritually starving, the castaways of the soul! They will always be a majority even when everyone is a state-owned millionaire. Have courage, for here you will always be master of your audience! Genius which cannot be helped should be politely ignored. Nor do I mean that it is useless to master and continuously practise your craft. No. A good writer should be able to write anything. But a great writer is the servant of compulsions which are ordained¹⁶¹ by the very structure of the psyche and cannot be disregarded. Where is he? Where is he? Come, let us collaborate¹⁶² on a four- or five-decker job, shall we? ‘Why the Curate Slipped’ would be a good title. Quick, they are waiting, those hypnagogic figures among the London minarets¹⁶³, the muezzin of the trade. ‘Does Curate get girl as well as stipend¹⁶⁴, or only stipend? Read the next thousand pages and find out!’ English life in the raw — like some pious¹⁶⁵ melodrama¹⁶⁶ acted by criminal churchwardens sentenced to a lifetime of sexual misgivings¹⁶⁷! In this way we can put a tea-cosy over reality to our mutual¹⁶⁸ advantage, writing it all in the plain prose which is only just distinguishable from galvanized iron. In this way we will put a lid on a box with no sides! Brother Ass, let us conciliate a world of listless curmudgeons¹⁶⁹ who read to verify, not their intuitions, but their prejudices! I remember old Da Capo saying one afternoon: ‘Today I had five girls. I know it will seem excessive to you. I was not trying to prove anything to myself. But if I said that I had merely blended five teas to suit my palate or five tobaccos to suit my pipe, you would not give the matter a second thought. You would, on the contrary, admire my eclecticism¹⁷⁰, would you not?’ The belly-furbished Kenilworth at the F.O. once told me plaintively¹⁷¹ that he had ‘just dropped in’ on James Joyce out of curiosity, and was surprised and pained to find him rude, arrogant¹⁷² and short-tempered. ‘But’ I said ‘he was paying for his privacy by giving lessons to niggers at one and six an hour! He might have been entitled to feel safe from ineffables like yourself who imagine that art is something to which a good education automatically entitles you; that it is a part of a social equipment, class aptitude¹⁷³, like painting water-colours was for a Victorian gentlewoman! I can imagine his poor heart sinking as he studied your face, with its expression of wayward condescension¹⁷⁴ — the fathomless¹⁷⁵ self-esteem which one sees occasionally flit across the face of a goldfish with a hereditary¹⁷⁶ title!’ After this we never spoke¹⁷⁷, which was what I wanted. The art of making necessary enemies! Yet one thing I liked in him: he pronounced the word ‘Civilization’ as if it had an S-bend in it. (Brother Ass is on symbolism now, and really talking good sense, I must admit.) Symbolism! The abbreviation of language into poem. The heraldic aspect of reality! Symbolism is the great repair-outfit of the psyche, Brother Ass, the fond de pouvoir of the soul. The sphincter-loosening music which copies the ripples¹⁷⁸ of the soul’s progress through human flesh, playing in us like electricity! (Old Parr, when he was drunk, said once: ‘Yes, but it hurts to realize!’) Of course it does. But we know that the history of literature is the history of laughter and pain. The imperatives¹⁷⁹ from which there is no escape are: Laugh till it hurts, and hurt till you laugh! The greatest thoughts are accessible to the least of men. Why do we have to struggle so? Because understanding is a function not of ratiocination¹⁸⁰ but of the psyche’s stage of growth. There, Brother Ass, is the point at which we are at variance¹⁸¹. No amount of explanation can close the gap. Only realization¹⁸²! One day you are going to wake from your sleep shouting with laughter. Ecco! About Art I always tell myself: while they are watching the firework display, yclept Beauty, you must smuggle¹⁸³ the truth into their veins¹⁸⁴ like a filter-passing virus! This is easier said than done. How slowly one learns to embrace the paradox¹⁸⁵! Even I am not there as yet; nevertheless, like that little party of explorers, ‘Though we were still two days’ march from the falls we suddenly heard their thunder growing up in the distance’! Ah! those who merit it may one day be granted a rebirth-certificate by a kindly Government Department. This will entitle them to receive everything free of charge — a prize reserved for those who want nothing. Celestial¹⁸⁶ economics, about which Lenin is strangely silent! Ah! the gaunt faces of the English muses¹⁸⁷! Pale distressed¹⁸⁸ gentlewomen in smocks and beads¹⁸⁹, dispensing¹⁹⁰ tea and drop-scones to the unwary! The foxy faces Of Edwardian Graces Horse-faces full of charm With strings¹⁹¹ of beads And a packet of seeds And an ape-tuft under each arm! Society! Let us complicate¹⁹² existence to the point of drudgery¹⁹³ so that it acts as a drug against reality. Unfair! Unfair! But, my dear Brother Ass, the sort of book I have in mind will be characterized by the desired quality which will make us rich and famous: it will be characterized by a total lack of codpiece! When I want to infuriate Balthazar I say: ‘Now if the Jews would only assimilate they would give us a valuable lead in the matter of breaking down puritanism everywhere. For they are the licence-holders and patentees of the closed system, the ethical response! Even our absurd food prohibitions and inhibitions are copied from their melancholy¹⁹⁴ priest-ridden rigmarole about flesh and fowl¹⁹⁵. Aye! We artists are not interested in policies but in values — this is our field of battle! If once we could loosen up, relax the terrible grip of the so-called Kingdom of Heaven which has made the earth such a blood-soaked place, we might rediscover in sex the key to a metaphysical search which is our raison d’être here below! If the closed system and the moral exclusiveness on divine right were relaxed a little what could we not do?’ What indeed? But the good Balthazar smokes his Lakadif gloomily and shakes his shaggy head. I think of the black velvet¹⁹⁶ sighs of Juliet and fall silent. I think of the soft white knosps — unopened flower-shapes — which decorate the tombs of Moslem¹⁹⁷ women! The slack, soft insipid¹⁹⁸ mansuetude of these females of the mind! No, clearly my history is pretty weak. Islam also libs as the Pope does. Brother Ass, let us trace the progress of the European artist from problem-child to case-history, from case-history to crybaby! He has kept the psyche of Europe alive by his ability to be wrong, by his continual cowardice¹⁹⁹ — this is his function! Cry-baby of the Western World! Cry-babies of the world unite! But let me hasten to add, lest this sounds cynical²⁰⁰ or despairing, that I am full of hope. For always, at every moment of time, there is a chance that the artist will stumble upon what I can only call The Great Inkling! Whenever this happens he is at once free to enjoy his fecundating role; but it can never really happen as fully⁶ and completely as it deserves until the miracle comes about — the miracle of Pursewarden’s Ideal Commonwealth²⁰¹! Yes, I believe in this miracle. Our very existence as artists affirms it! It is the act of yea-saying about which the old poet of the city speaks in a poem you once showed me in translation.* The fact of an artist being born affirms and reaffirms this in every generation. The miracle is there, on ice so to speak. One fine day it will blossom: then the artist suddenly grows up and accepts the full responsibility for his origins in the people, and when simultaneously²⁰² the people recognize his peculiar significance and value, and greet him as the unborn child in themselves, the infant Joy! I am certain it will come. At the moment they are like wrestlers nervously²⁰³ circling one another, looking for the hold. But when it comes, this great blinding second of illumination — only then shall we be able to dispense²⁰⁴ with hierarchy²⁰⁵ as a social form. The new society — so different from anything we can imagine now — will be born around the small strict white temple of the Infant Joy! Men and women will group themselves around it, the protoplasmic growth of the village, the town, the capital! Nothing stands in the way of this Ideal Commonwealth, save that in every generation the vanity and laziness of the artist has always matched the self-indulgent blindness of the people. But prepare, prepare! It is on the way. It is here, there, nowhere! The great schools of love will arise, and sensual and intellectual knowledge will draw their impetus²⁰⁶ from each other. The human animal will be uncaged, all his dirty cultural straw and coprolitic refuse of belief cleaned out. And the human spirit, radiating light and laughter, will softly tread the green grass like a dancer; will emerge to cohabit with the time-forms and give children to the world of the elementaries — undines and salamanders, sylphs and sylvestres, Gnomi and Vulcani, angels and gnomes²⁰⁷. Yes, to extend the range of physical sensuality to embrace mathematics and theology: to nourish not to stunt²⁰⁸ the intuitions. For culture means sex, the root-knowledge, and where the faculty²⁰⁹ is derailed or crippled, its derivatives²¹⁰ like religion come up dwarfed²¹¹ or contorted — instead of the emblematic²¹² mystic rose you get Judaic cauliflowers like Morons²¹³ or Vegetarians²¹⁴, instead of artists you get cry-babies, instead of philosophy semantics. The sexual and the creative energy go hand in hand. They convert into one another — the solar sexual and the lunar spiritual holding an eternal dialogue. They ride the spiral of time together. They embrace the whole of the human motive²¹⁵. The truth is only to be found in our own entrails — the truth of Time. ‘Copulation is the lyric²¹⁶ of the mob!’ Aye, and also the university of the soul: but a university at present without endowments, without books or even students. No, there are a few. How wonderful the death-struggle of Lawrence: to realize his sexual nature fully, to break free from the manacles of the Old Testament²¹⁷; flashing down the firmament²¹⁸ like a great white struggling man-fish, the last Christian martyr²¹⁹. His struggle is ours — to rescue Jesus from Moses. For a brief moment it looked possible, but St Paul restored the balance and the iron handcuffs of the Judaic prison closed about the growing soul forever. Yet in The Man Who Died he tells us plainly what must be, what the reawakening of Jesus should have meant — the true birth of free man. Where is he? What has happened to him? Will he ever come? My spirit trembles with joy as I contemplate²²⁰ this city of light which a divine accident might create before our very eyes at any moment! Here art will find its true form and place, and the artist can play like a fountain without contention²²¹, without even trying. For I see art more and more clearly as a sort of manuring of the psyche. It has no intention, that is to say no theology. By nourishing the psyche, by dunging it up, it helps it to find its own level, like water. That level is an original innocence²²² — who invented the perversion²²³ of Original Sin, that filthy²²⁴ obscenity of the West? Art, like a skilled masseur on a playing-field, is always standing by to help deal with casualties; and just as a masseur does, its ministrations ease up the tensions of the psyche’s musculature. That is why it always goes for the sore places, its fingers pressing upon the knotted muscles, the tendon afflicted²²⁵ with cramp²²⁶ — the sins, perversions²²⁷, displeasing²²⁸ points which we are reluctant to accept. Revealing them with its harsh kindness it unravels²²⁹ the tensions, relaxes the psyche. The other part of the work, if there is any other work, must belong to religion. Art is the purifying factor merely. It predicates nothing. It is the handmaid of silent content, essential only to joy and to love! These strange beliefs, Brother Ass, you will find lurking²³⁰ under my mordant²³¹ humours, which may be described simply as a technique of therapy. As Balthazar says: ‘A good doctor, and in a special sense the psychologist, makes it quite deliberately²³², slightly harder for the patient to recover too easily. You do this to see if his psyche has any real bounce in it, for the secret of healing is in the patient and not the doctor. The only measure is the reaction!’ I was born under Jupiter, Hero of the Comic Mode! My poems, like soft music invading the encumbered²³³ senses of young lovers left alone at night…. What was I saying? Yes, the best thing to do with a great truth, as Rabelais discovered, is to bury it in a mountain of follies²³⁴ where it can comfortably wait for the picks and shovels²³⁵ of the elect. Between infinity²³⁶ and eternity²³⁷ stretches the thin hard tightrope²³⁸ human beings must walk, joined at the waist! Do not let these unamiable propositions dismay you, Brother Ass. They are written down in pure joy, uncontaminated by a desire to preach! I am really writing for an audience of the blind — but aren’t we all? Good art points, like a man too ill to speak, like a baby! But if instead of following the direction it indicates you take it for a thing in itself, having some sort of absolute value, or as a thesis upon something which can be paraphrased²³⁹, surely you miss the point; you lose yourself at once among the barren abstractions of the critic? Try to tell yourself that its fundamental object was only to invoke²⁴⁰ the ultimate healing silence — and that the symbolism contained in form and pattern is only a frame of reference through which, as in a mirror, one may glimpse the idea of a universe at rest, a universe in love with itself. Then like a babe in arms you will ‘milk the universe at every breath’! We must learn to read between the lines, between the lives. Liza used to say: ‘But its very perfection makes one sure that it will come to an end.’ She was right; but women will not accept time and the dictates²⁴¹ of the death-divining second. They do not see that a civilization is simply a great metaphor²⁴² which describes the aspirations²⁴³ of the individual soul in collective form — as perhaps a novel or a poem might do. The struggle is always for greater consciousness. But alas²⁴⁴! Civilizations die in the measure that they become conscious of themselves. They realize, they lose heart, the propulsion of the unconscious motive is no longer there. Desperately²⁴⁵ they begin to copy themselves in the mirror. It is no use. But surely there is a catch in all this? Yes, Time is the catch! Space is a concrete idea, but Time is abstract. In the scar tissue of Proust’s great poem you see that so clearly; his work is the great academy of the time-consciousness. But being unwilling²⁴⁶ to mobilize the meaning of time he was driven to fall back on memory, the ancestor of hope! Ah! but being a Jew he had hope — and with Hope comes the irresistible²⁴⁷ desire to meddle²⁴⁸. Now we Celts mate with despair out of which alone grows laughter and the desperate romance of the eternally hopeless. We hunt the unattainable, and for us there is only a search unending. For him it would mean nothing, my phrase ‘the prolongation of childhood into art’. Brother Ass, the diving-board, the trapeze, lie just to the eastward²⁴⁹ of this position! A leap through the firmament to a new status — only don’t miss the ring! Why for example don’t they recognize in Jesus the great Ironist that he is, the comedian²⁵⁰? I am sure that two-thirds of the Beatitudes are jokes or squibs in the manner of Chuang Tzu. Generations of mystagogues and pedants²⁵¹ have lost the sense. I am sure of it however because he must have known that Truth disappears with the telling of it. It can only be conveyed, not stated; irony²⁵² alone is the weapon for such a task. Or let us turn to another aspect of the thing; it was you, just a moment ago, who mentioned our poverty of observation in all that concerns each other — the limitations of sight itself. Bravely spoken! But translated spiritually you get the picture of a man walking about the house, hunting for the spectacles which are on his forehead. To see is to imagine! And what, Brother Ass, could be a better illustration than your manner of seeing Justine, fitfully lit up in the electric signs of the imagination? It is not the same woman evidently who set about besieging²⁵³ me and who was finally driven off by my sardonic²⁵⁴ laughter. What you saw as soft and appealing in her seemed to me a specially²⁵⁵ calculated hardness, not which she invented, but which you evoked²⁵⁶ in her. All that throaty chatter²⁵⁷, the compulsion to exteriorize²⁵⁸ hysteria, reminded me of a feverish²⁵⁹ patient plucking at a sheet! The violent necessity to incriminate life, to explain her soul-states, reminded me of a mendicant²⁶⁰ soliciting²⁶¹ pity by a nice exhibition of sores. Mentally she always had me scratching myself! Yet there was much to admire in her and I indulged my curiosity in exploring the outlines of her character with some sympathy — the configurations²⁶² of an unhappiness which was genuine, though it always smelt²⁶³ of grease paint! The child, for example! ‘I found it, of course. Or rather Mnemjian did. In a brothel. It died from something, perhaps meningitis. Darley and Nessim came and dragged me away. All of a sudden I realized that I could not bear to find it; all the time I hunted I lived on the hope of finding it. But this thing, once dead, seemed suddenly to deprive me of all purpose. I recognized it, but my inner mind kept crying out that it was not true, refusing to let me recognize it, even though I already had consciously done so!’ The mixture of conflicting emotions was so interesting that I jotted²⁶⁴ them down in my notebook between a poem and a recipe for angel bread which I got from El Kalef. Tabulated²⁶⁵ thus: 1. Relief at end of search. 2. Despair at end of search; no further motive force in life. 3. Horror at death. 4. Relief at death. What future possible for it? 5. Intense shame (don’t understand this). 6. Sudden desire to continue search uselessly rather than admit truth. 7. Preferred to continue to feed on false hopes! A bewildering collection of fragments to leave among the analects of a moribund²⁶⁶ poet! But here was the point I was trying to make. She said: ‘Of course neither Nessim nor Darley noticed anything. Men are so stupid, they never do. I would have been able to forget it even perhaps, and dream that I had never really discovered it, but for Mnemjian, who wanted the reward, and was so convinced of the truth of his case that he made a great row. There was some talk of an autopsy by Balthazar. I was foolish enough to go to his clinic and offer to bribe²⁶⁷ him to say it was not my child. He was pretty astonished. I wanted him to deny a truth which I so perfectly²⁶⁸ knew to be true, so that I should not have to change my outlook. I would not be deprived of my sorrow, if you like; I wanted it to go on — to go on passionately searching for what I did not dare to find. I even frightened Nessim and incurred²⁶⁹ his suspicions with my antics over his private safe. So the matter passed off, and for a long time I still went on automatically searching until underneath²⁷⁰ I could stand the strain of the truth and come to terms with it. I see it so clearly, the divan²⁷¹, the tenement²⁷².’ Here she put on her most beautiful expression, which was one of intense sadness, and put her hands upon her breasts. Shall I tell you something? I suspected her of lying; it was an unworthy thought but then … I am an unworthy person. I: ‘Have you ever been back to the place?’ She: ‘No. I have often wanted to, but did not dare.’ She shuddered²⁷³ a little. ‘In my memory I have become attached to that old divan. It must be knocking about somewhere. You see, I am still half convinced it was all a dream.’ At once I took up my pipe, violin and deerstalker like a veritable Sherlock. I have always been an X-marks-the-spot man. ‘Let us go and revisit it’ I said briskly. At the worst, I thought, such a visitation would be cathartic²⁷⁴. It was in fact a supremely²⁷⁵ practical thing to suggest, and to my surprise she at once rose and put on her coat. We walked silently down through the western edges of the town, arm in arm. There was some kind of festival going on in the Arab town which was blazing with electric fight and flags. Motionless sea, small high clouds, and a moon like a disapproving²⁷⁶ archimandrite of another faith. Smell of fish, cardamon seed and frying entrails packed with cummin and garlic. The air was full of the noise of mandolines scratching their little souls out on the night, as if afflicted with fleas²⁷⁷ — scratching until the blood came on the lice-intoxicated night! The air was heavy. Each breath invisibly perforated it. You felt it come in and out of the lungs as if in a leather bellows²⁷⁸. Eheu! It was grisly all that light and noise, I thought. And they talk of the romance of the East! Give me the Metropole at Brighton any day! We traversed this sector²⁷⁹ of light with quick deliberate step. She walked unerringly, head bent²⁸⁰, deep in thought. Then gradually the streets grew darker, faded into the violet of darkness, became narrower, twisted and turned. At last we came to a great empty space with starlight. A dim great barrack of a building. She moved slowly now, with less certainty, hunting for a door. In a whisper she said ‘This place is run by old Mettrawi. He is bedridden. The door is always open. But he hears everything from his bed. Take my hand.’ I was never a great fire-eater and I must confess to a certain uneasiness as we walked into this bandage of total blackness. Her hand was firm and cool, her voice precise, unmarked by any range of emphasis, betraying neither excitement nor fear. I thought I heard the scurrying²⁸¹ of immense rats in the rotten structure around me, the very rafters of night itself. (Once in a thunderstorm among the ruins I had seen their fat wet glittering bodies flash here and there as they feasted on garbage.) ‘Please God, remember that even though I am an English poet I do not deserve to be eaten by rats’ I prayed silently. We had started to walk down a long corridor of blackness with the rotten wooden boards creaking under us; here and there was one missing, and I wondered if we were not walking over the bottomless pit itself! The air smelt of wet ashes and that unmistakable odour of black flesh when it is sweating. It is quite different from white flesh. It is dense²⁸², foetid, like the lion’s cage at the Zoo. The Darkness itself was sweating — and why not? The Darkness must wear Othello’s skin. Always a timorous²⁸³ fellow, I suddenly wanted to go to the lavatory²⁸⁴ but I crushed the thought like a blackbeetle. Let my bladder wait. On we went, and round two sides of a … piece of darkness floored with rotten boards. Then suddenly she whispered: ‘I think we are there!’ and pushed open a door upon another piece of impenetrable darkness. But it was a room of some size for the air was cool. One felt the space though one could see nothing whatsoever²⁸⁵. We both inhaled²⁸⁶ deeply. ‘Yes’ she whispered thoughtfully and, groping in her velvet handbag for a box of matches, hesitantly struck one. It was a tall room, so tall that it was roofed by darkness despite the yellow flapping of the match-flame; one huge shattered window faintly reflected starlight. The walls were of verdigris²⁸⁷, the plaster peeling everywhere, and their only decoration was the imprint²⁸⁸ of little blue hands which ran round the four walls in a haphazard²⁸⁹ pattern. As if a lot of pygmies had gone mad with blue paint and then galloped²⁹⁰ all over the walls standing on their hands! To the left, a little off centre, reposed²⁹¹ a large gloomy divan, floating upon the gloom like a Viking catafalque; it was a twice-chewed relic²⁹² of some Ottoman calif, riddled²⁹³ with holes. The match went out. ‘There it is’ she said and putting the box into my hand she left my side. When I lit up again she was sitting beside the divan with her cheek resting upon it, softly stroking it with the palm of her hand. She was completely composed. She stroked it with a calm voluptuous²⁹⁴ gesture and then crossed her paws on it, reminding me of a lioness sitting astride its lunch. The moment had a kind of weird²⁹⁵ tension, but this was not reflected on her face. (Human beings are like pipe-organs, I thought. You pull out a stop marked ‘Lover’ or ‘Mother’ and the requisite²⁹⁶ emotions are unleashed²⁹⁷ — tears or sighs or endearments²⁹⁸. Sometimes I try and think of us all as habit-patterns rather than human beings. I mean, wasn’t the idea of the individual soul grafted²⁹⁹ on us by the Greeks in the wild hope that, by its sheer beauty, it would ‘take’ — as we say of vaccination³⁰⁰? That we might grow up to the size of the concept and grow the heavenly flame in each of our hearts? Has it taken or hasn’t it? Who can say? Some of us still have one, but how vestigial it seems. Perhaps….) ‘They have heard us.’ Somewhere in the darkness there was a thin snarl³⁰¹ of voice, and the silence became suddenly padded out with the scamper³⁰² of feet upon rotted woodwork. In the expiring flicker⁸⁹ of the match I saw, as if somewhere very far away, a bar of light — like a distant furnace door opening in heaven. And voices now, the voices of ants! The children came through a sort of hatch or trap-door made of darkness, in their cotton nightgowns, absurdly faded. With rings on their fingers and bells on their toes. She shall have music wherever she goes! One of them carried a waxlight floating in a saucer. They twanged nasally about us, interrogating³⁰³ our needs with blasting frankness — but they were surprised to see Justine sitting beside the Viking catafalque, her head (now smiling) half turned towards them. ‘I think we should leave’ I said in a low voice, for they smelt dreadfully these tiny apparitions³⁰⁴, and they showed a disagreeable tendency to twine³⁰⁵ their skinny arms about my waist as they wheedled³⁰⁶ and intoned. But Justine turned to one and said: ‘Bring the light here, where we can all see.’ And when the light was brought she suddenly turned herself, crossed her legs under her, and in the high ringing tone of the street storyteller she intoned: ‘Now gather about me, all ye blessed of Allah, and hear the wonders of the story I shall tell you.’ The effect was electric; they settled about her like a pattern of dead leaves in a wind, crowding up close together. Some even climbed on to the old divan, chuckling³⁰⁷ and nudging with delight. And in the same rich triumphant³⁰⁸ voice, saturated³¹⁰ with unshed tears, Justine began again in the voice of the professional story-teller: ‘Ah, listen to me, all ye true believers, and I will unfold to you the story of Yuna and Aziz, of their great many-petalled love, and of the mishaps³¹¹ which befell them from the doing of Abu Ali Saraq el-Maza. In those days of the great Califate, when many heads fell and armies marched….’ It was a wild sort of poetry for the place and the time — the little circle of wizened³¹² faces, the divan, the flopping³¹³ light; and the strangely captivating lilt of the Arabic with its heavy damascened imagery, the thick brocade of alliterative repetitions, the nasal twanging accents, gave it a laic splendour which brought tears to my eyes — gluttonous³¹⁴ tears! It was such a rich diet for the soul! It made me aware how thin the fare is which we moderns supply to our hungry readers. The epic²⁴ contours, that is what her story had! I was envious³¹⁵. How rich these beggar children were. And I was envious too of her audience. Talk of suspended judgement! They sank into the imagery of her story like plummets³¹⁶. One saw, creeping out like mice, their true souls — creeping out upon those painted masks in little expressions of wonder, suspense³¹⁷ and joy. In that yellow gloaming they were expressions of a terrible truth. You saw how they would be in middle age — the witch, the good wife, the gossip, the shrew. The poetry had stripped them to the bone and left only their natural selves to flower thus in expressions faithfully portraying³¹⁸ their tiny stunted³¹⁹ spirits! How could I help but admire her for giving me one of the most significant and memorable³²⁰ moments of a writer’s life? I put my arm about her shoulders and sat, as rapt as any of them, following the long sinuous³²¹ curves of the immortal¹²⁶ story as it unfolded before our eyes. They could hardly bear to part with us when at last the story came to an end. They clung to her, pleading for more. Some picked the hem⁵¹ of her skirt and kissed it in an agony of pleading. ‘There is no time’ she said, smiling calmly. ‘But I will come again, my little ones.’ They hardly heeded³²² the money she distributed but thronged³²³ after us along the dark corridors to the blackness of the square. At the corner I looked back but could only see the flicker of shadows. They said farewell in voices of heartbreaking sweetness. We talked in deep contented³²⁴ silence across the shattered, time-corrupted town until we reached the cool seafront; and stood a long time leaning upon the cold stone piers³²⁵ above the sea, smoking and saying nothing! At last she turned to me a face of tremendous weariness and whispered: ‘Take me home, now. I’m dead tired.’ And so we hailed a pottering gharry and swung along the Corniche as sedately³²⁶ as bankers after a congress. ‘I suppose we are all hunting for the secrets of growth!’ was all she said as we parted. It was a strange remark to make at parting. I watched her walk wearily up the steps to the great house groping for her key. I still felt drunk with the story of Yuna and Aziz! Brother Ass, it is a pity that you will never have a chance to read all this tedious rigmarole; it would amuse me to study your puzzled expression as you did so. Why should the artist always be trying to saturate³⁰⁹ the world with his own anguish, you asked me once. Why indeed? I will give you another phrase: emotional gongorism! I have always been good at polite phrasemaking. Loneliness and desire, Lord of the Flies, Are thy unholy empire and The self’s inmost surprise! Come to these arms, my dear old Dutch And firmly bar the door I could not love thee, dear, so much Loved I not more! And later, aimlessly walking, who should I encounter but the slightly titubating Pombal just back from the Casino with a chamber-pot full of paper money and a raging thirst for a last beaker of champagne³²⁷ which we took together at the Etoile. It was strange that I had no taste for a girl that night; somehow Yuna and Aziz had barred the way. Instead I straggled back to Mount Vulture with a bottle in my mackintosh pocket, to confront once more the ill-starred pages of my book which, twenty years from now, will be the cause of many a thrashing among the lower forms of our schools. It seemed a disastrous³²⁸ sort of gift to be offering to the generations as yet unborn; I would rather have left them something like Yuna and Aziz, but it hasn’t been possible since Chaucer; the sophistication of the laic audience is perhaps to blame? The thought of all those smarting little bottoms made me close my notebooks with a series of ill-tempered snaps. Champagne is a wonderfully soothing³²⁹ drink, however, and prevented me from being too cast-down. Then I stumbled upon the little note which you, Brother Ass, had pushed under the door earlier in the evening: a note which complimented me on the new series of poems which the Anvil³³⁰ was producing (a misprint per line); and writers being what they are I thought most kindly of you, I raised my glass to you. In my eyes you had become a critic of the purest discernment; and once more I asked myself in exasperated tones why the devil I had never wasted more time on you? It was really remiss³³¹ of me. And falling asleep I made a mental note to take you to dinner the next evening and talk your jackass’s head off — about writing, of course, what else? Ah! but that is the point. Once a writer seldom a talker; I knew that, speechless as Goldsmith, I should sit hugging my hands in my armpits while you did the talking! In my sleep I dug up a mummy with poppy-coloured lips, dressed in the long white wedding dress of the Arab sugar-dolls. She smiled but would not awake, though I kissed her and talked to her persuasively³³². Once her eyes half opened; but they closed again and she lapsed³³³ back into smiling sleep. I whispered her name which was Yuna, but which had unaccountably become Liza. And as it was no use I interred³³⁴ her once more among the shifting dunes³³⁵ where (the wind-shapes were changing fast) there would be no trace remaining of the spot. At dawn I woke early and took a gharry down to the Rushdi beach to cleanse³³⁶ myself in the dawn-sea. There was not a soul about at that time save Clea, who was on the far beach in a blue bathing-costume, her marvellous hair swinging about her like a blonde Botticelli. I waved and she waved back, but showed no inclination³³⁷ to come and talk which made me grateful. We lay, a thousand yards apart, smoking and wet as seals. I thought for an instant of the lovely burnt coffee of her summer flesh, with the little hairs on her temples bleached³³⁸ to ash. I inhaled her metaphorically³³⁹, like a whiff of roasting coffee, dreaming of the white thighs³⁴⁰ with those small blue veins in them! Well, well … she would have been worth taking trouble over had she not been so beautiful. That brilliant glance exposed everything and forced me to take shelter from her. One could hardly ask her to bandage them in order to be made love to! And yet … like the black silk stockings some men insist on! Two sentences ending with a preposition! What is poor Purse-warden coming to? His prose created grievous lusts³⁴¹ Among the middle classes His propositions were decried³⁴² As dangerous for the masses His major works were classified Among the noxious³⁴³ gases England awake! Brother Ass, the so-called act of living is really an act of the imagination. The world — which we always visualize³⁴⁴ as ‘the outside’ World — yields only to self-exploration! Faced by this cruel, yet necessary paradox, the poet finds himself growing gills and a tail, the better to swim against the currents of unenlightenment. What appears to be perhaps an arbitrary act of violence is precisely³⁴⁵ the opposite, for by reversing process in this way, he unites the rushing, heedless stream of humanity to the still, tranquil³⁴⁶, motionless, odourless, tasteless plenum from which its own motive essence is derived³⁴⁷. (Yes, but it hurts to realize!) If he were to abandon his role all hope of gaining a purchase on the slippery surface of reality would be lost, and everything in nature would disappear! But this act, the poetic³⁴⁸ act, will cease to be necessary when everyone can perform it for himself. What hinders them, you ask? Well, we are all naturally afraid to surrender our own pitifully rationalized morality — and the poetic jump I’m predicating lies the other side of it. It is only terrifying because we refuse to recognize in ourselves the horrible gargoyles³⁴⁹ which decorate the totem poles of our churches — murderers, liars³⁵⁰, adulterers and so on. (Once recognized, these papier-maché masks fade.) Whoever makes this enigmatic leap into the heraldic reality of the poetic life discovers that truth has its own built-in morality! There is no need to wear a truss any longer. Inside the penumbra³⁵¹ of this sort of truth morality can be disregarded because it is a donnée, a part of the thing, and not simply a brake, an inhibition. It is there to be lived out and not thought out! Ah, Brother Ass, this will seem a far cry to the ‘purely literary’ preoccupations which beset³⁵² you; yet unless you tackle this corner of the field with your sickle³⁵³ you will never reap the harvest in yourself, and so fulfil your true function here below. But how? you ask me plaintively. And truly here you have me by the short hairs, for the thing operates differently with each one of us. I am only suggesting that you have not become desperate enough, determined³⁵⁴ enough. Somewhere at the heart of things you are still lazy of spirit. But then, why struggle? If it is to happen to you it will happen of its own accord. You may be quite right to hang about like this, waiting. I was too proud. I felt I must take it by the horns, this vital question of my birthright. For me it was grounded in an act of will. So for people like me I would say: ‘Force the lock, batter³⁵⁵ down the door. Outface, defy, disprove the Oracle³⁵⁶ in order to become the poet, the darer!’ But I am aware the test may come under any guise⁶⁹, perhaps even in the physical world by a blow between the eyes or a few lines scribbled³⁵⁷ in pencil on the back of an envelope left in a café. The heraldic reality can strike from any point, above or below: it is not particular. But without it the enigma will remain. You may travel round the world and colonize³⁵⁸ the ends of the earth with your lines and yet never hear the singing yourself.

1 ass   

n.驴；傻瓜，蠢笨的人

参考例句：

• He is not an ass as they make him.他不象大家猜想的那样笨。
• An ass endures his burden but not more than his burden.驴能负重但不能超过它能力所负担的。

2 vertigo   

n.眩晕

参考例句：

• He had a dreadful attack of vertigo.他忽然头晕得厉害。
• If you have vertigo it seems as if the whole room is spinning round you.如果你头晕，就会觉得整个房间都旋转起来

3 passionately   

ad.热烈地，激烈地

参考例句：

• She could hate as passionately as she could love. 她能恨得咬牙切齿，也能爱得一往情深。
• He was passionately addicted to pop music. 他酷爱流行音乐。

4 hysterically   

ad. 歇斯底里地

参考例句：

• The children giggled hysterically. 孩子们歇斯底里地傻笑。
• She sobbed hysterically, and her thin body was shaken. 她歇斯底里地抽泣着，她瘦弱的身体哭得直颤抖。

5 propped   

支撑，支持，维持( prop的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• He sat propped up in the bed by pillows. 他靠着枕头坐在床上。
• This fence should be propped up. 这栅栏该用东西支一支。

6 fully   

adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地

参考例句：

• The doctor asked me to breathe in,then to breathe out fully.医生让我先吸气，然后全部呼出。
• They soon became fully integrated into the local community.他们很快就完全融入了当地人的圈子。

7 gnawing   

a.痛苦的，折磨人的

参考例句：

• The dog was gnawing a bone. 那狗在啃骨头。
• These doubts had been gnawing at him for some time. 这些疑虑已经折磨他一段时间了。

8 modulated   

已调整[制]的，被调的

参考例句：

• He carefully modulated his voice. 他小心地压低了声音。
• He had a plump face, lemur-like eyes, a quiet, subtle, modulated voice. 他有一张胖胖的脸，狐猴般的眼睛，以及安详、微妙和富于抑扬顿挫的嗓音。

9 tact   

n.机敏，圆滑，得体

参考例句：

• She showed great tact in dealing with a tricky situation.她处理棘手的局面表现得十分老练。
• Tact is a valuable commodity.圆滑老练是很有用处的。

10 rue   

n.懊悔，芸香，后悔；v.后悔，悲伤，懊悔

参考例句：

• You'll rue having failed in the examination.你会悔恨考试失败。
• You're going to rue this the longest day that you live.你要终身悔恨不尽呢。

11 Oxford   

n.牛津（英国城市）

参考例句：

• At present he has become a Professor of Chemistry at Oxford.他现在已是牛津大学的化学教授了。
• This is where the road to Oxford joins the road to London.这是去牛津的路与去伦敦的路的汇合处。

12 tormentor   

n. 使苦痛之人, 使苦恼之物, 侧幕 =tormenter

参考例句：

• He was the tormentor, he was the protector, he was the inquisitor, he was the friend. 他既是拷打者，又是保护者；既是审问者，又是朋友。 来自英汉文学
• The tormentor enlarged the engagement garment. 折磨者加大了订婚服装。

13 torment   

n.折磨；令人痛苦的东西(人)；vt.折磨；纠缠

参考例句：

• He has never suffered the torment of rejection.他从未经受过遭人拒绝的痛苦。
• Now nothing aggravates me more than when people torment each other.没有什么东西比人们的互相折磨更使我愤怒。

14 conversational   

adj.对话的，会话的

参考例句：

• The article is written in a conversational style.该文是以对话的形式写成的。
• She values herself on her conversational powers.她常夸耀自己的能言善辩。

15 staples   

n.（某国的）主要产品( staple的名词复数 )；钉书钉；U 形钉；主要部份v.用钉书钉钉住( staple的第三人称单数 )

参考例句：

• The anvil onto which the staples are pressed was not assemble correctly. 订书机上的铁砧安装错位。 来自辞典例句
• I'm trying to make an analysis of the staples of his talk. 我在试行分析他的谈话的要旨。 来自辞典例句

16 scents   

n.香水( scent的名词复数 )；气味；（动物的）臭迹；（尤指狗的）嗅觉

参考例句：

• The air was fragrant with scents from the sea and the hills. 空气中荡漾着山和海的芬芳气息。
• The winds came down with scents of the grass and wild flowers. 微风送来阵阵青草和野花的香气。 来自《简明英汉词典》

17 enigma   

n.谜，谜一样的人或事

参考例句：

• I've known him for many years,but he remains something of an enigma to me.我与他相识多年，他仍然难以捉摸。
• Even after all the testimonies,the murder remained a enigma.即使听完了所有的证词，这件谋杀案仍然是一个谜。

18 frantically   

ad.发狂地, 发疯地

参考例句：

• He dashed frantically across the road. 他疯狂地跑过马路。
• She bid frantically for the old chair. 她发狂地喊出高价要买那把古老的椅子。

19 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。

20 waxworks   

n.公共供水系统；蜡制品，蜡像( waxwork的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Madame Tussaud is one of most famous waxworks in the world. 杜莎夫人蜡像馆是世界上最著名的蜡像馆之一。 来自互联网
• A lot of people in the waxworks will get the axe. 蜡像馆里的很多人将被解雇。 来自互联网

21 circumvent   

vt.环绕，包围；对…用计取胜，智胜

参考例句：

• Military planners tried to circumvent the treaty.军事策略家们企图绕开这一条约。
• Any action I took to circumvent his scheme was justified.我为斗赢他的如意算盘而采取的任何行动都是正当的。

22 celebrated   

adj.有名的，声誉卓著的

参考例句：

• He was soon one of the most celebrated young painters in England.不久他就成了英格兰最负盛名的年轻画家之一。
• The celebrated violinist was mobbed by the audience.观众团团围住了这位著名的小提琴演奏家。

23 depiction   

n.描述

参考例句：

• Double rhythms, resounding through the lyric depiction and connecting with each other, indicate the thespian place of mankind and the cognition of the writer to this thespian place. 这双重旋律互为表里，表明了人类的某种悲剧性处境以及作家对这种悲剧性处境的感受和认识。
• A realistic depiction of scenes from everyday domestic life. 日常家居生活的写实画。

24 epic   

n.史诗，叙事诗；adj.史诗般的，壮丽的

参考例句：

• I gave up my epic and wrote this little tale instead.我放弃了写叙事诗，而写了这个小故事。
• They held a banquet of epic proportions.他们举行了盛大的宴会。

25 autopsy   

n.尸体解剖；尸检

参考例句：

• They're carrying out an autopsy on the victim.他们正在给受害者验尸。
• A hemorrhagic gut was the predominant lesion at autopsy.尸检的主要发现是肠出血。

26 diligently   

ad.industriously;carefully

参考例句：

• He applied himself diligently to learning French. 他孜孜不倦地学法语。
• He had studied diligently at college. 他在大学里勤奋学习。

27 nostrils   

鼻孔( nostril的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Her nostrils flared with anger. 她气得两个鼻孔都鼓了起来。
• The horse dilated its nostrils. 马张大鼻孔。

28 corpse   

n.尸体，死尸

参考例句：

• What she saw was just an unfeeling corpse.她见到的只是一具全无感觉的尸体。
• The corpse was preserved from decay by embalming.尸体用香料涂抹以防腐烂。

29 annul   

v.宣告…无效，取消，废止

参考例句：

• They have the power to alter or annul inappropriate decisions of their own standing committees.他们有权改变或者撤销本级人民代表大会常务委员会不适当的决定。
• The courts later found grounds to annul the results,after the king urged them to sort out the "mess".在国王敦促法庭收拾烂摊子后，法庭随后宣布废除选举结果。

30 hearty   

adj.热情友好的；衷心的；尽情的，纵情的

参考例句：

• After work they made a hearty meal in the worker's canteen.工作完了，他们在工人食堂饱餐了一顿。
• We accorded him a hearty welcome.我们给他热忱的欢迎。

31 improper   

adj.不适当的，不合适的，不正确的，不合礼仪的

参考例句：

• Short trousers are improper at a dance.舞会上穿短裤不成体统。
• Laughing and joking are improper at a funeral.葬礼时大笑和开玩笑是不合适的。

32 improperly   

不正确地，不适当地

参考例句：

• Of course it was acting improperly. 这样做就是不对嘛！
• He is trying to improperly influence a witness. 他在试图误导证人。

33 asylum   

n.避难所，庇护所，避难

参考例句：

• The people ask for political asylum.人们请求政治避难。
• Having sought asylum in the West for many years,they were eventually granted it.他们最终获得了在西方寻求多年的避难权。

34 heed   

v.注意，留意；n.注意，留心

参考例句：

• You must take heed of what he has told.你要注意他所告诉的事。
• For the first time he had to pay heed to his appearance.这是他第一次非得注意自己的外表不可了。

35 herd   

n.兽群，牧群；vt.使集中，把…赶在一起

参考例句：

• She drove the herd of cattle through the wilderness.她赶着牛群穿过荒野。
• He had no opinions of his own but simply follow the herd.他从无主见，只是人云亦云。

36 cogent   

adj.强有力的，有说服力的

参考例句：

• The result is a cogent explanation of inflation.结果令人信服地解释了通货膨胀问题。
• He produced cogent reasons for the change of policy.他对改变政策提出了充分的理由。

37 scarlet   

n.深红色，绯红色，红衣；adj.绯红色的

参考例句：

• The scarlet leaves of the maples contrast well with the dark green of the pines.深红的枫叶和暗绿的松树形成了明显的对比。
• The glowing clouds are growing slowly pale,scarlet,bright red,and then light red.天空的霞光渐渐地淡下去了，深红的颜色变成了绯红，绯红又变为浅红。

38 disinterested   

adj.不关心的，不感兴趣的

参考例句：

• He is impartial and disinterested.他公正无私。
• He's always on the make,I have never known him do a disinterested action.他这个人一贯都是唯利是图，我从来不知道他有什么无私的行动。

39 exoneration   

n.免罪，免除

参考例句：

• Empathy for the criminal's childhood misery does not imply exoneration of the crimes he committed as an adult. 对罪犯悲惨的童年表示怜悯不等于可以免除他长大成人后所犯的罪。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Exoneration or rehabilitation should be made known as widely as were the original wrong decisions. 原来在什么范围内弄错的，也应该在什么范围内宣布平反。 来自互联网

40 plaintive   

adj.可怜的，伤心的

参考例句：

• Her voice was small and plaintive.她的声音微弱而哀伤。
• Somewhere in the audience an old woman's voice began plaintive wail.观众席里，一位老太太伤心地哭起来。

41 slanting   

倾斜的，歪斜的

参考例句：

• The rain is driving [slanting] in from the south. 南边潲雨。
• The line is slanting to the left. 这根线向左斜了。

42 deafened   

使聋( deafen的过去式和过去分词 )； 使隔音

参考例句：

• A hard blow on the ear deafened him for life. 耳朵上挨的一记猛击使他耳聋了一辈子。
• The noise deafened us. 嘈杂声把我们吵聋了。

43 pomposity   

n.浮华；虚夸；炫耀；自负

参考例句：

• He hated pomposity and disliked being called a genius. 他憎恶自负的作派，而且不喜欢被称为天才。 来自辞典例句
• Nothing could deflate his ego/pomposity, ie make him less self-assured or pompous. 任何事都不能削弱他的自信心[气焰]。 来自辞典例句

44 utterances   

n.发声( utterance的名词复数 )；说话方式；语调；言论

参考例句：

• John Maynard Keynes used somewhat gnomic utterances in his General Theory. 约翰·梅纳德·凯恩斯在其《通论》中用了许多精辟言辞。 来自辞典例句
• Elsewhere, particularly in his more public utterances, Hawthorne speaks very differently. 在别的地方，特别是在比较公开的谈话里，霍桑讲的话则完全不同。 来自辞典例句

45 skull   

n.头骨；颅骨

参考例句：

• The skull bones fuse between the ages of fifteen and twenty-five.头骨在15至25岁之间长合。
• He fell out of the window and cracked his skull.他从窗子摔了出去，跌裂了颅骨。

46 reverberating   

回响，回荡( reverberate的现在分词 )； 使反响，使回荡，使反射

参考例句：

• The words are still ringing [reverberating] in one's ears. 言犹在耳。
• I heard a voice reverberating: "Crawl out! I give you liberty!" 我听到一个声音在回荡：“爬出来吧，我给你自由！”

47 gravy   

n.肉汁；轻易得来的钱，外快

参考例句：

• You have spilled gravy on the tablecloth.你把肉汁泼到台布上了。
• The meat was swimming in gravy.肉泡在浓汁之中。

48 aligned   

adj.对齐的，均衡的

参考例句：

• Make sure the shelf is aligned with the top of the cupboard.务必使搁架与橱柜顶端对齐。

49 brass   

n.黄铜；黄铜器，铜管乐器

参考例句：

• Many of the workers play in the factory's brass band.许多工人都在工厂铜管乐队中演奏。
• Brass is formed by the fusion of copper and zinc.黄铜是通过铜和锌的熔合而成的。

50 discoursing   

演说（discourse的现在分词形式）

参考例句：

• He was discoursing to us on Keats. 他正给我们讲济慈。
• He found the time better employed in searching than in discussing, in discovering than in discoursing. 他认为与其把时间花费在你争我辩和高谈阔论上，不如用在研究和发现上。

51 hem   

n.贴边，镶边；vt.缝贴边；(in)包围，限制

参考例句：

• The hem on her skirt needs sewing.她裙子上的褶边需要缝一缝。
• The hem of your dress needs to be let down an inch.你衣服的折边有必要放长1英寸。

52 painstaking   

adj.苦干的；艰苦的，费力的，刻苦的

参考例句：

• She is not very clever but she is painstaking.她并不很聪明，但肯下苦功夫。
• Through years of our painstaking efforts,we have at last achieved what we have today.大家经过多少年的努力，才取得今天的成绩。

53 awakened   

v.（使）醒( awaken的过去式和过去分词 )；（使）觉醒；弄醒；（使）意识到

参考例句：

• She awakened to the sound of birds singing. 她醒来听到鸟的叫声。
• The public has been awakened to the full horror of the situation. 公众完全意识到了这一状况的可怕程度。 来自《简明英汉词典》

54 amiable   

adj.和蔼可亲的，友善的，亲切的

参考例句：

• She was a very kind and amiable old woman.她是个善良和气的老太太。
• We have a very amiable companionship.我们之间存在一种友好的关系。

55 jot   

n.少量；vi.草草记下；vt.匆匆写下

参考例句：

• I'll jot down their address before I forget it.我得赶快把他们的地址写下来，免得忘了。
• There is not a jot of evidence to say it does them any good.没有丝毫的证据显示这对他们有任何好处。

56 ragged   

adj.衣衫褴褛的，粗糙的，刺耳的

参考例句：

• A ragged shout went up from the small crowd.这一小群人发出了刺耳的喊叫。
• Ragged clothing infers poverty.破衣烂衫意味着贫穷。

57 cuff   

n.袖口；手铐；护腕；vt.用手铐铐；上袖口

参考例句：

• She hoped they wouldn't cuff her hands behind her back.她希望他们不要把她反铐起来。
• Would you please draw together the snag in my cuff?请你把我袖口上的裂口缝上好吗？

58 succinctness   

n.简洁；简要；简明

参考例句：

• But we've seen little discussion on the relation between verb tenses and succinctness. 但有关动词时态与简练的关系的论述不多见。 来自互联网
• The design is characterized by logicality, flexibility, systematization and succinctness by case analysis. 并通过实例证明设计上具有逻辑性、灵活性、系统性和简洁性等特点。 来自互联网

59 sonnet   

n.十四行诗

参考例句：

• The composer set a sonnet to music.作曲家为一首十四行诗谱了曲。
• He wrote a sonnet to his beloved.他写了一首十四行诗，献给他心爱的人。

60 metropolis   

n.首府；大城市

参考例句：

• Shanghai is a metropolis in China.上海是中国的大都市。
• He was dazzled by the gaiety and splendour of the metropolis.大都市的花花世界使他感到眼花缭乱。

61 portent   

n.预兆；恶兆；怪事

参考例句：

• I see it as a portent of things to come.我把它看作是将要到来的事物的前兆。
• As for her engagement with Adam,I would say the portents are gloomy.至于她和亚当的婚约，我看兆头不妙。

62 binoculars   

n.双筒望远镜

参考例句：

• He watched the play through his binoculars.他用双筒望远镜看戏。
• If I had binoculars,I could see that comet clearly.如果我有望远镜，我就可以清楚地看见那颗彗星。

63 kindly   

adj.和蔼的，温和的，爽快的；adv.温和地，亲切地

参考例句：

• Her neighbours spoke of her as kindly and hospitable.她的邻居都说她和蔼可亲、热情好客。
• A shadow passed over the kindly face of the old woman.一道阴影掠过老太太慈祥的面孔。

64 confidentially   

ad.秘密地，悄悄地

参考例句：

• She was leaning confidentially across the table. 她神神秘秘地从桌子上靠过来。
• Kao Sung-nien and Wang Ch'u-hou talked confidentially in low tones. 高松年汪处厚两人低声密谈。

65 reverent   

adj.恭敬的，虔诚的

参考例句：

• He gave reverent attention to the teacher.他恭敬地听老师讲课。
• She said the word artist with a gentle,understanding,reverent smile.她说作家一词时面带高雅，理解和虔诚的微笑。

66 nagging   

adj.唠叨的，挑剔的；使人不得安宁的v.不断地挑剔或批评（某人）( nag的现在分词 )；不断地烦扰或伤害（某人）；无休止地抱怨；不断指责

参考例句：

• Stop nagging—I'll do it as soon as I can. 别唠叨了—我会尽快做的。
• I've got a nagging pain in my lower back. 我后背下方老是疼。 来自《简明英汉词典》

67 plucky   

adj.勇敢的

参考例句：

• The plucky schoolgirl amazed doctors by hanging on to life for nearly two months.这名勇敢的女生坚持不放弃生命近两个月的精神令医生感到震惊。
• This story featured a plucky heroine.这个故事描述了一个勇敢的女英雄。

68 aphorist   

警句家

参考例句：

69 guise   

n.外表，伪装的姿态

参考例句：

• They got into the school in the guise of inspectors.他们假装成视察员进了学校。
• The thief came into the house under the guise of a repairman.那小偷扮成个修理匠进了屋子。

70 ram   

(random access memory)随机存取存储器

参考例句：

• 512k RAM is recommended and 640k RAM is preferred.推荐配置为512K内存，640K内存则更佳。

71 psyche   

n.精神；灵魂

参考例句：

• His exploration of the myth brings insight into the American psyche.他对这个神话的探讨揭示了美国人的心理。
• She spent her life plumbing the mysteries of the human psyche.她毕生探索人类心灵的奥秘。

72 rejection   

n.拒绝，被拒，抛弃，被弃

参考例句：

• He decided not to approach her for fear of rejection.他因怕遭拒绝决定不再去找她。
• The rejection plunged her into the dark depths of despair.遭到拒绝使她陷入了绝望的深渊。

73 injustice   

n.非正义，不公正，不公平，侵犯（别人的）权利

参考例句：

• They complained of injustice in the way they had been treated.他们抱怨受到不公平的对待。
• All his life he has been struggling against injustice.他一生都在与不公正现象作斗争。

74 aggrieved   

adj.愤愤不平的，受委屈的；悲痛的；（在合法权利方面）受侵害的v.令委屈，令苦恼，侵害( aggrieve的过去式)；令委屈，令苦恼，侵害( aggrieve的过去式和过去分词)

参考例句：

• He felt aggrieved at not being chosen for the team. 他因没被选到队里感到愤愤不平。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• She is the aggrieved person whose fiance&1& did not show up for their wedding. 她很委屈，她的未婚夫未出现在他们的婚礼上。 来自《简明英汉词典》

75 endorse   

vt.(支票、汇票等)背书，背署；批注；同意

参考例句：

• No one is foolish enough to endorse it.没有哪个人会傻得赞成它。
• I fully endorse your opinions on this subject.我完全拥护你对此课题的主张。

76 patriotism   

n.爱国精神，爱国心，爱国主义

参考例句：

• His new book is a demonstration of his patriotism.他写的新书是他的爱国精神的证明。
• They obtained money under the false pretenses of patriotism.他们以虚伪的爱国主义为借口获得金钱。

77 eyebrows   

眉毛( eyebrow的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Eyebrows stop sweat from coming down into the eyes. 眉毛挡住汗水使其不能流进眼睛。
• His eyebrows project noticeably. 他的眉毛特别突出。

78 bishops   

（基督教某些教派管辖大教区的）主教( bishop的名词复数 )； （国际象棋的）象

参考例句：

• Each player has two bishops at the start of the game. 棋赛开始时，每名棋手有两只象。
• "Only sheriffs and bishops and rich people and kings, and such like. “他劫富济贫，抢的都是郡长、主教、国王之类的富人。

79 deformed   

adj.畸形的；变形的；丑的，破相了的

参考例句：

• He was born with a deformed right leg.他出生时右腿畸形。
• His body was deformed by leprosy.他的身体因为麻风病变形了。

80 sage   

n.圣人，哲人；adj.贤明的，明智的

参考例句：

• I was grateful for the old man's sage advice.我很感激那位老人贤明的忠告。
• The sage is the instructor of a hundred ages.这位哲人是百代之师。

81 bleak   

adj.(天气)阴冷的；凄凉的；暗淡的

参考例句：

• They showed me into a bleak waiting room.他们引我来到一间阴冷的会客室。
• The company's prospects look pretty bleak.这家公司的前景异常暗淡。

82 sprightly   

adj.愉快的，活泼的

参考例句：

• She is as sprightly as a woman half her age.她跟比她年轻一半的妇女一样活泼。
• He's surprisingly sprightly for an old man.他这把年纪了，还这么精神，真了不起。

83 muse   

n.缪斯（希腊神话中的女神），创作灵感

参考例句：

• His muse had deserted him,and he could no longer write.他已无灵感，不能再写作了。
• Many of the papers muse on the fate of the President.很多报纸都在揣测总统的命运。

84 nonentity   

n.无足轻重的人

参考例句：

• She was written off then as a political nonentity.她当时被认定是成不了气候的政坛小人物。
• How could such a nonentity become chairman of the company? 这样的庸才怎么能当公司的董事长？

85 explicit   

adj.详述的，明确的；坦率的；显然的

参考例句：

• She was quite explicit about why she left.她对自己离去的原因直言不讳。
• He avoids the explicit answer to us.他避免给我们明确的回答。

86 faltered   

（嗓音）颤抖( falter的过去式和过去分词 )； 支吾其词； 蹒跚； 摇晃

参考例句：

• He faltered out a few words. 他支吾地说出了几句。
• "Er - but he has such a longhead!" the man faltered. 他不好意思似的嚅嗫着：“这孩子脑袋真长。”

87 guttered   

vt.形成沟或槽于…（gutter的过去式与过去分词形式）

参考例句：

• Her screen career all practical purposes, had guttered out. 她的银幕生涯实际上默默无闻地结束了。 来自互联网
• The torches guttered in the breeze, casting wavering shadows upon the battlements. 火把在风中闪烁不定，它的影子也随着在墙壁上摇曳着。 来自互联网

88 flickered   

（通常指灯光）闪烁，摇曳( flicker的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• The lights flickered and went out. 灯光闪了闪就熄了。
• These lights flickered continuously like traffic lights which have gone mad. 这些灯象发狂的交通灯一样不停地闪动着。

89 flicker   

vi./n.闪烁，摇曳，闪现

参考例句：

• There was a flicker of lights coming from the abandoned house.这所废弃的房屋中有灯光闪烁。
• At first,the flame may be a small flicker,barely shining.开始时，光辉可能是微弱地忽隐忽现，几乎并不灿烂。

90 wan   

(wide area network)广域网

参考例句：

• The shared connection can be an Ethernet,wireless LAN,or wireless WAN connection.提供共享的网络连接可以是以太网、无线局域网或无线广域网。

91 proponents   

n.（某事业、理论等的）支持者，拥护者( proponent的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Reviewing courts were among the most active proponents of hybrid rulemaking procedures. 复审法院是最积极的混合型规则制定程序的建议者。 来自英汉非文学 - 行政法
• Proponents of such opinions were arrested as 'traitors. ' 提倡这种主张的人马上作为“卖国贼”逮捕起来。 来自辞典例句

92 exasperated   

adj.恼怒的

参考例句：

• We were exasperated at his ill behaviour. 我们对他的恶劣行为感到非常恼怒。
• Constant interruption of his work exasperated him. 对他工作不断的干扰使他恼怒。

93 irresistibly   

adv.无法抵抗地，不能自持地；极为诱惑人地

参考例句：

• Her gaze was drawn irresistibly to the scene outside. 她的目光禁不住被外面的风景所吸引。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• He was irresistibly attracted by her charm. 他不能自已地被她的魅力所吸引。 来自《简明英汉词典》

94 deployment   

n. 部署,展开

参考例句：

• He has inquired out the deployment of the enemy troops. 他已查出敌军的兵力部署情况。
• Quality function deployment (QFD) is a widely used customer-driven quality, design and manufacturing management tool. 质量功能展开(quality function deployment,QFD)是一个广泛应用的顾客需求驱动的设计、制造和质量管理工具。

95 peculiar   

adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的

参考例句：

• He walks in a peculiar fashion.他走路的样子很奇特。
• He looked at me with a very peculiar expression.他用一种很奇怪的表情看着我。

96 terrain   

n.地面，地形，地图

参考例句：

• He had made a detailed study of the terrain.他对地形作了缜密的研究。
• He knows the terrain of this locality like the back of his hand.他对这一带的地形了如指掌。

97 exhausted   

adj.极其疲惫的，精疲力尽的

参考例句：

• It was a long haul home and we arrived exhausted.搬运回家的这段路程特别长，到家时我们已筋疲力尽。
• Jenny was exhausted by the hustle of city life.珍妮被城市生活的忙乱弄得筋疲力尽。

98 purely   

adv.纯粹地，完全地

参考例句：

• I helped him purely and simply out of friendship.我帮他纯粹是出于友情。
• This disproves the theory that children are purely imitative.这证明认为儿童只会单纯地模仿的理论是站不住脚的。

99 ethical   

adj.伦理的，道德的，合乎道德的

参考例句：

• It is necessary to get the youth to have a high ethical concept.必须使青年具有高度的道德观念。
• It was a debate which aroused fervent ethical arguments.那是一场引发强烈的伦理道德争论的辩论。

100 literally   

adv.照字面意义，逐字地；确实

参考例句：

• He translated the passage literally.他逐字逐句地翻译这段文字。
• Sometimes she would not sit down till she was literally faint.有时候，她不走到真正要昏厥了，决不肯坐下来。

101 containment   

n.阻止，遏制；容量

参考例句：

• Your list might include such things as cost containment,quality,or customer satisfaction.你的清单上应列有诸如成本控制、产品质量、客户满意程度等内容。
• Insularity and self-containment,it is argued,go hand in hand.他们争论说，心胸狭窄和自我封闭是并存的。

102 growling   

n.吠声, 咆哮声 v.怒吠, 咆哮, 吼

参考例句：

• We heard thunder growling in the distance. 我们听见远处有隆隆雷声。
• The lay about the deck growling together in talk. 他们在甲板上到处游荡，聚集在一起发牢骚。

103 lashing   

n.鞭打；痛斥；大量；许多v.鞭打( lash的现在分词 )；煽动；紧系；怒斥

参考例句：

• The speaker was lashing the crowd. 演讲人正在煽动人群。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The rain was lashing the windows. 雨急打着窗子。 来自《简明英汉词典》

104 prohibitions   

禁令，禁律( prohibition的名词复数 )； 禁酒； 禁例

参考例句：

• Nowadays NO PARKING is the most ubiquitous of prohibitions. 今天，“NO PARKING”（禁止停车），几乎成了到处可见的禁止用语了。
• Inappropriate, excessive or capricious administration of aversive stimulation has led to scandals, lawsuits and prohibitions. 不恰当的、过度的或随意滥用厌恶性刺激会引起人们的反感、控告与抵制。

105 dismal   

adj.阴沉的，凄凉的，令人忧郁的，差劲的

参考例句：

• That is a rather dismal melody.那是一支相当忧郁的歌曲。
• My prospects of returning to a suitable job are dismal.我重新找到一个合适的工作岗位的希望很渺茫。

106 mosaic   

n./adj.镶嵌细工的，镶嵌工艺品的，嵌花式的

参考例句：

• The sky this morning is a mosaic of blue and white.今天早上的天空是幅蓝白相间的画面。
• The image mosaic is a troublesome work.图象镶嵌是个麻烦的工作。

107 mincing   

adj.矫饰的；v.切碎；切碎

参考例句：

• She came to the park with mincing,and light footsteps.她轻移莲步来到了花园之中。
• There is no use in mincing matters.掩饰事实是没有用的。

108 effrontery   

n.厚颜无耻

参考例句：

• This is a despicable fraud . Just imagine that he has the effrontery to say it.这是一个可耻的骗局. 他竟然有脸说这样的话。
• One could only gasp at the sheer effrontery of the man.那人十足的厚颜无耻让人们吃惊得无话可说。

109 adolescence   

n.青春期，青少年

参考例句：

• Adolescence is the process of going from childhood to maturity.青春期是从少年到成年的过渡期。
• The film is about the trials and tribulations of adolescence.这部电影讲述了青春期的麻烦和苦恼。

110 sweeping   

adj.范围广大的，一扫无遗的

参考例句：

• The citizens voted for sweeping reforms.公民投票支持全面的改革。
• Can you hear the wind sweeping through the branches?你能听到风掠过树枝的声音吗？

111 bloody   

adj.非常的的；流血的；残忍的；adv.很；vt.血染

参考例句：

• He got a bloody nose in the fight.他在打斗中被打得鼻子流血。
• He is a bloody fool.他是一个十足的笨蛋。

112 connivance   

n.纵容；默许

参考例句：

• The criminals could not have escaped without your connivance.囚犯没有你的默契配合，是逃不掉的。
• He tried to bribe the police into connivance.他企图收买警察放他一马。

113 atlas   

n.地图册，图表集

参考例句：

• He reached down the atlas from the top shelf.他从书架顶层取下地图集。
• The atlas contains forty maps,including three of Great Britain.这本地图集有40幅地图，其中包括3幅英国地图。

114 knack   

n.诀窍，做事情的灵巧的，便利的方法

参考例句：

• He has a knack of teaching arithmetic.他教算术有诀窍。
• Making omelettes isn't difficult,but there's a knack to it.做煎蛋饼并不难，但有窍门。

115 extenuated   

v.（用偏袒的辩解或借口）减轻( extenuate的过去式和过去分词 )；低估，藐视

参考例句：

• What can be excused or extenuated in criminal cases necessity is not so in civil ones. 紧急状况在刑事案件中免除、减轻罪责，但在民事案件却不免除、减轻责任。 来自互联网

116 daunted   

使（某人）气馁，威吓( daunt的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• She was a brave woman but she felt daunted by the task ahead. 她是一个勇敢的女人，但对面前的任务却感到信心不足。
• He was daunted by the high quality of work they expected. 他被他们对工作的高品质的要求吓倒了。

117 prolix   

adj.罗嗦的；冗长的

参考例句：

• Too much speaking makes it a little prolix.说那么多，有些罗嗦了。
• Her style is tediously prolix.她的文章冗长而乏味。

118 standing   

n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的

参考例句：

• After the earthquake only a few houses were left standing.地震过后只有几幢房屋还立着。
• They're standing out against any change in the law.他们坚决反对对法律做任何修改。

119 erect   

n./v.树立，建立，使竖立；adj.直立的，垂直的

参考例句：

• She held her head erect and her back straight.她昂着头，把背挺得笔直。
• Soldiers are trained to stand erect.士兵们训练站得笔直。

120 truthful   

adj.真实的，说实话的，诚实的

参考例句：

• You can count on him for a truthful report of the accident.你放心，他会对事故作出如实的报告的。
• I don't think you are being entirely truthful.我认为你并没全讲真话。

121 resonance   

n.洪亮；共鸣；共振

参考例句：

• Playing the piano sets up resonance in those glass ornaments.一弹钢琴那些玻璃饰物就会产生共振。
• The areas under the two resonance envelopes are unequal.两个共振峰下面的面积是不相等的。

122 coffin   

n.棺材，灵柩

参考例句：

• When one's coffin is covered,all discussion about him can be settled.盖棺论定。
• The coffin was placed in the grave.那口棺材已安放到坟墓里去了。

123 knuckles   

n.（指人）指关节( knuckle的名词复数 )；（指动物）膝关节，踝v.（指人）指关节( knuckle的第三人称单数 )；（指动物）膝关节，踝

参考例句：

• He gripped the wheel until his knuckles whitened. 他紧紧握住方向盘，握得指关节都变白了。
• Her thin hands were twisted by swollen knuckles. 她那双纤手因肿大的指关节而变了形。 来自《简明英汉词典》

124 resonances   

n.共鸣( resonance的名词复数 )；（声音） 洪亮；（文章、乐曲等） 激发联想的力量；（情感）同感

参考例句：

• This system can set up acoustical resonances. 这种系统能产生共鸣。 来自辞典例句
• New supershortlived particles are called resonances. 新超短寿命粒子叫做共振态粒子。 来自辞典例句

125 immortality   

n.不死，不朽

参考例句：

• belief in the immortality of the soul 灵魂不灭的信念
• It was like having immortality while you were still alive. 仿佛是当你仍然活着的时候就得到了永生。

126 immortal   

adj.不朽的；永生的，不死的；神的

参考例句：

• The wild cocoa tree is effectively immortal.野生可可树实际上是不会死的。
• The heroes of the people are immortal!人民英雄永垂不朽！

127 lackey   

n.侍从；跟班

参考例句：

• I'm not staying as a paid lackey to act as your yes-man.我不要再做拿钱任你使唤的应声虫。
• Who would have thought that Fredo would become a lackey of women?谁能料到弗烈特竟堕落成女人脚下的哈叭狗？

128 wince   

n.畏缩，退避，（因痛苦，苦恼等)面部肌肉抽动；v.畏缩，退缩，退避

参考例句：

• The barb of his wit made us wince.他那锋芒毕露的机智使我们退避三舍。
• His smile soon modified to a wince.他的微笑很快就成了脸部肌肉的抽搐。

129 anguish   

n.(尤指心灵上的)极度痛苦，烦恼

参考例句：

• She cried out for anguish at parting.分手时，她由于痛苦而失声大哭。
• The unspeakable anguish wrung his heart.难言的痛苦折磨着他的心。

130 braced   

adj.拉牢的v.支住( brace的过去式和过去分词 )；撑牢；使自己站稳；振作起来

参考例句：

• They braced up the old house with balks of timber. 他们用梁木加固旧房子。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The house has a wooden frame which is braced with brick. 这幢房子是木结构的砖瓦房。 来自《简明英汉词典》

131 resolute   

adj.坚决的，果敢的

参考例句：

• He was resolute in carrying out his plan.他坚决地实行他的计划。
• The Egyptians offered resolute resistance to the aggressors.埃及人对侵略者作出坚决的反抗。

132 axe   

n.斧子；v.用斧头砍，削减

参考例句：

• Be careful with that sharp axe.那把斧子很锋利，你要当心。
• The edge of this axe has turned.这把斧子卷了刃了。

133 sprains   

扭伤( sprain的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Bruises, sprains, muscular pain, muscular fatigue, lumbago, stiff shoulders, backache. 跌打扭伤，肌肉疼痛，肌肉疲劳，腰痛，肩肌僵直，背痛。
• For recent injuries such as sprains and headaches, cold compresses are recommended. 对最近的一些伤病，例如扭伤和头痛，建议进行冷敷。

134 vessels   

n.血管( vessel的名词复数 )；船；容器；（具有特殊品质或接受特殊品质的）人

参考例句：

• The river is navigable by vessels of up to 90 tons. 90 吨以下的船只可以从这条河通过。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• All modern vessels of any size are fitted with radar installations. 所有现代化船只都有雷达装置。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》

135 heralds   

n.使者( herald的名词复数 )；预报者；预兆；传令官v.预示( herald的第三人称单数 )；宣布（好或重要）

参考例句：

• The song of birds heralds the approach of spring. 百鸟齐鸣报春到。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》
• The wind sweeping through the tower heralds a rising storm in the mountain. 山雨欲来风满楼。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》

136 fustian   

n.浮夸的；厚粗棉布

参考例句：

• Fustian can't disguise the author's meager plot.浮夸的文章掩饰不住这个作者的贫乏情节。
• His fustian shirt,sanguineflowered,trembles its Spanish tassels at his secrets.他身上穿的是件印有血红色大花的粗斜纹布衬衫，每当他吐露秘密时，西班牙式的流苏就颤悠。

137 justification   

n.正当的理由；辩解的理由

参考例句：

• There's no justification for dividing the company into smaller units. 没有理由把公司划分成小单位。
• In the young there is a justification for this feeling. 在年轻人中有这种感觉是有理由的。

138 Christian   

adj.基督教徒的；n.基督教徒

参考例句：

• They always addressed each other by their Christian name.他们总是以教名互相称呼。
• His mother is a sincere Christian.他母亲是个虔诚的基督教徒。

139 eminently   

adv.突出地；显著地；不寻常地

参考例句：

• She seems eminently suitable for the job. 她看来非常适合这个工作。
• It was an eminently respectable boarding school. 这是所非常好的寄宿学校。 来自《简明英汉词典》

140 eminent   

adj.显赫的，杰出的，有名的，优良的

参考例句：

• We are expecting the arrival of an eminent scientist.我们正期待一位著名科学家的来访。
• He is an eminent citizen of China.他是一个杰出的中国公民。

141 incapable   

adj.无能力的，不能做某事的

参考例句：

• He would be incapable of committing such a cruel deed.他不会做出这么残忍的事。
• Computers are incapable of creative thought.计算机不会创造性地思维。

142 humbug   

n.花招，谎话，欺骗

参考例句：

• I know my words can seem to him nothing but utter humbug.我知道，我说的话在他看来不过是彻头彻尾的慌言。
• All their fine words are nothing but humbug.他们的一切花言巧语都是骗人的。

143 cant   

n.斜穿，黑话，猛扔

参考例句：

• The ship took on a dangerous cant to port.船只出现向左舷危险倾斜。
• He knows thieves'cant.他懂盗贼的黑话。

144 scant   

adj.不充分的，不足的；v.减缩，限制，忽略

参考例句：

• Don't scant the butter when you make a cake.做糕饼时不要吝惜奶油。
• Many mothers pay scant attention to their own needs when their children are small.孩子们小的时候，许多母亲都忽视自己的需求。

145 abhorring   

v.憎恶( abhor的现在分词 )；（厌恶地）回避；拒绝；淘汰

参考例句：

• He is a very upright man, abhorring evil as a deadly foe. 他具有正义感，一向嫉恶如仇。 来自互联网

146 ecstasy   

n.狂喜，心醉神怡，入迷

参考例句：

• He listened to the music with ecstasy.他听音乐听得入了神。
• Speechless with ecstasy,the little boys gazed at the toys.小孩注视着那些玩具，高兴得说不出话来。

147 ulcer   

n.溃疡，腐坏物

参考例句：

• She had an ulcer in her mouth.她口腔出现溃疡。
• A bacterium is identified as the cause for his duodenal ulcer.一种细菌被断定为造成他十二指肠溃疡的根源。

148 entirely   

ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地

参考例句：

• The fire was entirely caused by their neglect of duty. 那场火灾完全是由于他们失职而引起的。
• His life was entirely given up to the educational work. 他的一生统统献给了教育工作。

149 millennium   

n.一千年，千禧年；太平盛世

参考例句：

• The whole world was counting down to the new millennium.全世界都在倒计时迎接新千年的到来。
• We waited as the clock ticked away the last few seconds of the old millennium.我们静候着时钟滴答走过千年的最后几秒钟。

150 sneak   

vt.潜行(隐藏,填石缝)；偷偷摸摸做；n.潜行；adj.暗中进行

参考例句：

• He raised his spear and sneak forward.他提起长矛悄悄地前进。
• I saw him sneak away from us.我看见他悄悄地从我们身边走开。

151 harp   

n.竖琴；天琴座

参考例句：

• She swept her fingers over the strings of the harp.她用手指划过竖琴的琴弦。
• He played an Irish melody on the harp.他用竖琴演奏了一首爱尔兰曲调。

152 axis   

n.轴，轴线，中心线；坐标轴，基准线

参考例句：

• The earth's axis is the line between the North and South Poles.地轴是南北极之间的线。
• The axis of a circle is its diameter.圆的轴线是其直径。

153 embodying   

v.表现( embody的现在分词 )；象征；包括；包含

参考例句：

• Every instrument constitutes an independent contract embodying a payment obligation. 每张票据都构成一份独立的体现支付义务的合同。 来自口语例句
• Fowth, The aesthetical transcendency and the beauty embodying the man's liberty. \" 第四部分：审美的超越和作为人类自由最终体现的“美”。 来自互联网

154 narrative   

n.叙述，故事；adj.叙事的，故事体的

参考例句：

• He was a writer of great narrative power.他是一位颇有记述能力的作家。
• Neither author was very strong on narrative.两个作者都不是很善于讲故事。

155 drowsily   

adv.睡地，懒洋洋地，昏昏欲睡地

参考例句：

• She turned drowsily on her side, a slow creeping blackness enveloping her mind. 她半睡半醒地翻了个身，一片缓缓蠕动的黑暗渐渐将她的心包围起来。 来自飘（部分）
• I felt asleep drowsily before I knew it. 不知过了多久，我曚扙地睡着了。 来自互联网

156 nudes   

（绘画、照片或雕塑）裸体( nude的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• He also drew Chinese opera figures, nudes and still lives. 他还画戏曲人物画、裸女、瓶花静物等。

157 strife   

n.争吵，冲突，倾轧，竞争

参考例句：

• We do not intend to be drawn into the internal strife.我们不想卷入内乱之中。
• Money is a major cause of strife in many marriages.金钱是造成很多婚姻不和的一个主要原因。

158 fleeting   

adj.短暂的，飞逝的

参考例句：

• The girls caught only a fleeting glimpse of the driver.女孩们只匆匆瞥了一眼司机。
• Knowing the life fleeting,she set herself to enjoy if as best as she could.她知道这种日子转瞬即逝，于是让自已尽情地享受。

159 scraps   

油渣

参考例句：

• Don't litter up the floor with scraps of paper. 不要在地板上乱扔纸屑。
• A patchwork quilt is a good way of using up scraps of material. 做杂拼花布棉被是利用零碎布料的好办法。

160 brackish   

adj.混有盐的；咸的

参考例句：

• Brackish waters generally support only a small range of faunas.咸水水域通常只能存活为数不多的几种动物。
• The factory has several shallow pools of brackish water.工厂有几个浅的咸水池。

161 ordained   

v.任命（某人）为牧师( ordain的过去式和过去分词 )；授予（某人）圣职；（上帝、法律等）命令；判定

参考例句：

• He was ordained in 1984. 他在一九八四年被任命为牧师。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• He was ordained priest. 他被任命为牧师。 来自辞典例句

162 collaborate   

vi.协作，合作；协调

参考例句：

• The work gets done more quickly when we collaborate.我们一旦合作，工作做起来就更快了。
• I would ask you to collaborate with us in this work.我们愿意请你们在这项工作中和我们合作。

163 minarets   

n.（清真寺旁由报告祈祷时刻的人使用的）光塔( minaret的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Remind you of a mosque, red baked bricks, the minarets. 红砖和尖塔都会使你联想到伊斯兰教的礼拜寺。 来自互联网
• These purchases usually went along with embellishments such as minarets. 这些购置通常也伴随着注入尖塔等的装饰。 来自互联网

164 stipend   

n.薪贴；奖学金；养老金

参考例句：

• The company is going to ajust my stipend from this month onwards.从这一个月开始公司将对我的薪金作调整。
• This sum was nearly a third of his total stipend.这笔钱几乎是他全部津贴的三分之一。

165 pious   

adj.虔诚的；道貌岸然的

参考例句：

• Alexander is a pious follower of the faith.亚历山大是个虔诚的信徒。
• Her mother was a pious Christian.她母亲是一个虔诚的基督教徒。

166 melodrama   

n.音乐剧；情节剧

参考例句：

• We really don't need all this ridiculous melodrama!别跟我们来这套荒唐的情节剧表演！
• White Haired Woman was a melodrama,but in certain spots it was deliberately funny.《白毛女》是一出悲剧性的歌剧，但也有不少插科打诨。

167 misgivings   

n.疑虑，担忧，害怕；疑虑，担心，恐惧( misgiving的名词复数 )；疑惧

参考例句：

• I had grave misgivings about making the trip. 对于这次旅行我有过极大的顾虑。
• Don't be overtaken by misgivings and fear. Just go full stream ahead! 不要瞻前顾后， 畏首畏尾。甩开膀子干吧！ 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》

168 mutual   

adj.相互的，彼此的；共同的，共有的

参考例句：

• We must pull together for mutual interest.我们必须为相互的利益而通力合作。
• Mutual interests tied us together.相互的利害关系把我们联系在一起。

169 curmudgeons   

n.坏脾气的人，吝啬鬼，守财奴( curmudgeon的名词复数 )

参考例句：

170 eclecticism   

n.折衷主义

参考例句：

• Eclecticism is good,that they keeped the style and avoided the defects.兼收并蓄是好，避免了很多中国传统样式的问题，却依然古色古香。
• All of the groups moved towards a broader eclecticism and synthesis.所有的乐队都朝着更广泛的折衷主义和结合主义的方向前进。

171 plaintively   

adv.悲哀地，哀怨地

参考例句：

• The last note of the song rang out plaintively. 歌曲最后道出了离别的哀怨。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Birds cry plaintively before they die, men speak kindly in the presence of death. 鸟之将死，其鸣也哀；人之将死，其言也善。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》

172 arrogant   

adj.傲慢的，自大的

参考例句：

• You've got to get rid of your arrogant ways.你这骄傲劲儿得好好改改。
• People are waking up that he is arrogant.人们开始认识到他很傲慢。

173 aptitude   

n.(学习方面的)才能，资质，天资

参考例句：

• That student has an aptitude for mathematics.那个学生有数学方面的天赋。
• As a child,he showed an aptitude for the piano.在孩提时代，他显露出对于钢琴的天赋。

174 condescension   

n.自以为高人一等，贬低(别人)

参考例句：

• His politeness smacks of condescension. 他的客气带有屈尊俯就的意味。
• Despite its condescension toward the Bennet family, the letter begins to allay Elizabeth's prejudice against Darcy. 尽管这封信对班纳特家的态度很高傲，但它开始消除伊丽莎白对达西的偏见。

175 fathomless   

a.深不可测的

参考例句：

• "The sand-sea deepens with fathomless ice, And darkness masses its endless clouds;" 瀚海阑干百丈冰，愁云黪淡万里凝。 来自英汉 - 翻译样例 - 文学
• Day are coloured bubbles that float upon the surface of fathomless night. 日是五彩缤纷的气泡，漂浮在无尽的夜的表面。

176 hereditary   

adj.遗传的，遗传性的，可继承的，世袭的

参考例句：

• The Queen of England is a hereditary ruler.英国女王是世袭的统治者。
• In men,hair loss is hereditary.男性脱发属于遗传。

177 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。

178 ripples   

逐渐扩散的感觉( ripple的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The moon danced on the ripples. 月亮在涟漪上舞动。
• The sea leaves ripples on the sand. 海水在沙滩上留下了波痕。

179 imperatives   

n.必要的事( imperative的名词复数 )；祈使语气；必须履行的责任

参考例句：

• Nixon, however, had other imperatives. 但尼克松另有需要。 来自辞典例句
• There could be some cultural imperatives in there somewhere! 在公共传播那里，在某些方面，可能有更迫切的文化需要！ 来自互联网

180 ratiocination   

n.推理；推断

参考例句：

• There's no difference of Win or lose,or good or bad in ratiocination.推理是没有胜负、好坏之分的。
• Your thesis is short for the accurate ratiocination to suppose your argument.你的论文缺少能证明你的论点的正确推理。

181 variance   

n.矛盾，不同

参考例句：

• The question of woman suffrage sets them at variance. 妇女参政的问题使他们发生争执。
• It is unnatural for brothers to be at variance. 兄弟之间不睦是不近人情的。

182 realization   

n.实现；认识到，深刻了解

参考例句：

• We shall gladly lend every effort in our power toward its realization.我们将乐意为它的实现而竭尽全力。
• He came to the realization that he would never make a good teacher.他逐渐认识到自己永远不会成为好老师。

183 smuggle   

vt.私运；vi.走私

参考例句：

• Friends managed to smuggle him secretly out of the country.朋友们想方设法将他秘密送出国了。
• She has managed to smuggle out the antiques without getting caught.她成功将古董走私出境，没有被逮捕。

184 veins   

n.纹理；矿脉( vein的名词复数 )；静脉；叶脉；纹理

参考例句：

• The blood flows from the capillaries back into the veins. 血从毛细血管流回静脉。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• I felt a pleasant glow in all my veins from the wine. 喝过酒后我浑身的血都热烘烘的，感到很舒服。 来自《简明英汉词典》

185 paradox   

n.似乎矛盾却正确的说法；自相矛盾的人(物)

参考例句：

• The story contains many levels of paradox.这个故事存在多重悖论。
• The paradox is that Japan does need serious education reform.矛盾的地方是日本确实需要教育改革。

186 celestial   

adj.天体的；天上的

参考例句：

• The rosy light yet beamed like a celestial dawn.玫瑰色的红光依然象天上的朝霞一样绚丽。
• Gravity governs the motions of celestial bodies.万有引力控制着天体的运动。

187 muses   

v.沉思，冥想( muse的第三人称单数 )；沉思自语说（某事）

参考例句：

• We have listened too long to the courtly muses of Europe. 欧洲那种御用的诗才，我们已经听够了。 来自辞典例句
• Shiki muses that this is, at least, probably the right atmosphere. 志贵觉得这至少是正确的气氛。 来自互联网

188 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。

189 beads   

n.（空心）小珠子( bead的名词复数 )；水珠；珠子项链

参考例句：

• a necklace of wooden beads 一条木珠项链
• Beads of perspiration stood out on his forehead. 他的前额上挂着汗珠。

190 dispensing   

v.分配( dispense的现在分词 )；施与；配（药）

参考例句：

• A dispensing optician supplies glasses, but doesn't test your eyes. 配镜师为你提供眼镜，但不检查眼睛。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The firm has been dispensing ointments. 本公司配制药膏。 来自《简明英汉词典》

191 strings   

n.弦

参考例句：

• He sat on the bed,idly plucking the strings of his guitar.他坐在床上，随意地拨着吉他的弦。
• She swept her fingers over the strings of the harp.她用手指划过竖琴的琴弦。

192 complicate   

vt.使复杂化，使混乱，使难懂

参考例句：

• There is no need to complicate matters.没有必要使问题复杂化。
• These events will greatly complicate the situation.这些事件将使局势变得极其复杂。

193 drudgery   

n.苦工，重活，单调乏味的工作

参考例句：

• People want to get away from the drudgery of their everyday lives.人们想摆脱日常生活中单调乏味的工作。
• He spent his life in pointlessly tiresome drudgery.他的一生都在做毫无意义的烦人的苦差事。

194 melancholy   

n.忧郁，愁思；adj.令人感伤（沮丧）的，忧郁的

参考例句：

• All at once he fell into a state of profound melancholy.他立即陷入无尽的忧思之中。
• He felt melancholy after he failed the exam.这次考试没通过，他感到很郁闷。

195 fowl   

n.家禽，鸡，禽肉

参考例句：

• Fowl is not part of a traditional brunch.禽肉不是传统的早午餐的一部分。
• Since my heart attack,I've eaten more fish and fowl and less red meat.自从我患了心脏病后，我就多吃鱼肉和禽肉，少吃红色肉类。

196 velvet   

n.丝绒，天鹅绒；adj.丝绒制的，柔软的

参考例句：

• This material feels like velvet.这料子摸起来像丝绒。
• The new settlers wore the finest silk and velvet clothing.新来的移民穿着最华丽的丝绸和天鹅绒衣服。

197 Moslem   

n.回教徒，穆罕默德信徒；adj.回教徒的，回教的

参考例句：

• Moslem women used to veil their faces before going into public.信回教的妇女出门之前往往用面纱把脸遮起来。
• If possible every Moslem must make the pilgrimage to Mecca once in his life.如有可能，每个回教徒一生中必须去麦加朝觐一次。

198 insipid   

adj.无味的，枯燥乏味的，单调的

参考例句：

• The food was rather insipid and needed gingering up.这食物缺少味道，需要加点作料。
• She said she was a good cook,but the food she cooked is insipid.她说她是个好厨师，但她做的食物却是无味道的。

199 cowardice   

n.胆小，怯懦

参考例句：

• His cowardice reflects on his character.他的胆怯对他的性格带来不良影响。
• His refusal to help simply pinpointed his cowardice.他拒绝帮助正显示他的胆小。

200 cynical   

adj.(对人性或动机)怀疑的，不信世道向善的

参考例句：

• The enormous difficulty makes him cynical about the feasibility of the idea.由于困难很大，他对这个主意是否可行持怀疑态度。
• He was cynical that any good could come of democracy.他不相信民主会带来什么好处。

201 commonwealth   

n.共和国，联邦，共同体

参考例句：

• He is the chairman of the commonwealth of artists.他是艺术家协会的主席。
• Most of the members of the Commonwealth are nonwhite.英联邦的许多成员国不是白人国家。

202 simultaneously   

adv.同时发生地，同时进行地

参考例句：

• The radar beam can track a number of targets almost simultaneously.雷达波几乎可以同时追着多个目标。
• The Windows allow a computer user to execute multiple programs simultaneously.Windows允许计算机用户同时运行多个程序。

203 nervously   

adv.神情激动地，不安地

参考例句：

• He bit his lip nervously,trying not to cry.他紧张地咬着唇，努力忍着不哭出来。
• He paced nervously up and down on the platform.他在站台上情绪不安地走来走去。

204 dispense   

vt.分配，分发；配(药)，发(药)；实施

参考例句：

• Let us dispense the food.咱们来分发这食物。
• The charity has been given a large sum of money to dispense as it sees fit.这个慈善机构获得一大笔钱，可自行适当分配。

205 hierarchy   

n.等级制度；统治集团，领导层

参考例句：

• There is a rigid hierarchy of power in that country.那个国家有一套严密的权力等级制度。
• She's high up in the management hierarchy.她在管理阶层中地位很高。

206 impetus   

n.推动，促进，刺激；推动力

参考例句：

• This is the primary impetus behind the economic recovery.这是促使经济复苏的主要动力。
• Her speech gave an impetus to my ideas.她的讲话激发了我的思绪。

207 gnomes   

n.矮子( gnome的名词复数 )；侏儒；（尤指金融市场上搞投机的）银行家；守护神

参考例句：

• I have a wonderful recipe: bring two gnomes, two eggs. 我有一个绝妙的配方：准备两个侏儒，两个鸡蛋。 来自互联网
• Illusions cast by gnomes from a small village have started becoming real. 53侏儒对一个小村庄施放的幻术开始变为真实。 来自互联网

208 stunt   

n.惊人表演，绝技，特技；vt.阻碍...发育，妨碍...生长

参考例句：

• Lack of the right food may stunt growth.缺乏适当的食物会阻碍发育。
• Right up there is where the big stunt is taking place.那边将会有惊人的表演。

209 faculty   

n.才能；学院，系；(学院或系的)全体教学人员

参考例句：

• He has a great faculty for learning foreign languages.他有学习外语的天赋。
• He has the faculty of saying the right thing at the right time.他有在恰当的时候说恰当的话的才智。

210 derivatives   

n.衍生性金融商品；派生物，引出物( derivative的名词复数 )；导数

参考例句：

• Many English words are derivatives of Latin words. 许多英语词来自拉丁语。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• These compounds are nitrosohydroxylamine derivatives. 这类合成物是亚硝基羟胺衍生物。 来自辞典例句

211 dwarfed   

vt.（使）显得矮小（dwarf的过去式与过去分词形式）

参考例句：

• The old houses were dwarfed by the huge new tower blocks. 这些旧房子在新建的高楼大厦的映衬下显得十分矮小。
• The elephant dwarfed the tortoise. 那只乌龟跟那头象相比就显得很小。 来自《简明英汉词典》

212 emblematic   

adj.象征的，可当标志的；象征性

参考例句：

• The violence is emblematic of what is happening in our inner cities. 这种暴力行为正标示了我们市中心贫民区的状况。
• Whiteness is emblematic of purity. 白色是纯洁的象征。 来自辞典例句

213 morons   

傻子( moron的名词复数 )； 痴愚者（指心理年龄在8至12岁的成年人）

参考例句：

• They're a bunch of morons. 他们是一群蠢货。
• They're a load of morons. 他们是一群笨蛋。

214 vegetarians   

n.吃素的人( vegetarian的名词复数 )；素食者；素食主义者；食草动物

参考例句：

• Vegetarians are no longer dismissed as cranks. 素食者不再被视为有怪癖的人。
• Vegetarians believe that eating meat is bad karma. 素食者认为吃肉食是造恶业。

215 motive   

n.动机，目的；adv.发动的，运动的

参考例句：

• The police could not find a motive for the murder.警察不能找到谋杀的动机。
• He had some motive in telling this fable.他讲这寓言故事是有用意的。

216 lyric   

n.抒情诗，歌词；adj.抒情的

参考例句：

• This is a good example of Shelley's lyric poetry.这首诗是雪莱抒情诗的范例。
• His earlier work announced a lyric talent of the first order.他的早期作品显露了一流的抒情才华。

217 testament   

n.遗嘱；证明

参考例句：

• This is his last will and testament.这是他的遗愿和遗嘱。
• It is a testament to the power of political mythology.这说明，编造政治神话可以产生多大的威力。

218 firmament   

n.苍穹；最高层

参考例句：

• There are no stars in the firmament.天空没有一颗星星。
• He was rich,and a rising star in the political firmament.他十分富有，并且是政治高层一颗冉冉升起的新星。

219 martyr   

n.烈士，殉难者；vt.杀害，折磨，牺牲

参考例句：

• The martyr laid down his life for the cause of national independence.这位烈士是为了民族独立的事业而献身的。
• The newspaper carried the martyr's photo framed in black.报上登载了框有黑边的烈士遗像。

220 contemplate   

vt.盘算，计议；周密考虑；注视，凝视

参考例句：

• The possibility of war is too horrifying to contemplate.战争的可能性太可怕了，真不堪细想。
• The consequences would be too ghastly to contemplate.后果不堪设想。

221 contention   

n.争论，争辩，论战；论点，主张

参考例句：

• The pay increase is the key point of contention. 加薪是争论的焦点。
• The real bone of contention,as you know,is money.你知道，争论的真正焦点是钱的问题。

222 innocence   

n.无罪；天真；无害

参考例句：

• There was a touching air of innocence about the boy.这个男孩有一种令人感动的天真神情。
• The accused man proved his innocence of the crime.被告人经证实无罪。

223 perversion   

n.曲解；堕落；反常

参考例句：

• In its most general sense,corruption means the perversion or abandonment.就其最一般的意义上说，舞弊就是堕落，就是背离准则。
• Her account was a perversion of the truth.她所讲的歪曲了事实。

224 filthy   

adj.卑劣的；恶劣的，肮脏的

参考例句：

• The whole river has been fouled up with filthy waste from factories.整条河都被工厂的污秽废物污染了。
• You really should throw out that filthy old sofa and get a new one.你真的应该扔掉那张肮脏的旧沙发，然后再去买张新的。

225 afflicted   

使受痛苦，折磨( afflict的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• About 40% of the country's population is afflicted with the disease. 全国40%左右的人口患有这种疾病。
• A terrible restlessness that was like to hunger afflicted Martin Eden. 一阵可怕的、跟饥饿差不多的不安情绪折磨着马丁·伊登。

226 cramp   

n.痉挛；[pl.](腹)绞痛；vt.限制，束缚

参考例句：

• Winston stopped writing,partly because he was suffering from cramp.温斯顿驻了笔，手指也写麻了。
• The swimmer was seized with a cramp and had to be helped out of the water.那个在游泳的人突然抽起筋来，让别人帮着上了岸。

227 perversions   

n.歪曲( perversion的名词复数 )；变坏；变态心理

参考例句：

• Many practices commonly regarded as perversions were widespread. 许多通常认为是性变态的行为的做法实际上是广泛存在的。 来自辞典例句

228 displeasing   

不愉快的，令人发火的

参考例句：

• Such conduct is displeasing to your parents. 这种行为会使你的父母生气的。
• Omit no harsh line, smooth away no displeasing irregularity. 不能省略任何刺眼的纹路，不能掩饰任何讨厌的丑处。

229 unravels   

解开，拆散，散开( unravel的第三人称单数 )； 阐明； 澄清； 弄清楚

参考例句：

• Khrushchev's Cold War unravels the tangled contradictions in his leadership of the Communist Party. 赫鲁晓夫的冷战》这本书揭示出赫鲁晓夫作为共产党的领袖，面临着一些棘手的问题。

230 lurking   

潜在

参考例句：

• Why are you lurking around outside my house? 你在我房子外面鬼鬼祟祟的，想干什么？
• There is a suspicious man lurking in the shadows. 有一可疑的人躲在阴暗中。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》

231 mordant   

adj.讽刺的；尖酸的

参考例句：

• Actors feared the critic's mordant pen.演员都惧怕这位批评家辛辣尖刻的笔调。
• His mordant wit appealed to students.他那尖刻的妙语受到学生们的欢迎。

232 deliberately   

adv.审慎地；蓄意地；故意地

参考例句：

• The girl gave the show away deliberately.女孩故意泄露秘密。
• They deliberately shifted off the argument.他们故意回避这个论点。

233 encumbered   

v.妨碍，阻碍，拖累( encumber的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• The police operation was encumbered by crowds of reporters. 警方的行动被成群的记者所妨碍。
• The narrow quay was encumbered by hundreds of carts. 狭窄的码头被数百辆手推车堵得水泄不通。 来自辞典例句

234 follies   

罪恶，时事讽刺剧； 愚蠢，蠢笨，愚蠢的行为、思想或做法( folly的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• He has given up youthful follies. 他不再做年轻人的荒唐事了。
• The writings of Swift mocked the follies of his age. 斯威夫特的作品嘲弄了他那个时代的愚人。

235 shovels   

n.铲子( shovel的名词复数 )；锹；推土机、挖土机等的)铲；铲形部份v.铲子( shovel的第三人称单数 )；锹；推土机、挖土机等的)铲；铲形部份

参考例句：

• workmen with picks and shovels 手拿镐铲的工人
• In the spring, we plunge shovels into the garden plot, turn under the dark compost. 春天，我们用铁锨翻开园子里黑油油的沃土。 来自辞典例句

236 infinity   

n.无限，无穷，大量

参考例句：

• It is impossible to count up to infinity.不可能数到无穷大。
• Theoretically,a line can extend into infinity.从理论上来说直线可以无限地延伸。

237 eternity   

n.不朽，来世；永恒，无穷

参考例句：

• The dull play seemed to last an eternity.这场乏味的剧似乎演个没完没了。
• Finally,Ying Tai and Shan Bo could be together for all of eternity.英台和山伯终能双宿双飞，永世相随。

238 tightrope   

n.绷紧的绳索或钢丝

参考例句：

• The audience held their breath as the acrobat walked along the tightrope.杂技演员走钢丝时，观众都屏住了呼吸。
• The tightrope walker kept her balance by holding up an umbrella.走钢丝的演员举着一把伞，保持身体的均衡。

239 paraphrased   

v.释义，意译( paraphrase的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• Baxter paraphrased the contents of the press release. 巴克斯特解释了新闻稿的内容。 来自辞典例句
• It is paraphrased from the original. 它是由原文改述的。 来自辞典例句

240 invoke   

v.求助于(神、法律)；恳求，乞求

参考例句：

• Let us invoke the blessings of peace.让我们祈求和平之福。
• I hope I'll never have to invoke this clause and lodge a claim with you.我希望我永远不会使用这个条款向你们索赔。

241 dictates   

n.命令，规定，要求( dictate的名词复数 )v.大声讲或读( dictate的第三人称单数 )；口授；支配；摆布

参考例句：

• Convention dictates that a minister should resign in such a situation. 依照常规部长在这种情况下应该辞职。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• He always follows the dictates of common sense. 他总是按常识行事。 来自《简明英汉词典》

242 metaphor   

n.隐喻，暗喻

参考例句：

• Using metaphor,we say that computers have senses and a memory.打个比方，我们可以说计算机有感觉和记忆力。
• In poetry the rose is often a metaphor for love.玫瑰在诗中通常作为爱的象征。

243 aspirations   

强烈的愿望( aspiration的名词复数 )； 志向； 发送气音； 发 h 音

参考例句：

• I didn't realize you had political aspirations. 我没有意识到你有政治上的抱负。
• The new treaty embodies the aspirations of most nonaligned countries. 新条约体现了大多数不结盟国家的愿望。

244 alas   

int.唉(表示悲伤、忧愁、恐惧等)

参考例句：

• Alas!The window is broken!哎呀！窗子破了！
• Alas,the truth is less romantic.然而，真理很少带有浪漫色彩。

245 desperately   

adv.极度渴望地，绝望地，孤注一掷地

参考例句：

• He was desperately seeking a way to see her again.他正拼命想办法再见她一面。
• He longed desperately to be back at home.他非常渴望回家。

246 unwilling   

adj.不情愿的

参考例句：

• The natives were unwilling to be bent by colonial power.土著居民不愿受殖民势力的摆布。
• His tightfisted employer was unwilling to give him a raise.他那吝啬的雇主不肯给他加薪。

247 irresistible   

adj.非常诱人的，无法拒绝的，无法抗拒的

参考例句：

• The wheel of history rolls forward with an irresistible force.历史车轮滚滚向前，势不可挡。
• She saw an irresistible skirt in the store window.她看见商店的橱窗里有一条叫人着迷的裙子。

248 meddle   

v.干预，干涉，插手

参考例句：

• I hope he doesn't try to meddle in my affairs.我希望他不来干预我的事情。
• Do not meddle in things that do not concern you.别参与和自己无关的事。

249 eastward   

adv.向东；adj.向东的；n.东方，东部

参考例句：

• The river here tends eastward.这条河从这里向东流。
• The crowd is heading eastward,believing that they can find gold there.人群正在向东移去，他们认为在那里可以找到黄金。

250 comedian   

n.喜剧演员；滑稽演员

参考例句：

• The comedian tickled the crowd with his jokes.喜剧演员的笑话把人们逗乐了。
• The comedian enjoyed great popularity during the 30's.那位喜剧演员在三十年代非常走红。

251 pedants   

n.卖弄学问的人，学究，书呆子( pedant的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Only pedants believe in the advantage of obfuscation. 只有书呆子才相信使人困惑会有好处。 来自辞典例句
• Those cold-blooded pedants are not insensible. 那些冷血腐儒，都不是没有知觉。 来自辞典例句

252 irony   

n.反语，冷嘲；具有讽刺意味的事，嘲弄

参考例句：

• She said to him with slight irony.她略带嘲讽地对他说。
• In her voice we could sense a certain tinge of irony.从她的声音里我们可以感到某种讥讽的意味。

253 besieging   

包围，围困，围攻( besiege的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• They constituted a near-insuperable obstacle to the besieging infantry. 它们就会形成围城步兵几乎不可逾越的障碍。
• He concentrated the sun's rays on the Roman ships besieging the city and burned them. 他把集中的阳光照到攻城的罗马船上，把它们焚毁。

254 sardonic   

adj.嘲笑的，冷笑的，讥讽的

参考例句：

• She gave him a sardonic smile.她朝他讥讽地笑了一笑。
• There was a sardonic expression on her face.她脸上有一种嘲讽的表情。

255 specially   

adv.特定地；特殊地；明确地

参考例句：

• They are specially packaged so that they stack easily.它们经过特别包装以便于堆放。
• The machine was designed specially for demolishing old buildings.这种机器是专为拆毁旧楼房而设计的。

256 evoked   

[医]诱发的

参考例句：

• The music evoked memories of her youth. 这乐曲勾起了她对青年时代的回忆。
• Her face, though sad, still evoked a feeling of serenity. 她的脸色虽然悲伤，但仍使人感觉安详。

257 chatter   

vi.／n.喋喋不休；短促尖叫；(牙齿)打战

参考例句：

• Her continuous chatter vexes me.她的喋喋不休使我烦透了。
• I've had enough of their continual chatter.我已厌烦了他们喋喋不休的闲谈。

258 exteriorize   

v.将器官由腹取出

参考例句：

• Nail head clamp the unravelling of nail exteriorize broken nails and clean. 钉头卡钉，拆开钉头取出碎钉并清洁。 来自互联网

259 feverish   

adj.发烧的，狂热的，兴奋的

参考例句：

• He is too feverish to rest.他兴奋得安静不下来。
• They worked with feverish haste to finish the job.为了完成此事他们以狂热的速度工作着。

260 mendicant   

n.乞丐；adj.行乞的

参考例句：

• He seemed not an ordinary mendicant.他好象不是寻常的乞丐。
• The one-legged mendicant begins to beg from door to door.独腿乞丐开始挨门乞讨。

261 soliciting   

v.恳求( solicit的现在分词 )；（指娼妇）拉客；索求；征求

参考例句：

• A prostitute was soliciting on the street. 一名妓女正在街上拉客。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• China Daily is soliciting subscriptions. 《中国日报》正在征求订户。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》

262 configurations   

n.[化学]结构( configuration的名词复数 )；构造；（计算机的）配置；构形（原子在分子中的相对空间位置）

参考例句：

• Such configurations, obtained theoretically by calculation, are called models of a star. 通过理论计算得到的恒星结构称为恒星模型。 来自辞典例句
• The other two configurations have overriding advantages for special applications. 其它两种接法对特殊应用具有突出的优点。 来自辞典例句

263 smelt   

v.熔解，熔炼；n.银白鱼，胡瓜鱼

参考例句：

• Tin is a comparatively easy metal to smelt.锡是比较容易熔化的金属。
• Darby was looking for a way to improve iron when he hit upon the idea of smelting it with coke instead of charcoal.达比一直在寻找改善铁质的方法，他猛然想到可以不用木炭熔炼，而改用焦炭。

264 jotted   

v.匆忙记下( jot的过去式和过去分词 )；草草记下，匆匆记下

参考例句：

• I jotted down her name. 我匆忙记下了她的名字。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The policeman jotted down my address. 警察匆匆地将我的地址记下。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》

265 tabulated   

把（数字、事实）列成表( tabulate的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• Results for the test program haven't been tabulated. 试验的结果还没有制成表格。
• A large number of substances were investigated and the relevant properties tabulated. 已经研究了多种物质，并将有关性质列成了表。

266 moribund   

adj.即将结束的，垂死的

参考例句：

• The moribund Post Office Advisory Board was replaced.这个不起作用的邮局顾问委员会已被替换。
• Imperialism is monopolistic,parasitic and moribund capitalism.帝国主义是垄断的、寄生的、垂死的资本主义。

267 bribe   

n.贿赂；v.向…行贿，买通

参考例句：

• He tried to bribe the policeman not to arrest him.他企图贿赂警察不逮捕他。
• He resolutely refused their bribe.他坚决不接受他们的贿赂。

268 perfectly   

adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地

参考例句：

• The witnesses were each perfectly certain of what they said.证人们个个对自己所说的话十分肯定。
• Everything that we're doing is all perfectly above board.我们做的每件事情都是光明正大的。

269 incurred   

[医]招致的，遭受的； incur的过去式

参考例句：

• She had incurred the wrath of her father by marrying without his consent 她未经父亲同意就结婚，使父亲震怒。
• We will reimburse any expenses incurred. 我们将付还所有相关费用。

270 underneath   

adj.在...下面，在...底下；adv.在下面

参考例句：

• Working underneath the car is always a messy job.在汽车底下工作是件脏活。
• She wore a coat with a dress underneath.她穿着一件大衣，里面套着一条连衣裙。

271 divan   

n.长沙发；（波斯或其他东方诗人的）诗集

参考例句：

• Lord Henry stretched himself out on the divan and laughed.亨利勋爵伸手摊脚地躺在沙发椅上，笑着。
• She noticed that Muffat was sitting resignedly on a narrow divan-bed.她看见莫法正垂头丧气地坐在一张不宽的坐床上。

272 tenement   

n.公寓；房屋

参考例句：

• They live in a tenement.他们住在廉价公寓里。
• She felt very smug in a tenement yard like this.就是在个这样的杂院里，她觉得很得意。

273 shuddered   

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

参考例句：

• He slammed on the brakes and the car shuddered to a halt. 他猛踩刹车，车颤抖着停住了。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• I shuddered at the sight of the dead body. 我一看见那尸体就战栗。 来自《简明英汉词典》

274 cathartic   

adj.宣泄情绪的；n.泻剂

参考例句：

• His laughter was cathartic,an animal yelp that brought tears to his eyes.他哈哈大笑以宣泄情绪，声音如野兽般尖厉，眼泪都笑出来了。
• The drug had a cathartic effect.这药有导泻的作用。

275 supremely   

adv.无上地，崇高地

参考例句：

• They managed it all supremely well. 这件事他们干得极其出色。
• I consider a supremely beautiful gesture. 我觉得这是非常优雅的姿态。

276 disapproving   

adj.不满的，反对的v.不赞成( disapprove的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• Mother gave me a disapproving look. 母亲的眼神告诉我她是不赞成的。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Her father threw a disapproving glance at her. 她父亲不满地瞥了她一眼。 来自《简明英汉词典》

277 fleas   

n.跳蚤( flea的名词复数 )；爱财如命；没好气地（拒绝某人的要求）

参考例句：

• The dog has fleas. 这条狗有跳蚤。
• Nothing must be done hastily but killing of fleas. 除非要捉跳蚤，做事不可匆忙。 来自《简明英汉词典》

278 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

279 sector   

n.部门，部分；防御地段，防区；扇形

参考例句：

• The export sector will aid the economic recovery. 出口产业将促进经济复苏。
• The enemy have attacked the British sector.敌人已进攻英国防区。

280 bent   

n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的

参考例句：

• He was fully bent upon the project.他一心扑在这项计划上。
• We bent over backward to help them.我们尽了最大努力帮助他们。

281 scurrying   

v.急匆匆地走( scurry的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• We could hear the mice scurrying about in the walls. 我们能听见老鼠在墙里乱跑。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》
• We were scurrying about until the last minute before the party. 聚会开始前我们一直不停地忙忙碌碌。 来自辞典例句

282 dense   

a.密集的，稠密的，浓密的；密度大的

参考例句：

• The general ambushed his troops in the dense woods. 将军把部队埋伏在浓密的树林里。
• The path was completely covered by the dense foliage. 小路被树叶厚厚地盖了一层。

283 timorous   

adj.胆怯的，胆小的

参考例句：

• She is as timorous as a rabbit.她胆小得像只兔子。
• The timorous rabbit ran away.那只胆小的兔子跑开了。

284 lavatory   

n.盥洗室，厕所

参考例句：

• Is there any lavatory in this building?这座楼里有厕所吗？
• The use of the lavatory has been suspended during take-off.在飞机起飞期间，盥洗室暂停使用。

285 whatsoever   

adv.（用于否定句中以加强语气）任何；pron.无论什么

参考例句：

• There's no reason whatsoever to turn down this suggestion.没有任何理由拒绝这个建议。
• All things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you,do ye even so to them.你想别人对你怎样，你就怎样对人。

286 inhaled   

v.吸入( inhale的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• She closed her eyes and inhaled deeply. 她合上双眼，深深吸了一口气。
• Janet inhaled sharply when she saw him. 珍妮特看到他时猛地吸了口气。 来自《简明英汉词典》

287 verdigris   

n.铜锈；铜绿

参考例句：

• His pockets are full of red lead and verdigris.他的衣袋里装满铅丹和铜绿。
• Verdigris has spread all over that abandoned copper pot.那把已经废弃的铜壶上长满了铜锈。

288 imprint   

n.印痕，痕迹；深刻的印象；vt.压印，牢记

参考例句：

• That dictionary is published under the Longman imprint.那本词典以朗曼公司的名义出版。
• Her speech left its imprint on me.她的演讲给我留下了深刻印象。

289 haphazard   

adj.无计划的，随意的，杂乱无章的

参考例句：

• The town grew in a haphazard way.这城镇无计划地随意发展。
• He regrerted his haphazard remarks.他悔不该随口说出那些评论话。

290 galloped   

（使马）飞奔，奔驰( gallop的过去式和过去分词 )； 快速做[说]某事

参考例句：

• Jo galloped across the field towards him. 乔骑马穿过田野向他奔去。
• The children galloped home as soon as the class was over. 孩子们一下课便飞奔回家了。

291 reposed   

v.将（手臂等）靠在某人（某物）上( repose的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• Mr. Cruncher reposed under a patchwork counterpane, like a Harlequin at home. 克朗彻先生盖了一床白衲衣图案的花哨被子，像是呆在家里的丑角。 来自英汉文学 - 双城记
• An old man reposed on a bench in the park. 一位老人躺在公园的长凳上。 来自辞典例句

292 relic   

n.神圣的遗物，遗迹，纪念物

参考例句：

• This stone axe is a relic of ancient times.这石斧是古代的遗物。
• He found himself thinking of the man as a relic from the past.他把这个男人看成是过去时代的人物。

293 riddled   

adj.布满的；充斥的；泛滥的v.解谜，出谜题(riddle的过去分词形式)

参考例句：

• The beams are riddled with woodworm. 这些木梁被蛀虫蛀得都是洞。
• The bodies of the hostages were found riddled with bullets. 在人质的尸体上发现了很多弹孔。 来自《简明英汉词典》

294 voluptuous   

adj.肉欲的，骄奢淫逸的

参考例句：

• The nobility led voluptuous lives.贵族阶层过着骄奢淫逸的生活。
• The dancer's movements were slow and voluptuous.舞女的动作缓慢而富挑逗性。

295 weird   

adj.古怪的，离奇的；怪诞的，神秘而可怕的

参考例句：

• From his weird behaviour,he seems a bit of an oddity.从他不寻常的行为看来，他好像有点怪。
• His weird clothes really gas me.他的怪衣裳简直笑死人。

296 requisite   

adj.需要的，必不可少的；n.必需品

参考例句：

• He hasn't got the requisite qualifications for the job.他不具备这工作所需的资格。
• Food and air are requisite for life.食物和空气是生命的必需品。

297 unleashed   

v.把（感情、力量等）释放出来，发泄( unleash的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• The government's proposals unleashed a storm of protest in the press. 政府的提案引发了新闻界的抗议浪潮。
• The full force of his rage was unleashed against me. 他把所有的怒气都发泄在我身上。 来自《简明英汉词典》

298 endearments   

n.表示爱慕的话语，亲热的表示( endearment的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• They were whispering endearments to each other. 他们彼此低声倾吐着爱慕之情。
• He held me close to him, murmuring endearments. 他抱紧了我，喃喃述说着爱意。 来自辞典例句

299 grafted   

移植( graft的过去式和过去分词 )； 嫁接； 使（思想、制度等）成为（…的一部份）； 植根

参考例句：

• No art can be grafted with success on another art. 没有哪种艺术能成功地嫁接到另一种艺术上。
• Apples are easily grafted. 苹果树很容易嫁接。

300 vaccination   

n.接种疫苗，种痘

参考例句：

• Vaccination is a preventive against smallpox.种痘是预防天花的方法。
• Doctors suggest getting a tetanus vaccination every ten years.医生建议每十年注射一次破伤风疫苗。

301 snarl   

v.吼叫，怒骂，纠缠，混乱；n.混乱，缠结，咆哮

参考例句：

• At the seaside we could hear the snarl of the waves.在海边我们可以听见波涛的咆哮。
• The traffic was all in a snarl near the accident.事故发生处附近交通一片混乱。

302 scamper   

v.奔跑，快跑

参考例句：

• She loves to scamper through the woods of the forest.她喜欢在森林里的树林中穿梭嬉戏。
• The flash sent the foxes scampering away.闪光惊得狐狸四处逃窜。

303 interrogating   

n.询问技术v.询问( interrogate的现在分词 )；审问；（在计算机或其他机器上）查询

参考例句：

• She was no longer interrogating but lecturing. 她已经不是在审问而是在教训人了。 来自辞典例句
• His face remained blank, interrogating, slightly helpless. 他的面部仍然没有表情，只带有询问的意思，还有点无可奈何。 来自辞典例句

304 apparitions   

n.特异景象( apparition的名词复数 )；幽灵；鬼；（特异景象等的）出现

参考例句：

• And this year occurs the 90th anniversary of these apparitions. 今年是她显现的九十周年纪念。 来自互联网
• True love is like ghostly apparitions: everybody talks about them but few have ever seen one. 真爱就如同幽灵显现：所有人都谈论它们，但很少有人见到过一个。 来自互联网

305 twine   

v.搓，织，编饰；（使）缠绕

参考例句：

• He tied the parcel with twine.他用细绳捆包裹。
• Their cardboard boxes were wrapped and tied neatly with waxed twine.他们的纸板盒用蜡线扎得整整齐齐。

306 wheedled   

v.骗取（某物），哄骗（某人干某事）( wheedle的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• The children wheedled me into letting them go to the film. 孩子们把我哄得同意让他们去看电影了。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• She wheedled her husband into buying a lottery ticket. 她用甜言蜜语诱使她的丈夫买彩券。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》

307 chuckling   

轻声地笑( chuckle的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• I could hear him chuckling to himself as he read his book. 他看书时，我能听见他的轻声发笑。
• He couldn't help chuckling aloud. 他忍不住的笑了出来。 来自汉英文学 - 骆驼祥子

308 triumphant   

adj.胜利的，成功的；狂欢的，喜悦的

参考例句：

• The army made a triumphant entry into the enemy's capital.部队胜利地进入了敌方首都。
• There was a positively triumphant note in her voice.她的声音里带有一种极为得意的语气。

309 saturate   

vt.使湿透，浸透；使充满，使饱和

参考例句：

• We'll saturate California with the rise in its crime rate.我们将使加利福尼亚州的犯罪案件增长率达到饱和点。
• Saturate the meat in the mixture of oil and herbs.把肉浸泡在油和作料的卤汁里。

310 saturated   

a.饱和的，充满的

参考例句：

• The continuous rain had saturated the soil. 连绵不断的雨把土地淋了个透。
• a saturated solution of sodium chloride 氯化钠饱和溶液

311 mishaps   

n.轻微的事故，小的意外( mishap的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• a series of mishaps 一连串的倒霉事
• In spite of one or two minor mishaps everything was going swimmingly. 尽管遇到了一两件小小的不幸，一切都进行得很顺利。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》

312 wizened   

adj.凋谢的；枯槁的

参考例句：

• That wizened and grotesque little old man is a notorious miser.那个干瘪难看的小老头是个臭名远扬的吝啬鬼。
• Mr solomon was a wizened little man with frizzy gray hair.所罗门先生是一个干瘪矮小的人，头发鬈曲灰白。

313 flopping   

n.贬调v.（指书、戏剧等）彻底失败( flop的现在分词 )；（因疲惫而）猛然坐下；（笨拙地、不由自主地或松弛地）移动或落下；砸锅

参考例句：

• The fish are still flopping about. 鱼还在扑腾。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》
• What do you mean by flopping yourself down and praying agin me?' 咚一声跪下地来咒我，你这是什么意思” 来自英汉文学 - 双城记

314 gluttonous   

adj.贪吃的，贪婪的

参考例句：

• He is a gluttonous and lazy guy.他是个好吃懒做之徒。
• He is a selfish, gluttonous and lazy person.他是一个自私、贪婪又懒惰的人。

315 envious   

adj.嫉妒的，羡慕的

参考例句：

• I don't think I'm envious of your success.我想我并不嫉妒你的成功。
• She is envious of Jane's good looks and covetous of her car.她既忌妒简的美貌又垂涎她的汽车。

316 plummets   

v.垂直落下，骤然跌落( plummet的第三人称单数 )

参考例句：

• As a result, blood sugar plummets, sometimes even going below the baseline. 结果，血糖浓度迅速掉落，有时甚至落于基线之下。 来自互联网
• State and local governments could continue to back as tax revenue plummets. 由于税收的直线下降，州和地方政府可能继续削减支出。 来自互联网

317 suspense   

n.（对可能发生的事）紧张感，担心，挂虑

参考例句：

• The suspense was unbearable.这样提心吊胆的状况实在叫人受不了。
• The director used ingenious devices to keep the audience in suspense.导演用巧妙手法引起观众的悬念。

318 portraying   

v.画像( portray的现在分词 )；描述；描绘；描画

参考例句：

• The artist has succeeded in portraying my father to the life. 那位画家把我的父亲画得惟妙惟肖。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Ding Ling was good at portraying figures through careful and refined description of human psychology. 《莎菲女士的日记》是丁玲的成名作，曾引起强烈的社会反响。 来自汉英文学 - 中国现代小说

319 stunted   

adj.矮小的；发育迟缓的

参考例句：

• the stunted lives of children deprived of education 未受教育的孩子所过的局限生活
• But the landed oligarchy had stunted the country's democratic development for generations. 但是好几代以来土地寡头的统治阻碍了这个国家民主的发展。

320 memorable   

adj.值得回忆的，难忘的，特别的，显著的

参考例句：

• This was indeed the most memorable day of my life.这的确是我一生中最值得怀念的日子。
• The veteran soldier has fought many memorable battles.这个老兵参加过许多难忘的战斗。

321 sinuous   

adj.蜿蜒的，迂回的

参考例句：

• The river wound its sinuous way across the plain.这条河蜿蜒曲折地流过平原。
• We moved along the sinuous gravel walks,with the great concourse of girls and boys.我们沿着曲折的石径,随着男孩女孩汇成的巨流一路走去。

322 heeded   

v.听某人的劝告，听从( heed的过去式和过去分词 )；变平，使（某物）变平( flatten的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• She countered that her advice had not been heeded. 她反驳说她的建议未被重视。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• I heeded my doctor's advice and stopped smoking. 我听从医生的劝告，把烟戒了。 来自《简明英汉词典》

323 thronged   

v.成群，挤满( throng的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• Mourners thronged to the funeral. 吊唁者蜂拥着前来参加葬礼。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The department store was thronged with people. 百货商店挤满了人。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》

324 contented   

adj.满意的，安心的，知足的

参考例句：

• He won't be contented until he's upset everyone in the office.不把办公室里的每个人弄得心烦意乱他就不会满足。
• The people are making a good living and are contented,each in his station.人民安居乐业。

325 piers   

n.水上平台( pier的名词复数 )；（常设有娱乐场所的）突堤；柱子；墙墩

参考例句：

• Most road bridges have piers rising out of the vally. 很多公路桥的桥墩是从河谷里建造起来的。 来自辞典例句
• At these piers coasters and landing-craft would be able to discharge at all states of tide. 沿岸航行的海船和登陆艇，不论潮汐如何涨落，都能在这种码头上卸载。 来自辞典例句

326 sedately   

adv.镇静地，安详地

参考例句：

• Life in the country's south-west glides along rather sedately. 中国西南部的生活就相对比较平静。 来自互联网
• She conducts herself sedately. 她举止端庄。 来自互联网

327 champagne   

n.香槟酒；微黄色

参考例句：

• There were two glasses of champagne on the tray.托盘里有两杯香槟酒。
• They sat there swilling champagne.他们坐在那里大喝香槟酒。

328 disastrous   

adj.灾难性的，造成灾害的；极坏的，很糟的

参考例句：

• The heavy rainstorm caused a disastrous flood.暴雨成灾。
• Her investment had disastrous consequences.She lost everything she owned.她的投资结果很惨，血本无归。

329 soothing   

adj.慰藉的；使人宽心的；镇静的

参考例句：

• Put on some nice soothing music.播放一些柔和舒缓的音乐。
• His casual, relaxed manner was very soothing.他随意而放松的举动让人很快便平静下来。

330 anvil   

n.铁钻

参考例句：

• The blacksmith shaped a horseshoe on his anvil.铁匠在他的铁砧上打出一个马蹄形。
• The anvil onto which the staples are pressed was not assemble correctly.订书机上的铁砧安装错位。

331 remiss   

adj.不小心的，马虎

参考例句：

• It was remiss of him to forget her birthday.他竟忘了她的生日，实在是糊涂。
• I would be remiss if I did not do something about it.如果我对此不做点儿什么就是不负责任。

332 persuasively   

adv.口才好地；令人信服地

参考例句：

• Students find that all historians argue reasonably and persuasively. 学生们发现所有的历史学家都争论得有条有理，并且很有说服力。 来自辞典例句
• He spoke a very persuasively but I smelled a rat and refused his offer. 他说得头头是道，但我觉得有些可疑，于是拒绝了他的建议。 来自辞典例句

333 lapsed   

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

参考例句：

• He had lapsed into unconsciousness. 他陷入了昏迷状态。
• He soon lapsed into his previous bad habits. 他很快陷入以前的恶习中去。 来自《简明英汉词典》

334 interred   

v.埋，葬( inter的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• Marie Curie's remains were exhumed and interred in the Pantheon. 玛丽·居里的遗体被移出葬在先贤祠中。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The body was interred at the cemetery. 遗体埋葬在公墓里。 来自《简明英汉词典》

335 dunes   

沙丘( dune的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The boy galloped over the dunes barefoot. 那男孩光着脚在沙丘间飞跑。
• Dragging the fully laden boat across the sand dunes was no mean feat. 将满载货物的船拖过沙丘是一件了不起的事。

336 cleanse   

vt.使清洁，使纯洁，清洗

参考例句：

• Health experts are trying to cleanse the air in cities. 卫生专家们正设法净化城市里的空气。
• Fresh fruit juices can also cleanse your body and reduce dark circles.新鲜果汁同样可以清洁你的身体,并对黑眼圈同样有抑制作用。

337 inclination   

n.倾斜；点头；弯腰；斜坡；倾度；倾向；爱好

参考例句：

• She greeted us with a slight inclination of the head.她微微点头向我们致意。
• I did not feel the slightest inclination to hurry.我没有丝毫着急的意思。

338 bleached   

漂白的，晒白的，颜色变浅的

参考例句：

• His hair was bleached by the sun . 他的头发被太阳晒得发白。
• The sun has bleached her yellow skirt. 阳光把她的黄裙子晒得褪色了。

339 metaphorically   

adv. 用比喻地

参考例句：

• It is context and convention that determine whether a term will be interpreted literally or metaphorically. 对一个词的理解是按字面意思还是隐喻的意思要视乎上下文和习惯。
• Metaphorically it implied a sort of admirable energy. 从比喻来讲，它含有一种令人赞许的能量的意思。

340 thighs   

n.股，大腿( thigh的名词复数 )；食用的鸡（等的）腿

参考例句：

• He's gone to London for skin grafts on his thighs. 他去伦敦做大腿植皮手术了。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The water came up to the fisherman's thighs. 水没到了渔夫的大腿。 来自《简明英汉词典》

341 lusts   

贪求（lust的第三人称单数形式）

参考例句：

• A miser lusts for gold. 守财奴贪财。
• Palmer Kirby had wakened late blooming lusts in her. 巴穆·柯比在她心中煽动起一片迟暮的情欲。

342 decried   

v.公开反对，谴责( decry的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• The measures were decried as useless. 这些措施受到指责，说是不起作用。
• The old poet decried the mediocrity of today's writing. 老诗人抨击了现代文体的平庸无奇。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》

343 noxious   

adj.有害的，有毒的；使道德败坏的，讨厌的

参考例句：

• Heavy industry pollutes our rivers with noxious chemicals.重工业产生的有毒化学品会污染我们的河流。
• Many household products give off noxious fumes.很多家用产品散发有害气体。

344 visualize   

vt.使看得见，使具体化，想象，设想

参考例句：

• I remember meeting the man before but I can't visualize him.我记得以前见过那个人，但他的样子我想不起来了。
• She couldn't visualize flying through space.她无法想像在太空中飞行的景象。

345 precisely   

adv.恰好，正好，精确地，细致地

参考例句：

• It's precisely that sort of slick sales-talk that I mistrust.我不相信的正是那种油腔滑调的推销宣传。
• The man adjusted very precisely.那个人调得很准。

346 tranquil   

adj. 安静的, 宁静的, 稳定的, 不变的

参考例句：

• The boy disturbed the tranquil surface of the pond with a stick. 那男孩用棍子打破了平静的池面。
• The tranquil beauty of the village scenery is unique. 这乡村景色的宁静是绝无仅有的。

347 derived   

vi.起源；由来；衍生；导出v.得到( derive的过去式和过去分词 )；（从…中）得到获得；源于；（从…中）提取

参考例句：

• Many English words are derived from Latin and Greek. 英语很多词源出于拉丁文和希腊文。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• He derived his enthusiasm for literature from his father. 他对文学的爱好是受他父亲的影响。 来自《简明英汉词典》

348 poetic   

adj.富有诗意的，有诗人气质的，善于抒情的

参考例句：

• His poetic idiom is stamped with expressions describing group feeling and thought.他的诗中的措辞往往带有描写群体感情和思想的印记。
• His poetic novels have gone through three different historical stages.他的诗情小说创作经历了三个不同的历史阶段。

349 gargoyles   

n.怪兽状滴水嘴( gargoyle的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Week of Gargoyle: Double growth for Gargoyle and O idia Gargoyles. 石像鬼周：石像鬼产量加倍。 来自互联网
• Fixed a problem that caused Gargoyles to become stuck in Stone Form. 修正了石像鬼在石像形态卡住的问题。 来自互联网

350 liars   

说谎者( liar的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The greatest liars talk most of themselves. 最爱自吹自擂的人是最大的说谎者。
• Honest boys despise lies and liars. 诚实的孩子鄙视谎言和说谎者。

351 penumbra   

n.（日蚀）半影部

参考例句：

• This includes the continuous survey of umbra and penumbra of the sunspot.这包括对太阳黑子本影和半影持续的观测。
• A penumbra of doubt surrounds the incident.疑惑的阴影笼罩着该事件。

352 beset   

v.镶嵌；困扰，包围

参考例句：

• She wanted to enjoy her retirement without being beset by financial worries.她想享受退休生活而不必为金钱担忧。
• The plan was beset with difficulties from the beginning.这项计划自开始就困难重重。

353 sickle   

n.镰刀

参考例句：

• The gardener was swishing off the tops of weeds with a sickle.园丁正在用镰刀嗖嗖地割掉杂草的顶端。
• There is a picture of the sickle on the flag. 旗帜上有镰刀的图案。

354 determined   

adj.坚定的；有决心的

参考例句：

• I have determined on going to Tibet after graduation.我已决定毕业后去西藏。
• He determined to view the rooms behind the office.他决定查看一下办公室后面的房间。

355 batter   

v.接连重击；磨损；n.牛奶面糊；击球员

参考例句：

• The batter skied to the center fielder.击球手打出一个高飞球到中外野手。
• Put a small quantity of sugar into the batter.在面糊里放少量的糖。

356 oracle   

n.神谕，神谕处，预言

参考例句：

• In times of difficulty,she pray for an oracle to guide her.在困难的时候，她祈祷神谕来指引她。
• It is a kind of oracle that often foretells things most important.它是一种内生性神谕，常常能预言最重要的事情。

357 scribbled   

v.潦草的书写( scribble的过去式和过去分词 )；乱画；草草地写；匆匆记下

参考例句：

• She scribbled his phone number on a scrap of paper. 她把他的电话号码匆匆写在一张小纸片上。
• He scribbled a note to his sister before leaving. 临行前，他给妹妹草草写了一封短信。

358 colonize   

v.建立殖民地，拓殖；定居，居于

参考例句：

• Around 700 Arabs began to colonize East Africa.公元700年阿拉伯人开始把东非变为殖民地。
• Japan used to colonize many countries in Asia.日本曾经殖民过许多亚洲国家。