Helen and her aunt returned to Wickham Place in a state of collapse1, and for a little time Margaret had three invalids2 on her hands. Mrs. Munt soon recovered. She possessed3 to a remarkable4 degree the power of distorting the past, and before many days were over she had forgotten the part played by her own imprudence in the catastrophe5. Even at the crisis she had cried, "Thank goodness, poor Margaret is saved this!" which during the journey to London evolved into, "It had to be gone through by someone," which in its turn ripened6 into the permanent form of "The one time I really did help Emily's girls was over the Wilcox business." But Helen was a more serious patient. New ideas had burst upon her like a thunder clap, and by them and by her reverberations she had been stunned7.
The truth was that she had fallen in love, not with an individual, but with a family.
Before Paul arrived she had, as it were, been tuned8 up into his key. The energy of the Wilcoxes had fascinated her, had created new images of beauty in her responsive mind. To be all day with them in the open air, to sleep at night under their roof, had seemed the supreme9 joy of life, and had led to that abandonment of personality that is a possible prelude10 to love. She had liked giving in to Mr. Wilcox, or Evie, or Charles; she had liked being told that her notions of life were sheltered or academic; that Equality was nonsense, Votes for Women nonsense, Socialism nonsense, Art and Literature, except when conducive11 to strengthening the character, nonsense. One by one the Schlegel fetiches had been overthrown12, and, though professing13 to defend them, she had rejoiced. When Mr. Wilcox said that one sound man of business did more good to the world than a dozen of your social reformers, she had swallowed the curious assertion without a gasp14, and had leant back luxuriously15 among the cushions of his motor-car. When Charles said, "Why be so polite to servants? they don't understand it," she had not given the Schlegel retort of, "If they don't understand it, I do." No; she had vowed16 to be less polite to servants in the future. "I am swathed in cant," she thought, "and it is good for me to be stripped of it." And all that she thought or did or breathed was a quiet preparation for Paul. Paul was inevitable17. Charles was taken up with another girl, Mr. Wilcox was so old, Evie so young, Mrs. Wilcox so different. Round the absent brother she began to throw the halo of Romance, to irradiate him with all the splendour of those happy days, to feel that in him she should draw nearest to the robust18 ideal. He and she were about the same age, Evie said. Most people thought Paul handsomer than his brother. He was certainly a better shot, though not so good at golf. And when Paul appeared, flushed with the triumph of getting through an examination, and ready to flirt19 with any pretty girl, Helen met him halfway20, or more than halfway, and turned towards him on the Sunday evening.
He had been talking of his approaching exile in Nigeria, and he should have continued to talk of it, and allowed their guest to recover. But the heave of her bosom21 flattered him. Passion was possible, and he became passionate22. Deep down in him something whispered, "This girl would let you kiss her; you might not have such a chance again."
That was "how it happened," or, rather, how Helen described it to her sister, using words even more unsympathetic than my own. But the poetry of that kiss, the wonder of it, the magic that there was in life for hours after it--who can describe that? It is so easy for an Englishman to sneer23 at these chance collisions of human beings. To the insular24 cynic and the insular moralist they offer an equal opportunity. It is so easy to talk of "passing emotion," and how to forget how vivid the emotion was ere it passed. Our impulse to sneer, to forget, is at root a good one. We recognize that emotion is not enough, and that men and women are personalities25 capable of sustained relations, not mere26 opportunities for an electrical discharge. Yet we rate the impulse too highly. We do not admit that by collisions of this trivial sort the doors of heaven may be shaken open. To Helen, at all events, her life was to bring nothing more intense than the embrace of this boy who played no part in it. He had drawn27 her out of the house, where there was danger of surprise and light; he had led her by a path he knew, until they stood under the column of the vast wych-elm. A man in the darkness, he had whispered "I love you" when she was desiring love. In time his slender personality faded, the scene that he had evoked28 endured. In all the variable years that followed she never saw the like of it again.
"I understand," said Margaret--"at least, I understand as much as ever is understood of these things. Tell me now what happened on the Monday morning."
"It was over at once."
"How, Helen?"
"I was still happy while I dressed, but as I came downstairs I got nervous, and when I went into the dining-room I knew it was no good. There was Evie--I can't explain--managing the tea-urn, and Mr. Wilcox reading the TIMES."
"Was Paul there?"
"Yes; and Charles was talking to him about Stocks and Shares, and he looked frightened."
By slight indications the sisters could convey much to each other. Margaret saw horror latent in the scene, and Helen's next remark did not surprise her.
"Somehow, when that kind of man looks frightened it is too awful. It is all right for us to be frightened, or for men of another sort--father, for instance; but for men like that! When I saw all the others so placid29, and Paul mad with terror in case I said the wrong thing, I felt for a moment that the whole Wilcox family was a fraud, just a wall of newspapers and motor-cars and golf-clubs, and that if it fell I should find nothing behind it but panic and emptiness. "
"I don't think that. The Wilcoxes struck me as being genuine people, particularly the wife."
"No, I don't really think that. But Paul was so broad-shouldered; all kinds of extraordinary things made it worse, and I knew that it would never do--never. I said to him after breakfast, when the others were practising strokes, 'We rather lost our heads,' and he looked better at once, though frightfully ashamed. He began a speech about having no money to marry on, but it hurt him to make it, and I--stopped him. Then he said, 'I must beg your pardon over this, Miss Schlegel; I can't think what came over me last night.' And I said, 'Nor what over me; never mind.' And then we parted--at least, until I remembered that I had written straight off to tell you the night before, and that frightened him again. I asked him to send a telegram for me, for he knew you would be coming or something; and he tried to get hold of the motor, but Charles and Mr. Wilcox wanted it to go to the station; and Charles offered to send the telegram for me, and then I had to say that the telegram was of no consequence, for Paul said Charles might read it, and though I wrote it out several times, he always said people would suspect something. He took it himself at last, pretending that he must walk down to get cartridges30, and, what with one thing and the other, it was not handed in at the Post Office until too late. It was the most terrible morning. Paul disliked me more and more, and Evie talked cricket averages till I nearly screamed. I cannot think how I stood her all the other days. At last Charles and his father started for the station, and then came your telegram warning me that Aunt Juley was coming by that train, and Paul--oh, rather horrible--said that I had muddled31 it. But Mrs. Wilcox knew."
"Knew what?"
"Everything; though we neither of us told her a word, and had known all along, I think."
"Oh, she must have overheard you."
"I suppose so, but it seemed wonderful. When Charles and Aunt Juley drove up, calling each other names, Mrs. Wilcox stepped in from the garden and made everything less terrible. Ugh! but it has been a disgusting business. To think that--" She sighed.
"To think that because you and a young man meet for a moment, there must be all these telegrams and anger," supplied Margaret.
Helen nodded.
"I've often thought about it, Helen. It's one of the most interesting things in the world. The truth is that there is a great outer life that you and I have never touched--a life in which telegrams and anger count. Personal relations, that we think supreme, are not supreme there. There love means marriage settlements, death, death duties. So far I'm clear. But here my difficulty. This outer life, though obviously horrid32, often seems the real one--there's grit33 in it. It does breed character. Do personal relations lead to sloppiness34 in the end?"
"Oh, Meg, that's what I felt, only not so clearly, when the Wilcoxes were so competent, and seemed to have their hands on all the ropes. "
"Don't you feel it now?"
"I remember Paul at breakfast," said Helen quietly. "I shall never forget him. He had nothing to fall back upon. I know that personal relations are the real life, for ever and ever.
"Amen!"
So the Wilcox episode fell into the background, leaving behind it memories of sweetness and horror that mingled35, and the sisters pursued the life that Helen had commended. They talked to each other and to other people, they filled the tall thin house at Wickham Place with those whom they liked or could befriend. They even attended public meetings. In their own fashion they cared deeply about politics, though not as politicians would have us care; they desired that public life should mirror whatever is good in the life within. Temperance, tolerance36, and sexual equality were intelligible37 cries to them; whereas they did not follow our Forward Policy in Thibet with the keen attention that it merits, and would at times dismiss the whole British Empire with a puzzled, if reverent38, sigh. Not out of them are the shows of history erected39: the world would be a grey, bloodless place were it entirely40 composed of Miss Schlegels. But the world being what it is, perhaps they shine out in it like stars.
A word on their origin. They were not "English to the backbone41," as their aunt had piously42 asserted. But, on the other band, they were not "Germans of the dreadful sort." Their father had belonged to a type that was more prominent in Germany fifty years ago than now. He was not the aggressive German, so dear to the English journalist, nor the domestic German, so dear to the English wit. If one classed him at all it would be as the countryman of Hegel and Kant, as the idealist, inclined to be dreamy, whose Imperialism43 was the Imperialism of the air. Not that his life had been inactive. He had fought like blazes against Denmark, Austria, France. But he had fought without visualizing44 the results of victory. A hint of the truth broke on him after Sedan, when he saw the dyed moustaches of Napoleon going grey; another when he entered Paris, and saw the smashed windows of the Tuileries. Peace came--it was all very immense, one had turned into an Empire--but he knew that some quality had vanished for which not all Alsace-Lorraine could compensate45 him. Germany a commercial Power, Germany a naval46 Power, Germany with colonies here and a Forward Policy there, and legitimate47 aspirations48 in the other place, might appeal to others, and be fitly served by them; for his own part, he abstained49 from the fruits of victory, and naturalized himself in England. The more earnest members of his family never forgave him, and knew that his children, though scarcely English of the dreadful sort, would never be German to the backbone. He had obtained work in one of our provincial50 Universities, and there married Poor Emily (or Die Englanderin as the case may be), and as she had money, they proceeded to London, and came to know a good many people. But his gaze was always fixed51 beyond the sea. It was his hope that the clouds of materialism52 obscuring the Fatherland would part in time, and the mild intellectual light re-emerge. "Do you imply that we Germans are stupid, Uncle Ernst?" exclaimed a haughty53 and magnificent nephew. Uncle Ernst replied, "To my mind. You use the intellect, but you no longer care about it. That I call stupidity." As the haughty nephew did not follow, he continued, "You only care about the' things that you can use, and therefore arrange them in the following order: Money, supremely54 useful; intellect, rather useful; imagination, of no use at all. No"--for the other had protested--"your Pan-Germanism is no more imaginative than is our Imperialism over here. It is the vice55 of a vulgar mind to be thrilled by bigness, to think that a thousand square miles are a thousand times more wonderful than one square mile, and that a million square miles are almost the same as heaven. That is not imagination. No, it kills it. When their poets over here try to celebrate bigness they are dead at once, and naturally. Your poets too are dying, your philosophers, your musicians, to whom Europe has listened for two hundred years. Gone. Gone with the little courts that nurtured56 them--gone with Esterhaz and Weimar. What? What's that? Your Universities? Oh, yes, you have learned men, who collect more facts than do the learned men of England. They collect facts, and facts, and empires of facts. But which of them will rekindle57 the light within?"
To all this Margaret listened, sitting on the haughty nephew's knee.
It was a unique education for the little girls. The haughty nephew would be at Wickham Place one day, bringing with him an even haughtier58 wife, both convinced that Germany was appointed by God to govern the world. Aunt Juley would come the next day, convinced that Great Britain had been appointed to the same post by the same authority. Were both these loud-voiced parties right? On one occasion they had met, and Margaret with clasped hands had implored59 them to argue the subject out in her presence. Whereat they blushed, and began to talk about the weather. "Papa" she cried--she was a most offensive child--"why will they not discuss this most clear question?" Her father, surveying the parties grimly, replied that he did not know. Putting her head on one side, Margaret then remarked, "To me one of two things is very clear; either God does not know his own mind about England and Germany, or else these do not know the mind of God." A hateful little girl, but at thirteen she had grasped a dilemma60 that most people travel through life without perceiving. Her brain darted61 up and down; it grew pliant62 and strong. Her conclusion was, that any human being lies nearer to the unseen than any organization, and from this she never varied63.
Helen advanced along the same lines, though with a more irresponsible tread. In character she resembled her sister, but she was pretty, and so apt to have a more amusing time. People gathered round her more readily, especially when they were new acquaintances, and she did enjoy a little homage64 very much. When their father died and they ruled alone at Wickham Place, she often absorbed the whole of the company, while Margaret--both were tremendous talkers--fell flat. Neither sister bothered about this. Helen never apologized afterwards, Margaret did not feel the slightest rancour. But looks have their influence upon character. The sisters were alike as little girls, but at the time of the Wilcox episode their methods were beginning to diverge65; the younger was rather apt to entice66 people, and, in enticing67 them, to be herself enticed68; the elder went straight ahead, and accepted an occasional failure as part of the game.
Little need be premised about Tibby. He was now an intelligent man of sixteen, but dyspeptic and difficile.
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collapse
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| vi.累倒；昏倒；倒塌；塌陷 | |
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invalids
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| 病人，残疾者( invalid的名词复数 ) | |
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possessed
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| adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的 | |
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remarkable
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| adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的 | |
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catastrophe
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| n.大灾难，大祸 | |
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ripened
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| v.成熟，使熟( ripen的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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stunned
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| adj. 震惊的，惊讶的 动词stun的过去式和过去分词 | |
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tuned
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| adj.调谐的，已调谐的v.调音( tune的过去式和过去分词 )；调整；（给收音机、电视等）调谐；使协调 | |
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supreme
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| adj.极度的，最重要的；至高的，最高的 | |
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prelude
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| n.序言，前兆，序曲 | |
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conducive
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| adj.有益的，有助的 | |
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overthrown
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| adj. 打翻的，推倒的，倾覆的 动词overthrow的过去分词 | |
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professing
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| 声称( profess的现在分词 )； 宣称； 公开表明； 信奉 | |
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gasp
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| n.喘息，气喘；v.喘息；气吁吁他说 | |
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luxuriously
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| adv.奢侈地，豪华地 | |
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vowed
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| 起誓，发誓（vow的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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inevitable
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| adj.不可避免的，必然发生的 | |
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robust
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| adj.强壮的，强健的，粗野的，需要体力的，浓的 | |
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flirt
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| v.调情，挑逗，调戏；n.调情者，卖俏者 | |
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halfway
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| adj.中途的，不彻底的，部分的；adv.半路地，在中途，在半途 | |
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bosom
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| n.胸，胸部；胸怀；内心；adj.亲密的 | |
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passionate
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| adj.热情的，热烈的，激昂的，易动情的，易怒的，性情暴躁的 | |
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sneer
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| v.轻蔑；嘲笑；n.嘲笑，讥讽的言语 | |
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insular
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| adj.岛屿的，心胸狭窄的 | |
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personalities
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| n. 诽谤，（对某人容貌、性格等所进行的）人身攻击； 人身攻击；人格, 个性, 名人( personality的名词复数 ) | |
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mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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drawn
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| v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的 | |
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evoked
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| [医]诱发的 | |
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placid
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| adj.安静的，平和的 | |
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cartridges
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| 子弹( cartridge的名词复数 )； （打印机的）墨盒； 录音带盒； （唱机的）唱头 | |
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muddled
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| adj.混乱的；糊涂的；头脑昏昏然的v.弄乱，弄糟( muddle的过去式)；使糊涂；对付，混日子 | |
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horrid
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| adj.可怕的；令人惊恐的；恐怖的；极讨厌的 | |
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grit
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| n.沙粒，决心，勇气；v.下定决心，咬紧牙关 | |
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sloppiness
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| n.草率，粗心 | |
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mingled
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| 混合，混入( mingle的过去式和过去分词 )； 混进，与…交往[联系] | |
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tolerance
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| n.宽容；容忍，忍受；耐药力；公差 | |
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intelligible
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| adj.可理解的，明白易懂的，清楚的 | |
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reverent
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| adj.恭敬的，虔诚的 | |
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ERECTED
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| adj. 直立的，竖立的，笔直的 vt. 使 ... 直立，建立 | |
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entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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backbone
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| n.脊骨，脊柱，骨干；刚毅，骨气 | |
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piously
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| adv.虔诚地 | |
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imperialism
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| n.帝国主义，帝国主义政策 | |
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visualizing
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| 肉眼观察 | |
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compensate
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| vt.补偿，赔偿；酬报 vi.弥补；补偿；抵消 | |
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naval
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| adj.海军的，军舰的，船的 | |
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legitimate
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| adj.合法的，合理的，合乎逻辑的；v.使合法 | |
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aspirations
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| 强烈的愿望( aspiration的名词复数 )； 志向； 发送气音； 发 h 音 | |
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abstained
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| v.戒（尤指酒），戒除( abstain的过去式和过去分词 )；弃权（不投票） | |
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provincial
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| adj.省的，地方的；n．外省人，乡下人 | |
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fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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materialism
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| n.［哲］唯物主义，唯物论；物质至上 | |
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haughty
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| adj.傲慢的，高傲的 | |
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supremely
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| adv.无上地，崇高地 | |
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vice
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| n.坏事；恶习；[pl.]台钳，老虎钳；adj.副的 | |
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nurtured
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| 养育( nurture的过去式和过去分词 )； 培育； 滋长； 助长 | |
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rekindle
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| v.使再振作；再点火 | |
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haughtier
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| haughty（傲慢的，骄傲的）的比较级形式 | |
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implored
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| 恳求或乞求（某人）( implore的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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dilemma
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| n.困境，进退两难的局面 | |
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darted
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| v.投掷，投射( dart的过去式和过去分词 )；向前冲，飞奔 | |
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pliant
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| adj.顺从的；可弯曲的 | |
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varied
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| adj.多样的，多变化的 | |
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homage
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| n.尊敬，敬意，崇敬 | |
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diverge
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| v.分叉，分歧，离题，使...岔开，使转向 | |
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entice
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| v.诱骗，引诱，怂恿 | |
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enticing
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| adj.迷人的；诱人的 | |
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enticed
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| 诱惑，怂恿( entice的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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