The wood grew denser11 as he descended and a damp, mouldy odor pervaded12 the spaces underneath13 the commingling14 boughs15 of the oaks, pines, cedars16, and sassafras. Here and there a lizard17 scampered18 around a tree-hole or darted[31] under the fallen leaves. Overhead certain shadowy flittings betrayed the presence of an occasional small bird, demurely19 going about its business of food-getting. The main elements of the surroundings, however, were gloom and silence. The breeze-currents astir in the valley and rippling20 over the gray peaks of Mt. Boab could not enter the leafy chambers21 of this wooded gorge22. Heat of a peculiarly sultry sort seemed to be stored here, for as Dufour proceeded he began at length to gasp1 for breath, and it was with such relief as none but the suffocating24 can fully25 appreciate, that he emerged into an open space surrounded, almost, with butting26 limestone27 cliffs, but cut across by a noisy little stream that went bubbling down into the valley through a cleft28 bedecked with ferns and sprinkled with perennial29 dew from a succession of gentle cascades30. The ideal trout31-brook32 was this, so far as appearances could go. At the foot of each tiny water-fall was a swirling33 pool, semi-opaque, giving forth34 emerald flashes and silver glints, and bearing little cones35 of creamy foam36 round and round on its bosom37. A thousand noises, every one a water-note, rising all along the line of the brook’s broken current, clashed together with an effect like that of hearing a far-off multitude applauding or some distant army rushing on a charge.
So much out of breath and so deluged38 with perspiration39 was Dufour that he flung himself upon the ground beside the brook and lay there panting and mopping his face. Overhead[32] the bit of sky was like turquoise40, below a slender glimpse of the valley shone between the rock walls, like a sketch41 subdued42 almost to monochrome of crepuscular43 purple. A fitful breath of cool air fell into the place, fanning the man’s almost purple cheeks and forehead, while a wood-thrush, whose liquid voice might have been regarded as part of the water-tumult, sang in a thorn tree hard by.
In a half-reclining attitude, Dufour gave himself over to the delicious effect of all this, indulging at the same time in the impolite and ridiculous, but quite Shakespearian, habit of soliloquizing.
“Jingo!” he remarked, “Jingo! but isn’t this a daisy prospect44 for trout! If those pools aren’t full of the beauties, then there’s nothing in Waltonian lore45 and life isn’t worth living. Ha! Jingo! there went one clean above the water—a ten ouncer, at least!”
He sprang at his rod as if to break it to pieces, and the facility with which he fitted the joints46 and the reel and run the line and tied the cast was really a wonder.
“I knew they were here,” he muttered, “just as soon as I laid my eyes on the water. Who ever did see such another brook!”
At the third cast of the fly, a brown hackle, by the way, up came a trout with a somersault and a misty47 gleam of royal purple and silver, attended by a spray of water and a short bubbling sound. Dufour struck deftly48, hooking the beautiful fish very insecurely through the edge[33] of the lower lip. Immediately the reel began to sing and the rod to quiver, while Dufour’s eyes glared almost savagely49 and his lips pursed with comical intensity50.
Round and round flew the trout, now rushing to the bottom of the pool, now whisking under a projecting ledge51 and anon flinging itself clean above the water and shaking itself convulsively.
The angler was led hither and thither52 by his active prey53, the exercise bedewing his face again with perspiration, whilst his feet felt the cool bath of water and the soothing54 embrace of tangled55 water-grass. The mere56 switch of a bamboo rod, bent57 almost into a loop, shook like a rush in a wind.
Dufour was ill prepared to formulate58 a polite response when, at the height of his sport, a gentle but curiously59 earnest voice exclaimed:
“Snatch ’im out, snatch ’im out, dog gone yer clumsy hide! Snatch ’im out, er I’ll do it for ye!”
The trout must have heard, for as the angler turned to get a hasty glance at the stranger, up it leaped and by a desperate shake broke the snell.
“Confound you!” cried Dufour, his face redder than ever. “Confound your meddlesome60 tongue, why didn’t you keep still till I landed him?”
There was a tableau61 set against the gray, lichen-bossed rocks. Two men glaring at each other. The new-comer was a tall, athletic,[34] brown-faced mountaineer, bearing a gun and wearing two heavy revolvers. He towered above Dufour and gazed down upon him as if about to execute him. The latter did not quail62, but grew angrier instead.
“You ought to have better sense than to interfere63 with my sport in such a way! Who are you, anyway?” he cried in a hot, fierce tone.
The mountaineer stood silent for a moment, as if collecting words enough for what he felt like saying, then:
“See yer,” he drawled, rather musically, “ef I take ye by the scruff o’ yer neck an’ the heel o’ yer stockin’ an’ jest chuck ye inter6 thet puddle64, ye’ll begin to surmise65 who I air, ye saucy66 little duck-legged minny-catcher, you!”
Dufour, remembering his long training years ago at the Gentlemen’s Glove-Club, squared himself with fists in position, having flung aside his tackle. In his righteous rage he forgot that his adversary67 was not only his superior in stature68 but also heavily armed.
“Well, thet’ ther’ do beat me!” said the mountaineer, with an incredulous ring in his voice. “The very idee! W’y ye little aggervatin’ banty rooster, a puttin’ up yer props69 at me! W’y I’ll jest eternally and everlastin’ly wring70 yer neck an’ swob the face o’ nature wi’ ye!”
What followed was about as indescribable as a whirlwind in dry grass. The two men appeared to coalesce71 for a single wild, whirling, resounding72 instant, and then the mountaineer went[35] over headlong into the middle of the pool with a great plash and disappeared. Dufour, in a truly gladiatorial attitude, gazed fiercely at the large dimple in which his antagonist73 was buried for the instant, but out of which he presently projected himself with great promptness, then, as a new thought came to him, he seized the fallen gun of the mountaineer, cocked it and leveled it upon its owner. There was a peculiar23 meaning in his words as he stormed out:
“Lie down! down with you, or I blow a hole clean through you instantly!”
Promptly74 enough the mountaineer lay down until the water rippled75 around his chin and floated his flaxen beard. Some moments of peculiar silence followed, broken only by the lapsing76 gurgle and murmur77 of the brook.
Dufour, with arms as steady as iron bars, kept the heavy gun bearing on the gasping78 face of the unwilling79 bather, whilst at the same time he was dangerously fingering the trigger. The stout80, short figure really had a muscular and doughty81 air and the heavy face certainly looked warlike.
“Stranger, a seein’ ’at ye’ve got the drap onto me, ’spose we swear off an’ make up friends?” The man in the water said this at length, in the tone of one presenting a suggestion of doubtful propriety82.
“Don’t hardly think you’ve cooled off sufficiently83, do you?” responded Dufour.
“This here’s spring warter, ye must ’member,” offered the mountaineer.
[36]
The gun was beginning to tire Dufour’s arms.
“Great mind ter say yes,” was the shivering response.
“Oh, take your time to consider, I’m in no hurry,” said Dufour.
If the man in the water could have known how the supple85 but of late untrained arms of the man on shore were aching, the outcome might have been different; but the bath was horribly cold and the gun’s muzzle86 kept its bearing right on the bather’s eye.
“I give in, ye’ve got me, stranger,” he at last exclaimed.
Dufour was mightily87 relieved as he put down the gun and watched his dripping and shivering antagonist wade88 out of the cold pool. The men looked at each other curiously.
“Ye’re the dog gone’dest man ’at ever I see,” remarked the mountaineer; “who air ye, anyhow?”
“Oh, I’m a pretty good fellow, if you take me on the right tack,” said Dufour.
The other hesitated a moment, and then inquired:
“Yes.”
“A boardin’ there?”
“Yes.”
“For all summer?”
“Possibly.”
[37]
Again there was a silence, during which the water trickled90 off the mountaineer’s clothes and ran over the little stones at his feet.
“Goin’ ter make fun o’ me when ye git up thar?” the catechism was at length resumed. Dufour laughed.
“I could tell a pretty good thing on you,” he answered, taking a sweeping91 observation of the stalwart fellow’s appearance as he stood there with his loose jeans trousers and blue cotton shirt clinging to his shivering limbs.
“See yer, now,” said the latter, in a wheedling92 tone, and wringing93 his light, thin beard with one sinewy94 dark hand, “see yer, now, I’d like for ye not ter do thet, strenger.”
“Why?”
“Well,” said the mountaineer, after some picturesque95 hesitation96 and faltering97, “’cause I hev a ’quaintance o’ mine up ther’ at thet tavern.”
“Indeed, have you? Who is it?”
“Mebbe ye mought be erquainted with Miss Sarah Anna Crabb?”
“No.”
“Well, she’s up ther’, she stayed all night at our house las’ night an’ went on up ther’ this mornin’; she’s a literary woman an’ purty, an’ smart, an’ a mighty98 much of a talker.”
“Ugh!”
“Jest tell her ’at ye met me down yer, an’ ’at I’m tol’ble well; but don’t say nothin’ ’bout this ’ere duckin’ ’at ye gi’ me, will ye?”
“Oh, of course, that’s all right,” Dufour hastened[38] to say, feeling an indescribable thrill of sympathy for the man.
“Yer’s my hand, strenger, an’ w’en Wesley Tolliver gives a feller his hand hit means all there air ter mean,” exclaimed the latter, as warmly as his condition would permit, “an’ w’en ye need er friend in these parts jest come ter me.”
He shouldered his gun, thereupon, and remarking that he might as well be going, strode away over a spur of the mountain, his clothes still dripping and sticking close to his muscular limbs. Dufour found his rod broken and his reel injured, by having felt the weight of Wesley Tolliver’s foot, and so he too turned to retrace99 his steps.
Such an adventure could not fail to gain in spectacular grotesqueness100 as it took its place in the memory and imagination of Dufour. He had been in the habit of seeing such things on the stage and of condemning101 them out of hand as the baldest melodramatic nonsense, so that now he could not fairly realize the matter as something that had taken place in his life.
He was very tired and hungry when he reached Hotel Helicon.
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收听单词发音
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1
gasp
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| n.喘息，气喘；v.喘息；气吁吁他说 | |
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2
adipose
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| adj.脂肪质的，脂肪多的；n.（储于脂肪组织中的）动物脂肪；肥胖 | |
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3
descended
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| a.为...后裔的，出身于...的 | |
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4
droll
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| adj.古怪的，好笑的 | |
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5
tune
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| n.调子；和谐，协调；v.调音，调节，调整 | |
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inter
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| v.埋葬 | |
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7
intervals
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| n.[军事]间隔( interval的名词复数 )；间隔时间；[数学]区间；（戏剧、电影或音乐会的）幕间休息 | |
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8
sundry
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| adj.各式各样的，种种的 | |
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9
jutting
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| v.（使）突出( jut的现在分词 )；伸出；（从…）突出；高出 | |
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10
perspired
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| v.出汗，流汗( perspire的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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denser
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| adj. 不易看透的, 密集的, 浓厚的, 愚钝的 | |
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12
pervaded
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| v.遍及，弥漫( pervade的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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13
underneath
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| adj.在...下面，在...底下；adv.在下面 | |
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14
commingling
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| v.混合，掺和，合并( commingle的现在分词 ) | |
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15
boughs
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| 大树枝( bough的名词复数 ) | |
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16
cedars
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| 雪松，西洋杉( cedar的名词复数 ) | |
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17
lizard
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| n.蜥蜴，壁虎 | |
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18
scampered
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| v.蹦蹦跳跳地跑，惊惶奔跑( scamper的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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19
demurely
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| adv.装成端庄地，认真地 | |
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20
rippling
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| 起涟漪的，潺潺流水般声音的 | |
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21
chambers
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| n.房间( chamber的名词复数 )；（议会的）议院；卧室；会议厅 | |
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22
gorge
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| n.咽喉，胃，暴食，山峡；v.塞饱，狼吞虎咽地吃 | |
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23
peculiar
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| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
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24
suffocating
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| a.使人窒息的 | |
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25
fully
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| adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地 | |
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26
butting
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| 用头撞人（犯规动作） | |
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27
limestone
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| n.石灰石 | |
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28
cleft
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| n.裂缝；adj.裂开的 | |
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perennial
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| adj.终年的；长久的 | |
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30
cascades
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| 倾泻( cascade的名词复数 )； 小瀑布（尤指一连串瀑布中的一支）； 瀑布状物； 倾泻（或涌出）的东西 | |
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31
trout
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| n.鳟鱼；鲑鱼(属) | |
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32
brook
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| n.小河，溪；v.忍受，容让 | |
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33
swirling
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| v.旋转，打旋( swirl的现在分词 ) | |
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34
forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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35
cones
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| n.（人眼）圆锥细胞；圆锥体( cone的名词复数 )；球果；圆锥形东西；（盛冰淇淋的）锥形蛋卷筒 | |
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36
foam
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| v./n.泡沫，起泡沫 | |
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37
bosom
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| n.胸，胸部；胸怀；内心；adj.亲密的 | |
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38
deluged
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| v.使淹没( deluge的过去式和过去分词 )；淹没；被洪水般涌来的事物所淹没；穷于应付 | |
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39
perspiration
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| n.汗水；出汗 | |
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40
turquoise
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| n.绿宝石；adj.蓝绿色的 | |
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41
sketch
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| n.草图；梗概；素描；v.素描；概述 | |
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42
subdued
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| adj. 屈服的，柔和的，减弱的 动词subdue的过去式和过去分词 | |
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43
crepuscular
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| adj.晨曦的；黄昏的；昏暗的 | |
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44
prospect
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| n.前景，前途；景色，视野 | |
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45
lore
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| n.传说；学问，经验，知识 | |
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46
joints
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| 接头( joint的名词复数 )； 关节； 公共场所（尤指价格低廉的饮食和娱乐场所） （非正式）； 一块烤肉 （英式英语） | |
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47
misty
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| adj.雾蒙蒙的，有雾的 | |
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48
deftly
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| adv.灵巧地，熟练地，敏捷地 | |
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49
savagely
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| adv. 野蛮地，残酷地 | |
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50
intensity
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| n.强烈，剧烈；强度；烈度 | |
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51
ledge
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| n.壁架，架状突出物；岩架，岩礁 | |
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52
thither
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| adv.向那里；adj.在那边的，对岸的 | |
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53
prey
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| n.被掠食者，牺牲者，掠食；v.捕食，掠夺，折磨 | |
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54
soothing
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| adj.慰藉的；使人宽心的；镇静的 | |
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55
tangled
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| adj. 纠缠的，紊乱的 动词tangle的过去式和过去分词 | |
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56
mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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57
bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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58
formulate
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| v.用公式表示；规划；设计；系统地阐述 | |
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59
curiously
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| adv.有求知欲地；好问地；奇特地 | |
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60
meddlesome
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| adj.爱管闲事的 | |
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61
tableau
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| n.画面，活人画（舞台上活人扮的静态画面） | |
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62
quail
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| n.鹌鹑；vi.畏惧，颤抖 | |
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63
interfere
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| v.(in)干涉，干预；(with)妨碍，打扰 | |
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64
puddle
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| n.(雨)水坑，泥潭 | |
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65
surmise
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| v./n.猜想，推测 | |
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66
saucy
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| adj.无礼的；俊俏的；活泼的 | |
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67
adversary
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| adj.敌手，对手 | |
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68
stature
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| n.（高度）水平，（高度）境界，身高，身材 | |
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69
props
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| 小道具； 支柱( prop的名词复数 )； 支持者； 道具； （橄榄球中的）支柱前锋 | |
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70
wring
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| n.扭绞；v.拧，绞出，扭 | |
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71
coalesce
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| v.联合，结合，合并 | |
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72
resounding
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| adj. 响亮的 | |
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73
antagonist
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| n.敌人，对抗者，对手 | |
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74
promptly
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| adv.及时地，敏捷地 | |
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75
rippled
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| 使泛起涟漪（ripple的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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76
lapsing
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| v.退步( lapse的现在分词 )；陷入；倒退；丧失 | |
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77
murmur
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| n.低语，低声的怨言；v.低语，低声而言 | |
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78
gasping
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| adj. 气喘的, 痉挛的 动词gasp的现在分词 | |
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79
unwilling
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| adj.不情愿的 | |
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81
doughty
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| adj.勇猛的，坚强的 | |
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82
propriety
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| n.正当行为；正当；适当 | |
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83
sufficiently
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| adv.足够地，充分地 | |
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84
fumbling
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| n. 摸索,漏接 v. 摸索,摸弄,笨拙的处理 | |
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85
supple
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| adj.柔软的，易弯的，逢迎的，顺从的，灵活的；vt.使柔软，使柔顺，使顺从；vi.变柔软，变柔顺 | |
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86
muzzle
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| n.鼻口部；口套；枪(炮)口；vt.使缄默 | |
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87
mightily
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| ad.强烈地；非常地 | |
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88
wade
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| v.跋涉，涉水；n.跋涉 | |
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89
tavern
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| n.小旅馆，客栈；小酒店 | |
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90
trickled
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| v.滴( trickle的过去式和过去分词 )；淌；使)慢慢走；缓慢移动 | |
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91
sweeping
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| adj.范围广大的，一扫无遗的 | |
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92
wheedling
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| v.骗取（某物），哄骗（某人干某事）( wheedle的现在分词 ) | |
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93
wringing
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| 淋湿的，湿透的 | |
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94
sinewy
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| adj.多腱的，强壮有力的 | |
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95
picturesque
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| adj.美丽如画的，（语言）生动的，绘声绘色的 | |
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96
hesitation
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| n.犹豫，踌躇 | |
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97
faltering
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| 犹豫的，支吾的，蹒跚的 | |
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98
mighty
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| adj.强有力的；巨大的 | |
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99
retrace
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| v.折回；追溯，探源 | |
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100
grotesqueness
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101
condemning
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| v.（通常因道义上的原因而）谴责( condemn的现在分词 )；宣判；宣布…不能使用；迫使…陷于不幸的境地 | |
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