The "Sons of the Covenant1" sent no representatives to the club balls, wotting neither of waltzes nor of dress-coats, and preferring death to the embrace of a strange dancing woman. They were the congregation of which Mr. Belcovitch was President and their synagogue was the ground floor of No. 1 Royal Street--two large rooms knocked into one, and the rear partitioned off for the use of the bewigged, heavy-jawed women who might not sit with the men lest they should fascinate their thoughts away from things spiritual. Its furniture was bare benches, a raised platform with a reading desk in the centre and a wooden curtained ark at the end containing two parchment scrolls3 of the Law, each with a silver pointer and silver bells and pomegranates. The scrolls were in manuscript, for the printing-press has never yet sullied the sanctity of the synagogue editions of the Pentateuch. The room was badly ventilated and what little air there was was generally sucked up by a greedy company of wax candles, big and little, struck in brass4 holders5. The back window gave on the yard and the contiguous cow-sheds, and "moos" mingled6 with the impassioned supplications of the worshippers, who came hither two and three times a day to batter7 the gates of heaven and to listen to sermons more exegetical8 than ethical9. They dropped in, mostly in their work-a-day garments and grime, and rumbled10 and roared and chorused prayers with a zeal11 that shook the window-panes, and there was never lack of _minyan_--the congregational quorum12 of ten. In the West End, synagogues are built to eke13 out the income of poor _minyan-men_ or professional congregants; in the East End rooms are tricked up for prayer. This synagogue was all of luxury many of its Sons could boast. It was their _salon_ and their lecture-hall. It supplied them not only with their religion but their art and letters, their politics and their public amusements. It was their home as well as the Almighty's, and on occasion they were familiar and even a little vulgar with Him. It was a place in which they could sit in their slippers14, metaphorically15 that is; for though they frequently did so literally16, it was by way of reverence17, not ease. They enjoyed themselves in this _Shool_ of theirs; they shouted and skipped and shook and sang, they wailed18 and moaned; they clenched19 their fists and thumped20 their breasts and they were not least happy when they were crying. There is an apocryphal21 anecdote22 of one of them being in the act of taking a pinch of snuff when the "Confession23" caught him unexpectedly.
"We have trespassed," he wailed mechanically, as he spasmodically put the snuff in his bosom24 and beat his nose with his clenched fist.
They prayed metaphysics, acrostics, angelology, Cabalah, history, exegetics, Talmudical controversies25, _menus_, recipes, priestly prescriptions26, the canonical27 books, psalms28, love-poems, an undigested hotch-potch of exalted29 and questionable30 sentiments, of communal31 and egoistic aspirations32 of the highest order. It was a wonderful liturgy33, as grotesque34 as it was beautiful--like an old cathedral in all styles of architecture, stored with shabby antiquities35 and side-shows and overgrown with moss36 and lichen--a heterogeneous37 blend of historical strata38 of all periods, in which gems39 of poetry and pathos40 and spiritual fervor41 glittered and pitiful records of ancient persecution42 lay petrified43. And the method of praying these things was equally complex and uncouth44, equally the bond-slave of tradition; here a rising and there a bow, now three steps backwards45 and now a beating of the breast, this bit for the congregation and that for the minister, variants46 of a page, a word, a syllable47, even a vowel49, ready for every possible contingency50. Their religious consciousness was largely a musical box--the thrill of the ram's horn, the cadenza of psalmic51 phrase, the jubilance of a festival "Amen" and the sobriety of a work-a-day "Amen," the Passover melodies and the Pentecost, the minor52 keys of Atonement and the hilarious53 rhapsodies of Rejoicing, the plain chant of the Law and the more ornate intonation54 of the Prophets--all this was known and loved and was far more important than the meaning of it all or its relation to their real lives; for page upon page was gabbled off at rates that could not be excelled by automata. But if they did not always know what they were saying they always meant it. If the service had been more intelligible55 it would have been less emotional and edifying56. There was not a sentiment, however incomprehensible, for which they were not ready to die or to damn.
"All Israel are brethren," and indeed there was a strange antique clannishness57 about these "Sons of the Covenant" which in the modern world, where the ends of the ages meet, is Socialism. They prayed for one another while alive, visited one another's bedsides when sick, buried one another when dead. No mercenary hands poured the yolks of eggs over their dead faces and arrayed their corpses58 in their praying-shawls. No hired masses were said for the sick or the troubled, for the psalm-singing services of the "Sons of the Covenant" were always available for petitioning the Heavens, even though their brother had been arrested for buying stolen goods, and the service might be an invitation to Providence59 to compound a felony. Little charities of their own they had, too--a Sabbath Meal Society, and a Marriage Portion Society to buy the sticks for poor couples--and when a pauper60 countryman arrived from Poland, one of them boarded him and another lodged61 him and a third taught him a trade. Strange exotics in a land of prose carrying with them through the paven highways of London the odor of Continental62 Ghettos and bearing in their eyes through all the shrewdness of their glances the eternal mysticism of the Orient, where God was born! Hawkers and peddlers, tailors and cigar-makers, cobblers and furriers, glaziers and cap-makers--this was in sum their life. To pray much and to work long, to beg a little and to cheat a little, to eat not over-much and to "drink" scarce at all, to beget65 annual children by chaste66 wives (disallowed them half the year), and to rear them not over-well, to study the Law and the Prophets and to reverence the Rabbinical tradition and the chaos67 of commentaries expounding68 it, to abase69 themselves before the "Life of Man" and Joseph Cam's "Prepared Table" as though the authors had presided at the foundation of the earth, to wear phylacteries and fringes, to keep the beard unshaven, and the corners of the hair uncut, to know no work on Sabbath and no rest on week-day. It was a series of recurrent landmarks70, ritual and historical, of intimacy71 with God so continuous that they were in danger of forgetting His existence as of the air they breathed. They ate unleavened bread in Passover and blessed the moon and counted the days of the _Omer_ till Pentecost saw the synagogue dressed with flowers in celebration of an Asiatic fruit harvest by a European people divorced from agriculture; they passed to the terrors and triumphs of the New Year (with its domestic symbolism of apple and honey and its procession to the river) and the revelry of repentance72 on the Great White Fast, when they burned long candles and whirled fowls73 round their heads and attired74 themselves in grave-clothes and saw from their seats in synagogue the long fast-day darken slowly into dusk, while God was sealing the decrees of life and death; they passed to Tabernacles when they ran up rough booths in back yards draped with their bed-sheets and covered with greenery, and bore through the streets citrons in boxes and a waving combination of myrtle, and palm and willow75 branches, wherewith they made a pleasant rustling76 in the synagogue; and thence to the Rejoicing of the Law when they danced and drank rum in the House of the Lord and scrambled77 sweets for the little ones, and made a sevenfold circuit with the two scrolls, supplemented by toy flags and children's candles stuck in hollow carrots; and then on again to Dedication78 with its celebration of the Maccabaean deliverance and the miracle of the unwaning oil in the Temple, and to Purim with its masquerading and its execration79 of Haman's name by the banging of little hammers; and so back to Passover. And with these larger cycles, epicycles of minor fasts and feasts, multiplex, not to be overlooked, from the fast of the ninth of Ab--fatal day for the race--when they sat on the ground in shrouds80, and wailed for the destruction of Jerusalem, to the feast of the Great Hosannah when they whipped away willow-leaves on the _Shool_ benches in symbolism of forgiven sins, sitting up the whole of the night before in a long paroxysm of prayer mitigated81 by coffee and cakes; from the period in which nuts were prohibited to the period in which marriages were commended.
And each day, too, had its cycles of religious duty, its comprehensive and cumbrous ritual with accretions82 of commentary and tradition.
And every contingency of the individual life was equally provided for, and the writings that regulated all this complex ritual are a marvellous monument of the patience, piety83 and juristic genius of the race--and of the persecution which threw it back upon its sole treasure, the Law.
Thus they lived and died, these Sons of the Covenant, half-automata, sternly disciplined by voluntary and involuntary privation, hemmed84 and mewed in by iron walls of form and poverty, joyfully85 ground under the perpetual rotary86 wheel of ritualism, good-humored withal and casuistic like all people whose religion stands much upon ceremony; inasmuch as a ritual law comes to count one equally with a moral, and a man is not half bad who does three-fourths of his duty.
And so the stuffy87 room with its guttering88 candles and its Chameleon-colored ark-curtain was the pivot89 of their barren lives. Joy came to bear to it the offering of its thanksgiving and to vow48 sixpenny bits to the Lord, prosperity came in a high hat to chaffer for the holy privileges, and grief came with rent garments to lament90 the beloved dead and glorify91 the name of the Eternal.
The poorest life is to itself the universe and all that therein is, and these humble92 products of a great and terrible past, strange fruits of a motley-flowering secular93 tree whose roots are in Canaan and whose boughs94 overshadow the earth, were all the happier for not knowing that the fulness of life was not theirs.
And the years went rolling on, and the children grew up and here and there a parent.
* * * * *
The elders of the synagogue were met in council.
"He is greater than a Prince," said the Shalotten _Shammos_.
"If all the Princes of the Earth were put in one scale," said Mr. Belcovitch, "and our _Maggid_, Moses, in the other, he would outweigh95 them all. He is worth a hundred of the Chief Rabbi of England, who has been seen bareheaded."
"From Moses to Moses there has been none like Moses," said old Mendel Hyams, interrupting the Yiddish with a Hebrew quotation96.
"Oh no," said the Shalotten _Shammos_, who was a great stickler97 for precision, being, as his nickname implied, a master of ceremonies. "I can't admit that. Look at my brother Nachmann."
There was a general laugh at the Shalotten _Shammos's_ bull; the proverb dealing98 only with Moseses.
"He has the true gift," observed _Froom_ Karlkammer, shaking the flames of his hair pensively99. "For the letters of his name have the same numerical value as those of the great Moses da Leon."
_Froom_ Karlkammer was listened to with respect, for he was an honorary member of the committee, who paid for two seats in a larger congregation and only worshipped with the Sons of the Covenant on special occasions. The Shalotten _Shammos_, however, was of contradictory100 temperament--a born dissentient, upheld by a steady consciousness of highly superior English, the drop of bitter in Belcovitch's presidential cup. He was a long thin man, who towered above the congregation, and was as tall as the bulk of them even when he was bowing his acknowledgments to his Maker64.
"How do you make that out?" he asked Karlkammer. "Moses of course adds up the same as Moses--but while the other part of the _Maggid's_ name makes seventy-three, da Leon's makes ninety-one."
"Ah, that's because you're ignorant of _Gematriyah_," said little Karlkammer, looking up contemptuously at the cantankerous102 giant. "You reckon all the letters on the same system, and you omit to give yourself the license103 of deleting the ciphers104."
In philology106 it is well known that all consonants107 are interchangeable and vowels108 don't count; in _Gematriyah_ any letter may count for anything, and the total may be summed up anyhow.
Karlkammer was one of the curiosities of the Ghetto63. In a land of _froom_ men he was the _froomest_. He had the very genius of fanaticism109. On the Sabbath he spoke110 nothing but Hebrew whatever the inconvenience and however numerous the misunderstandings, and if he perchance paid a visit he would not perform the "work" of lifting the knocker. Of course he had his handkerchief girt round his waist to save him from carrying it, but this compromise being general was not characteristic of Karlkammer any more than his habit of wearing two gigantic sets of phylacteries where average piety was content with one of moderate size.
One of the walls of his room had an unpapered and unpainted scrap112 in mourning for the fall of Jerusalem. He walked through the streets to synagogue attired in his praying-shawl and phylacteries, and knocked three times at the door of God's house when he arrived. On the Day of Atonement he walked in his socks, though the heavens fell, wearing his grave-clothes. On this day he remained standing111 in synagogue from 6 A.M. to 7 P.M. with his body bent113 at an angle of ninety degrees; it was to give him bending space that he hired two seats. On Tabernacles, not having any ground whereon to erect114 a booth, by reason of living in an attic115, he knocked a square hole in the ceiling, covered it with branches through which the free air of heaven played, and hung a quadrangle of sheets from roof to floor; he bore to synagogue the tallest _Lulav_ of palm-branches that could be procured116 and quarrelled with a rival pietist for the last place in the floral procession, as being the lowliest and meekest117 man in Israel--an ethical pedestal equally claimed by his rival. He insisted on bearing a corner of the biers of all the righteous dead. Almost every other day was a fast-day for Karlkammer, and he had a host of supplementary118 ceremonial observances which are not for the vulgar. Compared with him Moses Ansell and the ordinary "Sons of the Covenant" were mere119 heathens. He was a man of prodigious120 distorted mental activity. He had read omnivorously121 amid the vast stores of Hebrew literature, was a great authority on Cabalah, understood astronomy, and, still more, astrology, was strong on finance, and could argue coherently on any subject outside religion. His letters to the press on specifically Jewish subjects were the most hopeless, involved, incomprehensible and protracted122 puzzles ever penned, bristling123 with Hebrew quotations124 from the most varying, the most irrelevant125 and the most mutually incongruous sources and peppered with the dates of birth and death of every Rabbi mentioned.
No one had ever been known to follow one of these argumentations to the bitter end. They were written in good English modified by a few peculiar126 terms used in senses unsuspected by dictionary-makers; in a beautiful hand, with the t's uncrossed, but crowned with the side-stroke, so as to avoid the appearance of the symbol of Christianity, and with the dates expressed according to the Hebrew Calendar, for Karlkammer refused to recognize the chronology of the Christian127. He made three copies of every letter, and each was exactly like the others in every word and every line. His bill for midnight oil must have been extraordinary, for he was a business man and had to earn his living by day. Kept within the limits of sanity128 by a religion without apocalyptic129 visions, he was saved from predicting the end of the world by mystic calculations, but he used them to prove everything else and fervently130 believed that endless meanings were deducible from the numerical value of Biblical words, that not a curl at the tail of a letter of any word in any sentence but had its supersubtle significance. The elaborate cipher105 with which Bacon is alleged131 to have written Shakspeare's plays was mere child's play compared with the infinite revelations which in Karlkammer's belief the Deity132 left latent in writing the Old Testament133 from Genesis to Malachi, and in inspiring the Talmud and the holier treasures of Hebrew literature. Nor were these ideas of his own origination. His was an eclectic philosophy and religionism, of which all the elements were discoverable in old Hebrew books: scraps134 of Alexandrian philosophy inextricably blent with Aristotelian, Platonic135, mystic.
He kept up a copious136 correspondence with scholars in other countries and was universally esteemed137 and pitied.
"We haven't come to discuss the figures of the _Maggid's_ name, but of his salary." said Mr. Belcovitch, who prided himself on his capacity for conducting public business.
"I have examined the finances," said Karlkammer, "and I don't see how we can possibly put aside more for our preacher than the pound a week."
"But he is not satisfied," said Mr. Belcovitch.
"I don't see why he shouldn't be," said the Shalotten _Shammos_. "A pound a week is luxury for a single man."
The Sons of the Covenant did not know that the poor consumptive _Maggid_ sent half his salary to his sisters in Poland to enable them to buy back their husbands from military service; also they had vague unexpressed ideas that he was not mortal, that Heaven would look after his larder138, that if the worst came to the worst he could fall back on Cabalah and engage himself with the mysteries of food-creation.
Besides being Reader, Greenberg blew the horn and killed cattle and circumcised male infants and educated children and discharged the functions of beadle and collector. He spent a great deal of his time in avoiding being drawn140 into the contending factions141 of the congregation and in steering142 equally between Belcovitch and the Shalotten _Shammos_. The Sons only gave him fifty a year for all his trouble, but they eked143 it out by allowing him to be on the Committee, where on the question of a rise in the Reader's salary he was always an ineffective minority of one. His other grievance144 was that for the High Festivals the Sons temporarily engaged a finer voiced Reader and advertised him at raised prices to repay themselves out of the surplus congregation. Not only had Greenberg to play second fiddle145 on these grand occasions, but he had to iterate "Pom" as a sort of musical accompaniment in the pauses of his rival's vocalization.
"You can't compare yourself with the _Maggid_" the Shalotten _Shammos_ reminded him consolingly. "There are hundreds of you in the market. There are several _morceaux_ of the service which you do not sing half so well as your predecessor146; your horn-blowing cannot compete with Freedman's of the Fashion Street _Chevrah_, nor can you read the Law as quickly and accurately147 as Prochintski. I have told you over and over again you confound the air of the Passover _Yigdal_ with the New Year ditto. And then your preliminary flourish to the Confession of Sin--it goes 'Ei, Ei, Ei, Ei, Ei, Ei, Ei'" (he mimicked148 Greenberg's melody) "whereas it should be 'Oi, Oi, Oi, Oi, Oi, Oi.'"
"Oh no," interrupted Belcovitch. "All the _Chazanim_ I've ever heard do it 'Ei, Ei, Ei.'"
"You are not entitled to speak on this subject, Belcovitch," said the Shalotten _Shammos_ warmly. "You are a Man-of-the-Earth. I have heard every great _Chazan_ in Europe."
"What was good enough for my father is good enough for me," retorted Belcovitch. "The _Shool_ he took me to at home had a beautiful _Chazan_, and he always sang it 'Ei, Ei, Ei.'"
"I don't care what you heard at home. In England every _Chazan_ sings 'Oi, Oi, Oi.'"
"We can't take our tune149 from England," said Karlkammer reprovingly. "England is a polluted country by reason of the Reformers whom we were compelled to excommunicate."
"Do you mean to say that my father was an Epicurean?" asked Belcovitch indignantly. "The tune was as Greenberg sings it. That there are impious Jews who pray bareheaded and sit in the synagogue side by side with the women has nothing to do with it."
The Reformers did neither of these things, but the Ghetto to a man believed they did, and it would have been countenancing150 their blasphemies151 to pay a visit to their synagogues and see. It was an extraordinary example of a myth flourishing in the teeth of the facts, and as such should be useful to historians sifting152 "the evidence of contemporary writers."
"Shah!" said the President at last. "Make an end, make an end!"
"You see he knows I'm right," murmured the Shalotten _Shammos_ to his circle.
"And if you are!" burst forth155 the impeached156 Greenberg, who had by this time thought of a retort. "And if I do sing the Passover _Yigdal_ instead of the New Year, have I not reason, seeing I have _no bread in the house_? With my salary I have Passover all the year round."
The _Chazan's_ sally made a good impression on his audience if not on his salary. It was felt that he had a just grievance, and the conversation was hastily shifted to the original topic.
"We mustn't forget the _Maggid_ draws crowds here every Saturday and Sunday afternoon," said Mendel Hyams. "Suppose he goes over to a _Chevrah_ that will pay him more!"
"No, he won't do that," said another of the Committee. "He will remember that we brought him out of Poland."
"Yes, but we shan't have room for the audiences soon," said Belcovitch. "There are so many outsiders turned away every time that I think we ought to let half the applicants157 enjoy the first two hours of the sermon and the other half the second two hours."
"No, no, that would be cruel," said Karlkammer. "He will have to give the Sunday sermons at least in a larger synagogue. My own _Shool_, the German, will be glad to give him facilities."
"But what if they want to take him altogether at a higher salary?" said Mendel.
"No, I'm on the Committee, I'll see to that," said Karlkammer reassuringly158.
"Then do you think we shall tell him we can't afford to give him more?" asked Belcovitch.
There was a murmur154 of assent159 with a fainter mingling160 of dissent101. The motion that the _Maggid's_ application be refused was put to the vote and carried by a large majority.
It was the fate of the _Maggid_ to be the one subject on which Belcovitch and the Shalotten _Shammos_ agreed. They agreed as to his transcendent merits and they agreed as to the adequacy of his salary.
"But he's so weakly," protested Mendel Hyams, who was in the minority. "He coughs blood."
"He ought to go to a sunny place for a week," said Belcovitch compassionately161.
"Yes, he must certainly have that," said Karlkammer. "Let us add as a rider that although we cannot pay him more per week, he must have a week's holiday in the country. The Shalotten _Shammos_ shall write the letter to Rothschild."
Rothschild was a magic name in the Ghetto; it stood next to the Almighty's as a redresser163 of grievances164 and a friend of the poor, and the Shalotten _Shammos_ made a large part of his income by writing letters to it. He charged twopence halfpenny per letter, for his English vocabulary was larger than any other scribe's in the Ghetto, and his words were as much longer than theirs as his body. He also filled up printed application forms for Soup or Passover cakes, and had a most artistic165 sense of the proportion of orphans166 permissible167 to widows and a correct instinct for the plausible168 duration of sicknesses.
The Committee agreed _nem. con2._ to the grant of a seaside holiday, and the Shalotten _Shammos_ with a gratified feeling of importance waived169 his twopence halfpenny. He drew up a letter forthwith, not of course in the name of the Sons of the Covenant, but in the _Maggid's_ own.
He took the magniloquent sentences to the _Maggid_ for signature. He found the _Maggid_ walking up and down Royal Street waiting for the verdict. The _Maggid_ walked with a stoop that was almost a permanent bow, so that his long black beard reached well towards his baggy170 knees. His curved eagle nose was grown thinner, his long coat shinier, his look more haggard, his corkscrew earlocks were more matted, and when he spoke his voice was a tone more raucous171. He wore his high hat--a tall cylinder172 that reminded one of a weather-beaten turret173.
"Nay176, thine is more important," replied the Shalotten _Shammos_ with hilarious heartiness177, and he proceeded to read the letter as they walked along together, giant and doubled-up wizard.
"But I haven't got a wife and six children," said the _Maggid_, for whom one or two phrases stood out intelligible. "My wife is dead and I never was blessed with a _Kaddish_."
"It sounds better so," said the Shalotten _Shammos_ authoritatively178. "Preachers are expected to have heavy families dependent upon them. It would sound lies if I told the truth."
This was an argument after the _Maggid's_ own heart, but it did not quite convince him.
"But they will send and make inquiries," he murmured.
"Then your family are in Poland; you send your money over there."
"That is true," said the _Maggid_ feebly. "But still it likes me not."
"You leave it to me," said the Shalotten _Shammos_ impressively. "A shamefaced man cannot learn, and a passionate162 man cannot teach. So said Hillel. When you are in the pulpit I listen to you; when I have my pen in hand, do you listen to me. As the proverb says, if I were a Rabbi the town would burn. But if you were a scribe the letter would burn. I don't pretend to be a _Maggid_, don't you set up to be a letter writer."
"Well, but do you think it's honorable?"
"Hear, O Israel!" cried the Shalotten _Shammos_, spreading out his palms impatiently. "Haven't I written letters for twenty years?"
The _Maggid_ was silenced. He walked on brooding. "And what is this place, Burnmud, I ask to go to?" he inquired.
"Bournemouth," corrected the other. "It is a place on the South coast where all the most aristocratic consumptives go."
"But it must be very dear," said the poor _Maggid_, affrighted.
"Dear? Of course it's dear," said the Shalotten _Shammos_ pompously179. "But shall we consider expense where your health is concerned?"
The _Maggid_ felt so grateful he was almost ashamed to ask whether he could eat _kosher_ there, but the Shalotten _Shammos_, who had the air of a tall encyclopaedia180, set his soul at rest on all points.
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1
covenant
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| n.盟约，契约；v.订盟约 | |
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con
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| n.反对的观点，反对者，反对票，肺病；vt.精读，学习，默记；adv.反对地，从反面；adj.欺诈的 | |
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scrolls
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| n.（常用于录写正式文件的）纸卷( scroll的名词复数 )；卷轴；涡卷形（装饰）；卷形花纹v.（电脑屏幕上）从上到下移动（资料等），卷页( scroll的第三人称单数 )；（似卷轴般）卷起；（像展开卷轴般地）将文字显示于屏幕 | |
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brass
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| n.黄铜；黄铜器，铜管乐器 | |
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holders
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| 支持物( holder的名词复数 )； 持有者； （支票等）持有人； 支托（或握持）…之物 | |
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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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batter
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| v.接连重击；磨损；n.牛奶面糊；击球员 | |
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exegetical
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| adj.评释的，解经的 | |
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ethical
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| adj.伦理的，道德的，合乎道德的 | |
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rumbled
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| 发出隆隆声，发出辘辘声( rumble的过去式和过去分词 )； 轰鸣着缓慢行进； 发现…的真相； 看穿（阴谋） | |
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zeal
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| n.热心，热情，热忱 | |
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quorum
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| n.法定人数 | |
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eke
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| v.勉强度日，节约使用 | |
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slippers
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| n. 拖鞋 | |
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metaphorically
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literally
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| adv.照字面意义，逐字地；确实 | |
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reverence
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| n.敬畏，尊敬，尊严；Reverence:对某些基督教神职人员的尊称；v.尊敬，敬畏，崇敬 | |
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wailed
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| v.哭叫，哀号( wail的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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clenched
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| v.紧握，抓紧，咬紧( clench的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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thumped
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| v.重击， （指心脏）急速跳动( thump的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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21
apocryphal
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| adj.假冒的，虚假的 | |
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22
anecdote
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| n.轶事，趣闻，短故事 | |
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23
confession
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| n.自白，供认，承认 | |
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24
bosom
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| n.胸，胸部；胸怀；内心；adj.亲密的 | |
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25
controversies
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| 争论 | |
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26
prescriptions
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| 药( prescription的名词复数 )； 处方； 开处方； 计划 | |
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27
canonical
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| n.权威的；典型的 | |
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28
psalms
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| n.赞美诗( psalm的名词复数 )；圣诗；圣歌；(中的) | |
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29
exalted
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| adj.(地位等)高的，崇高的；尊贵的，高尚的 | |
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30
questionable
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| adj.可疑的，有问题的 | |
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31
communal
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| adj.公有的，公共的，公社的，公社制的 | |
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32
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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33
liturgy
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| n.礼拜仪式 | |
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34
grotesque
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| adj.怪诞的，丑陋的；n.怪诞的图案，怪人（物） | |
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35
antiquities
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| n.古老( antiquity的名词复数 )；古迹；古人们；古代的风俗习惯 | |
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36
moss
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| n.苔，藓，地衣 | |
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37
heterogeneous
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| adj.庞杂的；异类的 | |
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38
strata
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|
| n.地层（复数）；社会阶层 | |
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39
gems
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|
| growth； economy； management； and customer satisfaction 增长 | |
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40
pathos
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|
| n.哀婉，悲怆 | |
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41
fervor
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|
| n.热诚；热心；炽热 | |
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42
persecution
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|
| n. 迫害,烦扰 | |
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43
petrified
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|
| adj.惊呆的；目瞪口呆的v.使吓呆，使惊呆；变僵硬；使石化(petrify的过去式和过去分词) | |
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44
uncouth
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|
| adj.无教养的，粗鲁的 | |
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45
backwards
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|
| adv.往回地，向原处，倒，相反，前后倒置地 | |
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46
variants
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|
| n.变体( variant的名词复数 )；变种；变型；（词等的）变体 | |
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47
syllable
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|
| n.音节；vt.分音节 | |
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48
vow
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|
| n.誓(言)，誓约；v.起誓，立誓 | |
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49
vowel
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|
| n.元音；元音字母 | |
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50
contingency
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|
| n.意外事件，可能性 | |
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51
psalmic
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| 海滨群落 | |
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52
minor
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|
| adj.较小(少)的，较次要的；n.辅修学科；vi.辅修 | |
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53
hilarious
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|
| adj.充满笑声的，欢闹的；[反]depressed | |
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54
intonation
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|
| n.语调，声调；发声 | |
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55
intelligible
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|
| adj.可理解的，明白易懂的，清楚的 | |
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56
edifying
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|
| adj.有教训意味的，教训性的，有益的v.开导，启发( edify的现在分词 ) | |
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57
clannishness
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58
corpses
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|
| n.死尸，尸体( corpse的名词复数 ) | |
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59
providence
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|
| n.深谋远虑，天道，天意；远见；节约；上帝 | |
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60
pauper
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| n.贫民，被救济者，穷人 | |
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61
lodged
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|
| v.存放( lodge的过去式和过去分词 )；暂住；埋入；（权利、权威等）归属 | |
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62
continental
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|
| adj.大陆的，大陆性的，欧洲大陆的 | |
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63
ghetto
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| n.少数民族聚居区，贫民区 | |
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64
maker
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|
| n.制造者，制造商 | |
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65
beget
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| v.引起；产生 | |
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66
chaste
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|
| adj.贞洁的；有道德的；善良的；简朴的 | |
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67
chaos
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| n.混乱，无秩序 | |
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68
expounding
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| 论述，详细讲解( expound的现在分词 ) | |
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69
abase
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| v.降低，贬抑 | |
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70
landmarks
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| n.陆标( landmark的名词复数 )；目标；（标志重要阶段的）里程碑 ~ (in sth)；有历史意义的建筑物（或遗址） | |
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71
intimacy
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|
| n.熟悉，亲密，密切关系，亲昵的言行 | |
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72
repentance
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| n.懊悔 | |
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73
fowls
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|
| 鸟( fowl的名词复数 )； 禽肉； 既不是这； 非驴非马 | |
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74
attired
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|
| adj.穿着整齐的v.使穿上衣服，使穿上盛装( attire的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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75
willow
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| n.柳树 | |
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76
rustling
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|
| n. 瑟瑟声，沙沙声 adj. 发沙沙声的 | |
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77
scrambled
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|
| v.快速爬行( scramble的过去式和过去分词 )；攀登；争夺；（军事飞机）紧急起飞 | |
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78
dedication
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|
| n.奉献，献身，致力，题献，献辞 | |
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79
execration
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|
| n.诅咒，念咒，憎恶 | |
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80
shrouds
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|
| n.裹尸布( shroud的名词复数 )；寿衣；遮蔽物；覆盖物v.隐瞒( shroud的第三人称单数 )；保密 | |
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81
mitigated
|
|
| v.减轻，缓和( mitigate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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82
accretions
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|
| n.堆积( accretion的名词复数 )；连生；添加生长；吸积 | |
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83
piety
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|
| n.虔诚，虔敬 | |
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84
hemmed
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|
| 缝…的褶边( hem的过去式和过去分词 )； 包围 | |
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85
joyfully
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|
| adv. 喜悦地, 高兴地 | |
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86
rotary
|
|
| adj.(运动等)旋转的；轮转的；转动的 | |
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87
stuffy
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|
| adj.不透气的，闷热的 | |
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88
guttering
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|
| n.用于建排水系统的材料；沟状切除术；开沟 | |
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89
pivot
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|
| v.在枢轴上转动；装枢轴，枢轴；adj.枢轴的 | |
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90
lament
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|
| n.悲叹，悔恨，恸哭；v.哀悼，悔恨，悲叹 | |
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91
glorify
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|
| vt.颂扬，赞美，使增光，美化 | |
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92
humble
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|
| adj.谦卑的，恭顺的；地位低下的；v.降低，贬低 | |
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93
secular
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|
| n.牧师，凡人；adj.世俗的，现世的，不朽的 | |
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94
boughs
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| 大树枝( bough的名词复数 ) | |
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95
outweigh
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|
| vt.比...更重，...更重要 | |
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96
quotation
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|
| n.引文，引语，语录；报价，牌价，行情 | |
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97
stickler
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| n.坚持细节之人 | |
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98
dealing
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|
| n.经商方法，待人态度 | |
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99
pensively
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|
| adv.沉思地，焦虑地 | |
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100
contradictory
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|
| adj.反驳的，反对的，抗辩的；n.正反对，矛盾对立 | |
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101
dissent
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|
| n./v.不同意，持异议 | |
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102
cantankerous
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|
| adj.爱争吵的，脾气不好的 | |
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103
license
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| n.执照，许可证，特许；v.许可，特许 | |
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104
ciphers
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| n.密码( cipher的名词复数 )；零；不重要的人；无价值的东西 | |
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105
cipher
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|
| n.零；无影响力的人；密码 | |
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106
philology
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| n.语言学；语文学 | |
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107
consonants
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| n.辅音，子音( consonant的名词复数 )；辅音字母 | |
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108
vowels
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|
| n.元音，元音字母( vowel的名词复数 ) | |
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109
fanaticism
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| n.狂热，盲信 | |
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110
spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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111
standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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112
scrap
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| n.碎片；废料；v.废弃，报废 | |
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113
bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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114
erect
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| n./v.树立，建立，使竖立；adj.直立的，垂直的 | |
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115
attic
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| n.顶楼，屋顶室 | |
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116
procured
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| v.（努力）取得， （设法）获得( procure的过去式和过去分词 )；拉皮条 | |
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117
meekest
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| adj.温顺的，驯服的( meek的最高级 ) | |
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118
supplementary
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| adj.补充的，附加的 | |
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119
mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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120
prodigious
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| adj.惊人的，奇妙的；异常的；巨大的；庞大的 | |
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121
omnivorously
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| adv.随手地 | |
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122
protracted
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| adj.拖延的；延长的v.拖延“protract”的过去式和过去分词 | |
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123
bristling
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| a.竖立的 | |
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124
quotations
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| n.引用( quotation的名词复数 )；[商业]行情（报告）；（货物或股票的）市价；时价 | |
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125
irrelevant
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| adj.不恰当的，无关系的，不相干的 | |
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126
peculiar
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| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
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127
Christian
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| adj.基督教徒的；n.基督教徒 | |
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128
sanity
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| n.心智健全，神智正常，判断正确 | |
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129
apocalyptic
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| adj.预示灾祸的，启示的 | |
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130
fervently
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| adv.热烈地，热情地，强烈地 | |
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131
alleged
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| a.被指控的，嫌疑的 | |
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132
deity
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| n.神，神性；被奉若神明的人(或物) | |
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133
testament
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| n.遗嘱；证明 | |
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134
scraps
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| 油渣 | |
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135
platonic
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|
| adj.精神的；柏拉图（哲学）的 | |
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136
copious
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| adj.丰富的，大量的 | |
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137
esteemed
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| adj.受人尊敬的v.尊敬( esteem的过去式和过去分词 )；敬重；认为；以为 | |
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138
larder
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| n.食物贮藏室，食品橱 | |
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139
grumbled
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|
| 抱怨( grumble的过去式和过去分词 )； 发牢骚； 咕哝； 发哼声 | |
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140
drawn
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| v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的 | |
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141
factions
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| 组织中的小派别，派系( faction的名词复数 ) | |
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142
steering
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| n.操舵装置 | |
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143
eked
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|
| v.（靠节省用量）使…的供应持久( eke的过去式和过去分词 )；节约使用；竭力维持生计；勉强度日 | |
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144
grievance
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| n.怨愤，气恼，委屈 | |
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145
fiddle
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| n.小提琴；vi.拉提琴；不停拨弄，乱动 | |
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146
predecessor
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| n.前辈，前任 | |
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147
accurately
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| adv.准确地，精确地 | |
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148
mimicked
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| v.（尤指为了逗乐而）模仿( mimic的过去式和过去分词 )；酷似 | |
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149
tune
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| n.调子；和谐，协调；v.调音，调节，调整 | |
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150
countenancing
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| v.支持，赞同，批准( countenance的现在分词 ) | |
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151
blasphemies
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| n.对上帝的亵渎，亵渎的言词[行为]( blasphemy的名词复数 )；侮慢的言词（或行为） | |
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152
sifting
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| n.筛，过滤v.筛( sift的现在分词 )；筛滤；细查；详审 | |
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153
concord
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| n.和谐；协调 | |
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154
murmur
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| n.低语，低声的怨言；v.低语，低声而言 | |
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155
forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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156
impeached
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| v.控告（某人）犯罪( impeach的过去式和过去分词 )；弹劾；对（某事物）怀疑；提出异议 | |
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157
applicants
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| 申请人，求职人( applicant的名词复数 ) | |
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158
reassuringly
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| ad.安心，可靠 | |
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159
assent
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| v.批准，认可；n.批准，认可 | |
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160
mingling
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| adj.混合的 | |
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161
compassionately
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| adv.表示怜悯地，有同情心地 | |
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162
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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163
redresser
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| 改正[修正，调整，补偿]者；解调器 | |
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164
grievances
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| n.委屈( grievance的名词复数 )；苦衷；不满；牢骚 | |
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artistic
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| adj.艺术(家)的，美术(家)的；善于艺术创作的 | |
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166
orphans
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| 孤儿( orphan的名词复数 ) | |
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167
permissible
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| adj.可允许的，许可的 | |
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168
plausible
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| adj.似真实的，似乎有理的，似乎可信的 | |
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169
waived
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| v.宣布放弃( waive的过去式和过去分词 )；搁置；推迟；放弃（权利、要求等） | |
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170
baggy
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| adj.膨胀如袋的，宽松下垂的 | |
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171
raucous
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| adj.(声音)沙哑的，粗糙的 | |
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172
cylinder
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| n.圆筒，柱(面)，汽缸 | |
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173
turret
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| n.塔楼，角塔 | |
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174
briefly
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| adv.简单地，简短地 | |
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175
gratitude
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| adj.感激，感谢 | |
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176
nay
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| adv.不；n.反对票，投反对票者 | |
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177
heartiness
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| 诚实，热心 | |
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178
authoritatively
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| 命令式地，有权威地，可信地 | |
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179
pompously
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| adv.傲慢地，盛大壮观地；大模大样 | |
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180
encyclopaedia
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| n.百科全书 | |
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