The house was plunged1 in silence. Since Melchior's death everything seemed dead. Now that his loud voice was stilled, from morning to night nothing was heard but the wearisome murmuring of the river.
Christophe hurled4 himself into his work. He took a fiercely angry pleasure in self-castigation for having wished to be happy. To expressions of sympathy and kind words he made no reply, but was proud and stiff. Without a word he went about his daily task, and gave his lessons with icy politeness. His pupils who knew of his misfortune were shocked by his insensibility. But, those who were older and had some experience of sorrow knew that this apparent coldness might, in a child, be used only to conceal6 suffering: and they pitied him. He was not grateful for their sympathy. Even music could bring him no comfort. He played without pleasure, and as a duty. It was as though he found a cruel joy in no longer taking pleasure in anything, or in persuading himself that he did not: in depriving himself of every reason for living, and yet going on.
His two brothers, terrified by the silence of the house of death, ran away from it as quickly as possible. Rodolphe went into the office of his uncle Theodore, and lived with him, and Ernest, after trying two or three trades, found work on one of the Rhine steamers plying7 between Mainz and Cologne, and he used to come back only when he wanted money. Christophe was left alone with his mother in the house, which was too large for them; and the meagerness of their resources, and the payment of certain debts which had been discovered after his father's death, forced them, whatever pain it might cost, to seek another more lowly and less expensive dwelling8.
They found a little flat,—two or three rooms on the second floor of a house in the Market Street. It was a noisy district in the middle of the town, far from the river, far from the trees, far from the country and all the familiar places. But they had to consult reason, not sentiment, and Christophe found in it a fine opportunity for gratifying his bitter creed9 of self-mortification. Besides, the owner of the house, old registrar10 Euler, was a friend of his grandfather, and knew the family: that was enough for Louisa, who was lost in her empty house, and was irresistibly11 drawn12 towards those who had known the creatures whom she had loved.
They got ready to leave. They took long draughts13 of the bitter melancholy14 of the last days passed by the sad, beloved fireside that was to be left forever. They dared hardly tell their sorrow: they were ashamed of it, or afraid. Each thought that they ought not to show their weakness to the other. At table, sitting alone in a dark room with half-closed shutters15, they dared not raise their voices: they ate hurriedly and did not look at each other for fear of not being able to conceal their trouble. They parted as soon as they had finished. Christophe went back to his work; but as soon as he was free for a moment, he would come back, go stealthily home, and creep on tiptoe to his room or to the attic16. Then he would shut the door, sit down in a corner on an old trunk or on the window-ledge, or stay there without thinking, letting the indefinable buzzing and humming of the old house, which trembled with the lightest tread, thrill through him. His heart would tremble with it. He would listen anxiously for the faintest breath in or out of doors, for the creaking of floors, for all the imperceptible familiar noises: he knew them all. He would lose consciousness, his thoughts would be filled with the images of the past, and he would issue from his stupor17 only at the sound of St. Martin's clock, reminding him that it was time to go.
In the room below him he could hear Louisa's footsteps passing softly to and fro, then for hours she could not be heard; she made no noise. Christophe would listen intently. He would go down, a little uneasy, as one is for a long time after a great misfortune. He would push the door ajar; Louisa would turn her back on him; she would be sitting in front of a cupboard in the midst of a heap of things—rags, old belongings18, odd garments, treasures, which she had brought out intending to sort them. But she had no strength for it; everything reminded her of something; she would turn and turn it in her hands and begin to dream; it would drop from her hands; she would stay for hours together with her arms hanging down, lying back exhausted19 in a chair, given up to a stupor of sorrow.
Poor Louisa was now spending most of her life in the past—that sad past, which had been very niggardly20 of joy for her; but she was so used to suffering that she was still grateful for the least tenderness shown to her, and the pale lights which had shone here and there in the drab days of her life, were still enough to make them bright. All the evil that Melchior had done her was forgotten; she remembered only the good. Her marriage had been the great romance of her life. If Melchior had been drawn into it by a caprice, of which he had quickly repented21, she had given herself with her whole heart; she thought that she was loved as much as she had loved; and to Melchior she was ever most tenderly grateful. She did not try to understand what he had become in the sequel. Incapable22 of seeing reality as it is, she only knew how to bear it as it is, humbly23 and honestly, as a woman who has no need of understanding life in order to be able to live. What she could not explain, she left to God for explanation. In her singular piety24, she put upon God the responsibility for all the injustice25 that she had suffered at the hands of Melchior and the others, and only visited them with the good that they had given her. And so her life of misery26 had left her with no bitter memory. She only felt worn out—weak as she was—by those years of privation and fatigue27. And now that Melchior was no longer there, now that two of her sons were gone from their home, and the third seemed to be able to do without her, she had lost all heart for action; she was tired, sleepy; her will was stupefied. She was going through one of those crises of neurasthenia which often come upon active and industrious28 people in the decline of life, when some unforeseen event deprives them of every reason for living. She had not the heart even to finish the stocking she was knitting, to tidy the drawer in which she was looking, to get up to shut the window; she would sit there, without a thought, without strength—save for recollection. She was conscious of her collapse29, and was ashamed of it or blushed for it; she tried to hide it from her son; and Christophe, wrapped up in the egoism of his own grief, never noticed it. No doubt he was often secretly impatient with his mother's slowness in speaking, and acting30, and doing the smallest thing; but different though her ways were from her usual activity, he never gave a thought to the matter until then.
Suddenly on that day it came home to him for the first time when he surprised her in the midst of her rags, turned out on the floor, heaped up at her feet, in her arms, and in her lap. Her neck was drawn out, her head was bowed, her face was stiff and rigid31. When she heard him come in she started; her white cheeks were suffused32 with red; with an instinctive33 movement she tried to hide the things she was holding, and muttered with an awkward smile:
"You see, I was sorting…."
The sight of the poor soul stranded34 among the relics35 of the past cut to his heart, and he was filled with pity. But he spoke36 with a bitter asperity37 and seemed to scold, to drag her from her apathy38:
"Come, come, mother; you must not stay there, in the middle of all that dust, with the room all shut up! It is not good for you. You must pull yourself together, and have done with all this."
She tried to get up to put the things back in the drawer. But she sat down again at once and listlessly let them fall from her hands.
"Oh! I can't … I can't," she moaned. "I shall never finish!"
"Come, mother, what is it?" he said. "Shall I help you? Are you ill?"
She did not answer. She gave a sort of stifled41 sob42. He took her hands, and knelt down by her side, the better to see her in the dusky room.
"Mother!" he said anxiously.
Louisa laid her head on his shoulder and burst into tears.
"My boy, my boy," she cried, holding close to him. "My boy!… You will not leave me? Promise me that you will not leave me?"
His heart was torn with pity.
"No, mother, no. I will not leave you. What made you think of such a thing?"
"I am so unhappy! They have all left me, all…."
She pointed43 to the things all about her, and he did not know whether she was speaking of them or of her sons and the dead.
"You will stay with me? You will not leave me?… What should I do, if you went too?"
"I will not go, I tell you; we will stay together. Don't cry. I promise."
She went on weeping. She could not stop herself. He dried her eyes with his handkerchief.
"What is it, mother dear? Are you in pain?"
"I don't know; I don't know what it is." She tried to calm herself and to smile.
"I do try to be sensible. I do. But just nothing at all makes me cry…. You see, I'm doing it again…. Forgive me. I am so stupid. I am old. I have no strength left. I have no taste for anything any more. I am no good for anything. I wish I were buried with all the rest…."
He held her to him, close, like a child.
"Don't worry, mother; be calm; don't think about it…."
Gradually she grew quiet.
"It is foolish. I am ashamed…. But what is it? What is it?"
She who had always worked so hard could not understand why her strength had suddenly snapped, and she was humiliated44 to the very depths of her being. He pretended not to see it.
"A little weariness, mother," he said, trying to speak carelessly. "It is nothing; you will see; it is nothing."
But he too was anxious. From his childhood he had been accustomed to see her brave, resigned, in silence withstanding every test. And he was astonished to see her suddenly broken: he was afraid.
He helped her to sort the things scattered45 on the floor. Every now and then she would linger over something, but he would gently take it from her hands, and she suffered him.
From that time on he took pains to be more with her. As soon as he had finished his work, instead of shutting himself up in his room, as he loved to do, he would return to her. He felt her loneliness and that she was not strong enough to be left alone: there was danger in leaving her alone.
He would sit by her side in the evening near the open window looking on to the road. The view would slowly disappear. The people were returning home. Little lights appeared in the houses far off. They had seen it all a thousand times. But soon they would see it no more. They would talk disjointedly. They would point out to each other the smallest of the familiar incidents and expectations of the evening, always with fresh interest. They would have long intimate silences, or Louisa, for no apparent reason, would tell some reminiscence, some disconnected story that passed through her mind. Her tongue was loosed a little now that she felt that she was with one who loved her. She tried hard to talk. It was difficult for her, for she had grown used to living apart from her family; she looked upon her sons and her husband as too clever to talk to her, and she had never dared to join in their conversation. Christophe's tender care was a new thing to her and infinitely46 sweet, though it made her afraid. She deliberated over her words; she found it difficult to express herself; her sentences were left unfinished and obscure. Sometimes she was ashamed of what she was saying; she would look at her son, and stop in the middle of her narrative47. But he would press her hand, and she would be reassured48. He was filled with love and pity for the childish, motherly creature, to whom he had turned when he was a child, and now she turned to him for support. And he took a melancholy pleasure in her prattle49, that had no interest for anybody but himself, in her trivial memories of a life that had always been joyless and mediocre50, though it seemed to Louisa to be of infinite worth. Sometimes he would try to interrupt her; he was afraid that her memories would make her sadder than ever, and he would urge her to sleep. She would understand what he was at, and would say with gratitude51 in her eyes:
"No. I assure you, it does one good; let us stay a little longer."
They would stay until the night was far gone and the neighbors were abed. Then they would say good-night, she a little comforted by being rid of some of her trouble, he with a heavy heart under this new burden added to that which already he had to bear.
The day came for their departure. On the night before they stayed longer than usual in the unlighted room. They did not speak. Every now and then Louisa moaned: "Fear God! Fear God!" Christophe tried to keep her attention fixed52 on the thousand details of the morrow's removal. She would not go to bed until he gently compelled her. But he went up to his room and did not go to bed for a long time. When leaning out of the window he tried to gaze through the darkness to see for the last time the moving shadows of the river beneath the house. He heard the wind in the tall trees in Minna's garden. The sky was black. There was no one in the street. A cold rain was just falling. The weathercocks creaked. In a house near by a child was crying. The night weighed with an overwhelming heaviness upon the earth and upon his soul. The dull chiming of the hours, the cracked note of the halves and quarters, dropped one after another into the grim silence, broken only by the sound of the rain on the roofs and the cobbles.
When Christophe at last made up his mind to go to bed, chilled in body and soul, he heard the window below him shut. And, as he lay, he thought sadly that it is cruel for the poor to dwell on the past, for they have no right to have a past, like the rich: they have no home, no corner of the earth wherein to house their memories: their joys, their sorrows, all their days, are scattered in the wind.
Next day in beating rain they moved their scanty53 furniture to their new dwelling. Fischer, the old furniture dealer54, lent them a cart and a pony55; he came and helped them himself. But they could not take everything, for the rooms to which they were going were much smaller than the old. Christophe had to make his mother leave the oldest and most useless of their belongings. It was not altogether easy; the least thing had its worth for her: a shaky table, a broken chair, she wished to leave nothing behind. Fischer, fortified56 by the authority of his old friendship with Jean Michel, had to join Christophe in complaining, and, good-fellow that he was and understanding her grief, had even to promise to keep some of her precious rubbish for her against the day when she should want it again. Then she agreed to tear herself away.
The two brothers had been told of the removal, but Ernest came on the night before to say that he could not be there, and Rodolphe appeared for a moment about noon; he watched them load the furniture, gave some advice, and went away again looking mightily57 busy.
The procession set out through the muddy streets. Christophe led the horse, which slipped on the greasy58 cobbles. Louisa walked by her son's side, and tried to shelter him from the rain. And so they had a melancholy homecoming in the damp rooms, that were made darker than ever by the dull light coming from the lowering sky. They could not have fought against the depression that was upon them had it not been for the attentions of their landlord and his family. But, when the cart had driven away, as night fell, leaving the furniture heaped up in the room; and Christophe and Louisa were sitting, worn out, one on a box, the other on a sack; they heard a little dry cough on the staircase; there was a knock at the door. Old Euler came in. He begged pardon elaborately for disturbing his guests, and said that by way of celebrating their first evening he hoped that they would be kind enough to sup with himself and his family. Louisa, stunned59 by her sorrow, wished to refuse. Christophe was not much more tempted60 than she by this friendly gathering61, but the old man insisted and Christophe, thinking that it would be better for his mother not to spend their first evening in their new home alone with her thoughts, made her accept.
They went down to the floor below, where they found the whole family collected: the old man, his daughter, his son-in-law, Vogel, and his grandchildren, a boy and a girl, both a little younger than Christophe. They clustered around their guests, bade them welcome, asked if they were tired, if they were pleased with their rooms, if they needed anything; putting so many questions that Christophe in bewilderment could make nothing of them, for everybody spoke at once. The soup was placed on the table; they sat down. But the noise went on. Amalia, Euler's daughter, had set herself at once to acquaint Louisa with local details: with the topography of the district, the habits and advantages of the house, the time when the milkman called, the time when she got up, the various tradespeople and the prices that she paid. She did not stop until she had explained everything. Louisa, half-asleep, tried hard to take an interest in the information, but the remarks which she ventured showed that she had understood not a word, and provoked Amalia to indignant exclamations62 and repetition of every detail. Old Euler, a clerk, tried to explain to Christophe the difficulties of a musical career. Christophe's other neighbor, Rosa, Amalia's daughter, never stopped talking from the moment when they sat down,—so volubly that she had no time to breathe; she lost her breath in the middle of a sentence, but at once she was off again. Vogel was gloomy and complained of the food, and there were embittered63 arguments on the subject. Amalia, Euler, the girl, left off talking to take part in the discussion; and there were endless controversies64 as to whether there was too much salt in the stew65 or not enough; they called each other to witness, and, naturally, no two opinions were the same. Each despised his neighbor's taste, and thought only his own healthy and reasonable. They might have gone on arguing until the Last Judgment66.
But, in the end, they all joined in crying out upon the bad weather. They all commiserated67 Louisa and Christophe upon their troubles, and in terms which moved him greatly they praised him for his courageous68 conduct. They took great pleasure in recalling not only the misfortunes of their guests, but also their own, and those of their friends and all their acquaintance, and they all agreed that the good are always unhappy, and that there is joy only for the selfish and dishonest. They decided69 that life is sad, that it is quite useless, and that they were all better dead, were it not the indubitable will of God that they should go on living so as to suffer. All these ideas came very near to Christophe's actual pessimism70, he thought the better of his landlord, and closed his eyes to their little oddities.
When he went upstairs again with his mother to the disordered rooms, they were weary and sad, but they felt a little less lonely; and while Christophe lay awake through the night, for he could not sleep because of his weariness and the noise of the neighborhood, and listened to the heavy carts shaking the walls, and the breathing of the family sleeping below, he tried to persuade himself that he would be, if not happy, at least less unhappy here, with these good people—a little tiresome71, if the truth be told—who suffered from like misfortunes, who seemed to understand him, and whom, he thought, he understood.
But when at last he did fall asleep, he was roused unpleasantly at dawn by the voices of his neighbors arguing, and the creaking of a pump worked furiously by some one who was in a hurry to swill72 the yard and the stairs.
Justus Euler was a little bent73 old man, with uneasy, gloomy eyes, a red face, all lines and pimples74, gap-toothed, with an unkempt beard, with which he was forever fidgeting with his hands. Very honest, quite able, profoundly moral, he had been on quite good terms with Christophe's grandfather. He was said to be like him. And, in truth, he was of the same generation and brought up with the same principles; but he lacked Jean Michel's strong physique, that is, while he was of the same opinion on many points, fundamentally he was hardly at all like him, for it is temperament75 far more than ideas that makes a man, and whatever the divisions, fictitious76 or real, marked between men by intellect, the great divisions between men and men are into those who are healthy and those who are not. Old Euler was not a healthy man. He talked morality, like Jean Michel, but his morals were not the same as Jean Michel's; he had not his sound stomach, his lungs, or his jovial77 strength. Everything in Euler and his family was built on a more parsimonious78 and niggardly plan. He had been an official for forty years, was now retired79, and suffered from that melancholy that comes from inactivity and weighs so heavily upon old men, who have not made provision in their inner life for their last years. All his habits, natural and acquired, all the habits of his trade had given him a meticulous80 and peevish81 quality, which was reproduced to a certain extent in each of his children.
His son-in-law, Vogel, a clerk at the Chancery Court, was fifty years old. Tall, strong, almost bald, with gold spectacles, fairly good-looking, he considered himself ill, and no doubt was so, although obviously he did not have the diseases which he thought he had, but only a mind soured by the stupidity of his calling and a body ruined to a certain extent by his sedentary life. Very industrious, not without merit, even cultured up to a point; he was a victim of our ridiculous modern life, or like so many clerks, locked up in their offices, he had succumbed82 to the demon83 of hypochondria. One of those unfortunates whom Goethe called "ein trauriger, ungriechischer Hypochondrist"—"a gloomy and un-Greek hypochondriac,"—and pitied, though he took good care to avoid them.
Amalia was neither the one nor the other. Strong, loud, and active, she wasted no sympathy on her husband's jeremiads; she used to shake him roughly. But no human strength can bear up against living together, and when in a household one or other is neurasthenic, the chances are that in time they will both be so. In vain did Amalia cry out upon Vogel, in vain did she go on protesting either from habit or because it was necessary; next moment she herself was lamenting84 her condition more loudly even than he, and, passing imperceptibly from scolding to lamentation85, she did him no good; she increased his ills tenfold by loudly singing chorus to his follies86. In the end not only did she crush the unhappy Vogel, terrified by the proportions assumed by his own outcries sent sounding back by this echo, but she crushed everybody, even herself. In her turn she caught the trick of unwarrantably bemoaning87 her health, and her father's, and her daughter's, and her son's. It became a mania88; by constant repetition she came to believe what she said. She took the least chill tragically89; she was uneasy and worried about everybody. More than that, when they were well, she still worried, because of the sickness that was bound to come. So life was passed in perpetual fear. Outside that they were all in fairly good health, and it seemed as though their state of continual moaning and groaning90 did serve to keep them well. They all ate and slept and worked as usual, and the life of this household was not relaxed for it all. Amalia's activity was not satisfied with working from morning to night up and down the house; they all had to toil91 with her, and there was forever a moving of furniture, a washing of floors, a polishing of wood, a sound of voices, footsteps, quivering, movement.
The two children, crushed by such loud authority, leaving nobody alone, seemed to find it natural enough to submit to it. The boy, Leonard, was good looking, though insignificant92 of feature, and stiff in manner. The girl, Rosa, fair-haired, with pretty blue eyes, gentle and affectionate, would have been pleasing especially with the freshness of her delicate complexion93, and her kind manner, had her nose not been quite so large or so awkwardly placed; it made her face heavy and gave her a foolish expression. She was like a girl of Holbein, in the gallery at Basle—the daughter of burgomaster Meier—sitting, with eyes cast down, her hands on her knees, her fair hair falling down to her shoulders, looking embarrassed and ashamed of her uncomely nose. But so far Rosa had not been troubled by it, and it never had broken in upon her inexhaustible chatter94. Always her shrill95 voice was heard in the house telling stories, always breathless, as though she had no time to say everything, always excited and animated96, in spite of the protests which she drew from her mother, her father, and even her grandfather, exasperated97, not so much because she was forever talking as because she prevented them talking themselves. For these good people, kind, loyal, devoted—the very cream of good people—had almost all the virtues98, but they lacked one virtue99 which is capital, and is the charm of life: the virtue of silence.
Christophe was in tolerant mood. His sorrow had softened100 his intolerant and emphatic101 temper. His experience of the cruel indifference102 of the elegant made him more conscious of the worth of these honest folk, graceless and devilish tiresome, who had yet an austere103 conception of life, and because they lived joylessly, seemed to him to live without weakness. Having decided that they were excellent, and that he ought to like them, like the German that he was, he tried to persuade himself that he did in fact like them. But he did not succeed; he lacked that easy Germanic idealism, which does not wish to see, and does not see, what would be displeasing104 to its sight, for fear of disturbing the very proper tranquillity105 of its judgment and the pleasantness of its existence. On the contrary, he never was so conscious of the defects of these people as when he loved them, when he wanted to love them absolutely without reservation; it was a sort of unconscious loyalty106, and an inexorable demand for truth, which, in spite of himself, made him more clear-sighted, and more exacting107, with what was dearest to him. And it was not long before he began to be irritated by the oddities of the family. They made no attempt to conceal them. Contrary to the usual habit they displayed every intolerable quality they possessed108, and all the good in them was hidden. So Christophe told himself, for he judged himself to have been unjust, and tried to surmount109 his first impressions, and to discover in them the excellent qualities which they so carefully concealed111.
He tried to converse112 with old Justus Euler, who asked nothing better. He had a secret sympathy with him, remembering that his grandfather had liked to praise him. But good old Jean Michel had more of the pleasant faculty113 of deceiving himself about his friends than Christophe, and Christophe soon saw that. In vain did he try to accept Euler's memories of his grandfather. He could only get from him a discolored caricature of Jean Michel, and scraps114 of talk that were utterly115 uninteresting. Euler's stories used invariably to begin with: "As I used to say to your poor grandfather…" He could remember nothing else. He had heard only what he had said himself.
Perhaps Jean Michel used only to listen in the same way. Most friendships are little more than arrangements for mutual116 satisfaction, so that each party may talk about himself to the other. But at least Jean Michel, however naïvely he used to give himself up to the delight of talking, had sympathy which he was always ready to lavish117 on all sides. He was interested in everything; he always regretted that he was no longer fifteen, so as to be able to see the marvelous inventions of the new generations, and to share their thoughts. He had the quality, perhaps the most precious in life, a curiosity always fresh, sever118 changing with the years, born anew every morning. He had not the talent to turn this gift to account; but how many men of talent might envy him! Most men die at twenty or thirty; thereafter they are only reflections of themselves: for the rest of their lives they are aping themselves, repeating from day to day more and more mechanically and affectedly119 what they said and did and thought and loved when they were alive.
It was so long since old Euler had been alive, and he had been such a small thing then, that what was left of him now was very poor and rather ridiculous. Outside his former trade and his family life he knew nothing, and wished to know nothing. On every subject he had ideas ready-made, dating from his youth. He pretended to some knowledge of the arts, but he clung to certain hallowed names of men, about whom he was forever reiterating120 his emphatic formulæ: everything else was naught121 and had never been. When modern interests were mentioned he would not listen, and talked of something else. He declared that he loved music passionately123, and he would ask Christophe to play. But as soon as Christophe, who had been caught once or twice, began to play, the old fellow would begin to talk loudly to his daughter, as though the music only increased his interest in everything but music. Christophe would get up exasperated in the middle of his piece, so one would notice it. There were only a few old airs—three or four—some very beautiful, others very ugly, but all equally sacred, which were privileged to gain comparative silence and absolute approval. With the very first notes the old man would go into ecstasies124, tears would come to his eyes, not so much for the pleasure he was enjoying as for the pleasure which once he had enjoyed. In the end Christophe had a horror of these airs, though some of them, like the Adelaïde of Beethoven, were very dear to him; the old man was always humming the first bars of them, and never failed to declare, "There, that is music," contemptuously comparing it with "all the blessed modern music, in which there is no melody." Truth to tell, he knew nothing whatever about it.
His son-in-law was better educated and kept in touch with artistic125 movements; but that was even worse, for in his judgment there was always a disparaging126 tinge127. He was lacking neither in taste nor intelligence; but he could not bring himself to admire anything modern. He would have disparaged128 Mozart and Beethoven, if they had been contemporary, just as he would have acknowledged the merits of Wagner and Richard Strauss had they been dead for a century. His discontented temper refused to allow that there might be great men living during his own lifetime; the idea was distasteful to him. He was so embittered by his wasted life that he insisted on pretending that every life was wasted, that it could not be otherwise, and that those who thought the opposite, or pretended to think so, were one of two things: fools or humbugs129.
And so he never spoke of any new celebrity130 except in a tone of bitter irony131, and as he was not stupid he never failed to discover at the first glance the weak or ridiculous sides of them. Any new name roused him to distrust; before he knew anything about the man he was inclined to criticise132 him—because he knew nothing about him. If he was sympathetic towards Christophe it was because he thought that the misanthropic133 boy found life as evil as he did himself, and that he was not a genius. Nothing so unites the small of soul in their suffering and discontent as the statement of their common impotence. Nothing so much restores the desire for health or life to those who are healthy and made for the joy of life as contact with the stupid pessimism of the mediocre and the sick, who, because they are not happy, deny the happiness of others. Christophe felt this. And yet these gloomy thoughts were familiar to him; but he was surprised to find them on Vogel's lips, where they were unrecognizable; more than that, they were repugnant to him; they offended him.
He was even more in revolt against Amalia's ways. The good creature did no more than practise Christophe's theories of duty. The word was upon her lips at every turn. She worked unceasingly, and wanted everybody to work as she did. Her work was never directed towards making herself and others happier; on the contrary. It almost seemed as though it Was mainly intended to incommode everybody and to make life as disagreeable as possible so as to sanctify it. Nothing would induce her for a moment to relinquish134 her holy duties in the household, that sacro-sanct institution which in so many women takes the place of all other duties, social and moral. She would have thought herself lost had she not on the same day, at the same time, polished the wooden floors, washed the tiles, cleaned the door-handles, beaten the carpets, moved the chairs, the cupboards, the tables. She was ostentatious about it. It was as though it was a point of honor with her. And after all, is it not in much the same spirit that many women conceive and defend their honor? It is a sort of piece of furniture which they have to keep polished, a well waxed floor, cold, hard—and slippery.
The accomplishment135 of her task did not make Frau Vogel more amicable136. She sacrificed herself to the trivialities of the household, as to a duty imposed by God. And she despised those who did not do as she did, those who rested, and were able to enjoy life a little in the intervals137 of work. She would go and rouse Louisa in her room when from time to time she sat down in the middle of her work to dream. Louisa would sigh, but she submitted to it with a half-shamed smile. Fortunately, Christophe knew nothing about it; Amalia used to wait until he had gone out before she made these irruptions into their rooms, and so far she had not directly attacked him; he would not have put up with it. When he was with her he was conscious of a latent hostility138 within himself. What he could least forgive her was the noise she made. He was maddened by it. When he was locked in his room—a little low room looking out on the yard—with the window hermetically sealed, in spite of the want of air, so as not to hear the clatter139 in the house, he could not escape from it. Involuntarily he was forced to listen attentively140 for the least sound coming up from below, and when the terrible voice which penetrated141 all the walls broke out again after a moment of silence he was filled with rage; he would shout, stamp with his foot, and roar insults at her through the wall. In the general uproars142 no one ever noticed it; they thought he was composing. He would consign143 Frau Vogel to the depths of hell. He had no respect for her, nor esteem144 to check him. At such times it seemed to him that he would have preferred the loosest and most stupid of women, if only she did not talk, to cleverness, honesty, all the virtues, when they make too much noise.
His hatred145 of noise brought him in touch with Leonard. In the midst of the general excitement the boy was the only one to keep calm, and never to raise his voice more at one moment than another. He always expressed himself correctly and deliberately146, choosing his words, and never hurrying. Amalia, simmering, never had patience to wait until he had finished; the whole family cried out upon his slowness. He did not worry about it. Nothing could upset his calm, respectful deference147. Christophe was the more attracted to him when he learned that Leonard intended to devote his life to the Church, and his curiosity was roused.
With regard to religion, Christophe was in a queer position; he did not know himself how he stood towards it. He had never had time to think seriously about it. He was not well enough educated, and he was too much absorbed by the difficulties of existence to be able to analyze148 himself and to set his ideas in order. His violence led him from one extreme to the other, from absolute facts to complete negation149, without troubling to find out whether in either case he agreed with himself. When he was happy he hardly thought of God at all, but he was quite ready to believe in Him. When he was unhappy he thought of Him, but did not believe; it seemed to him impossible that a God could authorize150 unhappiness and, injustice. But these difficulties did not greatly exercise him. He was too fundamentally religious to think much about God. He lived in God; he had no need to believe in Him. That is well enough for the weak and worn, for those whose lives are anæmic. They aspire151 to God, as a plant does to the sun. The dying cling to life. But he who bears in his soul the sun and life, what need has he to seek them outside himself?
Christophe would probably never have bothered about these questions had he lived alone. But the obligations of social life forced him to bring his thoughts to bear on these puerile152 and useless problems, which occupy a place out of all proportion in the world; it is impossible not to take them into account since at every step they are in the way. As if a healthy, generous creature, overflowing153 with strength and love, had not a thousand more worthy154 things to do than to worry as to whether God exists or no!… If it were only a question of believing in God! But it is needful to believe in a God, of whatever shape or size and color and race. So far Christophe never gave a thought to the matter. Jesus hardly occupied his thoughts at all. It was not that he did not love him: he loved him when he thought of him: but he never thought of him. Sometimes he reproached himself for it, was angry with himself, could not understand why he did not take more interest in him. And yet he professed155, all his family professed; his grandfather was forever reading the Bible; he went regularly to Mass; he served it in a sort of way, for he was an organist; and he set about his task conscientiously157 and in an exemplary manner. But when he left the church he would have been hard put to it to say what he had been thinking about. He set himself to read the Holy Books in order to fix his ideas, and he found amusement and even pleasure in them, just as in any beautiful strange books, not essentially158 different from other books, which no one ever thinks of calling sacred. In truth, if Jesus appealed to him, Beethoven did no less. And at his organ in Saint Florian's Church, where he accompanied on Sundays, he was more taken up with his organ than with Mass, and he was more religious when he played Bach than when he played Mendelssohn, Some of the ritual brought him to a fervor159 of exaltation. But did he then love God, or was it only the music, as an impudent160 priest said to him one day in jest, without thinking of the unhappiness which his quip might cause in him? Anybody else would not have paid any attention to it, and would not have changed his mode of living—(so many people put up with not knowing what they think!) But Christophe was cursed with an awkward need for sincerity161, which filled him with scruples162 at every turn. And when scruples came to him they possessed him forever. He tortured himself; he thought that he had acted with duplicity. Did he believe or did he not?… He had no means, material or intellectual—(knowledge and leisure are necessary)—of solving the problem by himself. And yet it had to be solved, or he was either indifferent or a hypocrite. Now, he was incapable of being either one or the other.
He tried timidly to sound those about him. They all seemed to be sure of themselves. Christophe burned to know their reasons. He could not discover them. Hardly did he receive a definite answer; they always talked obliquely163. Some thought him arrogant164, and said that there is no arguing these things, that thousands of men cleverer and better than himself had believed without argument, and that he needed only to do as they had done. There were some who were a little hurt, as though it were a personal affront165 to ask them such a question, and yet they were of all perhaps the least certain of their facts. Others shrugged166 their shoulders and said with a smile: "Bah! it can't do any harm." And their smile said: "And it is so useful!…" Christophe despised them with all his heart.
He had tried to lay his uncertainties167 before a priest, but he was discouraged by the experiment. He could not discuss the matter seriously with him. Though his interlocution was quite pleasant, he made Christophe feel, quite politely, that there was no real equality between them; he seemed to assume in advance that his superiority was beyond dispute, and that the discussion could not exceed the limits which he laid down for it, without a kind of impropriety; it was just a fencing bout5, and was quite inoffensive. When Christophe wished to exceed the limits and to ask questions which the worthy man was pleased not to answer, he stepped back with a patronizing smile, and a few Latin quotations168, and a fatherly objurgation to pray, pray that God would enlighten him. Christophe issued from the interview humiliated and wounded by his love of polite superiority. Wrong or right, he would never again for anything in the world have recourse to a priest. He admitted that these men were his superiors in intelligence or by reason of their sacred calling; but in argument there is neither superiority, nor inferiority, nor title, nor age, nor name; nothing is of worth but truth, before which all men are equal.
So he was glad to find a boy of his own age who believed. He asked no more than belief, and he hoped that Leonard would give him good reason for believing. He made advances to him. Leonard replied with his usual gentleness, but without eagerness; he was never eager about anything. As they could not carry on a long conversation in the house without being interrupted every moment by Amalia or the old man, Christophe proposed that they should go for a walk one evening after dinner. Leonard was too polite to refuse, although he would gladly have got out of it, for his indolent nature disliked walking, talking, and anything that cost him an effort.
Christophe had some difficulty in opening up the conversation. After two or three awkward sentences about trivialities he plunged with a brusqueness that was almost brutal169. He asked Leonard if he were really going to be a priest, and if he liked the idea. Leonard was nonplussed170, and looked at him uneasily, but when he saw that Christophe was not hostilely disposed he was reassured.
"Yes," he replied. "How could it be otherwise?"
"Ah!" said Christophe. "You are very happy." Leonard was conscious of a shade of envy in Christophe's voice and was agreeably flattered by it. He altered his manner, became expansive, his face brightened.
"Yes," he said, "I am happy." He beamed.
"What do you do to be so?" asked Christophe.
Before replying Leonard proposed that they should sit down, on a quiet seat in the cloisters171 of St. Martin's. From there they could see a corner of the little square, planted with acacias, and beyond it the town, the country, bathed in the evening mists. The Rhine flowed at the foot of the hill. An old deserted172 cemetery173, with graves lost under the rich grass, lay in slumber174 beside them behind the closed gates.
Leonard began to talk. He said, with his eyes shining with contentment, how happy he was to escape from life, to have found a refuge, where a man is, and forever will be, in shelter. Christophe, still sore from his wounds, felt passionately the desire for rest and forgetfulness; but it was mingled175 with regret. He asked with a sigh:
"Oh!" said Leonard quietly. "What is there to regret? Isn't life sad and ugly?"
"There are lovely things too," said Christophe, looking at the beautiful evening.
"There are some beautiful things, but very few."
"The few that there are are yet many to me."
"Oh, well! it is simply a matter of common sense. On the one hand a little good and much evil; on the other neither good nor evil on earth, and after, infinite happiness—how can one hesitate?"
Christophe was not very pleased with this sort of arithmetic. So economic a life seemed to him very poor. But he tried to persuade himself that it was wisdom.
"So," he asked a little ironically, "there is no risk of your being seduced177 by an hour's pleasure?"
"You are quite certain of eternity?"
"Of course."
Christophe questioned him. He was thrilled with hope and desire. Perhaps Leonard would at last give him impregnable reasons for believing. With what a passion he would himself renounce all the world to follow him to God.
At first Leonard, proud of his rôle of apostle, and convinced that Christophe's doubts were only a matter of form, and that they would of course give way before his first arguments, relied upon the Holy Books, the authority of the Gospel, the miracles, and traditions. But he began to grow gloomy when, after Christophe had listened for a few minutes, he stopped him and said that he was answering questions with questions, and that he had not asked him to tell exactly what it was that he was doubting, but to give some means of resolving his doubts. Leonard then had to realize that Christophe was much more ill than he seemed, and that he would only allow himself to be convinced by the light of reason. But he still thought that Christophe was playing the free thinker—(it never occurred to him that he might be so sincerely).—He was not discouraged, and, strong in his recently acquired knowledge, he turned back to his school learning: he unfolded higgledy, piggledy, with more authority than order, his metaphysical proofs of the existence of God and the immortality179 of the soul. Christophe, with his mind at stretch, and his brow knit in the effort, labored180 in silence, and made him say it all over again; tried hard to gather the meaning, and to take it to himself, and to follow the reasoning. Then suddenly he burst out, vowed181 that Leonard was laughing at him, that it was all tricks, jests of the fine talkers who forged words and then amused themselves with pretending that these words were things. Leonard was nettled182, and guaranteed the good faith of his authors. Christophe shrugged his shoulders, and said with an oath that they were only humbugs, infernal writers; and he demanded fresh proof.
Leonard perceived to his horror that Christophe was incurably183 attainted, and took no more interest in him. He remembered that he had been told not to waste his time in arguing with skeptics,—at least when they stubbornly refuse to believe. There was the risk of being shaken himself, without profiting the other. It was better to leave the unfortunate fellow to the will of God, who, if He so designs, would see to it that the skeptic184 was enlightened: or if not, who would dare to go against the will of God? Leonard did not insist then on carrying on the discussion. He only said gently that for the time being there was nothing to be done, that no reasoning could show the way to a man who was determined185 not to see it, and that Jean-Christophe must pray and appeal to Grace: nothing is possible without that: he must desire grace and the will to believe.
"The will," thought Christophe bitterly. "So then, God will exist because I will Him to exist? So then, death will not exist, because it pleases me to deny it!… Alas186! How easy life is to those who have no need to see the truth, to those who can see what they wish to see, and are forever forging pleasant dreams in which softly to sleep!" In such a bed, Christophe knew well that be would never sleep….
Leonard went on talking. He had fallen back on his favorite subject, the sweets of the contemplative life, and once on this neutral ground, he was inexhaustible. In his monotonous187 voice, that shook with the pleasure in him, he told of the joys of the life in God, outside, above the world, far from noise, of which he spoke in a sudden tone of hatred (he detested188 it almost as much as Christophe), far from violence, far from frivolity189, far from the little miseries190 that one has to suffer every day, in the warm, secure nest of faith, from which you can contemplate191 in peace the wretchedness of a strange and distant world. And as Christophe listened, he perceived the egoism of that faith. Leonard saw that. He hurriedly explained: the contemplative life was not a lazy life. On the contrary, a man is more active in prayer than in action. What would the world be without prayer? You expiate192 the sins of others, you bear the burden of their misdeeds, you offer up your talents, you intercede193 between the world and God.
Christophe listened in silence with increasing hostility. He was conscious of the hypocrisy194 of such renunciation in Leonard. He was not unjust enough to assume hypocrisy in all those who believe. He knew well that with a few, such abdication195 of life comes from the impossibility of living, from a bitter despair, an appeal to death,—that with still fewer, it is an ecstasy196 of passion…. (How long does it last?)…. But with the majority of men is it not too often the cold reasoning of souls more busied with their own ease and peace than with the happiness of others, or with truth? And if sincere men are conscious of it, how much they must suffer by such profanation197 of their ideal!…
Leonard was quite happy, and now set forth198 the beauty and harmony of the world, seen from the loftiness of the divine roost: below all was dark, unjust, sorrowful; seen from on high, it all became clear, luminous199, ordered: the world was like the works of a clock, perfectly200 ordered….
Now Christophe only listened absently. He was asking himself: "Does he believe, or does he believe that he believes?" And yet his own faith, his own passionate122 desire for faith was not shaken. Not the mediocrity of soul, and the poverty of argument of a fool like Leonard could touch that….
Night came down over the town. The seat on which they were sitting was in darkness: the stars shone out, a white mist came up from the river, the crickets chirped201 under the trees in the cemetery. The bells began to ring: first the highest of them, alone, like a plaintive202 bird, challenging the sky: then the second, a third lower, joined in its plaint: at last came the, deepest, on the fifth, and seemed to answer them. The three voices were merged204 in each other. At the bottom of the towers there was a buzzing, as of a gigantic hive of bees. The air and the boy's heart quivered. Christophe held his breath, and thought how poor was the music of musicians compared with such an ocean of music, with all the sounds of thousands of creatures: the former, the free world of sounds, compared with the world tamed, catalogued, coldly labeled by human intelligence. He sank and sank into that sonorous205 and immense world without continents or bounds….
And when the great murmuring had died away, when the air had ceased at last to quiver, Christophe woke up. He looked about him startled…. He knew nothing. Around him and in him everything was changed. There was no God….
As with faith, so the loss of faith is often equally a flood of grace, a sudden light. Reason counts for nothing: the smallest thing is enough—a word, silence, the sound of bells. A man walks, dreams, expects nothing. Suddenly the world crumbles206 away. All about him is in ruins. He is alone. He no longer believes.
Christophe was terrified, and could not understand how it had come about.
It was like the flooding of a river in the spring….
Leonard's voice was still sounding, more monotonous than the voice of a cricket. Christophe did not hear it: he heard nothing. Night was fully110 come. Leonard stopped. Surprised to find Christophe motionless, uneasy because of the lateness of the hour, he suggested that they should go home. Christophe did not reply. Leonard took his arm. Christophe trembled, and looked at Leonard with wild eyes.
"Christophe, we must go home," said Leonard.
"Go to hell!" cried Christophe furiously.
"Oh! Christophe! What have I done?" asked Leonard tremulously. He was dumfounded.
Christophe came to himself.
"Yes. You are right," he said more gently. "I do not know what I'm saying.
Go to God! Go to God!"
"Ah! my God! my God!" he cried, wringing208 his hands, passionately raising his face to the dark sky. "Why do I no longer believe? Why can I believe no more? What has happened to me?…"
The disproportion between the wreck209 of his faith and the conversation that he had just had with Leonard was too great: it was obvious that the conversation had no more brought it about than that the boisterousness210 of Amalia's gabble and the pettiness of the people with whom he lived were not the cause of the upheaval211 which for some days had been taking place in his moral resolutions. These were only pretexts212. The uneasiness had not come from without. It was within himself. He felt stirring in his heart monstrous213 and unknown things, and he dared not rely on his thoughts to face the evil. The evil? Was it evil? A languor214, an intoxication215, a voluptuous216 agony filled all his being. He was no longer master of himself. In vain he sought to fortify217 himself with his former stoicism. His whole being crashed down. He had a sudden consciousness of the vast world, burning, wild, a world immeasurable…. How it swallows up God!
Only for a moment. But the whole balance of his old life was in that moment destroyed.
There was only one person in the family to whom Christophe paid no attention: this was little Rosa. She was not beautiful: and Christophe, who was far from beautiful himself, was very exacting of beauty in others. He had that calm, cruelty of youth, for which a woman does not exist if she be ugly,—unless she has passed the age for inspiring tenderness, and there is then no need to feel for her anything but grave, peaceful, and quasi-religious sentiments. Rosa also was not distinguished219 by any especial gift, although she was not without intelligence: and she was cursed with a chattering220 tongue which drove Christophe from her. And he had never taken the trouble to know her, thinking that there was in her nothing to know; and the most he ever did was to glance at her.
But she was of better stuff than most girls: she was certainly better than Minna, whom he had so loved. She was a good girl, no coquette, not at all vain, and until Christophe came it had never occurred to her that she was plain, or if it had, it had not worried her: for none of her family bothered about it. Whenever her grandfather or her mother told her so out of a desire to grumble221, she only laughed: she did not believe it, or she attached no importance to it; nor did they. So many others, just as plain, and more, had found some one to love them! The Germans are very mildly indulgent to physical imperfections: they cannot see them: they are even able to embellish222 them, by virtue of an easy imagination which finds unexpected qualities in the face of their desire to make them like the most illustrious examples of human beauty. Old Euler would not have needed much urging to make him declare that his granddaughter had the nose of the Juno Ludovisi. Happily he was too grumpy to pay compliments: and Rosa, unconcerned about the shape of her nose, had no vanity except in the accomplishment, with all the ritual, of the famous household duties. She had accepted as Gospel all that she had been taught. She hardly ever went out, and she had very little standard of comparison; she admired her family naïvely, and believed what they said. She was of an expansive and confiding223 nature, easily satisfied, and tried to fall in with the mournfulness of her home, and docilely224 used to repeat the pessimistic ideas which she heard. She was a creature of devotion—always thinking of others, trying to please, sharing anxieties, guessing at what others wanted; she had a great need of loving without demanding anything in return. Naturally her family took advantage of her, although they were kind and loved her: but there is always a temptation to take advantage of the love of those who are absolutely delivered into your hands. Her family were so sure of her attentions that they were not at all grateful for them: whatever she did, they expected more. And then, she was clumsy; she was awkward and hasty; her movements were jerky and boyish; she had outbursts of tenderness which used to end in disaster: a broken glass, a jug225 upset, a door slammed to: things which let loose upon her the wrath226 of everybody in the house. She was always being snubbed and would go and weep in a corner. Her tears did not last long. She would soon smile again, and begin to chatter without a suspicion of rancor227 against anybody.
Christophe's advent228 was an important event in her life. She had often heard of him. Christophe had some place in the gossip of the town: he was a sort of little local celebrity: his name used often to recur229 in the family conversation, especially when old Jean Michel was alive, who, proud of his grandson, used to sing his praises to all of his acquaintance. Rosa had seen the young musician once or twice at concerts. When she heard that he was coming to live with them, she clapped her hands. She was sternly rebuked230 for her breach231 of manners and became confused. She saw no harm in it. In a life so monotonous as hers, a new lodger232 was a great distraction233. She spent the last few days before his arrival in a fever of expectancy234. She was fearful lest he should not like the house, and she tried hard to make every room as attractive as possible. On the morning of his arrival, she even put a little bunch of flowers on the mantelpiece to bid him welcome. As to herself, she took no care at all to look her best; and one glance was enough to make Christophe decide that she was plain, and slovenly235 dressed. She did not think the same of him, though she had good reason to do so: for Christophe, busy, exhausted, ill-kempt, was even more ugly than usual. But Rosa, who was incapable of thinking the least ill of anybody, Rosa, who thought her grandfather, her father, and her mother, all perfectly beautiful, saw Christophe exactly as she had expected to see him, and admired him with all her heart. She was frightened at sitting next to him at table; and unfortunately her shyness took the shape of a flood of words, which at once alienated236 Christophe's sympathies. She did not see this, and that first evening remained a shining memory in her life. When she was alone in her room, after, they had all gone upstairs, she heard the tread of the new lodgers237 as they walked over her head; and the sound of it ran joyously238 through her; the house seemed to her to taken new life.
The next morning for the first time in her life she looked at herself in the mirror carefully and: uneasily, and without exactly knowing the extent of her misfortune she began to be conscious of it. She tried to decide about her features, one by one; but she could not. She was filled with sadness and apprehension239. She sighed deeply, and thought of introducing certain changes in her toilet, but she only made herself look still more plain. She conceived the unlucky idea of overwhelming Christophe with her kindness. In her naïve desire to be always seeing her new friends, and doing them service, she was forever going up and down the stairs, bringing them some utterly useless thing, insisting on helping240 them, and always laughing and talking and shouting. Her zeal241 and her stream of talk could only be interrupted by her mother's impatient voice calling her. Christophe looked grim; but for his good resolutions he must have lost his temper quite twenty times. He restrained himself for two days; on the third, he locked his door. Rosa knocked, called, understood, went downstairs in dismay, and did not try again. When he saw her he explained that he was very busy and could not be disturbed. She humbly begged his pardon. She could not deceive herself as to the failure of her innocent advances: they had accomplished242 the opposite of her intention: they had alienated Christophe. He no longer took the trouble to conceal his ill-humor; he did not listen when she talked, and did not disguise his impatience243. She felt that her chatter irritated him, and by force of will she succeeded in keeping silent for a part of the evening: but the thing was stronger than herself: suddenly she would break out again and her words would tumble over each other more tumultuously than ever. Christophe would leave her in the middle of a sentence. She was not angry with him. She was angry with herself. She thought herself stupid, tiresome, ridiculous: all her faults assumed enormous proportions and she tried to wrestle244 with them: but she was discouraged by the check upon her first attempts, and said to herself that she could not do it, that she was not strong enough. But she would try again.
But there were other faults against which she was powerless: what could she do against her plainness? There was no doubt about it. The certainty of her misfortune had suddenly been revealed to her one day when she was looking at herself in the mirror; it came like a thunderclap. Of course she exaggerated the evil, and saw her nose as ten times larger than it was; it seemed to her to fill all her face; she dared not show herself; she wished to die. But there is in youth such a power of hope that these fits of discouragement never lasted long: she would end by pretending that she had been mistaken; she would try to believe it, and for a moment or two would actually succeed in thinking her nose quite ordinary and almost shapely. Her instinct made her attempt, though very clumsily, certain childish tricks, a way of doing her hair so as not so much to show her forehead and so accentuate245 the disproportion of her face. And yet, there was no coquetry in her; no thought of love had crossed her mind, or she was unconscious of it. She asked little: nothing but a little friendship: but Christophe did not show any inclination246 to give her that little. It seemed to Rosa that she would have been perfectly happy had he only condescended247 to say good-day when they met. A friendly good-evening with a little kindness. But Christophe usually looked so hard and so cold! It chilled her. He never said anything disagreeable to her, but she would rather have had cruel reproaches than such cruel silence.
One evening Christophe was playing his piano. He had taken up his quarters in a little attic at the top of the house so as not to be so much disturbed by the noise. Downstairs Rosa was listening to him, deeply moved. She loved music though her taste was bad and unformed. While her mother was there, she stayed in a corner of the room and bent over her sewing, apparently248 absorbed in her work; but her heart was with the sounds coming from upstairs, and she wished to miss nothing. As soon as Amalia went out for a walk in the neighborhood, Rosa leaped to her feet, threw down her sewing, and went upstairs with her heart beating until she came to the attic door. She held her breath and laid her ear against the door. She stayed like that until Amalia returned. She went on tiptoe, taking care to make no noise, but as she was not very sure-footed, and was always in a hurry, she was always tripping upon the stairs; and once while she was listening, leaning forward with her cheek glued to the keyhole, she lost her balance, and banged her forehead against the door. She was so alarmed that she lost her breath. The piano stopped dead: she could not escape. She was getting up when the door opened. Christophe saw her, glared at her furiously, and then without a word, brushed her aside, walked angrily downstairs, and went out. He did not return until dinner time, paid no heed249 to the despairing looks with which she asked his pardon, ignored her existence, and for several weeks he never played at all. Rosa secretly shed many tears; no one noticed it, no one paid any attention to her. Ardently251 she prayed to God … for what? She did not know. She had to confide252 her grief in some one. She was sure that Christophe detested her.
And, in spite of all, she hoped. It was enough for her if Christophe seemed to show any sign of interest in her, if he appeared to listen to what she said, if he pressed her hand with a little more friendliness253 than usual….
A few imprudent words from her relations set her imagination off upon a false road.
The whole family was filled with sympathy for Christophe. The big boy of sixteen, serious and solitary254, who had such lofty ideas of his duty, inspired a sort of respect in them all. His fits of ill-temper, his obstinate255 silences, his gloomy air, his brusque manner, were not surprising in such a house as that. Frau Vogel, herself, who regarded every artist as a loafer, dared not reproach him aggressively, as she would have liked to do, with the hours that he spent in star-gazing in the evening, leaning, motionless, out of the attic window overlooking the yard, until night fell; for she knew that during the rest of the day he was hard at work with his lessons; and she humored him—like the rest—for an ulterior motive256 which no one expressed though everybody knew it.
Rosa had seen her parents exchanging looks and mysterious whisperings when she was talking to Christophe. At first she took no notice of it. Then she was puzzled and roused by it; she longed to know what they were saying, but dared not ask.
One evening when she had climbed on to a garden seat to untie257 the clothes-line hung between two trees, she leaned on Christophe's shoulder to jump down. Just at that moment her eyes met her grandfather's and her father's; they were sitting smoking their pipes, and leaning against the wall of the house. The two men winked259 at each other, and Justus Euler said to Vogel:
"They will make a fine couple."
Vogel nudged him, seeing that the girl was listening, and he covered his remark very cleverly—(or so he thought)—with a loud "Hm! hm!" that could have been heard twenty yards away. Christophe, whose back was turned, saw nothing, but Rosa was so bowled over by it that she forgot that she was jumping down, and sprained260 her foot. She would have fallen had not Christophe caught her, muttering curses on her clumsiness. She had hurt herself badly, but she did not show it; she hardly thought of it; she thought only of what she had just heard. She walked to her room; every step was agony to her; she stiffened261 herself against it so as not to let it be seen. A delicious, vague uneasiness surged through her. She fell into a chair at the foot of her bed and hid her face in the coverlet. Her cheeks were burning; there were tears in her eyes, and she laughed. She was ashamed, she wished to sink into the depths of the earth, she could not fix her ideas; her blood beat in her temples, there were sharp pains in her ankle; she was in a feverish262 stupor. Vaguely263 she heard sounds outside, children crying and playing in the street, and her grandfather's words were ringing in her ears; she was thrilled, she laughed softly, she blushed, with her face buried in the eiderdown: she prayed, gave thanks, desired, feared—she loved.
Her mother called her. She tried to get up. At the first step she felt a pain so unbearable264 that she almost fainted; her head swam. She thought she was going to die, she wished to die, and at the same time she wished to live with all the forces of her being, to live for the promised happiness. Her mother came at last, and the whole household was soon excited. She was scolded as usual, her ankle was dressed, she was put to bed, and sank into the sweet bewilderment of her physical pain and her inward joy. The night was sweet…. The smallest memory of that dear evening was hallowed for her. She did not think of Christophe, she knew not what she thought. She was happy.
The next day, Christophe, who thought himself in some measure responsible for the accident, came to make inquiries265, and for the first time he made some show of affection for her. She was filled with gratitude, and blessed her sprained ankle. She would gladly have suffered all her life, if, all her life, she might have such joy.—She had to lie down for several days and never move; she spent them in turning over and over her grandfather's words, and considering them. Had he said:
"They will…."
Or:
"They would …?"
But it was possible that he had never said anything of this kind?—Yes. He had said it; she was certain of it…. What! Did they not see that she was ugly, and that Christophe could not bear her?… But it was so good to hope! She came to believe that perhaps she had been wrong, that she was not as ugly as she thought; she would sit up on her sofa to try and see herself in the mirror on the wall opposite, above the mantelpiece; she did not know what to think. After all, her father and her grandfather were better judges than herself; people cannot tell about themselves…. Oh! Heaven, if it were possible!… If it could be … if, she never dared think it, if … if she were pretty!… Perhaps, also, she had exaggerated Christophe's antipathy266. No doubt he was indifferent, and after the interest he had shown in her the day after the accident did not bother about her any more; he forgot to inquire; but Rosa made excuses for him, he was so busy! How should he think of her? An artist cannot be judged like other men….
And yet, resigned though she was, she could not help expecting with beating heart a word of sympathy from him when he came near her. A word only, a look … her imagination did the rest. In the beginning love needs so little food! It is enough to see, to touch as you pass; such a power of dreams flows from the soul in such moments, that almost of itself it can create its love: a trifle can plunge2 it into ecstasy that later, when it is more satisfied, and in proportion more exacting, it will hardly find again when at last it does possess the object of its desire.—Rosa lived absolutely, though no one knew it, in a romance of her own fashioning, pieced together by herself: Christophe loved her secretly, and was too shy to confess his love, or there was some stupid reason, fantastic or romantic, delightful267 to the imagination of the sentimental268 little ninny. She fashioned endless stories, and all perfectly absurd; she knew it herself, but tried not to know it; she lied to herself voluptuously269 for days and days as she bent over her sewing. It made her forget to talk: her flood of words was turned inward, like a river which suddenly disappears underground. But then the river took its revenge. What a debauch270 of speeches, of unuttered conversations which no one heard but herself! Sometimes her lips would move as they do with people who have to spell out the syllables271 to themselves as they read so as to understand them.
When her dreams left her she was happy and sad. She knew that things were not as she had just told herself: but she was left with a reflected happiness, and had greater confidence for her life. She did not despair of winning Christophe.
She did not admit it to herself, but she set about doing it. With the sureness of instinct that great affection brings, the awkward, ignorant girl contrived272 immediately to find the road by which she might reach her beloved's heart. She did not turn directly to him. But as soon as she was better and could once more walk about the house she approached Louisa. The smallest excuse served. She found a thousand little services to render her. When she went out she never failed to undertake various errands: she spared her going to the market, arguments with tradespeople, she would fetch water for her from the pump in the yard; she cleaned the windows and polished the floors in spite of Louisa's protestations, who was confused when she did not do her work alone; but she was so weary that she had not the strength to oppose anybody who came to help her. Christophe was out all day. Louisa felt that she was deserted, and the companionship of the affectionate, chattering girl was pleasant to her. Rosa took up her quarters in her room. She brought her sewing, and talked all the time. By clumsy devices she tried to bring conversation round to Christophe. Just to hear of him, even to hear his name, made her happy; her hands would tremble; she would sit with downcast eyes. Louisa was delighted to talk of her beloved Christophe, and would tell little tales of his childhood, trivial and just a little ridiculous; but there was no fear of Rosa thinking them so: she took a great joy, and there was a dear emotion for her in imagining Christophe as a child, and doing all the tricks and having all the darling ways of children: in her the motherly tenderness which lies in the hearts of all women was mingled deliciously with that other tenderness: she would laugh heartily273 and tears would come to her eyes. Louisa was touched by the interest that Rosa took in her. She guessed dimly what was in the girl's heart, but she never let it appear that she did so; but she was glad of it; for of all in the house she only knew the worth of the girl's heart. Sometimes she would stop talking to look at her. Rosa, surprised by her silence, would raise her eyes from her work. Louisa would smile at her. Rosa would throw herself into her arms, suddenly, passionately, and would hide her face in Louisa's bosom274. Then they would go on working and talking, as if nothing had happened.
In the evening when Christophe came home, Louisa, grateful for Rosa's attentions, and in pursuance of the little plan she had made, always praised the girl to the skies. Christophe was touched by Rosa's kindness. He saw how much good she was doing his mother, in whose face there was more serenity275: and he would thank her effusively276. Rosa would murmur3, and escape to conceal her embarrassment277: so she appeared a thousand times more intelligent and sympathetic to Christophe than if she had spoken. He looked at her less with a prejudiced eye, and did not conceal his surprise at finding unsuspected qualities in her. Rosa saw that; she marked the progress that she made in his sympathy and thought that his sympathy would lead to love. She gave herself up more than ever to her dreams. She came near to believing with the beautiful presumption278 of youth that what you desire with all your being is always accomplished in the end. Besides, how was her desire unreasonable279? Should not Christophe have been more sensible than any other of her goodness and her affectionate need of self-devotion?
But Christophe gave no thought to her. He esteemed280 her; but she filled no room in his thoughts. He was busied with far other things at the moment. Christophe was no longer Christophe. He did not know himself. He was in a mighty281 travail282 that was like to sweep everything away, a complete upheaval.
Christophe was conscious of extreme weariness and great uneasiness. He was for no reason worn out; his head was heavy, his eyes, his ears, all his senses were dumb and throbbing283. He could not give his attention to anything. His mind leaped from one subject to another, and was in a fever that sucked him dry. The perpetual fluttering of images in his mind made him giddy. At first he attributed it to fatigue and the enervation284 of the first days of spring. But spring passed and his sickness only grew worse.
It was what the poets who only touch lightly on things call the unease of adolescence285, the trouble of the cherubim, the waking of the desire of love in the young body and soul. As if the fearful crisis of all a man's being, breaking up, dying, and coming to full rebirth, as if the cataclysm286 in which everything, faith, thought, action, all life, seems like to be blotted287 out, and then to be new-forged in the convulsions of sorrow and joy, can be reduced to terms of a child's folly288!
All his body and soul were in a ferment289. He watched them, having no strength to struggle, with a mixture of curiosity and disgust. He did not understand what was happening in himself. His whole being was disintegrated290. He spent days together in absolute torpor291. Work was torture to him. At night he slept heavily and in snatches, dreaming monstrously292, with gusts293 of desire; the soul of a beast was racing294 madly in him. Burning, bathed in sweat, he watched himself in horror; he tried to break free of the crazy and unclean thoughts that possessed him, and he wondered if he were going mad.
The day gave him no shelter from his brutish thoughts. In the depths of his soul he felt that he was slipping down and down; there was no stay to clutch at; no barrier to keep back chaos295. All his defenses, all his citadels296, with the quadruple rampart that hemmed297 him in so proudly—his God, his art, his pride, his moral faith, all was crumbling298 away, falling piece by piece from him. He saw himself naked, bound, lying unable to move, like a corpse299 on which vermin swarm300. He had spasms302 of revolt: where was his will, of which he was so proud? He called to it in vain: it was like the efforts that one makes in sleep, knowing that one is dreaming, and trying to awake. Then one succeeds only in falling from one dream to another like a lump of lead, and in being more and more choked by the suffocation303 of the soul in bondage304. At last he found that it was less painful not to struggle. He decided not to do so, with, fatalistic apathy and despair.
The even tenor305 of his life seemed to be broken up. Now he slipped down a subterranean306 crevasse307 and was like to disappear; now he bounded up again with a violent jerk. The chain of his days was snapped. In the midst of the even plain of the hours great gaping308 holes would open to engulf309 his soul. Christophe looked on at the spectacle as though it did not concern him. Everything, everybody,—and himself—were strange to him. He went about his business, did his work, automatically: it seemed to him that the machinery310 of his life might stop at any moment: the wheels were out of gear. At dinner with his mother and the others, in the orchestra with the musicians and the audience, suddenly there would be a void and emptiness in his brain; he would look stupidly at the grinning faces about him; and he could not understand. He would ask himself:
"What is there between these creatures and …?"
He dared not even say:
"… and me."
For he knew not whether he existed. He would speak and his voice would seem to issue from another body. He would move, and he saw his movements from afar, from above—from the top of a tower. He would pass his hand over his face, and his eyes would wander. He was often near doing crazy things.
It was especially when he was most in public that he had to keep guard on himself. For example, on the evenings when he went to the Palace or was playing in public. Then he would suddenly be seized by a terrific desire to make a face, or say something outrageous311, to pull the Grand Duke's nose, or to take a running kick at one of the ladies. One whole evening while he was conducting the orchestra, he struggled against an insensate desire to undress himself in public; and he was haunted by the idea from the moment when he tried to check it; he had to exert all his strength not to give way to it. When he issued from the brute312 struggle he was dripping with sweat and his mind was blank. He was really mad. It was enough for him to think that he must not do a thing for it to fasten on him with the maddening tenacity313 of a fixed idea.
So his life was spent in a series of unbridled outbreaks and of endless falls into emptiness. A furious wind in the desert. Whence came this wind? From what abyss came these desires that wrenched314 his body and mind? He was like a bow stretched to breaking point by a strong hand,—to what end unknown?—which then springs back like a piece of dead wood. Of what force was he the prey315? He dared not probe for it. He felt that he was beaten, humiliated, and he would not face his defeat. He was weary and broken in spirit. He understood now the people whom formerly316 he had despised: those who will not seek awkward truth. In the empty hours, when he remembered that time was passing, his work neglected, the future lost, he was frozen with terror. But there was no reaction: and his cowardice317 found excuses in desperate affirmation of the void in which he lived: he took a bitter delight in abandoning himself to it like a wreck on the waters. What was the good of fighting? There was nothing beautiful, nor good; neither God, nor life, nor being of any sort. In the street as he walked, suddenly the earth would sink away from him: there was neither ground, nor air, nor light, nor himself: there was nothing. He would fall, his head would drag him down, face forwards: he could hardly hold himself up; he was on the point of collapse. He thought he was going to die, suddenly, struck down. He thought he was dead….
Christophe was growing a new skin. Christophe was growing a new soul. And seeing the worn out and rotten soul of his childhood falling away he never dreamed that he was taking on a new one, young and stronger. As through life we change our bodies, so also do we change our souls: and the metamorphosis does not always take place slowly over many days; there are times of crisis when the whole is suddenly renewed. The adult changes his soul. The old soul that is cast off dies. In those hours of anguish318 we think that all is at an end. And the whole thing begins again. A life dies. Another life has already come into being.
One night he was alone in his room, with his elbow on his desk under the light of a candle. His back was turned to the window. He was not working. He had not been able to work for weeks. Everything was twisting and turning in his head. He had brought everything under scrutiny319 at once: religion, morals, art, the whole of life. And in the general dissolution of his thoughts was no method, no order: he had plunged into the reading of books taken haphazard320 from his grandfather's heterogeneous321 library or from Vogel's collection of books: books of theology, science, philosophy, an odd lot, of which he understood nothing, having everything to learn: he could not finish any of them, and in the middle of them went off on divagations, endless whimsies322, which left him weary, empty, and in mortal sorrow.
So, that evening, he was sunk in an exhausted torpor. The whole house was asleep. His window was open. Not a breath came up from the yard. Thick clouds filled the sky. Christophe mechanically watched the candle burn away at the bottom of the candlestick. He could not go to bed. He had no thought of anything. He felt the void growing, growing from moment to moment. He tried not to see the abyss that drew him to its brink323: and in spite of himself he leaned over and his eyes gazed into the depths of the night. In the void, chaos was stirring, and faint sounds came from the darkness. Agony filled him: a shiver ran down his spine324: his skin tingled325: he clutched the table so as not to fall. Convulsively he awaited nameless things, a miracle, a God….
Suddenly, like an opened sluice326, in the yard behind him, a deluge327 of water, a heavy rain, large drops, down pouring, fell. The still air quivered. The dry, hard soil rang out like a bell. And the vast scent328 of the earth, burning, warm as that of an animal, the smell of the flowers, fruit, and amorous329 flesh rose in a spasm301 of fury and pleasure. Christophe, under illusion, at fullest stretch, shook. He trembled…. The veil was rent. He was blinded. By a flash of lightning, he saw, in the depths of the night, he saw—he was God. God was in himself; He burst the ceiling of the room, the walls of the house; He cracked the very bounds of existence. He filled the sky, the universe, space. The world coursed through Him, like a cataract330. In the horror and ecstasy of that cataclysm, Christophe fell too, swept along by the whirlwind which brushed away and crushed like straws the laws of nature. He was breathless: he was drunk with the swift hurtling down into God … God-abyss! God-gulf! Fire of Being! Hurricane of life! Madness of living,—aimless, uncontrolled, beyond reason,—for the fury of living!
When the crisis was over, he fell into a deep sleep and slept as he had not done for long enough. Next day when he awoke his head swam: he was as broken as though he had been drunk. But in his inmost heart he had still a beam of that somber331 and great light that had struck him down the night before. He tried to relight it. In vain. The more he pursued it, the more it eluded332 him. From that time on, all his energy was directed towards recalling the vision of a moment. The endeavor was futile333. Ecstasy does not answer the bidding of the will.
But that mystic exaltation was not the only experience that he had of it: it recurred334 several times, but never with the intensity335 of the first. It came always at moments when Christophe was least expecting it, for a second only, a time so short, so sudden,—no longer than a wink258 of an eye or a raising of a hand—that the vision was gone before he could discover that it was: and then he would wonder whether he had not dreamed it. After that fiery336 bolt that had set the night aflame, it was a gleaming dust, shedding fleeting337 sparks, which the eye could hardly see as they sped by. But they reappeared more and more often: and in the end they surrounded Christophe with a halo of perpetual misty338 dreams, in which his spirit melted. Everything that distracted him in his state of semi-hallucination was an irritation339 to him. It was impossible to work; he gave up thinking about it. Society was odious340 to him; and more than any, that of his intimates, even that of his mother, because they arrogated341 to themselves more rights over his soul.
He left the house: he took to spending his days abroad, and never returned until nightfall. He sought the solitude342 of the fields, and delivered himself up to it, drank his fill of it, like a maniac343 who wishes not to be disturbed by anything in the obsession344 of his fixed ideas.—But in the great sweet air, in contact with the earth, his obsession relaxed, his ideas ceased to appear like specters. His exaltation was no less: rather it was heightened, but it was no longer a dangerous delirium345 of the mind but a healthy intoxication of his whole being: body; and soul crazy in their strength.
He rediscovered the world, as though he had never seen it. It was a new childhood. It was as though a magic word had been uttered. An "Open Sesame!"—Nature flamed with gladness. The sun boiled. The liquid sky ran like a clear river. The earth steamed and cried aloud in delight. The plants, the trees, the insects, all the innumerable creatures were like dazzling tongues of flame in the fire of life writhing346 upwards347. Everything sang aloud in joy.
And that joy was his own. That strength was his own. He was no longer cut off from the rest of the world. Till then, even in the happy days of childhood, when he saw nature with ardent250 and delightful curiosity, all creatures had seemed to him to be little worlds shut up, terrifying and grotesque348, unrelated to himself, and incomprehensible. He was not even sure that they had feeling and life. They were strange machines. And sometimes Christophe had even, with the unconscious cruelty of a child, dismembered wretched insects without dreaming that they might suffer—for the pleasure of watching their queer contortions349. His uncle Gottfried, usually so calm, had one day indignantly to snatch from his hands an unhappy fly that he was torturing. The boy had tried to laugh at first: then he had burst into tears, moved by his uncle's emotion: he began to understand that his victim did really exist, as well as himself, and that he had committed a crime. But if thereafter nothing would have induced him to do harm to the beasts, he never felt any sympathy for them: he used to pass them by without ever trying to feel what it was that worked their machinery: rather he was afraid to think of it: it was something like a bad dream.—And now everything was made plaint These humble350, obscure creatures became in their turn centers of light.
Lying on his belly351 in the grass where creatures swarmed352, in the shade of the trees that buzzed with insects, Christophe would watch the fevered movements of the ants, the long-legged spiders, that seemed to dance as they walked, the bounding grasshoppers353, that leap aside, the heavy, bustling354 beetles355, and the naked worms, pink and glabrous, mottled with white, or with his hands under his head and his eyes dosed he would listen to the invisible orchestra, the roundelay of the frenzied356 insects circling in a sunbeam about the scented357 pines, the trumpeting358 of the mosquitoes, the organ, notes of the wasps359, the brass360 of the wild bees humming like bells in the tops of the trees, and the godlike whispering of the swaying trees, the sweet moaning of the wind in the branches, the soft whispering of the waving grass, like a breath of wind rippling361 the limpid362 surface of a lake, like the rustling363 of a light dress and lovers footsteps coming near, and passing, then lost upon the air.
He heard all these sounds and cries within himself. Through all these creatures from the smallest to the greatest flowed the same river of life: and in it he too swam. So, he was one of them, he was of their blood, and, brotherly, he heard the echo of their sorrows and their joys: their strength was merged is his like a river fed with thousands of streams. He sank into them. His lungs were like to burst with the wind, too freely blowing, too strong, that burst the windows and forced its way, into the closed house of his suffocating364 heart. The change was too abrupt365: after finding everywhere a void, when he had been buried only in his own existence, and had felt it slipping from him and dissolving like rain, now everywhere he found infinite and unmeasured Being, now that he longed to forget himself, to find rebirth in the universe. He seemed to have issued from the grave. He swam voluptuously in life flowing free and full: and borne on by its current he thought that he was free. He did not know that he was less free than ever, that no creature is ever free, that even the law that governs the universe is not free, that only death—perhaps—can bring deliverance.
But the chrysalis issuing from its stifling366 sheath, joyously, stretched its limbs in its new shape, and had no time as yet to mark the bounds of its new prison.
There began a new cycle of days. Days of gold and fever, mysterious, enchanted367, like those of his childhood, when by one he discovered things for the first time. From dawn to set of sun he lived in one long mirage368. He deserted all his business. The conscientious156 boy, who for years had never missed a lesson, or an orchestra rehearsal369, even when he was ill, was forever finding paltry370 excuses for neglecting his work. He was not afraid to lie. He had no remorse371 about it. The stoic218 principles of life, to which he had hitherto delighted to bend his will, morality, duty, now seemed to him to have no truth, nor reason. Their jealous despotism was smashed against Nature. Human nature, healthy, strong, free, that alone was virtue: to hell with all the rest! It provoked pitying laughter to see the little peddling372 rules of prudence373 and policy which the world adorns374 with the name of morality, while it pretends to inclose all life within them. A preposterous375 mole-hill, an ant-like people! Life sees to it that they are brought to reason. Life does but pass, and all is swept away….
Bursting with energy Christophe had moments when he was consumed with a desire to destroy, to burn, to smash, to glut376 with actions blind and uncontrolled the force which choked him. These outbursts usually ended in a sharp reaction: he would weep, and fling himself down on the ground, and kiss the earth, and try to dig into it with his teeth and hands, to feed himself with it, to merge203 into it: he trembled then with fever and desire.
One evening he was walking in the outskirts377 of a wood. His eyes were swimming with the light, his head was whirling: he was in that state of exaltation when all creatures and things were transfigured. To that was added the magic of the soft warm light of evening. Bays of purple and gold hovered378 in the trees. From the meadows seemed to come a phosphorescent glimmer379. In a field near by a girl was making hay. In her blouse and short skirt, with her arms and neck bare, she was raking the hay and heaping it up. She had a short nose, wide cheeks, a round face, a handkerchief thrown over her hair. The setting sun touched with red her sunburned skin, which, like a piece of pottery380, seemed to absorb the last beams of the day.
She fascinated Christophe. Leaning against a beech-tree he watched her come towards the verge381 of the woods, eagerly, passionately. Everything else had disappeared. She took no notice of him. For a moment she looked at him cautiously: he saw her eyes blue and hard in her brown face. She passed so near to him that, when she leaned down to gather up the hay, through her open blouse he saw a soft down on her shoulders and back. Suddenly the vague desire which was in him leaped forth. He hurled himself at her from behind, seized her neck and waist, threw back her head and fastened his lips upon hers. He kissed her dry, cracked lips until he came against her teeth that bit him angrily. His hands ran over her rough arms, over her blouse wet with her sweat. She struggled. He held her tighter, he wished to strangle her. She broke loose, cried out, spat382, wiped her lips with her hand, and hurled insults at him. He let her go and fled across the fields. She threw stones at him and went on discharging after him a litany of filthy383 epithets384. He blushed, less for anything that she might say or think, but for what he was thinking himself. The sudden unconscious act filled him with terror. What had he done? What should he do? What he was able to understand of it all only filled him with disgust. And he was tempted by his disgust. He fought against himself and knew not on which side was the real Christophe. A blind force beset385 him: in vain did he fly from it: it was only to fly from himself. What would she do about him? What should he do to-morrow … in an hour … the time it took to cross the plowed386 field to reach the road?… Would he ever reach it? Should he not stop, and go back, and run back to the girl? And then?… He remembered that delirious387 moment when he had held her by the throat. Everything was possible. All things were worth while. A crime even…. Yes, even a crime…. The turmoil388 in his heart made him breathless. When he reached the road he stopped to breathe. Over there the girl was talking to another girl who had been attracted by her cries: and with arms akimbo, they were looking at each other and shouting with laughter.
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1 plunged | |
v.颠簸( plunge的过去式和过去分词 );暴跌;骤降;突降 | |
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2 plunge | |
v.跳入,(使)投入,(使)陷入;猛冲 | |
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3 murmur | |
n.低语,低声的怨言;v.低语,低声而言 | |
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4 hurled | |
v.猛投,用力掷( hurl的过去式和过去分词 );大声叫骂 | |
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5 bout | |
n.侵袭,发作;一次(阵,回);拳击等比赛 | |
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6 conceal | |
v.隐藏,隐瞒,隐蔽 | |
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7 plying | |
v.使用(工具)( ply的现在分词 );经常供应(食物、饮料);固定往来;经营生意 | |
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8 dwelling | |
n.住宅,住所,寓所 | |
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9 creed | |
n.信条;信念,纲领 | |
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10 registrar | |
n.记录员,登记员;(大学的)注册主任 | |
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11 irresistibly | |
adv.无法抵抗地,不能自持地;极为诱惑人地 | |
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12 drawn | |
v.拖,拉,拔出;adj.憔悴的,紧张的 | |
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13 draughts | |
n. <英>国际跳棋 | |
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14 melancholy | |
n.忧郁,愁思;adj.令人感伤(沮丧)的,忧郁的 | |
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15 shutters | |
百叶窗( shutter的名词复数 ); (照相机的)快门 | |
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16 attic | |
n.顶楼,屋顶室 | |
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17 stupor | |
v.昏迷;不省人事 | |
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18 belongings | |
n.私人物品,私人财物 | |
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19 exhausted | |
adj.极其疲惫的,精疲力尽的 | |
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20 niggardly | |
adj.吝啬的,很少的 | |
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21 repented | |
对(自己的所为)感到懊悔或忏悔( repent的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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22 incapable | |
adj.无能力的,不能做某事的 | |
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23 humbly | |
adv. 恭顺地,谦卑地 | |
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24 piety | |
n.虔诚,虔敬 | |
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25 injustice | |
n.非正义,不公正,不公平,侵犯(别人的)权利 | |
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26 misery | |
n.痛苦,苦恼,苦难;悲惨的境遇,贫苦 | |
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27 fatigue | |
n.疲劳,劳累 | |
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28 industrious | |
adj.勤劳的,刻苦的,奋发的 | |
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29 collapse | |
vi.累倒;昏倒;倒塌;塌陷 | |
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30 acting | |
n.演戏,行为,假装;adj.代理的,临时的,演出用的 | |
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31 rigid | |
adj.严格的,死板的;刚硬的,僵硬的 | |
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32 suffused | |
v.(指颜色、水气等)弥漫于,布满( suffuse的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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33 instinctive | |
adj.(出于)本能的;直觉的;(出于)天性的 | |
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34 stranded | |
a.搁浅的,进退两难的 | |
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35 relics | |
[pl.]n.遗物,遗迹,遗产;遗体,尸骸 | |
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36 spoke | |
n.(车轮的)辐条;轮辐;破坏某人的计划;阻挠某人的行动 v.讲,谈(speak的过去式);说;演说;从某种观点来说 | |
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37 asperity | |
n.粗鲁,艰苦 | |
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38 apathy | |
n.漠不关心,无动于衷;冷淡 | |
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39 meekly | |
adv.温顺地,逆来顺受地 | |
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40 caressed | |
爱抚或抚摸…( caress的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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41 stifled | |
(使)窒息, (使)窒闷( stifle的过去式和过去分词 ); 镇压,遏制; 堵 | |
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42 sob | |
n.空间轨道的轰炸机;呜咽,哭泣 | |
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43 pointed | |
adj.尖的,直截了当的 | |
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44 humiliated | |
感到羞愧的 | |
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45 scattered | |
adj.分散的,稀疏的;散步的;疏疏落落的 | |
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46 infinitely | |
adv.无限地,无穷地 | |
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47 narrative | |
n.叙述,故事;adj.叙事的,故事体的 | |
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48 reassured | |
adj.使消除疑虑的;使放心的v.再保证,恢复信心( reassure的过去式和过去分词) | |
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49 prattle | |
n.闲谈;v.(小孩般)天真无邪地说话;发出连续而无意义的声音 | |
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50 mediocre | |
adj.平常的,普通的 | |
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51 gratitude | |
adj.感激,感谢 | |
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52 fixed | |
adj.固定的,不变的,准备好的;(计算机)固定的 | |
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53 scanty | |
adj.缺乏的,仅有的,节省的,狭小的,不够的 | |
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54 dealer | |
n.商人,贩子 | |
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55 pony | |
adj.小型的;n.小马 | |
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56 fortified | |
adj. 加强的 | |
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57 mightily | |
ad.强烈地;非常地 | |
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58 greasy | |
adj. 多脂的,油脂的 | |
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59 stunned | |
adj. 震惊的,惊讶的 动词stun的过去式和过去分词 | |
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60 tempted | |
v.怂恿(某人)干不正当的事;冒…的险(tempt的过去分词) | |
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61 gathering | |
n.集会,聚会,聚集 | |
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62 exclamations | |
n.呼喊( exclamation的名词复数 );感叹;感叹语;感叹词 | |
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63 embittered | |
v.使怨恨,激怒( embitter的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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64 controversies | |
争论 | |
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65 stew | |
n.炖汤,焖,烦恼;v.炖汤,焖,忧虑 | |
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66 judgment | |
n.审判;判断力,识别力,看法,意见 | |
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67 commiserated | |
v.怜悯,同情( commiserate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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68 courageous | |
adj.勇敢的,有胆量的 | |
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69 decided | |
adj.决定了的,坚决的;明显的,明确的 | |
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70 pessimism | |
n.悲观者,悲观主义者,厌世者 | |
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71 tiresome | |
adj.令人疲劳的,令人厌倦的 | |
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72 swill | |
v.冲洗;痛饮;n.泔脚饲料;猪食;(谈话或写作中的)无意义的话 | |
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73 bent | |
n.爱好,癖好;adj.弯的;决心的,一心的 | |
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74 pimples | |
n.丘疹,粉刺,小脓疱( pimple的名词复数 ) | |
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75 temperament | |
n.气质,性格,性情 | |
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76 fictitious | |
adj.虚构的,假设的;空头的 | |
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77 jovial | |
adj.快乐的,好交际的 | |
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78 parsimonious | |
adj.吝啬的,质量低劣的 | |
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79 retired | |
adj.隐退的,退休的,退役的 | |
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80 meticulous | |
adj.极其仔细的,一丝不苟的 | |
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81 peevish | |
adj.易怒的,坏脾气的 | |
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82 succumbed | |
不再抵抗(诱惑、疾病、攻击等)( succumb的过去式和过去分词 ); 屈从; 被压垮; 死 | |
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83 demon | |
n.魔鬼,恶魔 | |
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84 lamenting | |
adj.悲伤的,悲哀的v.(为…)哀悼,痛哭,悲伤( lament的现在分词 ) | |
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85 lamentation | |
n.悲叹,哀悼 | |
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86 follies | |
罪恶,时事讽刺剧; 愚蠢,蠢笨,愚蠢的行为、思想或做法( folly的名词复数 ) | |
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87 bemoaning | |
v.为(某人或某事)抱怨( bemoan的现在分词 );悲悼;为…恸哭;哀叹 | |
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88 mania | |
n.疯狂;躁狂症,狂热,癖好 | |
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89 tragically | |
adv. 悲剧地,悲惨地 | |
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90 groaning | |
adj. 呜咽的, 呻吟的 动词groan的现在分词形式 | |
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91 toil | |
vi.辛劳工作,艰难地行动;n.苦工,难事 | |
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92 insignificant | |
adj.无关紧要的,可忽略的,无意义的 | |
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93 complexion | |
n.肤色;情况,局面;气质,性格 | |
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94 chatter | |
vi./n.喋喋不休;短促尖叫;(牙齿)打战 | |
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95 shrill | |
adj.尖声的;刺耳的;v尖叫 | |
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96 animated | |
adj.生气勃勃的,活跃的,愉快的 | |
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97 exasperated | |
adj.恼怒的 | |
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98 virtues | |
美德( virtue的名词复数 ); 德行; 优点; 长处 | |
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99 virtue | |
n.德行,美德;贞操;优点;功效,效力 | |
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100 softened | |
(使)变软( soften的过去式和过去分词 ); 缓解打击; 缓和; 安慰 | |
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101 emphatic | |
adj.强调的,着重的;无可置疑的,明显的 | |
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102 indifference | |
n.不感兴趣,不关心,冷淡,不在乎 | |
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103 austere | |
adj.艰苦的;朴素的,朴实无华的;严峻的 | |
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104 displeasing | |
不愉快的,令人发火的 | |
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105 tranquillity | |
n. 平静, 安静 | |
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106 loyalty | |
n.忠诚,忠心 | |
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107 exacting | |
adj.苛求的,要求严格的 | |
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108 possessed | |
adj.疯狂的;拥有的,占有的 | |
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109 surmount | |
vt.克服;置于…顶上 | |
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110 fully | |
adv.完全地,全部地,彻底地;充分地 | |
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111 concealed | |
a.隐藏的,隐蔽的 | |
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112 converse | |
vi.谈话,谈天,闲聊;adv.相反的,相反 | |
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113 faculty | |
n.才能;学院,系;(学院或系的)全体教学人员 | |
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114 scraps | |
油渣 | |
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115 utterly | |
adv.完全地,绝对地 | |
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116 mutual | |
adj.相互的,彼此的;共同的,共有的 | |
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117 lavish | |
adj.无节制的;浪费的;vt.慷慨地给予,挥霍 | |
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118 sever | |
v.切开,割开;断绝,中断 | |
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119 affectedly | |
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120 reiterating | |
反复地说,重申( reiterate的现在分词 ) | |
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121 naught | |
n.无,零 [=nought] | |
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122 passionate | |
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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123 passionately | |
ad.热烈地,激烈地 | |
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124 ecstasies | |
狂喜( ecstasy的名词复数 ); 出神; 入迷; 迷幻药 | |
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125 artistic | |
adj.艺术(家)的,美术(家)的;善于艺术创作的 | |
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126 disparaging | |
adj.轻蔑的,毁谤的v.轻视( disparage的现在分词 );贬低;批评;非难 | |
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127 tinge | |
vt.(较淡)着色于,染色;使带有…气息;n.淡淡色彩,些微的气息 | |
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128 disparaged | |
v.轻视( disparage的过去式和过去分词 );贬低;批评;非难 | |
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129 humbugs | |
欺骗( humbug的名词复数 ); 虚伪; 骗子; 薄荷硬糖 | |
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130 celebrity | |
n.名人,名流;著名,名声,名望 | |
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131 irony | |
n.反语,冷嘲;具有讽刺意味的事,嘲弄 | |
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132 criticise | |
v.批评,评论;非难 | |
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133 misanthropic | |
adj.厌恶人类的,憎恶(或蔑视)世人的;愤世嫉俗 | |
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134 relinquish | |
v.放弃,撤回,让与,放手 | |
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135 accomplishment | |
n.完成,成就,(pl.)造诣,技能 | |
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136 amicable | |
adj.和平的,友好的;友善的 | |
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137 intervals | |
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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138 hostility | |
n.敌对,敌意;抵制[pl.]交战,战争 | |
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139 clatter | |
v./n.(使)发出连续而清脆的撞击声 | |
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140 attentively | |
adv.聚精会神地;周到地;谛;凝神 | |
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141 penetrated | |
adj. 击穿的,鞭辟入里的 动词penetrate的过去式和过去分词形式 | |
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142 uproars | |
吵闹,喧嚣,骚乱( uproar的名词复数 ) | |
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143 consign | |
vt.寄售(货品),托运,交托,委托 | |
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144 esteem | |
n.尊敬,尊重;vt.尊重,敬重;把…看作 | |
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145 hatred | |
n.憎恶,憎恨,仇恨 | |
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146 deliberately | |
adv.审慎地;蓄意地;故意地 | |
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147 deference | |
n.尊重,顺从;敬意 | |
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148 analyze | |
vt.分析,解析 (=analyse) | |
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149 negation | |
n.否定;否认 | |
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150 authorize | |
v.授权,委任;批准,认可 | |
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151 aspire | |
vi.(to,after)渴望,追求,有志于 | |
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152 puerile | |
adj.幼稚的,儿童的 | |
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153 overflowing | |
n. 溢出物,溢流 adj. 充沛的,充满的 动词overflow的现在分词形式 | |
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154 worthy | |
adj.(of)值得的,配得上的;有价值的 | |
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155 professed | |
公开声称的,伪称的,已立誓信教的 | |
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156 conscientious | |
adj.审慎正直的,认真的,本着良心的 | |
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157 conscientiously | |
adv.凭良心地;认真地,负责尽职地;老老实实 | |
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158 essentially | |
adv.本质上,实质上,基本上 | |
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159 fervor | |
n.热诚;热心;炽热 | |
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160 impudent | |
adj.鲁莽的,卑鄙的,厚颜无耻的 | |
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161 sincerity | |
n.真诚,诚意;真实 | |
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162 scruples | |
n.良心上的不安( scruple的名词复数 );顾虑,顾忌v.感到于心不安,有顾忌( scruple的第三人称单数 ) | |
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163 obliquely | |
adv.斜; 倾斜; 间接; 不光明正大 | |
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164 arrogant | |
adj.傲慢的,自大的 | |
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165 affront | |
n./v.侮辱,触怒 | |
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166 shrugged | |
vt.耸肩(shrug的过去式与过去分词形式) | |
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167 uncertainties | |
无把握( uncertainty的名词复数 ); 不确定; 变化不定; 无把握、不确定的事物 | |
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168 quotations | |
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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169 brutal | |
adj.残忍的,野蛮的,不讲理的 | |
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170 nonplussed | |
adj.不知所措的,陷于窘境的v.使迷惑( nonplus的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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171 cloisters | |
n.(学院、修道院、教堂等建筑的)走廊( cloister的名词复数 );回廊;修道院的生活;隐居v.隐退,使与世隔绝( cloister的第三人称单数 ) | |
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172 deserted | |
adj.荒芜的,荒废的,无人的,被遗弃的 | |
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173 cemetery | |
n.坟墓,墓地,坟场 | |
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174 slumber | |
n.睡眠,沉睡状态 | |
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175 mingled | |
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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176 renounce | |
v.放弃;拒绝承认,宣布与…断绝关系 | |
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177 seduced | |
诱奸( seduce的过去式和过去分词 ); 勾引; 诱使堕落; 使入迷 | |
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178 eternity | |
n.不朽,来世;永恒,无穷 | |
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179 immortality | |
n.不死,不朽 | |
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180 labored | |
adj.吃力的,谨慎的v.努力争取(for)( labor的过去式和过去分词 );苦干;详细分析;(指引擎)缓慢而困难地运转 | |
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181 vowed | |
起誓,发誓(vow的过去式与过去分词形式) | |
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182 nettled | |
v.拿荨麻打,拿荨麻刺(nettle的过去式与过去分词形式) | |
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183 incurably | |
ad.治不好地 | |
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184 skeptic | |
n.怀疑者,怀疑论者,无神论者 | |
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185 determined | |
adj.坚定的;有决心的 | |
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186 alas | |
int.唉(表示悲伤、忧愁、恐惧等) | |
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187 monotonous | |
adj.单调的,一成不变的,使人厌倦的 | |
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188 detested | |
v.憎恶,嫌恶,痛恨( detest的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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189 frivolity | |
n.轻松的乐事,兴高采烈;轻浮的举止 | |
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190 miseries | |
n.痛苦( misery的名词复数 );痛苦的事;穷困;常发牢骚的人 | |
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191 contemplate | |
vt.盘算,计议;周密考虑;注视,凝视 | |
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192 expiate | |
v.抵补,赎罪 | |
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193 intercede | |
vi.仲裁,说情 | |
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194 hypocrisy | |
n.伪善,虚伪 | |
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195 abdication | |
n.辞职;退位 | |
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196 ecstasy | |
n.狂喜,心醉神怡,入迷 | |
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197 profanation | |
n.亵渎 | |
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198 forth | |
adv.向前;向外,往外 | |
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199 luminous | |
adj.发光的,发亮的;光明的;明白易懂的;有启发的 | |
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200 perfectly | |
adv.完美地,无可非议地,彻底地 | |
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201 chirped | |
鸟叫,虫鸣( chirp的过去式 ) | |
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202 plaintive | |
adj.可怜的,伤心的 | |
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203 merge | |
v.(使)结合,(使)合并,(使)合为一体 | |
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204 merged | |
(使)混合( merge的过去式和过去分词 ); 相融; 融入; 渐渐消失在某物中 | |
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205 sonorous | |
adj.响亮的,回响的;adv.圆润低沉地;感人地;n.感人,堂皇 | |
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206 crumbles | |
酥皮水果甜点( crumble的名词复数 ) | |
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207 distress | |
n.苦恼,痛苦,不舒适;不幸;vt.使悲痛 | |
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208 wringing | |
淋湿的,湿透的 | |
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209 wreck | |
n.失事,遇难;沉船;vt.(船等)失事,遇难 | |
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210 boisterousness | |
n.喧闹;欢跃;(风暴)狂烈 | |
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211 upheaval | |
n.胀起,(地壳)的隆起;剧变,动乱 | |
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212 pretexts | |
n.借口,托辞( pretext的名词复数 ) | |
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213 monstrous | |
adj.巨大的;恐怖的;可耻的,丢脸的 | |
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214 languor | |
n.无精力,倦怠 | |
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215 intoxication | |
n.wild excitement;drunkenness;poisoning | |
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216 voluptuous | |
adj.肉欲的,骄奢淫逸的 | |
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217 fortify | |
v.强化防御,为…设防;加强,强化 | |
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218 stoic | |
n.坚忍克己之人,禁欲主义者 | |
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219 distinguished | |
adj.卓越的,杰出的,著名的 | |
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220 chattering | |
n. (机器振动发出的)咔嗒声,(鸟等)鸣,啁啾 adj. 喋喋不休的,啾啾声的 动词chatter的现在分词形式 | |
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221 grumble | |
vi.抱怨;咕哝;n.抱怨,牢骚;咕哝,隆隆声 | |
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222 embellish | |
v.装饰,布置;给…添加细节,润饰 | |
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223 confiding | |
adj.相信人的,易于相信的v.吐露(秘密,心事等)( confide的现在分词 );(向某人)吐露(隐私、秘密等) | |
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224 docilely | |
adv.容易教地,易驾驶地,驯服地 | |
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225 jug | |
n.(有柄,小口,可盛水等的)大壶,罐,盂 | |
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226 wrath | |
n.愤怒,愤慨,暴怒 | |
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227 rancor | |
n.深仇,积怨 | |
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228 advent | |
n.(重要事件等的)到来,来临 | |
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229 recur | |
vi.复发,重现,再发生 | |
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230 rebuked | |
责难或指责( rebuke的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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231 breach | |
n.违反,不履行;破裂;vt.冲破,攻破 | |
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232 lodger | |
n.寄宿人,房客 | |
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233 distraction | |
n.精神涣散,精神不集中,消遣,娱乐 | |
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234 expectancy | |
n.期望,预期,(根据概率统计求得)预期数额 | |
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235 slovenly | |
adj.懒散的,不整齐的,邋遢的 | |
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236 alienated | |
adj.感到孤独的,不合群的v.使疏远( alienate的过去式和过去分词 );使不友好;转让;让渡(财产等) | |
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237 lodgers | |
n.房客,租住者( lodger的名词复数 ) | |
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238 joyously | |
ad.快乐地, 高兴地 | |
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239 apprehension | |
n.理解,领悟;逮捕,拘捕;忧虑 | |
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240 helping | |
n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的,辅助的 | |
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241 zeal | |
n.热心,热情,热忱 | |
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242 accomplished | |
adj.有才艺的;有造诣的;达到了的 | |
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243 impatience | |
n.不耐烦,急躁 | |
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244 wrestle | |
vi.摔跤,角力;搏斗;全力对付 | |
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245 accentuate | |
v.着重,强调 | |
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246 inclination | |
n.倾斜;点头;弯腰;斜坡;倾度;倾向;爱好 | |
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247 condescended | |
屈尊,俯就( condescend的过去式和过去分词 ); 故意表示和蔼可亲 | |
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248 apparently | |
adv.显然地;表面上,似乎 | |
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249 heed | |
v.注意,留意;n.注意,留心 | |
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250 ardent | |
adj.热情的,热烈的,强烈的,烈性的 | |
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251 ardently | |
adv.热心地,热烈地 | |
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252 confide | |
v.向某人吐露秘密 | |
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253 friendliness | |
n.友谊,亲切,亲密 | |
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254 solitary | |
adj.孤独的,独立的,荒凉的;n.隐士 | |
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255 obstinate | |
adj.顽固的,倔强的,不易屈服的,较难治愈的 | |
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256 motive | |
n.动机,目的;adv.发动的,运动的 | |
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257 untie | |
vt.解开,松开;解放 | |
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258 wink | |
n.眨眼,使眼色,瞬间;v.眨眼,使眼色,闪烁 | |
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259 winked | |
v.使眼色( wink的过去式和过去分词 );递眼色(表示友好或高兴等);(指光)闪烁;闪亮 | |
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260 sprained | |
v.&n. 扭伤 | |
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261 stiffened | |
加强的 | |
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262 feverish | |
adj.发烧的,狂热的,兴奋的 | |
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263 vaguely | |
adv.含糊地,暖昧地 | |
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264 unbearable | |
adj.不能容忍的;忍受不住的 | |
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265 inquiries | |
n.调查( inquiry的名词复数 );疑问;探究;打听 | |
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266 antipathy | |
n.憎恶;反感,引起反感的人或事物 | |
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267 delightful | |
adj.令人高兴的,使人快乐的 | |
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268 sentimental | |
adj.多愁善感的,感伤的 | |
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269 voluptuously | |
adv.风骚地,体态丰满地 | |
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270 debauch | |
v.使堕落,放纵 | |
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271 syllables | |
n.音节( syllable的名词复数 ) | |
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272 contrived | |
adj.不自然的,做作的;虚构的 | |
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273 heartily | |
adv.衷心地,诚恳地,十分,很 | |
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274 bosom | |
n.胸,胸部;胸怀;内心;adj.亲密的 | |
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275 serenity | |
n.宁静,沉着,晴朗 | |
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276 effusively | |
adv.变溢地,热情洋溢地 | |
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277 embarrassment | |
n.尴尬;使人为难的人(事物);障碍;窘迫 | |
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278 presumption | |
n.推测,可能性,冒昧,放肆,[法律]推定 | |
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279 unreasonable | |
adj.不讲道理的,不合情理的,过度的 | |
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280 esteemed | |
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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281 mighty | |
adj.强有力的;巨大的 | |
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282 travail | |
n.阵痛;努力 | |
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283 throbbing | |
a. 跳动的,悸动的 | |
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284 enervation | |
n.无活力,衰弱 | |
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285 adolescence | |
n.青春期,青少年 | |
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286 cataclysm | |
n.洪水,剧变,大灾难 | |
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287 blotted | |
涂污( blot的过去式和过去分词 ); (用吸墨纸)吸干 | |
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288 folly | |
n.愚笨,愚蠢,蠢事,蠢行,傻话 | |
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289 ferment | |
vt.使发酵;n./vt.(使)激动,(使)动乱 | |
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290 disintegrated | |
v.(使)破裂[分裂,粉碎],(使)崩溃( disintegrate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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291 torpor | |
n.迟钝;麻木;(动物的)冬眠 | |
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292 monstrously | |
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293 gusts | |
一阵强风( gust的名词复数 ); (怒、笑等的)爆发; (感情的)迸发; 发作 | |
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294 racing | |
n.竞赛,赛马;adj.竞赛用的,赛马用的 | |
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295 chaos | |
n.混乱,无秩序 | |
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296 citadels | |
n.城堡,堡垒( citadel的名词复数 ) | |
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297 hemmed | |
缝…的褶边( hem的过去式和过去分词 ); 包围 | |
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298 crumbling | |
adj.摇摇欲坠的 | |
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299 corpse | |
n.尸体,死尸 | |
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300 swarm | |
n.(昆虫)等一大群;vi.成群飞舞;蜂拥而入 | |
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301 spasm | |
n.痉挛,抽搐;一阵发作 | |
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302 spasms | |
n.痉挛( spasm的名词复数 );抽搐;(能量、行为等的)突发;发作 | |
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303 suffocation | |
n.窒息 | |
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304 bondage | |
n.奴役,束缚 | |
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305 tenor | |
n.男高音(歌手),次中音(乐器),要旨,大意 | |
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306 subterranean | |
adj.地下的,地表下的 | |
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307 crevasse | |
n. 裂缝,破口;v.使有裂缝 | |
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308 gaping | |
adj.口的;张口的;敞口的;多洞穴的v.目瞪口呆地凝视( gape的现在分词 );张开,张大 | |
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309 engulf | |
vt.吞没,吞食 | |
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310 machinery | |
n.(总称)机械,机器;机构 | |
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311 outrageous | |
adj.无理的,令人不能容忍的 | |
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312 brute | |
n.野兽,兽性 | |
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313 tenacity | |
n.坚韧 | |
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314 wrenched | |
v.(猛力地)扭( wrench的过去式和过去分词 );扭伤;使感到痛苦;使悲痛 | |
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315 prey | |
n.被掠食者,牺牲者,掠食;v.捕食,掠夺,折磨 | |
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316 formerly | |
adv.从前,以前 | |
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317 cowardice | |
n.胆小,怯懦 | |
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318 anguish | |
n.(尤指心灵上的)极度痛苦,烦恼 | |
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319 scrutiny | |
n.详细检查,仔细观察 | |
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320 haphazard | |
adj.无计划的,随意的,杂乱无章的 | |
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321 heterogeneous | |
adj.庞杂的;异类的 | |
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322 whimsies | |
n.怪念头( whimsy的名词复数 );异想天开;怪脾气;与众不同的幽默感 | |
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323 brink | |
n.(悬崖、河流等的)边缘,边沿 | |
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324 spine | |
n.脊柱,脊椎;(动植物的)刺;书脊 | |
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325 tingled | |
v.有刺痛感( tingle的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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326 sluice | |
n.水闸 | |
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327 deluge | |
n./vt.洪水,暴雨,使泛滥 | |
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328 scent | |
n.气味,香味,香水,线索,嗅觉;v.嗅,发觉 | |
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329 amorous | |
adj.多情的;有关爱情的 | |
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330 cataract | |
n.大瀑布,奔流,洪水,白内障 | |
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331 somber | |
adj.昏暗的,阴天的,阴森的,忧郁的 | |
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332 eluded | |
v.(尤指机敏地)避开( elude的过去式和过去分词 );逃避;躲避;使达不到 | |
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333 futile | |
adj.无效的,无用的,无希望的 | |
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334 recurred | |
再发生,复发( recur的过去式和过去分词 ); 治愈 | |
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335 intensity | |
n.强烈,剧烈;强度;烈度 | |
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336 fiery | |
adj.燃烧着的,火红的;暴躁的;激烈的 | |
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337 fleeting | |
adj.短暂的,飞逝的 | |
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338 misty | |
adj.雾蒙蒙的,有雾的 | |
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339 irritation | |
n.激怒,恼怒,生气 | |
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340 odious | |
adj.可憎的,讨厌的 | |
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341 arrogated | |
v.冒称,妄取( arrogate的过去式和过去分词 );没来由地把…归属(于) | |
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342 solitude | |
n. 孤独; 独居,荒僻之地,幽静的地方 | |
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343 maniac | |
n.精神癫狂的人;疯子 | |
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344 obsession | |
n.困扰,无法摆脱的思想(或情感) | |
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345 delirium | |
n. 神智昏迷,说胡话;极度兴奋 | |
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346 writhing | |
(因极度痛苦而)扭动或翻滚( writhe的现在分词 ) | |
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347 upwards | |
adv.向上,在更高处...以上 | |
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348 grotesque | |
adj.怪诞的,丑陋的;n.怪诞的图案,怪人(物) | |
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349 contortions | |
n.扭歪,弯曲;扭曲,弄歪,歪曲( contortion的名词复数 ) | |
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350 humble | |
adj.谦卑的,恭顺的;地位低下的;v.降低,贬低 | |
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351 belly | |
n.肚子,腹部;(像肚子一样)鼓起的部分,膛 | |
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352 swarmed | |
密集( swarm的过去式和过去分词 ); 云集; 成群地移动; 蜜蜂或其他飞行昆虫成群地飞来飞去 | |
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353 grasshoppers | |
n.蚱蜢( grasshopper的名词复数 );蝗虫;蚂蚱;(孩子)矮小的 | |
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354 bustling | |
adj.喧闹的 | |
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355 beetles | |
n.甲虫( beetle的名词复数 ) | |
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356 frenzied | |
a.激怒的;疯狂的 | |
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357 scented | |
adj.有香味的;洒香水的;有气味的v.嗅到(scent的过去分词) | |
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358 trumpeting | |
大声说出或宣告(trumpet的现在分词形式) | |
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359 wasps | |
黄蜂( wasp的名词复数 ); 胡蜂; 易动怒的人; 刻毒的人 | |
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360 brass | |
n.黄铜;黄铜器,铜管乐器 | |
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361 rippling | |
起涟漪的,潺潺流水般声音的 | |
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362 limpid | |
adj.清澈的,透明的 | |
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363 rustling | |
n. 瑟瑟声,沙沙声 adj. 发沙沙声的 | |
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364 suffocating | |
a.使人窒息的 | |
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365 abrupt | |
adj.突然的,意外的;唐突的,鲁莽的 | |
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366 stifling | |
a.令人窒息的 | |
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367 enchanted | |
adj. 被施魔法的,陶醉的,入迷的 动词enchant的过去式和过去分词 | |
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368 mirage | |
n.海市蜃楼,幻景 | |
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369 rehearsal | |
n.排练,排演;练习 | |
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370 paltry | |
adj.无价值的,微不足道的 | |
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371 remorse | |
n.痛恨,悔恨,自责 | |
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372 peddling | |
忙于琐事的,无关紧要的 | |
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373 prudence | |
n.谨慎,精明,节俭 | |
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374 adorns | |
装饰,佩带( adorn的第三人称单数 ) | |
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375 preposterous | |
adj.荒谬的,可笑的 | |
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376 glut | |
n.存货过多,供过于求;v.狼吞虎咽 | |
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377 outskirts | |
n.郊外,郊区 | |
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378 hovered | |
鸟( hover的过去式和过去分词 ); 靠近(某事物); (人)徘徊; 犹豫 | |
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379 glimmer | |
v.发出闪烁的微光;n.微光,微弱的闪光 | |
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380 pottery | |
n.陶器,陶器场 | |
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381 verge | |
n.边,边缘;v.接近,濒临 | |
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382 spat | |
n.口角,掌击;v.发出呼噜呼噜声 | |
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383 filthy | |
adj.卑劣的;恶劣的,肮脏的 | |
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384 epithets | |
n.(表示性质、特征等的)词语( epithet的名词复数 ) | |
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385 beset | |
v.镶嵌;困扰,包围 | |
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386 plowed | |
v.耕( plow的过去式和过去分词 );犁耕;费力穿过 | |
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387 delirious | |
adj.不省人事的,神智昏迷的 | |
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388 turmoil | |
n.骚乱,混乱,动乱 | |
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