My brother was a tall fellow of twenty-one who had the freedom of the house and grounds in which to work out any of his fancies. During my convalescence10 I entertained myself greatly speculating about something he was busy with in the garden, which something I was dying of impatience11 to see. At the end of the yard, in a lovely nook under an old plum tree, my brother was making a tiny lake; he had dug it out and cemented it like a cistern12, and from the country round about he procured13 stones and quantities of moss14 with which to make the banks about the lake romantic looking; he also constructed rocky elevations15 and grottoes out of stones and mosses17.
And this work was finished the day that I went out for the first time; they had even put little gold fish into the water, and they turned on the tiny fountain and it played in my honor.
I approached it with ecstasy18, and I found that it greatly surpassed in beauty anything that my imagination had been able to conjure19 up. And when my brother told me it was mine, I felt a joy so intense that it seemed to me it must last forever. Oh! what unexpected joy to possess it for my very own! And what happiness to know that I could enjoy it every single day during the warm and beautiful months that were to come. And the thought of being able to live out of doors again, the prospect20 of playing in every nook of that lovely garden, as I had done the previous summer, was rapture21 to me.
I remained at the edge of the pond a long time, looking at it and admiring it unceasingly, and I breathed in the sweet, mild spring air, and warmed myself in the radiant sunlight so long denied to me. The old plum tree above my head, planted so long ago by one of my ancestors, and now almost at the end of its usefulness, spread its lacy curtain of new leaves to the tender blue of the sky, and the tiny fountain in its shade continued its tuneful melody as if it were a little hurdy-gurdy celebrating my return to health.
To-day that old plum tree is dead and its trunk the only thing left of it, and spared out of respect, is covered, like a ruin, with ivy22 vines.
But the pond, with its grottoes and islets, still remains23 intact; time has given it the appearance of genuine nature herself. Its greenish stones look old and decayed; the mosses, the delicate little plants brought from the river, and the rushes and wild iris24 have acclimated25 themselves, and dragon flies that stray through the town take refuge there—a bit of wild nature has established itself in that little corner and I hope it will never be disturbed.
I am more loyally attached to that spot than to any other, although I have loved many places; in no other one have I found so much peace; there I feel tranquil26, there I refresh myself and acquire youth and new life. That little corner is my sacred Mecca, so much indeed is it to me that should any one destroy it I would feel as if some vital thing in my life had lost balance, would feel that I had missed my footing, or almost imagine that it presaged27 the beginning of my end.
The reverent28 feeling that I have for the place has been born, I believe, from my sea-faring life, with its long voyages to distant places and its dreary29 exiles during which I thought and dreamed of it constantly.
There is in particular one little grotto16 for which I have an especial affection: the memory of it has often, in times of depression and melancholy30, during the years of weary exile heartened me.
After the angel Azrael had so cruelly passed our way, after reverses of many sorts, and during that sad term when I was a wanderer on the face of the earth, and my widowed mother and my aunt Claire were left alone in the beloved but deserted31 home that was almost as silent as a tomb, I experienced many a heartache as I thought of the dear hearthstone and of the things so familiar to my childhood that were doubtless going to ruin through neglect. I felt especially anxious to know if the storms of winter and the hands of time had destroyed the delicate arch of that grotto; and strange as it may seem, if those little moss-covered rocks had fallen in I would have felt that an almost irreparable breach32 had been made in my own life.
At the side of the pond there is an old gray wall which is an integral part of the corner that I call my Holy Mecca; I think it is the very centre of the sacred place, and I recall the tiniest details of it. I can picture to myself the scarcely visible mosses that grow there, and the gaps made by time, which the spiders now inhabit. Growing up at the back of the wall there is an arbor33 of ivy and honeysuckles whose shade I sought daily every beautiful summer day for the purpose of studying my lessons. But I lounged there lazily, as a school-boy will, and allowed all my attention to be absorbed by those gray stones with their teeming34 world of insects. Not only do I love and venerate35 that old wall as the Moslems love their holiest mosque36, but I regard it also as something which actually protects me; as something which conserves37 my life and prolongs my youth. I would not suffer any one to change it in the least, and should it be demolished38 I would feel as if the very supports under my life were insecure. May it not be because certain things persist, and are known to us throughout our lives, that we borrow from thence delusions39 in regard to our own stability and our own continuance. Seeing that they abide40 we suppose that we cannot change nor cease to be.
Personally I cannot explain these sentiments of mine in any other way than to regard them as some sort of fetich worship.
And when I consider that those stones are very like other stones, that they have been brought from I know not where, by whom I care not, to be built into a wall by workmen who lived and died a century before I was even thought of, I realize the childishness of the illusion, which I indulge in spite of myself, that it can extend any sort of spiritual protection to me; I comprehend only too well what a frail41 and unstable42 base has that that symbolizes43 for me the permanency of life.
Those who have never had a permanent home, but who have from infancy44 been taken from place to place, living in lodgings45 meantime, may not be able to appreciate these sentiments.
But among those who have daily gathered about the same hearthstone, there are, I am sure, many who, without confessing it, are susceptible46 in varying degrees to impressions of this sort. And do not such people often, because of an old stone wall, a garden known and loved since childhood, an old terrace which has become in indestructible part of their memory, or an old tree that has not changed form within their lives, seek a warrant for their own hope of immortality47?
And doubtless, alas48! before their birth these objects lent the same delusive49 countenance50 to others, to those unknown now turned to dust and gone to nothingness, who may not even have been of their blood and race.
点击收听单词发音
1 sinister | |
adj.不吉利的,凶恶的,左边的 | |
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2 bower | |
n.凉亭,树荫下凉快之处;闺房;v.荫蔽 | |
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3 enchantment | |
n.迷惑,妖术,魅力 | |
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4 enacted | |
制定(法律),通过(法案)( enact的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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5 renewal | |
adj.(契约)延期,续订,更新,复活,重来 | |
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6 aged | |
adj.年老的,陈年的 | |
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7 intoxication | |
n.wild excitement;drunkenness;poisoning | |
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8 bespoke | |
adj.(产品)订做的;专做订货的v.预定( bespeak的过去式 );订(货);证明;预先请求 | |
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9 mightily | |
ad.强烈地;非常地 | |
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10 convalescence | |
n.病后康复期 | |
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11 impatience | |
n.不耐烦,急躁 | |
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12 cistern | |
n.贮水池 | |
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13 procured | |
v.(努力)取得, (设法)获得( procure的过去式和过去分词 );拉皮条 | |
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14 moss | |
n.苔,藓,地衣 | |
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15 elevations | |
(水平或数量)提高( elevation的名词复数 ); 高地; 海拔; 提升 | |
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16 grotto | |
n.洞穴 | |
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17 mosses | |
n. 藓类, 苔藓植物 名词moss的复数形式 | |
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18 ecstasy | |
n.狂喜,心醉神怡,入迷 | |
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19 conjure | |
v.恳求,祈求;变魔术,变戏法 | |
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20 prospect | |
n.前景,前途;景色,视野 | |
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21 rapture | |
n.狂喜;全神贯注;着迷;v.使狂喜 | |
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22 ivy | |
n.常青藤,常春藤 | |
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23 remains | |
n.剩余物,残留物;遗体,遗迹 | |
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24 iris | |
n.虹膜,彩虹 | |
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25 acclimated | |
v.使适应新环境,使服水土服水土,适应( acclimate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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26 tranquil | |
adj. 安静的, 宁静的, 稳定的, 不变的 | |
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27 presaged | |
v.预示,预兆( presage的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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28 reverent | |
adj.恭敬的,虔诚的 | |
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29 dreary | |
adj.令人沮丧的,沉闷的,单调乏味的 | |
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30 melancholy | |
n.忧郁,愁思;adj.令人感伤(沮丧)的,忧郁的 | |
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31 deserted | |
adj.荒芜的,荒废的,无人的,被遗弃的 | |
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32 breach | |
n.违反,不履行;破裂;vt.冲破,攻破 | |
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33 arbor | |
n.凉亭;树木 | |
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34 teeming | |
adj.丰富的v.充满( teem的现在分词 );到处都是;(指水、雨等)暴降;倾注 | |
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35 venerate | |
v.尊敬,崇敬,崇拜 | |
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36 mosque | |
n.清真寺 | |
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37 conserves | |
n.(含有大块或整块水果的)果酱,蜜饯( conserve的名词复数 )v.保护,保藏,保存( conserve的第三人称单数 ) | |
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38 demolished | |
v.摧毁( demolish的过去式和过去分词 );推翻;拆毁(尤指大建筑物);吃光 | |
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39 delusions | |
n.欺骗( delusion的名词复数 );谬见;错觉;妄想 | |
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40 abide | |
vi.遵守;坚持;vt.忍受 | |
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41 frail | |
adj.身体虚弱的;易损坏的 | |
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42 unstable | |
adj.不稳定的,易变的 | |
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43 symbolizes | |
v.象征,作为…的象征( symbolize的第三人称单数 ) | |
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44 infancy | |
n.婴儿期;幼年期;初期 | |
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45 lodgings | |
n. 出租的房舍, 寄宿舍 | |
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46 susceptible | |
adj.过敏的,敏感的;易动感情的,易受感动的 | |
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47 immortality | |
n.不死,不朽 | |
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48 alas | |
int.唉(表示悲伤、忧愁、恐惧等) | |
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49 delusive | |
adj.欺骗的,妄想的 | |
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50 countenance | |
n.脸色,面容;面部表情;vt.支持,赞同 | |
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