It is told that there was once a mighty1 river which ran south into the sea, and at the mouth thereof was a great and rich city, which had been builded and had waxed and thriven because of the great and most excellent haven2 which the river aforesaid made where it fell into the sea. And now it was like looking at a huge wood of barked and smoothened fir-trees when one saw the masts of the ships that lay in the said haven.
But up in this river ran the flood of tide a long way, so that the biggest of dromonds and round-ships might fare up it, and oft they lay amid pleasant up-country places, with their yards all but touching3 the windows of the husbandman's stead, and their bowsprits thrusting forth4 amongst the middens, and the routing swine, and querulous hens. And the uneasy lads and lasses sitting at high-mass of the Sunday in the grey church would see the tall masts amidst the painted saints of the aisle5 windows, and their minds would wander from the mass-hackled priest and the words and the gestures of him, and see visions of far countries and outlandish folk, and some would be heart-smitten with that desire of wandering and looking on new things which so oft the sea-beat board and the wind-strained pine bear with them to the dwellings6 of the stay-at-homes: and to some it seemed as if, when they went from out the church, they should fall in with St. Thomas of India stepping over the gangway, and come to visit their uplandish Christmas and the Yule-feast of the field-abiders of midwinter frost. And moreover, when the tide failed, and there was no longer a flood to bear the sea-going keels up-stream (and that was hard on an hundred of miles from the sea), yet was this great river a noble and wide-spreading water, and the downlong stream thereof not so heavy nor so fierce but that the barges7 and lesser8 keels might well spread their sails when the south-west blew, and fare on without beating; or if the wind were fouler9 for them, they that were loth to reach from shore to shore might be tracked up by the draught10 of horses and bullocks, and bear the wares11 of the merchants to many a cheaping.
Other rivers moreover not a few fell into this main flood, and of the some were no lesser than the Thames is at Abingdon, where I, who gathered this tale, dwell in the House of the Black Canons; blessed be St. William, and St. Richard, and the Holy Austin our candle in the dark! Yea and some were even bigger, so that the land was well furnished both of fisheries and water-ways.
Now the name of this river was the Sundering12 Flood, and the city at the mouth thereof was called the City of the Sundering Flood. And it is no wonder, considering all that I have told concerning the wares and chaffer that it bore up-country, though the folk of the City and its lands (and the city-folk in special) knew no cause for this name. Nay13, oft they jested and gibed14 and gabbed15, for they loved their river much and were proud of it; wherefore they said it was no sunderer but a uniter; that it joined land to land and shore to shore; that it had peopled the wilderness16 and made the waste places blossom, and that no highway for wheels and beasts in all the land was so full of blessings18 and joys as was their own wet Highway of the Flood. Nevertheless, as meseemeth that no name is given to any town or mountain or river causeless, but that men are moved to name all steads for a remembrance of deeds that have been done and tidings that have befallen, or some due cause, even so might it well be with the Sundering Flood, and whereas also I wot something of that cause I shall now presently show you the same.
For ye must know that all this welfare of the said mighty river was during that while that it flowed through the plain country anigh the city, or the fertile pastures and acres of hill and dale and down further to the north. But one who should follow it up further and further would reach at last the place where it came forth from the mountains. There, though it be far smaller than lower down, yet is it still a mighty great water, and it is then well two hundred miles from the main sea. Now from the mountains it cometh in three great forces, and many smaller ones, and perilous20 and awful it is to behold21; for betwixt those forces it filleth all the mountain ghyll, and there is no foothold for man, nay for goat, save at a hundred foot or more above the water, and that evil and perilous; and is the running of a winter millstream to the beetles22 and shrew-mice that haunt the greensward beside it, so is the running of that flood to the sons of Adam and the beasts that serve them: and none has been so bold as to strive to cast a bridge across it.
But when ye have journeyed with much toil23 and no little peril19 over the mountain-necks (for by the gorge24 of the river, as aforesaid, no man may go) and have come out of the mountains once more, then again ye have the flood before you, cleaving25 a great waste of rocks mingled26 with sand, where groweth neither tree nor bush nor grass; and now the flood floweth wide and shallow but swift, so that no words may tell of its swiftness, and on either side the water are great wastes of tumbled stones that the spates27 have borne down from the higher ground. And ye shall know that from this place upward to its very wells in the higher mountains, the flood decreaseth not much in body or might, though it be wider or narrower as it is shallower or deeper, for nought28 but mere29 trickles30 of water fall into it in the space of this sandy waste, and what feeding it hath is from the bents and hills on either side as you wend toward the mountains to the north, where, as aforesaid, are its chiefest wells.
Now when ye have journeyed over this waste for some sixty miles, the land begins to better, and there is grass again, yet no trees, and it rises into bents, which go back on each side, east and west, from the Flood, and the said bents are grass also up to the tops, where they are crested32 with sheer rocks black of colour. As for the Flood itself, it is now gathered into straiter compass, and is deep, and exceeding strong; high banks it hath on either side thereof of twenty foot and upward of black rock going down sheer to the water; and thus it is for a long way, save that the banks be higher and higher as the great valley of the river rises toward the northern mountains.
But as it rises the land betters yet, and is well grassed, and in divers33 nooks and crannies groweth small wood of birch and whiles of quicken tree; but ever the best of the grass waxeth nigh unto the lips of the Sundering Flood, where it rises a little from the Dale to the water; and what little acre-land there is, and it is but little, is up on knolls34 that lie nearer to the bent31, and be turned somewhat southward; or on the east side of the Flood (which runneth here nigh due north to south), on the bent-side itself, where, as it windeth and turneth, certain slopes lie turned to southwest. And in these places be a few garths, fenced against the deer, wherein grow rye, and some little barley35 whereof to make malt for beer and ale, whereas the folk of this high-up windy valley may have no comfort of wine. And it is to be said that ever is that land better and the getting more on the east side of the Sundering Flood than on the west.
As to the folk of this land, they are but few even now, and belike were fewer yet in the time of my tale. There was no great man amongst them, neither King, nor Earl, nor Alderman, and it had been hard living for a strong-thief in the Dale. Yet folk there were both on the east side and the west of the Flood. On neither side were they utterly36 cut off from the world outside the Dale; for though it were toilsome, it was not perilous to climb the bents and so wend over the necks east and west, where some forty miles from the west bank and fifty from the east you might come down into a valley fairly well peopled, wherein were two or three cheaping-towns: and to these towns the dalesmen had some resort, that they might sell such of their wool as they needed not to weave for themselves, and other small chaffer, so that they might buy wrought37 wares such as cutlery and pots, and above all boards and timber, whereof they had nought at home.
But this you must wot and understand, that howsoever the Sundering Flood might be misnamed down below, up in the Dale and down away to the southern mountains it was such that better named it might not be, and that nought might cross its waters undrowned save the fowl38 flying. Nay, and if one went up-stream to where it welled forth from the great mountains, he were no nearer to passing from one side to the other, for there would be nought before him but a wall of sheer rock, and above that rent and tumbled crags, the safe strong-houses of erne and osprey and gerfalcon. Wherefore all the dealings which the folk on the east Dale and the west might have with each other was but shouting and crying across the swirling39 and gurgling eddies40 of the black water, which themselves the while seemed to be talking together in some dread41 and unknown tongue.
True it is that on certain feast days and above all on Midsummer night, the folk would pluck up a heart, and gather together as gaily42 clad as might be where the Flood was the narrowest (save at one place, whereof more hereafter), and there on each side would trundle the fire-wheel, and do other Midsummer games, and make music of string-play and horns, and sing songs of old time and drink to each other, and depart at last to their own homes blessing17 each other. But never might any man on the east touch the hand of any on the west, save it were that by some strange wandering from the cheaping-towns aforesaid they might meet at last, far and far off from the Dale of the Sundering Flood.
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1
mighty
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| adj.强有力的；巨大的 | |
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2
haven
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| n.安全的地方，避难所，庇护所 | |
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3
touching
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| adj.动人的，使人感伤的 | |
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4
forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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5
aisle
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| n.（教堂、教室、戏院等里的）过道，通道 | |
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6
dwellings
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| n.住处，处所( dwelling的名词复数 ) | |
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7
barges
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| 驳船( barge的名词复数 ) | |
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8
lesser
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| adj.次要的，较小的；adv.较小地，较少地 | |
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9
fouler
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| adj.恶劣的( foul的比较级 )；邪恶的；难闻的；下流的 | |
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10
draught
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| n.拉，牵引，拖；一网（饮，吸，阵)；顿服药量，通风；v.起草，设计 | |
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11
wares
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| n. 货物, 商品 | |
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12
sundering
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| v.隔开，分开( sunder的现在分词 ) | |
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13
nay
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| adv.不；n.反对票，投反对票者 | |
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14
gibed
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| v.嘲笑，嘲弄( gibe的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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gabbed
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| v.空谈，唠叨，瞎扯( gab的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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16
wilderness
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| n.杳无人烟的一片陆地、水等，荒漠 | |
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17
blessing
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| n.祈神赐福；祷告；祝福，祝愿 | |
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18
blessings
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| n.（上帝的）祝福( blessing的名词复数 )；好事；福分；因祸得福 | |
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19
peril
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| n.(严重的)危险；危险的事物 | |
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20
perilous
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| adj.危险的，冒险的 | |
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21
behold
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| v.看，注视，看到 | |
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22
beetles
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| n.甲虫( beetle的名词复数 ) | |
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23
toil
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| vi.辛劳工作，艰难地行动；n.苦工，难事 | |
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24
gorge
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| n.咽喉，胃，暴食，山峡；v.塞饱，狼吞虎咽地吃 | |
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25
cleaving
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| v.劈开，剁开，割开( cleave的现在分词 ) | |
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26
mingled
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| 混合，混入( mingle的过去式和过去分词 )； 混进，与…交往[联系] | |
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27
spates
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| n.大量( spate的名词复数 )；（河流）暴涨；发洪水；（人）口若悬河 | |
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28
nought
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| n.／adj.无，零 | |
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29
mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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30
trickles
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| n.细流( trickle的名词复数 )；稀稀疏疏缓慢来往的东西v.滴( trickle的第三人称单数 )；淌；使)慢慢走；缓慢移动 | |
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31
bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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32
crested
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| adj.有顶饰的，有纹章的，有冠毛的v.到达山顶（或浪峰）( crest的过去式和过去分词 )；到达洪峰，达到顶点 | |
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33
divers
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| adj.不同的；种种的 | |
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34
knolls
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| n.小圆丘，小土墩( knoll的名词复数 ) | |
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35
barley
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| n.大麦，大麦粒 | |
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36
utterly
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| adv.完全地，绝对地 | |
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37
wrought
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| v.引起；以…原料制作；运转；adj.制造的 | |
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38
fowl
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| n.家禽，鸡，禽肉 | |
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39
swirling
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| v.旋转，打旋( swirl的现在分词 ) | |
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40
eddies
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| （水、烟等的）漩涡，涡流( eddy的名词复数 ) | |
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41
dread
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| vt.担忧，忧虑；惧怕，不敢；n.担忧，畏惧 | |
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42
gaily
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| adv.欢乐地，高兴地 | |
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