ALL was dark around him. Was it still midnight or had morning come? Morning, surely; for against the barred shutters1 he heard the tiny song of the robin2.
Tramp, tramp, too, came a heavy step up the stair. He had but a moment in which to scramble3 back into the interior of the great stove, when the door opened and the two dealers4 entered, bringing burning candles with them to see their way.
August was scarcely conscious of danger more than he was of cold or hunger. A marvellous sense of courage, of security, of happiness, was about him, like strong and gentle arms enfolding him and lifting him upwards—upwards—upwards! Hirschvogel would defend him.
The dealers undid5 the shutters, scaring the red-breast away, and then tramped about in their heavy boots and chattered6 in contented7 voices, and began to wrap up the stove once more in all its straw and hay and cordage.
It never once occurred to them to glance inside. Why should they look inside a stove that they had bought and were about to sell again for all its glorious beauty of exterior8?[79]
The child still did not feel afraid. A great exaltation had come to him: he was like one lifted up by his angels.
Presently the two traders called up their porters, and the stove, heedfully swathed and wrapped and tended as though it were some sick prince going on a journey, was borne on the shoulders of six stout9 Bavarians down the stairs and out of the door into the Marienplatz. Even behind all those wrappings August felt the icy bite of the intense cold of the outer air at dawn of a winter’s day in Munich. The men moved the stove with exceeding gentleness and care, so that he had often been far more roughly shaken in his big brothers’ arms than he was in his journey now; and though both hunger and thirst made themselves felt, being foes10 that will take no denial, he was still in that state of nervous exaltation which deadens all physical suffering and is at once a cordial and an opiate. He had heard Hirschvogel speak; that was enough.
The stout carriers tramped through the city, six of them, with the Nürnberg fire-castle on their brawny11 shoulders, and went right across Munich to the railway-station, and August in the dark recognized all the ugly, jangling, pounding, roaring, hissing12 railway-noises, and thought,[80] despite his courage and excitement, “Will it be a very long journey?” For his stomach had at times an odd sinking sensation, and his head sadly often felt light and swimming. If it was a very, very long journey he felt half afraid that he would be dead or something bad before the end, and Hirschvogel would be so lonely: that was what he thought most about; not much about himself, and not much about Dorothea and the house at home. He was “high strung to high emprise,” and could not look behind him.
Whether for a long or a short journey, whether for weal or woe13, the stove with August still within it was once more hoisted14 up into a great van; but this time it was not all alone, and the two dealers as well as the six porters were all with it.
He in his darkness knew that; for he heard their voices. The train glided15 away over the Bavarian plain southward; and he heard the men say something of Berg and the Wurm-See, but their German was strange to him, and he could not make out what these names meant.
The train rolled on, with all its fume16 and fuss, and roar of steam, and stench of oil and burning coal. It had to go quietly and slowly on account[81] of the snow which was falling, and which had fallen all night.
“He might have waited till he came to the city,” grumbled18 one man to another. “What weather to stay on at Berg!”
But who he was that stayed on at Berg, August could not make out at all.
Though the men grumbled about the state of the roads and the season, they were hilarious19 and well content, for they laughed often, and, when they swore, did so good-humoredly, and promised their porters fine presents at New-Year; and August, like a shrewd little boy as he was, who even in the secluded20 Innthal had learned that money is the chief mover of men’s mirth, thought to himself, with a terrible pang,—
“They have sold Hirschvogel for some great sum. They have sold him already!”
Then his heart grew faint and sick within him, for he knew very well that he must soon die, shut up without food and water thus; and what new owner of the great fire-palace would ever permit him to dwell in it?
“Never mind; I will die,” thought he; “and Hirschvogel will know it.”
Perhaps you think him a very foolish little fellow; but I do not.[82]
It is always good to be loyal and ready to endure to the end.
It is but an hour and a quarter that the train usually takes to pass from Munich to the Wurm-See or Lake of Starnberg; but this morning the journey was much slower, because the way was encumbered21 by snow. When it did reach Possenhofen and stop, and the Nürnberg stove was lifted out once more, August could see through the fret-work of the brass22 door, as the stove stood upright facing the lake, that this Wurm-See was a calm and noble piece of water, of great width, with low wooded banks and distant mountains, a peaceful, serene23 place, full of rest.
It was now near ten o’clock. The sun had come forth24; there was a clear gray sky hereabouts; the snow was not falling, though it lay white and smooth everywhere, down to the edge of the water, which before long would itself be ice.
Before he had time to get more than a glimpse of the green gliding25 surface, the stove was again lifted up and placed on a large boat that was in waiting,—one of those very long and huge boats which the women in these parts use as laundries, and the men as timber-rafts. The stove, with much labor26 and much expenditure27 of time and care, was hoisted into this, and August would have[83] grown sick and giddy with the heaving and falling if his big brothers had not long used him to such tossing about, so that he was as much at ease head, as feet, downward. The stove once in it safely with its guardians28, the big boat moved across the lake to Leoni. How a little hamlet on a Bavarian lake got that Tuscan-sounding name I cannot tell; but Leoni it is. The big boat was a long time crossing: the lake here is about three miles broad, and these heavy barges30 are unwieldy and heavy to move, even though they are towed and tugged31 at from the shore.
“If we should be too late!” the two dealers muttered to each other, in agitation32 and alarm. “He said eleven o’clock.”
“Who was he?” thought August; “the buyer, of course, of Hirschvogel.” The slow passage across the Wurm-See was accomplished33 at length: the lake was placid34; there was a sweet calm in the air and on the water; there was a great deal of snow in the sky, though the sun was shining and gave a solemn hush35 to the atmosphere. Boats and one little steamer were going up and down; in the clear frosty light the distant mountains of Zillerthal and the Algau Alps were visible; market-people, cloaked and furred, went by on the water or on the banks;[84] the deep woods of the shores were black and gray and brown. Poor August could see nothing of a scene that would have delighted him; as the stove was now set, he could only see the old worm-eaten wood of the huge barge29.
“Now, men, for a stout mile and half! You shall drink your reward at Christmas-time,” said one of the dealers to his porters, who, stout, strong men as they were, showed a disposition37 to grumble17 at their task. Encouraged by large promises, they shouldered sullenly38 the Nürnberg stove, grumbling39 again at its preposterous40 weight, but little dreaming that they carried within it a small, panting, trembling boy; for August began to tremble now that he was about to see the future owner of Hirschvogel.
“If he look a good, kind man,” he thought, “I will beg him to let me stay with it.”
点击
收听单词发音
收听单词发音 |
1
shutters
|
|
| 百叶窗( shutter的名词复数 )； （照相机的）快门 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
2
robin
|
|
| n.知更鸟，红襟鸟 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
3
scramble
|
|
| v.爬行，攀爬，杂乱蔓延，碎片，片段，废料 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
4
dealers
|
|
| n.商人( dealer的名词复数 )；贩毒者；毒品贩子；发牌者 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
5
Undid
|
|
| v. 解开, 复原 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
6
chattered
|
|
| （人）喋喋不休( chatter的过去式 )； 唠叨； （牙齿）打战； （机器）震颤 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
7
contented
|
|
| adj.满意的，安心的，知足的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
8
exterior
|
|
| adj.外部的，外在的；表面的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
10
foes
|
|
| 敌人，仇敌( foe的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
11
brawny
|
|
| adj.强壮的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
12
hissing
|
|
| n. 发嘶嘶声, 蔑视 动词hiss的现在分词形式 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
13
woe
|
|
| n.悲哀，苦痛，不幸，困难；int.用来表达悲伤或惊慌 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
14
hoisted
|
|
| 把…吊起，升起( hoist的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
15
glided
|
|
| v.滑动( glide的过去式和过去分词 )；掠过；（鸟或飞机 ） 滑翔 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
16
fume
|
|
| n.(usu pl.)(浓烈或难闻的)烟，气，汽 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
17
grumble
|
|
| vi.抱怨；咕哝；n.抱怨，牢骚；咕哝，隆隆声 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
18
grumbled
|
|
| 抱怨( grumble的过去式和过去分词 )； 发牢骚； 咕哝； 发哼声 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
19
hilarious
|
|
| adj.充满笑声的，欢闹的；[反]depressed | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
20
secluded
|
|
| adj.与世隔绝的；隐退的；偏僻的v.使隔开，使隐退( seclude的过去式和过去分词) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
21
encumbered
|
|
| v.妨碍，阻碍，拖累( encumber的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
22
brass
|
|
| n.黄铜；黄铜器，铜管乐器 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
23
serene
|
|
| adj. 安详的，宁静的，平静的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
24
forth
|
|
| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
25
gliding
|
|
| v. 滑翔 adj. 滑动的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
26
labor
|
|
| n.劳动，努力，工作，劳工；分娩；vi.劳动，努力，苦干；vt.详细分析；麻烦 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
27
expenditure
|
|
| n.(时间、劳力、金钱等)支出；使用，消耗 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
28
guardians
|
|
| 监护人( guardian的名词复数 )； 保护者，维护者 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
29
barge
|
|
| n.平底载货船，驳船 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
30
barges
|
|
| 驳船( barge的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
31
tugged
|
|
| v.用力拉，使劲拉，猛扯( tug的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
32
agitation
|
|
| n.搅动；搅拌；鼓动，煽动 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
33
accomplished
|
|
| adj.有才艺的；有造诣的；达到了的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
34
placid
|
|
| adj.安静的，平和的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
35
hush
|
|
| int.嘘，别出声；n.沉默，静寂；v.使安静 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
36
pier
|
|
| n.码头；桥墩，桥柱；[建]窗间壁，支柱 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
37
disposition
|
|
| n.性情，性格；意向，倾向；排列，部署 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
38
sullenly
|
|
| 不高兴地，绷着脸，忧郁地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
39
grumbling
|
|
| adj. 喃喃鸣不平的, 出怨言的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
40
preposterous
|
|
| adj.荒谬的，可笑的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
| 欢迎访问英文小说网 |