Ombra piu che di notte, in cui di luce
Raggio misto non e;
....
Ne piu il palagio appar, ne piu le sue
Vestigia; ne dir puossi — egli qui fue.
“Ger. Lib.”, canto1 xvi.-lxix.
(Darkness greater than of night, in which not a ray of light is mixed;...The palace appears no more: not even a vestige2,— nor can one say that it has been.)
The clubs are noisy with clamorous3 frenzy4; the leaders are grim with schemes. Black Henriot flies here and there, muttering to his armed troops, “Robespierre, your beloved, is in danger!” Robespierre stalks perturbed5, his list of victims swelling6 every hour. Tallien, the Macduff to the doomed7 Macbeth, is whispering courage to his pale conspirators8. Along the streets heavily roll the tumbrils. The shops are closed,— the people are gorged9 with gore10, and will lap no more. And night after night, to the eighty theatres flock the children of the Revolution, to laugh at the quips of comedy, and weep gentle tears over imaginary woes11!
In a small chamber12, in the heart of the city, sits the mother, watching over her child. It is quiet, happy noon; the sunlight, broken by the tall roofs in the narrow street, comes yet through the open casement13, the impartial14 playfellow of the air, gleesome alike in temple and prison, hall and hovel; as golden and as blithe16, whether it laugh over the first hour of life, or quiver in its gay delight on the terror and agony of the last! The child, where it lay at the feet of Viola, stretched out its dimpled hands as if to clasp the dancing motes17 that revelled18 in the beam. The mother turned her eyes from the glory; it saddened her yet more. She turned and sighed.
Is this the same Viola who bloomed fairer than their own Idalia under the skies of Greece? How changed! How pale and worn! She sat listlessly, her arms dropping on her knee; the smile that was habitual19 to her lips was gone. A heavy, dull despondency, as if the life of life were no more, seemed to weigh down her youth, and make it weary of that happy sun! In truth, her existence had languished20 away since it had wandered, as some melancholy22 stream, from the source that fed it. The sudden enthusiasm of fear or superstition23 that had almost, as if still in the unconscious movements of a dream, led her to fly from Zanoni, had ceased from the day which dawned upon her in a foreign land. Then — there — she felt that in the smile she had evermore abandoned lived her life. She did not repent24,— she would not have recalled the impulse that winged her flight. Though the enthusiasm was gone, the superstition yet remained; she still believed she had saved her child from that dark and guilty sorcery, concerning which the traditions of all lands are prodigal25, but in none do they find such credulity, or excite such dread26, as in the South of Italy. This impression was confirmed by the mysterious conversations of Glyndon, and by her own perception of the fearful change that had passed over one who represented himself as the victim of the enchanters. She did not, therefore, repent; but her very volition27 seemed gone.
On their arrival at Paris, Viola saw her companion — the faithful wife — no more. Ere three weeks were passed, husband and wife had ceased to live.
And now, for the first time, the drudgeries of this hard earth claimed the beautiful Neapolitan. In that profession, giving voice and shape to poetry and song, in which her first years were passed, there is, while it lasts, an excitement in the art that lifts it from the labour of a calling. Hovering28 between two lives, the Real and Ideal, dwells the life of music and the stage. But that life was lost evermore to the idol29 of the eyes and ears of Naples. Lifted to the higher realm of passionate30 love, it seemed as if the fictitious31 genius which represents the thoughts of others was merged32 in the genius that grows all thought itself. It had been the worst infidelity to the Lost, to have descended33 again to live on the applause of others. And so — for she would not accept alms from Glyndon — so, by the commonest arts, the humblest industry which the sex knows, alone and unseen, she who had slept on the breast of Zanoni found a shelter for their child. As when, in the noble verse prefixed to this chapter, Armida herself has destroyed her enchanted34 palace,— not a vestige of that bower35, raised of old by Poetry and Love, remained to say, “It had been!”
And the child avenged36 the father; it bloomed, it thrived,— it waxed strong in the light of life. But still it seemed haunted and preserved by some other being than her own. In its sleep there was that slumber37, so deep and rigid38, which a thunderbolt could not have disturbed; and in such sleep often it moved its arms, as to embrace the air: often its lips stirred with murmured sounds of indistinct affection,— NOT FOR HER; and all the while upon its cheeks a hue39 of such celestial40 bloom, upon its lips a smile of such mysterious joy! Then, when it waked, its eyes did not turn first to HER,— wistful, earnest, wandering, they roved around, to fix on her pale face, at last, in mute sorrow and reproach.
Never had Viola felt before how mighty41 was her love for Zanoni; how thought, feeling, heart, soul, life,— all lay crushed and dormant42 in the icy absence to which she had doomed herself! She heard not the roar without, she felt not one amidst those stormy millions,— worlds of excitement labouring through every hour. Only when Glyndon, haggard, wan21, and spectre-like, glided43 in, day after day, to visit her, did the fair daughter of the careless South know how heavy and universal was the Death–Air that girt her round. Sublime44 in her passive unconsciousness,— her mechanic life,— she sat, and feared not, in the den15 of the Beasts of Prey45.
The door of the room opened abruptly46, and Glyndon entered. His manner was more agitated47 than usual.
“Is it you, Clarence?” she said in her soft, languid tones. “You are before the hour I expected you.”
“Who can count on his hours at Paris?” returned Glyndon, with a frightful48 smile. “Is it not enough that I am here! Your apathy49 in the midst of these sorrows appalls50 me. You say calmly, ‘Farewell;’ calmly you bid me, ‘Welcome!’— as if in every corner there was not a spy, and as if with every day there was not a massacre51!”
“Pardon me! But in these walls lies my world. I can hardly credit all the tales you tell me. Everything here, save THAT,” and she pointed52 to the infant, “seems already so lifeless, that in the tomb itself one could scarcely less heed53 the crimes that are done without.”
Glyndon paused for a few moments, and gazed with strange and mingled54 feelings upon that face and form, still so young, and yet so invested with that saddest of all repose,— when the heart feels old.
“O Viola,” said he, at last, and in a voice of suppressed passion, “was it thus I ever thought to see you,— ever thought to feel for you, when we two first met in the gay haunts of Naples? Ah, why then did you refuse my love; or why was mine not worthy55 of you? Nay56, shrink not!— let me touch your hand. No passion so sweet as that youthful love can return to me again. I feel for you but as a brother for some younger and lonely sister. With you, in your presence, sad though it be, I seem to breathe back the purer air of my early life. Here alone, except in scenes of turbulence57 and tempest, the Phantom58 ceases to pursue me. I forget even the Death that stalks behind, and haunts me as my shadow. But better days may be in store for us yet. Viola, I at last begin dimly to perceive how to baffle and subdue59 the Phantom that has cursed my life,— it is to brave, and defy it. In sin and in riot, as I have told thee, it haunts me not. But I comprehend now what Mejnour said in his dark apothegms, ‘that I should dread the spectre most WHEN UNSEEN.’ In virtuous60 and calm resolution it appears,— ay, I behold61 it now; there, there, with its livid eyes!”— and the drops fell from his brow. “But it shall no longer daunt62 me from that resolution. I face it, and it gradually darkens back into the shade.” He paused, and his eyes dwelt with a terrible exultation63 upon the sunlit space; then, with a heavy and deep-drawn breath, he resumed, “Viola, I have found the means of escape. We will leave this city. In some other land we will endeavour to comfort each other, and forget the past.”
“No,” said Viola, calmly; “I have no further wish to stir, till I am born hence to the last resting-place. I dreamed of him last night, Clarence!— dreamed of him for the first time since we parted; and, do not mock me, methought that he forgave the deserter, and called me ‘Wife.’ That dream hallows the room. Perhaps it will visit me again before I die.”
“Talk not of him,— of the demi-fiend!” cried Glyndon, fiercely, and stamping his foot. “Thank the Heavens for any fate that hath rescued thee from him!”
“Hush!” said Viola, gravely. And as she was about to proceed, her eye fell upon the child. It was standing64 in the very centre of that slanting65 column of light which the sun poured into the chamber; and the rays seemed to surround it as a halo, and settled, crown-like, on the gold of its shining hair. In its small shape, so exquisitely66 modelled, in its large, steady, tranquil67 eyes, there was something that awed68, while it charmed the mother’s pride. It gazed on Glyndon as he spoke69, with a look which almost might have seemed disdain70, and which Viola, at least, interpreted as a defence of the Absent, stronger than her own lips could frame.
Glyndon broke the pause.
“Thou wouldst stay, for what? To betray a mother’s duty! If any evil happen to thee here, what becomes of thine infant? Shall it be brought up an orphan71, in a country that has desecrated72 thy religion, and where human charity exists no more? Ah, weep, and clasp it to thy bosom73; but tears do not protect and save.”
“Thou hast conquered, my friend, I will fly with thee.”
“To-morrow night, then, be prepared. I will bring thee the necessary disguises.”
And Glyndon then proceeded to sketch74 rapidly the outline of the path they were to take, and the story they were to tell. Viola listened, but scarcely comprehended; he pressed her hand to his heart and departed.
1 canto | |
n.长篇诗的章 | |
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2 vestige | |
n.痕迹,遗迹,残余 | |
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3 clamorous | |
adj.吵闹的,喧哗的 | |
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4 frenzy | |
n.疯狂,狂热,极度的激动 | |
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5 perturbed | |
adj.烦燥不安的v.使(某人)烦恼,不安( perturb的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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6 swelling | |
n.肿胀 | |
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7 doomed | |
命定的 | |
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8 conspirators | |
n.共谋者,阴谋家( conspirator的名词复数 ) | |
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9 gorged | |
v.(用食物把自己)塞饱,填饱( gorge的过去式和过去分词 );作呕 | |
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10 gore | |
n.凝血,血污;v.(动物)用角撞伤,用牙刺破;缝以补裆;顶 | |
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11 woes | |
困境( woe的名词复数 ); 悲伤; 我好苦哇; 某人就要倒霉 | |
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12 chamber | |
n.房间,寝室;会议厅;议院;会所 | |
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13 casement | |
n.竖铰链窗;窗扉 | |
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14 impartial | |
adj.(in,to)公正的,无偏见的 | |
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15 den | |
n.兽穴;秘密地方;安静的小房间,私室 | |
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16 blithe | |
adj.快乐的,无忧无虑的 | |
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17 motes | |
n.尘埃( mote的名词复数 );斑点 | |
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18 revelled | |
v.作乐( revel的过去式和过去分词 );狂欢;着迷;陶醉 | |
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19 habitual | |
adj.习惯性的;通常的,惯常的 | |
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20 languished | |
长期受苦( languish的过去式和过去分词 ); 受折磨; 变得(越来越)衰弱; 因渴望而变得憔悴或闷闷不乐 | |
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21 wan | |
(wide area network)广域网 | |
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22 melancholy | |
n.忧郁,愁思;adj.令人感伤(沮丧)的,忧郁的 | |
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23 superstition | |
n.迷信,迷信行为 | |
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24 repent | |
v.悔悟,悔改,忏悔,后悔 | |
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25 prodigal | |
adj.浪费的,挥霍的,放荡的 | |
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26 dread | |
vt.担忧,忧虑;惧怕,不敢;n.担忧,畏惧 | |
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27 volition | |
n.意志;决意 | |
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28 hovering | |
鸟( hover的现在分词 ); 靠近(某事物); (人)徘徊; 犹豫 | |
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29 idol | |
n.偶像,红人,宠儿 | |
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30 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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31 fictitious | |
adj.虚构的,假设的;空头的 | |
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32 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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33 descended | |
a.为...后裔的,出身于...的 | |
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34 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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35 bower | |
n.凉亭,树荫下凉快之处;闺房;v.荫蔽 | |
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36 avenged | |
v.为…复仇,报…之仇( avenge的过去式和过去分词 );为…报复 | |
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37 slumber | |
n.睡眠,沉睡状态 | |
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38 rigid | |
adj.严格的,死板的;刚硬的,僵硬的 | |
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39 hue | |
n.色度;色调;样子 | |
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40 celestial | |
adj.天体的;天上的 | |
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41 mighty | |
adj.强有力的;巨大的 | |
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42 dormant | |
adj.暂停活动的;休眠的;潜伏的 | |
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43 glided | |
v.滑动( glide的过去式和过去分词 );掠过;(鸟或飞机 ) 滑翔 | |
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44 sublime | |
adj.崇高的,伟大的;极度的,不顾后果的 | |
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45 prey | |
n.被掠食者,牺牲者,掠食;v.捕食,掠夺,折磨 | |
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46 abruptly | |
adv.突然地,出其不意地 | |
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47 agitated | |
adj.被鼓动的,不安的 | |
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48 frightful | |
adj.可怕的;讨厌的 | |
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49 apathy | |
n.漠不关心,无动于衷;冷淡 | |
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50 appalls | |
v.使惊骇,使充满恐惧( appall的第三人称单数 ) | |
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51 massacre | |
n.残杀,大屠杀;v.残杀,集体屠杀 | |
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52 pointed | |
adj.尖的,直截了当的 | |
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53 heed | |
v.注意,留意;n.注意,留心 | |
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54 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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55 worthy | |
adj.(of)值得的,配得上的;有价值的 | |
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56 nay | |
adv.不;n.反对票,投反对票者 | |
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57 turbulence | |
n.喧嚣,狂暴,骚乱,湍流 | |
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58 phantom | |
n.幻影,虚位,幽灵;adj.错觉的,幻影的,幽灵的 | |
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59 subdue | |
vt.制服,使顺从,征服;抑制,克制 | |
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60 virtuous | |
adj.有品德的,善良的,贞洁的,有效力的 | |
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61 behold | |
v.看,注视,看到 | |
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62 daunt | |
vt.使胆怯,使气馁 | |
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63 exultation | |
n.狂喜,得意 | |
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64 standing | |
n.持续,地位;adj.永久的,不动的,直立的,不流动的 | |
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65 slanting | |
倾斜的,歪斜的 | |
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66 exquisitely | |
adv.精致地;强烈地;剧烈地;异常地 | |
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67 tranquil | |
adj. 安静的, 宁静的, 稳定的, 不变的 | |
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68 awed | |
adj.充满敬畏的,表示敬畏的v.使敬畏,使惊惧( awe的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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69 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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70 disdain | |
n.鄙视,轻视;v.轻视,鄙视,不屑 | |
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71 orphan | |
n.孤儿;adj.无父母的 | |
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72 desecrated | |
毁坏或亵渎( desecrate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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73 bosom | |
n.胸,胸部;胸怀;内心;adj.亲密的 | |
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74 sketch | |
n.草图;梗概;素描;v.素描;概述 | |
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