Mrs. Farrinder, meanwhile, was not eager to address the assembly. She confessed as much to Olive Chancellor1, with a smile which asked that a temporary lapse2 of promptness might not be too harshly judged. She had addressed so many assemblies, and she wanted to hear what other people had to say. Miss Chancellor herself had thought so much on the vital subject; would not she make a few remarks and give them some of her experiences? How did the ladies on Beacon3 Street feel about the ballot4? Perhaps she could speak for them more than for some others. That was a branch of the question on which, it might be, the leaders had not information enough; but they wanted to take in everything, and why shouldn’t Miss Chancellor just make that field her own? Mrs. Farrinder spoke5 in the tone of one who took views so wide that they might easily, at first, before you could see how she worked round, look almost meretricious6; she was conscious of a scope that exceeded the first flight of your imagination. She urged upon her companion the idea of labouring in the world of fashion, appeared to attribute to her familiar relations with that mysterious realm, and wanted to know why she shouldn’t stir up some of her friends down there on the Mill-dam?
Olive Chancellor received this appeal with peculiar7 feelings. With her immense sympathy for reform, she found herself so often wishing that reformers were a little different. There was something grand about Mrs. Farrinder; it lifted one up to be with her: but there was a false note when she spoke to her young friend about the ladies in Beacon Street. Olive hated to hear that fine avenue talked about as if it were such a remarkable8 place, and to live there were a proof of worldly glory. All sorts of inferior people lived there, and so brilliant a woman as Mrs. Farrinder, who lived at Roxbury, ought not to mix things up. It was, of course, very wretched to be irritated by such mistakes; but this was not the first time Miss Chancellor had observed that the possession of nerves was not by itself a reason for embracing the new truths. She knew her place in the Boston hierarchy9, and it was not what Mrs. Farrinder supposed; so that there was a want of perspective in talking to her as if she had been a representative of the aristocracy. Nothing could be weaker, she knew very well, than (in the United States) to apply that term too literally10; nevertheless, it would represent a reality if one were to say that, by distinction, the Chancellors11 belonged to the bourgeoisie — the oldest and best. They might care for such a position or not (as it happened, they were very proud of it), but there they were, and it made Mrs. Farrinder seem provincial12 (there was something provincial, after all, in the way she did her hair too) not to understand. When Miss Birdseye spoke as if one were a “leader of society,” Olive could forgive her even that odious13 expression, because, of course, one never pretended that she, poor dear, had the smallest sense of the real. She was heroic, she was sublime14, the whole moral history of Boston was reflected in her displaced spectacles; but it was a part of her originality15, as it were, that she was deliciously provincial. Olive Chancellor seemed to herself to have privileges enough without being affiliated16 to the exclusive set and having invitations to the smaller parties, which were the real test; it was a mercy for her that she had not that added immorality17 on her conscience. The ladies Mrs. Farrinder meant (it was to be supposed she meant some particular ones) might speak for themselves. She wished to work in another field; she had long been preoccupied18 with the romance of the people. She had an immense desire to know intimately some very poor girl. This might seem one of the most accessible of pleasures; but, in point of fact, she had not found it so. There were two or three pale shop-maidens whose acquaintance she had sought; but they had seemed afraid of her, and the attempt had come to nothing. She took them more tragically19 then they took themselves; they couldn’t make out what she wanted them to do, and they always ended by being odiously20 mixed up with Charlie. Charlie was a young man in a white overcoat and a paper collar; it was for him, in the last analysis, that they cared much the most. They cared far more about Charlie than about the ballot. Olive Chancellor wondered how Mrs. Farrinder would treat that branch of the question. In her researches among her young townswomen she had always found this obtrusive21 swain planted in her path, and she grew at last to dislike him extremely. It filled her with exasperation22 to think that he should be necessary to the happiness of his victims (she had learned that whatever they might talk about with her, it was of him and him only that they discoursed23 among themselves), and one of the main recommendations of the evening club for her fatigued24, underpaid sisters, which it had long been her dream to establish, was that it would in some degree undermine his position — distinct as her prevision might be that he would be in waiting at the door. She hardly knew what to say to Mrs. Farrinder when this momentarily misdirected woman, still preoccupied with the Mill-dam, returned to the charge.
“We want labourers in that field, though I know two or three lovely women — sweet home-women — moving in circles that are for the most part closed to every new voice, who are doing their best to help on the fight. I have several names that might surprise you, names well known on State Street. But we can’t have too many recruits, especially among those whose refinement25 is generally acknowledged. If it be necessary, we are prepared to take certain steps to conciliate the shrinking. Our movement is for all — it appeals to the most delicate ladies. Raise the standard among them, and bring me a thousand names. I know several that I should like to have. I look after the details as well as the big currents,” Mrs. Farrinder added, in a tone as explanatory as could be expected of such a woman, and with a smile of which the sweetness was thrilling to her listener.
“I can’t talk to those people, I can’t!” said Olive Chancellor, with a face which seemed to plead for a remission of responsibility. “I want to give myself up to others; I want to know everything that lies beneath and out of sight, don’t you know? I want to enter into the lives of women who are lonely, who are piteous. I want to be near to them — to help them. I want to do something — oh, I should like so to speak!”
“We should be glad to have you make a few remarks at present,” Mrs. Farrinder declared, with a punctuality which revealed the faculty26 of presiding.
“Oh dear, no, I can’t speak; I have none of that sort of talent. I have no self-possession, no eloquence27; I can’t put three words together. But I do want to contribute.”
“What have you got?” Mrs. Farrinder inquired, looking at her interlocutress, up and down, with the eye of business, in which there was a certain chill. “Have you got money?”
Olive was so agitated28 for the moment with the hope that this great woman would approve of her on the financial side that she took no time to reflect that some other quality might, in courtesy, have been suggested. But she confessed to possessing a certain capital, and the tone seemed rich and deep in which Mrs. Farrinder said to her, “Then contribute that!” She was so good as to develop this idea, and her picture of the part Miss Chancellor might play by making liberal donations to a fund for the diffusion29 among the women of America of a more adequate conception of their public and private rights — a fund her adviser30 had herself lately inaugurated — this bold, rapid sketch31 had the vividness which characterised the speaker’s most successful public efforts. It placed Olive under the spell; it made her feel almost inspired. If her life struck others in that way — especially a woman like Mrs. Farrinder, whose horizon was so full — then there must be something for her to do. It was one thing to choose for herself, but now the great representative of the enfranchisement32 of their sex (from every form of bondage) had chosen for her.
The barren, gas-lighted room grew richer and richer to her earnest eyes; it seemed to expand, to open itself to the great life of humanity. The serious, tired people, in their bonnets33 and overcoats, began to glow like a company of heroes. Yes, she would do something, Olive Chancellor said to herself; she would do something to brighten the darkness of that dreadful image that was always before her, and against which it seemed to her at times that she had been born to lead a crusade — the image of the unhappiness of women. The unhappiness of women! The voice of their silent suffering was always in her ears, the ocean of tears that they had shed from the beginning of time seemed to pour through her own eyes. Ages of oppression had rolled over them; uncounted millions had lived only to be tortured, to be crucified. They were her sisters, they were her own, and the day of their delivery had dawned. This was the only sacred cause; this was the great, the just revolution. It must triumph, it must sweep everything before it; it must exact from the other, the brutal34, blood-stained, ravening35 race, the last particle of expiation36! It would be the greatest change the world had seen; it would be a new era for the human family, and the names of those who had helped to show the way and lead the squadrons would be the brightest in the tables of fame. They would be names of women weak, insulted, persecuted37, but devoted38 in every pulse of their being to the cause, and asking no better fate than to die for it. It was not clear to this interesting girl in what manner such a sacrifice (as this last) would be required of her, but she saw the matter through a kind of sunrise-mist of emotion which made danger as rosy39 as success. When Miss Birdseye approached, it transfigured her familiar, her comical shape, and made the poor little humanitary hack40 seem already a martyr41. Olive Chancellor looked at her with love, remembered that she had never, in her long, unrewarded, weary life, had a thought or an impulse for herself. She had been consumed by the passion of sympathy; it had crumpled42 her into as many creases43 as an old glazed44, distended45 glove. She had been laughed at, but she never knew it; she was treated as a bore, but she never cared. She had nothing in the world but the clothes on her back, and when she should go down into the grave she would leave nothing behind her but her grotesque46, undistinguished, pathetic little name. And yet people said that women were vain, that they were personal, that they were interested! While Miss Birdseye stood there, asking Mrs. Farrinder if she wouldn’t say something, Olive Chancellor tenderly fastened a small battered47 brooch which confined her collar and which had half detached itself.
收听单词发音 |
1
chancellor
|
|
| n.(英)大臣；法官；(德、奥)总理；大学校长 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
2
lapse
|
|
| n.过失，流逝，失效，抛弃信仰，间隔；vi.堕落，停止，失效，流逝；vt.使失效 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
3
beacon
|
|
| n.烽火，（警告用的）闪火灯，灯塔 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
4
ballot
|
|
| n.（不记名）投票，投票总数，投票权；vi.投票 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
5
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 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
6
meretricious
|
|
| adj.华而不实的，俗艳的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
7
peculiar
|
|
| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
8
remarkable
|
|
| adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
9
hierarchy
|
|
| n.等级制度；统治集团，领导层 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
10
literally
|
|
| adv.照字面意义，逐字地；确实 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
11
chancellors
|
|
| 大臣( chancellor的名词复数 )； （某些美国大学的）校长； （德国或奥地利的）总理； （英国大学的）名誉校长 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
12
provincial
|
|
| adj.省的，地方的；n．外省人，乡下人 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
13
odious
|
|
| adj.可憎的，讨厌的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
14
sublime
|
|
| adj.崇高的，伟大的；极度的，不顾后果的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
15
originality
|
|
| n.创造力，独创性；新颖 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
16
affiliated
|
|
| adj. 附属的, 有关连的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
17
immorality
|
|
| n. 不道德, 无道义 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
18
preoccupied
|
|
| adj.全神贯注的，入神的；被抢先占有的；心事重重的v.占据（某人）思想，使对…全神贯注，使专心于( preoccupy的过去式) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
19
tragically
|
|
| adv. 悲剧地，悲惨地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
20
odiously
|
|
| Odiously | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
21
obtrusive
|
|
| adj.显眼的；冒失的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
22
exasperation
|
|
| n.愤慨 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
23
discoursed
|
|
| 演说（discourse的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
24
fatigued
|
|
| adj. 疲乏的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
25
refinement
|
|
| n.文雅；高尚；精美；精制；精炼 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
26
faculty
|
|
| n.才能；学院，系；(学院或系的)全体教学人员 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
27
eloquence
|
|
| n.雄辩；口才，修辞 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
28
agitated
|
|
| adj.被鼓动的，不安的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
29
diffusion
|
|
| n.流布；普及；散漫 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
30
adviser
|
|
| n.劝告者，顾问 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
31
sketch
|
|
| n.草图；梗概；素描；v.素描；概述 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
32
enfranchisement
|
|
| 选举权 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
33
bonnets
|
|
| n.童帽( bonnet的名词复数 )；（烟囱等的）覆盖物；（苏格兰男子的）无边呢帽；（女子戴的）任何一种帽子 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
34
brutal
|
|
| adj.残忍的，野蛮的，不讲理的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
35
ravening
|
|
| a.贪婪而饥饿的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
36
expiation
|
|
| n.赎罪，补偿 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
37
persecuted
|
|
| （尤指宗教或政治信仰的）迫害(~sb. for sth.)( persecute的过去式和过去分词 )； 烦扰，困扰或骚扰某人 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
38
devoted
|
|
| adj.忠诚的，忠实的，热心的，献身于...的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
39
rosy
|
|
| adj.美好的，乐观的，玫瑰色的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
40
hack
|
|
| n.劈，砍，出租马车；v.劈，砍，干咳 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
41
martyr
|
|
| n.烈士，殉难者；vt.杀害，折磨，牺牲 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
42
crumpled
|
|
| adj. 弯扭的, 变皱的 动词crumple的过去式和过去分词形式 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
43
creases
|
|
| （使…）起折痕，弄皱( crease的第三人称单数 )； （皮肤）皱起，使起皱纹 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
44
glazed
|
|
| adj.光滑的，像玻璃的；上过釉的；呆滞无神的v.装玻璃( glaze的过去式)；上釉于，上光；（目光）变得呆滞无神 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
45
distended
|
|
| v.（使）膨胀，肿胀( distend的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
46
grotesque
|
|
| adj.怪诞的，丑陋的；n.怪诞的图案，怪人（物） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
47
battered
|
|
| adj.磨损的；v.连续猛击；磨损 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
| 欢迎访问英文小说网 |