Part 3 Chapter 8

    "Mrs Ramsay!" Lily cried, "Mrs Ramsay!" But nothing happened. Thepain increased. That anguish¹ could reduce one to such a pitch of imbecility,she thought! Anyhow the old man had not heard her. He remainedbenignant, calm—if one chose to think it, sublime². Heaven be praised, noone had heard her cry that ignominious³ cry, stop pain, stop! She had notobviously taken leave of her senses. No one had seen her step off herstrip of board into the waters of annihilation. She remained a skimpy oldmaid, holding a paint-brush.

　　And now slowly the pain of the want, and the bitter anger (to be calledback, just as she thought she would never feel sorrow for Mrs Ramsayagain. Had she missed her among the coffee cups at breakfast? not in theleast) lessened⁴; and of their anguish left, as antidote⁵, a relief that wasbalm in itself, and also, but more mysteriously, a sense of some onethere, of Mrs Ramsay, relieved for a moment of the weight that the worldhad put on her, staying lightly by her side and then (for this was MrsRamsay in all her beauty) raising to her forehead a wreath of whiteflowers with which she went. Lily squeezed her tubes again. She attackedthat problem of the hedge. It was strange how clearly she sawher, stepping with her usual quickness across fields among whose folds,purplish and soft, among whose flowers, hyacinth or lilies, she vanished.

　　It was some trick of the painter's eye. For days after she had heard of herdeath she had seen her thus, putting her wreath to her forehead and goingunquestioningly with her companion, a shade across the fields. Thesight, the phrase, had its power to console. Wherever she happened tobe, painting, here, in the country or in London, the vision would come toher, and her eyes, half closing, sought something to base her vision on.

　　She looked down the railway carriage, the omnibus; took a line fromshoulder or cheek; looked at the windows opposite; at Piccadilly, lamp-strung in the evening. All had been part of the fields of death. But alwayssomething—it might be a face, a voice, a paper boy crying STANDARD,NEWS—thrust through, snubbed her, waked her, required and got in theend an effort of attention, so that the vision must be perpetually remade.

　　Now again, moved as she was by some instinctive⁶ need of distance andblue, she looked at the bay beneath her, making hillocks of the blue barsof the waves, and stony⁷ fields of the purpler spaces, again she wasroused as usual by something incongruous. There was a brown spot inthe middle of the bay. It was a boat. Yes, she realised that after a second.

　　But whose boat? Mr Ramsay's boat, she replied. Mr Ramsay; the manwho had marched past her, with his hand raised, aloof⁸, at the head of aprocession, in his beautiful boots, asking her for sympathy, which shehad refused. The boat was now half way across the bay.

　　So fine was the morning except for a streak⁹ of wind here and there thatthe sea and sky looked all one fabric¹⁰, as if sails were stuck high up in thesky, or the clouds had dropped down into the sea. A steamer far out atsea had drawn¹¹ in the air a great scroll¹² of smoke which stayed therecurving and circling decoratively¹³, as if the air were a fine gauze whichheld things and kept them softly in its mesh¹⁴, only gently swaying themthis way and that. And as happens sometimes when the weather is veryfine, the cliffs looked as if they were conscious of the ships, and the shipslooked as if they were conscious of the cliffs, as if they signalled to eachother some message of their own. For sometimes quite close to the shore,the Lighthouse looked this morning in the haze¹⁵ an enormous distanceaway.

　　"Where are they now?" Lily thought, looking out to sea. Where was he,that very old man who had gone past her silently, holding a brown paperparcel under his arm? The boat was in the middle of the bay.

1 anguish   

n.(尤指心灵上的)极度痛苦，烦恼

参考例句：

• She cried out for anguish at parting.分手时，她由于痛苦而失声大哭。
• The unspeakable anguish wrung his heart.难言的痛苦折磨着他的心。

2 sublime   

adj.崇高的，伟大的；极度的，不顾后果的

参考例句：

• We should take some time to enjoy the sublime beauty of nature.我们应该花些时间去欣赏大自然的壮丽景象。
• Olympic games play as an important arena to exhibit the sublime idea.奥运会，就是展示此崇高理念的重要舞台。

3 ignominious   

adj.可鄙的，不光彩的，耻辱的

参考例句：

• The marriage was considered especially ignominious since she was of royal descent.由于她出身王族，这门婚事被认为是奇耻大辱。
• Many thought that he was doomed to ignominious failure.许多人认为他注定会极不光彩地失败。

4 lessened   

减少的，减弱的

参考例句：

• Listening to the speech through an interpreter lessened its impact somewhat. 演讲辞通过翻译的嘴说出来，多少削弱了演讲的力量。
• The flight to suburbia lessened the number of middle-class families living within the city. 随着迁往郊外的风行，住在城内的中产家庭减少了。

5 antidote   

n.解毒药，解毒剂

参考例句：

• There is no known antidote for this poison.这种毒药没有解药。
• Chinese physicians used it as an antidote for snake poison.中医师用它来解蛇毒。

6 instinctive   

adj.(出于)本能的；直觉的；(出于)天性的

参考例句：

• He tried to conceal his instinctive revulsion at the idea.他试图饰盖自己对这一想法本能的厌恶。
• Animals have an instinctive fear of fire.动物本能地怕火。

7 stony   

adj.石头的，多石头的，冷酷的，无情的

参考例句：

• The ground is too dry and stony.这块地太干，而且布满了石头。
• He listened to her story with a stony expression.他带着冷漠的表情听她讲经历。

8 aloof   

adj.远离的；冷淡的，漠不关心的

参考例句：

• Never stand aloof from the masses.千万不可脱离群众。
• On the evening the girl kept herself timidly aloof from the crowd.这小女孩在晚会上一直胆怯地远离人群。

9 streak   

n.条理，斑纹，倾向，少许，痕迹；v.加条纹，变成条纹，奔驰，快速移动

参考例句：

• The Indians used to streak their faces with paint.印第安人过去常用颜料在脸上涂条纹。
• Why did you streak the tree?你为什么在树上刻条纹？

10 fabric   

n.织物，织品，布；构造，结构，组织

参考例句：

• The fabric will spot easily.这种织品很容易玷污。
• I don't like the pattern on the fabric.我不喜欢那块布料上的图案。

11 drawn   

v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的

参考例句：

• All the characters in the story are drawn from life.故事中的所有人物都取材于生活。
• Her gaze was drawn irresistibly to the scene outside.她的目光禁不住被外面的风景所吸引。

12 scroll   

n.卷轴，纸卷；(石刻上的)漩涡

参考例句：

• As I opened the scroll,a panorama of the Yellow River unfolded.我打开卷轴时，黄河的景象展现在眼前。
• He was presented with a scroll commemorating his achievements.他被授予一幅卷轴，以表彰其所做出的成就。

13 decoratively   

参考例句：

• Aileen came briskly, vigorously in, her beautiful body clothed as decoratively as ever. 爱玲神气活现地走了进来，她苗条的身躯照常穿得很华丽。
• The blouse is decoratively bordered at neck and sleeves. 这件女衬衫领圈和袖口做得很花哨。

14 mesh   

n.网孔，网丝，陷阱；vt.以网捕捉，啮合，匹配；vi.适合； [计算机]网络

参考例句：

• Their characters just don't mesh.他们的性格就是合不来。
• This is the net having half inch mesh.这是有半英寸网眼的网。

15 haze   

n.霾，烟雾；懵懂，迷糊；vi.(over)变模糊

参考例句：

• I couldn't see her through the haze of smoke.在烟雾弥漫中，我看不见她。
• He often lives in a haze of whisky.他常常是在威士忌的懵懂醉意中度过的。