“All our idyls and marriage, all, are the result for the most part of our eating. Does that astonish you? For my part, I am astonished that we do not see it. Not far from my estate this spring some moujiks were working on a railway embankment. You know what a peasant’s food is,— bread, kvass,* onions. With this frugal5 nourishment he lives, he is alert, he makes light work in the fields. But on the railway this bill of fare becomes cacha and a pound of meat. Only he restores this meat by sixteen hours of labor6 pushing loads weighing twelve hundred pounds.
* Kvass, a sort of cider.
“And we, who eat two pounds of meat and game, we who absorb all sorts of heating drinks and food, how do we expend7 it? In sensual excesses. If the valve is open, all goes well; but close it, as I had closed it temporarily before my marriage, and immediately there will result an excitement which, deformed8 by novels, verses, music, by our idle and luxurious9 life, will give a love of the finest water. I, too, fell in love, as everybody does, and there were transports, emotions, poesy; but really all this passion was prepared by mamma and the dressmakers. If there had been no trips in boats, no well-fitted garments, etc., if my wife had worn some shapeless blouse, and I had seen her thus at her home, I should not have been seduced10.
点击收听单词发音
1 nourishment | |
n.食物,营养品;营养情况 | |
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2 systematic | |
adj.有系统的,有计划的,有方法的 | |
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3 immediate | |
adj.立即的;直接的,最接近的;紧靠的 | |
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4 unnatural | |
adj.不自然的;反常的 | |
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5 frugal | |
adj.节俭的,节约的,少量的,微量的 | |
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6 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 | |
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7 expend | |
vt.花费,消费,消耗 | |
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8 deformed | |
adj.畸形的;变形的;丑的,破相了的 | |
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9 luxurious | |
adj.精美而昂贵的;豪华的 | |
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10 seduced | |
诱奸( seduce的过去式和过去分词 ); 勾引; 诱使堕落; 使入迷 | |
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