I went up to Feisal’s camp, which was busy. Some of the tribes were drawing a month’s wages; all were getting eight days’ food; tents and heavy baggage were being stored; and the last arrangement for the march being made. I sat and listened to the chatter12 of the staff: Faiz el Ghusein, Beduin sheikh, Turkish official, chronicler of the Armenian massacres13, now secretary; Nesib el Bekri, Damascene land-owner, and Feisal’s host in Syria, now exiled from his country with a death-sentence over him; Sami, Nesib’s brother, graduate of the Law School, and now assistant paymaster; Shefik el Eyr, ex-journalist, now assistant secretary, a little white-faced man, and furtive14, with a whispering manner, honest in his patriotism15, but in Me perverse16, and so a nasty colleague.
Hassan Sharaf, the headquarters’ doctor, a noble man who had put not merely his Me, but his purse to service in the Arab cause, was plaintive17 with excess of disgust at finding his phials smashed and their drugs confounded in the bottom of his chest. Shefik rallying him, said, ‘Do you expect a rebellion to be comfortable?’ and the contrast with the pale misery18 of their manner delighted us. In hardships the humour of triteness19 outweighed20 a whole world of wit.
With Feisal in the evening we talked of the coming marches. The first stage was short: to Semna, where were palm-groves22 and wells of abundant water. After that there was choice of ways, to be determined23 only when our scouts24 returned with reports as to ponded rainwater. By the coast, the straight road, it was sixty dry miles to the next well, and our multitude of footmen would find that long.
The army at Bir el Waheida amounted to five thousand one hundred camel-riders, and five thousand three hundred men on foot, with four Krupp mountain guns, and ten machine-guns: and for transport we had three hundred and eighty baggage camels. Everything was cut to the lowest, far below the standard of the Turks. Our start was set for January the eighteenth just after noon, and punctually by lunch-time Feisal’s work was finished. We were a merry party: Feisal himself, relaxed after responsibility, Abd el Kerim, never very serious, Sherif Jabar, Nasib and Sami, Shefik, Hassan Sharaf and myself. After lunch the tent was struck. We went to our camels, where they were couched in a circle, saddled and loaded, each held short by the slave standing25 on its doubled foreleg. The kettle drummer, waiting beside ibn Dakhil, who commanded the bodyguard26, rolled his drum seven or eight times, and everything became still. We watched Feisal. He got up from his rug, on which he had been saying a last word to Abd el Kerim, caught the saddle-pommels in his hands, put his knee on the side and said aloud, ‘Make God your agent’. The slave released the camel, which sprang up. When it was on its feet Feisal passed his other leg across its back, swept his skirts and his cloak under him by a wave of the arm, and settled himself in the saddle.
As his camel moved we had jumped for ours, and the whole mob rose together, some of the beasts roaring, but the most quiet, as trained she-camels should be. Only a young animal, a male or ill-bred, would grumble27 on the road, and self-respecting Beduins did not ride such, since the noise might give them away by night or in surprise attacks. The camels took their first abrupt28 steps, and we riders had quickly to hook our legs round the front cantles, and pick up the head-stalls to check the pace. We then looked where Feisal was, and tapped our mounts’ heads gently round, and pressed them on the shoulders with our bare feet till they were in line beside him. Ibn Dakhil came up, and after a glance at the country and the direction of march passed a short order for the Ageyl to arrange themselves in wings, out to right and left of us for two or three hundred yards, camel marching by camel in line as near as the accidents underfoot permitted. The manoeuvre29 was neatly30 done.
These Ageyl were Nejd townsmen, the youth of Aneyza, Boreida or Russ, who had contracted for service as regular camel corps31 for a term of years. They were young, from sixteen to twenty-five, and nice fellows, large-eyed, cheery, a bit educated, catholic, intelligent, good companions on the road. There was seldom a heavy one. Even in repose32 (when most Eastern faces emptied themselves of life) these lads remained keen-looking and handsome. They talked a delicate and elastic33 Arabic, and were mannered, often foppish34, in habit. The docility35 and reasonableness of their town-bred minds made them look after themselves and their masters without reiterated36 instructions. Their fathers dealt in camels, and they had followed the trade from infancy37; consequently they wandered instinctively38, like Beduin; while the decadent39 softness in their nature made them biddable, tolerant of the harshness and physical punishment which in the East were the outward proofs of discipline. They were essentially40 submissive; yet had the nature of soldiers, and fought with brains and courage when familiarly led.
Not being a tribe, they had no blood enemies, but passed freely in the desert: the carrying trade and chaffer of the interior lay in their hands. The gains of the desert were poor, but enough to tempt41 them abroad, since the conditions of their home-life were uncomfortable. The Wahabis, followers42 of a fanatical Moslem43 heresy44, had imposed their strict rules on easy and civilized45 Kasim. In Kasim there was but little coffee-hospitality, much prayer and fasting, no tobacco, no artistic46 dalliance with women, no silk clothes, no gold and silver head-ropes or ornaments47. Everything was forcibly pious48 or forcibly puritanical49.
It was a natural phenomenon, this periodic rise at intervals50 of little more than a century, of ascetic51 creeds52 in Central Arabia. Always the votaries53 found their neighbours’ beliefs cluttered54 with inessential things, which became impious in the hot imagination of their preachers. Again and again they had arisen, had taken possession, soul and body, of the tribes, and had dashed themselves to pieces on the urban Semites, merchants and concupiscent men of the world. About their comfortable possessions the new creeds ebbed55 and flowed like the tides or the changing seasons, each movement with the seeds of early death in its excess of Tightness. Doubtless they must recur56 so long as the causes — sun, moon, wind, acting57 in the emptiness of open spaces, weigh without check on the unhurried and uncumbered minds of the desert-dwellers.
However, this afternoon the Ageyl were not thinking of God, but of us, and as ibn Dakhil ranged them to the right and left they fell eagerly into rank. There came a warning patter from the drums and the poet of the right wing burst into strident song, a single invented couplet, of Feisal and the pleasures he would afford us at Wejh. The right wing listened to the verse intently, took it up and sang it together once, twice and three times, with pride and self-satisfaction and derision. However, before they could brandish58 it a fourth time the poet of the left wing broke out in extempore reply, in the same metre, in answering rhyme, and capping the sentiment. The left wing cheered it in a roar of triumph, the drums tapped again, the standard-bearers threw out their great crimson59 banners, and the whole guard, right, left and centre, broke together into the rousing regimental chorus,
I’ve lost Britain, and I’ve lost Gaul, I’ve lost Rome, and, worst of all, I’ve lost Lalage —’
only it was Nejd they had lost, and the women of the Maabda, and their future lay from Jidda towards Suez. Yet it was a good song, with a rhythmical60 beat which the camels loved, so that they put down their heads, stretched their necks out far and with lengthened61 pace shuffled62 forward musingly63 while it lasted.
Our road to-day was easy for them, since it was over firm sand slopes, long, slowly-rising waves of dunes64, bare-backed, but for scrub in the folds, or barren palm-trees solitary65 in the moist depressions. Afterwards in a broad flat, two horsemen came cantering across from the left to greet Feisal. I knew the first one, dirty old blear-eyed Mohammed Ali el Beidawi, Emir of the Juheina: but the second looked strange. When he came nearer I saw he was in khaki uniform, with a cloak to cover it and a silk head-cloth and head-rope, much awry66. He looked up, and there was Newcombe’s red and peeling face, with straining eyes and vehement67 mouth, a strong, humorous grin between the jaws68. He had arrived at Um Lejj this morning, and hearing we were only just off, had seized Sheikh Yu-suf’s fastest horse and galloped69 after us.
I offered him my spare camel and an introduction to Feisal, whom he greeted like an old school-friend; and at once they plunged70 into the midst of things, suggesting, debating, planning at lightning speed. Newcombe’s initial velocity71 was enormous, and the freshness of the day and the life and happiness of the Army gave inspiration to the march and brought the future bubbling out of us without pain.
We passed Ghowashia, a ragged72 grove21 of palms, and marched over a lava-field easily, its roughnesses being drowned in sand just deep enough to smooth them, but not deep enough to be too soft. The tops of the highest lava-piles showed through. An hour later we came suddenly to a crest73 which dropped as a sand slope, abrupt and swept and straight enough to be called a sand-cliff, into a broad splendid valley of rounded pebbles74. This was Semna, and our road went down the steep, through terraces of palms.
The wind had been following our march, and so it was very still and warm at bottom of the valley in lee of the great bank of sand. Here was our water, and here we would halt till the scouts returned from seeking rain-pools in front of us; for so Abd el Kerim, our chief guide, had advised. We rode the four hundred yards across the valley and up the further slopes till we were safe from floods, and there Feisal tapped his camel lightly on the neck till she sank to her knees with a scrape of shingle75 pushed aside, and settled herself. Hejris spread the carpet for us, and with the other Sherifs we sat and jested while the coffee was made hot.
I maintained against Feisal the greatness of Ibrahim Pasha, leader of Milli-Kurds, in North Mesopotamia. When he was to march, his women rose before dawn, and footing noiselessly overhead on the taut76 tentcloth, unskewered the strips of it, while others beneath held and removed the poles till all was struck and divided into camel-loads, and loaded. Then they drove off, so that the Pasha awoke alone on his pallet in the open air where at night he had lain down in the rich inner compartment77 of his palace-tent.
He would get up at leisure and drink coffee on his carpet: and afterwards the horses would be brought, and they would ride towards the new camping ground. But if on his way he thirsted he would crisp his fingers to the servants, and the coffee man would ride up beside him with his pots ready and his brazier burning on a copper78 bracket of the saddle, to serve the cup on the march without breaking stride; and at sunset they would find the women waiting in the erected79 tent, as it had been on the evening before.
To-day had a grey weather, so strange after the many thronging80 suns, that Newcombe and I walked stooping to look where our shadows had gone, as we talked of what I hoped, and of what he wanted.
They were the same thing, so we had brain-leisure to note Semna and its fine groves of cared-for palms between little hedges of dead thorn; with here and there huts of reed and palm-rib, to shelter the owners and their families at times of fertilization and harvest. In the lowest gardens and in the valley bed were the shallow wood-lined wells, whose water was, they said, fairly sweet and never-failing: but so little fluent that to water our host of camels took the night.
Feisal wrote letters from Semna to twenty-five leaders of the Billi and Howeitat and Beni Atiyeh, saying that he with his army would be instantly in Wejh and they must see to it. Mohammed Ali bestirred himself, and since almost all our men were of his tribe, was useful in arranging the detachments and detailing them their routes for the morrow. Our water-scouts had come in, to report shallow pools at two points well-spaced on the coast road. After cross-questioning them we decided81 to send four sections that way, and the other five by the hills: in such a fashion we thought we should arrive soonest and safest at Abu Zereibat.
The route was not easy to decide with the poor help of the Musa Juheina, our informants. They seemed to have no unit of time smaller than the half-day, or of distance between the span and the stage; and a stage might be from six to sixteen hours according to the man’s will and camel. Intercommunication between our units was hindered because often there was no one who could read or write, in either. Delay, confusion, hunger and thirst marred82 this expedition. These might have been avoided had time let us examine the route beforehand. The animals were without food for nearly three days, and the men marched the last fifty miles on half a gallon of water, with nothing to eat. It did not in any way dim their spirit, and they trotted83 into Wejh gaily84 enough, hoarsely85 singing, and executing mock charges: but Feisal said that another hot and barren midday would have broken both their speed and their energy.
When business ended, Newcombe and I went off to sleep in the tent Feisal had lent us as a special luxury. Baggage conditions were so hard and important for us that we rich took pride in faring like the men, who could not transport unnecessary things: and never before had I had a tent of my own. We pitched it at the very edge of a bluff86 of the foothills; a bluff no wider than the tent and rounded, so that the slope went straight down from the pegs87 of the door-flap. There we found sitting and waiting for us Abd el Kerim, the young Beidawi Sherif, wrapped up to the eyes in his head-cloth and cloak, since the evening was chill and threatened rain. He had come to ask me for a mule7, with saddle and bridle. The smart appearance of Maulud’s little company in breeches and puttees, and their fine new animals in the market at Um Lejj, had roused his desire.
I played with his eagerness, and put him off, advancing a condition that he should ask me after our successful arrival at Wejh; and with this he was content. We hungered for sleep, and at last he rose to go, but, chancing to look across the valley, saw the hollows beneath and about us winking88 with the faint camp-fires of the scattered89 contingents90. He called me out to look, and swept his arm round, saying half-sadly, ‘We are no longer Arabs but a People’.
He was half-proud too, for the advance on Wejh was their biggest effort; the first time in memory that the manhood of a tribe, with transport, arms, and food for two hundred miles, had left its district and marched into another’s territory without the hope of plunder91 or the stimulus92 of blood feud93. Abd el Kerim was glad that his tribe had shown this new spirit of service, but also sorry; for to him the joys of life were a fast camel, the best weapons, and a short sharp raid against his neighbour’s herd94: and the gradual achievement of Feisal’s ambition was making such joys less and less easy for the responsible.
点击收听单词发音
1 friction | |
n.摩擦,摩擦力 | |
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2 ashore | |
adv.在(向)岸上,上岸 | |
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3 helping | |
n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的,辅助的 | |
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4 squad | |
n.班,小队,小团体;vt.把…编成班或小组 | |
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5 barricade | |
n.路障,栅栏,障碍;vt.设路障挡住 | |
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6 mules | |
骡( mule的名词复数 ); 拖鞋; 顽固的人; 越境运毒者 | |
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7 mule | |
n.骡子,杂种,执拗的人 | |
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8 bridle | |
n.笼头,束缚;vt.抑制,约束;动怒 | |
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9 ramping | |
土堤斜坡( ramp的现在分词 ); 斜道; 斜路; (装车或上下飞机的)活动梯 | |
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10 wilderness | |
n.杳无人烟的一片陆地、水等,荒漠 | |
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11 batch | |
n.一批(组,群);一批生产量 | |
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12 chatter | |
vi./n.喋喋不休;短促尖叫;(牙齿)打战 | |
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13 massacres | |
大屠杀( massacre的名词复数 ); 惨败 | |
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14 furtive | |
adj.鬼鬼崇崇的,偷偷摸摸的 | |
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15 patriotism | |
n.爱国精神,爱国心,爱国主义 | |
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16 perverse | |
adj.刚愎的;坚持错误的,行为反常的 | |
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17 plaintive | |
adj.可怜的,伤心的 | |
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18 misery | |
n.痛苦,苦恼,苦难;悲惨的境遇,贫苦 | |
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19 triteness | |
n.平凡,陈腐 | |
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20 outweighed | |
v.在重量上超过( outweigh的过去式和过去分词 );在重要性或价值方面超过 | |
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21 grove | |
n.林子,小树林,园林 | |
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22 groves | |
树丛,小树林( grove的名词复数 ) | |
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23 determined | |
adj.坚定的;有决心的 | |
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24 scouts | |
侦察员[机,舰]( scout的名词复数 ); 童子军; 搜索; 童子军成员 | |
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25 standing | |
n.持续,地位;adj.永久的,不动的,直立的,不流动的 | |
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26 bodyguard | |
n.护卫,保镖 | |
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27 grumble | |
vi.抱怨;咕哝;n.抱怨,牢骚;咕哝,隆隆声 | |
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28 abrupt | |
adj.突然的,意外的;唐突的,鲁莽的 | |
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29 manoeuvre | |
n.策略,调动;v.用策略,调动 | |
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30 neatly | |
adv.整洁地,干净地,灵巧地,熟练地 | |
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31 corps | |
n.(通信等兵种的)部队;(同类作的)一组 | |
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32 repose | |
v.(使)休息;n.安息 | |
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33 elastic | |
n.橡皮圈,松紧带;adj.有弹性的;灵活的 | |
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34 foppish | |
adj.矫饰的,浮华的 | |
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35 docility | |
n.容易教,易驾驶,驯服 | |
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36 reiterated | |
反复地说,重申( reiterate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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37 infancy | |
n.婴儿期;幼年期;初期 | |
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38 instinctively | |
adv.本能地 | |
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39 decadent | |
adj.颓废的,衰落的,堕落的 | |
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40 essentially | |
adv.本质上,实质上,基本上 | |
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41 tempt | |
vt.引诱,勾引,吸引,引起…的兴趣 | |
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42 followers | |
追随者( follower的名词复数 ); 用户; 契据的附面; 从动件 | |
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43 Moslem | |
n.回教徒,穆罕默德信徒;adj.回教徒的,回教的 | |
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44 heresy | |
n.异端邪说;异教 | |
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45 civilized | |
a.有教养的,文雅的 | |
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46 artistic | |
adj.艺术(家)的,美术(家)的;善于艺术创作的 | |
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47 ornaments | |
n.装饰( ornament的名词复数 );点缀;装饰品;首饰v.装饰,点缀,美化( ornament的第三人称单数 ) | |
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48 pious | |
adj.虔诚的;道貌岸然的 | |
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49 puritanical | |
adj.极端拘谨的;道德严格的 | |
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50 intervals | |
n.[军事]间隔( interval的名词复数 );间隔时间;[数学]区间;(戏剧、电影或音乐会的)幕间休息 | |
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51 ascetic | |
adj.禁欲的;严肃的 | |
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52 creeds | |
(尤指宗教)信条,教条( creed的名词复数 ) | |
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53 votaries | |
n.信徒( votary的名词复数 );追随者;(天主教)修士;修女 | |
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54 cluttered | |
v.杂物,零乱的东西零乱vt.( clutter的过去式和过去分词 );乱糟糟地堆满,把…弄得很乱;(以…) 塞满… | |
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55 ebbed | |
(指潮水)退( ebb的过去式和过去分词 ); 落; 减少; 衰落 | |
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56 recur | |
vi.复发,重现,再发生 | |
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57 acting | |
n.演戏,行为,假装;adj.代理的,临时的,演出用的 | |
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58 brandish | |
v.挥舞,挥动;n.挥动,挥舞 | |
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59 crimson | |
n./adj.深(绯)红色(的);vi.脸变绯红色 | |
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60 rhythmical | |
adj.有节奏的,有韵律的 | |
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61 lengthened | |
(时间或空间)延长,伸长( lengthen的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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62 shuffled | |
v.洗(纸牌)( shuffle的过去式和过去分词 );拖着脚步走;粗心地做;摆脱尘世的烦恼 | |
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63 musingly | |
adv.沉思地,冥想地 | |
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64 dunes | |
沙丘( dune的名词复数 ) | |
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65 solitary | |
adj.孤独的,独立的,荒凉的;n.隐士 | |
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66 awry | |
adj.扭曲的,错的 | |
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67 vehement | |
adj.感情强烈的;热烈的;(人)有强烈感情的 | |
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68 jaws | |
n.口部;嘴 | |
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69 galloped | |
(使马)飞奔,奔驰( gallop的过去式和过去分词 ); 快速做[说]某事 | |
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70 plunged | |
v.颠簸( plunge的过去式和过去分词 );暴跌;骤降;突降 | |
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71 velocity | |
n.速度,速率 | |
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72 ragged | |
adj.衣衫褴褛的,粗糙的,刺耳的 | |
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73 crest | |
n.顶点;饰章;羽冠;vt.达到顶点;vi.形成浪尖 | |
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74 pebbles | |
[复数]鹅卵石; 沙砾; 卵石,小圆石( pebble的名词复数 ) | |
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75 shingle | |
n.木瓦板;小招牌(尤指医生或律师挂的营业招牌);v.用木瓦板盖(屋顶);把(女子头发)剪短 | |
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76 taut | |
adj.拉紧的,绷紧的,紧张的 | |
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77 compartment | |
n.卧车包房,隔间;分隔的空间 | |
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78 copper | |
n.铜;铜币;铜器;adj.铜(制)的;(紫)铜色的 | |
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79 ERECTED | |
adj. 直立的,竖立的,笔直的 vt. 使 ... 直立,建立 | |
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80 thronging | |
v.成群,挤满( throng的现在分词 ) | |
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81 decided | |
adj.决定了的,坚决的;明显的,明确的 | |
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82 marred | |
adj. 被损毁, 污损的 | |
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83 trotted | |
小跑,急走( trot的过去分词 ); 匆匆忙忙地走 | |
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84 gaily | |
adv.欢乐地,高兴地 | |
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85 hoarsely | |
adv.嘶哑地 | |
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86 bluff | |
v.虚张声势,用假象骗人;n.虚张声势,欺骗 | |
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87 pegs | |
n.衣夹( peg的名词复数 );挂钉;系帐篷的桩;弦钮v.用夹子或钉子固定( peg的第三人称单数 );使固定在某水平 | |
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88 winking | |
n.瞬眼,目语v.使眼色( wink的现在分词 );递眼色(表示友好或高兴等);(指光)闪烁;闪亮 | |
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89 scattered | |
adj.分散的,稀疏的;散步的;疏疏落落的 | |
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90 contingents | |
(志趣相投、尤指来自同一地方的)一组与会者( contingent的名词复数 ); 代表团; (军队的)分遣队; 小分队 | |
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91 plunder | |
vt.劫掠财物,掠夺;n.劫掠物,赃物;劫掠 | |
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92 stimulus | |
n.刺激,刺激物,促进因素,引起兴奋的事物 | |
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93 feud | |
n.长期不和;世仇;v.长期争斗;世代结仇 | |
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94 herd | |
n.兽群,牧群;vt.使集中,把…赶在一起 | |
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