【英文读物】THREE JEWS.docx

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1、【英文读物】THREE JEWSTHREE JEWS It was a Sunday and the first day of spring, the first day on which one felt at any rate spring in the air. It blew in at my window with its warm breath, with its inevitable little touch of sadness. I felt restless, and I had nowhere to go to; everyone I knew was out of to

2、wn. I looked out of my window at the black trees breaking into bud, the tulips and the hyacinths that even London could not rob of their reds and blues and yellows, the delicate spring sunshine on the asphalt, and the pale blue sky that the chimney pots broke into. I found myself muttering damn it f

3、or no very obvious reason. It was spring, I suppose, the first stirring of the blood. I wanted to see clean trees, and the sun shine upon grass; I wanted flowers and leaves unsoiled by soot; I wanted to see and smell the earth; above all I wanted the horizon. I felt that something was waiting for me

4、 beyond the houses and the chimney-pots: I should find it where earth and sky meet. I didnt of course but I took the train to Kew. If I did not find in Kew the place where earth and sky meet or even the smell of the earth, I saw at any rate the sun upon the brown bark of trees and the delicate green

5、 of grass. It was spring there, English spring with its fresh warm breath, and its pale blue sky above the trees. Yes, the quiet orderly English spring that embraced and sobered even the florid luxuriance of great flowers bursting in white cascades over strange tropical trees. And the spring had bro

6、ught the people out into the gardens, the quiet orderly English people. It was the first stirring of the blood. It had stirred them to come out in couples, in family parties, in tight matronly black dresses, in drab coats and trousers in dowdy skirts and hats. It had stirred some to come in elegant

7、costumes and morning suits and spats. They looked at the flaunting tropical trees, and made jokes, and chaffed one another, and laughed not very loud. They were happy in their quiet orderly English way, happy in the warmth of the sunshine, happy to be among quiet trees, and to feel the soft grass un

8、der their feet. They did not run about or shout, they walked slowly, quietly, taking care to keep off the edges of the grass because the notices told them to do so. It was very warm, very pleasant, and very tiring. I wandered cut at last through the big gates, and was waved by a man with a napkinhe

9、stood on the pavementthrough a Georgian house into a garden studded with white topped tables and dirty ricketty chairs. It was crowded with people, and I sat down at the only vacant table, and watched them eating plum-cake and drinking tea quietly, soberly, under the gentle apple-blossom. A man came

10、 up the garden looking quickly from side to side for an empty place. I watched him in a tired lazy way. There was a bustle and roll and energy in his walk. I noticed the thickness of his legs above the knee, the arms that hung so loosely and limply by his sides as they do with people who wear loose

11、hanging clothes without sleeves, his dark fat face and the sensual mouth, the great curve of the upper lip and the hanging lower one. A clever face, dark and inscrutable, with its large mysterious eyes and the heavy lids which went into deep folds at the corners. He stopped near my table, looked at

12、the empty chair and then at me, and said: Excuse me, Sir, but dyou mind my sitting at your table? I noticed the slight thickness of the voice, the overemphasis, and the little note of assertiveness in it. I said I didnt mind at all. He sat down, leaned back in his chair, and took his hat off. He had

13、 a high forehead, black hair, and well-shaped fat hands. Fine day, he said, wonderfully fine day, the finest day I ever remember. Nothing to beat a fine English spring day. I saw the delicate apple-blossom and the pale blue sky behind his large dark head. I smiled. He saw the smile, flushed, and the

14、n smiled himself. You are amused, he said, still smiling, I believe I know why. Yes, I said, You knew me at once and I knew you. We show up, dont we, under the apple-blossom and this sky. It doesnt belong to us, do you wish it did? Ah, he said seriously, thats the question. Or rather we dont belong

15、to it. We belong to Palestine still, but Im not sure that it doesnt belong to us for all that. Well, perhaps your version is truer than mine. Ill take it, but theres still the question, do you wish you belonged to it? He wasnt a bit offended. He tilted back his chair, put one thumb in the arm-hole o

16、f his waistcoat, and looked round the garden. He showed abominably concentrated, floridly intelligent, in the thin spring air and among the inconspicuous tea-drinkers. He didnt answer my question; he was thinking, and when he spoke, he asked another: Do you ever go to Synagogue? No. Nor do I, except

17、 on Yom Kippur. I still go then every yearpure habit. I dont believe in it, of course; I believe in nothingyou believe in nothingwere all sceptics. And yet we belong to Palestine still. Funny, aint it? How it comes out! Under the apple-blossom and blue sky, as you say, as well asasamong the tombs. A

18、mong the tombs? Ah, I was thinking of another man I met. He belongs to Palestine too. Shall I tell you about him? I said I wished he would. He put his hands in his pockets and began at once. * * * * * * * * * The first time I saw him, I remember the day well, as well as yesterday. There was no apple

19、-blossom then, a November day, cold, bitter cold, the coldest day I remember. It was the anniversary of my poor wifes death. She was my first wife, Rebecca. She made me a good wife, I tell youwe were very happy. (He took out a white silk pocket handkerchief, opened it with something of a flourish, a

20、nd blew his nose long and loudly. Then he continued.) I buried her at the cemetery in KRoad. You know it? What? No? You must know it, the big cemetery near the hospital. You know the hospital at any rate? Well, you turn down by it coming from the station, take the first turning to the right and the

21、second to the left, and there you are. Its a big cemetery, very big, almost as big as Golders Green, and they keep the gardens very nicely. Well, my poor wife lies theremy first wife, Ive married again, you see, and shes living and well, thank Godand I went on the first anniversary to visit the grav

22、e and put flowers on it. There you are now, theres another curious thing. I often wonder why we do it. Its not as if it did anyone any good. I dont believe in immortality, nor do you, nor do any of us. But I go and put flowers on her grave though it wont do her any good, poor soul. Its sentiment, I

23、suppose. No one can say we Jews havent got that, and family affection. Theyre among our very strongest characteristics. Yes, they dont like us. (He looked round at the quiet tea-drinkers.) Were too clever perhaps, too sharp, too go-ahead. Nous, thats what weve got, Nous, and they dont like it, eh? B

24、ut they cant deny us our other virtuessentiment and family affection. Now look at the Titanic disaster: who was it refused to get into the boats, unless her husband went too? Who met death hand in hand with him? Eh? A Jewess! There you are! Her children rise up and call her blessed: her husband also

25、 and he praiseth her! I put that verse from Proverbs on my poor wifes tombstone. I remember standing in front of it, and reading it over and over again that day, the day Im talking about. My dear Sir, I felt utterly wretched, standing there in that cold wet cemetery, with all those white tombstones

26、round me and a damp yellow November fog. I put some beautiful white flowers on her grave. The cemetery-keeper had given me some glass gallipots to stand the flowers in, and, as I left, I thought I would give him a shilling. He was standing near the gates. By Jove! You couldnt mistake him for anythin

27、g but a Jew. His arms hung down from his shoulders in that curious, loose, limp wayyou know it?it makes the clothes look as if they didnt belong to the man who is wearing them. Clever cunning grey eyes, gold pince-nez, and a nose, by Jove, Sir, one of the best, one of those noses, white and shiny, w

28、hich, when you look at it full face, seems almost flat on the face, but immensely broad, curving down, like a broad highroad from between the bushy eye-brows down over the lips. And side face, it was colossal; it stood out like an elephants trunk with its florid curves and scrolls. I was, as I say,

29、utterly wretched. I wanted someone to talk to, and though I didnt expect to get much comfort out of a cemetery-keeper, I said by way of conversation, as I gave him a shilling: You keep these gardens very nicely. He looked at me over the gold rims of his glasses: We do our best. I havent been here lo

30、ng, you know, but I do my best. And a man cant do more, now can he? No I said, he cant. He put his head on one side, and looked at a tombstone near by: it was tilted over to one side, blackened by the soot to a dirty yellow colour, the plaster peeling off. There was one dirty scraggy evergreen growi

31、ng on the grave. There was a text on the stone, I remember, something about the righteous nourishing like the bay-tree. Of course one cant do everything. Look at that now. Some people dont do anything, never come near the place, dont spend a penny on their graves. Then of course they go like that. I

32、t will get worse and worse, for we only bury reserves here now. Sometimes it aint anyones fault: families die out, the graves are forgotten. It dont look nice, but well, I say, what does it matter after all? When Im dead, they may chuck me on the dung-hill, for all I care. He looked down his nose at

33、 the rows and rows of dirty white grave-stones, which were under his charge, critically, with an air of hostility, as if they had done him some wrong. You dont perhaps believe in a life after death? I said. He pushed his hands well down into the pockets of his long overcoat, hugged himself together,

34、 and looked up at the yellow sky and dirty yellow houses, looming over the cemetery. No I dont, he said with conviction. It aint likely. Nobody knows anything about it. It aint likely, is it? No, but what about the Bible? His cold grey eyes looked at me steadily over the gold pince-nez. Im not sure

35、theres much in the Bible about it, eh? And one cant believe everything in the Bible. Theres the Almighty of course, well, who can say? He may exist, he may notI say I dont know. But a life hereafter, I dont believe in it. One dont have to believe everything now: it was different when I was young. Yo

36、u had to believe everything then; you had to believe everything they told you in Schul. Now you may think for yourself. And mind you, it dont do to think too much: if you think too much about those things, you go mad, raving mad. What I say is, lead a pure clean life here, and youll get your reward

37、here. Ive seen it in my own case: I wasnt always in a job like this. I had a business once, things went wrong through no fault of mine, and I lost everythingeverything sold up except an old wooden bed. Ah, those were hard times, I can tell you! Then I got offered this jobit aint very good, but I tho

38、ught to myself: well, therell be a comfortable home for my wife and my two boys as long as I live. Ive tried to live a clean life, and I shall have better times now, eh? I thought of my own wife and my motherless children: my sadness increased. And I thought of our race, its traditions and its faith

39、, how they are vanishing in the life that surrounds us. The old spirit, the old faith, they had kept alive hot and vigorousfor how many centuries?when we were spat upon, outcasts. But now they are cold and feeble, vanishing in the universal disbelief. I looked at the man under the shadow of the dirt

40、y yellow London fog and the squalid yellow London houses. This man, I thought to myself, a mere keeper of graves is touched by it as much as I am. He isnt a Jew now any more than I am. Were Jews only externally now, in our black hair and our large noses, in the way we stand and the way we walk. But

41、inside were Jews no longer. Even he doesnt believe, the keeper of Jewish graves! The old spirit, the ancient faith has gone out of him. I was wrong; I know now, and Ill tell you how I came to see it. The spirits still there all right; it comes out under the apple-blossom, eh?, and it came out among

42、the tombs too. The next time I saw him was another November day, an English, a London day; O Lord, his nose showed in it very white and florid under the straight houses and the chimney-pots and the heavy, melancholy dripping sky. I had married in the meantime, and my wifelike the good soul that she

43、ishad come with me to put flowers on my poor Rebeccas graveanother anniversary you see. Yes, I was happyI dont mind telling you soeven at my poor Rebeccas graveside. He was standing there in the same place, in a black top-hat and a great black overcoat, looking at the tombstones over the top of his

44、gold-rimmed glasses. All the cares of the world seemed to be weighing down his sloping shoulders. Good day, he said to me, just touching the brim of his hat. Well, I said, and hows the world going with you? He fixed me with his hard grey eyes that had a look of pain in them, and said in a tone which

45、 had neither reverence nor irony in it, nor indeed any feeling at all: The Lord gave and the Lord hath taken away, blessed be the name of the Lord. I buried my poor wife last Thursday. There was an awkward silence. Im very sorry to hear that, I said, very sorry. Yes he said, The righteous flourish l

46、ike the bay-tree: they tell us that: you see it there on the tombstone. He put his head on one side and stared at it. Vell, he saidand I noticed for the first time the thick Jewish speechvell, its there, so I suppose its true, aint it? But its difficult to see, y know always. Ive often said the only

47、 thing we can do is to lead a clean life here, a pure life, and well get our reward. But mine seems to be pretty long in coming, he sighed, yes pretty long, I tell you. I had hard times before: we both of us did, my poor wife and I. And then at last I got this job; I thought she was going to have a

48、happy peaceful life at last. Nothing very grand in pay, but enough to keep us and the two boys. And a nice enough house for her. And then as soon as we come here she takes ill and dies, poor soul. He wiped his eyes. I dont know why I should call her poor soul. Shes at rest any way. And she made me the best, the very best wife a man could have. He put his hands well down in the pockets of his overcoat, drew his arms to his sides so that he looked like a great b