【英文文学】The Gilded Age, Complete.docx

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1、【英文文学】The Gilded Age, CompleteCHAPTER I.June 18. Squire Hawkins sat upon the pyramid of large blocks, called the “stile,” in front of his house, contemplating the morning.The locality was Obedstown, East Tennessee. You would not know that Obedstown stood on the top of a mountain, for there was nothi

2、ng about the landscape to indicate itbut it did: a mountain that stretched abroad over whole counties, and rose very gradually. The district was called the “Knobs of East Tennessee,” and had a reputation like Nazareth, as far as turning out any good thing was concerned.The Squires house was a double

3、 log cabin, in a state of decay; two or three gaunt hounds lay asleep about the threshold, and lifted their heads sadly whenever Mrs. Hawkins or the children stepped in and out over their bodies. Rubbish was scattered about the grassless yard; a bench stood near the door with a tin wash basin on it

4、and a pail of water and a gourd; a cat had begun to drink from the pail, but the exertion was overtaxing her energies, and she had stopped to rest. There was an ash-hopper by the fence, and an iron pot, for soft-soap-boiling, near it. This dwelling constituted one-fifteenth of Obedstown; the other f

5、ourteen houses were scattered about among the tall pine trees and among the corn-fields in such a way that a man might stand in the midst of the city and not know but that he was in the country if he only depended on his eyes for information.“Squire” Hawkins got his title from being postmaster of Ob

6、edstownnot that the title properly belonged to the office, but because in those regions the chief citizens always must have titles of some sort, and so the usual courtesy had been extended to Hawkins. The mail was monthly, and sometimes amounted to as much as three or four letters at a single delive

7、ry. Even a rush like this did not fill up the postmasters whole month, though, and therefore he “kept store” in the intervals.The Squire was contemplating the morning. It was balmy and tranquil, the vagrant breezes were laden with the odor of flowers, the murmur of bees was in the air, there was eve

8、rywhere that suggestion of repose that summer woodlands bring to the senses, and the vague, pleasurable melancholy that such a time and such surroundings inspire. Presently the United States mail arrived, on horseback. There was but one letter, and it was for the postmaster. The long-legged youth wh

9、o carried the mail tarried an hour to talk, for there was no hurry; and in a little while the male population of the village had assembled to help. As a general thing, they were dressed in homespun “jeans,” blue or yellowhere were no other varieties of it; all wore one suspender and sometimes twoyar

10、n ones knitted at home,some wore vests, but few wore coats. Such coats and vests as did appear, however, were rather picturesque than otherwise, for they were made of tolerably fanciful patterns of calicoa fashion which prevails thereto this day among those of the community who have tastes above the

11、 common level and are able to afford style. Every individual arrived with his hands in his pockets; a hand came out occasionally for a purpose, but it always went back again after service; and if it was the head that was served, just the cant that the dilapidated straw hat got by being uplifted and

12、rooted under, was retained until the next call altered the inclination; many hats were present, but none were erect and no two were canted just alike. We are speaking impartially of men, youths and boys. And we are also speaking of these three estates when we say that every individual was either che

13、wing natural leaf tobacco prepared on his own premises, or smoking the same in a corn-cob pipe. Few of the men wore whiskers; none wore moustaches; some had a thick jungle of hair under the chin and hiding the throatthe only pattern recognized there as being the correct thing in whiskers; but no par

14、t of any individuals face had seen a razor for a week. These neighbors stood a few moments looking at the mail carrier reflectively while he talked; but fatigue soon began to show itself, and one after another they climbed up and occupied the top rail of the fence, hump-shouldered and grave, like a

15、company of buzzards assembled for supper and listening for the death-rattle. Old Damrell said:“Tha haint no news bout the jedge, hit aint likely?”“Caint tell for sartin; some thinks hes gwyne to be long toreckly, and some thinks e haint. Russ Mosely he tote ole Hanks he mought git to Obeds tomorrer

16、or nex day he reckoned.”“Well, I wisht I knowed. I got a prime sow and pigs in the cote-house, and I haint got no place for to put em. If the jedge is a gwyne to hold cote, I got to roust em out, I reckon. But tomorrerll do, I spect.”The speaker bunched his thick lips together like the stem-end of a

17、 tomato and shot a bumble-bee dead that had lit on a weed seven feet away. One after another the several chewers expressed a charge of tobacco juice and delivered it at the deceased with steady, aim and faultless accuracy.“Whats a stirrin, down bout the Forks?” continued Old Damrell.“Well, I dunno,

18、skasely. Ole Drake Higgins hes ben down to Shelby las week. Tuck his crap down; couldnt git shet o the most uv it; hit wasnt no time for to sell, he say, so he fotch it back agin, lowin to wait tell fall. Talks bout goin to Mozourilots uv ems talkin thataway down thar, Ole Higgins say. Caint make a

19、livin here no mo, sich times as these. Si Higgins hes ben over to Kaintuck n married a high-toned gal thar, outen the fust families, an hes come back to the Forks with jist a hells-mint o whoop-jamboree notions, folks says. Hes tuck an fixed up the ole house like they does in Kaintuck, he say, an th

20、as ben folks come cler from Turpentine for to see it. Hes tuck an gawmed it all over on the inside with plarsterin.”“Whats plasterin?”“I dono. Hits what he calls it. Ole Mam Higgins, she tole me. She say she wasnt gwyne to hang out in no sich a dern hole like a hog. Says its mud, or some sich kind o

21、 nastiness that sticks on n covers up everything. Plarsterin, Si calls it.”This marvel was discussed at considerable length; and almost with animation. But presently there was a dog-fight over in the neighborhood of the blacksmith shop, and the visitors slid off their perch like so many turtles and

22、strode to the battle-field with an interest bordering on eagerness. The Squire remained, and read his letter. Then he sighed, and sat long in meditation. At intervals he said:“Missouri. Missouri. Well, well, well, everything is so uncertain.”At last he said:“I believe Ill do it.A man will just rot,

23、here. My house my yard, everything around me, in fact, shows that I am becoming one of these cattleand I used to be thrifty in other times.”He was not more than thirty-five, but he had a worn look that made him seem older. He left the stile, entered that part of his house which was the store, traded

24、 a quart of thick molasses for a coonskin and a cake of beeswax, to an old dame in linsey-woolsey, put his letter away, and went into the kitchen. His wife was there, constructing some dried apple pies; a slovenly urchin of ten was dreaming over a rude weather-vane of his own contriving; his small s

25、ister, close upon four years of age, was sopping corn-bread in some gravy left in the bottom of a frying-pan and trying hard not to sop over a finger-mark that divided the pan through the middlefor the other side belonged to the brother, whose musings made him forget his stomach for the moment; a ne

26、gro woman was busy cooking, at a vast fire-place. Shiftlessness and poverty reigned in the place. “Nancy, Ive made up my mind. The world is done with me, and perhaps I ought to be done with it. But no matterI can wait. I am going to Missouri. I wont stay in this dead country and decay with it. Ive h

27、ad it on my mind sometime. Im going to sell out here for whatever I can get, and buy a wagon and team and put you and the children in it and start.”“Anywhere that suits you, suits me, Si. And the children cant be any worse off in Missouri than, they are here, I reckon.”Motioning his wife to a privat

28、e conference in their own room, Hawkins said: “No, theyll be better off. Ive looked out for them, Nancy,” and his face lighted. “Do you see these papers? Well, they are evidence that I have taken up Seventy-five Thousand Acres of Land in this countythink what an enormous fortune it will be some day!

29、 Why, Nancy, enormous dont express itthe words too tame! I tell your Nancy”“For goodness sake, Si”“Wait, Nancy, waitlet me finishIve been secretly bailing and fuming with this grand inspiration for weeks, and I must talk or Ill burst! I havent whispered to a soulnot a wordhave had my countenance und

30、er lock and key, for fear it might drop something that would tell even these animals here how to discern the gold mine thats glaring under their noses. Now all that is necessary to hold this land and keep it in the family is to pay the trifling taxes on it yearlyfive or ten dollarsthe whole tract wo

31、uld not sell for over a third of a cent an acre now, but some day people will be glad to get it for twenty dollars, fifty dollars, a hundred dollars an acre! What should you say to” here he dropped his voice to a whisper and looked anxiously around to see that there were no eavesdroppers, “a thousan

32、d dollars an acre! “Well you may open your eyes and stare! But its so. You and I may not see the day, but theyll see it. Mind I tell you; theyll see it. Nancy, youve heard of steamboats, and maybe you believed in themof course you did. Youve heard these cattle here scoff at them and call them lies a

33、nd humbugs,but theyre not lies and humbugs, theyre a reality and theyre going to be a more wonderful thing some day than they are now. Theyre going to make a revolution in this worlds affairs that will make men dizzy to contemplate. Ive been watchingIve been watching while some people slept, and I k

34、now whats coming.“Even you and I will see the day that steamboats will come up that little Turkey river to within twenty miles of this land of oursand in high water theyll come right to it! And this is not all, Nancyit isnt even half! Theres a bigger wonderthe railroad! These worms here have never e

35、ven heard of itand when they do theyll not believe in it. But its another fact. Coaches that fly over the ground twenty miles an hourheavens and earth, think of that, Nancy! Twenty miles an hour. It makes a mans brain whirl. Some day, when you and I are in our graves, therell be a railroad stretchin

36、g hundreds of milesall the way down from the cities of the Northern States to New Orleansand its got to run within thirty miles of this landmay be even touch a corner of it. Well, do you know, theyve quit burning wood in some places in the Eastern States? And what do you suppose they burn? Coal!” He

37、 bent over and whispered again: “Theres worldworlds of it on this land! You know that black stuff that crops out of the bank of the branch?well, thats it. Youve taken it for rocks; so has every body here; and theyve built little dams and such things with it. One man was going to build a chimney out

38、of it. Nancy I expect I turned as white as a sheet! Why, it might have caught fire and told everything. I showed him it was too crumbly. Then he was going to build it of copper oresplendid yellow forty-per-cent. ore! Theres fortunes upon fortunes of copper ore on our land! It scared me to death, the

39、 idea of this fool starting a smelting furnace in his house without knowing it, and getting his dull eyes opened. And then he was going to build it of iron ore! Theres mountains of iron ore here, Nancywhole mountains of it. I wouldnt take any chances. I just stuck by himI haunted himI never let him

40、alone till he built it of mud and sticks like all the rest of the chimneys in this dismal country. Pine forests, wheat land, corn land, iron, copper, coalwait till the railroads come, and the steamboats! Well never see the day, Nancynever in the worldnever, never, never, child. Weve got to drag alon

41、g, drag along, and eat crusts in toil and poverty, all hopeless and forlornbut theyll ride in coaches, Nancy! Theyll live like the princes of the earth; theyll be courted and worshiped; their names will be known from ocean to ocean! Ah, well-a-day! Will they ever come back here, on the railroad and

42、the steamboat, and say, This one little spot shall not be touchedthis hovel shall be sacredfor here our father and our mother suffered for us, thought for us, laid the foundations of our future as solid as the hills!”“You are a great, good, noble soul, Si Hawkins, and I am an honored woman to be the

43、 wife of such a man”and the tears stood in her eyes when she said it. “We will go to Missouri. You are out of your place, here, among these groping dumb creatures. We will find a higher place, where you can walk with your own kind, and be understood when you speaknot stared at as if you were talking

44、 some foreign tongue. I would go anywhere, anywhere in the wide world with you. I would rather my body would starve and die than your mind should hunger and wither away in this lonely land.”“Spoken like yourself, my child! But well not starve, Nancy. Far from it. I have a letter from Beriah Sellersj

45、ust came this day. A letter thatIll read you a line from it!”He flew out of the room. A shadow blurred the sunlight in Nancys facethere was uneasiness in it, and disappointment. A procession of disturbing thoughts began to troop through her mind. Saying nothing aloud, she sat with her hands in her l

46、ap; now and then she clasped them, then unclasped them, then tapped the ends of the fingers together; sighed, nodded, smiledoccasionally paused, shook her head. This pantomime was the elocutionary expression of an unspoken soliloquy which had something of this shape:“I was afraid of itwas afraid of

47、it. Trying to make our fortune in Virginia, Beriah Sellers nearly ruined us and we had to settle in Kentucky and start over again. Trying to make our fortune in Kentucky he crippled us again and we had to move here. Trying to make our fortune here, he brought us clear down to the ground, nearly. Hes

48、 an honest soul, and means the very best in the world, but Im afraid, Im afraid hes too flighty. He has splendid ideas, and hell divide his chances with his friends with a free hand, the good generous soul, but something does seem to always interfere and spoil everything. I never did think he was ri

49、ght well balanced. But I dont blame my husband, for I do think that when that man gets his head full of a new notion, he can out-talk a machine. Hell make anybody believe in that notion thatll listen to him ten minuteswhy I do believe he would make a deaf and dumb man believe in it and get beside himself, if you only