【英文读物】炉边的蟋蟀 The Cricket on the Hearth.docx

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1、【英文读物】炉边的蟋蟀 The Cricket on the HearthCHAPTER I - Chirp the FirstTHE kettle began it! Dont tell me what Mrs. Peerybingle said. I know better. Mrs. Peerybingle may leave it on record to the end of time that she couldnt say which of them began it; but, I say the kettle did. I ought to know, I hope! The

2、 kettle began it, full five minutes by the little waxy-faced Dutch clock in the corner, before the Cricket uttered a chirp. As if the clock hadnt finished striking, and the convulsive little Haymaker at the top of it, jerking away right and left with a scythe in front of a Moorish Palace, hadnt mowe

3、d down half an acre of imaginary grass before the Cricket joined in at all! Why, I am not naturally positive. Every one knows that. I wouldnt set my own opinion against the opinion of Mrs. Peerybingle, unless I were quite sure, on any account whatever. Nothing should induce me. But, this is a questi

4、on of act. And the fact is, that the kettle began it, at least five minutes before the Cricket gave any sign of being in existence. Contradict me, and Ill say ten. Let me narrate exactly how it happened. I should have proceeded to do so in my very first word, but for this plain consideration - if I

5、am to tell a story I must begin at the beginning; and how is it possible to begin at the beginning, without beginning at the kettle? It appeared as if there were a sort of match, or trial of skill, you must understand, between the kettle and the Cricket. And this is what led to it, and how it came a

6、bout. Mrs. Peerybingle, going out into the raw twilight, and clicking over the wet stones in a pair of pattens that worked innumerable rough impressions of the first proposition in Euclid all about the yard -Mrs. Peerybingle filled the kettle at the water-butt. Presently returning, less the pattens

7、(and a good deal less, for they were tall and Mrs. Peerybingle was but short), she set the kettle on the fire. In doing which she lost her temper, or mislaid it for an instant; for, the water being uncomfortably cold, and in that slippy, slushy, sleety sort of state wherein it seems to penetrate thr

8、ough every kind of substance, patten rings included - had laid 2 hold of Mrs. Peerybingles toes, and even splashed her legs. And when we rather plume ourselves (with reason too) upon our legs, and keep ourselves particularly neat in point of stockings, we find this, for the moment, hard to bear. Bes

9、ides, the kettle was aggravating and obstinate. It wouldnt allow itself to be adjusted on the top bar; it wouldnt hear of accommodating itself kindly to the knobs of coal; it WOULD lean forward with a drunken air, and dribble, a very Idiot of a kettle, on the hearth. It was quarrelsome, and hissed a

10、nd spluttered morosely at the fire.To sum up all, the lid, resisting Mrs. Peerybingles fingers, first of all turned topsy-turvy, and then, with an ingenious pertinacity deserving of a better cause, dived sideways in - down to the very bottom of the kettle. And the hull of the Royal George has never

11、made half the monstrous resistance to coming out of the water, which the lid of that kettle employed against Mrs. Peerybingle, before she got it up again. It looked sullen and pig-headed enough, even then; carrying its handle with an air of defiance, and cocking its spout pertly and mockingly at Mrs

12、. Peerybingle, as if it said, I wont boil. Nothing shall induce me! But Mrs. Peerybingle, with restored good humour, dusted her chubby little hands against each other, and sat down before the kettle, laughing. Meantime, the jolly blaze uprose and fell, flashing and gleaming on the little Haymaker at

13、 the top of the Dutch clock, until one might have thought he stood stock still before the Moorish Palace, and nothing was in motion but the flame. He was on the move, however; and had his spasms, two to the second, all right and regular. But, his sufferings when the clock was going to strike, were f

14、rightful to behold; and, when a Cuckoo looked out of a trapdoor in the Palace, and gave note six times, it shook him, each time, like a spectral voice - or like a something wiry, plucking at his legs. It was not until a violent commotion and a whirring noise among the weights and ropes below him had

15、 quite subsided, that this terrified Haymaker became himself again. Nor was he startled without reason; for these rattling, bony skeletons of clocks are very disconcerting in their operation, and I wonder very much how any set of men, but most of all 3 how Dutchmen, can have had a liking to invent t

16、hem. There is a popular belief that Dutchmen love broad cases and much clothing for their own lower selves; and they might know better than to leave their clocks so very lank and unprotected, surely. Now it was, you observe, that the kettle began to spend the evening. Now it was, that the kettle, gr

17、owing mellow and musical, began to have irrepressible gurglings in its throat, and to indulge in short vocal snorts, which it checked in the bud, as if it hadnt quite made up its mind yet, to be good company. Now it was, that after two or three such vain attempts to stifle its convivial sentiments,

18、it threw off all moroseness, all reserve, and burst into a stream of song so cosy and hilarious, as never maudlin nightingale yet formed the least idea of. So plain too! Bless you, you might have understood it like a book better than some books you and I could name, perhaps. With its warm breath gus

19、hing forth in a light cloud which merrily and gracefully ascended a few feet, then hung about the chimney-corner as its own domestic Heaven, it trolled its song with that strong energy of cheerfulness, that its iron body hummed and stirred upon the fire; and the lid itself, the recently rebellious l

20、id - such is the influence of a bright example performed a sort of jig, and clattered like a deaf and dumb young cymbal that had never known the use of its twin brother. That this song of the kettles was a song of invitation and welcome to somebody out of doors: to somebody at that moment coming on,

21、 towards the snug small home and the crisp fire: there is no doubt whatever. Mrs. Peerybingle knew it, perfectly, as she sat musing before the hearth. Its a dark night, sang the kettle, and the rotten leaves are lying by the way; and, above, all is mist and darkness, and, below, all is mire and clay

22、; and theres only one relief in all the sad and murky air; and I dont know that it is one, for its nothing but a glare; of deep and angry crimson, where the sun and wind together; set a brand upon the clouds for being guilty of such weather; and the widest open country is a long dull streak of black

23、; and theres hoar-frost on the finger-post, and thaw upon the track; and the ice it isnt water, and the water isnt free; and you couldnt say that anything is what it ought to be; but hes coming, coming, 4 coming! And here, if you like, the Cricket DID chime in! with a Chirrup, Chirrup, Chirrup of su

24、ch magnitude, by way of chorus; with a voice so astoundingly disproportionate to its size, as compared with the kettle; (size! you couldnt see it!) that if it had then and there burst itself like an overcharged gun, if it had fallen a victim on the spot, and chirruped its little body into fifty piec

25、es, it would have seemed a natural and inevitable consequence, for which it had expressly laboured. The kettle had had the last of its solo performance. It persevered with undiminished ardour; but the Cricket took first fiddle and kept it. Good Heaven, how it chirped! Its shrill, sharp, piercing voi

26、ce resounded through the house, and seemed to twinkle in the outer darkness like a star. There was an indescribable little trill and tremble in it, at its loudest, which suggested its being carried off its legs, and made to leap again, by its own intense enthusiasm. Yet they went very well together,

27、 the Cricket and the kettle. The burden of the song was still the same; and louder, louder, louder still, they sang it in their emulation. The fair little listener - for fair she was, and young: though something of what is called the dumpling shape; but I dont myself object to that - lighted a candl

28、e, glanced at the Haymaker on the top of the clock, who was getting in a pretty average crop of minutes; and looked out of the window, where she saw nothing, owing to the darkness, but her own face imaged in the glass. And my opinion is (and so would yours have been), that she might have looked a lo

29、ng way, and seen nothing half so agreeable. When she came back, and sat down in her former seat, the Cricket and the kettle were still keeping it up, with a perfect fury of competition. The kettles weak side clearly being, that he didnt know when he was beat. There was all the excitement of a race a

30、bout it. Chirp, chirp, chirp! Cricket a mile ahead. Hum, hum, hum - m - m! Kettle making play in the distance, like a great top. Chirp, chirp, chirp! Cricket round the corner. Hum, hum, hum - m - m! Kettle sticking to him in his own way; no idea of giving in. Chirp, chirp, chirp! Cricket fresher tha

31、n ever. Hum, hum, hum -m -m! Kettle slow and steady. Chirp, chirp, chirp! Cricket going in to finish him. Hum, hum, hum - m - m! Kettle not to 5 be finished. Until at last they got so jumbled together, in the hurry-skurry, helter-skelter, of the match, that whether the kettle chirped and the Cricket

32、 hummed, or the Cricket chirped and the kettle hummed, or they both chirped and both hummed, it would have taken a clearer head than yours or mine to have decided with anything like certainty. But, of this, there is no doubt: that, the kettle and the Cricket, at one and the same moment, and by some

33、power of amalgamation best known to themselves, sent, each, his fireside song of comfort streaming into a ray of the candle that shone out through the window, and a long way down the lane. And this light, bursting on a certain person who, on the instant, approached towards it through the gloom, expr

34、essed the whole thing to him, literally in a twinkling, and cried, Welcome home, old fellow! Welcome home, my boy! This end attained, the kettle, being dead beat, boiled over, and was taken off the fire. Mrs. Peerybingle then went running to the door, where, what with the wheels of a cart, the tramp

35、 of a horse, the voice of a man, the tearing in and out of an excited dog, and the surprising and mysterious appearance of a baby, there was soon the very Whats-his-name to pay. Where the baby came from, or how Mrs. Peerybingle got hold of it in that flash of time, I dont know. But a live baby there

36、 was, in Mrs. Peerybingles arms; and a pretty tolerable amount of pride she seemed to have in it, when she was drawn gently to the fire, by a sturdy figure of a man, much taller and much older than herself, who had to stoop a long way down, to kiss her. But she was worth the trouble. Six foot six, w

37、ith the lumbago, might have done it. Oh goodness, John! said Mrs. P. What a state you are in with the weather! He was something the worse for it, undeniably. The thick mist hung in clots upon his eyelashes like candied thaw; and between the fog and fire together, there were rainbows in his very whis

38、kers. Why, you see, Dot, John made answer, slowly, as he unrolled a shawl from about his throat; and warmed his hands; it - it ant exactly summer weather. So, no wonder. I wish you wouldnt call me Dot, John. I dont like it, said Mrs. 6 Peerybingle: pouting in a way that clearly showed she DID like i

39、t, very much. Why what else are you? returned John, looking down upon her with a smile, and giving her waist as light a squeeze as his huge hand and arm could give. A dot and - here he glanced at the baby - a dot and carry - I wont say it, for fear I should spoil it; but I was very near a joke. I do

40、nt know as ever I was nearer. He was often near to something or other very clever, by his own account: this lumbering, slow, honest John; this John so heavy, but so light of spirit; so rough upon the surface, but so gentle at the core; so dull without, so quick within; so stolid, but so good! Oh Mot

41、her Nature, give thy children the true poetry of heart that hid itself in this poor Carriers breast - he was but a Carrier by the way - and we can bear to have them talking prose, and leading lives of prose; and bear to bless thee for their company! It was pleasant to see Dot, with her little figure

42、, and her baby in her arms: a very doll of a baby: glancing with a coquettish thoughtfulness at the fire, and inclining her delicate little head just enough on one side to let it rest in an odd, half-natural, half-affected, wholly nestling and agreeable manner, on the great rugged figure of the Carr

43、ier. It was pleasant to see him, with his tender awkwardness, endeavouring to adapt his rude support to her slight need, and make his burly middle-age a leaning-staff not inappropriate to her blooming youth. It was pleasant to observe how Tilly Slowboy, waiting in the background for the baby, took s

44、pecial cognizance (though in her earliest teens) of this grouping; and stood with her mouth and eyes wide open, and her head thrust forward, taking it in as if it were air. Nor was it less agreeable to observe how John the Carrier, reference being made by Dot to the aforesaid baby, checked his hand

45、when on the point of touching the infant, as if he thought he might crack it; and bending down, surveyed it from a safe distance, with a kind of puzzled pride, such as an amiable mastiff might be supposed to show, if he found himself, one day, the father of a young canary. Ant he beautiful, John? Do

46、nt he look precious in his sleep? 7 Very precious, said John. Very much so. He generally IS asleep, ant he? Lor, John! Good gracious no! Oh, said John, pondering. I thought his eyes was generally shut. Halloa! Goodness, John, how you startle one! It ant right for him to turn em up in that way! said

47、the astonished Carrier, is it? See how hes winking with both of em at once! And look at his mouth! Why hes gasping like a gold and silver fish! You dont deserve to be a father, you dont, said Dot, with all the dignity of an experienced matron. But how should you know what little complaints children

48、are troubled with, John! You wouldnt so much as know their names, you stupid fellow. And when she had turned the baby over on her left arm, and had slapped its back as a restorative, she pinched her husbands ear, laughing. No, said John, pulling off his outer coat. Its very true, Dot. I dont know mu

49、ch about it. I only know that Ive been fighting pretty stiffly with the wind to-night. Its been blowing north- east, straight into the cart, the whole way home. Poor old man, so it has! cried Mrs. Peerybingle, instantly becoming very active. Here! Take the precious darling, Tilly, while I make myself of some use. Bless it, I could smother it with kissing it, I could! Hie then, good dog! Hie, Boxer, boy! Only let me make the tea first, John; and then Ill help you with the parcels,