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Miss Blimber, too, although a slim and graceful maid, did no soft violence to the gravity of the house. There was no light nonsense about Miss Blimber. She kept her hair short and crisp, and wore spectacles. She was dry and sandy with working in the graves of deceased languages. None of your live languages for Miss Blimber. They must be dead - stone dead - and then Miss Blimber dug them up like a Ghoul.
布林伯小姐虽然是一位苗条、优雅的姑娘，但也没有做任何事情破坏这房屋里的严肃气氛。轻浮的胡闹与布林伯小姐格格不入。她留着短而卷曲的头发，并戴着眼镜。她在已死去的语言的坟墓中挖掘着，所以皮肤干枯，表面是沙子的颜色。布林伯小姐不需要你们那些活的语言。她所需要的语言必须是死的——完全断了气的——，那时布林伯小姐才像食尸鬼一样，把它们挖掘出来。
Mrs Blimber, her Mama, was not learned herself, but she pretended to be, and that did quite as well. She said at evening parties, that if she could have known Cicero, she thought she could have died contented. It was the steady joy of her life to see the Doctor's young gentlemen go out walking, unlike all other young gentlemen, in the largest possible shirt-collars, and the stiffest possible cravats. It was so classical, she said.
她的妈妈布林伯夫人本人并没有学问，但是她却装出有学问的样子，而且装得还不坏。她在一些晚会上说，如果她能认识西塞罗①的话，那么她想她就能甘心满意地死去了。她的永不改变的生活乐趣就是看着博士手下的年轻的先生们，与其他年轻人不一样，敞开大得不能再大的衬衫领子，佩戴着硬得不能再硬的领带，出去散步。她说，那是古典式的。
As to Mr Feeder, B.A., Doctor Blimber's assistant, he was a kind of human barrel-organ, with a little list of tunes at which he was continually working, over and over again, without any variation. He might have been fitted up with a change of barrels, perhaps, in early life, if his destiny had been favourable; but it had not been; and he had only one, with which, in a monotonous round, it was his occupation to bewilder the young ideas of Doctor Blimber's young gentlemen. The young gentlemen were prematurely full of carking anxieties. They knew no rest from the pursuit of stony-hearted verbs, savage noun-substantives, inflexible syntactic passages, and ghosts of exercises that appeared to them in their dreams. Under the forcing system, a young gentleman usually took leave of his spirits in three weeks. He had all the cares of the world on his head in three months. He conceived bitter sentiments against his parents or guardians in four; he was an old misanthrope, in five; envied Curtius that blessed refuge in the earth, in six; and at the end of the first twelvemonth had arrived at the conclusion, from which he never afterwards departed, that all the fancies of the poets, and lessons of the sages, were a mere collection of words and grammar, and had no other meaning in the world.
至于布林格博士的助手、文学士菲德先生，他是一个人为的手摇风琴；他根据一份小小的曲调目录，一遍又一遍、毫无变化地演奏着。如果他的命运好的话，那么他可能在早年就装备好一个备用的手摇风琴；但是他的命运不好，他只有他本人这个手摇风琴，他的职业就是用这个单调的圆筒来迷糊博士手下的这些年轻的先生们的年轻的思想。这些年轻的先生们过早地操心、忧虑。铁石心肠的动词、残暴粗野的名词、毫不通融的句法，以及出现在他们梦中的练习的魔鬼在追赶着他们，使他们得不到休息；在催熟的制度下，一位年轻的先生通常在三个星期以后就失去了朝气；他在三个月以后就为世界上各种事情操心；他在四个月以后对他的父母和监护人怀着怨恨的情绪；他在五个月以后成了个老厌世者；他在六个月以后羡慕库尔提乌斯②幸运地遁身在地中；他在头十二个月末尾的时候得出结论：诗篇中的幻想和圣人的教训只不过是词与语法的汇集，在世界上没有其他意义；从此以后他就再也没有抛弃过这个结论。
But he went on blow, blow, blowing, in the Doctor's hothouse, all the time; and the Doctor's glory and reputation were great, when he took his wintry growth home to his relations and friends.
可是他在博士的温室中一直继续生长着，生长着，生长着。当他把他冬天生长出的产品带回家中，呈现在他的亲友面前时，博士就得到了极大的光荣与声誉。
Upon the Doctor's door-steps one day, Paul stood with a fluttering heart, and with his small right hand in his father's. His other hand was locked in that of Florence. How tight the tiny pressure of that one; and how loose and cold the other!
有一天，保罗怀着一颗忐忑不安的心，由他父亲握着小小的右手，站立在博士的门阶上。他的另一只手由弗洛论斯紧紧地握在她的手中。那只小手是握得多么紧，而另一只手是多么松驰与冷淡呵！
Mrs Pipchin hovered behind the victim, with her sable plumage and her hooked beak, like a bird of ill-omen. She was out of breath - for Mr Dombey, full of great thoughts, had walked fast - and she croaked hoarsely as she waited for the opening of the door.
皮普钦太太像只凶鸟，长着乌黑的羽毛和钩状的喙，在他的牺牲品后面盘旋。因为董贝先生脑子里在思考重大的事情，走得很快，所以她走得上气不接下气；当等着开门的时候，她嘶哑地发出了哭丧的声音。
'Now, Paul,' said Mr Dombey, exultingly. 'This is the way indeed to be Dombey and Son, and have money. You are almost a man already.'
“保罗，”董贝先生喜不自胜地说道。“这就是真正通向董贝父子和有钱的道路。你几乎已成为一个大人了。”
'Almost,' returned the child.
“几乎，”孩子回答道。
-------- ①西塞罗（MarcusTulliusCicero）（公元前106—43年）：古罗马政治家、雄辩家和著作家。 ②库尔提乌斯（MarcusCurtius）：据古罗马神话传说，公元前362年，罗马广场裂开一条无底深沟；预言师说，只有把罗马最宝贵的东西扔下去，裂缝才能重新合拢。这时年轻人库尔提乌斯宣称，没有什么能比一个勇敢的公民更可宝贵的了，于是他全副武装跳下了深沟。他刚一跳下，裂缝就立即重新合拢。后来这处地方变成了一片池塘，称为库尔提乌斯湖（LacusCurtius）。 |
