先讀課文﹕
The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe 魯賓孫漂流記
By Daniel Defoe
CHAPTER I -- START IN LIFE
I was born in the year 1632, in the city of York, of a good family, though
not of that country, my father being a foreigner of Bremen, who settled
first at Hull. He got a good estate by merchandise, and leaving off his
trade, lived afterwards at York, from whence he had married my mother, whose
relations were named Robinson, a very good family in that country, and from
whom I was called Robinson Kreutznaer; but, by the usual corruption of words
in England, we are now called -- nay, we call ourselves and write our name
-- Crusoe; and so my companions always called me.
I had two elder brothers, one of whom was lieutenant-colonel to an English
regiment of foot in Flanders, formerly commanded by the famous Colonel Lockhart,
and was killed at the battle near Dunkirk against the Spaniards. What
became of my second brother I never knew, any more than my father or mother
knew what became of me.
Being the third son of the family and not bred to any trade, my head began
to be filled very early with rambling thoughts. My father, who was very
ancient, had given me a competent share of learning, as far as house-education
and a country free school generally go, and designed me for the law; but
I would be satisfied with nothing but going to sea; and my inclination to
this led me so strongly against the will, nay, the commands of my father,
and against all the entreaties and persuasions of my mother and other friends,
that there seemed to be something fatal in that propensity of nature, tending
directly to the life of misery which was to befall me.
My father, a wise and grave man, gave me serious and excellent counsel against
what he foresaw was my design. He called me one morning into his chamber,
where he was confined by the gout, and expostulated very warmly with me
upon this subject. He asked me what reasons, more than a mere wandering
inclination, I had for leaving father's house and my native country, where
I might be well introduced, and had a prospect of raising my fortune by application
and industry, with a life of ease and pleasure. He told me it was men of
desperate fortunes on one hand, or of aspiring superior fortunes on the
other, who went abroad upon adventures, to rise by enterprise, and make
themselves famous in undertakings of a nature out of the common road; that
these things were all either too far above me or too far below me; that
mine was the middle state, or what might be called the upper station of low
life, which he had found, by long experience, was the best state in the
world, the most suited to human happiness, not exposed to the miseries and
hardships, the labour and sufferings of the mechanic part of mankind, and
not embarrassed with the pride, luxury, ambition, and envy of the upper
part of mankind. He told me I might judge of the happiness of this state
by this one thing -- viz. that this was the state of life which all other
people envied; that kings have frequently lamented the miserable consequence
of being born to great things, and wished they had been placed in the middle
of the two extremes, between the mean and the great; that the wise man gave
his testimony to this, as the standard of felicity, when he prayed to have
neither poverty nor riches.
He bade me observe it, and I should always find that the calamities of life
were shared among the upper and lower part of mankind, but that the middle
station had the fewest disasters, and was not exposed to so many vicissitudes
as the higher or lower part of mankind; nay, they were not subjected to
so many distempers and uneasinesses, either of body or mind, as those were
who, by vicious living, luxury, and extravagances on the one hand, or by
hard labour, want of necessaries, and mean or insufficient diet on the other
hand, bring distemper upon themselves by the natural consequences of their
way of living; that the middle station of life was calculated for all kind
of virtue and all kind of enjoyments; that peace and plenty were the handmaids
of a middle fortune; that temperance, moderation, quietness, health, society,
all agreeable diversions, and all desirable pleasures, were the blessings
attending the middle station of life; that this way men went silently and
smoothly through the world, and comfortably out of it, not embarrassed with
the labours of the hands or of the head, not sold to a life of slavery for
daily bread, nor harassed with perplexed circumstances, which rob the soul
of peace and the body of rest, nor enraged with the passion of envy, or
the secret burning lust of ambition for great things; but, in easy circumstances,
sliding gently through the world, and sensibly tasting the sweets of living,
without the bitter; feeling that they are happy, and learning by every
day's experience to know it more sensibly.
After this he pressed me earnestly, and in the most affectionate manner,
not to play the young man, nor to precipitate myself into miseries which
nature, and the station of life I was born in, seemed to have provided against;
that I was under no necessity of seeking my bread; that he would do well
for me, and endeavour to enter me fairly into the station of life which he
had just been recommending to me; and that if I was not very easy and happy
in the world, it must be my mere fate or fault that must hinder it; and
that he should have nothing to answer for, having thus discharged his duty
in warning me against measures which he knew would be to my hurt; in a word,
that as he would do very kind things for me if I would stay and settle at
home as he directed, so he would not have so much hand in my misfortunes
as to give me any encouragement to go away; and to close all, he told me
I had my elder brother for an example, to whom he had used the same earnest
persuasions to keep him from going into the Low Country wars, but could
not prevail, his young desires prompting him to run into the army, where
he was killed; and though he said he would not cease to pray for me, yet
he would venture to say to me, that if I did take this foolish step, God
would not bless me, and I should have leisure hereafter to reflect upon
having neglected his counsel when there might be none to assist in my recovery.
I observed in this last part of his discourse, which was truly prophetic,
though I suppose my father did not know it to be so himself -- I say, I
observed the tears run down his face very plentifully, especially when he
spoke of my brother who was killed: and that when he spoke of my having
leisure to repent, and none to assist me, he was so moved that he broke off
the discourse, and told me his heart was so full he could say no more to
me.
I was sincerely affected with this discourse, and, indeed, who could be
otherwise? and I resolved not to think of going abroad any more, but to
settle at home according to my father's desire. But alas! a few days wore
it all off; and, in short, to prevent any of my father's further importunities,
in a few weeks after I resolved to run quite away from him. However, I
did not act quite so hastily as the first heat of my resolution prompted;
but I took my mother at a time when I thought her a little more pleasant
than ordinary, and told her that my thoughts were so entirely bent upon
seeing the world that I should never settle to anything with resolution enough
to go through with it, and my father had better give me his consent than
force me to go without it; that I was now eighteen years old, which was
too late to go apprentice to a trade or clerk to an attorney; that I was
sure if I did I should never serve out my time, but I should certainly run
away from my master before my time was out, and go to sea; and if she would
speak to my father to let me go one voyage abroad, if I came home again,
and did not like it, I would go no more; and I would promise, by a double
diligence, to recover the time that I had lost.
This put my mother into a great passion; she told me she knew it would be
to no purpose to speak to my father upon any such subject; that he knew
too well what was my interest to give his consent to anything so much for
my hurt; and that she wondered how I could think of any such thing after
the discourse I had had with my father, and such kind and tender expressions
as she knew my father had used to me; and that, in short, if I would ruin
myself, there was no help for me; but I might depend I should never have
their consent to it; that for her part she would not have so much hand in
my destruction; and I should never have it to say that my mother was willing
when my father was not.
Though my mother refused to move it to my father, yet I heard afterwards
that she reported all the discourse to him, and that my father, after showing
a great concern at it, said to her, with a sigh, "That boy might be happy
if he would stay at home; but if he goes abroad, he will be the most miserable
wretch that ever was born: I can give no consent to it."
It was not till almost a year after this that I broke loose, though, in
the meantime, I continued obstinately deaf to all proposals of settling
to business, and frequently expostulated with my father and mother about
their being so positively determined against what they knew my inclinations
prompted me to. But being one day at Hull, where I went casually, and without
any purpose of making an elopement at that time; but, I say, being there,
and one of my companions being about to sail to London in his father's ship,
and prompting me to go with them with the common allurement of seafaring
men, that it should cost me nothing for my passage, I consulted neither
father nor mother any more, nor so much as sent them word of it; but leaving
them to hear of it as they might, without asking God's blessing or my father's,
without any consideration of circumstances or consequences, and in an ill
hour, God knows, on the 1st of September 1651, I went on board a ship bound
for London. Never any young adventurer's misfortunes, I believe, began
sooner, or continued longer than mine. The ship was no sooner out of the
Humber than the wind began to blow and the sea to rise in a most frightful
manner; and, as I had never been at sea before, I was most inexpressibly
sick in body and terrified in mind. I began now seriously to reflect upon
what I had done, and how justly I was overtaken by the judgment of Heaven
for my wicked leaving my father's house, and abandoning my duty. All the
good counsels of my parents, my father's tears and my mother's entreaties,
came now fresh into my mind; and my conscience, which was not yet come to
the pitch of hardness to which it has since, reproached me with the contempt
of advice, and the breach of my duty to God and my father.
All this while the storm increased, and the sea went very high, though nothing
like what I have seen many times since; no, nor what I saw a few days after;
but it was enough to affect me then, who was but a young sailor, and had
never known anything of the matter. I expected every wave would have swallowed
us up, and that every time the ship fell down, as I thought it did, in the
trough or hollow of the sea, we should never rise more; in this agony of
mind, I made many vows and resolutions that if it would please God to spare
my life in this one voyage, if ever I got once my foot upon dry land again,
I would go directly home to my father, and never set it into a ship again
while I lived; that I would take his advice, and never run myself into such
miseries as these any more. Now I saw plainly the goodness of his observations
about the middle station of life, how easy, how comfortably he had lived
all his days, and never had been exposed to tempests at sea or troubles
on shore; and I resolved that I would, like a true repenting prodigal, go
home to my father.
These wise and sober thoughts continued all the while the storm lasted,
and indeed some time after; but the next day the wind was abated, and the
sea calmer, and I began to be a little inured to it; however, I was very
grave for all that day, being also a little sea-sick still; but towards
night the weather cleared up, the wind was quite over, and a charming fine
evening followed; the sun went down perfectly clear, and rose so the next
morning; and having little or no wind, and a smooth sea, the sun shining
upon it, the sight was, as I thought, the most delightful that ever I saw.
I had slept well in the night, and was now no more sea-sick, but very cheerful,
looking with wonder upon the sea that was so rough and terrible the day
before, and could be so calm and so pleasant in so little a time after.
And now, lest my good resolutions should continue, my companion, who had
enticed me away, comes to me; "Well, Bob," says he, clapping me upon the
shoulder, "how do you do after it? I warrant you were frighted, wer'n't
you, last night, when it blew but a capful of wind?" "A capful d'you call
it?" said I; " 'twas a terrible storm." "A storm, you fool you," replies
he; "do you call that a storm? why, it was nothing at all; give us but a
good ship and sea-room, and we think nothing of such a squall of wind as
that; but you're but a fresh-water sailor, Bob. Come, let us make a bowl
of punch, and we'll forget all that; d'ye see what charming weather 'tis
now?" To make short this sad part of my story, we went the way of all sailors;
the punch was made and I was made half drunk with it: and in that one night's
wickedness I drowned all my repentance, all my reflections upon my past
conduct, all my resolutions for the future. In a word, as the sea was returned
to its smoothness of surface and settled calmness by the abatement of that
storm, so the hurry of my thoughts being over, my fears and apprehensions
of being swallowed up by the sea being forgotten, and the current of my
former desires returned, I entirely forgot the vows and promises that I made
in my distress. I found, indeed, some intervals of reflection; and the
serious thoughts did, as it were, endeavour to return again sometimes; but
I shook them off, and roused myself from them as it were from a distemper,
and applying myself to drinking and company, soon mastered the return of
those fits -- for so I called them; and I had in five or six days got as
complete a victory over conscience as any young fellow that resolved not
to be troubled with it could desire. But I was to have another trial for
it still; and Providence, as in such cases generally it does, resolved to
leave me entirely without excuse; for if I would not take this for a deliverance,
the next was to be such a one as the worst and most hardened wretch among
us would confess both the danger and the mercy of.
The sixth day of our being at sea we came into Yarmouth Roads; the wind
having been contrary and the weather calm, we had made but little way since
the storm. Here we were obliged to come to an anchor, and here we lay,
the wind continuing contrary -- viz. at south-west -- for seven or eight
days, during which time a great many ships from Newcastle came into the
same Roads, as the common harbour where the ships might wait for a wind for
the river.
We had not, however, rid here so long but we should have tided it up the
river, but that the wind blew too fresh, and after we had lain four or five
days, blew very hard. However, the Roads being reckoned as good as a harbour,
the anchorage good, and our ground-tackle very strong, our men were unconcerned,
and not in the least apprehensive of danger, but spent the time in rest
and mirth, after the manner of the sea; but the eighth day, in the morning,
the wind increased, and we had all hands at work to strike our topmasts,
and make everything snug and close, that the ship might ride as easy as
possible. By noon the sea went very high indeed, and our ship rode forecastle
in, shipped several seas, and we thought once or twice our anchor had come
home; upon which our master ordered out the sheet-anchor, so that we rode
with two anchors ahead, and the cables veered out to the bitter end.
By this time it blew a terrible storm indeed; and now I began to see terror
and amazement in the faces even of the seamen themselves. The master, though
vigilant in the business of preserving the ship, yet as he went in and out
of his cabin by me, I could hear him softly to himself say, several times,
"Lord be merciful to us! we shall be all lost! we shall be all undone!" and
the like. During these first hurries I was stupid, lying still in my cabin,
which was in the steerage, and cannot describe my temper: I could ill resume
the first penitence which I had so apparently trampled upon and hardened
myself against: I thought the bitterness of death had been past, and that
this would be nothing like the first; but when the master himself came by
me, as I said just now, and said we should be all lost, I was dreadfully
frighted. I got up out of my cabin and looked out; but such a dismal sight
I never saw: the sea ran mountains high, and broke upon us every three or
four minutes; when I could look about, I could see nothing but distress
round us; two ships that rode near us, we found, had cut their masts by the
board, being deep laden; and our men cried out that a ship which rode about
a mile ahead of us was foundered. Two more ships, being driven from their
anchors, were run out of the Roads to sea, at all adventures, and that with
not a mast standing. The light ships fared the best, as not so much labouring
in the sea; but two or three of them drove, and came close by us, running
away with only their spritsail out before the wind.
Towards evening the mate and boatswain begged the master of our ship to
let them cut away the fore-mast, which he was very unwilling to do; but
the boatswain protesting to him that if he did not the ship would founder,
he consented; and when they had cut away the fore-mast, the main-mast stood
so loose, and shook the ship so much, they were obliged to cut that away
also, and make a clear deck.
看到這裡大約是第一章的一半。如果有興趣要看下去﹐或要看全書的﹐可以在網上
找到。我們這裡要閱讀的或注意的是寫作的文筆﹐及表達法﹐不是故事的情節。如
果對航海用語不熟悉的﹐可以不必管它。能理解到主要情節的描述﹐就說明基本看
懂了。這是泛讀的要求。閱讀得多了﹐理解力就會提高﹐說明閱讀水平也就提高了。
這就是學習的積累過程。鍥而不捨﹐金石可鏤。
1) 生詞自查。
2) 作者介紹﹕Daniel Defoe (ca. 1659--1661 to 24 April 1731), born Daniel
Foe, was an English trader, writer, journalist, and pamphleteer, who gained
fame for his novel Robinson Crusoe. Defoe is notable for being one of the
earliest proponents of the novel, as he helped to popularise the form in
Britain and along with others such as Richardson, is among the founders of
the English novel. A prolific and versatile writer, he wrote more than 500
books, pamphlets and journals on various topics (including politics, crime,
religion, marriage, psychology and the supernatural). He was also a pioneer
of economic journalism.
3) 本書簡介﹕Robinson Crusoe is a novel by Daniel Defoe that was first published
in 1719. Epistolary, confessional, and didactic in form, the book is a fictional
autobiography of the title character--a castaway who spends 28 years on
a remote tropical island near Trinidad, encountering cannibals, captives,
and mutineers before being rescued.
4) 魯賓孫漂流記也是本世界名著。我小時候就聽說過的。應該可作英文專業人士的
泛讀材料。
选择“Disable on www.wenxuecity.com”
选择“don't run on pages on this domain”
