章节正文
along the bridge; Rebecca pursued; it danced along and stuck
between two of the railings; Rebecca flew after it, her long
braids floating in the wind.
"Come back"! Come back! Don't leave me alone with the team. I
won't have it! Come back, and leave your hat!"
Miranda had at length extricated herself from the submerging
shawl, but she was so blinded by the wind, and so confused that
she did not measure the financial loss involved in her commands.
Rebecca heard, but her spirit being in arms, she made one more
mad scramble for the vagrant hat, which now seemed possessed with
an evil spirit, for it flew back and forth, and bounded here and
there, like a living thing, finally distinguishing itself by
blowing between the horse's front and hind legs, Rebecca trying
to circumvent it by going around the wagon, and meeting it on the
other side.
It was no use; as she darted from behind the wheels the wind gave
the hat an extra whirl, and scurrying in the opposite direction
it soared above the bridge rail and disappeared into the rapid
water below.
"Get in again!" cried Miranda, holding on her bonnet. "You done
your best and it can't be helped, I only wish't I'd let you wear
your black hat as you wanted to; and I wish't we'd never come
such a day! The shawl has broke the stems of the velvet geraniums
in my bonnet, and the wind has blowed away my shawl pin and my
back comb. I'd like to give up and turn right back this minute,
but I don't like to borrer Perkins's hoss again this month. When
we get up in the woods you can smooth your hair down and tie the
rigolette over your head and settle what's left of my bonnet;
it'll be an expensive errant, this will!"
* * * * * * * * * * * *
II
It was not till next morning that Rebecca's heart really began
its song of thanksgiving. Her Aunt Miranda announced at
breakfast, that as Mrs. Perkins was going to Milliken's Mills,
Rebecca might go too, and buy a serviceable hat.
"You mustn't pay over two dollars and a half, and you mustn't get
the pink bird without Mrs. Perkins says, and the milliner says,
that it won't fade nor moult. Don't buy a light-colored felt
because you'll get sick of it in two or three years same as you
did the brown one. I always liked the shape of the brown one, and
you'll never get another trimmin' that'll wear like them quills."
"I hope not!" thought Rebecca.
"If you had put your elastic under your chin, same as you used
to, and not worn it behind because you think it's more grown-up
an' fash'onable, the wind never'd a' took the hat off your head,
and you wouldn't a' lost it; but the mischief's done and you can
go right over to Mis' Perkins now, so you won't miss her nor keep
her waitin'. The two dollars and a half is in an envelope side o'
the clock."
Rebecca swallowed the last spoonful of picked-up codfish on her
plate, wiped her lips, and rose from her chair happier than the
seraphs in Paradise.
The porcupine quills had disappeared from her life, and without
any fault or violence on her part. She was whollyinnocent and
virtuous, but nevertheless she was going to have a new hat with
the solferino breast, should the adored object prove, under
rigorous examination, to be practically indestructible.
"Whene'er I take my walks abroad,
How many hats I'll see;
But if they're trimmed with hedgehog quills
They'll not belong to me!"
So she improvised, secretly and ecstatically, as she went towards
the side entry.
"There's 'Bijah Flagg drivin' in," said Miss Miranda, going to
the window. "Step out and see what he's got, Jane; some passel
from the Squire, I guess. It's a paper bag and it may be a
punkin, though he wouldn't wrop up a punkin, come to think of it!
Shet the dinin' room door, Jane; it's turrible drafty. Make
haste, for the Squire's hoss never stan's still a minute cept
when he's goin'!"
Abijah Flagg alighted and approached the side door with a grin.
"Guess what I've got for ye, Rebecky?"
No throb of prophetic soul warned Rebecca of her approaching
doom.
"Nodhead apples?" she sparkled, looking as bright and rosy and
satin-skinned as an apple herself.
"No; guess again."
"A flowering geranium?"
"Guess again!"
"Nuts? Oh! I can't, " Bijah; I'm just going to Milliken's Mills
on an errand, and I'm afraid of missing Mrs. Perkins. Show me
quick! Is it really for me, or for Aunt Miranda?
"Reely for you, I guess!" and he opened the large brown paper bag
and drew from it the remains of a water-soaked hat!
They WERE remains, but there was no doubt of their nature and
substance. They had clearly been a hat in the past, and one could
even suppose that, when resuscitated, they might again assume
their original form in some near and happy future.
Miss Miranda, full of curiosity, joined the group in the side
entry at this dramatic moment.
"Well, I never!" she exclaimed. "Where, and how under the canopy,
did you ever?"
"I was working on the dam at Union Falls yesterday," chuckled
Abijah, with a pleased glance at each of the trio in turn, "an' I
seen this little bunnit skippin' over the water jest as Becky
does over the road. It's shaped kind o' like a boat, an' gorry,
ef it wa'nt sailin' jest like a boat! Where hev I seen that kind
of a bristlin' plume?' thinks I."
("Where indeed!" thought Rebecca stormily.)
"Then it come to me that I'd drove that plume to school and drove
it to meetin' and drove it to the Fair an'drove it most
everywheres on Becky. So I reached out a pole an' ketched it fore
it got in amongst the logs an' come to any damage, an' here it
is! The hat's passed in its checks, I guess; looks kind as if a
wet elephant had stepped on it; but the plume's bout's good as
new! I reely fetched the hat beck for the sake o' the plume."
"It was real good of you, 'Bijah, an' we're all of us obliged to
you," said Miranda, as she poised the hat on one hand and turned
it slowly with the other.
"Well, I do say," she exclaimed, "and I guess I've said it
before, that of all the wearing' plumes that ever I see, that
one's the wearin'est! Seems though it just wouldn't give up. Look
at the way it's held Mis' Cobb's dye; it's about as brown's when
it went int' the water."
"Dyed, but not a mite dead," grinned Abijah, who was somewhat
celebrated for his puns.
"And I declare," Miranda continued, "when you think o' the fuss
they make about ostriches, killin' em off by hundreds for the
sake o' their feathers that'll string out and spoil in one hard
rainstorm,--an' all the time lettin' useful porcupines run round
with their quills on, why I can't hardly understand it, without
milliners have found out jest how good they do last, an' so they
won't use em for trimmin'. 'Bijah's right; the hat ain't no more
use, Rebecca, but you can buy you another this mornin'--any color
or shape you fancy--an' have Miss Morton sew these brown quills
on to it with some kind of a buckle or a bow, jest to hide the
roots. Then you'll be fixed for another season, thanks to
'Bijah."
Uncle Jerry and Aunt Sarah Cobb were made acquainted before very
long with the part that destiny, or Abijah Flagg, had played in
Rebecca's affairs, for, accompanied by the teacher, she walked to
the old stage driver's that same afternoon. Taking off her new
hat with the venerable trimming, she laid it somewhat
ostentatiously upside down on the kitchen table and left the
room, dimpling a little more than usual.
Uncle Jerry rose from his seat, and, crossing the room, looked
curiously into the hat and found that a circular paper lining was
neatly pinned in the crown, and that it bore these lines, which
were read aloud with great effect by Miss Dearborn, and with her
approval were copied in the Thought Book for the benefit of
posterity:
"It was the bristling porcupine, As he stood on his native heath,
He said, I'll pluck me some immortelles And make me up a wreath.
For tho' I may not live myself To more than a hundred and ten, My
quills will last till crack of doom, And maybe after then. They
can be colored blue or green Or orange, brown, or red, But often
as they may be dyed They never will be dead.' And so the
bristling porcupine As he stood on his native heath, Said, I
think I'll pluck me some immmortelles And make me up a wreath.'
R.R.R."
Fifth Chronicle
THE SAVING OF THE COLORS
I
Even when Rebecca had left school, having attained the great age
of seventeen and therefore able to look back over a past
incredibly long and full, she still reckoned time not by years,
but by certain important occurrences.
There was the year her father died; the year she left Sunnybrook
Farm to come to her aunts in Riverboro; the year Sister Hannah
became engaged; the year little Mira died; the year Abijah Flagg
ceased to be Squire Bean's chore-boy, and astounded Riverboro by
departing for Limerick Academy in search of an education; and
finally the year of her graduation, which, to the mind of
seventeen, seems rather the culmination than the beginning of
existence.
Between these epoch-making events certain other happenings stood
out in bold relief against the gray of dull daily life.
There was the day she first met her friend of friends, "Mr.
Aladdin," and the later, even more radiant one when he gave her
the coral necklace. There was the day the Simpson family moved
away from Riverboro under a cloud, and she kissed Clara Belle
fervently at the cross-roads, telling her that she would always
be faithful. There was the visit of the Syrian missionaries to
the brick house. That was a bright, romantic memory, as strange
and brilliant as the wonderful little birds' wings and breasts
that the strangers brought from the Far East. She remembered the
moment they asked her to choose some for herself, and the rapture
with which she stroked the beautiful things as they lay on the
black haircloth sofa. Then there was the coming of the new
minister, for though many were tried only one was chosen; and
finally there was the flag-raising, a festivity that thrilled
Riverboro and Edgewood society from centre to circumference, a
festivity that took place just before she entered the Female
Seminary at Wareham and said good-by to kind Miss Dearborn and
the village school.
There must have been other flag-raisings in history,--even the
persons most interested in this particular one would grudgingly
have allowed that much,--but it would have seemed to them
improbable that any such flag-raising as theirs, either in
magnitude of conception or brilliancy of actual performance,
could twice glorify the same century. Of some pageants it is
tacitly admitted that there can be no duplicates, and the
flag-raising at Riverboro Centre was one of these; so that it is
small wonder if Rebecca chose it as one of the important dates in
her personal almanac.
The new minister's wife was the being, under Providence, who had
conceived the germinal idea of the flag.
At this time the parish had almost settled down to the trembling
belief that they were united on a pastor. In the earlier time a
minister was chosen for life, and if he had faults, which was a
probably enough contingency, and if his congregation had any,
between two of the railings; Rebecca flew after it, her long
braids floating in the wind.
"Come back"! Come back! Don't leave me alone with the team. I
won't have it! Come back, and leave your hat!"
Miranda had at length extricated herself from the submerging
shawl, but she was so blinded by the wind, and so confused that
she did not measure the financial loss involved in her commands.
Rebecca heard, but her spirit being in arms, she made one more
mad scramble for the vagrant hat, which now seemed possessed with
an evil spirit, for it flew back and forth, and bounded here and
there, like a living thing, finally distinguishing itself by
blowing between the horse's front and hind legs, Rebecca trying
to circumvent it by going around the wagon, and meeting it on the
other side.
It was no use; as she darted from behind the wheels the wind gave
the hat an extra whirl, and scurrying in the opposite direction
it soared above the bridge rail and disappeared into the rapid
water below.
"Get in again!" cried Miranda, holding on her bonnet. "You done
your best and it can't be helped, I only wish't I'd let you wear
your black hat as you wanted to; and I wish't we'd never come
such a day! The shawl has broke the stems of the velvet geraniums
in my bonnet, and the wind has blowed away my shawl pin and my
back comb. I'd like to give up and turn right back this minute,
but I don't like to borrer Perkins's hoss again this month. When
we get up in the woods you can smooth your hair down and tie the
rigolette over your head and settle what's left of my bonnet;
it'll be an expensive errant, this will!"
* * * * * * * * * * * *
II
It was not till next morning that Rebecca's heart really began
its song of thanksgiving. Her Aunt Miranda announced at
breakfast, that as Mrs. Perkins was going to Milliken's Mills,
Rebecca might go too, and buy a serviceable hat.
"You mustn't pay over two dollars and a half, and you mustn't get
the pink bird without Mrs. Perkins says, and the milliner says,
that it won't fade nor moult. Don't buy a light-colored felt
because you'll get sick of it in two or three years same as you
did the brown one. I always liked the shape of the brown one, and
you'll never get another trimmin' that'll wear like them quills."
"I hope not!" thought Rebecca.
"If you had put your elastic under your chin, same as you used
to, and not worn it behind because you think it's more grown-up
an' fash'onable, the wind never'd a' took the hat off your head,
and you wouldn't a' lost it; but the mischief's done and you can
go right over to Mis' Perkins now, so you won't miss her nor keep
her waitin'. The two dollars and a half is in an envelope side o'
the clock."
Rebecca swallowed the last spoonful of picked-up codfish on her
plate, wiped her lips, and rose from her chair happier than the
seraphs in Paradise.
The porcupine quills had disappeared from her life, and without
any fault or violence on her part. She was whollyinnocent and
virtuous, but nevertheless she was going to have a new hat with
the solferino breast, should the adored object prove, under
rigorous examination, to be practically indestructible.
"Whene'er I take my walks abroad,
How many hats I'll see;
But if they're trimmed with hedgehog quills
They'll not belong to me!"
So she improvised, secretly and ecstatically, as she went towards
the side entry.
"There's 'Bijah Flagg drivin' in," said Miss Miranda, going to
the window. "Step out and see what he's got, Jane; some passel
from the Squire, I guess. It's a paper bag and it may be a
punkin, though he wouldn't wrop up a punkin, come to think of it!
Shet the dinin' room door, Jane; it's turrible drafty. Make
haste, for the Squire's hoss never stan's still a minute cept
when he's goin'!"
Abijah Flagg alighted and approached the side door with a grin.
"Guess what I've got for ye, Rebecky?"
No throb of prophetic soul warned Rebecca of her approaching
doom.
"Nodhead apples?" she sparkled, looking as bright and rosy and
satin-skinned as an apple herself.
"No; guess again."
"A flowering geranium?"
"Guess again!"
"Nuts? Oh! I can't, " Bijah; I'm just going to Milliken's Mills
on an errand, and I'm afraid of missing Mrs. Perkins. Show me
quick! Is it really for me, or for Aunt Miranda?
"Reely for you, I guess!" and he opened the large brown paper bag
and drew from it the remains of a water-soaked hat!
They WERE remains, but there was no doubt of their nature and
substance. They had clearly been a hat in the past, and one could
even suppose that, when resuscitated, they might again assume
their original form in some near and happy future.
Miss Miranda, full of curiosity, joined the group in the side
entry at this dramatic moment.
"Well, I never!" she exclaimed. "Where, and how under the canopy,
did you ever?"
"I was working on the dam at Union Falls yesterday," chuckled
Abijah, with a pleased glance at each of the trio in turn, "an' I
seen this little bunnit skippin' over the water jest as Becky
does over the road. It's shaped kind o' like a boat, an' gorry,
ef it wa'nt sailin' jest like a boat! Where hev I seen that kind
of a bristlin' plume?' thinks I."
("Where indeed!" thought Rebecca stormily.)
"Then it come to me that I'd drove that plume to school and drove
it to meetin' and drove it to the Fair an'drove it most
everywheres on Becky. So I reached out a pole an' ketched it fore
it got in amongst the logs an' come to any damage, an' here it
is! The hat's passed in its checks, I guess; looks kind as if a
wet elephant had stepped on it; but the plume's bout's good as
new! I reely fetched the hat beck for the sake o' the plume."
"It was real good of you, 'Bijah, an' we're all of us obliged to
you," said Miranda, as she poised the hat on one hand and turned
it slowly with the other.
"Well, I do say," she exclaimed, "and I guess I've said it
before, that of all the wearing' plumes that ever I see, that
one's the wearin'est! Seems though it just wouldn't give up. Look
at the way it's held Mis' Cobb's dye; it's about as brown's when
it went int' the water."
"Dyed, but not a mite dead," grinned Abijah, who was somewhat
celebrated for his puns.
"And I declare," Miranda continued, "when you think o' the fuss
they make about ostriches, killin' em off by hundreds for the
sake o' their feathers that'll string out and spoil in one hard
rainstorm,--an' all the time lettin' useful porcupines run round
with their quills on, why I can't hardly understand it, without
milliners have found out jest how good they do last, an' so they
won't use em for trimmin'. 'Bijah's right; the hat ain't no more
use, Rebecca, but you can buy you another this mornin'--any color
or shape you fancy--an' have Miss Morton sew these brown quills
on to it with some kind of a buckle or a bow, jest to hide the
roots. Then you'll be fixed for another season, thanks to
'Bijah."
Uncle Jerry and Aunt Sarah Cobb were made acquainted before very
long with the part that destiny, or Abijah Flagg, had played in
Rebecca's affairs, for, accompanied by the teacher, she walked to
the old stage driver's that same afternoon. Taking off her new
hat with the venerable trimming, she laid it somewhat
ostentatiously upside down on the kitchen table and left the
room, dimpling a little more than usual.
Uncle Jerry rose from his seat, and, crossing the room, looked
curiously into the hat and found that a circular paper lining was
neatly pinned in the crown, and that it bore these lines, which
were read aloud with great effect by Miss Dearborn, and with her
approval were copied in the Thought Book for the benefit of
posterity:
"It was the bristling porcupine, As he stood on his native heath,
He said, I'll pluck me some immortelles And make me up a wreath.
For tho' I may not live myself To more than a hundred and ten, My
quills will last till crack of doom, And maybe after then. They
can be colored blue or green Or orange, brown, or red, But often
as they may be dyed They never will be dead.' And so the
bristling porcupine As he stood on his native heath, Said, I
think I'll pluck me some immmortelles And make me up a wreath.'
R.R.R."
Fifth Chronicle
THE SAVING OF THE COLORS
I
Even when Rebecca had left school, having attained the great age
of seventeen and therefore able to look back over a past
incredibly long and full, she still reckoned time not by years,
but by certain important occurrences.
There was the year her father died; the year she left Sunnybrook
Farm to come to her aunts in Riverboro; the year Sister Hannah
became engaged; the year little Mira died; the year Abijah Flagg
ceased to be Squire Bean's chore-boy, and astounded Riverboro by
departing for Limerick Academy in search of an education; and
finally the year of her graduation, which, to the mind of
seventeen, seems rather the culmination than the beginning of
existence.
Between these epoch-making events certain other happenings stood
out in bold relief against the gray of dull daily life.
There was the day she first met her friend of friends, "Mr.
Aladdin," and the later, even more radiant one when he gave her
the coral necklace. There was the day the Simpson family moved
away from Riverboro under a cloud, and she kissed Clara Belle
fervently at the cross-roads, telling her that she would always
be faithful. There was the visit of the Syrian missionaries to
the brick house. That was a bright, romantic memory, as strange
and brilliant as the wonderful little birds' wings and breasts
that the strangers brought from the Far East. She remembered the
moment they asked her to choose some for herself, and the rapture
with which she stroked the beautiful things as they lay on the
black haircloth sofa. Then there was the coming of the new
minister, for though many were tried only one was chosen; and
finally there was the flag-raising, a festivity that thrilled
Riverboro and Edgewood society from centre to circumference, a
festivity that took place just before she entered the Female
Seminary at Wareham and said good-by to kind Miss Dearborn and
the village school.
There must have been other flag-raisings in history,--even the
persons most interested in this particular one would grudgingly
have allowed that much,--but it would have seemed to them
improbable that any such flag-raising as theirs, either in
magnitude of conception or brilliancy of actual performance,
could twice glorify the same century. Of some pageants it is
tacitly admitted that there can be no duplicates, and the
flag-raising at Riverboro Centre was one of these; so that it is
small wonder if Rebecca chose it as one of the important dates in
her personal almanac.
The new minister's wife was the being, under Providence, who had
conceived the germinal idea of the flag.
At this time the parish had almost settled down to the trembling
belief that they were united on a pastor. In the earlier time a
minister was chosen for life, and if he had faults, which was a
probably enough contingency, and if his congregation had any,
- measure [´meʒə]
n.量度；范围 vt.测量 (初中英语单词) - financial [fi´nænʃəl] a.金融的，财政的 (初中英语单词)
- velvet [´velvit] n.&a.天鹅绒(般的) (初中英语单词)
- expensive [ik´spensiv] a.费钱的，昂贵的 (初中英语单词)
- envelope [´envələup] n.信封，封皮 (初中英语单词)
- violence [´vaiələns] n.猛烈；暴力(行) (初中英语单词)
- wholly [´həul-li] ad.完全，十足；统统 (初中英语单词)
- innocent [´inəsənt] a.无罪的；单纯的 (初中英语单词)
- nevertheless [,nevəðə´les] conj.&ad.然而；不过 (初中英语单词)
- examination [ig,zæmi´neiʃən] n.检查；考试；检验 (初中英语单词)
- squire [skwaiə] n.护卫，侍从；乡绅 (初中英语单词)
- errand [´erənd] n.差使，使命 (初中英语单词)
- missing [´misiŋ] a.缺掉的；失踪的 (初中英语单词)
- curiosity [,kjuəri´ɔsiti] n.好奇；奇事；珍品 (初中英语单词)
- dramatic [drə´mætik] a.戏剧的；戏剧般的 (初中英语单词)
- working [´wə:kiŋ] a.工人的；劳动的 (初中英语单词)
- elephant [´elifənt] n.象 (初中英语单词)
- circular [´sə:kjulə] a.圆形的 n.通知 (初中英语单词)
- therefore [´ðeəfɔ:] ad.&conj.因此；所以 (初中英语单词)
- academy [ə´kædəmi] n.专科学校；学会；协会 (初中英语单词)
- beginning [bi´giniŋ] n.开始，开端；起源 (初中英语单词)
- relief [ri´li:f] n.救济；援救；减轻 (初中英语单词)
- faithful [´feiθfəl] a.忠实的；可靠的 (初中英语单词)
- romantic [rəu´mæntik] a.传奇(式)的；浪漫的 (初中英语单词)
- brilliant [´briliənt] a.灿烂的；杰出的 (初中英语单词)
- actual [´æktʃuəl] a.现实的；实际的 (初中英语单词)
- scramble [´skræmbəl] v.&n.爬；争夺；炒(蛋) (高中英语单词)
- bonnet [´bɔnit] n.无边女帽；童帽 (高中英语单词)
- thanksgiving [´θæŋks,giviŋ] 感恩节 (高中英语单词)
- elastic [i´læstik] a.灵活的 n.橡皮带 (高中英语单词)
- secretly [´si:kritli] ad.秘密地；隐蔽地 (高中英语单词)
- amongst [ə´mʌŋst] prep.其中之一 =among (高中英语单词)
- destiny [´destini] n.命运 (高中英语单词)
- lining [´lainiŋ] n.衬里；衬料 (高中英语单词)
- radiant [´reidiənt] a.发光的 n.光源(体) (高中英语单词)
- theirs [ðeəz] pron.他们的 (高中英语单词)
- conception [kən´sepʃən] n.构思；概念；怀孕 (高中英语单词)
- parish [´pæriʃ] n.教区(的全体居民) (高中英语单词)
- pastor [´pɑ:stə] n.牧师 (高中英语单词)
- bridge [bridʒ] n.桥(梁)；鼻梁；桥牌 (英语四级单词)
- porcupine [´pɔ:kjupain] n.豪猪，箭猪 (英语四级单词)
- buckle [´bʌkəl] n.带扣 v.(用...)扣住 (英语四级单词)
- venerable [´venərəbəl] a.可尊敬的；森严的 (英语四级单词)
- upside [´ʌpsaid] n.上边，上段，上部 (英语四级单词)
- necklace [´neklis] n.项链 (英语四级单词)
- circumference [sə´kʌmfərəns] n.圆周；周围；(圆)周线 (英语四级单词)
- glorify [´glɔ:rifai] vt.赞美，颂扬，美化 (英语四级单词)
- providence [´prɔvidəns] n.天意，天命，上帝 (英语四级单词)
- congregation [,kɔŋgri´geiʃən] n.集合；团体 (英语四级单词)
- vagrant [´veigrənt] n.流浪者 a.流浪的 (英语六级单词)
- holding [´həuldiŋ] n.保持，固定，存储 (英语六级单词)
- hedgehog [´hedʒhɔg] n.刺猬 (英语六级单词)
- prophetic [prə´fetik] a.预言(家)的；预示的 (英语六级单词)
- taking [´teikiŋ] a.迷人的 n.捕获物 (英语六级单词)
- graduation [,grædʒu´eiʃən] n.毕业(典礼)；刻度 (英语六级单词)
- syrian [´siriən] a.&n.叙利亚人(的) (英语六级单词)
- festivity [fe´stiviti] n.节日；喜庆日；庆祝 (英语六级单词)
文章标签:名著
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