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The Silverado Squatters-Part9_ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON(1850-1894)_English Literature(文学名著)-第2页

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powerful, and felt no shame in owning to the weakness.

Something was once wanted from the crazy platform over the



shaft, and he at once refused to venture there - "did not

like," as he said, "foolen' round them kind o' places," and



let my wife go instead of him, looking on with a grin.

Vanity, where it rules, is usually more heroic: but Irvine



steadily approved himself, and expected others to approve

him; rather looked down upon my wife, and decidedly expected



her to look up to him, on the strength of his superior

prudence.



Yet the strangest part of the whole matter was perhaps this,

that Irvine was as beautiful as a statue. His features were,



in themselves, perfect; it was only his cloudy, uncouth, and

coarse expression that disfigured them. So much strength



residing in so spare a frame was proof sufficient of the

accuracy of his shape. He must have been built somewhat



after the pattern of Jack Sheppard; but the famous

housebreaker, we may be certain, was no lout. It was by the



extraordinary powers of his mind no less than by the vigour

of his body, that he broke his strong prison with such



imperfect implements, turning the very obstacles to service.

Irvine, in the same case, would have sat down and spat, and



grumbled curses. He had the soul of a fat sheep, but,

regarded as an artist's model, the exterior of a Greek God.



It was a cruel thought to persons less favoured in their

birth, that this creature, endowed - to use the language of



theatres - with extraordinary "means," should so manage to

misemploy them that he looked ugly and almost deformed. It



was only by an effort of abstraction, and after many days,

that you discovered what he was.



By playing on the oaf's conceit, and standing closely over

him, we got a path made round the corner of the dump to our



door, so that we could come and go with decent ease; and he

even enjoyed the work, for in that there were boulders to be



plucked up bodily, bushes to be uprooted, and other occasions

for athletic display: but cutting wood was a different



matter. Anybody could cut wood; and, besides, my wife was

tired of supervising him, and had other things to attend to.



And, in short, days went by, and Irvine came daily, and

talked and lounged and spat; but the firewood remained intact



as sleepers on the platform or growing trees upon the

mountainside. Irvine, as a woodcutter, we could tolerate;



but Irvine as a friend of the family, at so much a day, was

too bald an imposition, and at length, on the afternoon of



the fourth or fifth day of our connection, I explained to

him, as clearly as I could, the light in which I had grown to



regard his presence. I pointed out to him that I could not

continue to give him a salary for spitting on the floor; and



this expression, which came after a good many others, at last

penetrated his obdurate wits. He rose at once, and said if



that was the way he was going to be spoke to, he reckoned he

would quit. And, no one interposing, he departed.



So far, so good. But we had no firewood. The next

afternoon, I strolled down to Rufe's and consulted him on the



subject. It was a very droll interview, in the large, bare

north room of the Silverado Hotel, Mrs. Hanson's patchwork on



a frame, and Rufe, and his wife, and I, and the oaf himself,

all more or less embarrassed. Rufe announced there was



nobody in the neighbourhood but Irvine who could do a day's

work for anybody. Irvine, thereupon, refused to have any



more to do with my service; he "wouldn't work no more for a

man as had spoke to him's I had done." I found myself on the



point of the last humiliation - driven to beseech the

creature whom I had just dismissed with insult: but I took



the high hand in despair, said there must be no talk of

Irvine coming back unless matters were to be differently



managed; that I would rather chop firewood for myself than be

fooled; and, in short, the Hansons being eager for the lad's



hire, I so imposed upon them with merely affected resolution,

that they ended by begging me to re-employ him again, on a



solemn promise that he should be more industrious. The

promise, I am bound to say, was kept. We soon had a fine



pile of firewood at our door; and if Caliban gave me the cold

shoulder and spared me his conversation, I thought none the






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