酷兔英语
    当前位置:
  1. 首页
  2. 文章
  3. 娱乐英语
  4. 原版小说
  5. 正文

Father Goriot-Part4_Honore de Balzac(1799-1850)_Translated Works(翻译文学)-第2页

0 收藏 0 分享 0 赞

章节正文
文章总共2页
She left him, revolted by his coarseness.

"My angel," said she to her dear friend, "you will make nothing



of that man yonder. He is absurdly suspicious, and he is a mean

curmudgeon, an idiot, a fool; you would never be happy with him."



After what had passed between M. Goriot and Mme. de

l'Ambermesnil, the Countess would no longer live under the same



roof. She left the next day, forgot to pay for six months' board,

and left behind her wardrobe, cast-off clothing to the value of



five francs. Eagerly and persistently as Mme. Vauquer sought her

quondam lodger, the Comtesse de l'Ambermesnil was never heard of



again in Paris. The widow often talked of this deplorable

business, and regretted her own too confiding disposition. As a



matter of fact, she was as suspicious as a cat; but she was like

many other people, who cannot trust their own kin and put



themselves at the mercy of the next chance comer--an odd but

common phenomenon, whose causes may readily be traced to the



depths of the human heart.

Perhaps there are people who know that they have nothing more to



look for from those with whom they live; they have shown the

emptiness of their hearts to their housemates, and in their



secret selves they are conscious that they are severely judged,

and that they deserve to be judged severely; but still they feel



an unconquerable craving for praises that they do not hear, or

they are consumed by a desire to appear to possess, in the eyes



of a new audience, the qualities which they have not, hoping to

win the admiration or affection of strangers at the risk of



forfeiting it again some day. Or, once more, there are other

mercenary natures who never do a kindness to a friend or a



relation simply because these have a claim upon them, while a

service done to a stranger brings its reward to self-love. Such



natures feel but little affection for those who are nearest to

them; they keep their kindness for remoter circles of



acquaintance, and show most to those who dwell on its utmost

limits. Mme. Vauquer belonged to both these essentially mean,



false, and execrable classes.

"If I had been there at the time," Vautrin would say at the end



of the story, I would have shown her up, and that misfortune

would not have befallen you. I know that kind of phiz!"



Like all narrow natures, Mme. Vauquer was wont to confine her

attention to events, and did not go very deeply into the causes



that brought them about; she likewise preferred to throw the

blame of her own mistakes on other people, so she chose to



consider that the honest vermicelli maker was responsible for her

misfortune. It had opened her eyes, so she said, with regard to



him. As soon as she saw that her blandishments were in vain, and

that her outlay on her toilette was money thrown away, she was



not slow to discover the reason of his indifference. It became

plain to her at once that there was SOME OTHER ATTRACTION, to use



her own expression. In short, it was evident that the hope she

had so fondly cherished was a baseless delusion, and that she



would "never make anything out of that man yonder," in the

Countess' forcible phrase. The Countess seemed to have been a



judge of character. Mme. Vauquer's aversion was naturally more

energetic than her friendship, for her hatred was not in



proportion to her love, but to her disappointed expectations. The

human heart may find here and there a resting-place short of the



highest height of affection, but we seldom stop in the steep,

downward slope of hatred. Still, M. Goriot was a lodger, and the



widow's wounded self-love could not vent itself in an explosion

of wrath; like a monk harassed by the prior of his convent, she



was forced to stifle her sighs of disappointment, and to gulp

down her craving for revenge. Little minds find gratification for



their feelings, benevolent or otherwise, by a constant exercise

of petty ingenuity. The widow employed her woman's malice to



devise a system of covertpersecution. She began by a course of




文章总共2页
文章标签:翻译  译文  翻译文  

章节正文
Copyright © 2023 Qeto All rights reserved.
商务合作 | 联系我们 | 关于我们 | 版权声明 | 隐私条款 | 如果智培

京ICP备05059198号-1 京公网安备 11011202003401号