章节正文
At last he sat down on his heel to it, in the centre of the clear floor,
resting his wrist on his knee, and keeping time with an index finger.
It was very funny, but the thing was taken seriously all through.
Irreverent echo from the old Lambing Flat trouble, from camp across the gully:
Rule Britannia! Britannia rules the waves!
No more Chinamen will enter Noo South Wales!
and
Yankee Doodle came to town
On a little pony --
Stick a feather in his cap,
And call him Maccaroni!
All the camps seem to be singing to-night:
Ring the bell, watchman!
Ring! Ring! Ring!
Ring, for the good news
Is now on the wing!
Good lines, the introduction:
High on the belfry the old sexton stands,
Grasping the rope with his thin bony hands! . . .
Bon-fires are blazing throughout the land . . .
Glorious and blessed tidings! Ring! Ring the bell!
. . . . .
Granny Mathews fails to coax her niece into the kitchen,
but persuades her to sing inside. She is the girl who learnt `sub rosa'
from the bad girl who sang "Madeline". Such as have them on
instinctively take their hats off. Diggers, &c., strolling past,
halt at the first notes of the girl's voice, and stand like statues
in the moonlight:
Shall we gather at the river,
Where bright angel feet have trod?
The beautiful -- the beautiful river
That flows by the throne of God! --
Diggers wanted to send that girl "Home", but Granny Mathews had
the old-fashionedhorror of any of her children becoming "public" --
Gather with the saints at the river,
That flows by the throne of God!
. . . . .
But it grows late, or rather, early. The "Eyetalians" go by
in the frostymoonlight, from their last shift in the claim
(for it is Saturday night), singing a litany.
"Get up on one end, Abe! -- stand up all!" Hands are clasped
across the kitchen table. Redclay, one of the last of the alluvial fields,
has petered out, and the Roaring Days are dying. . . . The grand old song
that is known all over the world; yet how many in ten thousand
know more than one verse and the chorus? Let Peter McKenzie lead:
Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
And never brought to min'?
And hearts echo from far back in the past and across wide, wide seas:
Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
And days o' lang syne?
Now boys! all together!
For auld lang syne, my dear,
For auld lang syne,
We'll tak' a cup o' kindness yet,
For auld lang syne.
We twa hae run about the braes,
And pu'd the gowans fine;
But we've wandered mony a weary foot,
Sin' auld lang syne.
The world was wide then.
We twa hae paidl't i' the burn,
Frae mornin' sun till dine:
the log fire seems to grow watery, for in wide, lonely Australia --
But seas between us braid hae roar'd,
Sin' auld lang syne.
The kitchen grows dimmer, and the forms of the digger-singers
seemed suddenly vague and unsubstantial, fading back rapidly
through a misty veil. But the words ring strong and defiant
through hard years:
And here's a hand, my trusty frien',
And gie's a grup o' thine;
And we'll tak' a cup o' kindness yet,
For auld lang syne.
. . . . .
And the nettles have been growing for over twenty years on the spot
where Granny Mathews' big bark kitchen stood.
A Vision of Sandy Blight
I'd been humping my back, and crouching and groaning
for an hour or so in the darkest corner of the travellers' hut,
tortured by the demon of sandy blight. It was too hot to travel,
and there was no one there except ourselves and Mitchell's cattle pup.
We were waiting till after sundown, for I couldn't have travelled
in the daylight, anyway. Mitchell had tied a wet towel round my eyes,
and led me for the last mile or two by another towel --
one end fastened to his belt behind, and the other in my hand
as I walked in his tracks. And oh! but this was a relief!
It was out of the dust and glare, and the flies didn't come into the dark hut,
and I could hump and stick my knees in my eyes and groan in comfort.
I didn't want a thousand a year, or anything; I only wanted relief for my eyes
-- that was all I prayed for in this world. When the sun got down a bit,
Mitchell started poking round, and presently he found amongst the rubbish
a dirty-looking medicine bottle, corked tight; when he rubbed the dirt
off a piece of notepaper that was pasted on, he saw "eye-water" written on it.
He drew the cork with his teeth, smelt the water, stuck his little finger in,
turned the bottle upside down, tasted the top of his finger,
and reckoned the stuff was all right.
"Here! Wake up, Joe!" he shouted. "Here's a bottle of tears."
"A bottler wot?" I groaned.
"Eye-water," said Mitchell.
"Are you sure it's all right?" I didn't want to be poisoned
or have my eyes burnt out by mistake; perhaps some burning acid
had got into that bottle, or the label had been put on, or left on,
in mistake or carelessness.
"I dunno," said Mitchell, "but there's no harm in tryin'."
I chanced it. I lay down on my back in a bunk, and Mitchell
dragged my lids up and spilt half a bottle of eye-water over my eye-balls.
The relief was almost instantaneous. I never experienced such a quick cure
in my life. I carried the bottle in my swag for a long time afterwards,
with an idea of getting it analysed, but left it behind at last in a camp.
Mitchell scratched his head thoughtfully, and watched me for a while.
"I think I'll wait a bit longer," he said at last, "and if it doesn't
blind you I'll put some in my eyes. I'm getting a touch of blight myself now.
That's the fault of travelling with a mate who's always catching something
that's no good to him."
As it grew dark outside we talked of sandy-blight and fly-bite,
and sand-flies up north, and ordinary flies, and branched off to Barcoo rot,
and struck the track again at bees and bee stings. When we got to bees,
Mitchell sat smoking for a while and looking dreamily backwards
along tracks and branch tracks, and round corners and circles
he had travelled, right back to the short, narrow, innocent bit of track
that ends in a vague, misty point -- like the end of a long, straight,
cleared road in the moonlight -- as far back as we can remember.
. . . . .
"I had about fourteen hives," said Mitchell -- "we used to call them `swarms',
no matter whether they were flying or in the box -- when I left home
first time. I kept them behind the shed, in the shade,
on tables of galvanised iron cases turned down on stakes;
but I had to make legs later on, and stand them in pans of water,
on account of the ants. When the bees swarmed -- and some hives sent out
the Lord knows how many swarms in a year, it seemed to me --
we'd tin-kettle 'em, and throw water on 'em, to make 'em believe
the biggest thunderstorm was coming to drown the oldest inhabitant;
and, if they didn't get the start of us and rise, they'd settle on a branch --
generally on one of the scraggy fruit trees. It was rough on the bees --
come to think of it; their instinct told them it was going to be fine,
and the noise and water told them it was raining. They must have thought
that nature was mad, drunk, or gone ratty, or the end of the world had come.
We'd rig up a table, with a box upside down, under the branch,
cover our face with a piece of mosquito net, have rags burning round,
and then give the branch a sudden jerk, turn the box down, and run. If we got
most of the bees in, the rest that were hanging to the bough or flying round
would follow, and then we reckoned we'd shook the queen in.
If the bees in the box came out and joined the others,
we'd reckon we hadn't shook the queen in, and go for them again.
When a hive was full of honey we'd turn the box upside down,
turn the empty box mouth down on top of it, and drum and hammer
on the lower box with a stick till all the bees went up into the top box.
I suppose it made their heads ache, and they went up on that account.
"I suppose things are done differently on proper bee-farms.
I've heard that a bee-farmer will part a hanging swarm with his fingers,
take out the queen bee and arrange matters with her; but our ways suited us,
and there was a lot of expectation and running and excitement in it,
especially when a swarm took us by surprise. The yell of `Bees swarmin'!'
was as good to us as the yell of `Fight!' is now, or `Bolt!' in town,
or `Fire' or `Man overboard!' at sea.
"There was tons of honey. The bees used to go to the vineyards at wine-making
and get honey from the heaps of crushed grape-skins thrown out in the sun,
and get so drunk sometimes that they wobbled in their bee-lines home.
They'd fill all the boxes, and then build in between and under the bark,
and board, and tin covers. They never seemed to get the idea
out of their heads that this wasn't an evergreen country,
and it wasn't going to snow all winter. My younger brother Joe
used to put pieces of meat on the tables near the boxes,
and in front of the holes where the bees went in and out,
for the dogs to grab at. But one old dog, `Black Bill', was a match for him;
if it was worth Bill's while, he'd camp there, and keep Joe and the other dogs
from touching the meat -- once it was put down -- till the bees turned in
for the night. And Joe would get the other kids round there, and when
they weren't looking or thinking, he'd brush the bees with a stick and run.
I'd lam him when I caught him at it. He was an awful young devil, was Joe,
and he grew up steady, and respectable, and respected -- and I went
to the bad. I never trust a good boy now. . . . Ah, well!
"I remember the first swarm we got. We'd been talking of getting a few swarms
for a long time. That was what was the matter with us
English and Irish and English-Irish Australian farmers:
we used to talk so much about doing things while the Germans and Scotch
did them. And we even talked in a lazy, easy-going sort of way.
"Well, one blazing hot day I saw father coming along the road, home to dinner
(we had it in the middle of the day), with his axe over his shoulder.
I noticed the axe particularly because father was bringing it home to grind,
and Joe and I had to turn the stone; but, when I noticed Joe
dragging along home in the dust about fifty yards behind father,
I felt easier in my mind. Suddenly father dropped the axe and started to run
back along the road towards Joe, who, as soon as he saw father coming,
shied for the fence and got through. He thought he was going to catch it
for something he'd done -- or hadn't done. Joe used to do so many things
and leave so many things not done that he could never be sure of father.
Besides, father had a way of starting to hammer us unexpectedly --
when the idea struck him. But father pulled himself up in about thirty yards
and started to grab up handfuls of dust and sand and throw them into the air.
My idea, in the first flash, was to get hold of the axe, for I thought
it was sun-stroke, and father might take it into his head to start chopping up
the family before I could persuade him to put it (his head, I mean)
in a bucket of water. But Joe came running like mad, yelling:
"`Swarmer -- bees! Swawmmer -- bee--ee--es! Bring -- a -- tin -- dish --
and -- a -- dippera -- wa-a-ter!'
"I ran with a bucket of water and an old frying-pan, and pretty soon
the rest of the family were on the spot, throwing dust and water,
and banging everything, tin or iron, they could get hold of.
The only bullock bell in the district (if it was in the district)
was on the old poley cow, and she'd been lost for a fortnight.
resting his wrist on his knee, and keeping time with an index finger.
It was very funny, but the thing was taken seriously all through.
Irreverent echo from the old Lambing Flat trouble, from camp across the gully:
Rule Britannia! Britannia rules the waves!
No more Chinamen will enter Noo South Wales!
and
Yankee Doodle came to town
On a little pony --
Stick a feather in his cap,
And call him Maccaroni!
All the camps seem to be singing to-night:
Ring the bell, watchman!
Ring! Ring! Ring!
Ring, for the good news
Is now on the wing!
Good lines, the introduction:
High on the belfry the old sexton stands,
Grasping the rope with his thin bony hands! . . .
Bon-fires are blazing throughout the land . . .
Glorious and blessed tidings! Ring! Ring the bell!
. . . . .
Granny Mathews fails to coax her niece into the kitchen,
but persuades her to sing inside. She is the girl who learnt `sub rosa'
from the bad girl who sang "Madeline". Such as have them on
instinctively take their hats off. Diggers, &c., strolling past,
halt at the first notes of the girl's voice, and stand like statues
in the moonlight:
Shall we gather at the river,
Where bright angel feet have trod?
The beautiful -- the beautiful river
That flows by the throne of God! --
Diggers wanted to send that girl "Home", but Granny Mathews had
the old-fashionedhorror of any of her children becoming "public" --
Gather with the saints at the river,
That flows by the throne of God!
. . . . .
But it grows late, or rather, early. The "Eyetalians" go by
in the frostymoonlight, from their last shift in the claim
(for it is Saturday night), singing a litany.
"Get up on one end, Abe! -- stand up all!" Hands are clasped
across the kitchen table. Redclay, one of the last of the alluvial fields,
has petered out, and the Roaring Days are dying. . . . The grand old song
that is known all over the world; yet how many in ten thousand
know more than one verse and the chorus? Let Peter McKenzie lead:
Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
And never brought to min'?
And hearts echo from far back in the past and across wide, wide seas:
Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
And days o' lang syne?
Now boys! all together!
For auld lang syne, my dear,
For auld lang syne,
We'll tak' a cup o' kindness yet,
For auld lang syne.
We twa hae run about the braes,
And pu'd the gowans fine;
But we've wandered mony a weary foot,
Sin' auld lang syne.
The world was wide then.
We twa hae paidl't i' the burn,
Frae mornin' sun till dine:
the log fire seems to grow watery, for in wide, lonely Australia --
But seas between us braid hae roar'd,
Sin' auld lang syne.
The kitchen grows dimmer, and the forms of the digger-singers
seemed suddenly vague and unsubstantial, fading back rapidly
through a misty veil. But the words ring strong and defiant
through hard years:
And here's a hand, my trusty frien',
And gie's a grup o' thine;
And we'll tak' a cup o' kindness yet,
For auld lang syne.
. . . . .
And the nettles have been growing for over twenty years on the spot
where Granny Mathews' big bark kitchen stood.
A Vision of Sandy Blight
I'd been humping my back, and crouching and groaning
for an hour or so in the darkest corner of the travellers' hut,
tortured by the demon of sandy blight. It was too hot to travel,
and there was no one there except ourselves and Mitchell's cattle pup.
We were waiting till after sundown, for I couldn't have travelled
in the daylight, anyway. Mitchell had tied a wet towel round my eyes,
and led me for the last mile or two by another towel --
one end fastened to his belt behind, and the other in my hand
as I walked in his tracks. And oh! but this was a relief!
It was out of the dust and glare, and the flies didn't come into the dark hut,
and I could hump and stick my knees in my eyes and groan in comfort.
I didn't want a thousand a year, or anything; I only wanted relief for my eyes
-- that was all I prayed for in this world. When the sun got down a bit,
Mitchell started poking round, and presently he found amongst the rubbish
a dirty-looking medicine bottle, corked tight; when he rubbed the dirt
off a piece of notepaper that was pasted on, he saw "eye-water" written on it.
He drew the cork with his teeth, smelt the water, stuck his little finger in,
turned the bottle upside down, tasted the top of his finger,
and reckoned the stuff was all right.
"Here! Wake up, Joe!" he shouted. "Here's a bottle of tears."
"A bottler wot?" I groaned.
"Eye-water," said Mitchell.
"Are you sure it's all right?" I didn't want to be poisoned
or have my eyes burnt out by mistake; perhaps some burning acid
had got into that bottle, or the label had been put on, or left on,
in mistake or carelessness.
"I dunno," said Mitchell, "but there's no harm in tryin'."
I chanced it. I lay down on my back in a bunk, and Mitchell
dragged my lids up and spilt half a bottle of eye-water over my eye-balls.
The relief was almost instantaneous. I never experienced such a quick cure
in my life. I carried the bottle in my swag for a long time afterwards,
with an idea of getting it analysed, but left it behind at last in a camp.
Mitchell scratched his head thoughtfully, and watched me for a while.
"I think I'll wait a bit longer," he said at last, "and if it doesn't
blind you I'll put some in my eyes. I'm getting a touch of blight myself now.
That's the fault of travelling with a mate who's always catching something
that's no good to him."
As it grew dark outside we talked of sandy-blight and fly-bite,
and sand-flies up north, and ordinary flies, and branched off to Barcoo rot,
and struck the track again at bees and bee stings. When we got to bees,
Mitchell sat smoking for a while and looking dreamily backwards
along tracks and branch tracks, and round corners and circles
he had travelled, right back to the short, narrow, innocent bit of track
that ends in a vague, misty point -- like the end of a long, straight,
cleared road in the moonlight -- as far back as we can remember.
. . . . .
"I had about fourteen hives," said Mitchell -- "we used to call them `swarms',
no matter whether they were flying or in the box -- when I left home
first time. I kept them behind the shed, in the shade,
on tables of galvanised iron cases turned down on stakes;
but I had to make legs later on, and stand them in pans of water,
on account of the ants. When the bees swarmed -- and some hives sent out
the Lord knows how many swarms in a year, it seemed to me --
we'd tin-kettle 'em, and throw water on 'em, to make 'em believe
the biggest thunderstorm was coming to drown the oldest inhabitant;
and, if they didn't get the start of us and rise, they'd settle on a branch --
generally on one of the scraggy fruit trees. It was rough on the bees --
come to think of it; their instinct told them it was going to be fine,
and the noise and water told them it was raining. They must have thought
that nature was mad, drunk, or gone ratty, or the end of the world had come.
We'd rig up a table, with a box upside down, under the branch,
cover our face with a piece of mosquito net, have rags burning round,
and then give the branch a sudden jerk, turn the box down, and run. If we got
most of the bees in, the rest that were hanging to the bough or flying round
would follow, and then we reckoned we'd shook the queen in.
If the bees in the box came out and joined the others,
we'd reckon we hadn't shook the queen in, and go for them again.
When a hive was full of honey we'd turn the box upside down,
turn the empty box mouth down on top of it, and drum and hammer
on the lower box with a stick till all the bees went up into the top box.
I suppose it made their heads ache, and they went up on that account.
"I suppose things are done differently on proper bee-farms.
I've heard that a bee-farmer will part a hanging swarm with his fingers,
take out the queen bee and arrange matters with her; but our ways suited us,
and there was a lot of expectation and running and excitement in it,
especially when a swarm took us by surprise. The yell of `Bees swarmin'!'
was as good to us as the yell of `Fight!' is now, or `Bolt!' in town,
or `Fire' or `Man overboard!' at sea.
"There was tons of honey. The bees used to go to the vineyards at wine-making
and get honey from the heaps of crushed grape-skins thrown out in the sun,
and get so drunk sometimes that they wobbled in their bee-lines home.
They'd fill all the boxes, and then build in between and under the bark,
and board, and tin covers. They never seemed to get the idea
out of their heads that this wasn't an evergreen country,
and it wasn't going to snow all winter. My younger brother Joe
used to put pieces of meat on the tables near the boxes,
and in front of the holes where the bees went in and out,
for the dogs to grab at. But one old dog, `Black Bill', was a match for him;
if it was worth Bill's while, he'd camp there, and keep Joe and the other dogs
from touching the meat -- once it was put down -- till the bees turned in
for the night. And Joe would get the other kids round there, and when
they weren't looking or thinking, he'd brush the bees with a stick and run.
I'd lam him when I caught him at it. He was an awful young devil, was Joe,
and he grew up steady, and respectable, and respected -- and I went
to the bad. I never trust a good boy now. . . . Ah, well!
"I remember the first swarm we got. We'd been talking of getting a few swarms
for a long time. That was what was the matter with us
English and Irish and English-Irish Australian farmers:
we used to talk so much about doing things while the Germans and Scotch
did them. And we even talked in a lazy, easy-going sort of way.
"Well, one blazing hot day I saw father coming along the road, home to dinner
(we had it in the middle of the day), with his axe over his shoulder.
I noticed the axe particularly because father was bringing it home to grind,
and Joe and I had to turn the stone; but, when I noticed Joe
dragging along home in the dust about fifty yards behind father,
I felt easier in my mind. Suddenly father dropped the axe and started to run
back along the road towards Joe, who, as soon as he saw father coming,
shied for the fence and got through. He thought he was going to catch it
for something he'd done -- or hadn't done. Joe used to do so many things
and leave so many things not done that he could never be sure of father.
Besides, father had a way of starting to hammer us unexpectedly --
when the idea struck him. But father pulled himself up in about thirty yards
and started to grab up handfuls of dust and sand and throw them into the air.
My idea, in the first flash, was to get hold of the axe, for I thought
it was sun-stroke, and father might take it into his head to start chopping up
the family before I could persuade him to put it (his head, I mean)
in a bucket of water. But Joe came running like mad, yelling:
"`Swarmer -- bees! Swawmmer -- bee--ee--es! Bring -- a -- tin -- dish --
and -- a -- dippera -- wa-a-ter!'
"I ran with a bucket of water and an old frying-pan, and pretty soon
the rest of the family were on the spot, throwing dust and water,
and banging everything, tin or iron, they could get hold of.
The only bullock bell in the district (if it was in the district)
was on the old poley cow, and she'd been lost for a fortnight.
- seriously [´siəriəsli]
ad.严肃；严重，重大 (初中英语单词) - feather [´feðə] n.羽毛 (初中英语单词)
- learnt [lə:nt] learn 的过去式(分词) (初中英语单词)
- old-fashioned [´əuld´feʃənd] a.老式的；过时的 (初中英语单词)
- horror [´hɔrə] n.恐怖；战栗 (初中英语单词)
- moonlight [´mu:nlait] n.&a.月光(的) (初中英语单词)
- chorus [´kɔ:rəs] n.合唱；齐声 v.合唱 (初中英语单词)
- acquaintance [ə´kweintəns] n.相识；熟人，相识的人 (初中英语单词)
- lonely [´ləunli] a.孤独的；无人烟的 (初中英语单词)
- vision [´viʒən] n.视觉；想象力；幻影 (初中英语单词)
- waiting [´weitiŋ] n.等候；伺候 (初中英语单词)
- daylight [´deilait] n.日光；黎明 (初中英语单词)
- relief [ri´li:f] n.救济；援救；减轻 (初中英语单词)
- presently [´prezəntli] ad.不久；目前 (初中英语单词)
- innocent [´inəsənt] a.无罪的；单纯的 (初中英语单词)
- account [ə´kaunt] vi.说明 vt.认为 n.帐目 (初中英语单词)
- instinct [´instiŋkt] n.本能；直觉；天资 (初中英语单词)
- mosquito [məs´ki:təu] n.蚊子 (初中英语单词)
- reckon [´rekən] v.计算；认为；估计 (初中英语单词)
- running [´rʌniŋ] a.奔跑的；流动的 (初中英语单词)
- excitement [ik´saitmənt] n.兴奋；骚动；煽动 (初中英语单词)
- hammer [´hæmə] n.锤子 v.重击 (初中英语单词)
- persuade [pə´sweid] v.(被)说服；使相信 (初中英语单词)
- throne [θrəun] n.宝座；王位 (高中英语单词)
- granny [´græni] n.奶奶；外婆 (高中英语单词)
- amongst [ə´mʌŋst] prep.其中之一 =among (高中英语单词)
- thoughtfully [´θɔ:tfuli] ad.深思地；体贴地 (高中英语单词)
- hanging [´hæŋiŋ] n.绞刑 a.悬挂着的 (高中英语单词)
- differently [´difrentli] ad.不同地，有差别地 (高中英语单词)
- expectation [,ekspek´teiʃən] n.期待(望)；预期 (高中英语单词)
- respectable [ri´spektəbəl] a.可敬的；有身价的 (高中英语单词)
- bucket [´bʌkit] n.水桶 (高中英语单词)
- fortnight [´fɔ:tnait] n.两星期 (高中英语单词)
- blessed [´blesid] a.享福的；神圣的 (英语四级单词)
- frosty [´frɔsti] a.霜冻的；冷淡的 (英语四级单词)
- trusty [´trʌsti] a.可靠的 n.可信任的 (英语四级单词)
- blight [blait] n.打击 vt.摧残 (英语四级单词)
- upside [´ʌpsaid] n.上边，上段，上部 (英语四级单词)
- experienced [ik´spiəriənst] a.有经验的；熟练的 (英语四级单词)
- evergreen [´evəgri:n] a.常绿的，常青的 (英语四级单词)
- touching [´tʌtʃiŋ] a.动人的 prep.提到 (英语四级单词)
- unexpectedly [´ʌniks´pektidli] ad.意外地；突然地 (英语四级单词)
- watery [´wɔ:təri] a.水的；像水的 (英语六级单词)
- sundown [´sʌndaun] n.日落 (英语六级单词)
文章标签:名著
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