英语听书《白鲸记》 第3期

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 Call me Ishmael.Some years ago never mind how long precisely¹ having little or no money in my purse, 

 and nothing particular to interest me on shore, 

 I thought I would sail about a little and see the watery² part of the world. 

 It is a way I have of driving off the spleen and regulating the circulation. 

 Whenever I find myself growing grim about the mouth;whenever it is a damp, 

 drizzly November in my soul;whenever I find myself involuntarily pausing before coffin³ warehouses⁴, 

 and bringing up the rear of every funeral I meet;and especially whenever my hypos get such an upper hand of me, 

 that it requires a strong moral principle to prevent me from deliberately⁵ stepping into the street, 

 and methodically knocking people's hats off then,I account it high time to get to sea as soon as I can. 

 This is my substitute for pistol and ball.With a philosophical⁶ flourish Cato throws himself upon his sword; 

 I quietly take to the ship.There is nothing surprising in this. 

 If they but knew it,almost all men in their degree, 

 some time or other,cherish very nearly the same feelings towards the ocean with me. 

 There now is your insular⁷ city of the Manhattoes,belted round by wharves⁸ as Indian isles⁹ by coral reefs commerce surrounds it with her surf. 

 Right and left,the streets take you waterward.Its extreme downtown is the battery, 

 where that noble mole¹⁰ is washed by waves,and cooled by breezes, 

 which a few hours previous were out of sight of land. 

 Look at the crowds of water gazers there. 

 Circumambulate the city of a dreamy Sabbath afternoon. 

 Go from Corlears Hook to Coenties Slip,and from thence, 

 by Whitehall,northward.What do you see?Posted like silent sentinels all around the town, 

 stand thousands upon thousands of mortal men fixed¹¹ in ocean reveries. 

 Some leaning against the spiles;some seated upon the pier¹² heads;some looking over the bulwarks¹³ of ships from China; 

 some high aloft in the rigging,as if striving to get a still better seaward peep.But these are all landsmen; 

 of week days pent up in lath and plaster tied to counters,nailed to benches,clinched to desks. 

 How then is this?Are the green fields gone?What do they here? 

 But look!here come more crowds,pacing straight for the water,and seemingly bound for a dive. 

 Strange!Nothing will content them but the extremest limit of the land;loitering under the shady lee of yonder warehouses will not suffice. 

 No. They must get just as nigh the water as they possibly can without falling in.And there they stand files of them leagues. 

 Inlanders all,they come from lanes and alleys,streets and avenues forth,east,south,and west. 

 Yet here they all unite.Tell me,does the magnetic virtue¹⁴ of the needles of the compasses of all those ships attract them thither¹⁵? 

 Once more.Say you are in the country;in some high land of lakes. 

 Take almost any path you please,and ten to one it carries you down in a dale, 

 and leaves you there by a pool in the stream. 

 There is magic in it.Let the most absent minded of men be plunged¹⁶ in his deepest reveries stand that man on his legs, 

 set his feet a going,and he will infallibly lead you to water,if water there be in all that region. undefined

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