英语听书《白鲸记》第10期

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 Entering that gable ended Spouter Inn,you found yourself in a wide,low, 

 straggling entry with old fashioned wainscots,reminding one of the bulwarks² of some condemned³ old craft. 

 On one side hung a very large oilpainting so thoroughly⁴ besmoked,and every way defaced, 

 that in the unequal crosslights by which you viewed it,it was only by diligent⁵ study and a series of systematic⁶ visits to it, 

 and careful inquiry⁷ of the neighbors,that you could any way arrive at an understanding of its purpose. 

 Such unaccountable masses of shades and shadows,that at first you almost thought some ambitious young artist, 

 in the time of the New England hags,had endeavored to delineate chaos⁸ bewitched. 

 But by dint⁹ of much and earnest contemplation,and oft repeated ponderings,and especially by throwing open the little window towards the back of the entry, 

 you at last come to the conclusion that such an idea,however wild,might not be altogether unwarranted. 

 But what most puzzled and confounded you was a long,limber,portentous¹⁰,black mass of something hovering¹¹ in the centre of the picture over three blue, 

 dim,perpendicular lines floating in a nameless yeast¹².A boggy,soggy,squitchy picture truly,enough to drive a nervous man distracted. 

 Yet was there a sort of indefinite,half attained, 

 unimaginable sublimity¹³ about it that fairly froze you to it, 

 till you involuntarily took an oath with yourself to find out what that marvellous painting meant.Ever and anon a bright, 

 but,alas,deceptive idea would dart¹⁴ you through. 

 It's the Black Sea in a midnight gale¹⁵.It's the unnatural¹⁶ combat of the four primal¹⁷ elements. 

 It's a blasted heath.It's a Hyperborean winter scene. 

 It's the breaking up of the icebound stream of Time.But at last all these fancies yielded to that one portentous something in the picture's midst. 

 THAT once found out,and all the rest were plain.But stop;does it not bear a faint resemblance to a gigantic fish?even the great leviathan himself? 

 In fact,the artist's design seemed this:a final theory of my own,partly based upon the aggregated¹⁸ opinions of many aged¹⁹ persons with whom I conversed²⁰ upon the subject. 

 The picture represents a Cape²¹ Horner in a great hurricane; 

 the half foundered²² ship weltering there with its three dismantled²³ masts alone visible;and an exasperated²⁴ whale, 

 purposing to spring clean over the craft,is in the enormous act of impaling²⁵ himself upon the three mast heads. 

 The opposite wall of this entry was hung all over with a heathenish array of monstrous²⁶ clubs and spears. 

 Some were thickly set with glittering teeth resembling ivory saws;others were tufted with knots of human hair; 

 and one was sickle²⁷ shaped,with a vast handle sweeping²⁸ round like the segment made in the new mown grass by a long armed mower²⁹. 

 You shuddered³⁰ as you gazed,and wondered what monstrous cannibal and savage³¹ could ever have gone a death harvesting with such a hacking,horrifying implement³². 

 Mixed with these were rusty³³ old whaling lances and harpoons³⁴ all broken and deformed³⁵.Some were storied weapons. 

 With this once long lance,now wildly elbowed,fifty years ago did Nathan Swain kill fifteen whales between a sunrise and a sunset. 

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