英语听书《白鲸记》第37期

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 Returning to the Spouter² Inn from the Chapel³,I found Queequeg there quite alone;he having left the Chapel before the benediction⁴ some time. 

 He was sitting on a bench before the fire,with his feet on the stove hearth,and in one hand was holding close up to his face that little negro idol⁵ of his; 

 peering hard into its face,and with a jack⁶ knife gently whittling⁷ away at its nose,meanwhile humming to himself in his heathenish way. 

 But being now interrupted,he put up the image;and pretty soon,going to the table,took up a large book there,and placing it on his lap began counting the pages with deliberate regularity; 

 at every fiftieth page as I fancied stopping a moment,looking vacantly around him,and giving utterance⁸ to a long drawn⁹ gurgling whistle of astonishment¹⁰. 

 He would then begin again at the next fifty;seeming to commence at number one each time,as though he could not count more than fifty, 

 and it was only by such a large number of fifties being found together,that his astonishment at the multitude of pages was excited. 

 With much interest I sat watching him.Savage¹¹ though he was,and hideously¹² marred¹³ about the face at least to my taste his countenance¹⁴ yet had a something in it which was by no means disagreeable. 

 You can not hide the soul.Through all his unearthly tattooings,I thought I saw the traces of a simple honest heart;and in his large,deep eyes,fiery black and bold, 

 there seemed tokens of a spirit that would dare a thousand devils.And besides all this,there was a certain lofty bearing about the Pagan,which even his uncouthness¹⁵ could not altogether maim¹⁶. 

 He looked like a man who had never cringed and never had had a creditor¹⁷.Whether it was,too,that his head being shaved,his forehead was drawn out in freer and brighter relief, 

 and looked more expansive than it otherwise would,this I will not venture to decide;but certain it was his head was phrenologically an excellent one.It may seem ridiculous, 

 but it reminded me of General Washington's head,as seen in the popular busts¹⁸ of him.It had the same long regularly graded retreating slope from above the brows, 

 which were likewise very projecting,like two long promontories¹⁹ thickly wooded on top.Queequeg was George Washington cannibalistically developed. 

 Whilst I was thus closely scanning him,half pretending meanwhile to be looking out at the storm from the casement,he never heeded²⁰ my presence,never troubled himself with so much as a single glance; 

 but appeared wholly occupied with counting the pages of the marvellous book.Considering how sociably²¹ we had been sleeping together the night previous, 

 and especially considering the affectionate arm I had found thrown over me upon waking in the morning,I thought this indifference²² of his very strange. 

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