美國語文第五冊 第12期：農(nóng)場少年（01）
Say what you will about the general usefulness of boys, it is my impression that a farm without a boy would very soon come to grief.
你認(rèn)為農(nóng)場少年能做什么？依我看，沒有少年的農(nóng)場真的會非常糟糕。
What the boy does is the life of the farm.
他們在農(nóng)場生活里須臾不可少，
He is the factotum, always in demand, always expected to do the thousand indispensable things that nobody else will do.
他們是農(nóng)場的閑雜總管，男女老少大呼小叫的左膀右臂。在農(nóng)場里，千頭萬緒的事零星瑣碎，最為困難的事棘手龐雜，
Upon him fall all the odds and ends, the most difficult things.
無一例外都落到他們肩上，其他人委實(shí)無法幫忙。
After everybody else is through, he has to finish up.
別人忙完了活兒，農(nóng)場少年得去掃尾，
His work is like a woman's,—perpetually waiting on others.
有點(diǎn)像一直忙著為別人做嫁衣的嫁娘，總得聽從他人使喚。
Everybody knows how much easier it is to eat a good dinner than it is to wash the dishes afterwards.
毋庸置疑，外出赴宴享受美味大餐永遠(yuǎn)比餐后洗碗刷碟輕松太多太多。
Consider what a boy on a farm is required to do,—things that must be done, or life would actually stop.
只要想象一下農(nóng)場少年的活兒，那些需要做的，可又不得不做的，否則，生活將無法繼續(xù)下去。
It is understood, in the first place, that he is to do all the errands, to go to the store, to the post office, and to carry all sorts of messages.
首先，眾所周知，農(nóng)場少年得去做完所有跑腿的活計(jì)，他要跑商店、上郵局、送消息、傳信件，
If he had as many legs as a centiped, they would tire before night.
即使他擁有蜈蚣一樣的幾十條腿，晚上上床躺倒前亦會累個半死。
His two short limbs seem to him entirely inadequate to the task.
每天指望兩條細(xì)腿跑路干活，看來遠(yuǎn)遠(yuǎn)不夠，
He would like to have as many legs as a wheel has spokes, and rotate about in the same way.
他們恨不得長有自行車輪轂上眾多輻條般的腿，恐怕還要連軸轉(zhuǎn)個不停。
This he sometimes tries to do;
有時，農(nóng)場少年興沖沖地到處奔跑，
and the people who have seen him "turning cart wheels" along the side of the road, have supposed that he was amusing himself and idling his time;
旁人看來，他們騎車忙著到處亂竄，或許還有人認(rèn)為，他們純粹是玩酷一族或借此消磨時光。
he was only trying to invent a new mode of locomotion, so that he could economize his legs, and do his errands with greater dispatch.
其實(shí)，他們不過想創(chuàng)造某種新型的運(yùn)動方式，以便節(jié)省腿力，完成更多支派或差遣。
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