海倫·凱勒自傳《我的生活》第37期

　　At a little distance from this ship there was a model of the Santa Maria, which I also examined. The captain showed me Columbus’s cabin and the desk with an hour-glass on it. This smallinstrument impressed me most because it made me think how weary the heroic navigator must have felt as he saw the sand dropping grain by grain while desperate men were plotting against his life.

　　海盜船附近還有一艘“圣瑪利亞”號仿制帆船。“船長”領(lǐng)我參觀了哥倫布住的船艙，其中，放在桌子上的一個沙漏給我留下了深刻印象。這個小巧的儀器讓我想到了這位偉大的航海家所承受的巨大考驗(yàn)，在身心疲憊的狀況下，他要看著沙粒一點(diǎn)一點(diǎn)滴落;與此同時(shí)，他還要同內(nèi)心的絕望情緒作頑強(qiáng)的抗?fàn)帯?/p>

　　Mr. Higinbotham, President of the World’s Fair, kindly gave me permission to touch the exhibits, and with an eagerness as insatiable as that with which Pizarro seized the treasures of Peru, I took in the glories of the Fair with my fingers. It was a sort of tangible kaleidoscope, this white city of the West. Everything fascinated me, especially the French bronzes. They were so lifelike, I thought they were angel visions which the artist had caught and bound in earthly forms.

　　希金鮑瑟姆先生是世界博覽會的主席，他為人隨和并且允許我隨意觸摸展會上的展品。于是，我就像貪得無厭的皮薩羅擄掠秘魯?shù)恼鋵氁粯?，我用手?ldquo;吸納”了博覽會的所有精華。這有點(diǎn)像一個可以觸摸的萬花筒，每一樣?xùn)|西都讓我感到無比新奇，特別是法國的青銅雕像。這些栩栩如生的雕像宛如再現(xiàn)的天使，我想，藝術(shù)家們一定是抓住了天使的形象并將其塑造成型的。

　　At the Cape of Good Hope exhibit, I learned much about the processes of mining diamonds. Whenever it was possible, I touched the machinery while it was in motion, so as to get a clearer idea how the stones were weighed, cut, and polished. I searched in the washings for a diamondand found it myself—the only true diamond, they said, that was ever found in the United States.

　　在“好望角”展區(qū)，我了解了許多有關(guān)鉆石開采過程的知識。只要有可能，我都會摸一摸正在運(yùn)轉(zhuǎn)的機(jī)器，這樣我就能更清晰地感受到礦石有多重，它們又是如何被切割被拋光的。我還親自摸索到了一塊正在清洗之中的鉆石——人們告訴我說，這是在美國發(fā)現(xiàn)的唯一一顆真正的鉆石。

　　Dr. Bell went everywhere with us and in his own delightful way described to me the objects of greatest interest. In the electrical building we examined the telephones, autophones, phonographs, and other inventions, and he made me understand how it is possible to send a message on wires that mock space and outrun time, and, like Prometheus, to draw fire from the sky. We also visited the anthropological department, and I was much interested in the relics of ancient Mexico, in the rude stone implements that are so often the only record of an age—the simple monuments of nature’s unlettered children (so I thought as I fingered them) that seem bound to last while the memorials of kings and sages crumble in dust away—and in the Egyptian mummies, which I shrank from touching. From these relics I learned more about the progress of man than I have heard or read since.

　　貝爾博士陪我們參觀了所有的地方，他以令人愉快的方式向我描述了最有趣的展品。在電子大廈，我們試用了電話機(jī)、對講機(jī)、留聲機(jī)和其他發(fā)明。貝爾博士讓我明白了信息是如何突破了空間和時(shí)間的羈絆而在電線上傳播的，這就像普羅米修斯將火種帶到了人間一樣偉大。我們還參觀了人類學(xué)展區(qū)，我對古代墨西哥文物產(chǎn)生了濃厚興趣。粗糙的石器是那個時(shí)代僅有的記錄，也是未開化的人類童年時(shí)期的簡陋遺物(這是我用手指觸摸后的感想)。一代代君王和圣賢的功勞簿在歷史的塵埃中分崩離析，在埃及的木乃伊中被死亡塵封，但有些遺跡仍有幸留存到現(xiàn)在。通過對這些遺物的觸摸，我更多地了解了人類文明的進(jìn)化過程，而依靠別人的講解和閱讀是無法領(lǐng)會其中的深意的。

　　All these experiences added a great many new terms to my vocabulary, and in the three weeks I spent at the Fair I took a long leap from the little child’s interest in fairy tales and toys to theappreciation of the real and the earnest in the workaday world.

　　所有這些經(jīng)歷令我的詞匯量達(dá)到了一個新的水平。我在博覽會耽延了整整三個星期，我從一個沉迷于童話故事和玩具的小孩子，一躍成為懂得欣賞平凡世界真善美的有心人。