海底兩萬里 第222期 第17章 海底森林(3)

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There I saw again, but not yet pressed and dried like the Nautilus's specimens, some peacock's tails spread open like fans to stir up a cooling breeze, scarlet rosetangle, sea tangle stretching out their young and edible shoots, twisting strings of kelp from the genus Nereocystis that bloomed to a height of fifteen meters, bouquets of mermaid's cups whose stems grew wider at the top, and a number of other open-sea plants, all without flowers. "It's an odd anomaly in this bizarre element!" as one witty naturalist puts it. "The animal kingdom blossoms, and the vegetable kingdom doesn't!"

我在這里又看到的，不是像在諾第留斯號船上風干的標本，而是恬生生的、似乎迎鳳招展地作扇子般展開的孔雀彩貝，大紅的陶瓷貝，伸長像可食的嫩筍一樣的片形貝。細長柔軟，一直長到十五米高的古銅藻，莖在頂上長大的一束一柬瓶形水草，以及其他許多的海產植物，通通沒有花。一位很風趣的生物學家曾說過：“動物類開花，植物類不開花，大海真是奇異例外的環(huán)境，古怪新奇的自然!”

These various types of shrubbery were as big as trees in the temperate zones; in the damp shade between them, there were clustered actual bushes of moving flowers, hedges of zoophytes in which there grew stony coral striped with twisting furrows, yellowish sea anemone from the genus Caryophylia with translucent tentacles, plus anemone with grassy tufts from the genus Zoantharia; and to complete the illusion, minnows flitted from branch to branch like a swarm of hummingbirds, while there rose underfoot, like a covey of snipe, yellow fish from the genus Lepisocanthus with bristling jaws and sharp scales, flying gurnards, and pinecone fish.

在這些像溫帶樹木一般高大的各種不同的灌木中間，在它們的濕潤的蔭影下面，遍生著帶有生動花朵的真正叢林，植蟲動物的籬笆行列，上面像花一般開放出彎曲條紋的腦紋狀珊瑚，觸須透明的黑黃石竹珊瑚，草地上一堆一堆的石花珊瑚——為了使這個幻覺完整無缺一又有蠅魚，它們像成群的蜂雀，從這枝飛到那枝，至于兩腮聳起、鱗甲尖利的麥蟲魚，飛魚，單鰭魚，那簡直就像一群鵪鶉，在我們腳下跳來跳去。