弗兰克斯坦(当代的普罗米修斯)(外研社双语读库)(txt+pdf+epub+mobi电子书下载)

作者：Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley 玛丽·沃斯通克拉夫特·雪莱

出版社：外语教学与研究出版社

格式: AZW3, DOCX, EPUB, MOBI, PDF, TXT

弗兰克斯坦(当代的普罗米修斯)(外研社双语读库)试读：

Letter 1

第一封信

St. Petersburgh, Dec. 11th, 17—

17某某年12月11日写于圣彼得堡

TO Mrs. Saville, England

收信人：英格兰的萨维尔夫人

You will rejoice to hear that no disaster has accompanied the commencement of an enterprise which you have regarded with such evil forebodings. I arrived here yesterday, and my first task is to assure my dear sister of my welfare and increasing confidence in the success of my undertaking.

曾被你视为危机四伏的探险之旅如今已顺利展开，获悉这些你一定会欣慰吧。我昨日到此，首要任务就是向我亲爱的姐姐报平安，并提升你对我探险成功的信心。

I am already far north of London, and as I walk in the streets of Petersburgh, I feel a cold northern breeze play upon my cheeks, which braces my nerves and fills me with delight. Do you understand this feeling? This breeze, which has travelled from the regions towards which I am advancing, gives me a foretaste of those icy climes. Inspirited by this wind of promise, my daydreams become more fervent and vivid. I try in vain to be persuaded that the pole is the seat of frost and desolation; it ever presents itself to my imagination as the region of beauty and delight. There, Margaret, the sun is forever visible, its broad disk just skirting the horizon and diffusing a perpetual splendour. There—for with your leave, my sister, I will put some trust in preceding navigators—there snow and frost are banished; and, sailing over a calm sea, we may be wafted to a land surpassing in wonders and in beauty every region hitherto discovered on the habitable globe. Its productions and features may be without example, as the phenomena of the heavenly bodies undoubtedly are in those undiscovered solitudes. What may not be expected in a country of eternal light? I may there discover the wondrous power which attracts the needle and may regulate a thousand celestial observations that require only this voyage to render their seeming eccentricities consistent forever. I shall satiate my ardent curiosity with the sight of a part of the world never before visited, and may tread a land never before imprinted by the foot of man. These are my enticements, and they are sufficient to conquer all fear of danger or death and to induce me to commence this laborious voyage with the joy a child feels when he embarks in a little boat, with his holiday mates, on an expedition of discovery up his native river. But supposing all these conjectures to be false, you cannot contest the inestimable benefit which I shall confer on all mankind, to the last generation, by discovering a passage near the pole to those countries, to reach which at present so many months are requisite; or by ascertaining the secret of the magnet, which, if at all possible, can only be effected by an undertaking such as mine.

我已经到达伦敦以北很远的地方，当我漫步于圣彼得堡的街头，一丝寒冷的北风迎面吹来，让我为之一振，精神抖擞。你能理解这种感觉吗？这微风来自我正要前往的地方，它让我提前体味了一下那里冰天雪地的气候。这希望之风激发了我的灵感，我的梦想变得越发强烈和清晰。我试图说服自己，极地是冰天雪地、荒无人烟之地，却总是徒劳。在我的想象中，它总是呈现出一派美丽、欢乐的景象。在那里，玛格丽特，永远能看见太阳，它那巨大的盘面就在地平线的边缘，散发着永恒的光辉。那里——如果你允许的话，我的姐姐，我将对以前的航海家们抱有几分信任——那里冰雪消融，航行在平静的大海上，我们也许会漂到一个比迄今为止在适合人类居住的地球上所发现的任何地方都要更加美仑美幻之处。它的物产和特征也许是史无前例的，正如天体现象毫无疑问地处于那些不为人所知的状态一样。在一个永远光明的地方，还有什么不会发生呢？在那里，我可能发现吸引钢针的魔力，仅需要借助此次航行，来调整成千项天体观测，以便呈现其一直存在的看似古怪的现象。面对一个从未造访过的地方，我强烈的好奇心将得到充分满足，我可能会踏上一片人类从未涉足的土地。这些就是诱因，它们足可以征服危险和死亡所带来的所有恐惧，足可以引诱我开始这次艰难的航行，那种快乐就像一个孩子登上小船，和假日伙伴们一起沿着家乡的小河而上，开始一次探索与发现之旅。但即便所有的猜想都是假的，你也不能否认我将为全人类、为下一代带来无法估计的利益：比如发现极地附近的一条通向其他国家的航道，目前到达这些国家必须得用几个月；或是探知磁石的奥秘，如果说有任何可能性的话，就只能通过像我的这样的探险来完成。

These reflections have dispelled the agitation with which I began my letter, and I feel my heart glow with an enthusiasm which elevates me to heaven, for nothing contributes so much to tranquillize the mind as a steady purpose—a point on which the soul may fix its intellectual eye. This expedition has been the favourite dream of my early years. I have read with ardour the accounts of the various voyages which have been made in the prospect of arriving at the North Pacific Ocean through the seas which surround the pole. You may remember that a history of all the voyages made for purposes of discovery composed the whole of our good Uncle Thomas' library. My education was neglected, yet I was passionately fond of reading. These volumes were my study day and night, and my familiarity with them increased that regret which I had felt, as a child, on learning that my father's dying injunction had forbidden my uncle to allow me to embark in a seafaring life.

这些思考驱散了我刚开始写信时的焦虑不安，现在我感觉自己激情洋溢、心潮澎湃，因为没有什么能像一个持久的目标这样令人气定神闲——灵魂会将它智慧的目光凝聚于此目标点。年少时，这个探险就一直是我最喜欢的梦想。我热切地阅读了各种航行记录，这些航行都是希望通过穿越极地周围的海域到达北太平洋。你或许还记得，在我们亲爱的托马斯叔叔的图书馆里，满是关于发现探索的航海史书。我的教育虽然被忽视了，可我酷爱阅读。我夜以继日地研究这些书卷，但我对它们的日益熟悉却增加了我曾有的那份遗憾，当我还是个孩子的时候，我就得知父亲临终时严令叔叔禁止我从事航海工作。

These visions faded when I perused, for the first time, those poets whose effusions entranced my soul and lifted it to heaven. I also became a poet and for one year lived in a paradise of my own creation; I imagined that I also might obtain a niche in the temple where the names of Homer and Shakespeare are consecrated. You are well acquainted with my failure and how heavily I bore the disappointment. But just at that time I inherited the fortune of my cousin, and my thoughts were turned into the channel of their earlier bent.

当我第一次仔细阅读诗歌时，那些诗人们所迸发的激情让我神魂颠倒，激情澎湃。而我航海的念头也随之淡化了。我也成了一名诗人，在整整一年多时间里我活在自己的创作天堂中。我幻想着自己也可能会在供奉着荷马和莎士比亚的殿堂里谋得一席之地。你十分清楚我的失败以及我所承受过的沉重失望。但就是在那个时候我继承了堂兄的财产，我儿时的想法也转入正轨，得以复苏。

Six years have passed since I resolved on my present undertaking. I can, even now, remember the hour from which I dedicated myself to this great enterprise. I commenced by inuring my body to hardship. I accompanied the whale-fishers on several expeditions to the North Sea; I voluntarily endured cold, famine, thirst, and want of sleep; I often worked harder than the common sailors during the day and devoted my nights to the study of mathematics, the theory of medicine, and those branches of physical science from which a naval adventurer might derive the greatest practical advantage. Twice I actually hired myself as an under-mate in a Greenland whaler, and acquitted myself to admiration. I must own I felt a little proud when my captain offered me the second dignity in the vessel and entreated me to remain with the greatest earnestness, so valuable did he consider my services. And now, dear Margaret, do I not deserve to accomplish some great purpose? My life might have been passed in ease and luxury, but I preferred glory to every enticement that wealth placed in my path. Oh, that some encouraging voice would answer in the affirmative! My courage and my resolution is firm; but my hopes fluctuate, and my spirits are often depressed. I am about to proceed on a long and difficult voyage, the emergencies of which will demand all my fortitude:I am required not only to raise the spirits of others, but sometimes to sustain my own, when theirs are failing.

自我下定决心从事目前的探险起，六年的时间已经过去了。即便现在，我仍能记得自己决心献身于这个伟大事业的时刻。我开始让自己的身体习惯于苦难。我几次随捕鲸手去北海探险；我自愿忍受寒冷、饥饿、口渴以及睡眠不足；白天我经常比普通水手更加卖力工作，夜晚我致力于学习数学、医药理论和那些对航海探险者来说可能具有最大现实价值的自然科学的分支学科。我甚至曾经两次在一艘格陵兰的捕鲸船上当了一名二副，我的表现赢得了别人的尊重。我必须承认，当我的船长让我当大副，并极其热情地挽留我时，我感到了一丝骄傲，因为他认为我的工作颇具价值。那么现在，亲爱的玛格丽特，难道我不该去完成某个壮举吗？我的生活本可以在安逸和奢侈中度过，但我宁要荣誉也不要人生路上种种财富的诱惑。哦，某个鼓舞人心的声音将做出确定的回答！我的勇气和决心固若磐石，但我的希望漂浮不定，我的精神经常萎靡不振。我将开始一段漫长而艰难的航行，其中的各种危难时刻都要求我的意志要绝对坚强：这要求我不仅要鼓舞他人的士气，还要在别人士气低落的某些时候，仍保持自己的精气神。

This is the most favourable period for travelling in Russia. They fly quickly over the snow in their sledges; the motion is pleasant, and, in my opinion, far more agreeable than that of an English stagecoach. The cold is not excessive, if you are wrapped in furs—a dress which I have already adopted, for there is a great difference between walking the deck and remaining seated motionless for hours, when no exercise prevents the blood from actually freezing in your veins. I have no ambition to lose my life on the post-road between St. Petersburgh and Archangel. I shall depart for the latter town in a fortnight or three weeks; and my intention is to hire a ship there, which can easily be done by paying the insurance for the owner, and to engage as many sailors as I think necessary among those who are accustomed to the whale-fishing. I do not intend to sail until the month of June; and when shall I return? Ah, dear sister, how can I answer this question? If I succeed, many, many months, perhaps years, will pass before you and I may meet. If I fail, you will see me again soon, or never. Farewell, my dear, excellent Margaret. Heaven shower down blessings on you, and save me, that I may again and again testify my gratitude for all your love and kindness.

这是在俄罗斯旅行的最佳时期。人们驾着雪橇在雪地上飞驰而过，动作优雅，在我看来，这远比驾着一辆英国的驿站马车更令人惬意。如果你把自己包裹在毛皮大衣里，就不会觉得特别寒冷了——我已经买了一件这样的大衣，因为在甲板上走动和几个小时纹丝不动地坐着是截然不同的 ，当不运动的时候，血液真的会在你的血管里凝固。我可不想在圣彼得堡和阿尔汉格尔斯克之间的邮路上断送了性命。两三周后，我将前往下一个镇子。我想在那里租艘船，这很容易办到，只要付给船主保险金就行，然后在那些熟悉捕鲸的水手中雇佣我自认为必要数目的人员。我想在明年六月份起航，什么时候返航呢？啊，亲爱的姐姐，我怎么能回答得了这个问题呢？如果我成功了，那要好多好多个月，也许好几年之后，你我才能相见。如果我失败了，你将很快再次见到我，或是永远见不到了。再见了，我亲爱的、优秀的玛格丽特。愿上苍赐福于你，并保佑我，我将一次次地对你的全部关爱和好心表达感激之情。

Your affectionate brother, R. Walton

你亲爱的弟弟，罗·沃尔顿

Letter 2

第二封信

Archangel, 28th March, 17—

17某某年3月28日写于阿尔汉格尔斯克

To Mrs. Saville, England

收信人：英格兰的萨维尔夫人

How slowly the time passes here, encompassed as I am by frost and snow! Yet a second step is taken towards my enterprise. I have hired a vessel and am occupied in collecting my sailors; those whom I have already engaged appear to be men on whom I can depend and are certainly possessed of dauntless courage.

周围到处是冰雪，时间过得好慢啊！不过我已经开始了此行的又一个阶段。我已经租了一艘船，正在忙于召集水手。我已经招募的水手是些看上去可以让我信赖的、绝对勇敢无畏的男子汉。

But I have one want which I have never yet been able to satisfy, and the absence of the object of which I now feel as a most severe evil, I have no friend, Margaret: when I am glowing with the enthusiasm of success, there will be none to participate my joy; if I am assailed by disappointment, no one will endeavour to sustain me in dejection. I shall commit my thoughts to paper, it is true; but that is a poor medium for the communication of feeling. I desire the company of a man who could sympathize with me, whose eyes would reply to mine. You may deem me romantic, my dear sister, but I bitterly feel the want of a friend. I have no one near me, gentle yet courageous, possessed of a cultivated as well as of a capacious mind, whose tastes are like my own, to approve or amend my plans. How would such a friend repair the faults of your poor brother! I am too ardent in execution and too impatient of difficulties. But it is a still greater evil to me that I am self-educated: for the first fourteen years of my life I ran wild on a common and read nothing but our Uncle Thomas' books of voyages. At that age I became acquainted with the celebrated poets of our own country; but it was only when it had ceased to be in my power to derive its most important benefits from such a conviction that I perceived the necessity of becoming acquainted with more languages than that of my native country. Now I am twenty-eight and am in reality more illiterate than many schoolboys of fifteen. It is true that I have thought more and that my daydreams are more extended and magnificent, but they want (as the painters call it) KEEPING; and I greatly need a friend who would have sense enough not to despise me as romantic, and affection enough for me to endeavour to regulate my mind. Well, these are useless complaints; I shall certainly find no friend on the wide ocean, nor even here in Archangel, among merchants and seamen. Yet some feelings, unallied to the dross of human nature, beat even in these rugged bosoms. My lieutenant, for instance, is a man of wonderful courage and enterprise; he is madly desirous of glory, or rather, to word my phrase more characteristically, of advancement in his profession. He is an Englishman, and in the midst of national and professional prejudices, unsoftened by cultivation, retains some of the noblest endowments of humanity. I first became acquainted with him on board a whale vessel; finding that he was unemployed in this city, I easily engaged him to assist in my enterprise. The master is a person of an excellent disposition and is remarkable in the ship for his gentleness and the mildness of his discipline. This circumstance, added to his well-known integrity and dauntless courage, made me very desirous to engage him. A youth passed in solitude, my best years spent under your gentle and feminine fosterage, has so refined the groundwork of my character that I cannot overcome an intense distaste to the usual brutality exercised on board ship:I have never believed it to be necessary, and when I heard of a mariner equally noted for his kindliness of heart and the respect and obedience paid to him by his crew, I felt myself peculiarly fortunate in being able to secure his services. I heard of him first in rather a romantic manner, from a lady who owes to him the happiness of her life. This, briefly, is his story. Some years ago he loved a young Russian lady of moderate fortune, and having amassed a considerable sum in prize-money, the father of the girl consented to the match. He saw his mistress once before the destined ceremony; but she was bathed in tears, and throwing herself at his feet, entreated him to spare her, confessing at the same time that she loved another, but that he was poor, and that her father would never consent to the union. My generous friend reassured the suppliant, and on being informed of the name of her lover, instantly abandoned his pursuit. He had already bought a farm with his money, on which he had designed to pass the remainder of his life; but he bestowed the whole on his rival, together with the remains of his prize-money to purchase stock, and then himself solicited the young woman's father to consent to her marriage with her lover. But the old man decidedly refused, thinking himself bound in honour to my friend, who, when he found the father inexorable, quitted his country, nor returned until he heard that his former mistress was married according to her inclinations. "What a noble fellow!" you will exclaim. He is so; but then he is wholly uneducated: he is as silent as a Turk, and a kind of ignorant carelessness attends him, which, while it renders his conduct the more astonishing, detracts from the interest and sympathy which otherwise he would command.

但是我一直有个从未得以满足的需求，此时我感觉这种缺失就像个特别严重的灾祸，我连一个朋友也没有，玛格丽特：当我因成功而热情洋溢的时候，却无人分享我的喜悦；如果我正承受失望的打击，无人会竭尽全力来鼓舞我的士气。我将我的想法付诸笔端，它是真实的。但那是一种情感交流的可怜方式。我渴望有个人陪伴我，他能与我惺惺相惜、心有灵犀。你也许认为我太浪漫了，我亲爱的姐姐，但是我太想有个朋友了。我身边没有这样一个温文尔雅却又勇敢无畏，有教养且思维开阔的人，他和我兴趣相投，能认同或改良我的计划。这样的一个朋友能弥补你可怜的弟弟所犯下的多少错误啊。我做事太冲动，面对困难太缺乏耐心。但我还有个更大的麻烦，即我是自学的：因为在我生命最初的十四年里，我不务正业，除了我们的托马斯叔叔的航海书籍之外，我什么也没读过。那个时候，我熟悉了我国的一些著名诗人。就在我已经没有能力从这样一个信念中汲取其最重要的益处时，我看到了熟悉更多外语的必要性。如今我二十八岁了，但实际上我的学识还不及一个十五岁的学生。是的，我思想丰富，我的梦想更加宏伟壮观，但是它们需要“坚持”（借用画家的话），我非常需要一个朋友，他要有足够的判断力，不会鄙视我的浪漫，他要对我有足够的关爱，能努力去调整我的思维。唉，这些抱怨是徒劳的，在浩瀚的大海上我自然找不到任何朋友，即便是在阿尔汉格尔斯克这里，在那些商人和水手当中也同样找不到。然而一些与人性中的糟粕毫无关系的情感依旧在这些粗犷的胸怀中跳动着。比如我的副船长就是一个有胆有识、雄心勃勃的人。他极度渴望荣誉，若用我那更具特色的话来说，就是他渴望事业的蒸蒸日上。他是个英国人，有些民族的和职业的偏见，这些偏见并非教养所能软化的，但他保留了人性中某些最崇高的禀赋。我最初是在一艘捕鲸船上与他相识的，得知他在这个城市里已经失业了，我便轻而易举地说服了他来协助我的事业。船长性格极好，他的彬彬有礼和行事温和使他在船上显得与众不同。这个情况，再加上他那众所周知的正直和无畏，令我非常愿意雇佣他。在孤独中我的青春转瞬即逝，在你那温柔的、女性的呵护下我度过了最美好的时光，但这使我的性格本质变得过于细腻柔和，以致于我不能摆脱对船上司空见惯的粗俗的深深厌恶：我从未认为这种行事作风有什么必要性，但当我听说有个船员因其心地善良和深受同伴的尊敬和拥护而广为人知时，我觉得自己能将他收入旗下，真的很幸运。我起初是以一种非常浪漫的方式从一位女士的口中听说了他的故事，这位女士因他而获得了生活的幸福。简单地讲讲他的故事。几年前，他爱上了一个中等家境的俄国女孩，他积攒了一大笔礼金，女孩的父亲也同意了这门婚事。在预定的婚礼仪式之前，他同未婚妻见了一面，但她却痛哭流涕，扑倒在他的脚下，恳请他的宽恕，并坦白自己另有所爱，但因对方很穷，她父亲坚决不同意他们二人的结合。我那慷慨的朋友安抚了苦苦哀求的女孩，一得知她爱人的名字后，便立即放弃了对她的追求。他本来已经用自己的钱买了一个农场，本打算在那里度过余生。但他却把农场和用来买牲畜的剩余礼金都拱手让给了情敌，而后他还亲自劝说女孩的父亲同意她与心上人的婚事。但是那个老人认为这样做有损于他的名誉，便断然拒绝了。我的朋友发现他如此不通情理，便离开了祖国，直到听说他的前女友和心上人终成眷属才得以回国。“多么高尚的小伙子啊！”你一定会赞叹。的确如此，但他从未受过教育：他像土耳其人一样沉默寡言，还有些大大咧咧、漫不经心，这就使他曾经的仗义之举更令人震惊，不然的话，他原本会得到人们更多的关注和同情。

Yet do not suppose, because I complain a little or because I can conceive a consolation for my toils which I may never know, that I am wavering in my resolutions. Those are as fixed as fate, and my voyage is only now delayed until the weather shall permit my embarkation. The winter has been dreadfully severe, but the spring promises well, and it is considered as a remarkably early season, so that perhaps I may sail sooner than I expected. I shall do nothing rashly: you know me sufficiently to confide in my prudence and considerateness whenever the safety of others is committed to my care.

你可别因为我抱怨了几句，或因为我看到了能给我那未知的艰难带来慰藉的一个人，就认为我决心动摇了。那些是我命中注定的，我的航行只是因为天气耽搁了，天气一好转，我马上出发。冬天异常寒冷，但春天也为时不远了，这里的春天来得特别早，所以我可能会比预期要提前开始航行了。我绝不会鲁莽行事：你是非常了解我的，你相信无论何时只要我肩负着他人的安全，我都会谨慎小心、体贴周到的。

I cannot describe to you my sensations on the near prospect of my undertaking. It is impossible to communicate to you a conception of the trembling sensation, half pleasurable and half fearful, with which I am preparing to depart. I am going to unexplored regions, to "the land of mist and snow," but I shall kill no albatross; therefore do not be alarmed for my safety or if I should come back to you as worn and woeful as the "Ancient Mariner."You will smile at my allusion, but I will disclose a secret. I have often attributed my attachment to, my passionate enthusiasm for, the dangerous mysteries of ocean to that production of the most imaginative of modern poets. There is something at work in my soul which I do not understand. I am practically industrious—painstaking, a workman to execute with perseverance and labour—but besides this there is a love for the marvellous, a belief in the marvellous, intertwined in all my projects, which hurries me out of the common pathways of men, even to the wild sea and unvisited regions I am about to explore. But to return to dearer considerations. Shall I meet you again, after having traversed immense seas, and returned by the most southern cape of Africa or America? I dare not expect such success, yet I cannot bear to look on the reverse of the picture. Continue for the present to write to me by every opportunity:I may receive your letters on some occasions when I need them most to support my spirits. I love you very tenderly. Remember me with affection, should you never hear from me again.

我无法向你描述我对这次探险即将到来的前景作何感受。我无法向你表达那种跌宕起伏的感受，我喜忧参半地准备踏上征途。我打算去无人涉足之地，去“冰雪之地”，但我绝不会猎杀信天翁。因此不要担心我的安全，以为我会像《古舟子咏》里的人一样，衣衫褴褛、悲惨凄凉地回到你的身边。我的暗示会让你会心一笑吧，但是我要吐露一个秘密。我对大海那种危险的神秘感抱有极大的兴趣，我常常将此归因于现代诗人那极富想象力的作品。我的灵魂中有某种我不理解的东西在活动着。我真的很勤奋——是个不屈不挠、任劳任怨的工人——但除此之外，我对奇妙事物的热爱与信念纠结在我全部的计划中，这促使我跳出了常人之路，准备去探索一望无际的大海和无人问津的地方。但还是回到更重要的考虑上来吧。我还能在横穿了浩瀚的大海，并经由非洲或美洲最南端的海角回国之后见到你吗？我不敢觊觎成功，但我也不能承受目睹与此情景相反的状况。请你抓住每个机会给我写信：或许当我特别需要精神上的支持时，就会收到你的信。我非常爱你。万一我杳无音信，请将我珍藏于心中。

Your affectionate brother, Robert Walton

你亲爱的弟弟，罗伯特·沃尔顿

Letter 3

第三封信

July 7th, 17—

17某某年7月7日——

To Mrs. Saville, England

收信人：英格兰的萨维尔夫人

My dear Sister, I write a few lines in haste to say that I am safe—and well advanced on my voyage.

亲爱的姐姐，我匆匆写上几句向你报平安——我的航行很顺利。

This letter will reach England by a merchantman now on its homeward voyage from Archangel; more fortunate than I, who may not see my native land, perhaps, for many years. I am, however, in good spirits: my men are bold and apparently firm of purpose, nor do the floating sheets of ice that continually pass us, indicating the dangers of the region towards which we are advancing, appear to dismay them. We have already reached a very high latitude; but it is the height of summer, and although not so warm as in England, the southern gales, which blow us speedily towards those shores which I so ardently desire to attain, breathe a degree of renovating warmth which I had not expected.

这封信将由一艘从阿尔汉格尔斯克返航的商船带回英格兰。它可比我幸运得多了，我也许好多年都看不到故土了。不过我精神抖擞，我的船员们勇敢、执着，哪怕是大片的浮冰不断地从我们的船边漂过（这预示着我们正在前往的地方危险重重），也显然不能使他们感到恐慌。我们已经到了纬度很高的地区了，但这里正值盛夏，虽不像英格兰那么温暖，但强劲的南风带给我始料未及的一丝复苏的暖意，迅速将我们吹向了我特别想去的那片海岸。

No incidents have hitherto befallen us that would make a figure in a letter. One or two stiff gales and the springing of a leak are accidents which experienced navigators scarcely remember to record, and I shall be well content if nothing worse happen to us during our voyage.

迄今为止，还没发生什么值得在信中提及的小事故。有一两次强风和一次船漏水事故，这对于那些有经验的水手们来说，简直不值一提。如果我们的航行中没有更糟糕的事情出现的话，我将心满意足。

Adieu, my dear Margaret. Be assured that for my own sake, as well as yours, I will not rashly encounter danger. I will be cool, persevering, and prudent.

再见了，我亲爱的玛格丽特。放心吧，为了你，也为了我自己，在面对危险时我绝不会鲁莽行事的。我会头脑清楚、坚持不懈、小心谨慎的。

But success SHALL crown my endeavours. Wherefore not? Thus far I have gone, tracing a secure way over the pathless seas, the very stars themselves being witnesses and testimonies of my triumph. Why not still proceed over the untamed yet obedient element? What can stop the determined heart and resolved will of man?

但是我的努力一定会赢得成功的桂冠。为什么不呢？我已经航行得很远了，我在人迹未到的大海上寻求一条安全之路，满天繁星就是我巨大胜利的目击者和见证人。为何不继续前行去驾驭那尚未被掌控却可以被掌控的因素？什么能阻止人类的决心和意志呢？

My swelling heart involuntarily pours itself out thus. But I must finish. Heaven bless my beloved sister!

此时千言万语不由自主地涌上我的心头。但是我必须搁笔了。愿老天保佑我深爱的姐姐。

R.W.

罗·沃

Letter 4

第四封信

August 5th, 17—

17某某年8月5日

To Mrs. Saville, England

收信人：英格兰的萨维尔夫人

So strange an accident has happened to us that I cannot forbear recording it, although it is very probable that you will see me before these papers can come into your possession.

我们碰见了一件非常奇怪的事，以致于我忍不住把它记录了下来，尽管你很可能在收到这封信之前就能见到我。

Last Monday (July 31st) we were nearly surrounded by ice, which closed in the ship on all sides, scarcely leaving her the sea-room in which she floated. Our situation was somewhat dangerous, especially as we were compassed round by a very thick fog. We accordingly lay to, hoping that some change would take place in the atmosphere and weather.

上周一（7月31日），我们的船几乎被冰包围了，四面八方的浮冰将我们的船围得水泄不通，几乎动弹不了。我们的情况非常危险，尤其是当时周围又笼罩上了茫茫浓雾。我们于是原地不动，盼望着大气或天气能发生某种变化。

About two o'clock the mist cleared away, and we beheld, stretched out in every direction, vast and irregular plains of ice, which seemed to have no end. Some of my comrades groaned, and my own mind began to grow watchful with anxious thoughts, when a strange sight suddenly attracted our attention and diverted our solicitude from our own situation. We perceived a low carriage, fixed on a sledge and drawn by dogs, pass on towards the north, at the distance of half a mile; a being which had the shape of a man, but apparently of gigantic stature, sat in the sledge and guided the dogs. We watched the rapid progress of the traveller with our telescopes until he was lost among the distant inequalities of the ice. This appearance excited our unqualified wonder. We were, as we believed, many hundred miles from any land; but this apparition seemed to denote that it was not, in reality, so distant as we had supposed. Shut in, however, by ice, it was impossible to follow his track, which we had observed with the greatest attention. About two hours after this occurrence we heard the ground sea, and before night the ice broke and freed our ship. We, however, lay to until the morning, fearing to encounter in the dark those large loose masses which float about after the breaking up of the ice. I profited of this time to rest for a few hours.

大约两点钟的时候，雾散去了，我们四下望去，周围是一望无际、奇形怪状的巨大冰块。我的一些船员抱怨着，我自己因思想焦虑开始变得越发警惕。突然一个奇怪的景象吸引了我们的注意力，使我们一时忘了自己的处境。我们看见半英里开外有辆装着低矮车厢的狗拉雪橇正驶向北方。一个看上去像人，但明显体积庞大的家伙正坐在雪橇上，赶着那几条狗。我们通过望远镜观察着那个疾驰而过的旅行者，直到他消失在远方高低起伏的冰川中。这一幕绝对令我们叹为观止。我们一直以为自己离任何一块陆地都有几百英里远。但这个奇特景象表明事实并非如此，实际上我们离陆地并没有想象中那么远。虽然我们密切观察了他很久，然而由于被冰川所困，我们不可能追随他的足迹。这一幕出现后大约两个小时，我们听到了海啸，在夜幕降临之前，冰山碎了，我们的船解脱了。然而，由于担心在黑暗中遭遇冰山崩裂之后产生的巨大松散的浮冰，我们还是一直停泊到了次日早晨。我充分利用这段时间休息了几个小时。

In the morning, however, as soon as it was light, I went upon deck and found all the sailors busy on one side of the vessel, apparently talking to someone in the sea. It was, in fact, a sledge, like that we had seen before, which had drifted towards us in the night on a large fragment of ice. Only one dog remained alive; but there was a human being within it whom the sailors were persuading to enter the vessel. He was not, as the other traveller seemed to be, a savage inhabitant of some undiscovered island, but a European. When I appeared on deck the master said, "Here is our captain, and he will not allow you to perish on the open sea."

然而第二天清晨，天刚亮，我就来到了甲板上，发现所有的水手都在船的一边忙碌着，显然是在和海里的某个人讲话。原来，有辆很像我们之前见过的那辆雪橇搭载在一块巨大的浮冰上，在夜里漂向了我们。那些狗当中只有一条活着，但是雪橇上还有一个人，水手们正在劝说他上船。他和我们曾见过的那个旅行者不同，不像是个未开化的原始岛居民，而是个欧洲人。当我出现在甲板上时，船长说：“这是我们的队长，他不会眼看着你死在这茫茫海上的。”

On perceiving me, the stranger addressed me in English, although with a foreign accent. "Before I come on board your vessel," said he, "will you have the kindness to inform me whither you are bound?"

一看到我，陌生人就用英语和我讲话，尽管带着点外国口音。“在我上你们的船之前，”他说，"能否请您告诉我你们要去哪里？”

You may conceive my astonishment on hearing such a question addressed to me from a man on the brink of destruction and to whom I should have supposed that my vessel would have been a resource which he would not have exchanged for the most precious wealth the earth can afford. I replied, however, that we were on a voyage of discovery towards the northern pole.

你可能会想到，当听到一个濒临死亡的人向我提出这样一个问题时，我是多么震惊，我原以为对他而言，即便是世界上最宝贵的财富也不如这个登船机会更弥足珍贵。但我还是回答了他，我说我们正在去北极探险的航行中。

Upon hearing this he appeared satisfied and consented to come on board. Good God! Margaret, if you had seen the man who thus capitulated for his safety, your surprise would have been boundless. His limbs were nearly frozen, and his body dreadfully emaciated by fatigue and suffering. I never saw a man in so wretched a condition. We attempted to carry him into the cabin, but as soon as he had quitted the fresh air he fainted. We accordingly brought him back to the deck and restored him to animation by rubbing him with brandy and forcing him to swallow a small quantity. As soon as he showed signs of life we wrapped him up in blankets and placed him near the chimney of the kitchen stove. By slow degrees he recovered and ate a little soup, which restored him wonderfully.

一听到这个回答，他看上去满意了，并同意上船。我的天啊！玛格丽特，如果你亲眼看到这个为了自己的安全才不得不上船的人，你一定会惊讶不已的。他的四肢几乎冻僵了，身体也因疲劳和折磨变得十分虚弱。我从未见过一个人处于如此悲惨的状态。我们想把他抬进船舱，但他只要一呼吸不到新鲜空气就立刻昏了过去。我们于是把他抬回到甲板上，为了让他恢复知觉，我们用白兰地给他擦身体，并给他灌了一点点白兰地。他刚一有生命的迹象，我们就用毯子把他包裹起来，然后安置在厨房火炉的烟囱旁。慢慢地，他恢复过来了，喝了一点汤，感觉好多了。

Two days passed in this manner before he was able to speak, and I often feared that his sufferings had deprived him of understanding. When he had in some measure recovered, I removed him to my own cabin and attended on him as much as my duty would permit. I never saw a more interesting creature: his eyes have generally an expression of wildness, and even madness, but there are moments when, if anyone performs an act of kindness towards him or does him any the most trifling service, his whole countenance is lighted up, as it were, with a beam of benevolence and sweetness that I never saw equalled. But he is generally melancholy and despairing, and sometimes he gnashes his teeth, as if impatient of the weight of woes that oppresses him.

这样的状态持续了两天之后，他能够讲话了，我总担心他因所遭受的痛苦而失去理解力。他的身体稍有起色时，我便把他转移到我自己的船舱里，只要工作允许，我就尽可能多照顾他。我从未见过比他还有趣的家伙：他的眼神里总是流露出一种野性，甚至是疯狂的神情，但每当有人对他表示出善意或是帮他一个小忙，他便神采奕奕，所散发出的仁慈和甜蜜是我从未见过的。但他经常郁郁寡欢、悲观绝望，他有时咬牙切齿，好像无法忍受压迫他的灾难。

When my guest was a little recovered I had great trouble to keep off the men, who wished to ask him a thousand questions; but I would not allow him to be tormented by their idle curiosity, in a state of body and mind whose restoration evidently depended upon entire repose. Once, however, the lieutenant asked why he had come so far upon the ice in so strange a vehicle.

当我的客人身体刚恢复一点，我就得费力去为他挡驾，阻止那些有一大堆问题想要问他的船员们，我不会让他被他们无聊的好奇心困扰，他现在需要靠完全的静养来恢复体力和精神。但曾经有一次，我的副手问他为何驾着一个如此奇怪的交通工具在冰上行驶这么远。

His countenance instantly assumed an aspect of the deepest gloom, and he replied, "To seek one who fled from me."

他立刻神情黯淡，陷入深深的忧愁之中，而后他回答道：“为了找一个从我这里逃跑的家伙。”

"And did the man whom you pursued travel in the same fashion?"“你追捕的人和你驾着同样的交通工具吗？”

"Yes."“是的。”

"Then I fancy we have seen him, for the day before we picked you up we saw some dogs drawing a sledge, with a man in it, across the ice."“那么我想我们已经看见他了，就在我们把你救上来的前一天，我们看见几条狗拉着个雪橇穿过冰面，上面有个男人。”

This aroused the stranger's attention, and he asked a multitude of questions concerning the route which the demon, as he called him, had pursued. Soon after, when he was alone with me, he said, "I have, doubtless, excited your curiosity, as well as that of these good people; but you are too considerate to make inquiries."

这话引起了陌生人的注意，他问了很多关于那个“魔鬼”（他是这么称呼那个家伙的）去向的问题。很快，当他与我独处时，他说：“毫无疑问，我已经令你和那些好人们非常好奇。但是你太善解人意了，从未向我打听过。”

"Certainly; it would indeed be very impertinent and inhuman in me to trouble you with any inquisitiveness of mine."“当然，如果为了我的好奇心而去打扰你的话，那真是太无礼、太不近人情了。”

"And yet you rescued me from a strange and perilous situation; you have benevolently restored me to life."“然而，是你把我从陌生而危险的环境中解救出来，并好心把我救活。”

Soon after this he inquired if I thought that the breaking up of the ice had destroyed the other sledge. I replied that I could not answer with any degree of certainty, for the ice had not broken until near midnight, and the traveller might have arrived at a place of safety before that time; but of this I could not judge. From this time a new spirit of life animated the decaying frame of the stranger. He manifested the greatest eagerness to be upon deck to watch for the sledge which had before appeared; but I have persuaded him to remain in the cabin, for he is far too weak to sustain the rawness of the atmosphere. I have promised that someone should watch for him and give him instant notice if any new object should appear in sight.

刚说完这些，他就问我是否认为那次的冰层破裂已经摧毁了那辆雪橇。我回答说自己不能确定，因为冰层是在临近午夜的时候破裂的，在那之前，那位旅行者恐怕已经到了一个安全的地方，但对这一点我也不敢断言。从这时起，陌生人那日渐虚弱的身体里出现了一股新的生命动力。他表现出急于到甲板上去守候那辆曾出现的雪橇。但我一直劝说他留在船舱里，因为他还太虚弱了，还承受不了外面恶劣的天气。我向他承诺有人会替他守候，并且一旦发现任何新物体，都会立即告诉他。

Such is my journal of what relates to this strange occurrence up to the present day. The stranger has gradually improved in health but is very silent and appears uneasy when anyone except myself enters his cabin. Yet his manners are so conciliating and gentle that the sailors are all interested in him, although they have had very little communication with him. For my own part, I begin to love him as a brother, and his constant and deep grief fills me with sympathy and compassion. He must have been a noble creature in his better days, being even now in wreck so attractive and amiable. I said in one of my letters, my dear Margaret, that I should find no friend on the wide ocean; yet I have found a man who, before his spirit had been broken by misery, I should have been happy to have possessed as the brother of my heart.

这就是我所记录的迄今为止与这件怪事相关的事情。陌生人的身体逐渐好转，但是他非常沉默，除了我，任何人进入他的船舱时，他都表现出不安。但是他举止温文尔雅，虽然水手们与他交流不多，但都对他很感兴趣。而我本人则像兄弟一般关爱着他，他那持续的、深深的忧伤使我心中满是对他的同情和怜悯。在他风光时，一定是个高贵的人，即便是现在落魄之时，他还是那么迷人、亲切。我亲爱的玛格丽特，在一封信中我曾说过在苍茫的大海上我找不到一个朋友。但是现在我已经找到了，要不是他已经被苦难折磨得心力憔悴的话，我早就非常高兴地把他当做我的知己了。

I shall continue my journal concerning the stranger at intervals, should I have any fresh incidents to record.

如果有任何新鲜事件发生，我将继续记下关于这个陌生人的事情。

August 13th, 17—

17某某年8月13日

My affection for my guest increases every day. He excites at once my admiration and my pity to an astonishing degree. How can I see so noble a creature destroyed by misery without feeling the most poignant grief? He is so gentle, yet so wise; his mind is so cultivated, and when he speaks, although his words are culled with the choicest art, yet they flow with rapidity and unparalleled eloquence. He is now much recovered from his illness and is continually on the deck, apparently watching for the sledge that preceded his own. Yet, although unhappy, he is not so utterly occupied by his own misery but that he interests himself deeply in the projects of others. He has frequently conversed with me on mine, which I have communicated to him without disguise. He entered attentively into all my arguments in favour of my eventual success and into every minute detail of the measures I had taken to secure it. I was easily led by the sympathy which he evinced to use the language of my heart, to give utterance to the burning ardour of my soul and to say, with all the fervour that warmed me, how gladly I would sacrifice my fortune, my existence, my every hope, to the furtherance of my enterprise. One man's life or death were but a small price to pay for the acquirement of the knowledge which I sought, for the dominion I should acquire and transmit over the elemental foes of our race. As I spoke, a dark gloom spread over my listener's countenance. At first I perceived that he tried to suppress his emotion; he placed his hands before his eyes, and my voice quivered and failed me as I beheld tears trickle fast from between his fingers; a groan burst from his heaving breast. I paused; at length he spoke, in broken accents:"Unhappy man! Do you share my madness? Have you drunk also of the intoxicating draught? Hear me; let me reveal my tale, and you will dash the cup from your lips!"

我对我客人的感情与日俱增。我对他的敬佩和怜悯一下子达到了令人吃惊的程度。我怎能眼看着一个如此高尚的人被苦难摧毁，而自己却无动于衷呢?他如此文雅，如此睿智；他有很好的教养，讲话时虽有点咬文嚼字，但出口成章，能言善辩。现在他的病好多了，他总在甲板上，显然是在等待在他之前出现的那辆雪橇。然而，尽管不开心，他并非完全陷于自己的痛苦之中，对其他人的事情他也表现出了深深的兴趣。他时常和我聊些我的事情，我对此毫无保留。他聚精会神地聆听我全部的有利于最终成功的论断以及我已经采取的确保成功的各项措施的微不足道的细节。我很快就折服于他，他道出了我的心声，与我惺惺相惜，他道出了我灵魂中燃烧的激情，让我热血沸腾，我心甘情愿用我的财富、我的生命、我的希望去换取我事业的升华。比起我所追求的知识，比起我所寻求的、并利用其征服人类强大敌人的领域，个人的生死又何足挂齿。当我讲话时，我的听众脸上却写满了深深的忧伤。起初我发现他极力抑制自己的情感。他用手捂住眼睛，当我看见泪水一下子从他的指缝间流淌出来时，我的声音颤抖了，说不出话了，他那鼓起的胸中迸发出一阵呻吟。我停了下来；最后他断断续续地说道：“不快乐的人！你和我一样疯狂吗？你也喝了迷魂汤吗？听我说，让我告诉你我的故事，你会把唇边的杯子摔碎的。”

Such words, you may imagine, strongly excited my curiosity; but the paroxysm of grief that had seized the stranger overcame his weakened powers, and many hours of repose and tranquil conversation were necessary to restore his composure. Having conquered the violence of his feelings, he appeared to despise himself for being the slave of passion; and quelling the dark tyranny of despair, he led me again to converse concerning myself personally. He asked me the history of my earlier years. The tale was quickly told, but it awakened various trains of reflection. I spoke of my desire of finding a friend, of my thirst for a more intimate sympathy with a fellow mind than had ever fallen to my lot, and expressed my conviction that a man could boast of little happiness who did not enjoy this blessing. "I agree with you," replied the stranger; "we are unfashioned creatures, but half made up, if one wiser, better, dearer than ourselves—such a friend ought to be—do not lend his aid to perfectionate our weak and faulty natures. I once had a friend, the most noble of human creatures, and am entitled, therefore, to judge respecting friendship. You have hope, and the world before you, and have no cause for despair. But I—I have lost everything and cannot begin life anew.”

你能想象得出，这番话引起了我强烈的好奇心，但这突如其来的悲伤击垮了他虚弱的身体，需要几个小时的静养和心平气和的聊天才能使他恢复平静。他克制住了自己激动的情绪，似乎为自己的情绪化而感到惭愧。他抑制住自己的绝望，让我继续讲有关我的事情。他问了我早些年的经历。我的经历三言两语就讲完了，但这唤起了千丝万缕的回忆。我谈到自己盼望找到一个朋友，渴望拥有一个生命中更加亲密无间的朋友与我心心相印。我确信地说，一个没有这份福气的人是不会拥有幸福的。“我同意你的看法，”陌生人回答道，“我们都是不完善的生物，倘若没有一个比我们自己更睿智、优秀、可亲的人——应该是这样的朋友——来完善我们软弱、错误的本性的话，我们就只是个半成品了。我曾经有个朋友，他是人类中最高尚的，因此我完全有资格来评判什么是令人尊重的友谊。你有希望，世界就在你眼前，你完全没理由绝望。但是我——我已经一无所有了，不可能重新开始生活了。”

As he said this his countenance became expressive of a calm, settled grief that touched me to the heart. But he was silent and presently retired to his cabin.

当他说这番话时，他那看似平静却饱含忧伤的表情触动了我的心弦。但他沉默不语，过了一会儿就回到了他的船舱。

Even broken in spirit as he is, no one can feel more deeply than he does the beauties of nature. The starry sky, the sea, and every sight afforded by these wonderful regions seem still to have the power of elevating his soul from earth. Such a man has a double existence: he may suffer misery and be overwhelmed by disappointments, yet when he has retired into himself, he will be like a celestial spirit that has a halo around him, within whose circle no grief or folly ventures.

即便是像他一样情绪低落，也没有人能像他那样深深地领悟自然之美。星光璀璨的天空、海洋，以及这些奇妙之处所赋予的每个景色都似乎足以让他灵魂升华。这样的人有着双重性格：他也许遭受苦难，被失望打倒了，然而一旦他恢复自我，他就会像一个头戴光环的天使，在其周围没有任何悲伤或愚蠢的冒险行为。

Will you smile at the enthusiasm I express concerning this divine wanderer? You would not if you saw him. You have been tutored and refined by books and retirement from the world, and you are therefore somewhat fastidious; but this only renders you the more fit to appreciate the extraordinary merits of this wonderful man. Sometimes I have endeavoured to discover what quality it is which he possesses that elevates him so immeasurably above any other person I ever knew. I believe it to be an intuitive discernment, a quick but never-failing power of judgment, a penetration into the causes of things, unequalled for clearness and precision; add to this a facility of expression and a voice whose varied intonations are soul-subduing music.

我对这个天赐的流浪者所表现出来的兴致会让你付之一笑吗？如果你见了他，就不会那样做了。你一直远离尘嚣，饱受书本的教诲和熏陶，因此你有一点吹毛求疵。但正是这一点使你更适合去欣赏这个神奇男士身上的过人之处。有时我一直努力地去发掘究竟是他身上的什么资质使他不可限量地超越我所认识的任何一个人。我认为是他与生俱来的洞察力、迅速无误的判断力、洞察世事以及无以伦比的清晰准确性，此外，他那善于表达、抑扬顿挫的语调就像摄人心魄的音乐。

August 19, 17—

17某某年8月19日——

Yesterday the stranger said to me, "You may easily perceive, Captain Walton, that I have suffered great and unparalleled misfortunes. I had determined at one time that the memory of these evils should die with me, but you have won me to alter my determination. You seek for knowledge and wisdom, as I once did; and I ardently hope that the gratification of your wishes may not be a serpent to sting you, as mine has been. I do not know that the relation of my disasters will be useful to you; yet, when I reflect that you are pursuing the same course, exposing yourself to the same dangers which have rendered me what I am, I imagine that you may deduce an apt moral from my tale, one that may direct you if you succeed in your undertaking and console you in case of failure. Prepare to hear of occurrences which are usually deemed marvellous. Were we among the tamer scenes of nature I might fear to encounter your unbelief, perhaps your ridicule; but many things will appear possible in these wild and mysterious regions which would provoke the laughter of those unacquainted with the ever-varied powers of nature; nor can I doubt but that my tale conveys in its series internal evidence of the truth of the events of which it is composed.”

昨天陌生人对我说：“沃尔顿船长，你很容易看出来我曾遭受过巨大的、无可比拟的不幸。我曾决定把关于这些邪恶的记忆带进坟墓，但是你赢了，你让我改变了初衷。你像我当年那样追求知识和智慧，我热切地希望你梦想的实现不会成为咬伤你的毒蛇，我就曾经深受其害。我不知道我的灾难是否对你有用，当我想到你正追寻同样的道路、面临同样的危险，而这些危险使我成了今天这个样子，我猜想你或许能从我的故事中获得适当的教益，当你事业有成时，它会指导你，当你遭遇失败时，它会安慰你。准备听听那些经常被认为不可思议的事情吧。倘若我们身处比较温顺的自然环境中，我恐怕会担心受到你的质疑，或许是嘲笑。但在这些荒蛮、神秘的地方，一切都有可能出现，它们也许会令那些不熟悉大自然千变万化的力量的人们哈哈大笑。我毫不怀疑，我的故事会依次呈现其细节的事实证据。”

You may easily imagine that I was much gratified by the offered communication, yet I could not endure that he should renew his grief by a recital of his misfortunes. I felt the greatest eagerness to hear the promised narrative, partly from curiosity and partly from a strong desire to ameliorate his fate if it were in my power. I expressed these feelings in my answer.

你不难想象出他的主动交流令我很欣喜，但我真不忍心他因重述苦难而重陷悲伤。我迫切希望聆听他答应讲的故事，这一方面是因为好奇，另一方面是特别希望如果我有能力，我要改善他的命运。我把这些感受告诉了他。

"I thank you," he replied, "for your sympathy, but it is useless; my fate is nearly fulfilled. I wait but for one event, and then I shall repose in peace. I understand your feeling," continued he, perceiving that I wished to interrupt him; "but you are mistaken, my friend, if thus you will allow me to name you; nothing can alter my destiny; listen to my history, and you will perceive how irrevocably it is determined."“谢谢你的同情，”他说，“但那是徒劳的，我的命运将近尾声了。我只是在等待一件事情，然后我就可以安息了。我明白你的感受，”看到我想打断他的话时，他接着说道，“但是你错了，我的朋友，如果你允许我这么称呼你的话，什么也扭转不了我的宿命。听听我的历史，你就会知道一切都已注定好了。”

He then told me that he would commence his narrative the next day when I should be at leisure. This promise drew from me the warmest thanks. I have resolved every night, when I am not imperatively occupied by my duties, to record, as nearly as possible in his own words, what he has related during the day. If I should be engaged, I will at least make notes. This manuscript will doubtless afford you the greatest pleasure; but to me, who know him, and who hear it from his own lips—with what interest and sympathy shall I read it in some future day! Even now, as I commence my task, his full-toned voice swells in my ears; his lustrous eyes dwell on me with all their melancholy sweetness; I see his thin hand raised in animation, while the lineaments of his face are irradiated by the soul within.

然后他告诉我第二天等我有空的时候，他会开始讲述他的故事。这一许诺令我感激万分。我已经打算好了，每天晚上只要我不是非得履行工作职责，我就要尽可能用他的原话把他白天所讲述的事情记录下来。如果我必须得工作，至少我得做个笔记。这份手稿无疑会给你带来巨大的快乐，但对于我这样一个了解他，听到他亲口讲述的人来说，将来的某一天我将怀着怎样的兴趣和同情来阅读这份手稿啊！即便是此时，当我开始工作时，他那浑厚的声音仍回荡在我的耳畔。他那炯炯有神的眼睛无限哀婉地凝视着我。我见他用力扬起瘦弱的手，此时他的灵魂点亮了他的脸庞，神采奕奕。

Strange and harrowing must be his story, frightful the storm which embraced the gallant vessel on its course and wrecked it—thus!

他的故事一定是奇怪而悲惨的，就像那能袭击并摧毁行驶中的大船的风暴一样可怕——就是这样！

CHAPTER 1

第一章

I am by birth a Genevese, and my family is one of the most distinguished of that republic. My ancestors had been for many years counsellors and syndics, and my father had filled several public situations with honour and reputation. He was respected by all who knew him for his integrity and indefatigable attention to public business. He passed his younger days perpetually occupied by the affairs of his country; a variety of circumstances had prevented his marrying early, nor was it until the decline of life that he became a husband and the father of a family.

我是日内瓦人，我的家族是那个国家的一个名门望族。多年以来，我的祖先们一直担任政府顾问和市政官，我父亲也曾担任过好几个社会要职，名声显赫。他因正直和对公共事业孜孜以求的关注而得到了所有认识他的人的尊敬。他把青春完全奉献给国家事务，不断变化的环境使他未能早婚，直到他的人生开始走下坡路时，才为人夫，为人父。

As the circumstances of his marriage illustrate his character, I cannot refrain from relating them. One of his most intimate friends was a merchant who, from a flourishing state, fell, through numerous mischances, into poverty. This man, whose name was Beaufort, was of a proud and unbending disposition and could not bear to live in poverty and oblivion in the same country where he had formerly been distinguished for his rank and magnificence. Having paid his debts, therefore, in the most honourable manner, he retreated with his daughter to the town of Lucerne, where he lived unknown and in wretchedness. My father loved Beaufort with the truest friendship and was deeply grieved by his retreat in these unfortunate circumstances. He bitterly deplored the false pride which led his friend to a conduct so little worthy of the affection that united them. He lost no time in endeavouring to seek him out, with the hope of persuading him to begin the world again through his credit and assistance. Beaufort had taken effectual measures to conceal himself, and it was ten months before my father discovered his abode. Overjoyed at this discovery, he hastened to the house, which was situated in a mean street near the Reuss. But when he entered, misery and despair alone welcomed him. Beaufort had saved but a very small sum of money from the wreck of his fortunes, but it was sufficient to provide him with sustenance for some months, and in the meantime he hoped to procure some respectable employment in a merchant's house. The interval was, consequently, spent in inaction; his grief only became more deep and rankling when he had leisure for reflection, and at length it took so fast hold of his mind that at the end of three months he lay on a bed of sickness, incapable of any exertion.

因为他的婚姻状况诠释了他的性格，我不能不谈一谈这方面的情况。他的一个最亲密的朋友原本是个富商，后来历经灾难，家道衰落，陷入贫困。此人名叫博福特，为人骄傲、性格固执，在这个国家里，他曾经声名显赫、享尽荣华富贵，因而无法忍受去过一种穷困潦倒、无人问津的生活。他用最体面的方式还清了债务，然后和女儿来到了卢塞恩镇，过着默默无闻的清苦生活。我父亲怀着最真诚的友谊关爱着博福特，为他的不幸遭遇和隐居生活而倍感伤心。然而博福特的妄自尊大破坏了两人的友情，这令父亲深感痛惜。他争分夺秒，努力寻找博福特的下落，他希望凭借自己的信誉和资助说服对方东山再起。博福特把自己隐藏得很深，我父亲整整花了十个月的时间才找到他的住处。这一发现令父亲喜出望外，他迅速赶到了那里，那所房子坐落在罗伊斯河附近的一条陋巷里。但是他进屋以后，看到的只是痛苦和绝望。破产之后，博福特只剩下一小笔钱，而这只够维持他几个月的开销，当时他希望能在一家商号找到一份体面的工作。结果毫无进展。当他有时间反省时，便更加悲痛、怨恨不已，最终悲痛迅速占据了他的大脑，以致三个月后他便一病不起。

His daughter attended him with the greatest tenderness, but she saw with despair that their little fund was rapidly decreasing and that there was no other prospect of support. But Caroline Beaufort possessed a mind of an uncommon mould, and her courage rose to support her in her adversity. She procured plain work; she plaited straw and by various means contrived to earn a pittance scarcely sufficient to support life.

他的女儿悉心地照顾着他，但是她绝望地看到他们那点家底正迅速地耗尽，而且没有任何其他经济来源。但是卡罗琳·博福特有着非同寻常的思想，她的勇气支持她在苦难中坚持着。她找了份普通的工作。她编织稻草制品，用各种办法努力赚取微薄收入，勉强维持生计。

Several months passed in this manner. Her father grew worse; her time was more entirely occupied in attending him; her means of subsistence decreased; and in the tenth month her father died in her arms, leaving her an orphan and a beggar. This last blow overcame her, and she knelt by Beaufort's coffin weeping bitterly, when my father entered the chamber. He came like a protecting spirit to the poor girl, who committed herself to his care; and after the interment of his friend he conducted her to Geneva and placed her under the protection of a relation. Two years after this event Caroline became his wife.

就这样，几个月过去了。她父亲的身体每况愈下，她的时间几乎都用来照顾父亲，因而越来越难以维持生计。第十个月时，她的父亲在她怀里去世了，她变得孤苦伶仃、穷困潦倒。这个打击击垮了她，她跪在博福特的灵柩旁，痛哭流涕，这时我父亲走进了这间屋子。他就像一个保护神来到了这个可怜女孩的身边，担负起照顾她的责任。朋友葬礼结束后，他把女孩带到了日内瓦，安置在他的一个亲戚那里。两年后，卡罗琳成了他的妻子。

There was a considerable difference between the ages of my parents, but this circumstance seemed to unite them only closer in bonds of devoted affection. There was a sense of justice in my father's upright mind which rendered it necessary that he should approve highly to love strongly. Perhaps during former years he had suffered from the late-discovered unworthiness of one beloved and so was disposed to set a greater value on tried worth. There was a show of gratitude and worship in his attachment to my mother, differing wholly from the doting fondness of age, for it was inspired by reverence for her virtues and a desire to be the means of, in some degree, recompensing her for the sorrows she had endured, but which gave inexpressible grace to his behaviour to her. Everything was made to yield to her wishes and her convenience. He strove to shelter her, as a fair exotic is sheltered by the gardener, from every rougher wind and to surround her with all that could tend to excite pleasurable emotion in her soft and benevolent mind. Her health, and even the tranquillity of her hitherto constant spirit, had been shaken by what she had gone through. During the two years that had elapsed previous to their marriage my father had gradually relinquished all his public functions; and immediately after their union they sought the pleasant climate of Italy, and the change of scene and interest attendant on a tour through that land of wonders, as a restorative for her weakened frame.

我父母年龄相差悬殊，但这似乎更加紧密地把他们联系在一起，使他们感情深厚。我父亲正直的思想中有种公正感，这使他愿意为爱奉献全部。也许早些年他曾爱上一个后来发现不值得爱的人，备受煎熬，因此他愿意加倍珍惜一个值得爱的人。他对我母亲的爱中还有一份感激和仰慕，这与老夫对少妻的宠爱截然不同，因为这是源自对她品行的敬重，他希望在某种程度上能弥补她所承受的悲痛，对她宠爱有加。他对她百依百顺。他像园丁保护奇花异草一般，不让她受一点风寒，精心为她营造一个能令她那温柔仁慈的心灵散发愉悦的环境。尽管母亲一直保持平和的精神状态，她的健康还是因为过去所经历的苦难而受到损伤。在他们结婚前的两年里，我父亲就已经相继辞去了他所有的公职。他们结合之后，就立即去了气候宜人的意大利，在那片神奇土地上的旅行带来了不同的风景和兴致，这对她虚弱的身体是一剂滋补良方。

From Italy they visited Germany and France. I, their eldest child, was born at Naples, and as an infant accompanied them in their rambles. I remained for several years their only child. Much as they were attached to each other, they seemed to draw inexhaustible stores of affection from a very mine of love to bestow them upon me. My mother's tender caresses and my father's smile of benevolent pleasure while regarding me are my first recollections. I was their plaything and their idol, and something better—their child, the innocent and helpless creature bestowed on them by heaven, whom to bring up to good, and whose future lot it was in their hands to direct to happiness or misery, according as they fulfilled their duties towards me. With this deep consciousness of what they owed towards the being to which they had given life, added to the active spirit of tenderness that animated both, it may be imagined that while during every hour of my infant life I received a lesson of patience, of charity, and of self-control, I was so guided by a silken cord that all seemed but one train of enjoyment to me. For a long time I was their only care. My mother had much desired to have a daughter, but I continued their single offspring. When I was about five years old, while making an excursion beyond the frontiers of Italy, they passed a week on the shores of the Lake of Como. Their benevolent disposition often made them enter the cottages of the poor. This, to my mother, was more than a duty; it was a necessity, a passion—remembering what she had suffered, and how she had been relieved—for her to act in her turn the guardian angel to the afflicted. During one of their walks a poor cot in the foldings of a vale attracted their notice as being singularly disconsolate, while the number of half-clothed children gathered about it spoke of penury in its worst shape. One day, when my father had gone by himself to Milan, my mother, accompanied by me, visited this abode. She found a peasant and his wife, hard working, bent down by care and labour, distributing a scanty meal to five hungry babes. Among these there was one which attracted my mother far above all the rest. She appeared of a different stock. The four others were dark-eyed, hardy little vagrants; this child was thin and very fair. Her hair was the brightest living gold, and despite the poverty of her clothing, seemed to set a crown of distinction on her head. Her brow was clear and ample, her blue eyes cloudless, and her lips and the moulding of her face so expressive of sensibility and sweetness that none could behold her without looking on her as of a distinct species, a being heaven-sent, and bearing a celestial stamp in all her features. The peasant woman, perceiving that my mother fixed eyes of wonder and admiration on this lovely girl, eagerly communicated her history. She was not her child, but the daughter of a Milanese nobleman. Her mother was a German and had died on giving her birth. The infant had been placed with these good people to nurse: they were better off then. They had not been long married, and their eldest child was but just born. The father of their charge was one of those Italians nursed in the memory of the antique glory of Italy—one among the schiavi ognor frementi, who exerted himself to obtain the liberty of his country. He became the victim of its weakness. Whether he had died or still lingered in the dungeons of Austria was not known. His property was confiscated; his child became an orphan and a beggar. She continued with her foster parents and bloomed in their rude abode, fairer than a garden rose among dark-leaved brambles. When my father returned from Milan, he found playing with me in the hall of our villa a child fairer than pictured cherub—a creature who seemed to shed radiance from her looks and whose form and motions were lighter than the chamois of the hills. The apparition was soon explained. With his permission my mother prevailed on her rustic guardians to yield their charge to her. They were fond of the sweet orphan. Her presence had seemed a blessing to them, but it would be unfair to her to keep her in poverty and want when Providence afforded her such powerful protection. They consulted their village priest, and the result was that Elizabeth Lavenza became the inmate of my parents' house—my more than sister—the beautiful and adored companion of all my occupations and my pleasures.

离开意大利之后，他们又游历了德国和法国。我是他们的长子，就出生在那不勒斯，在襁褓中陪伴他们四处游历。好几年的时间里，我都是他们唯一的孩子。尽管他们彼此如胶似漆，但同时也似乎要从蕴藏着无尽爱意的宝藏中源源不断地向我倾注爱心。母亲温柔的呵护和父亲凝视我时那慈祥、和蔼的笑容就是我最初的记忆。我是他们的玩具、他们的玩偶，好点的话——他们的孩子，是上天赐予他们的纯真无助的生命，我需要他们把我抚养成人，我未来的命运掌握在他们手中，是将我引向幸福还是痛苦就要看他们如何履行对我的职责了。正是因为他们清楚地意识到他们赋予了我生命，对我负有责任，再加上他们本来就极富爱心，可以想象得出在婴儿时期我每时每刻所学到的都是耐心、博爱、自控，我被一条丝带牵引着，一路都是欢乐。很长一段时间里，我都是他们唯一的关爱。我母亲一直很想有个女儿，但我一直都是他们的独苗。在我大约五岁的时候，他们到意大利边境之外短途旅行，并在科莫湖畔度过了一周。他们那仁慈的天性使他们经常走进穷人们的小屋。这对我母亲而言不单单是一种责任，而是一种必要，一份爱——她一直记得自己所遭受的痛苦以及如何被解救的——现在轮到她去做苦难人的守护天使了。一次散步时，山坳里的一个小破房引起了他们的注意，房子特别破败，周围还聚集着衣衫褴褛的孩子们，显然这里贫困到了极点。有一天我父亲独自去了米兰，我母亲带着我探访了这个住处。她看到一个农民和他的妻子正弯着腰，认真地忙着给五个饥肠辘辘的婴儿分配少得可怜的食物。在这些孩子中，有个孩子引起了我母亲格外的注意。她的长相与众不同。其他四个孩子都是黑眼睛的、能吃苦的小流浪儿，但这个孩子却身体瘦弱，皮肤白皙。她那金黄色的头发明亮、蓬松，虽然衣裳破旧，但这一头金发宛若给她戴上了一顶别具特色的王冠。她的眉毛清晰饱满，眼睛碧蓝，双唇和脸庞如此感性和甜美，以致见到她的人都会视她为上天派来的独一无二的小天使，她所有的特征都带有天上的痕迹。农妇看到我母亲充满惊奇和羡慕地凝视着这个可爱的女孩，便热情地讲起了女孩的身世。女孩不是她的孩子，而是一个米兰贵族的女儿。女孩的母亲是个德国人，在生她的时候去世了。婴儿便由这些好心人抚养：当时他们家境富裕。那时他们刚结婚不久，他们的第一个孩子刚出生。女孩的父亲是个沉浸在意大利辉煌历史记忆中的人——他毕生都致力于争取祖国的自由。他因祖国的软弱而成了牺牲品。无人知道他究竟是死了还是仍被关押在奥地利的地牢里。他的财产被充公了，他的孩子沦为身无分文的孤儿。女孩继续和养父母生活，虽然成长在陋室中，她却比黑叶荆棘中的一朵玫瑰更加美丽。当我父亲从米兰回来的时候，发现一个小女孩正和我在我家别墅的大厅里玩耍，女孩比画中的小天使还美——她的容貌中散发出一种光芒，她的形态和动作比山上的岩羚羊还要轻盈。谜团很快被解开了。得到父亲的许可后，我母亲成功地说服了女孩乡下的监护人把监护权给了她。那对夫妇非常喜欢这个甜美的孤儿。她的存在就像上天对他们的赐福，但既然上天给她提供了如此强有力的保护，那么再把她留下来忍受贫穷对她来说是不公平的。他们咨询了村里的牧师，结果是伊丽莎白·拉温瑟成了我们家的一员——比亲妹妹还亲——时刻陪伴我、给我快乐的美丽可爱的伙伴。

Everyone loved Elizabeth. The passionate and almost reverential attachment with which all regarded her became, while I shared it, my pride and my delight. On the evening previous to her being brought to my home, my mother had said playfully, "I have a pretty present for my Victor—tomorrow he shall have it.”And when, on the morrow, she presented Elizabeth to me as her promised gift, I, with childish seriousness, interpreted her words literally and looked upon Elizabeth as mine—mine to protect, love, and cherish. All praises bestowed on her I received as made to a possession of my own. We called each other familiarly by the name of cousin. No word, no expression could body forth the kind of relation in which she stood to me—my more than sister, since till death she was to be mine only.

人人都喜爱伊丽莎白。所有人都对她万般宠爱，我对此深感骄傲和喜悦。在她被带到我家的前一个晚上，我母亲开玩笑地说：“我有件漂亮的礼物送给我的维克托——明天他就收到了。”第二天，她把许诺的礼物——伊丽莎白带到了我面前，我带着孩子式的认真，从字面上理解着我母亲的话，将伊丽莎白视为己有——将由我来保护、宠爱、珍惜。我将所有人对她的赞美之词都视为对我个人财产的赞美。我们以堂兄妹相称。没有任何词语、任何表述能描述出她和我之间的关系——对我而言，她不仅是妹妹，因为至死她都只属于我一个人。

CHAPTER 2

第二章

We were brought up together; there was not quite a year difference in our ages. I need not say that we were strangers to any species of disunion or dispute. Harmony was the soul of our companionship, and the diversity and contrast that subsisted in our characters drew us nearer together. Elizabeth was of a calmer and more concentrated disposition; but, with all my ardour, I was capable of a more intense application and was more deeply smitten with the thirst for knowledge. She busied herself with following the aerial creations of the poets; and in the majestic and wondrous scenes which surrounded our Swiss home—the sublime shapes of the mountains, the changes of the seasons, tempest and calm, the silence of winter, and the life and turbulence of our Alpine summers—she found ample scope for admiration and delight. While my companion contemplated with a serious and satisfied spirit the magnificent appearances of things, I delighted in investigating their causes. The world was to me a secret which I desired to divine. Curiosity, earnest research to learn the hidden laws of nature, gladness akin to rapture, as they were unfolded to me, are among the earliest sensations I can remember.

我们两小无猜，年龄相差不到一岁。不用说，我们从未有过分歧或争吵。和谐是我们友情的灵魂，我们性格上的差异和对比使我们更加亲密。伊丽莎白性格更文静、更专一；而我容易热血沸腾，更具有动手能力，并且极其渴望获得知识。她陶醉于空灵的诗歌创作中，陶醉于我们瑞士家园周围的雄伟壮丽的风景中——宏伟起伏的山峦，变幻的四季，时而的暴风雨雪，时而的平静无风，沉静的冬日，还有我们阿尔卑斯山区生机勃勃的夏日——她对此充满无限的崇拜和喜悦。当我的同伴以认真和满足的精神凝视着这些壮美景观时，我正热衷于探索这些事物的根源。对我来说，世界就是我渴望探究的一个秘密。好奇心、为获悉大自然隐藏法则进行的热情研究、解开谜团时的着迷和喜悦，这些就是我至今记得的最初感觉。

On the birth of a second son, my junior by seven years, my parents gave up entirely their wandering life and fixed themselves in their native country. We possessed a house in Geneva, and a campagne on Belrive, the eastern shore of the lake, at the distance of rather more than a league from the city. 地名手册没有查到，保留译文。We resided principally in the latter, and the lives of my parents were passed in considerable seclusion. It was my temper to avoid a crowd and to attach myself fervently to a few. I was indifferent, therefore, to my school-fellows in general; but I united myself in the bonds of the closest friendship to one among them. Henry Clerval was the son of a merchant of Geneva. 人名保留译文He was a boy of singular talent and fancy. He loved enterprise, hardship, and even danger for its own sake. He was deeply read in books of chivalry and romance. He composed heroic songs and began to write many a tale of enchantment and knightly adventure. He tried to make us act plays and to enter into masquerades, in which the characters were drawn from the heroes of Roncesvalles, of the Round Table of King Arthur, and the chivalrous train who shed their blood to redeem the holy sepulchre from the hands of the infidels.

当比我小七岁的弟弟（我父母的第二个儿子）出生后，他们就放弃了先前漂泊的生活，在家乡定居了。我们在日内瓦有幢房子，在湖东岸的贝尔日维还有个乡间别墅，距城市一里格远。我们主要居住在乡间别墅里，我父母的生活基本是与世隔绝。我生性愿意避开人群，只和少数人保持密切联系。因此我对同学大都是冷漠的，但我却和其中的一个同学建立了最亲密的友情。亨利·克莱瓦尔是一个日内瓦商人的儿子。他是个禀赋超凡、想象力丰富的男孩。他喜爱探险、磨练，甚至会为了冒险而冒险。他博览了那些有关骑士气概和浪漫情怀的书籍。他谱写了歌颂英雄的歌曲，并开始撰写许多关于魔法和骑士历险的故事。他尝试让我们表演戏剧，并参加化装舞会，舞会上的角色取材于容瑟瓦尔战役的英雄们、亚瑟王的圆桌骑士们，以及血洒沙场、从异教徒手中夺回圣墓的骑士团。

No human being could have passed a happier childhood than myself. My parents were possessed by the very spirit of kindness and indulgence. We felt that they were not the tyrants to rule our lot according to their caprice, but the agents and creators of all the many delights which we enjoyed. When I mingled with other families I distinctly discerned how peculiarly fortunate my lot was, and gratitude assisted the development of filial love.

恐怕没有一个人能比我的童年更加幸福了。我父母的精神中满是善良和宽容。我们觉得他们从不是根据自己的想法掌管我们命运的专横之人，而是我们所享受到的许多欢乐的创造者。当我与其他家庭来往之后，我清楚地觉察到我是多么幸运，这份感激之情使我更加孝顺了。

My temper was sometimes violent, and my passions vehement; but by some law in my temperature they were turned not towards childish pursuits but to an eager desire to learn, and not to learn all things indiscriminately. I confess that neither the structure of languages, nor the code of governments, nor the politics of various states possessed attractions for me. It was the secrets of heaven and earth that I desired to learn; and whether it was the outward substance of things or the inner spirit of nature and the mysterious soul of man that occupied me, still my inquiries were directed to the metaphysical, or in its highest sense, the physical secrets of the world.

我有时脾气暴躁，容易冲动，但是我的某种天性却没有把这些转变成幼稚的追求，而是变成了强烈的学习愿望，但并非不加区别地学习所有的东西。我承认，无论是语言结构，还是政府章程，或是各国政治对我来说都毫无吸引力。我渴望学习的是天地之奥秘。不知到底是事物的外在实体还是自然的内在精神和人类的神秘灵魂占据着我的思想，总之我的探索被引向了超自然的，或是从最高意义上讲，世界的物质奥秘。

Meanwhile Clerval occupied himself, so to speak, with the moral relations of things. The busy stage of life, the virtues of heroes, and the actions of men were his theme; and his hope and his dream was to become one among those whose names are recorded in story as the gallant and adventurous benefactors of our species. The saintly soul of Elizabeth shone like a shrine-dedicated lamp in our peaceful home. Her sympathy was ours; her smile, her soft voice, the sweet glance of her celestial eyes, were ever there to bless and animate us. She was the living spirit of love to soften and attract; I might have become sullen in my study, rough through the ardour of my nature, but that she was there to subdue me to a semblance of her own gentleness. And Clerval—could aught ill entrench on the noble spirit of Clerval? Yet he might not have been so perfectly humane, so thoughtful in his generosity, so full of kindness and tenderness amidst his passion for adventurous exploit, had she not unfolded to him the real loveliness of beneficence and made the doing good the end and aim of his soaring ambition.

与此同时，可以说克莱瓦尔正忙于事物之间的道德关系。生活的繁忙舞台、英雄们的美德、人们的行动都是他的主题。他的希望和梦想就是跻身于那些故事中所描述的我们人类的英勇无畏的拯救者行列。伊丽莎白那圣洁的灵魂如同一盏敬神的明灯照亮了我们平静的家庭。她与我们心心相印，她的微笑、柔和的声音、天使般双眸的甜美一瞥，一直在那里庇佑、激励着我们。她就是活生生的爱的神灵，安抚、吸引着我们。我本来会在研究中变得沉闷，我冲动的天性也本会使我变得浮躁，但就是她使我变得像她那样温文尔雅。而克莱瓦尔——是不是某个邪恶之物腐蚀了他那高尚的精神？如果不是伊丽莎白向他展示出真正的仁慈之爱，使他把行善作为他雄心壮志的最终目标，他或许就不会如此仁慈、慷慨，也不会在热切寻求冒险探索的同时还富有善心和爱心。

I feel exquisite pleasure in dwelling on the recollections of childhood, before misfortune had tainted my mind and changed its bright visions of extensive usefulness into gloomy and narrow reflections upon self. Besides, in drawing the picture of my early days, I also record those events which led, by insensible steps, to my after tale of misery, for when I would account to myself for the birth of that passion which afterwards ruled my destiny I find it arise, like a mountain river, from ignoble and almost forgotten sources; but, swelling as it proceeded, it became the torrent which, in its course, has swept away all my hopes and joys. Natural philosophy is the genius that has regulated my fate; I desire, therefore, in this narration, to state those facts which led to my predilection for that science. When I was thirteen years of age we all went on a party of pleasure to the baths near Thonon; the inclemency of the weather obliged us to remain a day confined to the inn. 地名与手册相符In this house I chanced to find a volume of the works of Cornelius Agrippa. I opened it with apathy; the theory which he attempts to demonstrate and the wonderful facts which he relates soon changed this feeling into enthusiasm. A new light seemed to dawn upon my mind, and bounding with joy, I communicated my discovery to my father. My father looked carelessly at the title page of my book and said, "Ah! Cornelius Agrippa! My dear Victor, do not waste your time upon this; it is sad trash."

我在回忆童年往事时总能感受到强烈的快乐，直到后来厄运玷污了我的思想，把我对未来的无限美好憧憬变成了阴郁、狭隘的自我反思。此外，在描述我早些年的经历时，我也得提提那些在不知不觉中一步步将我引向后来的苦难之中的事情，因为当我把后来主宰我命运的那份激情的产生归结为我自身原因时，我发现它已经像源自阴暗隐蔽之处的山涧溪水，逐渐增长，而且在前进中不断膨胀，变成一股洪流，一路冲走我全部的希望和欢乐。自然科学是操控我命运的天才，因此在我的故事中我愿意讲讲那些令我对那门科学情有独钟的事情。十三岁时我们全家去托农附近的温泉浴场参加派对。因天气恶劣我们不得不在旅馆里呆了一天。在这个房子里，我无意中发现了科纳柳斯·阿格里帕的一卷著作。我漫不经心地翻开了书。作者试图阐述的理论和他所列举的奇妙事实很快就让我变得兴致勃勃。一束新的光芒射进了我的思想，我满怀喜悦地和父亲交流起我的发现。我父亲草草地扫了一眼书的封皮，说道：“啊！科纳柳斯·阿格里帕！我亲爱的维克托，别把你的时间浪费在这本书上，它就是个可悲的垃圾。”

If, instead of this remark, my father had taken the pains to explain to me that the principles of Agrippa had been entirely exploded and that a modern system of science had been introduced which possessed much greater powers than the ancient, because the powers of the latter were chimerical, while those of the former were real and practical, under such circumstances I should certainly have thrown Agrippa aside and have contented my imagination, warmed as it was, by returning with greater ardour to my former studies. It is even possible that the train of my ideas would never have received the fatal impulse that led to my ruin. But the cursory glance my father had taken of my volume by no means assured me that he was acquainted with its contents, and I continued to read with the greatest avidity. When I returned home my first care was to procure the whole works of this author, and afterwards of Paracelsus and Albertus Magnus. I read and studied the wild fancies of these writers with delight; they appeared to me treasures known to few besides myself. I have described myself as always having been imbued with a fervent longing to penetrate the secrets of nature. In spite of the intense labour and wonderful discoveries of modern philosophers, I always came from my studies discontented and unsatisfied. Sir Isaac Newton is said to have avowed that he felt like a child picking up shells beside the great and unexplored ocean of truth. 人名查证手册Those of his successors in each branch of natural philosophy with whom I was acquainted appeared even to my boy's apprehensions as tyros engaged in the same pursuit.

假如我父亲没有说这番话，而是费些功夫向我解释阿格里帕的理论已经被推翻了，而且一个具有前所未有的巨大力量的现代科学体系已经被引入了，因为先前的理论不切实际，而新的理论真实、实用。如果是在这种情形下，我自然会把阿格里帕的书抛在一边，我的想象力也会得到了满足，趁热打铁，我会怀着更大的热情重返我的研究。我的思想中很有可能本来永远不会产生那种导致我毁灭的致命冲动。但我父亲对书的匆匆一瞥使我完全相信他根本不知道书的内容，因此我继续如饥似渴地阅读着。回到家后我的第一件事就是找到这个作者的全部著作，然后是帕拉赛尔瑟斯和阿尔贝特斯·玛格努斯的著作。我愉快地阅读和研究这些作家的奇思怪想。他们看起来就是除我之外鲜为人知的珍宝。我一直把自己描述为一个总是热衷于渴望揭示自然奥秘的人。尽管现代哲学家们已经付出了艰辛劳动并获得了重大发现，但基于我的研究，我总是对结果不甚满意。据说艾萨克·牛顿爵士曾坦言，他觉得自己就像一个在浩瀚、未知的真理海洋边捡贝壳的小孩。那些我所熟知的、各个自然科学分支中他的继承者们，即便是按照我这样的孩子式理解，也不过是些从事同样追求的新手。

The untaught peasant beheld the elements around him and was acquainted with their practical uses. The most learned philosopher knew little more. He had partially unveiled the face of Nature, but her immortal lineaments were still a wonder and a mystery. He might dissect, anatomize, and give names; but, not to speak of a final cause, causes in their secondary and tertiary grades were utterly unknown to him. I had gazed upon the fortifications and impediments that seemed to keep human beings from entering the citadel of nature, and rashly and ignorantly I had repined.

没有受过教育的农民在观察了他周围的自然力后，也会熟悉其实际用途。最渊博的哲学家知道的只是多那么一点点。他只是揭开了大自然的部分面纱，但其不朽的容颜却仍是一个奇迹、一个谜团。他也许能分析、剖析、命名，但别说最终起因了，即便是处于第二、第三等级的起因他也一无所知。我曾一直注视着那些有碍于人类进入自然界之大本营的堡垒和障碍，并轻率、无知地发着牢骚。

But here were books, and here were men who had penetrated deeper and knew more. I took their word for all that they averred, and I became their disciple. It may appear strange that such should arise in the eighteenth century; but while I followed the routine of education in the schools of Geneva, I was, to a great degree, self-taught with regard to my favourite studies. My father was not scientific, and I was left to struggle with a child's blindness, added to a student's thirst for knowledge. Under the guidance of my new preceptors I entered with the greatest diligence into the search of the philosopher's stone and the elixir of life; but the latter soon obtained my undivided attention. Wealth was an inferior object, but what glory would attend the discovery if I could banish disease from the human frame and render man invulnerable to any but a violent death! Nor were these my only visions. The raising of ghosts or devils was a promise liberally accorded by my favourite authors, the fulfilment of which I most eagerly sought; and if my incantations were always unsuccessful, I attributed the failure rather to my own inexperience and mistake than to a want of skill or fidelity in my instructors. And thus for a time I was occupied by exploded systems, mingling, like an unadept, a thousand contradictory theories and floundering desperately in a very slough of multifarious knowledge, guided by an ardent imagination and childish reasoning, till an accident again changed the current of my ideas. When I was about fifteen years old we had retired to our house near Belrive, when we witnessed a most violent and terrible thunderstorm. It advanced from behind the mountains of Jura, and the thunder burst at once with frightful loudness from various quarters of the heavens. 地名与手册相符I remained, while the storm lasted, watching its progress with curiosity and delight. As I stood at the door, on a sudden I beheld a stream of fire issue from an old and beautiful oak which stood about twenty yards from our house; and so soon as the dazzling light vanished, the oak had disappeared, and nothing remained but a blasted stump. When we visited it the next morning, we found the tree shattered in a singular manner. It was not splintered by the shock, but entirely reduced to thin ribbons of wood. I never beheld anything so utterly destroyed.

但是在这些书里，这些人已经洞察了更多，知道了更多。我把他们的话奉为经典，我成了他们的信徒。在十八世纪竟然发生这种事，这似乎让人匪夷所思。但当我在日内瓦的学校里接受常规教育时，我在很大程度上是通过自学来进行我所热爱的研究。我父亲不懂科学，因此我只能以孩子式的盲目，加上一个学生对知识的渴望，孤军奋战着。在我新导师们的指导下，我极其勤奋地投入到了对点金石和长生不老药的探求中，但很快后者就吸引了我全部的注意力。财富是次要的东西，但如果我能使人的身躯免于疾病，并且除了暴力致死外不受任何伤害的话，那将是一个多么辉煌的发现啊！我所幻想的不仅是这些。我所喜爱的作者们大但地宣称他们能召唤妖魔鬼怪，这是我最迫切寻求的成就。如果我的咒语总不成功，我就把失败归咎于自身经验不足和错误，而不是质疑我导师们的真才实学。就这样，在一段时间里我沉浸在这些已被推翻的理论体系里，在狂热的想象力和孩子似推理的指导下，我像个外行人似的，把成千个矛盾的理论混在一起，在千差万别的知识沼泽中孤注一掷地挣扎着，直到一个突发事件再次改变了我的思想动态。我大约十五岁时，我们搬回了贝尔日维附近的老宅，那时我们目睹了一场最猛烈、最可怕的暴风雨。暴风雨从朱拉山脉后面袭来，震耳欲聋的雷声突然从天空的四面八方炸响。在暴风雨持续时，我一直怀着好奇和喜悦的心情观察着这个过程。当时我站在门口，突然我看见在离我家房子二十码远的一棵美丽的老橡树上窜出了一束火焰，而后那炫目的光线刚一消失，橡树就不翼而飞了，只留下一截枯萎的树桩。次日清晨我们过去看时，发现树被毁坏的方式尤为特别。它不是被雷劈裂的，而是完全被炸成薄薄的碎木条。我从未见过有什么东西被摧毁得如此彻底。

Before this I was not unacquainted with the more obvious laws of electricity. On this occasion a man of great research in natural philosophy was with us, and excited by this catastrophe, he entered on the explanation of a theory which he had formed on the subject of electricity and galvanism, which was at once new and astonishing to me. All that he said threw greatly into the shade Cornelius Agrippa, Albertus Magnus, and Paracelsus, the lords of my imagination; but by some fatality the overthrow of these men disinclined me to pursue my accustomed studies. It seemed to me as if nothing would or could ever be known. All that had so long engaged my attention suddenly grew despicable. By one of those caprices of the mind which we are perhaps most subject to in early youth, I at once gave up my former occupations, set down natural history and all its progeny as a deformed and abortive creation, and entertained the greatest disdain for a would-be science which could never even step within the threshold of real knowledge. In this mood of mind I betook myself to the mathematics and the branches of study appertaining to that science as being built upon secure foundations, and so worthy of my consideration.

在这之前我也不是不知道比这更显而易见的电学原理。发生此事时，有个对自然哲学颇有研究的男士正和我们在一起。这场灾难令他兴奋不已，他开始解释起他已经形成的关于电学和流电学的理论，这立即让我感到新鲜、惊奇。他的话使科纳柳斯·阿格里帕、阿尔贝斯特·玛格努斯、帕拉赛尔瑟斯，这些我想象力的主宰们顿时黯然失色。但命中注定，推翻了这些人之后，我不愿意去追求我以往的研究了。对我而言，似乎一切都将会是或永远会是未知的。所有我长久以来所关注的事情突然变得可鄙起来。也许是因为我们年轻人所特有的一种反复无常的心态，我立刻放弃了我先前的研究，把自然科学及其全部成果都归为畸形、不成熟的产物，我对那永远不能迈入真正科学门槛的自诩的科学怀有最大的蔑视。在这种思想状态下，我开始研究数学和与其相关的分支学科，因为这些是建立在扎实基础之上的，非常值得我考虑。

Thus strangely are our souls constructed, and by such slight ligaments are we bound to prosperity or ruin. When I look back, it seems to me as if this almost miraculous change of inclination and will was the immediate suggestion of the guardian angel of my life—the last effort made by the spirit of preservation to avert the storm that was even then hanging in the stars and ready to envelop me. Her victory was announced by an unusual tranquillity and gladness of soul which followed the relinquishing of my ancient and latterly tormenting studies. It was thus that I was to be taught to associate evil with their prosecution, happiness with their disregard.

我们的灵魂构建得如此奇特，我们被如此纤弱的韧带所束缚，走向兴衰或毁灭。回首往事，似乎对我而言，爱好与愿望的几近奇迹的变化好像是我生命的守护天使的直接提示——守护神所做的最终努力就是提防曾悬在星云中、随时可能把我包围的风暴。当我放弃了自己先前和后来那些折磨人的研究之后，灵魂中非同寻常的宁静和欢愉便宣告了守护神的胜利。这便是守护神要教给我的：从事这些研究就意味着邪恶，放弃就意味着幸福。

It was a strong effort of the spirit of good, but it was ineffectual. Destiny was too potent, and her immutable laws had decreed my utter and terrible destruction.

这善意的神灵做出了很大努力，但效果不佳。命运太强势了，它那不可更改的法则宣判了我的灭顶之灾。

CHAPTER 3

第三章

When I had attained the age of seventeen my parents resolved that I should become a student at the university of Ingolstadt. I had hitherto attended the schools of Geneva, but my father thought it necessary for the completion of my education that I should be made acquainted with other customs than those of my native country. My departure was therefore fixed at an early date, but before the day resolved upon could arrive, the first misfortune of my life occurred—an omen, as it were, of my future misery. Elizabeth had caught the scarlet fever; her illness was severe, and she was in the greatest danger. During her illness many arguments had been urged to persuade my mother to refrain from attending upon her. She had at first yielded to our entreaties, but when she heard that the life of her favourite was menaced, she could no longer control her anxiety. She attended her sickbed; her watchful attentions triumphed over the malignity of the distemper—Elizabeth was saved, but the consequences of this imprudence were fatal to her preserver. On the third day my mother sickened; her fever was accompanied by the most alarming symptoms, and the looks of her medical attendants prognosticated the worst event. On her deathbed the fortitude and benignity of this best of women did not desert her. She joined the hands of Elizabeth and myself. "My children," she said, "my firmest hopes of future happiness were placed on the prospect of your union. This expectation will now be the consolation of your father. Elizabeth, my love, you must supply my place to my younger children. Alas! I regret that I am taken from you; and, happy and beloved as I have been, is it not hard to quit you all? But these are not thoughts befitting me; I will endeavour to resign myself cheerfully to death and will indulge a hope of meeting you in another world."

我十七岁时，我父母决定让我去因戈尔施塔特大学读书。之前，我一直在日内瓦的一些学校读书，但我父亲觉得，除了熟悉本国风土人情外我还应该熟悉别国的情况，这样我受的教育才算完整。我动身的日子早就定了下来，但是还没等到动身，我生命中的第一个不幸就出现了——好像是我未来灾难的一个预兆。伊丽莎白染上了猩红热。她病得很厉害，处于极度危险的状态。在她生病期间，我们曾多次极力劝阻母亲照顾伊丽莎白。起初她同意了我们的请求，但当她获知自己最喜爱的孩子生命垂危时，便再也不能控制自己的焦虑了。她到伊丽莎白的病床前照顾她。她的精心照料战胜了病魔——伊丽莎白得救了，但母亲的这种不谨慎的举动给自己身体带来了致命的后果。第三天，我母亲病倒了。她除了发烧还出现了非常令人担忧的症状，她的护理人员的表情预示了最糟糕的事情。弥留之际，这位杰出的女性仍保持着坚韧与仁慈。她把伊丽莎白的手和我的手拉在了一起。“我的孩子们，”她说，“我对未来幸福最坚定的期望就寄托在你们将来的结合上了。这份期望现在对你们的父亲来说是一种安慰。伊丽莎白，我亲爱的，你一定要替我照顾我的小儿子们。唉！我很遗憾自己要离开你们了。我曾一直是幸福的、被关爱的，现在要离你们而去，这岂不是太难了吗？但我现在不该这么想，我会努力地欣然面对死亡，但愿我在另一个世界还会见到你们。”

She died calmly, and her countenance expressed affection even in death. I need not describe the feelings of those whose dearest ties are rent by that most irreparable evil, the void that presents itself to the soul, and the despair that is exhibited on the countenance. It is so long before the mind can persuade itself that she whom we saw every day and whose very existence appeared a part of our own can have departed forever—that the brightness of a beloved eye can have been extinguished and the sound of a voice so familiar and dear to the ear can be hushed, never more to be heard. These are the reflections of the first days; but when the lapse of time proves the reality of the evil, then the actual bitterness of grief commences. Yet from whom has not that rude hand rent away some dear connection? And why should I describe a sorrow which all have felt, and must feel? The time at length arrives when grief is rather an indulgence than a necessity; and the smile that plays upon the lips, although it may be deemed a sacrilege, is not banished. My mother was dead, but we had still duties which we ought to perform; we must continue our course with the rest and learn to think ourselves fortunate whilst one remains whom the spoiler has not seized.

她平静地走了，虽已逝去，但脸上仍流露出仁爱的表情。我无需描述当最亲爱的人被无法挽回的灾难夺走时那些人内心的感受、灵魂的空虚以及脸上流露出的绝望。我们过了很久都无法相信，与我们朝夕相伴、融入我们生活的母亲竟已经永远地离开了——我们所深爱的她那明亮的目光已经不复存在了，我们所熟悉和感到亲切的声音竟沉寂下去，永远听不到了。这些便是我们最初几日的感受，但时间的流逝验证着残酷的事实，而后悲伤带来的真正痛苦便开始了。然而谁没有经历过被那残酷之手夺去至亲至爱的人呢？那么为什么要去描述所有人都曾体会过，也必须体会的一种悲痛呢？终有一天，悲伤不是一种必须而是一种放纵，脸上会自然地流露出一丝微笑，尽管这可能被认为是一种亵渎。母亲已经去世了，但是我们仍有应尽的职责。我们必须和他人一起继续我们的历程，并且我们要学会这样去思考：我们是幸运的，没有被死神夺去生命。

My departure for Ingolstadt, which had been deferred by these events, was now again determined upon. I obtained from my father a respite of some weeks. It appeared to me sacrilege so soon to leave the repose, akin to death, of the house of mourning and to rush into the thick of life. I was new to sorrow, but it did not the less alarm me. I was unwilling to quit the sight of those that remained to me, and above all, I desired to see my sweet Elizabeth in some degree consoled.

我去因戈尔施塔特的事一度因这些事情耽搁了下来，如今又再次提上了日程。父亲允许我过几周再出发。在我看来，这样匆忙地离开尸骨未寒的母亲、离开满是悲伤的家、深入到生活中去，是对逝者的不敬。我初次体会悲伤，但这丝毫没有减少我的忧虑。我不愿意离开一直陪伴我的那些人，最重要的是我希望看到我亲爱的伊丽莎白得到些许安慰。

She indeed veiled her grief and strove to act the comforter to us all. She looked steadily on life and assumed its duties with courage and zeal. She devoted herself to those whom she had been taught to call her uncle and cousins. Never was she so enchanting as at this time, when she recalled the sunshine of her smiles and spent them upon us. She forgot even her own regret in her endeavours to make us forget.

事实上她掩藏了自己的悲伤，竭力去安慰我们所有的人。她沉稳地面对生活，带着勇气和热情承担起生活的责任。她全心全意去照顾那些她自幼就学会称之为叔叔和堂兄弟的人们。当她再次向我们绽放出阳光般的灿烂笑容时，她比以往任何时候都更加迷人。在她努力使我们忘记痛苦的时候，她甚至也忘记了自己的痛苦。

The day of my departure at length arrived. Clerval spent the last evening with us. He had endeavoured to persuade his father to permit him to accompany me and to become my fellow student, but in vain. His father was a narrow-minded trader and saw idleness and ruin in the aspirations and ambition of his son. Henry deeply felt the misfortune of being debarred from a liberal education. He said little, but when he spoke I read in his kindling eye and in his animated glance a restrained but firm resolve not to be chained to the miserable details of commerce.

我起程的日子终归到来了。克莱瓦尔和我们度过了临行前最后一晚。他曾极力说服他父亲同意他和我作伴，成为我的同学，但没成功。他父亲是个思想狭隘的商人，把自己儿子的志气和抱负视为懒惰和堕落。亨利为自己被排除在开明教育之外而深感不幸。他话不多，但当他讲话时我从他那炯炯有神的眼睛里和他生气勃勃的眼神中看到了一种克制但坚定的决心，即不被令人厌烦的商业琐事所束缚。

We sat late. We could not tear ourselves away from each other nor persuade ourselves to say the word "Farewell!"It was said, and we retired under the pretence of seeking repose, each fancying that the other was deceived; but when at morning's dawn I descended to the carriage which was to convey me away, they were all there—my father again to bless me, Clerval to press my hand once more, my Elizabeth to renew her entreaties that I would write often and to bestow the last feminine attentions on her playmate and friend.

我们坐到很晚。我们无法忍受彼此的分离，也不忍心说出“再见”。我们最后还是说了再见，并假称要睡觉，所以得分开了，彼此都以为瞒过了对方。但次日拂晓，当我下去坐马车要离开的时候，他们都来了——父亲再次祝福了我，克莱瓦尔与我再次用力握手，我的伊丽莎白再次恳求我经常来信，并温柔地向身为她玩伴和朋友的我做最后的道别。

I threw myself into the chaise that was to convey me away and indulged in the most melancholy reflections. I, who had ever been surrounded by amiable companions, continually engaged in endeavouring to bestow mutual pleasure—I was now alone. In the university whither I was going I must form my own friends and be my own protector. My life had hitherto been remarkably secluded and domestic, and this had given me invincible repugnance to new countenances. I loved my brothers, Elizabeth, and Clerval; these were "old familiar faces," but I believed myself totally unfitted for the company of strangers. Such were my reflections as I commenced my journey; but as I proceeded, my spirits and hopes rose. I ardently desired the acquisition of knowledge. I had often, when at home, thought it hard to remain during my youth cooped up in one place and had longed to enter the world and take my station among other human beings. Now my desires were complied with, and it would, indeed, have been folly to repent.

我钻进将载我远行的马车，陷入最伤感的沉思当中。我曾一直被亲密的伙伴所包围，一直力求营造共同的欢乐——如今我却孑然一身。在我正在前往的大学里，我必须找到我自己的朋友，做我自己的保护者。迄今为止，我的生活一直是与世隔绝，局限在家里，这使我难以抑制地厌恶新面孔。我喜爱我的弟弟们，伊丽莎白和克莱瓦尔，这些都是“熟悉的老面孔”，但是我相信自己完全不适合与陌生人为伴。这便是我开始行程时的感想。但是在行进的过程中，我的情绪和希望高涨起来。我热切盼望获得知识。我以前在家的时候经常认为很难将自己的青春拘禁在一个地方，我一直盼望进入社会，在芸芸众生中找到我的一席之地。如今我的愿望得以实现了，我若感到后悔的话，那真的会很愚蠢。

I had sufficient leisure for these and many other reflections during my journey to Ingolstadt, which was long and fatiguing. At length the high white steeple of the town met my eyes. I alighted and was conducted to my solitary apartment to spend the evening as I pleased.

在前往因戈尔施塔特的漫长、疲惫的旅程中我有充分的闲暇时间来前思后想。终于，那个城镇高高的白塔尖映入了我的眼帘。我跳下马车，被带到一间单人公寓，称心如意地度过了当晚。

The next morning I delivered my letters of introduction and paid a visit to some of the principal professors. Chance—or rather the evil influence, the Angel of Destruction, which asserted omnipotent sway over me from the moment I turned my reluctant steps from my father's door—led me first to M. Krempe, professor of natural philosophy. He was an uncouth man, but deeply imbued in the secrets of his science. He asked me several questions concerning my progress in the different branches of science appertaining to natural philosophy. I replied carelessly, and partly in contempt, mentioned the names of my alchemists as the principal authors I had studied. The professor stared. "Have you," he said, "really spent your time in studying such nonsense?"

第二天上午，我递交了几封介绍信并拜访了几位重要的教授。命运——或者说是邪恶势力，毁灭之神，在我不情愿地离开家门时就已经无所不能地掌控了我——让我先去拜见了自然科学教授克兰帕先生。他是个粗野之人，但醉心于他的科学奥秘之中。他问了我几个问题，是关于我在与自然哲学有关的几个不同科学分支中的进展。我漫不经心地作出回答，有些鄙视地提到了几个炼金师的名字，他们都是我曾研究过的几个主要作者。教授瞪大了眼睛。“你已经，”他说，“真的花时间研究这些废话了吗？”

I replied in the affirmative. "Every minute," continued M. Krempe with warmth, "every instant that you have wasted on those books is utterly and entirely lost. You have burdened your memory with exploded systems and useless names. Good God! In what desert land have you lived, where no one was kind enough to inform you that these fancies which you have so greedily imbibed are a thousand years old and as musty as they are ancient? I little expected, in this enlightened and scientific age, to find a disciple of Albertus Magnus and Paracelsus. My dear sir, you must begin your studies entirely anew."

我肯定地回答了他。“每一分钟，”克兰帕先生继续激动地说，“你所浪费在这些书上的每一刻都是一种完全、彻底的损失。你竟让这些已被推翻的理论体系和无用的名字塞满了你的大脑。我的天啊！你曾生活在怎样的一片荒漠中，难道没有一个人好心地告诉你这些你所如痴如醉的幻想都是一千年前陈腐不堪的东西吗？我难以置信，在这样一个开化、科学的时代，还会发现一个阿尔贝斯特玛格努斯和帕拉赛尔瑟斯的信徒。我亲爱的先生，你必须完全重新开始你的学习了。”

So saying, he stepped aside and wrote down a list of several books treating of natural philosophy which he desired me to procure, and dismissed me after mentioning that in the beginning of the following week he intended to commence a course of lectures upon natural philosophy in its general relations, and that M. Waldman, a fellow professor, would lecture upon chemistry the alternate days that he omitted.

他边说边走到一边，列出了一些有关自然哲学的书目，希望我弄到这些书。在他让我离开前，他还提到从下周一开始，他打算开设一门介绍自然科学概论的课程，并且在没有他课的间隔日子里，他的同事沃尔德曼教授将讲授化学。

I returned home not disappointed, for I have said that I had long considered those authors useless whom the professor reprobated; but I returned not at all the more inclined to recur to these studies in any shape. M. Krempe was a little squat man with a gruff voice and a repulsive countenance; the teacher, therefore, did not prepossess me in favour of his pursuits. In rather a too philosophical and connected a strain, perhaps, I have given an account of the conclusions I had come to concerning them in my early years. As a child I had not been content with the results promised by the modern professors of natural science. With a confusion of ideas only to be accounted for by my extreme youth and my want of a guide on such matters, I had retrod the steps of knowledge along the paths of time and exchanged the discoveries of recent inquirers for the dreams of forgotten alchemists. Besides, I had a contempt for the uses of modern natural philosophy. It was very different when the masters of the science sought immortality and power; such views, although futile, were grand; but now the scene was changed. The ambition of the inquirer seemed to limit itself to the annihilation of those visions on which my interest in science was chiefly founded. I was required to exchange chimeras of boundless grandeur for realities of little worth.

我回去了，并不觉得沮丧，因为我已经说过了那些被教授痛贬的作者们早就被我视为无用了，但是我一点也不想重返任何形式的自然科学研究。克兰帕先生又胖又矮，声音粗哑，面目可憎，因此这个老师一开始并没能让我对他的研究产生好感。也许是基于一种过于哲学的、联系的禀性，我已经记录了自己在早些年时候得出的关于自然科学研究的一些结论。还是个孩子时，我就已经对当代的自然科学教授们许诺的结论不甚满意了。仅仅因为我太年轻、又没人指导我这些事情，才会想法混乱。一直以来我在求知过程中走了冤枉路，用最新探索的发现成果去换取无人问津的炼金术士的梦想。此外，我鄙视现代自然科学的种种用途。当科学的大师们寻求到不朽和力量之时，情况就截然不同了。这样的观点，尽管无用，但却出色。可如今这一幕被改变了。这位教授似乎志在毁灭我的那些幻想，而我对科学的兴趣却主要建立于此。我被要求放下无限辉煌的幻想，换得没有价值的事实。

Such were my reflections during the first two or three days of my residence at Ingolstadt, which were chiefly spent in becoming acquainted with the localities and the principal residents in my new abode. But as the ensuing week commenced, I thought of the information which M. Krempe had given me concerning the lectures. And although I could not consent to go and hear that little conceited fellow deliver sentences out of a pulpit, I recollected what he had said of M. Waldman, whom I had never seen, as he had hitherto been out of town.

这些便是我住在因戈尔施塔特最初两三天里的想法，那几天我主要是熟悉当地环境和我新住所里的主要住户们。但是当接下来的一周开始时，我想起了克兰帕教授告诉我的关于课程的信息。虽然我不可能去听那个自以为是的小个子家伙布道一般的讲座，但我回想起他曾提到过沃尔德曼先生，我从未见过此人，当时他出城了。

Partly from curiosity and partly from idleness, I went into the lecturing room, which M. Waldman entered shortly after. This professor was very unlike his colleague. He appeared about fifty years of age, but with an aspect expressive of the greatest benevolence; a few grey hairs covered his temples, but those at the back of his head were nearly black. His person was short but remarkably erect and his voice the sweetest I had ever heard. He began his lecture by a recapitulation of the history of chemistry and the various improvements made by different men of learning, pronouncing with fervour the names of the most distinguished discoverers. He then took a cursory view of the present state of the science and explained many of its elementary terms. After having made a few preparatory experiments, he concluded with a panegyric upon modern chemistry, the terms of which I shall never forget:"The ancient teachers of this science," said he, "promised impossibilities and performed nothing. The modern masters promise very little; they know that metals cannot be transmuted and that the elixir of life is a chimera but these philosophers, whose hands seem only made to dabble in dirt, and their eyes to pore over the microscope or crucible, have indeed performed miracles. They penetrate into the recesses of nature and show how she works in her hiding-places. They ascend into the heavens; they have discovered how the blood circulates, and the nature of the air we breathe. They have acquired new and almost unlimited powers; they can command the thunders of heaven, mimic the earthquake, and even mock the invisible world with its own shadows.”

部分是出于好奇，部分是出于无聊，我走进了讲堂，沃尔德曼先生随后也进来了。这个教授可一点不像他的同事。他看上去五十多岁，但面部表情极为慈祥，两鬓有些斑白，但后脑勺的头发却几乎都是黑色的。他个子不高，但站得笔直，他的嗓音是我所听过的最悦耳的声音。他先是简明扼要地介绍了一下化学的历史和不同学者所取得的成就，他慷慨激昂地道出那些最杰出的发明家的名字。而后他粗略地讲述了这门学科的目前状态，解释了该学科的许多基本术语。做完了一些准备性的试验之后，他做了总结陈词，赞美了现代化学，那些术语令我终身难忘。“这门科学的先辈们，”他说，“承诺了种种不可能之事，却什么也没做成。现代大师们很少承诺，他们知道点石不能成金，长生不老是幻想，但就是这些双手似乎只会摆弄泥巴，眼睛只会盯着显微镜和坩埚的科学家们制造了一个个奇迹。他们洞察自然的幽深之处，揭示自然在其隐藏之处如何运作。他们探索太空；他们已经发现了血液如何循环，发现了我们所呼吸的空气的本质。他们已经获得了新的、几乎无限的力量；他们能够控制天空的雷，模拟地震，甚至能模拟那看不见的世界和幽灵。”

Such were the professor's words—rather let me say such the words of the fate—enounced to destroy me. As he went on I felt as if my soul were grappling with a palpable enemy; one by one the various keys were touched which formed the mechanism of my being; chord after chord was sounded, and soon my mind was filled with one thought, one conception, one purpose. So much has been done, exclaimed the soul of Frankenstein—more, far more, will I achieve; treading in the steps already marked, I will pioneer a new way, explore unknown powers, and unfold to the world the deepest mysteries of creation.

就是教授的这些话——让我说倒不如叫作命中注定的一番话——宣告了我的毁灭。当他继续讲演的时候，我觉得自己的灵魂似乎在和一个真实的敌人扭打。我的身体就像一架乐器，各个琴键都被触动着，和弦此起彼伏地响起，很快我的大脑里便充斥着一个想法，一个概念，一个目的。我——弗兰克斯坦的灵魂宣告——前人已经做了如此之多，我将取得更多、更多的成就。踏着前人的足迹，我将开辟一条新路，探索未知的力量，向世界展示天地万物之最深奥的秘密。

I closed not my eyes that night. My internal being was in a state of insurrection and turmoil; I felt that order would thence arise, but I had no power to produce it. By degrees, after the morning's dawn, sleep came. I awoke, and my yesternight's thoughts were as a dream. There only remained a resolution to return to my ancient studies and to devote myself to a science for which I believed myself to possess a natural talent. On the same day I paid M. Waldman a visit. His manners in private were even more mild and attractive than in public, for there was a certain dignity in his mien during his lecture which in his own house was replaced by the greatest affability and kindness. I gave him pretty nearly the same account of my former pursuits as I had given to his fellow professor. He heard with attention the little narration concerning my studies and smiled at the names of Cornelius Agrippa and Paracelsus, but without the contempt that M. Krempe had exhibited. He said that "These were men to whose indefatigable zeal modern philosophers were indebted for most of the foundations of their knowledge. They had left to us, as an easier task, to give new names and arrange in connected classifications the facts which they in a great degree had been the instruments of bringing to light. The labours of men of genius, however erroneously directed, scarcely ever fail in ultimately turning to the solid advantage of mankind."I listened to his statement, which was delivered without any presumption or affectation, and then added that his lecture had removed my prejudices against modern chemists; I expressed myself in measured terms, with the modesty and deference due from a youth to his instructor, without letting escape (inexperience in life would have made me ashamed) any of the enthusiasm which stimulated my intended labours. I requested his advice concerning the books I ought to procure.

那天我一夜无眠。我的内心一直处于躁动不安的状态。我感觉秩序将从那里产生，但我毫无创造它的力量。渐渐地，拂晓之后，困意袭来。我醒来了，昨夜的想法就像一个梦。脑子里唯一留下的是个决定——重返我先前的研究，致力于我自认为自己颇有天赋的学科。当天我拜访了沃尔德曼先生。他私底下的举止甚至要比在公开场合时更为和蔼、魅力十足，因为在授课过程中他的神态中流露出某种尊严，但在他自己家时却极为和蔼可亲。在讲述我先前的探索时，我对他说的话几乎和以前对克兰帕教授说的话一模一样。他认真地倾听关于我的研究的细微讲述，当听到科纳柳斯·阿格里帕和帕拉赛尔瑟斯这些名字时，他微微一笑，但并未像克兰帕先生那样表现出蔑视的样子。他说：“现代科学家们所创立的大部分知识都得益于这些人孜孜不倦的努力。他们给我们留下了一个更加容易的任务，即给那些他们在很大程度上已经发现了的事实重新按照相关类别进行命名和安排。这些天才们的努力，虽然导向有误，但最终几乎无一例外地变成了人类的切实利益。”我聆听着他的讲述，他说这番话时毫无臆断和做作，我补充说，他的话消除了我对现代化学家的偏见。我字斟句酌地表达了自己的想法，带着一个年轻人对他的导师所应有谦虚和敬重，没有漏掉所有激励我想要努力奋斗的动力（缺乏生活经验都已经让我羞愧了）。我向他请教自己应该读些什么书。

"I am happy," said M. Waldman, "to have gained a disciple; and if your application equals your ability, I have no doubt of your success. Chemistry is that branch of natural philosophy in which the greatest improvements have been and may be made; it is on that account that I have made it my peculiar study; but at the same time, I have not neglected the other branches of science. A man would make but a very sorry chemist if he attended to that department of human knowledge alone. If your wish is to become really a man of science and not merely a petty experimentalist, I should advise you to apply to every branch of natural philosophy, including mathematics."He then took me into his laboratory and explained to me the uses of his various machines, instructing me as to what I ought to procure and promising me the use of his own when I should have advanced far enough in the science not to derange their mechanism. He also gave me the list of books which I had requested, and I took my leave.“我很高兴，”沃尔德曼先生说，“收下你这个学生。假如你的勤奋程度和你的自身能力相当的话，我相信你会成功的。化学是自然科学的一个分支，它已经创造了最伟大的成就，将来亦会如此。正因为这个原因，我才会把化学作为我的特别研究。但同时我并没有忽视科学的其他分支。如果一个人只是专心于人类知识的那个分支的话，那他将会成为一个非常可悲的化学家。如果你的愿望是成为一名真正的科学家，而不仅仅是一个小实验员的话，我建议你致力于自然科学的每个分支，包括数学。”他随后将我带进了他的实验室，向我讲解了他的各种仪器的用途，并指导我应该配置哪些仪器。他还许诺当我在科学上取得足够大的进步，不至于弄乱机械装置时，他就允许我用他的仪器。他还应我先前的要求，给我列出一份书目单，然后我就告辞了。

Thus ended a day memorable to me; it decided my future destiny.

于我而言值得纪念的一天就这样结束了。它决定了我未来的命运。

CHAPTER 4

第四章

From this day natural philosophy, and particularly chemistry, in the most comprehensive sense of the term, became nearly my sole occupation. I read with ardour those works, so full of genius and discrimination, which modern inquirers have written on these subjects. I attended the lectures and cultivated the acquaintance of the men of science of the university, and I found even in M. Krempe a great deal of sound sense and real information, combined, it is true, with a repulsive physiognomy and manners, but not on that account the less valuable. In M. Waldman I found a true friend. His gentleness was never tinged by dogmatism, and his instructions were given with an air of frankness and good nature that banished every idea of pedantry. In a thousand ways he smoothed for me the path of knowledge and made the most abstruse inquiries clear and facile to my apprehension. My application was at first fluctuating and uncertain; it gained strength as I proceeded and soon became so ardent and eager that the stars often disappeared in the light of morning whilst I was yet engaged in my laboratory.

从这天起，用一个最有概括性的词语来说，自然科学，特别是化学，几乎成了我唯一的兴趣所在。我热切地阅读了现代研究者写出的关于这些课题的著作，里面充满了精辟见解和鉴赏力。我上了一些课，并努力结识了大学里的一些科学人士。我发现即便是在克兰帕先生的课上，也有很多真知灼见，的确，他的相貌和举止令人厌恶，但这不会有损这些真知灼见的价值。我发现沃尔德曼先生是个真正的朋友。他彬彬有礼，丝毫未沾染学究气，他真诚而善意地给出指示，毫无卖弄之意。他用各种办法为我扫平了求知之路，令最深奥的问题清晰易懂。起初我的干劲忽大忽小，变化不定。渐渐地我获得了力量，很快就变得激情四射，常常夜以继日地奋战在我的实验室里。

As I applied so closely, it may be easily conceived that my progress was rapid. My ardour was indeed the astonishment of the students, and my proficiency that of the masters. Professor Krempe often asked me, with a sly smile, how Cornelius Agrippa went on, whilst M. Waldman expressed the most heartfelt exultation in my progress. Two years passed in this manner, during which I paid no visit to Geneva, but was engaged, heart and soul, in the pursuit of some discoveries which I hoped to make. None but those who have experienced them can conceive of the enticements of science. In other studies you go as far as others have gone before you, and there is nothing more to know; but in a scientific pursuit there is continual food for discovery and wonder. A mind of moderate capacity which closely pursues one study must infallibly arrive at great proficiency in that study; and I, who continually sought the attainment of one object of pursuit and was solely wrapped up in this, improved so rapidly that at the end of two years I made some discoveries in the improvement of some chemical instruments, which procured me great esteem and admiration at the university. When I had arrived at this point and had become as well acquainted with the theory and practice of natural philosophy as depended on the lessons of any of the professors at Ingolstadt, my residence there being no longer conducive to my improvements, I thought of returning to my friends and my native town, when an incident happened that protracted my stay.

因为我如此刻苦，很容易想象得到我进步飞快。我的激情着实令同学们惊讶，我的专业水平令大师们吃惊。克兰帕教授经常带着诡秘的微笑问我科纳柳斯·阿格里帕进展如何，而沃尔德曼先生却对我的进步表现出由衷的赞许。就这样两年过去了，在这期间我从未回过日内瓦，而是全心全意地去探索、研究，希望能有所发现。除了那些经历过这些的人们，无人能感受得到科学的诱惑。在其他研究领域里，你走的和前人一样远，不会知道更多。但是在科学的探索中，一直会有新的发现和新的奇迹产生。就算是资质平庸之人，如若潜心探索一个研究领域，一定会在那个领域达到精通的程度。我一直在追求一个研究目标，并完全致力于此。我的进步非常迅速，所以在这两年快结束的时候，我在一些化学仪器的改进方面有了些发现，这为我在大学里赢得了很大的声誉和赞美。当我达到这一高度之时，我已经非常熟悉因戈尔施塔特大学教授们所讲授的自然科学的理论和实践了，留在那里已经无益于我的提高，我想回到我朋友那里，回到我的家乡，但这时发生了一个小插曲，延误了我的行程。

One of the phenomena which had peculiarly attracted my attention was the structure of the human frame, and, indeed, any animal endued with life. Whence, I often asked myself, did the principle of life proceed? It was a bold question, and one which has ever been considered as a mystery; yet with how many things are we upon the brink of becoming acquainted, if cowardice or carelessness did not restrain our inquiries. I revolved these circumstances in my mind and determined thenceforth to apply myself more particularly to those branches of natural philosophy which relate to physiology. Unless I had been animated by an almost supernatural enthusiasm, my application to this study would have been irksome and almost intolerable. To examine the causes of life, we must first have recourse to death. I became acquainted with the science of anatomy, but this was not sufficient; I must also observe the natural decay and corruption of the human body. In my education my father had taken the greatest precautions that my mind should be impressed with no supernatural horrors. I do not ever remember to have trembled at a tale of superstition or to have feared the apparition of a spirit. Darkness had no effect upon my fancy, and a churchyard was to me merely the receptacle of bodies deprived of life, which, from being the seat of beauty and strength, had become food for the worm. Now I was led to examine the cause and progress of this decay and forced to spend days and nights in vaults and charnel-houses. My attention was fixed upon every object the most insupportable to the delicacy of the human feelings. I saw how the fine form of man was degraded and wasted; I beheld the corruption of death succeed to the blooming cheek of life; I saw how the worm inherited the wonders of the eye and brain. I paused, examining and analysing all the minutiae of causation, as exemplified in the change from life to death, and death to life, until from the midst of this darkness a sudden light broke in upon me—a light so brilliant and wondrous, yet so simple, that while I became dizzy with the immensity of the prospect which it illustrated, I was surprised that among so many men of genius who had directed their inquiries towards the same science, that I alone should be reserved to discover so astonishing a secret.

让我特别感兴趣的一种现象是人的骨架结构，事实上，是所有有生命的动物的骨架结构。我经常问自己，生命的源泉从何处开始？这是个大胆的问题，而且一直被视为一个迷。然而若不是因为胆怯和马虎妨碍了我们的探索，我们本可以揭开多少谜团啊。我脑子里盘算了一番各种情况，决心从那时起更加特别致力于自然科学中与生理学相关的一些分支学科。除非我身上附有了一种几乎超自然的狂热之情，不然我在这方面的努力会是令人厌烦的、令人几乎无法忍受的。要研究生命的起源，我们必须首先求助于死亡。我熟知解剖学，但这还不够，我还必须观察人尸体的自然腐烂过程。在对我进行教育的过程中，我父亲曾小心翼翼，不让我的思想受到任何超自然的恐怖事情的影响。我记得自己从未因迷信故事而发抖，或是曾害怕过幽魂鬼怪。黑暗于我的幻想毫无影响，墓地于我而言仅仅是容纳没有生命的躯体之所，而那些原本汇集着美丽与力量的躯体，已经变成了蛆虫的食物。而今我正调查这种腐烂的原因和过程，我不得不几天几夜地呆在墓穴和停尸房里。我关注人类微妙情感所最不能忍受的每个事物。我观察人的美丽外表如何腐败、消耗；我目睹了生机勃勃的脸颊因死亡而腐烂；我看见了蛆虫如何占据了人眼和大脑这片神奇之地。我暂停下来，对人体从生到死、从死到生所表现出来的变化进行细节性原因的调查和分析，直到有一天一道亮光让我茅塞顿开——如此绚烂、神奇的一道光，却又如此简单，以至于当我为它所诠释的广阔前景而头晕目眩之时，我惊讶万分，在众多将科学研究指向这一共同目标的天才当中，唯有我将揭开这个旷世秘密。

Remember, I am not recording the vision of a madman. The sun does not more certainly shine in the heavens than that which I now affirm is true. Some miracle might have produced it, yet the stages of the discovery were distinct and probable. After days and nights of incredible labour and fatigue, I succeeded in discovering the cause of generation and life; nay, more, I became myself capable of bestowing animation upon lifeless matter.

记住，我并非在疯言疯语。我保证现在说的都是真的，就像照耀天空的太阳，真真切切。某个奇迹或许造就了它，然而发现的各个阶段却是截然不同、极具可能性的。经过夜以继日的不断努力和精疲力尽之后，我终于成功地发现了繁衍和生命的起源。不，不仅如此，我还能给无生命物质注入生命力。

The astonishment which I had at first experienced on this discovery soon gave place to delight and rapture. After so much time spent in painful labour, to arrive at once at the summit of my desires was the most gratifying consummation of my toils. But this discovery was so great and overwhelming that all the steps by which I had been progressively led to it were obliterated, and I beheld only the result. What had been the study and desire of the wisest men since the creation of the world was now within my grasp. Not that, like a magic scene, it all opened upon me at once: the information I had obtained was of a nature rather to direct my endeavours so soon as I should point them towards the object of my search than to exhibit that object already accomplished. I was like the Arabian who had been buried with the dead and found a passage to life, aided only by one glimmering and seemingly ineffectual light.

最初我对这一发现惊讶不已，但很快我就变得欣喜若狂了。经历如此漫长的呕心沥血，终于达到了我愿望的巅峰，这就是对我辛苦努力最好的回报了。但是这个发现太伟大、太惊世骇俗了，以至于我都忘记了自己所经历的所有步骤，我现在只看到了结果。有史以来的多少智者的研究和愿望如今就掌握在我手中。这一切并非如魔术场景般一下子都展示给我：我所获得的是本质信息，它是要尽快地将我的努力指向我所研究的目标，而不是呈现已经实现的目标。我就像一个殉葬的阿拉伯人，找到了一条通向生命之路，却只能借助一丝微弱的、看似无效的光。

I see by your eagerness and the wonder and hope which your eyes express, my friend, that you expect to be informed of the secret with which I am acquainted; that cannot be; listen patiently until the end of my story, and you will easily perceive why I am reserved upon that subject. I will not lead you on, unguarded and ardent as I then was, to your destruction and infallible misery. Learn from me, if not by my precepts, at least by my example, how dangerous is the acquirement of knowledge and how much happier that man is who believes his native town to be the world, than he who aspires to become greater than his nature will allow.

我的朋友，从你那急切的神情和你眼睛里流露出的好奇和企盼中，我明白了你是盼望知道我所了解的秘密。但我不能那样，耐心地听完我的故事，你自然会理解我为何在这方面有所保留。我不会将你引入自我毁灭和万劫不复的痛苦中，不会让你像我当年那样毫无防备、满腔热情。如果你不愿听从我的忠言，至少也要从我这个切实的例子中懂得：获得知识是多么危险，一个相信自己的家乡是乐土的人远比一个立志超越自己的能力极限、野心勃勃的人要快乐得多。

When I found so astonishing a power placed within my hands, I hesitated a long time concerning the manner in which I should employ it. Although I possessed the capacity of bestowing animation, yet to prepare a frame for the reception of it, with all its intricacies of fibres, muscles, and veins, still remained a work of inconceivable difficulty and labour. I doubted at first whether I should attempt the creation of a being like myself, or one of simpler organization; but my imagination was too much exalted by my first success to permit me to doubt of my ability to give life to an animal as complex and wonderful as man. The materials at present within my command hardly appeared adequate to so arduous an undertaking, but I doubted not that I should ultimately succeed. I prepared myself for a multitude of reverses; my operations might be incessantly baffled, and at last my work be imperfect, yet when I considered the improvement which every day takes place in science and mechanics, I was encouraged to hope my present attempts would at least lay the foundations of future success. Nor could I consider the magnitude and complexity of my plan as any argument of its impracticability. It was with these feelings that I began the creation of a human being. As the minuteness of the parts formed a great hindrance to my speed, I resolved, contrary to my first intention, to make the being of a gigantic stature, that is to say, about eight feet in height, and proportionably large. After having formed this determination and having spent some months in successfully collecting and arranging my materials, I began.

当我发现自己掌握了一个如此令人震惊的能力时，我犹豫了很久来思考应该如何应用它。尽管我有构筑生命的能力，但还要准备一副骨骼来容纳生命，包括生命所有复杂的神经、肌肉和血管，这仍然是异常困难和艰苦的工作。起初我还拿不定主意，是要创造一个像我一样的生命还是一个更为简单的生理组织。但我的想象力被我的初次成功大大提升了，以至于我根本不怀疑自己拥有创造一个像人一样复杂、神奇生命的能力。当时我所掌握的材料看上去远不够完成一个如此艰难的任务，但是我从未质疑过自己终将成功。我对种种逆境都做好了准备。我的实验可能会不断地受挫，我的工作最终可能不尽完美，然而当我想到科学和机械学日新月异的进步时，我就欢欣鼓舞，希望我目前的尝试至少会为将来的成功打下基础。我没有因为自己计划的庞大和复杂而认为其不切实际。就是怀着这样的思想，我开始制造人体了。人体各部位的精密性成了影响我速度的巨大障碍，我决定违背自己的初衷，制造一个巨人，也就是说大约高八英尺，其他部分也相应变大。下定了决心，又花费数月成功地收集、整理了我的材料之后，我开始工作了。

No one can conceive the variety of feelings which bore me onwards, like a hurricane, in the first enthusiasm of success. Life and death appeared to me ideal bounds, which I should first break through, and pour a torrent of light into our dark world. A new species would bless me as its creator and source; many happy and excellent natures would owe their being to me. No father could claim the gratitude of his child so completely as I should deserve theirs. Pursuing these reflections, I thought that if I could bestow animation upon lifeless matter, I might in process of time (although I now found it impossible) renew life where death had apparently devoted the body to corruption.

无人能体会到我初获成功时的复杂情感，它就像一阵飓风推我前行。生与死在我看来是理想化了的界限，我首先要冲破它，向我们的黑暗世界注入一股光明。一个新物种将把我奉为其缔造者和起源。许许多多幸福而优秀的物种将因我而诞生。没有任何一个父亲能像我这样完全理所当然地获得孩子的感恩之情。为了追求这些想法，我想到了如果我能赋予无生命物质以生命的话，随着时间的推移我可能会使已经明显开始腐烂的尸体起死回生（尽管现在我知道这是不可能的）。

These thoughts supported my spirits, while I pursued my undertaking with unremitting ardour. My cheek had grown pale with study, and my person had become emaciated with confinement. Sometimes, on the very brink of certainty, I failed; yet still I clung to the hope which the next day or the next hour might realize. One secret which I alone possessed was the hope to which I had dedicated myself; and the moon gazed on my midnight labours, while, with unrelaxed and breathless eagerness, I pursued nature to her hiding-places. Who shall conceive the horrors of my secret toil as I dabbled among the unhallowed damps of the grave or tortured the living animal to animate the lifeless clay? My limbs now tremble, and my eyes swim with the remembrance; but then a resistless and almost frantic impulse urged me forward; I seemed to have lost all soul or sensation but for this one pursuit. It was indeed but a passing trance, that only made me feel with renewed acuteness so soon as, the unnatural stimulus ceasing to operate, I had returned to my old habits. I collected bones from charnel-houses and disturbed, with profane fingers, the tremendous secrets of the human frame. In a solitary chamber, or rather cell, at the top of the house, and separated from all the other apartments by a gallery and staircase, I kept my workshop of filthy creation; my eyeballs were starting from their sockets in attending to the details of my employment. The dissecting room and the slaughter-house furnished many of my materials; and often did my human nature turn with loathing from my occupation, whilst, still urged on by an eagerness which perpetually increased, I brought my work near to a conclusion.

这些想法支持着我的精神，我将无限的热情投入到我的工作中。我的脸颊因研究而日渐苍白，我整个人因为足不出户而变得憔悴。有时候，就在成功的边缘，我功亏一篑。然而我一直坚信明天或是下一个小时我也许就会实现梦想。我倾注全部精力的梦想就是我所独自享有的秘密。明月可见证我如何忙碌到深夜，无暇休息、气喘吁吁，我一直追寻着大自然直到她的隐藏之处。当我进出于肮脏、潮湿的墓穴或是为了给无生命的躯体注入活力而摧残活着的动物时，有谁能知晓我的秘密工作中的恐怖呢？现在一想到这些，我便四肢颤抖、眼泪汪汪。但一股无法抗拒的、几近疯狂的冲动迫使我向前。我似乎已经失去了全部的灵魂和理智，只剩这一个追求了。这真的只是一时的恍惚，一旦非自然的刺激不再起作用，并且我已经恢复原来的习惯之后，这恍惚只能令我恢复敏锐感觉。我从停尸房里收集了些骨头，用我亵渎神灵的手去探究人类骨骼结构的巨大奥秘。屋子顶层有一个单独房间（或更像是一间单独牢房），一个走廊和一段楼梯将其与其他房间分隔开来，我把这里作为肮脏的创造生命的车间。我全神贯注地进行我的试验，眼珠子都快从眼眶里蹦出来了。解剖室和屠宰厂为我提供了许多原材料。出于人类的天性，我经常想放弃所从事的恶心工作，但不断增长的急切心情驱使我前进，我的工作终于要接近尾声了。

The summer months passed while I was thus engaged, heart and soul, in one pursuit. It was a most beautiful season; never did the fields bestow a more plentiful harvest or the vines yield a more luxuriant vintage, but my eyes were insensible to the charms of nature. And the same feelings which made me neglect the scenes around me caused me also to forget those friends who were so many miles absent, and whom I had not seen for so long a time. I knew my silence disquieted them, and I well remembered the words of my father:"I know that while you are pleased with yourself you will think of us with affection, and we shall hear regularly from you. You must pardon me if I regard any interruption in your correspondence as a proof that your other duties are equally neglected."

我就这样全身心地投入到这个追求当中，夏天就这样过去了。夏天是一个特别美丽的季节。田野给予人们巨大的丰收，葡萄园也硕果累累，但我对大自然这些美景视若无睹。令我忽视周围景色的心情，又同样令我把远方阔别多年的朋友们抛在了九霄云外。我知道自己的杳无音信令他们不安，我还清楚地记得父亲的话：“我知道当你自得其乐时，会深情地想着我们，我们会定期地收到你的来信。如果我把你与我们联系的中断视为你同样忽视了自己其他责任的话，你一定要原谅我。”

I knew well therefore what would be my father's feelings, but I could not tear my thoughts from my employment, loathsome in itself, but which had taken an irresistible hold of my imagination. I wished, as it were, to procrastinate all that related to my feelings of affection until the great object, which swallowed up every habit of my nature, should be completed.

因此我很了解父亲的感受是怎样的，但我不能在工作上分心，工作虽恶心，但它已经无法抗拒地掌控了我的想象力。我希望，如果可能，先把与思念相关的情感搁置一旁，直到那个吞噬我所有天性的宏伟目标得以完成。

I then thought that my father would be unjust if he ascribed my neglect to vice or faultiness on my part, but I am now convinced that he was justified in conceiving that I should not be altogether free from blame. A human being in perfection ought always to preserve a calm and peaceful mind and never to allow passion or a transitory desire to disturb his tranquillity. I do not think that the pursuit of knowledge is an exception to this rule. If the study to which you apply yourself has a tendency to weaken your affections and to destroy your taste for those simple pleasures in which no alloy can possibly mix, then that study is certainly unlawful, that is to say, not befitting the human mind. If this rule were always observed; if no man allowed any pursuit whatsoever to interfere with the tranquillity of his domestic affections, Greece had not been enslaved, Caesar would have spared his country, America would have been discovered more gradually, and the empires of Mexico and Peru had not been destroyed.

因而我觉得假若父亲把我对亲情的忽视看成我的堕落和错误的话，那实在是不公平，但是我现在确信他认为我有可指责之处是合情合理的。一个完美的人应该总保持心平气和的状态，从不允许热情或一时的愿望去破坏他的平静心态。我认为探求知识也不能违背这个原则。假如你从事的研究会削弱你的感情，破坏你体味简单而质朴的快乐，那么那个研究自然是不合法的，也就是说，无益于人类的思想。倘若人们一直遵守这个原则，倘若无人允许任何追求干涉自己内在的情感平静，希腊就不会被奴役，凯撒就会厚待他的祖国，美洲也不会被逐渐迅速地发现，墨西哥帝国和秘鲁帝国也不会被毁灭。

But I forget that I am moralizing in the most interesting part of my tale, and your looks remind me to proceed. My father made no reproach in his letters and only took notice of my silence by inquiring into my occupations more particularly than before. Winter, spring, and summer passed away during my labours; but I did not watch the blossom or the expanding leaves—sights which before always yielded me supreme delight—so deeply was I engrossed in my occupation. The leaves of that year had withered before my work drew near to a close, and now every day showed me more plainly how well I had succeeded. But my enthusiasm was checked by my anxiety, and I appeared rather like one doomed by slavery to toil in the mines, or any other unwholesome trade than an artist occupied by his favourite employment. Every night I was oppressed by a slow fever, and I became nervous to a most painful degree; the fall of a leaf startled me, and I shunned my fellow creatures as if I had been guilty of a crime. Sometimes I grew alarmed at the wreck I perceived that I had become; the energy of my purpose alone sustained me: my labours would soon end, and I believed that exercise and amusement would then drive away incipient disease; and I promised myself both of these when my creation should be complete.

但我忘了，我正停在自己故事中最有趣的部分，进行一番说教，你的表情提醒我该继续了。父亲在后来的来信中并未责怪我，只是注意到我的沉默是因为我比以前更加投入到我的工作当中。冬天、春天、夏天就在我的工作中悄然离去。我没欣赏过鲜花盛开或是枝繁叶茂——曾令我极为喜悦的景色——我深深地沉浸在我的工作之中。那一年，我的工作尚未接近尾声，树叶就已经凋零了，现在我每天都有显著的进展。但是焦虑牵制了我的喜悦，我看上去更像是一个被奴隶制所诅咒的人，在矿井或是其他任何一个肮脏的行业里辛苦劳作，而并不像一个沉浸在自己喜爱的事业中的艺术家。每晚我都被低烧所折磨，我的紧张达到了一个特别痛苦的程度。一片叶子落下来都会吓到我，我躲避自己的同类，好像自己犯了罪一样。有时候，看到自己变得如此憔悴不堪，我更加紧张。唯一支撑我的就是我的目标的力量：我的辛苦努力即将结束，我相信锻炼和娱乐随即将驱散初期的疾病。我向自己保证，等完工之后我一定进行锻炼和放松。

CHAPTER 5

第五章

It was on a dreary night of November that I beheld the accomplishment of my toils. With an anxiety that almost amounted to agony, I collected the instruments of life around me, that I might infuse a spark of being into the lifeless thing that lay at my feet. It was already one in the morning; the rain pattered dismally against the panes, and my candle was nearly burnt out, when, by the glimmer of the half-extinguished light, I saw the dull yellow eye of the creature open; it breathed hard, and a convulsive motion agitated its limbs.

在十一月的一个阴沉之夜，我的辛苦工作终于获得了成功。怀着一种几乎等同于痛苦的焦虑，我把用来制造生命的一些仪器聚集在我周围，我将给躺在我脚下的毫无生气的躯体注入生命。那时已经是凌晨一点了，雨点沉闷地敲打着窗玻璃，我的蜡烛也即将燃尽。就在那时，借着快要熄灭的一缕烛光，我看到那具躯体睁开了浑浊昏黄的眼睛，它喘着粗气，四肢痉挛性地抽动着。

How can I describe my emotions at this catastrophe, or how delineate the wretch whom with such infinite pains and care I had endeavoured to form? His limbs were in proportion, and I had selected his features as beautiful. Beautiful! Great God! His yellow skin scarcely covered the work of muscles and arteries beneath; his hair was of a lustrous black, and flowing; his teeth of a pearly whiteness; but these luxuriances only formed a more horrid contrast with his watery eyes, that seemed almost of the same colour as the dun-white sockets in which they were set, his shrivelled complexion and straight black lips.

我如何能描述自己面对这场灾难时的感受，又如何能勾画我千辛万苦制造出来的这个可怜家伙？他的四肢符合比例，他的五官经过了我的精雕细琢。漂亮！万能的主啊！他黄色的皮肤刚好覆盖了肌肉组织和皮下血管；他的头发乌黑发亮，十分顺滑；他的牙齿珍珠般洁白；但这些漂亮的器官却与他的水泡眼、干瘪的脸庞和直直的黑唇构成了更加恐怖的对比，他的眼睛和四周的眼眶看起来差不多一样惨白。

The different accidents of life are not so changeable as the feelings of human nature. I had worked hard for nearly two years, for the sole purpose of infusing life into an inanimate body. For this I had deprived myself of rest and health. I had desired it with an ardour that far exceeded moderation; but now that I had finished, the beauty of the dream vanished, and breathless horror and disgust filled my heart. Unable to endure the aspect of the being I had created, I rushed out of the room and continued a long time traversing my bed-chamber, unable to compose my mind to sleep. At length lassitude succeeded to the tumult I had before endured, and I threw myself on the bed in my clothes, endeavouring to seek a few moments of forgetfulness. But it was in vain; I slept, indeed, but I was disturbed by the wildest dreams. I thought I saw Elizabeth, in the bloom of health, walking in the streets of Ingolstadt. Delighted and surprised, I embraced her, but as I imprinted the first kiss on her lips, they became livid with the hue of death; her features appeared to change, and I thought that I held the corpse of my dead mother in my arms; a shroud enveloped her form, and I saw the grave-worms crawling in the folds of the flannel. I started from my sleep with horror; a cold dew covered my forehead, my teeth chattered, and every limb became convulsed; when, by the dim and yellow light of the moon, as it forced its way through the window shutters, I beheld the wretch—the miserable monster whom I had created. He held up the curtain of the bed; and his eyes, if eyes they may be called, were fixed on me. His jaws opened, and he muttered some inarticulate sounds, while a grin wrinkled his cheeks. He might have spoken, but I did not hear; one hand was stretched out, seemingly to detain me, but I escaped and rushed downstairs. I took refuge in the courtyard belonging to the house which I inhabited, where I remained during the rest of the night, walking up and down in the greatest agitation, listening attentively, catching and fearing each sound as if it were to announce the approach of the demoniacal corpse to which I had so miserably given life.

生活中的反复无常远不及人性中情感的多变。我努力工作了将近两年，唯一的目的就是为毫无生气的躯体注入生命。为了这一目标，我废寝忘食，搭上了健康。我热切盼望实现梦想，几近癫狂，但是现在当我大功告成时，梦中的美景却消失了，我心中充满了令人窒息的恐惧和恶心。我无法忍受自己所制造出来的生物的模样，我冲出了工作间，在卧室里不停地走来走去，无法让自己心神平复，好安然入睡。最终疲惫超出了我一直以来忍受的极限，我连衣服都没脱就栽倒在床上，试图能有几分钟忘掉发生的一切。但这是徒劳的。我睡着了，确实，但是不断地被噩梦惊扰。我想我看见了青春洋溢的伊丽莎白，她正漫步在因戈尔施塔特的街头。我又惊又喜，拥她入怀，但是我的吻刚刚落在她的嘴唇上，她的嘴唇就立即变成了死人般的青紫色。她的五官看上去都变了，我觉得自己怀抱的是已故母亲的尸体。她被裹尸布包着，我看见尸虫在寿衣的褶痕里蠕动着。我从梦中惊醒，额头冒冷汗，牙齿打寒战，四肢抽搐着。此时，借着百叶窗里透出来的一道昏黄的月光，我看见了那个可怜的家伙——我所创造出来的可怕怪物。他掀起了床幔，他的眼睛（如果可以将其称为眼睛的话）正盯着我。他张开嘴巴，咕哝着一些含糊不清的声音，龇牙一笑，满脸皱纹。他或许说话了，但是我没听到。他伸出一只手，似乎想抓住我，但是我撒腿就跑，冲下楼去。我躲在了自己所住房子的院子里，在那里打发了那晚的剩余时光，我极其不安地在里面徘徊，竖起耳朵，害怕地捕捉着每个声音，好像任何声音都要告诉我那具我赋予生命的魔鬼般的尸体正在靠近。

Oh! No mortal could support the horror of that countenance. A mummy again endued with animation could not be so hideous as that wretch. I had gazed on him while unfinished; he was ugly then, but when those muscles and joints were rendered capable of motion, it became a thing such as even Dante could not have conceived.

噢！没有一个活人能忍受那恐怖的容貌。即便木乃伊复活了，也没有那个怪物骇人。尚未完工时，我曾凝视过他。那时他就丑陋，但是当那些肌肉和关节能够活动时，就变成了一个连但丁也想象不出来的丑陋东西了。

I passed the night wretchedly. Sometimes my pulse beat so quickly and hardly that I felt the palpitation of every artery; at others, I nearly sank to the ground through languor and extreme weakness. Mingled with this horror, I felt the bitterness of disappointment; dreams that had been my food and pleasant rest for so long a space were now become a hell to me; and the change was so rapid, the overthrow so complete!

我度过了恐怖的一晚。有时候，我的脉搏跳得太快、太猛，以致于我都能感觉到每根动脉的颤动，疲惫和极度的虚弱使我几乎瘫在了地上。伴随着这种恐惧，我感到了失望的痛苦。梦想一直是我的精神食粮，而且长久以来都是我的美好支持物，可如今变成了我的地狱。转变如此迅速，颠倒得如此彻底！

Morning, dismal and wet, at length dawned and discovered to my sleepless and aching eyes the church of Ingolstadt, its white steeple and clock, which indicated the sixth hour. The porter opened the gates of the court, which had that night been my asylum, and I issued into the streets, pacing them with quick steps, as if I sought to avoid the wretch whom I feared every turning of the street would present to my view. I did not dare return to the apartment which I inhabited, but felt impelled to hurry on, although drenched by the rain which poured from a black and comfortless sky.

天终于亮了，清晨的空气阴冷潮湿，我那因无眠而酸痛的双眼看到了因戈尔施塔特教堂，它白色尖顶上的钟指向了六点。看门人打开了院子——我昨晚的避难所——的大门，我来到了街上，快步行走，好像在努力避开那个怪物，我担心会在任何一条街道的拐角处撞见他。尽管此时阴沉的天空中乌云密布，瓢泼的大雨把我淋得浑身透湿，可我却不敢回到自己的寓所，觉得必须拼命赶路。

I continued walking in this manner for some time, endeavouring by bodily exercise to ease the load that weighed upon my mind. I traversed the streets without any clear conception of where I was or what I was doing. My heart palpitated in the sickness of fear, and I hurried on with irregular steps, not daring to look about me:

我就这样走了一段时间，努力通过消耗体力来缓解心中的压力。我在街上穿梭着，不知道自己身在何处，去向何方。我的心脏因恐惧而剧烈跳动，我跌跌撞撞地赶路，不敢环顾四周。

Like one who, on a lonely road,

在僻静的大街上，一个人

Doth walk in fear and dread,

焦虑而恐惧地走着，

And, having once turned round, walks on,

四下望去，继续前行，

And turns no more his head;

不再回头

Because he knows a frightful fiend

因为他知道有个可怕的恶魔

Doth close behind him tread.

紧随其后。

(Coleridge's "Ancient Mariner.")（柯勒律治的《古舟子咏》）

Continuing thus, I came at length opposite to the inn at which the various diligences and carriages usually stopped. Here I paused, I knew not why; but I remained some minutes with my eyes fixed on a coach that was coming towards me from the other end of the street. As it drew nearer I observed that it was the Swiss diligence; it stopped just where I was standing, and on the door being opened, I perceived Henry Clerval, who, on seeing me, instantly sprung out. "My dear Frankenstein," exclaimed he, "how glad I am to see you! How fortunate that you should be here at the very moment of my alighting!"

就这样，我最后来到了一家小旅馆对面，那里经常停着各种驿车和马车。不知道为什么，我在这里停了下来。我在原地站了几分钟，眼睛一直盯着一辆从街那头向我驶来的一辆马车。当它靠近时，我注意到这是辆瑞士的驿车。它就在我身旁停了下来，门刚一打开，我就看见了亨利·克莱瓦尔，一看见我，他立刻从马车上跳了下来。“我亲爱的弗兰克斯坦，”他大喊道，“见到你我太高兴了！我一下马车就正好看到了你，真是太幸运了！”

Nothing could equal my delight on seeing Clerval; his presence brought back to my thoughts my father, Elizabeth, and all those scenes of home so dear to my recollection. I grasped his hand, and in a moment forgot my horror and misfortune; I felt suddenly, and for the first time during many months, calm and serene joy. I welcomed my friend, therefore, in the most cordial manner, and we walked towards my college. Clerval continued talking for some time about our mutual friends and his own good fortune in being permitted to come to Ingolstadt. "You may easily believe," said he, "how great was the difficulty to persuade my father that all necessary knowledge was not comprised in the noble art of book-keeping; and, indeed, I believe I left him incredulous to the last, for his constant answer to my unwearied entreaties was the same as that of the Dutch schoolmaster in The Vicar of Wakefield:'I have ten thousand florins a year without Greek, I eat heartily without Greek.'But his affection for me at length overcame his dislike of learning, and he has permitted me to undertake a voyage of discovery to the land of knowledge."

见到克莱瓦尔我欣喜若狂。他的出现令我想起了我父亲、伊丽莎白和记忆中所珍藏的关于家乡的全部场景。我抓住他的手，那一刻我忘记了自己的恐惧和不幸。这么多月以来，我第一次突然感觉到了平和、宁静的欢乐。因此我用最热烈的方式欢迎了我的朋友，我们一起走向我的大学。克莱瓦尔讲了一阵子我们共同的朋友和他自己的好运气，他被允许来因戈尔施塔特了。“你自然知道，”他说，“要说服我父亲相信并非所有必备的知识都包含在记账——一门了不起的艺术——里面，那有多么困难。而且，实际上直到最后我也没能说服他，因为不管我怎么苦苦哀求，他都会像《维克菲牧师传》里的荷兰校长一样回答我：‘不懂希腊文，我每年照旧赚一万个弗罗林，照旧食欲很好。’但是他对我的爱到底是超过了他对学习的厌恶，他允许我在知识王国里开始求学之旅。”

"It gives me the greatest delight to see you; but tell me how you left my father, brothers, and Elizabeth."“见到你，我开心极了。但是请你告诉我，你离开时，我父亲、兄弟和伊丽莎白怎么样。”

"Very well, and very happy, only a little uneasy that they hear from you so seldom. By the by, I mean to lecture you a little upon their account myself. But, my dear Frankenstein," continued he, stopping short and gazing full in my face, "I did not before remark how very ill you appear; so thin and pale; you look as if you had been watching for several nights."“很好，很快乐，只是他们很少收到你的信，有点担心。而且，我真想替他们责怪你几句。可是，我亲爱的弗兰克斯坦，”他停了一下，仔细打量着我的脸，然后接着说，“我刚才没注意到你看上去这么瘦弱和苍白。你看起来好像几夜没合眼了。”

"You have guessed right; I have lately been so deeply engaged in one occupation that I have not allowed myself sufficient rest, as you see; but I hope, I sincerely hope, that all these employments are now at an end and that I am at length free."“你猜对了。我最近一直忙于一项工作，一直没让自己充分休息，就是你看到的样子了。但是我希望，衷心地希望，所有这些工作现在都可以结束，我终于自由了。”

I trembled excessively; I could not endure to think of, and far less to allude to, the occurrences of the preceding night. I walked with a quick pace, and we soon arrived at my college. I then reflected, and the thought made me shiver, that the creature whom I had left in my apartment might still be there, alive and walking about. I dreaded to behold this monster, but I feared still more that Henry should see him. Entreating him, therefore, to remain a few minutes at the bottom of the stairs, I darted up towards my own room. My hand was already on the lock of the door before I recollected myself. I then paused, and a cold shivering came over me. I threw the door forcibly open, as children are accustomed to do when they expect a spectre to stand in waiting for them on the other side; but nothing appeared. I stepped fearfully in: the apartment was empty, and my bedroom was also freed from its hideous guest. I could hardly believe that so great a good fortune could have befallen me, but when I became assured that my enemy had indeed fled, I clapped my hands for joy and ran down to Clerval.

我剧烈地颤抖着，无法忍受去回想，更不用说是提及昨晚发生的一切。我快步前进，我们很快就到了我的大学。那时我突然想到，我留在自己寓所里的怪物也许还活在那里，四处走动，这个想法令我不寒而栗。我害怕看到这个怪物，但是我更害怕亨利会看见他。因而，我恳请他在楼梯下等几分钟，我飞奔到我自己的房间。我喘息未定，手就已经按在了门锁上。那时，我停顿了一下，浑身打颤。我猛地一下把门打开，就像当小孩害怕鬼怪站在门后等着他们时所做的那样。但是什么也没出现。我恐惧地走进去：里面没人，我的卧室里也没有那个可怕的客人。我几乎不能相信如此巨大的好运会降临于我，但是当我开始确信我的敌人已经跑掉时，我高兴地拍着巴掌，跑下楼去接克莱瓦尔。

We ascended into my room, and the servant presently brought breakfast; but I was unable to contain myself. It was not joy only that possessed me; I felt my flesh tingle with excess of sensitiveness, and my pulse beat rapidly. I was unable to remain for a single instant in the same place; I jumped over the chairs, clapped my hands, and laughed aloud. Clerval at first attributed my unusual spirits to joy on his arrival, but when he observed me more attentively, he saw a wildness in my eyes for which he could not account, and my loud, unrestrained, heartless laughter frightened and astonished him.

我们上楼进了我的房间，随后侍者送来了早餐。但我不能控制自己的情绪。我心中不单单是喜悦，我感到肌肉因敏感过度而刺痛，我的脉搏跳得很快。我一刻都不能保持平静，跳到椅子上，拍手大笑。起初，克莱瓦尔把我的反常情绪归结为与他重逢的喜悦，但是当他更加认真地审视我时，他在我眼中看到了一丝他无法解释的疯狂，而且我那响亮、失控、冷酷的大笑令他害怕和惊讶。

"My dear Victor," cried he, "what, for God's sake, is the matter? Do not laugh in that manner. How ill you are! What is the cause of all this?"

"我亲爱的维克托，”他喊道，“看在上帝的份上，你怎么了？别那样笑了。你病得太严重了！为什么会这样啊？”

"Do not ask me," cried I, putting my hands before my eyes, for I thought I saw the dreaded spectre glide into the room; "HE can tell. Oh, save me! Save me!"I imagined that the monster seized me; I struggled furiously and fell down in a fit.“别问我，”我喊道，并用手捂住了眼睛，因为我觉得自己看见了那个可怕的怪物溜进了房间，“他能告诉你。噢，救救我！救救我！”我幻想着那个怪物抓住了我，我疯狂地挣扎，然后昏厥过去。

Poor Clerval! What must have been his feelings? A meeting, which he anticipated with such joy, so strangely turned to bitterness. But I was not the witness of his grief, for I was lifeless and did not recover my senses for a long, long time.

可怜的克莱瓦尔！他会有什么样的感受啊？他曾欣喜地期待着这次相逢，眼下却如此奇怪地变成了痛苦。但那时我没有目睹到他的悲伤，因为我昏迷了，好久才恢复知觉。

This was the commencement of a nervous fever which confined me for several months. During all that time Henry was my only nurse. I afterwards learned that, knowing my father's advanced age and unfitness for so long a journey, and how wretched my sickness would make Elizabeth, he spared them this grief by concealing the extent of my disorder. He knew that I could not have a more kind and attentive nurse than himself; and, firm in the hope he felt of my recovery, he did not doubt that, instead of doing harm, he performed the kindest action that he could towards them.

就这样我得上了神经性热病，在屋里躺了几个月。在那段时间里，只有亨利照顾我。后来我才知道，考虑到我父亲年事渐高，经不住长时间旅行，而且我的病也会让伊丽莎白痛苦不堪，他隐瞒了我的病情，使他们免于悲伤。他知道我不可能找到一个比他更温柔、体贴的护士，而且他坚信我能康复，所以他毫不怀疑他对我家人那样的做法是最善意的，而非恶意。

But I was in reality very ill, and surely nothing but the unbounded and unremitting attentions of my friend could have restored me to life. The form of the monster on whom I had bestowed existence was forever before my eyes, and I raved incessantly concerning him. Doubtless my words surprised Henry; he at first believed them to be the wanderings of my disturbed imagination, but the pertinacity with which I continually recurred to the same subject persuaded him that my disorder indeed owed its origin to some uncommon and terrible event.

但我的确病情严重，要不是我的朋友无微不至、坚持不懈的照顾，我根本不可能活过来。我自己制造出来的那个怪物的模样一直萦绕在眼前，而且说胡话时一直提到他。毋庸置疑，我的话令亨利很惊讶。起初他以为这些都是我的混乱幻觉，但我执拗地反复提到同一个话题使他相信我的反常其实是因为某个不同寻常的可怕事件。

By very slow degrees, and with frequent relapses that alarmed and grieved my friend, I recovered. I remember the first time I became capable of observing outward objects with any kind of pleasure, I perceived that the fallen leaves had disappeared and that the young buds were shooting forth from the trees that shaded my window. It was a divine spring, and the season contributed greatly to my convalescence. I felt also sentiments of joy and affection revive in my bosom; my gloom disappeared, and in a short time I became as cheerful as before I was attacked by the fatal passion.

我恢复得非常缓慢，经常性的反复令我的朋友担惊受怕。记得当我第一次能饶有兴致地观察外面的景色时，我看见枯叶已经消失，窗前遮阴的树上也已经冒出了新芽。春意盎然，这个季节非常有利于我的康复。我感到心头又泛起了喜悦之情，阴郁的心情一扫而光，很快我就变得像未被那致命激情所击中之前那样快乐了。

"Dearest Clerval," exclaimed I, "how kind, how very good you are to me. This whole winter, instead of being spent in study, as you promised yourself, has been consumed in my sick room. How shall I ever repay you? I feel the greatest remorse for the disappointment of which I have been the occasion, but you will forgive me."“最亲爱的克莱瓦尔，”我大声说，“你对我是多么温柔，多么好啊。你把整个冬天都用来陪伴病中的我，而你原本是打算用这段时间来学习的。我怎么才能报答你啊？沦落到令人失望的地步，我追悔莫及，但是你会原谅我的。”

"You will repay me entirely if you do not discompose yourself, but get well as fast as you can; and since you appear in such good spirits, I may speak to you on one subject, may I not?"“只要你不自寻烦恼，尽可能快地康复，就是对我最大的回报了。既然你看上去情绪不错，我想和你说件事，行吗？”

I trembled. One subject! What could it be? Could he allude to an object on whom I dared not even think? "Compose yourself," said Clerval, who observed my change of colour, "I will not mention it if it agitates you; but your father and cousin would be very happy if they received a letter from you in your own handwriting. They hardly know how ill you have been and are uneasy at your long silence."

我浑身一颤。一件事！能是什么事？他会不会是暗指一个我甚至都不敢去想的东西？“你镇静点，”克莱瓦尔说，他注意到了我脸色的变化，“如果它令你不快的话，我就不提了。但是你父亲和堂妹如果能收到你的一封亲笔信的话，他们会非常高兴的。他们几乎不知道你一直病得多么严重，你的杳无音信会令他们不安的。”

"Is that all, my dear Henry? How could you suppose that my first thought would not fly towards those dear, dear friends whom I love and who are so deserving of my love?"“就这些吗，我亲爱的亨利？你怎么能觉得我不会首先想到那些我所爱的、值得我爱的亲人和朋友们呢？”

"If this is your present temper, my friend, you will perhaps be glad to see a letter that has been lying here some days for you; it is from your cousin, I believe."“如果这是你现在的想法，我的朋友，那么当你看到这封放在这里好几天的信，你也许会非常高兴的。我想那是你堂妹写给你的。”

CHAPTER 6

第六章

Clerval then put the following letter into my hands. It was from my own Elizabeth:

随后克莱瓦尔把下面这封信放在了我手中。的确是我的伊丽莎白写来的。

"My dearest Cousin,“我最亲爱的堂兄：

"You have been ill, very ill, and even the constant letters of dear kind Henry are not sufficient to reassure me on your account. You are forbidden to write—to hold a pen; yet one word from you, dear Victor, is necessary to calm our apprehensions. For a long time I have thought that each post would bring this line, and my persuasions have restrained my uncle from undertaking a journey to Ingolstadt. I have prevented his encountering the inconveniences and perhaps dangers of so long a journey, yet how often have I regretted not being able to perform it myself! I figure to myself that the task of attending on your sickbed has devolved on some mercenary old nurse, who could never guess your wishes nor minister to them with the care and affection of your poor cousin. Yet that is over now:Clerval writes that indeed you are getting better. I eagerly hope that you will confirm this intelligence soon in your own handwriting.“你病了，病得不轻，即便是好心的亨利的不断来信也不足以让我对你的病情放下心来。你不能写信——甚至不能握笔。然而亲爱的维克托，哪怕你给我们写一个字，也能安慰我们焦虑的心情。长久以来，我一直认为会有一封邮件带来你的只言片语，所以我说服了叔叔，没让他前往因戈尔施塔特。我不愿让他经历长途跋涉的种种不便和可能的危险，而我自己却经常懊悔不能亲自去看望你！我自己想象着在你病床旁服侍的人可能是个雇来的老护士吧，她不可能猜到你的心思，也不可能像你可怜的堂妹那样悉心满足你的愿望。然而如今一切都结束了：克莱瓦尔来信说实际上你正在康复。我热切盼望你能尽快亲笔写信证实这个消息。

"Get well—and return to us. You will find a happy, cheerful home and friends who love you dearly. Your father's health is vigorous, and he asks but to see you, but to be assured that you are well; and not a care will ever cloud his benevolent countenance. How pleased you would be to remark the improvement of our Ernest! He is now sixteen and full of activity and spirit. He is desirous to be a true Swiss and to enter into foreign service, but we cannot part with him, at least until his elder brother returns to us. My uncle is not pleased with the idea of a military career in a distant country, but Ernest never had your powers of application. He looks upon study as an odious fetter; his time is spent in the open air, climbing the hills or rowing on the lake. I fear that he will become an idler unless we yield the point and permit him to enter on the profession which he has selected.“快点好起来，回到我们身边。你将拥有一个幸福、快乐的家庭和爱你的朋友们。你父亲精神矍铄，他只是想见见你，只是想确认你身体健康。那样他慈祥的脸庞将不再因惦念而满是愁容了。要是你能看到我们欧内斯特的进步，一定会非常高兴的！他现在十六岁了，活力四射，精力充沛。他渴望成为一个真正的瑞士人，去国外服兵役，但是我们舍不得他走，至少得等他的哥哥回到我们身边。我叔叔不赞成他去遥远的国家服兵役的想法，可欧内斯特从未像你那样用功读书。他视学习为讨厌的枷锁，他把时间都花在户外活动，爬山或是泛舟湖上。我担心除非我们屈服于他的想法，允许他从事他选择的职业，否则他将变成一个游手好闲之人。

"Little alteration, except the growth of our dear children, has taken place since you left us. The blue lake and snow-clad mountains—they never change; and I think our placid home and our contented hearts are regulated by the same immutable laws. My trifling occupations take up my time and amuse me, and I am rewarded for any exertions by seeing none but happy, kind faces around me. Since you left us, but one change has taken place in our little household. Do you remember on what occasion Justine Moritz entered our family? Probably you do not; I will relate her history, therefore in a few words. Madame Moritz, her mother, was a widow with four children, of whom Justine was the third. This girl had always been the favourite of her father, but through a strange perversity, her mother could not endure her, and after the death of M. Moritz, treated her very ill. My aunt observed this, and when Justine was twelve years of age, prevailed on her mother to allow her to live at our house. The republican institutions of our country have produced simpler and happier manners than those which prevail in the great monarchies that surround it. Hence there is less distinction between the several classes of its inhabitants; and the lower orders, being neither so poor nor so despised, their manners are more refined and moral. A servant in Geneva does not mean the same thing as a servant in France and England. Justine, thus received in our family, learned the duties of a servant, a condition which, in our fortunate country, does not include the idea of ignorance and a sacrifice of the dignity of a human being.“你离家之后，除了我们亲爱的弟弟们逐渐长大外，几乎没什么变化。碧蓝的湖水和白雪皑皑的山脉依然如故。我觉得我们宁静的家园和我们知足的心都顺应着同样亘古不变的自然法则。我的时间都花在一些零碎的家务活上，自得其乐，只要看到周围那一张张快乐、友善的面孔，我就觉得任何辛苦都是值得的。自从你离开我们，我们的小家只有一个变化。你还记得贾斯廷·莫里兹是怎么到我们家里来的吗？或许你不记得了，那么我得简单讲讲她的身世。她的母亲莫里兹夫人是个带着四个孩子的寡妇，贾斯廷是老三。这个女孩曾一直是他父亲最喜爱的孩子，但因为她异常任性，她母亲不能容忍她，她父亲死后，她母亲就虐待她。我婶婶知道这件事后，在贾斯廷十二岁的时候，说服了她母亲让贾斯廷住到我们家。我们国家的共和体制令我们比周边那些君主制盛行的国家的人民生活得更为简单、幸福。我国居民之间的等级区别微乎其微，因而等级较低的人民既不太贫困也不太被歧视，他们的举止也更优雅庄重。日内瓦的佣人和法国、英国的佣人可不是一回事。就这样，贾斯廷被我们家收留了，并学会了佣人的工作。在我们这个幸运的国家，当佣人并非意味着被忽视或牺牲做人的尊严。

"Justine, you may remember, was a great favourite of yours; and I recollect you once remarked that if you were in an ill humour, one glance from Justine could dissipate it, for the same reason that Ariosto gives concerning the beauty of Angelica—she looked so frank-hearted and happy. My aunt conceived a great attachment for her, by which she was induced to give her an education superior to that which she had at first intended. This benefit was fully repaid; Justine was the most grateful little creature in the world: I do not mean that she made any professions I never heard one pass her lips, but you could see by her eyes that she almost adored her protectress. Although her disposition was gay and in many respects inconsiderate, yet she paid the greatest attention to every gesture of my aunt. She thought her the model of all excellence and endeavoured to imitate her phraseology and manners, so that even now she often reminds me of her.“你或许记得贾斯廷曾是你最喜欢的人之一。我记得你曾说过当你心情低落时，贾斯廷的一瞥能消除你的烦恼，阿里奥斯托也是出于这般原因而赞叹安吉里卡的美貌的——她看上去纯真、快乐。我婶婶特别喜欢她，因此决定给予她一个比她最初所期望的还要好的教育。这份恩情得到了充分的回报。贾斯廷是世上最懂得感恩的小家伙了：我不是指她口头上千恩万谢，但是你从她的眼睛中可以看到她对自己的保护人几乎是顶礼膜拜。尽管她生性活泼，在很多方面考虑不周，然而她对婶婶的一举一动却极为关注。她视婶婶为完美的典范，竭力模仿其言谈举止，以至于现在她经常令我想起婶婶。

"When my dearest aunt died every one was too much occupied in their own grief to notice poor Justine, who had attended her during her illness with the most anxious affection. Poor Justine was very ill; but other trials were reserved for her.“当我最亲爱的婶婶去世时，每个人都沉浸在各自的悲伤中，没人留意可怜的贾斯廷，她在婶婶生病期间一直最悉心地照顾她。可怜的贾斯廷那时病得很厉害，但是还有其他的麻烦在等着她。

"One by one, her brothers and sister died; and her mother, with the exception of her neglected daughter, was left childless. The conscience of the woman was troubled; she began to think that the deaths of her favourites was a judgement from heaven to chastise her partiality. She was a Roman Catholic; and I believe her confessor confirmed the idea which she had conceived. Accordingly, a few months after your departure for Ingolstadt, Justine was called home by her repentant mother. Poor girl! She wept when she quitted our house; she was much altered since the death of my aunt; grief had given softness and a winning mildness to her manners, which had before been remarkable for vivacity. Nor was her residence at her mother's house of a nature to restore her gaiety. The poor woman was very vacillating in her repentance. She sometimes begged Justine to forgive her unkindness, but much oftener accused her of having caused the deaths of her brothers and sister. Perpetual fretting at length threw Madame Moritz into a decline, which at first increased her irritability, but she is now at peace for ever. She died on the first approach of cold weather, at the beginning of this last winter. Justine has just returned to us; and I assure you I love her tenderly. She is very clever and gentle, and extremely pretty; as I mentioned before, her mien and her expression continually remind me of my dear aunt.“她的兄弟姐妹相继死去，除了贾斯廷这个备受冷落的女儿，她的母亲就再无子女了。这个女人的良心受到了折磨。她开始觉得自己最喜爱的子女的死亡是上天对自己偏心的一种惩罚。她是个罗马天主教徒。我相信她的忏悔牧师确认了她曾有的那个想法。因而，在你离家前往因戈尔施塔特的几个月之后，贾斯廷就被她懊悔的母亲带回家去了。可怜的女孩！她哭哭啼啼地离开了我们的家。自从我婶婶去世以后，她变了很多，悲伤使她平和了些，也使她的举止温柔很多，而她以前是那么活泼。她与她母亲住在一起，也没能恢复她活跃的天性。那个可怜的女人因懊悔而反复无常。她时而恳求贾斯廷原谅她的不善之举，但更多时候她却责怪贾斯廷导致了她兄弟姐妹的死亡。长期的烦躁不安最终使莫里兹夫人的身体陷入衰弱，起初这导致了她更加易怒，但如今她永远安静了。她死于去年初冬首个寒潮来袭之时。贾斯廷刚刚回到了我们身边。我向你保证我会精心呵护她。她非常聪明、温柔，美丽动人。正如我刚才所提到的，她的神态和表情总是令我回想起我亲爱的婶婶。

"I must say also a few words to you, my dear cousin, of little darling William. I wish you could see him; he is very tall of his age, with sweet laughing blue eyes, dark eyelashes, and curling hair. When he smiles, two little dimples appear on each cheek, which are rosy with health. He has already had one or two little WIVES, but Louisa Biron is his favourite, a pretty little girl of five years of age.“我亲爱的堂兄，我还必须得和你说点关于宝贝威廉的事。我真希望你能看到他。他比同龄孩子个子高，他有带着甜蜜笑意的蓝眼睛、深色的睫毛和卷曲的头发。当他微笑时，健康红润的脸颊两侧就各露出一个小酒窝。他已经有一两个小‘妻子’了，但是他最喜爱路易莎·拜伦，一个五岁的漂亮小姑娘。

"Now, dear Victor, I dare say you wish to be indulged in a little gossip concerning the good people of Geneva. The pretty Miss Mansfield has already received the congratulatory visits on her approaching marriage with a young Englishman, John Melbourne, Esq. Her ugly sister, Manon, married M. Duvillard, the rich banker, last autumn. Your favourite schoolfellow, Louis Manoir, has suffered several misfortunes since the departure of Clerval from Geneva. But he has already recovered his spirits, and is reported to be on the point of marrying a lively pretty Frenchwoman, Madame Tavernier. She is a widow, and much older than Manoir; but she is very much admired, and a favourite with everybody.“亲爱的维克托，我敢说你现在很想知道一些关于日内瓦名流们的小道消息吧。美丽的曼斯菲尔德小姐就要嫁给年轻的英国绅士约翰·墨尔本了，她已经招待了前来道贺的亲朋好友。她那个其貌不扬的妹妹玛农，在去年秋天嫁给了富有的银行家杜维尔拉德先生了。你最喜欢的同学路易斯·马诺瓦自从克莱瓦尔离开日内瓦以后，就连遭不幸。不过他已经精神恢复了，据说他马上就要迎娶一位活泼、美丽的法国女人——塔弗尔涅尔夫人。她是个寡妇，比马诺瓦尔年长许多。但她倍受尊重，人见人爱。

"I have written myself into better spirits, dear cousin; but my anxiety returns upon me as I conclude. Write, dearest Victor,—one line—one word will be a blessing to us. Ten thousand thanks to Henry for his kindness, his affection, and his many letters; we are sincerely grateful. Adieu! my cousin; take care of your self; and, I entreat you, write!“亲爱的堂兄，我本来是写着写着，心情好多了，可是当快要收笔时，我又感到了焦虑。写点吧，最亲爱的维克托——一行字——哪怕就一个字对我们来说也是福音啊。万分感谢亨利的善举、关爱和多次来信，我们由衷地感激他。再见！我的堂兄，照顾好自己啊。我恳请你，写信啊！

"Elizabeth Lavenza.“伊丽莎白·拉温瑟

"Geneva, March 18, 17—.”“3月18日写于日内瓦”

"Dear, dear Elizabeth!"I exclaimed, when I had read her letter:"I will write instantly and relieve them from the anxiety they must feel."I wrote, and this exertion greatly fatigued me; but my convalescence had commenced, and proceeded regularly. In another fortnight I was able to leave my chamber.“亲爱的，亲爱的伊丽莎白！”看完她的信，我大叫着，“我马上就给他们写信，不再让他们焦虑万分。”我写了信，这把我累坏了。不过我的身体已经开始康复了，一步步好转起来。又过了两个周，我能离开病榻了。

One of my first duties on my recovery was to introduce Clerval to the several professors of the university. In doing this, I underwent a kind of rough usage, ill befitting the wounds that my mind had sustained. Ever since the fatal night, the end of my labours, and the beginning of my misfortunes, I had conceived a violent antipathy even to the name of natural philosophy. When I was otherwise quite restored to health, the sight of a chemical instrument would renew all the agony of my nervous symptoms. Henry saw this, and had removed all my apparatus from my view. He had also changed my apartment; for he perceived that I had acquired a dislike for the room which had previously been my laboratory. But these cares of Clerval were made of no avail when I visited the professors. M. Waldman inflicted torture when he praised, with kindness and warmth, the astonishing progress I had made in the sciences. He soon perceived that I disliked the subject; but not guessing the real cause, he attributed my feelings to modesty, and changed the subject from my improvement, to the science itself, with a desire, as I evidently saw, of drawing me out. What could I do? He meant to please, and he tormented me. I felt as if he had placed carefully, one by one, in my view those instruments which were to be afterwards used in putting me to a slow and cruel death. I writhed under his words, yet dared not exhibit the pain I felt. Clerval, whose eyes and feelings were always quick in discerning the sensations of others, declined the subject, alleging, in excuse, his total ignorance; and the conversation took a more general turn. I thanked my friend from my heart, but I did not speak. I saw plainly that he was surprised, but he never attempted to draw my secret from me; and although I loved him with a mixture of affection and reverence that knew no bounds, yet I could never persuade myself to confide in him that event which was so often present to my recollection, but which I feared the detail to another would only impress more deeply.

我康复后的首要任务就是把克莱瓦尔引荐给大学的几位教授。在做此事时，我心里不太舒服，一直以来的心灵创伤隐隐作痛。自从我工作结束的那个致命的夜晚，我的厄运就开始了，甚至一听到“自然科学”的字眼，我便感到一种强烈的反感。我终于基本康复了，但一看到化学仪器，我就会显得精神紧张、痛苦不堪。亨利看到了这一点，他把我所有的仪器都搬到了我的视野之外。他还给我换了间公寓，因为他发现我非常讨厌那个曾被我当做实验室的房间。但是当我拜访教授们时，克莱瓦尔曾经的精心呵护全都失去了作用。沃德尔曼教授热情洋溢地表扬我在科学领域所取得的惊人进步，这对我来说就是一种折磨。他很快就察觉到我不喜欢这个话题。但他并未猜到真正的原因，而是将其归结于我的谦虚。随后他把话题从我的进展上转移到了科学本身，我清楚地知道，他是想让我抒发真实情感。我能做什么？他本想取悦我，却是在折磨我。我感觉他仿佛是在把那些置我于缓慢、残忍的死亡之中的仪器一件件仔细地摆放在我眼前。他的话令我如坐针毡，但我又不敢表现出自己的痛苦。克莱瓦尔总是能敏锐地察觉到别人的情感，他以自己完全听不懂为借口，谢绝了这个话题，于是对话转向了一个更为普通的方向。我由衷地感激我的朋友，但我没说出来。我明显看出了他的吃惊，但他从未试图打探我的秘密。尽管我对他怀有无限的敬爱之情，然而我永远不能说服自己向他和盘托出那件经常出现在我记忆中的事情，我担心向别人的详细讲述只会进一步加深我的记忆。

M. Krempe was not equally docile; and in my condition at that time, of almost insupportable sensitiveness, his harsh blunt encomiums gave me even more pain than the benevolent approbation of M. Waldman. "D—n the fellow!" cried he; "why, M. Clerval, I assure you he has outstript us all. Ay, stare if you please; but it is nevertheless true. A youngster who, but a few years ago, believed in Cornelius Agrippa as firmly as in the gospel, has now set himself at the head of the university; and if he is not soon pulled down, we shall all be out of countenance.—Ay, ay," continued he, observing my face expressive of suffering, "M. Frankenstein is modest; an excellent quality in a young man. Young men should be diffident of themselves, you know, M. Clerval: I was myself when young; but that wears out in a very short time.”

克兰帕先生可不是那么好对付，我那时正处于极度的敏感状态，较之沃德尔曼先生的慷慨赞美，他那粗俗、直白的言辞甚至更令我痛苦。“该死的小伙子！”他大叫着，“哎呀，克莱瓦尔先生，我向你保证他已经超过我们所有的人了。哈，尽管瞪大你的眼睛吧，不管怎样这都是真的。就是几年前，这个年轻人还笃信科纳柳斯·阿格里帕，视其为先知，可如今他俨然已是大学里的风云人物了。如果他很快被累倒的话，我们将无地自容了。哈哈。”看到我的痛苦表情，他接着说道，“弗兰克斯坦先生谦虚，这是年轻人身上的一个美德。你也知道，克莱瓦尔先生，年轻人应该与众不同：我年轻时就个性鲜明，但这很快就消失了。”

M. Krempe had now commenced an eulogy on himself, which happily turned the conversation from a subject that was so annoying to me.

克兰帕先生开始吹嘘自己，这正好使谈话偏离了那个令我厌烦的话题。

Clerval had never sympathized in my tastes for natural science; and his literary pursuits differed wholly from those which had occupied me. He came to the university with the design of making himself complete master of the oriental languages, and thus he should open a field for the plan of life he had marked out for himself. Resolved to pursue no inglorious career, he turned his eyes toward the East, as affording scope for his spirit of enterprise. The Persian, Arabic, and Sanskrit languages engaged his attention, and I was easily induced to enter on the same studies. Idleness had ever been irksome to me, and now that I wished to fly from reflection, and hated my former studies, I felt great relief in being the fellow-pupil with my friend, and found not only instruction but consolation in the works of the orientalists. I did not, like him, attempt a critical knowledge of their dialects, for I did not contemplate making any other use of them than temporary amusement. I read merely to understand their meaning, and they well repaid my labours. Their melancholy is soothing, and their joy elevating, to a degree I never experienced in studying the authors of any other country. When you read their writings, life appears to consist in a warm sun and a garden of roses,—in the smiles and frowns of a fair enemy, and the fire that consumes your own heart. How different from the manly and heroical poetry of Greece and Rome!

克莱瓦尔从未理解过我对自然科学的兴趣。他对文学的追求与我所热衷的追求截然不同。他上大学是为了成为研究东方语言的真正专家，因而他应该为自己所规划的人生计划打开一片天地。他决心投身于一项伟大事业，将目光转向了东方，在那里他可以大展宏图。波斯语、阿拉伯语和梵语将他深深吸引住了，我也轻而易举地被引入了同样的学习当中。我素来讨厌无所事事，如今我希望远离回忆，而且我憎恨先前的研究，和我的朋友成为同窗让我倍感轻松，在东方学者的著作中我不但得到了指导还得到了慰藉。与他不同的是，我并非想要获得关于那些方言的最重要知识，因为我并没打算使用它们，只是作为暂时的消遣而已。我阅读那些著作仅仅是为了理解它们的含义，也的确是劳有所得。书中的伤感可以抚慰心灵，书中的快乐可以鼓舞人心，在研究其他任何一个国家的作者时，我从未有过这样强烈的体会。当你阅读他们的作品时，你就像沐浴着温暖的阳光，生活在玫瑰花园里——沉浸在一个势均力敌的对手的一颦一笑之中，一团火焰占据了你自己的心灵。这与希腊和罗马的充满阳刚之气和英雄气概的诗歌是多么不同啊！

Summer passed away in these occupations, and my return to Geneva was fixed for the latter end of autumn; but being delayed by several accidents, winter and snow arrived, the roads were deemed impassable, and my journey was retarded until the ensuing spring. I felt this delay very bitterly; for I longed to see my native town and my beloved friends. My return had only been delayed so long, from an unwillingness to leave Clerval in a strange place, before he had become acquainted with any of its inhabitants. The winter, however, was spent cheerfully; and although the spring was uncommonly late, when it came its beauty compensated for its dilatoriness.

在埋头读书中，夏天就被打发掉了，我原定秋末返回日内瓦，但是被几件意外的事情给耽搁了，冬季来临，雪花飘飘，道路已经不能通行了，我的行程被推迟到了来年春天。归期延迟令我倍感痛苦，因为我非常渴望见到故乡和我深爱的朋友们。我的归期之所以被推迟这么久，是因为在克莱瓦尔没熟悉当地居民之前，我不愿把他独自留在一个陌生的地方。不过我还是愉快地度过了冬天，虽然春天比以往来得晚些，但它的美丽景致弥补了它的姗姗来迟。

The month of May had already commenced, and I expected the letter daily which was to fix the date of my departure, when Henry proposed a pedestrian tour in the environs of Ingolstadt, that I might bid a personal farewell to the country I had so long inhabited. I acceded with pleasure to this proposition: I was fond of exercise, and Clerval had always been my favourite companion in the ramble of this nature that I had taken among the scenes of my native country.

已经进入五月份了，我每天都在期待着可以确定我行程的家信，这时克莱瓦尔建议我们绕着因戈尔施塔特的周边地区来一次徒步旅行，也算是我对这个居住良久的国家做个私人道别吧。我欣然接受了这个提议：我喜爱运动，而且过去我在家乡游山玩水时，克莱瓦尔也一直是我最喜欢的伙伴。

We passed a fortnight in these perambulations: my health and spirits had long been restored, and they gained additional strength from the salubrious air I breathed, the natural incidents of our progress, and the conversation of my friend. Study had before secluded me from the intercourse of my fellow-creatures, and rendered me unsocial; but Clerval called forth the better feelings of my heart; he again taught me to love the aspect of nature, and the cheerful faces of children. Excellent friend! How sincerely you did love me, and endeavour to elevate my mind until it was on a level with your own. A selfish pursuit had cramped and narrowed me, until your gentleness and affection warmed and opened my senses; I became the same happy creature who, a few years ago, loved and beloved by all, had no sorrow or care. When happy, inanimate nature had the power of bestowing on me the most delightful sensations. A serene sky and verdant fields filled me with ecstasy. The present season was indeed divine; the flowers of spring bloomed in the hedges, while those of summer were already in bud. I was undisturbed by thoughts which during the preceding year had pressed upon me, notwithstanding my endeavours to throw them off, with an invincible burden.

这次旅行花了我们两周的时间：我的身体和精神早已恢复了正常状态，户外的新鲜空气、沿途的自然风光、我们的畅所欲言，这些都使我更加充满力量。学习曾一度使我远离和同龄人的交流，使我变得不合群。但是克莱瓦尔唤起了我心中更加美好的情感，他再次教会我热爱大自然的景致、喜爱孩子们的笑脸。挚友啊！你真诚地热爱着我，竭尽全力把我的思想提升到你自己的高度。一个自私的追求曾令我心胸狭隘，直到你的温柔和关爱温暖并打开了我的心扉，我重新变成了几年前那个快乐的家伙，那时我充满爱心，得到大家的喜爱，过得无忧无虑。在我快乐的时候，无生命的物质也能够给我带来最愉悦的感受。平静的天空和广袤的田野让我如痴如醉。这个季节真是生机盎然、春花烂漫，而夏花也已含苞待放。去年一直压迫着我的那些想法没再干扰过我，那时我虽努力去甩掉它们，但那是个不可战胜的负担。

Henry rejoiced in my gaiety, and sincerely sympathised in my feelings: he exerted himself to amuse me, while he expressed the sensations that filled his soul. The resources of his mind on this occasion were truly astonishing: his conversation was full of imagination; and very often, in imitation of the Persian and Arabic writers, he invented tales of wonderful fancy and passion. At other times he repeated my favourite poems, or drew me out into arguments, which he supported with great ingenuity. We returned to our college on a Sunday afternoon: the peasants were dancing, and every one we met appeared gay and happy. My own spirits were high, and I bounded along with feelings of unbridled joy and hilarity.

亨利因我的快乐而欣喜，他真心地分享着我的感受：当他抒发个人情怀时，他竭尽全力地取悦我。他在这方面的聪明才智着实令人惊讶：他的谈话天马行空，他还经常模仿波斯和阿拉伯的作家们，他能编出满是奇思妙想和炙热情感的故事。其他的时候，他背诵我喜爱的一些诗歌，或是引导我与他展开辩论，他的观点独到、精辟。一个周日的下午我们回到了学校：农民们在跳舞，我们所遇见的每个人看上去都兴高采烈。我自己也情绪高涨，走路一蹦一跳，心中充满无限的欢喜之情。

CHAPTER 7

第七章

On my return, I found the following letter from my father:—

我一回来，就看到了下面这封来自我父亲的信——

"My dear Victor,“我亲爱的维克托：

"You have probably waited impatiently for a letter to fix the date of your return to us; and I was at first tempted to write only a few lines, merely mentioning the day on which I should expect you. But that would be a cruel kindness, and I dare not do it. What would be your surprise, my son, when you expected a happy and glad welcome, to behold, on the contrary, tears and wretchedness? And how, Victor, can I relate our misfortune? Absence cannot have rendered you callous to our joys and griefs; and how shall I inflict pain on my long absent son? I wish to prepare you for the woeful news, but I know it is impossible; even now your eye skims over the page to seek the words which are to convey to you the horrible tidings.“你恐怕对这封确定你回家日期的信已经等得不耐烦了吧。刚开始，我只是想写几行字，单单告诉你我所希望你归来的日子。但那会是一个残忍的善意，我不敢那么做。我的儿子，当你盼望家人兴高采烈地欢迎你的归来时，如果看到了痛苦和悲惨的场景，你怎能不惊讶？维克托啊，我该怎么讲述我们的不幸遭遇啊？你虽离家在外，但也不可能对我们的欢乐和悲伤无动于衷。我怎么能让一个常年在外的儿子遭受痛苦呢？我希望你对这个噩耗有思想准备，但我知道这是不可能的。就在此刻，你肯定在字里行间搜寻着传达噩耗的字眼。

"William is dead!—that sweet child, whose smiles delighted and warmed my heart, who was so gentle, yet so gay! Victor, he is murdered!“威廉死了！——那个可爱的孩子，他的微笑给我的心灵带来了欢乐和温暖，他那么温柔、那么快乐！维克托，他是被谋杀的！

"I will not attempt to console you; but will simply relate the circumstances of the transaction.“我不是试图安慰你，而是想简单说说事情的经过。

"Last Thursday (May 7th), I, my niece, and your two brothers, went to walk in Plainpalais. The evening was warm and serene, and we prolonged our walk farther than usual. It was already dusk before we thought of returning; and then we discovered that William and Ernest, who had gone on before, were not to be found. We accordingly rested on a seat until they should return. Presently Ernest came, and enquired if we had seen his brother; he said, that he had been playing with him, that William had run away to hide himself, and that he vainly sought for him, and afterwards waited for a long time, but that he did not return.“上周四（5月7日），我、我的侄女和你的两个弟弟，去普兰帕里斯散步。那晚温暖而宁静，我们就比平日多走了一会儿。直到黄昏我们才想起来该回去了。那时我们发现威廉和欧内斯特已经不知道跑去哪里了。于是我们就坐在椅子上休息，等他们回来。不久欧内斯特就回来了，他问我们是否看见他弟弟威廉了。他说自己一直在和他玩耍，威廉跑到一旁故意躲起来，他没找到威廉，然后就在那等了很久，但是威廉并没回来。

"This account rather alarmed us, and we continued to search for him until night fell, when Elizabeth conjectured that he might have returned to the house. He was not there. We returned again, with torches; for I could not rest, when I thought that my sweet boy had lost himself, and was exposed to all the damps and dews of night; Elizabeth also suffered extreme anguish. About five in the morning I discovered my lovely boy, whom the night before I had seen blooming and active in health, stretched on the grass livid and motionless; the print of the murder's finger was on his neck.“这个陈述令我们惊慌失措，我们接着寻找威廉，直至夜幕降临，这时伊丽莎白猜想他或许已经回家了。他并不在家。我们举着火把又回到了那里。一想到我那可爱的孩子可能迷了路、正饱受夜晚的湿气和寒冷，我就无法平静下来。伊丽莎白也心急如焚。大约凌晨五点，我发现了我那可爱的孩子，他前一个晚上还活蹦乱跳、健康红润，如今却浑身青紫，一动不动地躺在草地上。他的脖子上还有被凶手掐过的痕迹。

"He was conveyed home, and the anguish that was visible in my countenance betrayed the secret to Elizabeth. She was very earnest to see the corpse. At first I attempted to prevent her but she persisted, and entering the room where it lay, hastily examined the neck of the victim, and clasping her hands exclaimed, 'O God! I have murdered my darling child!'“他被抬回了家，我脸上显而易见的痛苦表情没能瞒过伊丽莎白。她执意要去看看尸体。起初我试图拦住她，但她一再坚持，走进了停放尸体的房间，匆匆查看了威廉的脖子之后，她紧扣双手，大声喊道：‘噢，天啊！我害死了我亲爱的弟弟啊!'

"She fainted, and was restored with extreme difficulty. When she again lived, it was only to weep and sigh. She told me, that that same evening William had teased her to let him wear a very valuable miniature that she possessed of your mother. This picture is gone, and was doubtless the temptation which urged the murderer to the deed. We have no trace of him at present, although our exertions to discover him are unremitted; but they will not restore my beloved William!“她昏了过去，好不容易才恢复了知觉。当她恢复知觉后，她只是哭泣和叹息。她告诉我就在昨天傍晚，威廉缠着她要戴那条一直由她保管的、嵌有你母亲的微型肖像的贵重项链。这张肖像现在已经没了，毫无疑问，凶手是见到项链，起了歹意。尽管我们竭力搜寻凶手，但目前毫无线索。但不管怎样努力，我心爱的威廉也回不来了！

"Come, dearest Victor; you alone can console Elizabeth. She weeps continually, and accuses herself unjustly as the cause of his death; her words pierce my heart. We are all unhappy; but will not that be an additional motive for you, my son, to return and be our comforter? Your dear mother! Alas, Victor! I now say, Thank God she did not live to witness the cruel, miserable death of her youngest darling!“回来吧，最亲爱的维克托，只有你能安慰伊丽莎白。她一直在哭，而且不公平地把威廉的死归咎于自己。她的话刺痛了我的心。我们都很痛苦。我的儿子，这难道不又是一个你回来安慰我们的理由吗？你亲爱的母亲！唉，维克托！我现在要说，感谢上帝，没让她活着时目睹她最爱的小儿子惨遭毒手。

"Come, Victor; not brooding thoughts of vengeance against the assassin, but with feelings of peace and gentleness, that will heal, instead of festering, the wounds of our minds. Enter the house of mourning, my friend, but with kindness and affection for those who love you, and not with hatred for your enemies.“来吧，维克托，别去酝酿向凶手复仇了，用你的镇定和温柔的情感来抚慰、而不是加重我们心灵的创伤。我的孩子，带着对那些疼爱你的人的友善与关爱，抛开对你仇人的憎恨，回到弥漫着悲伤的家中吧。

"Your affectionate and afflicted father,“你慈爱又痛苦的父亲，

"Alphonse Frankenstein.“阿方斯·弗兰克斯坦。

"Geneva, May 12th, 17—.”“5月12日写于日内瓦。”

Clerval, who had watched my countenance as I read this letter, was surprised to observe the despair that succeeded the joy I at first expressed on receiving new from my friends. I threw the letter on the table, and covered my face with my hands.

我看信的时候，克莱瓦尔一直在观察着我的表情，当他注意到我由刚从他手中拿到家信时的喜悦转变成后来的绝望时，他很是吃惊。我把信扔在了桌子上，双手捂住了脸。

"My dear Frankenstein," exclaimed Henry, when he perceived me weep with bitterness, "are you always to be unhappy? My dear friend, what has happened?"“我亲爱的弗兰克斯坦，”亨利看到了我在痛苦地哭泣，他大声说，“你怎么这么痛苦啊？我亲爱的朋友，出什么事了？”

I motioned him to take up the letter, while I walked up and down the room in the extremest agitation. Tears also gushed from the eyes of Clerval, as he read the account of my misfortune.

我示意他拿起那封信看看，而我极其痛苦地在房间里走来走去。当克莱瓦尔明白了我所经历的不幸之事时，他也泪如泉涌。

"I can offer you no consolation, my friend," said he; "your disaster is irreparable. What do you intend to do?"“我不能给你丝毫安慰，我的朋友。”他说，“你的灾难实在无法挽回。你打算怎么办？”

"To go instantly to Geneva: come with me, Henry, to order the horses.”“马上回日内瓦：亨利，和我一起去订马车吧。”

During our walk, Clerval endeavoured to say a few words of consolation; he could only express his heartfelt sympathy. "Poor William!" said he, "dear lovely child, he now sleeps with his angel mother! Who that had seen him bright and joyous in his young beauty, but must weep over his untimely loss! To die so miserably; to feel the murderer's grasp! How much more a murdered that could destroy radiant innocence! Poor little fellow! One only consolation have we; his friends mourn and weep, but he is at rest. The pang is over, his sufferings are at an end for ever. A sod covers his gentle form, and he knows no pain. He can no longer be a subject for pity; we must reserve that for his miserable survivors."

路上，克莱瓦尔竭力说些安慰的话，他也只能表达自己由衷的同情。“可怜的威廉！”他说，“可爱的小孩，他现在可以和他母亲在天堂里安息了！但凡见过他那聪明活泼的可爱小模样的人，都会为他的夭折而伤心落泪！死得太惨了，竟被凶手掐死了！凶手怎能如此狠心杀害一个天真无邪的小生命！可怜的小家伙！我们唯一的慰藉就是，他的朋友们在悲伤哭泣，而他安息了。肉体的剧痛结束了，他的痛苦遭遇永远地结束了。他弱小的身躯长眠地下，他不再知晓痛苦。他不再需要怜悯，我们必须把怜悯留给未亡人。”

Clerval spoke thus as we hurried through the streets; the words impressed themselves on my mind and I remembered them afterwards in solitude. But now, as soon as the horses arrived, I hurried into a cabriolet, and bade farewell to my friend.

我们匆忙地穿过一条条街道，克莱瓦尔如是说。他的话印刻在我的脑海里，后来独处时我仍记得这些话。但是现在，马车刚一到，我就迅速钻了进去，道别了我的朋友。

My journey was very melancholy. At first I wished to hurry on, for I longed to console and sympathise with my loved and sorrowing friends; but when I drew near my native town, I slackened my progress. I could hardly sustain the multitude of feelings that crowded into my mind. I passed through scenes familiar to my youth, but which I had not seen for nearly six years. How altered every thing might be during that time! One sudden and desolating change had taken place; but a thousand little circumstances might have by degrees worked other alterations, which, although they were done more tranquilly, might not be the less decisive. Fear overcame me; I dared no advance, dreading a thousand nameless evils that made me tremble, although I was unable to define them. I remained two days at Lausanne, in this painful state of mind. I contemplated the lake: the waters were placid; all around was calm; and the snowy mountains, 'the palaces of nature,' were not changed. By degrees the calm and heavenly scene restored me, and I continued my journey towards Geneva.

我的行程十分忧伤。最初我希望尽快赶路，因为我急于去安慰、同情我深爱的、正处于悲痛中的亲人。但当我接近家乡时，我却放慢了行程。各种情感涌上心头，我几乎不能承受。我途经年少时所熟悉的一幕幕场景，然而我已经几乎六年没见到这些了。在那些年里，会发生多少变化啊。一个突然的、悲惨的变故已经发生了。但可能有许许多多的情况在不同程度上发生了改变，尽管它们悄无声息地发生了，但也许并不乏决定性。恐惧压倒了我，我不敢前行，我害怕遭遇上千个令我颤抖的无名恶魔，虽然我说不清他们是什么。在这种痛苦的状态下，我在洛桑呆了两天。我凝视着湖水：水面平静，周围一片宁静，山脉白雪皑皑，‘大自然的宫殿’并未改变。这平静的天堂般的景致使我慢慢地恢复过来，我继续驶往日内瓦。

The road ran by the side of the lake, which became narrower as I approached my native town. I discovered more distinctly the black sides of Jura, and the bright summit of Mont Blanc. I wept like a child. "Dear mountains! My own beautiful lake! How do you welcome your wanderer? Your summits are clear; the sky and lake are blue and placid. Is this to prognosticate peace, or to mock at my unhappiness?"

当我接近故乡时，湖边的路变得越来越窄了。我更加清晰地看见了朱拉山的阴面山坡和勃朗峰的明媚山巅。我像个孩子似的哭泣着。“亲爱的高山！美丽的湖泊！你们如何迎接你们的游子？你们的山峰洁白无暇，天空和湖水湛蓝宁静。这是预示着平静还是嘲笑我的不幸？”

I fear, my friend, that I shall render myself tedious by dwelling on these preliminary circumstances; but they were days of comparative happiness, and I think of them with pleasure. My country, my beloved country! Who but a native can tell the delight I took in again beholding thy streams, thy mountains, and, more than all, thy lovely lake!

我的朋友，我担心自己这样絮叨过去的情形令你生厌了吧。但那是我相对比较幸福的日子，一想到它们我就满心欢喜。我的祖国，我热爱的祖国！只有你的子民方能体会当我再次看见你的溪流、群山，特别是你那美丽湖泊时的喜悦之情！

Yet, as I drew nearer home, grief and fear again overcame me. Night also closed around; and when I could hardly see the dark mountains, I felt still more gloomily. The picture appeared a vast and dim scene of evil, and I foresaw obscurely that I was destined to become the most wretched of human beings. Alas! I prophesied truly, and failed only in one single circumstance, that in all the misery I imagined and dreaded, I did not conceive the hundredth part of the anguish I was destined to endure. It was completely dark when I arrived in the environs of Geneva; the gates of the town were already shut; and I was obliged to pass the night at Secheron, a village at the distance of half a league from the city. The sky was serene; and, as I was unable to rest, I resolved to visit the spot where my poor William had been murdered. As I could not pass through the town, I was obliged to cross the lake in a boat to arrive at Plainpalais. During this short voyage I saw the lightning playing on the summit of Mont Blanc in the most beautiful figures. The storm appeared to approach rapidly, and, on landing, I ascended a low hill, that I might observe its progress. It advanced; the heavens were clouded, and I soon felt the rain coming slowly in large drops, but its violence quickly increased.

然而，当我离家越来越近时，悲伤和恐惧再次令我无法承受。夜幕降临，当我几乎看不见那变暗的群山时，我越发感到悲伤。眼前的景色看上去是幅广袤、昏暗充满邪恶的画面，我隐隐地预感到自己注定成为世上最不幸的人。哎！我预言得完全正确，只是有一处没有应验，我所想象和担心的所有不幸，还不到我注定要承受的痛苦的百分之一。当我到达日内瓦的周边地区时，天完全黑了。城门已经关闭，我必须在谢隆村过夜了，这里离城区一英里半远。夜空宁静，我无法入睡，于是决定去可怜的威廉被谋杀的地方看看。因为不能穿过城里，我只能坐船横跨湖泊，到达普兰帕里斯。在这短暂的行程中，我看见了勃朗峰上划过的闪电，造型特别美丽。暴风雨看起来即将来临，上岸后，我爬上一座小山，想看看这个过程。暴风雨逼近，天空乌云密布，我很快就感觉到巨大的雨点慢慢滴下来了，很快雨点便越发密集起来。

I quitted my seat, and walked on, although the darkness and storm increased every minute, and the thunder burst with a terrific crash over my head. It was echoed from Saleve, the Juras, and the Alps of Savoy; vivid flashes of lightning dazzled my eyes, illuminating the lake, making it appear like a vast sheet of fire; then for an instant every thing seemed of a pitchy darkness, until the eye recovered itself from the preceding flash. The storm, as is often the case in Switzerland, appeared at once in various parts of the heavens. The most violent storm hung exactly north of the town, over the part of the lake which lies between the promontory of Belrive and the village of Copet. Another storm enlightened Jura with faint flashes; and another darkened and sometimes disclosed the Mole, a peaked mountain to the east of the lake.

尽管天越来越黑，雨越来越大，我还是站起来，继续前行，在我的上空，一个惊雷炸响了。雷声回响在塞拉维的朱拉山和萨沃伊的阿尔卑斯山之间。耀眼的闪电让我目眩，闪电照亮了湖水，使它看上去像是一片火海。而后在一瞬间，万物似乎漆黑一片，直到眼睛从刚才的闪电中恢复过来。瑞士的暴风雨总是这样，看起来像是在天空中的不同方向同时爆发。最猛烈的暴风雨经常出现在城镇的正北方向，在位于贝尔日维岬角和克贝尔村之间的那片湖区上方。又一场暴风雨携着微弱的光照亮了朱拉山，另一边则是是漆黑一片，湖东面尖尖的莫勒山时而会显露出来。

While I watched the tempest, so beautiful yet terrific, I wandered on with a hasty step. This noble war in the sky elevated my spirits; I clasped my hands, and exclaimed aloud, "William, dear angel! this is thy funeral, this thy dirge!"As I said these words, I perceived in the gloom a figure which stole from behind a clump of trees near me; I stood fixed, gazing intently: I could not be mistaken. A flash of lightning illuminated the object, and discovered its shape plainly to me; its gigantic stature, and the deformity of its aspect more hideous than belongs to humanity, instantly informed me that it was the wretch, the filthy daemon, to whom I had given life. What did he there? Could he be (I shuddered at the conception) the murderer of my brother? No sooner did that idea cross my imagination, than I became convinced of its truth; my teeth chattered, and I was forced to lean against a tree for support. The figure passed me quickly, and I lost it in the gloom.

我一边观赏着剧烈、美丽却又可怕的暴风雨，一边加速前进。空中的壮丽之战令我情绪激昂，我双手紧握，大声呼唤：“威廉，亲爱的天使！这是你的葬礼，这是你的挽歌！”我正说着这些话，就看见一个身影从我旁边树丛的阴暗之处鬼鬼祟祟地走了出来。我僵住了，死死地盯着：我不会搞错。一道闪电照亮了这个物体，我清楚地看见了它的外形。它庞大的躯体、畸形丑陋的非人类外表立刻告诉我，它就是我给予了生命的那个怪物，那个肮脏的魔鬼。他在那里干什么？难道他就是（想到这里，我战栗了）谋杀我弟弟的凶手？这个想法刚在我的想象中闪过，我就对此确信无疑了：我的牙齿在打战，我只能靠着一棵大树才能站得住。那个身影在我身旁一闪而过，消失在黑暗中。

Nothing in human shape could have destroyed the fair child. HE was the murderer! I could not doubt it. The mere presence of the idea was an irresistible proof of the fact. I thought of pursuing the devil; but it would have been in vain, for another flash discovered him to me hanging among the rocks of the nearly perpendicular ascent of Mont Saleve, a hill that bounds Plainpalais on the south. He soon reached the summit, and disappeared.

只要是人就绝不会伤害那个可爱的孩子。他就是那个凶手！我对此毫不怀疑！这个想法的存在就是一个不容质疑的事实。我本想去追那个魔鬼，可惜徒劳，因为这时一道闪电划过，我发现他在攀爬塞拉维山，那是普兰帕里斯南边的一座小山。他很快就爬到了山顶，消失了。

I remained motionless. The thunder ceased; but the rain still continued, and the scene was enveloped in an impenetrable darkness. I revolved in my mind the events which I had until now sought to forget: the whole train of my progress toward the creation; the appearance of the works of my own hands at my bedside; its departure. Two years had now nearly elapsed since the night on which he first received life; and was this his first crime? Alas! I had turned loose into the world a depraved wretch, whose delight was in carnage and misery; had he not murdered my brother?

我一动不动地站在那里。雷声停了，但雨还在下，周围是一片深不见底的黑暗。我脑子里浮现出那些自己迄今为止仍在试图忘记的事情：我一步步制造怪物的整个轨迹；那个我亲手制造的家伙出现在我的床边；他的离去。从他获得生命的那晚到现在，差不多有两年了。这是他第一次犯罪吗？天啊！我竟放纵了一个邪恶的怪物在世上，他以残害生命和制造痛苦为乐。难道不是他谋杀了我的弟弟吗？

No one can conceive the anguish I suffered during the remainder of the night, which I spent, cold and wet, in the open air. But I did not feel the inconvenience of the weather; my imagination was busy in scenes of evil and despair. I considered the being whom I had cast among mankind, and endowed with the will and power to effect purposes of horror, such as the deed which he had now done, nearly in the light of my own vampire, my own spirit let loose from the grave, and forced to destroy all that was dear to me.

无人能体会我在那晚剩余时间里所承受的痛苦，我浑身湿冷地在野外度过了那段时间。但是我并未在意天气所带来的不便。我正忙于想象那些邪恶、绝望的场面。我在想那个我带到人间的怪物，是我赋予了他思想和力量，使他能达到作恶的目的，正如他现在已经做的那样。这几乎就相当于我自己成了吸血鬼，我的灵魂从坟墓中释放出来，被迫去残害所有我爱的人。

Day dawned; and I directed my steps towards the town. The gates were open, and I hastened to my father's house. My first thought was to discover what I knew of the murderer, and cause instant pursuit to be made. But I paused when I reflected on the story that I had to tell. A being whom I myself had formed, and endued with life, had met me at midnight among the precipices of an inaccessible mountain. I remembered also the nervous fever with which I had been seized just at the time that I dated my creation, and which would give an air of delirium to a tale otherwise so utterly improbable. I well knew that if any other had communicated such a relation to me, I should have looked upon it as the ravings of insanity. Besides, the strange nature of the animal would elude all pursuit, even if I were so far credited as to persuade my relatives to commence it. And then of what use would be pursuit? Who could arrest a creature capable of scaling the overhanging sides of Mont Saleve? These reflections determined me, and I resolved to remain silent.

天亮了，我向城里走去。城门打开了，我匆匆赶往父亲的房子。最初我想将自己所知道的关于凶手的情况公之于众，使大家立刻展开追捕。但想到我不得不讲的那个故事时，我犹豫了。午夜时分，在无法攀缘的悬崖峭壁处我遇见了自己亲手制造，并赋予生命的怪物。我还记得就在我制造出怪物的那天，我得了神经性发热，这使本来就如此荒诞不经的故事变得像痴人说梦了。我清楚地知道，倘若他人告诉我一个类似的故事，我一定会认为那是精神错乱的表现。而且，即便我能说服亲人去追捕那个怪物，那家伙的兽性也能使其逃脱掉所有的追捕。那么，追捕还有什么用呢？谁能逮住一个能爬上塞拉维山崖的家伙呢？想到这些，我决定保持沉默。

It was about five in the morning when I entered my father's house. I told the servants not to disturb the family, and went into the library to attend their usual hour of rising.

大约早上五点的时候，我走进了父亲的房子。我告诉仆人不要惊动我的家人，我走进书房等他们按时起床。

Six years had elapsed, passed in a dream but for one indelible trace, and I stood in the same place where I had last embraced my father before my departure for Ingolstadt. Beloved and venerable parent! He still remained to me. I gazed on the picture of my mother, which stood over the mantel-piece. It was an historical subject, painted at my father's desire, and represented Caroline Beaufort in an agony of despair, kneeling by the coffin of her dead father. Her garb was rustic, and her cheek pale; but there was an air of dignity and beauty, that hardly permitted the sentiment of pity. Below this picture was a miniature of William; and my tears flowed when I looked upon it. While I was thus engaged, Ernest entered: he had heard me arrive, and hastened to welcome me:"Welcome, my dearest Victor," said he. "Ah! I wish you had come three months ago, and then you would have found us all joyous and delighted. You come to us now to share a misery which nothing can alleviate; yet your presence will, I hope, revive our father, who seems sinking under his misfortune; and your persuasions will induce poor Elizabeth to cease her vain and tormenting self-accusations.—Poor William! He was our darling and our pride!”

六年的时光恍然如梦，除了一道抹不掉的痕迹，我就站在当年离家去因戈尔施塔特时与父亲最后一次拥抱的地方。可敬可爱的父亲啊！他一直在我心里。我凝视着壁炉上方母亲的肖像。这是一件有历史意义的作品，是按照我父亲的意愿画的，画中卡罗琳·博福特（我母亲）正跪在她已故父亲的灵柩旁。她衣着粗朴、面色苍白，但却有着高贵美丽的气质，让人很难不心生怜爱。这幅画像的下面摆着威廉的一副小肖像。我一看到他，泪水便夺眶而出。正当我沉浸在悲伤中的时候，欧内斯特进来了。他听说我到了，赶忙来欢迎我：“欢迎你，我最亲爱的维克托。”他说，“啊！我多希望你在三个月前就回来啊，那样你就会看到我们大家喜气洋洋的样子了。如今你回到我们身边，来分担一份无法减轻的痛苦。不过我希望你的到来能让我们的父亲振作起来，他陷入不幸，似乎无法自拔了。你的劝慰也许能让伊丽莎白停止她无用的、痛苦的自责——可怜的威廉！他是我们的宝贝、我们的骄傲！”

Tears, unrestrained, fell from my brother's eyes; a sense of mortal agony crept over my frame. Before, I had only imagined the wretchedness of my desolated home; the reality came on me as a

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