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1、【英文文学】The Race of LifeChapter 1. “A Boys Will is the Winds Will.”IF any man had told me a year ago that I should start out to write a book, I give you my word I should not have believed him. It would have been the very last job I should have thought of undertaking. Somehow Ive never been much of a f
2、ist with the pen. The branding iron and stockwhip have always been more in my line, and the saddle a much more familiar seat than the authors chair. However, fate is always at hand to arrange matters for us, whether we like it or not, and so it comes about that I find myself at this present moment s
3、eated at my table-pen in hand, with a small mountain of virgin foolscap in front of me, waiting to be covered with my sprawling penmanship. What the story will be like when I have finished it, and whether those who do me the honour of reading it will find it worthy of their consideration, is more th
4、an I can say. I have made up my mind to tell it, however, and that being so, well “chance it,” as we say in the Bush. Should it not turn out to be to your taste, well, my advice to you is to put it down at once and turn your attention to the work of somebody else who has had greater experience in th
5、is line of business than your humble servant. Give me a three-year old as green as grass, and Ill sit him until the cows come home; let me have a long days shearing, even when the wool is damp or theres grass seed in the fleece; a hut to be built, or a tank to be sunk, and its all the same to me; bu
6、t to sit down in cold blood and try to describe your past life, with all its good deeds (not very many of them in my case) and bad, successes and failures, hopes and fears, requires more cleverness, Im afraid, than I possess. However, Ill imitate the old single-stick players in the West of England,
7、and toss my hat on the stage as a sign that, no matter whether Im successful or not, I intend doing my best, and I cant say more than that. Here goes then.To begin with, I must tell you who I am, and whence I hail. First and foremost, my name is George Tregaskis-my father was also a George Tregaskis
8、, as, I believe, was his father before him. The old dad used to say that we came of good Cornish stock, and Im not quite sure that I did not once hear him tell somebody that there was a title in the family. But that did not interest me; for the reason, I suppose, that I was too young to understand t
9、he meaning of such things. My father was born in England, but my mother was Colonial, Ballarat being her native place. As for me, their only child, I first saw the light of day at a small station on the Murray River, which my father managed for a gentleman who lived in Melbourne, and whom I regarded
10、 as the greatest man in all the world, not even my own paternal parent excepted. Fortunately he did not trouble us much with visits, but when he did I trembled before him like a gum leaf in a storm. Even the fact that on one occasion he gave me half-a-crown on his departure could not altogether conv
11、ince me that he was a creature of flesh and blood like my own father or the hands upon the run. I can see him now, tall, burly, and the possessor of an enormous beard that reached almost to his waist. His face was broad and red and his voice deep and sonorous as a bell. When he laughed he seemed to
12、shake all over like a jelly; taken all round, he was a jovial, good-natured man, and proved a good friend to my mother and myself when my poor father was thrown from his horse and killed while out mustering in our back country. How well I remember that day! It seems to me as if I can even smell the
13、hot earth, and hear the chirrup of the cicadas in the gum trees by the river bank. Then came the arrival of Dick Bennet, the overseer, with a grave face, and as nervous as a plain turkey when youre after him on foot. His horse was all in a lather and so played out that I doubt if he could have trave
14、lled another couple of miles.“Georgie, boy,” Dick began, as he got out of his saddle and threw his reins on the ground, “wheres your mother? Hurry up and tell me, for Ive got something to say to her.”“Shes in the house,” I answered, and asked him to put me up in the saddle. He paid no attention to m
15、e, however, but was making for the house door when my mother made her appearance on the verandah. Little chap though I was, I can well recall the look on her face as her eyes fell upon him. She became deadly pale, and for a moment neither of them spoke, but stood looking at each other for all the wo
16、rld as if they were struck dumb. My mother was the first to speak.“What has happened?” she asked, and her voice seemed to come from deep down in her throat, while her hands were holding tight on to the rail before her as if to prevent herself from falling. “I can see there is something wrong, Mr. Be
17、nnet.”Dick turned half round and looked at me. I suppose he did not want me to overhear what he had to say. My mother bade him come inside, and they went into the house together. It was nearly ten minutes before he came out again, and, though I had to look more than once to make sure of it, there we
18、re big tears rolling down his cheeks. I could scarcely believe the evidence of my eyes, for Dick was not a man given to the display of emotion, and I had always been told that it was unworthy of a man to cry. I admired Dick from the bottom of my heart, and this unexpected weakness on his part came t
19、o me as somewhat of a shock. He left the verandah and came over to where I was standing by poor old Bronzewing, whose wide-spread nostrils and heaving flanks were good evidence as to the pace at which he had lately been compelled to travel.“Georgie, my poor little laddie,” he said, laying his hand u
20、pon my shoulder in a kindly way as he spoke, “run along into the house and find your mother. Shell be wanting you badly, if Im not mistaken, poor soul. Try and cheer her up, theres a good boy, but dont talk about your father unless she begins it.” And then, more to himself I fancy than to me, he add
21、ed, “Poor little man, I wonder what will happen to you now that hes gone? Youll have to hoe your row for yourself, and thats a fact.”Having seen me depart, he slipped his rein over his arm and went off in the direction of his own quarters, Bronzewing trailing after him looking more like a worn-out w
22、orking bullock than the smart animal that had left the station for the mustering camp three days before. I found my mother in her room, sitting beside her bed and looking straight before her as if she were turned to stone. Her eyes, in which there was no sign of a tear, were fixed upon a large photo
23、graph of my father hanging on the wall beside the window, and though I did not enter the room, I fear, any too quietly, she seemed quite unconscious of my presence.“Mother,” I began, “Dick said you wanted me.” And then I added anxiously, “You dont feel ill, do you, mother?”“No, my boy, Im not ill,”
24、she answered. “No! not ill. Though, were it not for you, I could wish that I might die. Oh, God, why could You not have taken my life instead of his?” Then drawing me to her, she pressed me to her heart and kissed me again and again. Later she found relief in tears, and between her sobs I learnt all
25、 there was to know. My father was dead; his horse that morning had put his foot in a hole and had thrown his rider-breaking his neck and killing him upon the spot. Dick had immediately set off to acquaint my mother with the terrible tidings, with the result I have already described. The men who had
26、accompanied him to the muster were now bringing the body into the head station, and it was necessary that preparations should be made to receive it. Never, if I live to be a hundred, shall I forget the dreariness, the utter and entire hopelessness of that day. Little boy though I was, and though I s
27、carcely realised what my loss meant to me, I was deeply affected by the prevailing gloom. As for my mother, she entered upon her preparations and went about her housework like one in a dream. She and my father had been a devoted couple, and her loss was a wound that only that great healer Time could
28、 cure. Indeed, it has always been my firm belief that she never did really recover from the shock-at any rate, she was never again the same cheery, merry woman that she had once been. Poor mother, looking back on all I have gone through myself since then, I can sympathise with you from the bottom of
29、 my heart.It was nearly nightfall when that melancholy little party made their appearance at the head station. Dick, with great foresight, had sent the ration cart out some miles to meet them, so that my mother was spared the pain of seeing the body of her husband brought in upon his horse. Rough an
30、d rude as he was, Dick was a thoughtful fellow, and I firmly believe he would have gone through fire and water to serve my mother, for whom he had a boundless admiration. Poor fellow, he died of thirst many years after when looking for new country out on the far western border of Queensland. God res
31、t him, for he was a good fellow, and did his duty as far as he could see it, which is more than most of us do, though, to be sure, we make a very fair pretence of it. However, I havent taken up my pen to moralise, so Ill get along with my story and leave my reader to draw his or her own conclusions
32、from what I have to set down, good, bad, or indifferent as the case may be.As I have said, it was towards evening when my fathers body reached the homestead. My mother met it at the gate of the horse paddock and walked beside it up to the house, as she had so often done when what was now but poor, c
33、old clay was vigorous, active flesh and blood. It had been her custom to meet him there on his return from inspecting the run, when he would dismount, and placing his arm around her waist, stroll back with her to the house, myself as often as not occupying his place in the saddle. On reaching his ol
34、d home he was carried reverently to his own room and placed upon the bed there. Then, for the first time, my mother looked upon her dead husbands face. I stole in behind her and slipped my hand into hers. Together we stood and gazed at the pale, yet placid face of the man we had both loved so well.
35、It was the first time I had met that grim sovereign, Death, and as yet I was unable to realise how great his power was. I could not understand that my father, the big, strong man, so fearless, so masterful, was gone from us beyond recall-that I should never hear his kindly voice again, or sit upon h
36、is knee while he told me tales of Bunyips and mysterious long-maned brumbies, who galloped across the moonlit plains, and of exploration journeys he had undertaken as a young man in the wilder and less known regions of the North and West. Even then I could not realise my loss. I asked my mother if h
37、e were asleep.“Yes, dear,” she answered, very softly, “he is asleep-asleep with God!” Then she led me from the room and put me to bed as quietly and composedly as she had always done. Her grief was too deep, too thorough, to find vent in the omission of even the most trivial details. I learnt afterw
38、ards that when she left me, after kissing me and bidding me “good-night,” she returned to the death chamber and spent the night there, kneeling and praying beside the bed on which lay the body of the man she loved, and to whom she had always been so good and true a wife.Realising how overwrought she
39、 was, Dick Bennet made all the necessary arrangements for the funeral, which took place two days later on a little knoll that over-looked the river, some two miles below the station house. There he was quietly laid to rest by the hands, who one and all mourned the loss they had sustained in him. Dic
40、k it was who read the service over him, and he, poor fellow, broke down in the middle of it. Then, after one final glance into the open grave, we, my mother and myself, took our places in the cart beside him and returned to the house that was destined to be our home for only a short time longer. As
41、a matter of fact, a month later we had bade the old place “good-bye,” and were installed in a small house in the neighbourhood of Melbourne, where I was immediately put to school. My father had all his life been a saving, thrifty man, so that, with what he left her, my mother was able not only to li
42、ve in a fairly comfortable way, but to give me an education by which, I can see now, I should have profited a great deal more than I did. I am afraid, however, that I had not the gift of application, as the schoolmasters express it. I could play cricket and football; in fact, I was fond of all outdo
43、or sports-but book-learning, Euclid, Algebra, Latin, and Greek, interested me not at all. Among my many other faults I unfortunately possessed that of an exceedingly hot temper, but from whom I inherited it I am quite unable to say. At the least provocation I was wont to fly into fits of ungovernabl
44、e rage, during which I would listen to no reason, and be pacified by nothing short of obtaining my own way. It was in vain that my mother argued with me and strove to make me conquer myself; I would promise to try, but the next time I was upset I was as bad as ever. To punish me was useless, it only
45、 strengthened my determination not to give in. I have often thought since, on looking back on it all, that it must have been a sad and anxious period of my poor mothers life, for, after all, I was all she had left in the world to think of and to love. What would I not give now to be able to tell her
46、 that I was sorry for the many heartaches I must have caused her by my wilfulness and folly?It was not until something like nine years after my fathers death, and when I was a tall, lanky youth of close upon eighteen, that I was called upon to make up my mind as to what profession I should adopt. My
47、 mother would have preferred me to enter the Government service, but a Civil Service clerkship was far from being to my taste. The promotion was slow and the life monotonous to the last degree. My own fancy was divided between the bush and the sea, both of which choices my mother opposed with all th
48、e strength and firmness of which she was capable. In either case she knew that she would lose me, and the thought cut her to the heart. Eventually it was decided that for the time being, at least, I should enter the office of an excellent firm of stock and station agents to whom my father had been w
49、ell-known. Should I later on determine to go into the Bush, the training I should have received there would prove of real value to me. This compromise I accepted, and accordingly the next two years found me gracing a stool in the firms office in Collins Street, growing taller every day, and laying the flattering unction to my soul that since I could play a moderate game of billiards and had developed a taste for tobacco, I was every day becoming more and more a man of the world. All th