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1、【国外英文文学】Back HomeBack Homeby Eugene Wood TO THE SAINTED MEMORY OF HER WHOM, IN THE DAYS BACK HOME, I KNEW AS MY MA MAG AND WHO WAS MORE TO ME THAN I CAN TELL, EVEN IF MY TARDY WORDS COULD REACH HER THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED That she who is an angel now Might sometimes think of meCONTENTSINTRODUCTIONTHE
2、 OLD RED SCHOOL-HOUSETHE SABBATH-SCHOOLTHE REVOLVING YEARTHE SWIMMING-HOLETHE FIREMENS TOURNAMENTTHE DEVOURING ELEMENTCIRCUS DAYTHE COUNTY FAIRCHRISTMAS BACK HOMEINTRODUCTIONGENTLE READER: - Let me make you acquainted with my book, Back Home. (Your right hand, Book, your right hand. Pitys sakes! How
3、 many times have I got to tell you that? Chest up and forward, shoulders back and down, and turn your toes out more.)It is a little book, Gentle Reader, but please dont let that prejudice you against it. The General Public, I know, likes to feel heft in its hand when it buys a book, but I had hoped
4、that you were a peg or two above the General Public. That mythical being goes on a reading spree about every so often, and it selects a book which will probably last out the craving, a book which it will be impossible to lay down, after it is once begun, until it is finished. (I quote from the stand
5、ard book notice). A few hours later the following dialogue ensues:Henry!Yes, dear.Arent you most done reading?Just as soon as I finish this chapter. A sigh and a long wait.Henry!Yes, dear.Did you lock the side-door? No answer.Henry! Did you?Did I what?Did you lock the side-door?In a minute now.Yes,
6、but did you?M-hm. I guess so.Guess so! Did you lock that side-door? They got in at Hilliards night before last and stole a bag of clothes-pins.M.Oh, put down that book, and go and lock the side-door. Ill not get a wink of sleep this blessed night unless you do.In a minute now. Just wait till I finis
7、h this . . . Go do it now.Mr. General Public has a card on his desk that says, Do it Now, and so he lays down his book with a patient sigh, and comes back to it with a patent grouch.Oh, so it is, says the voice from the bedroom. I remember now, I locked it myself when I put the milk-bottles out . .
8、. . Im going to stop taking of that man unless theres more cream on the top than there has been here lately.M.Henry!Oh, what is it?Arent you most done reading?In a minute, just as soon as I finish this chapter.How long is that chapter, for mercys sakes?I began another.Henry!What?Arent you coming to
9、bed pretty soon? You know I cant go to sleep when you are sitting up.Oh, hush up for one minute, cant ye? Its a funny thing if I cant read a little once in a while.Its a funny thing if Ive got to be broke of my rest this way. As much as I have to look after. Id hate to be so selfish . . . . Henry! W
10、ont you please put the book down and come to bed?Oh, for goodness sake! Turn over and go to sleep. You make me tired.Every two or three hours Mrs. General Public wakes up and announces that she cant get a wink of sleep, not a wink; she wishes he hadnt brought the plagued old book home; he hasnt the
11、least bit of consideration for her; please, please, wont he put the book away and come to bed?He reaches THE END at 2:30A.M., turns off the gas, and creeps into bed, his stomach all upset from smoking so much without eating anything, his eyes feeling like two burnt holes in a blanket, and wishing th
12、at he had the sense he was born with. Hell have to be up at 6:05, and he knows how he will feel. He also knows how he will feel along about three oclock in the afternoon. Smithers is coming then to close up that deal. Smithers is as sharp as tacks, as slippery as an eel, and as crooked as a dogs hin
13、d leg. Always looking for the best of it. You need all your wits when you deal with Smithers. Why didnt he take Mrs. General Publics advice, and get to bed instead of sitting up fuddling himself with that fool love-story?Thats how a book should be to be a great popular success, and one that all the
14、typewriter girls will have on their desks. I am guiltily conscious that Back Home is not up to standard either in avoirdupois heft or the power to unfit a man for business.Heres a book. Is it long? No. Is it exciting? No. Any lost diamonds in it? Nup. Mysterious murders? No. Whopping big fortune, no
15、w teetering this way, and now teetering that, tipping over on the Hero at the last and smothering him in an avalanche of fifty-dollar bills? No. Does She get Him? Isnt even that. No heart interest at all. Whats the use of putting out good money to make such a book; to have a cover design for it; to
16、get a man like A. B. Frost to draw illustrations for it, when he costs so like the mischief, when theres nothing in the book to make a man sit up till way past bedtime? Why print it at all?You may search me. I suppose its all right, but if it was my money, Ill bet I could make a better investment of
17、 it. If worst came to worst, I could do like the fellow in the story who went to the gambling-house and found it closed up, so he shoved the money under the door and went away. Hed done his part.And yet, on the other hand, I can see how some sort of a case can be made out for this book of mine. I su
18、ppose I am wrong - I generally am in regard to everything - but it seems to me that quite a large part of the population of this country must be grown-up people. If I am right in this contention, then this large part of the population is being unjustly discriminated against. I believe in doing a rea
19、sonable amount for the aid and comfort of the young things that are just beginning to turn their hair up under, or who rub a stealthy forefinger over their upper lips to feel the pleasant rasp, but I dont believe in their monopolizing everything. I dont think it s fair. All the books printed - excep
20、t, of course, those containing valuable information; we dont buy those books, but go to the public library for them - all the books printed are concerned with the problem of How She can get Him, and He can get Her.Well, now. It was either yesterday morning or the day before that you looked in the gl
21、ass and beheld there The First Gray Hair. You smiled a smile that was not all pure pleasure, a smile that petered out into a sigh, but nevertheless a smile, I will contend. What do you think about it? Youre still on earth, arent you? Youll last the month out, anyhow, wont you? Not at all ready to be
22、 laid on the shelf? What do you think of the relative importance of Love, Courtship, and Marriage? One or two other things in life just about as interesting, arent there? Take getting a living, for instance. That s worthy of ones attention, to a certain extent. When our young ones ask us: Pop, what
23、did you say to Mom when you courted her? they feel provoked at us for taking it so lightly and so frivolously. It vexes them for us to reply: Law, child! I dont remember. Why, I says to her: Will you have me? And she says: Why, yes, and jump at the chance. What difference does it make what we said,
24、or whether we said anything at all? Why should we charge our memories with the recollections of those few and foolish months of mere instinctive sex-attraction when all that really counts came after, the years wherein low passion blossomed into lofty Love, the dear companionship in joy and sorrow, a
25、nd in that which is more, far more than either joy or sorrow, the daily round, the common task? All that is wonderful to think of in our courtship is the marvel, for which we should never cease to thank the Almighty God, that with so little judgment at our disposal we should have chosen so wisely.If
26、 you, Gentle Reader, found your first gray hair day before yesterday morning, if you can remember, way, way back ten or fifteen years ago . . . er . . . er . . . or more, come with me. Let us go Back Home. Heres your transportation, all made out to you, and in your hand. It is no use my reminding yo
27、u that no railroad goes to the old home place. It isnt there any more, even in outward seeming. Cumminss woods, where you had your robbers cave, is all cleared off and cut up into building lots. The cool and echoing covered bridge, plastered with notices of dead and forgotten Strawberry Festivals an
28、d Public Vendues, has long ago been torn down to be replaced by a smart, red iron bridge. The Volunteer Firemens Engine-house, whose brick wall used to flutter with the gay rags of circus-bills, is gone as if it never were at all. Where the Union Schoolhouse was is all torn up now. They are putting
29、up a new magnificent structure, with all the modern improvements, exposed plumbing, and spankless discipline. The quiet leafy streets echo to the hissing snarl of trolley cars, and the power-house is right by the Old Swimming-hole above the dam. The meeting-house, where we attended Sabbath-school, a
30、nd marveled at the Greek temple frescoed on the wall behind the pulpit, is now a church with a big organ, and stained-glass windows, and folding opera-chairs on a slanting floor. There isnt any Amen Corner, any more, and in these calm and well-bred times nobody ever gets shouting happy.But even when
31、 the loved spots that our infancy knew are physically the same, a change has come upon them more saddening than words can tell. They have shrunken and grown shabbier. They are not nearly so spacious and so splendid as once they were.Some one comes up to you and calls you by your name. His voice echo
32、es in the chambers of your memory. You hold his hand in yours and try to peer through the false-face he has on, the mask of a beard or spectacles, or a changed expression of the countenance. He says he is So-and-so. Why, he used to sit with you in Miss Crutchers room, dont you remember? There was a
33、time when you and he walked together, your arms upon each others shoulders. But this is some other one than he. The boy you knew had freckles, and could spit between his teeth, ever and ever so far.They dont have the same things to eat they used to have, or, if they do, it all tastes different. Do y
34、ou remember the old well, with the windlass and the chain fastened to the rope just above the bucket, the chain that used to cluck-cluck when the dripping bucket came within reach to be swung upon the well-curb? How cold the water used to be, right out of the northwest corner of the well! It made th
35、e roof of your mouth ache when you drank. Everybody said it was such splendid water. It isnt so very cold these days, and I think it has a sort of funny taste to it.Ah, Gentle Reader, this is not really Back Home we gaze upon when we go there by the train. It is a last years birds nest. The nest is
36、there; the birds are flown, the birds of youth, and noisy health, and ravenous appetite, and inexperience. You cannot go Back Home by train, but here is the magic wishing-carpet, and here is your transportation in your hand all made out to you. You and I will make the journey together. Let us in hea
37、rt and mind thither ascend.I went to the Old Red School-house with you. Dont you remember me? I was learning to swim when you could go clear across the river without once letting down. I saw you at the County Fair, and bought a slab of ice-cream candy just before you did. I was in the infant-class i
38、n Sabbath-school when you spoke in the dialogue at the monthly concert. Look again. Dont you remember me? I used to stub my toe so; you ought to recollect me by that. I know plenty of people that you know. I may not always get their names just right, but then its been a good while ago. You Il recogn
39、ize them, though; youll know them in a minute.EUGENE WOOD.BACK HOMETHE OLD RED SCHOOL-HOUSE Oh, the little old red school-house on the hill, (2d bass: On the hill.) Oh, the little old red school-house on the hill, (2d bass: On the hi-hi-hi-yull) And my heart with joy oerflows, Like the dew-drop in t
40、he rose,* Thinking of the old red SCHOOL-HOUSE I o-o-on the hill, (2d tenor and 1st bass: The hill, the hill.)THE MALE QUARTETS COMPENDIUM.* I call your attention to the chaste beauty of this line, and the imperative necessity of the chord of the diminished seventh for the word rose. Also school-hou
41、se in the last line must be very loud and staccato. Snap it off.If the audience will kindly come forward and occupy the vacant seats in the front of the hall, the entertainment will now begin. The male quartet will first render an appropriate selection and then . . . . Cant you see them from where y
42、ou are? Let me assist you in the visualization.The first tenor, the gentleman on the extreme left, is a stocky little man, with a large chest and short legs conspicuously curving inward. He has plenty of white teeth, ash-blonde hair, and goes smooth-shaven for purely personal reasons. His round, dou
43、gh-colored face will never look older (from a distance) than it did when he was nine. The flight of years adds only deeper creases in the multitude of fine wrinkles, and increasing difficulty in hoisting his tiny, patent-leather foot up on his plump knee.The second tenor leans toward him in a way to
44、 make another man anxious about his watch, but the second tenor is as honest as the day. He is only blending the voices. He works in the bank. He is going to be married in June sometime. Dont look around right away, but shes the one in the pink shirt-waist, the second one from the aisle, the one . .
45、 . two . . . three . . . the sixth row back. See her? Say, theyve got it bad, those two. What d ye think? She goes down by the bank every day at noon, so as to walk up with him to luncheon. She lives across the street, and as soon as ever she has finished her luncheon, there she is, out on the front
46、 porch hallooing: Oo-hoo! How about that? And if he so much as looks at another girl - m-M!The first bass is one of these fellows with a flutter in his voice. No, I dont mean a vibrato. Its a flutter, like a goats tail. It is considered real operatic.The second bass has a great, big Adams apple that
47、 slides up and down his throat like a toy-monkey on a stick. He is tall, and has eyebrows like clothes-brushes, and he scowls fit to make you run and hide under the bed. He is really a good-hearted fellow, though. Pity he has the dyspepsia so bad. Oh, my, yes! Suffers everything with it, poor man. He generally sings that song about Drink-ing! DRINK-ang! Drink-awng! thou