The Old Man And The Sea C5

　　Sometimes someone would speak in a boat. But most of the boats were silent except for the dip of the oars. They spread apart after they were out of the mouth of the harbour and each one headed for the part of the ocean where he hoped to find fish. The old man knew he was going far out and he left the smell of the land behind and rowed out into the clean early morning smell of the ocean. He saw the phosphorescence of the Gulf weed in the water as he rowed over the part of the ocean that the fishermen cal led the great well because there was a sudden deep of seven hundred fathoms where all sorts of fish congregated because of the swirl the current made against the steep walls of the floor of the ocean. Here there were concentrations of shrimp and bait fish and sometimes schools of squid in the deepest holes and these rose close to the surface at night where all the wandering fish fed on them.

　　偶尔有条船上有人在说话。但是除了桨声外，大多数船只都寂静无声。它们一出港口就分散开来，每一条驶向指望能找到鱼的那片海面。老人知道自己要驶向远方，所以把陆地的气息抛在后方，划进清晨的海洋的清新气息中。他划过海里的某一片水域，看见果囊马尾藻闪出的磷光，渔夫们管这片水域叫“大井”，因为那儿水深突然达到七百英寻，海流冲击在海底深渊的峭壁上，激起了旋涡，种种鱼儿都聚集在那儿。那儿集中着海虾和作鱼饵用的小鱼，在那些深不可测的水底洞穴里，有时还有成群的柔鱼，它们在夜间浮到紧靠海面的地方，所有在那儿转游的鱼类都拿它们当食物。

　　In the dark the old man could feel the morning coming and as he rowed he heard the trembling sound as flying fish left the water and the hissing that their stiff set wings made as they soared away in the darkness. He was sorry for the birds, especially the small delicate dark terns that were always flying and looking and almost never finding, and he thought, the birds have a harder life than we do except for the robber birds and the heavy strong ones. Why did they make birds so delicate and fine as those sea swallows when the ocean can be so cruel? She is kind and very beautiful. But she can be so cruel and it comes so suddenly and such birds that fly, dipping and hunting, with their small sad voices are made too delicately for the sea.

　　老人在黑暗中感觉到早晨在来临，他划着划着，听见飞鱼出水时的颤抖声，还有它们在黑暗中凌空飞翔时挺直的翅膀所发出的咝咝声。他非常喜爱飞鱼，拿它们当作他在海洋上的主要朋友。他替鸟儿伤心，尤其是那些柔弱的黑色小燕鸥，它们始终在飞翔，在找食，但几乎从没找到过，于是他想，乌儿的生活过得比我们的还要艰难，除了那些猛禽和强有力的大鸟。既然海洋这样残暴，为什么象这些海燕那样的鸟儿生来就如此柔弱和纤巧？海洋是仁慈并十分美丽的。然而她能变得这样残暴，又是来得这样突然，而这些飞翔的鸟儿，从空中落下觅食，发出细微的哀鸣，却生来就柔弱得不适宜在海上生活。

　　He always thought of the sea as la mar which is what people call her in Spanish when they love her. Sometimes those who lover her say bad things of her but they are always said as though she were a woman. Some of the younger fishermen, those who used buoys as floats for their lines and had motorboats, bought when the shark livers had brought much money, spoke of her as el mar which is masculine. They spoke of her as a contestant or a place or even an enemy. But the old man always thought of her as feminine and as something that gave or withheld great favours, and if she did wild or wicked things it was because she could not help them. The moon affects her as it does a woman, he thought.

　　他每想到海洋，老是称她为ｌａｍａｒ，这是人们对海洋抱着好感时用西班牙语对她的称呼。有时候，对海洋抱着好感的人们也说她的坏话，不过说起来总是拿她当女性看待的。有些较年轻的渔夫，用浮标当钓索上的浮子，并且在把鲨鱼肝卖了好多钱后置备了汽艇，都管海洋叫ｅｌｍａｒ，这是表示男性的说法。他们提起她时，拿她当做一个竞争者或是一个去处，甚至当做一个敌人。可是这老人总是拿海洋当做女性，她给人或者不愿给人莫大的恩惠，如果她干出了任性或缺德的事儿来，那是因为她由不得自己。月亮对她起着影响，如同对一个女人那样，他想。

　　He was rowing steadily and it was no effort for him since he kept well within his speed and the surface of the ocean was flat except for the occasional swirls of the current. He was letting the current do a third of the work and as it started to be light he saw he was already further out than he had hoped to be at this hour.

　　他从容地划着，对他说来并不吃力，因为他保持在自己的最高速度以内，而且除了偶尔水流打个旋儿以外，海面是平坦无浪的。他正让海流帮他千三分之一的活儿，这时天渐渐亮了，他发现自己已经划到比预期此刻能达到的地方更远了。

　　I worked the deep wells for a week and did nothing, he thought. Today I‘ll work out where the schools of bonito and albacore are and maybe there will be a big one with them.

　　我在这海底的深渊上转游了一个礼拜，可是一无作为，他想。今天，我要找到那些鲣鱼和长鳍金枪鱼群在什么地方，说不定还有条大鱼跟它们在一起呢。

　　Before it was really light he had his baits out and was drifting with the current. One bait was down forty fathoms. The second was at seventy-five and the third and fourth were down in the blue water at one hundred and one hundred and twenty-five fathoms. Each bait hung head down with the shank of the hook inside the bait fish, tied and sewed solid and all the projecting part of the hook, the curve and the point, was covered with fresh sardines. Each sardine was hooked through both eyes so that they made a half-garland on the projecting steel. There was no part of the hook that a great fish could feel which was not sweet smelling and good tasting.

　　不等天色大亮，他就放出了一个个鱼饵，让船随着海流漂去。有个鱼饵下沉到四十英寻的深处。第二个在七十五英寻的深处，第三个和第四个分别在蓝色海水中一百英寻和一百二十五英寻的深处。每个由新鲜沙丁鱼做的鱼饵都是头朝下的，钓钩的钩身穿进小鱼的身子，扎好，缝牢，钓钩的所有突出部分，弯钩和尖端，都给包在鱼肉里。每条沙丁鱼都用钓钩穿过双眼，这样鱼的身子在突出的钢钩上构成了半个环形。不管一条大鱼接触到钓钩的哪一部分，都是喷香而美味的。

　　The boy had given him two fresh small tunas, or albacores, which hung on the two deepest lines like plummets and, on the others, he had a big blue runner and a yellow jack that had been used before; but they were in good condition still and had the excell ent sardines to give them scent and attractiveness. Each line, as thick around as a big pencil, was looped onto a green-sapped stick so that any pull or touch on the bait would make the stick dip and each line had two forty-fathom coils which could be mad e fast to the other spare coils so that, if it were necessary, a fish could take out over three hundred fathoms of line.

　　孩子给了他两条新鲜的小金枪鱼，或者叫做长鳍金枪鱼，它们正象铅垂般挂在那两根最深的钓索上，在另外两根上，他挂上了一条蓝色大鲹鱼和一条黄色金银鱼，它们已被使用过，但依然完好，而且还有出色的沙丁鱼给它们添上香味和吸引力。每根钓索都象一支大铅笔那么粗，一端给缠在一根青皮钓竿上，这样，只要鱼在鱼饵上一拉或一碰，就能使钓竿朝下落，而每根钓索有两个四十英寻长的卷儿，它们可以牢系在其他备用的卷儿上，这一来，如果用得着的话，一条鱼可以拉出三百多英寻长的钓索。

　　Now the man watched the dip of the three sticks over the side of the skiff and rowed gently to keep the lines straight up and down and at their proper depths. It was quite light and any moment now the sun would rise.

　　这时老人紧盯着那三根挑出在小船一边的钓竿，看看有没有动静，一边缓缓地划着，使钓索保持上下笔直，停留在适当的水底深处。天相当亮了，太阳随时会升起来。