血字的研究-Chapter 21

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答应了信奉摩门教徒的宗教信仰后，名为John Ferrier的中年男子带着他认的义女Lucy Ferrier，成功跟随着摩门教徒一起，逃出了荒漠。

Chapter 21

THIS is not the place to commemorate the trials and privations endured by the immigrant Mormons before they came to their final haven.

From the shores of the Mississippi（密西西比，美国州名）to the western slopes of the Rocky Mountains（落基山脉）they had struggled on with a constancy almost unparalleled（空前的）in history.

The savage man, and the savage beast, hunger, thirst, fatigue, and disease—every impediment which Nature could place in the way, had all been overcome with Anglo-Saxon tenacity（坚韧不屈）.

Yet the long journey and the accumulated terrors had shaken the hearts of the stoutest among them.

There was not one who did not sink upon his knees in heartfelt prayer when they saw the broad valley of Utah（犹他，美国州名）bathed in the sunlight beneath them, and learned from the lips of their leader that this was the promised land, and that these virgin acres（处女地）were to be theirs for evermore.

Young speedily proved himself to be a skilful administrator as well as a resolute chief.

Maps were drawn and charts prepared, in which the future city was sketched out.

All around farms were apportioned and allotted in proportion to the standing of each individual.

The tradesman was put to his trade and the artisan to his calling（职业）.

In the town streets and squares sprang up, as if by magic.

In the country there was draining and hedging（围篱）, planting and clearing, until the next summer saw the whole country golden with the wheat crop.

Everything prospered in the strange settlement.

Above all, the great temple which they had erected in the centre of the city grew ever taller and larger.

From the first blush of dawn until the closing of the twilight, the clatter of the hammer and the rasp of the saw were never absent from the monument which the immigrants erected to Him who had led them safe through many dangers.

The two castaways, John Ferrier and the little girl who had shared his fortunes and had been adopted as his daughter, accompanied the Mormons to the end of their great pilgrimage（朝圣者的旅程）.

Little Lucy Ferrier was borne along pleasantly enough in Elder Stangerson's waggon, a retreat which she shared with the Mormon's three wives and with his son, a headstrong forward boy of twelve.

Having rallied（恢复精神）, with the elasticity of childhood, from the shock caused by her mother's death, she soon became a pet with the women, and reconciled herself to this new life in her moving canvas-covered home.

In the meantime Ferrier having recovered from his privations, distinguished himself as a useful guide and an indefatigable（不知疲倦的）hunter.

So rapidly did he gain the esteem of his new companions, that when they reached the end of their wanderings, it was unanimously agreed that he should be provided with as large and as fertile a tract of land as any of the settlers, with the exception of Young himself, and of Stangerson, Kemball, Johnston, and Drebber, who were the four principal Elders.

On the farm thus acquired John Ferrier built himself a substantial log-house, which received so many additions in succeeding years that it grew into a roomy villa.

He was a man of a practical turn of mind（性情）, keen in his dealings and skilful with his hands.

His iron constitution enabled him to work morning and evening at improving and tilling his lands.

Hence it came about that his farm and all that belonged to him prospered exceedingly.

In three years he was better off than his neighbours, in six he was well-to-do, in nine he was rich, and in twelve there were not half a dozen men in the whole of Salt Lake City who could compare with him.

From the great inland sea to the distant Wahsatch Mountains there was no name better known than that of John Ferrier.

There was one way and only one in which he offended the susceptibilities（脆弱的情感）of his co-religionists.

No argument or persuasion could ever induce him to set up a female establishment after the manner of his companions.

He never gave reasons for this persistent refusal, but contented himself by resolutely and inflexibly adhering to his determination.

There were some who accused him of lukewarmness（不热情）in his adopted religion, and others who put it down to greed of wealth and reluctance to incur expense.

Others, again, spoke of some early love affair, and of a fair-haired girl who had pined away on the shores of the Atlantic.

Whatever the reason, Ferrier remained strictly celibate（独身的）.

In every other respect he conformed to the religion of the young settlement, and gained the name of being an orthodox and straight- walking man.

Lucy Ferrier grew up within the log-house, and assisted her adopted father in all his undertakings.

The keen air of the mountains and the balsamic（如香油的）odour of the pine trees took the place of nurse and mother to the young girl.

As year succeeded to year she grew taller and stronger, her cheek more rudy, and her step more elastic.

Many a wayfarer upon the high road which ran by Ferrier's farm felt long-forgotten thoughts revive in their mind as they watched her lithe girlish figure tripping through the wheatfields, or met her mounted upon her father's mustang, and managing it with all the ease and grace of a true child of the West.

So the bud blossomed into a flower, and the year which saw her father the richest of the farmers left her as fair a specimen（标本）of American girlhood as could be found in the whole Pacific slope.

It was not the father, however, who first discovered that the child had developed into the woman.

It seldom is in such cases.

That mysterious change is too subtle（不明显的）and too gradual to be measured by dates.

Least of all does the maiden herself know it until the tone of a voice or the touch of a hand sets her heart thrilling within her, and she learns, with a mixture of pride and of fear, that a new and a larger nature has awoken within her.

There are few who cannot recall that day and remember the one little incident which heralded the dawn of a new life.

In the case of Lucy Ferrier the occasion was serious enough in itself, apart from its future influence on her destiny and that of many besides.

It was a warm June morning, and the Latter Day Saints（摩门教徒）were as busy as the bees whose hive they have chosen for their emblem（徽章）.

In the fields and in the streets rose the same hum of human industry.

Down the dusty high roads defiled long streams of heavily-laden mules（骡子）, all heading to the west, for the gold fever had broken out in California, and the Overland Route lay through the City of the Elect.

There, too, were droves of sheep and bullocks coming in from the outlying pasture lands, and trains of tired immigrants, men and horses equally weary of their interminable（冗长的）journey.

Through all this motley assemblage, threading her way with the skill of an accomplished rider, there galloped Lucy Ferrier, her fair face flushed with the exercise and her long chestnut hair floating out behind her.

She had a commission from her father in the City, and was dashing in as she had done many a time before,

With all the fearlessness of youth, thinking only of her task and how it was to be performed.

The travel-stained adventurers gazed after her in astonishment, and even the unemotional Indians, journeying in with their pelties（剥下的动物皮毛）, relaxed their accustomed stoicism as they marvelled at the beauty of the pale-faced maiden.

（1261 words）

-今日短语-

1. struggled on挣扎下去

2. spring up出现

3. reconciled to接受

4. turn of mind性情

5. better off经济状况好的

6. adhering to坚持于

7. conform to遵从

8. marvelled at感到惊叹

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