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我亲爱的天使，你真是会指责别人呀。" "It's provoking to be talked to in that way."" 我讨厌你这么说话。" "Then, how will you be talked to? I'll talk to order,--any way you'll mention,--only to give satisfaction."" 那你希望我怎么说呢？您就尽管吩咐吧，只要您高兴，我一定听从。" A gay laugh from the court rang through the silken curtains of the verandah. St. Clare stepped out, and lifting up the curtain, laughed too. 这时，从门廊里的丝绸帘子透过一阵欢快的笑声，这笑声是从院子里传过来的。圣克莱尔走到门廊掀起帘子，看了看，也笑了起来。 "What is it?" said Miss Ophelia, coming to the railing. " 怎么回事？"奥菲利亚小姐朝栏杆走了过去。 
此时，汤姆正坐在院子里长满青苔的凳子上，衣服上所有的扣眼都插满了茉莉花，伊娃在旁边一边笑着，一边朝汤姆的脖上挂上一串玫瑰花环，随后她在汤姆的膝上坐了下来，像一只麻雀大笑个不停。 "O, Tom, you look so funny!"" 汤姆，你看上去真是好玩极了。" Tom had a sober, benevolent smile, and seemed, in his quiet way, to be enjoying the fun quite as much as his little mistress. He lifted his eyes, when he saw his master, with a half-deprecating, apologetic air. 汤姆没有说话，脸上挂着憨厚、善良的笑容，看得出来，他和小主人一样正享受着同样的快乐。当他看见自己的主人时，不好意思地略带歉意地抬起了头。 "How can you let her?" said Miss Ophelia." 你怎么可以让她这样呢？"奥菲利亚小姐问道。 "Why not?" said St. Clare." 为什么不可以呢？"圣克莱尔反问道。 
我也说不清为什么，可这样实在是太不像话了。" "You would think no harm in a child's caressing a large dog, even if he was black; but a creature that can think, and reason, and feel, and is immortal, you shudder at; confess it, cousin. I know the feeling among some of you northerners well enough. Not that there is a particle of virtue in our not having it; but custom with us does what Christianity ought to do,--obliterates the feeling of personal prejudice. I have often noticed, in my travels north, how much stronger this was with you than with us. You loathe them as you would a snake or a toad, yet you are indignant at their wrongs. You would not have them abused; but you don't want to have anything to do with them yourselves. You would send them to Africa, out of your sight and smell, and then send a missionary or two to do up all the self-denial of elevating them compendiously. Isn't that it?"" 如果孩子玩的是只大狗，就算是只黑狗吧，你就不会觉得有什么不妥了。可如果是个人，那就不一样了，因为他有思想，有理性，有感情和不灭的灵魂，是这样吧，堂姐，我对某些北方人的情感太了解了。我不是说南方人没有这种情感，因而品质上就怎么高贵了，只是我们的风俗习惯和基督教教义有不谋而合的地方罢了--那就是尽量避免个人的成见。我在北方旅行的时候，看到太多这样的现象，你们北方人对黑种人的歧视远远超过我们南方人。你们讨厌他们就如同讨厌蛇或癞蛤蟆一样，可他们的遭遇又让你们感到愤怒。你们不能容忍他们受到种种虐待，却又在极力避开他们。你们宁愿将他们送回非洲去，眼不见心不烦，然后再派一两个传教士去做自我牺牲，承担改造他们的任务，是这样吗？" "Well, cousin," said Miss Ophelia, thoughtfully, "there may be some truth in this."" 堂弟，你的话的确有些道理。"奥菲利亚小姐若有所思地说。 "What would the poor and lowly do, without children?" said St. Clare, leaning on the railing, and watching Eva, as she tripped off, leading Tom with her. "Your little child is your only true democrat. Tom, now is a hero to Eva; his stories are wonders in her eyes, his songs and Methodist hymns are better than an opera, and the traps and little bits of trash in his pocket a mine of jewels, and he the most wonderful Tom that ever wore a black skin. This is one of the roses of Eden that the Lord has dropped down expressly for the poor and lowly, who get few enough of any other kind."" 如果没有孩子们，这些生活穷苦、出身卑贱的人们该怎样活呢？"圣克莱尔说道，他倚着栏杆，看着伊娃领着汤姆走开了。"孩子是真正的民主主义者。对伊娃来说，汤姆是英雄。在她看来，汤姆讲的故事充满着神奇色彩，他唱的歌和卫理公会赞美诗比歌剧还要动听，口袋里那些不值钱的小玩意简直就是一座宝藏。而汤姆呢，则是一个黑色皮肤的最神奇的人。孩子是上帝特意送给那些穷苦卑贱的人的，就像伊甸园里的玫瑰花，他们从别处获得的快乐实在太少了。" "It's strange, cousin," said Miss Ophelia, "one might almost think you were a _professor_, to hear you talk."" 奇怪，堂弟，听你这么一番话，别人都会以为你是个理学家。" 
理学家？"圣克莱尔不解地问道。 "Yes; a professor of religion."" 宗教理学家，难道不是吗？" "Not at all; not a professor, as your town-folks have it; and, what is worse, I'm afraid, not a _practiser_, either."" 根本不是这样，我既不是你们所说的理学家，也不是什么实践家，这点恐怕更糟糕。" "What makes you talk so, then?"" 那你为什么说那么一番话呢？" "Nothing is easier than talking," said St. Clare. "I believe Shakespeare makes somebody say, `I could sooner show twenty what were good to be done, than be one of the twenty to follow my own showing.'[1] Nothing like division of labor. My forte lies in talking, and yours, cousin, lies in doing."" 还有什么事情比嘴巴上夸夸其谈来得更容易呢？我记得莎士比亚笔下有一个人物这么说过，'教诲十二人做人的道理远比按自己的教诲去做那十二个人容易得多。'因此最好是分工合作，我擅长于说，而堂姐你呢，则擅长于做。" 
从表面上看，汤姆目前的状况是没有什么可以值得抱怨的了，这正如人们爱说的那样。伊娃出于纯真的天性和本能的感激，十分喜爱汤姆，她向父亲请求让汤姆做她的特别陪伴，只要她出外散步或者坐车上街，需要一个仆人陪伴的时候，就让汤姆来陪她。所以，汤姆被告知，凡是伊娃小姐需要他陪伴时，他就可以把其他所有事情放在一边，读者可以想象汤姆对这样的吩咐绝对不会不满意的。他的衣着总是整整齐齐，圣克莱尔对这点非常挑剔并且给予坚持。他在马厩里的活十分清闲，每天只需要去照料巡视一番，指挥那个下手怎么干活就可以了。因为玛丽声称，汤姆到她身边的时候，不能让她闻到一丁点儿牲口的气味，所以凡是容易沾上这种让她不快活的气味的活，他都不能做。玛丽的神经系统对这种气味完全不能适应，照她自己的说法，哪怕是一点点这种臭味，她简直就活不下去了，世间的一切痛苦也就会随之完结。因而汤姆总是穿着一身刷得非常干净的毛葛衣服，头戴一顶光亮的獭皮帽，脚穿一双乌黑发亮的皮鞋，领口和袖口干干净净，这套行头加上他那庄严而又不失和蔼的黑脸庞，使人一见不由得生出敬意，因为他的样子太像是一位古代非洲迦太基的大主教。 Then, too, he was in a beautiful place, a consideration to which his sensitive race was never indifferent; and he did enjoy with a quiet joy the birds, the flowers, the fountains, the perfume, and light and beauty of the court, the silken hangings, and pictures, and lustres, and statuettes, and gilding, that made the parlors within a kind of Aladdin's palace to him. 汤姆以他那黑种人独有的灵敏感觉，对自己所处的如此美丽的环境，是绝对不会视而不见的。他愉快地欣赏着那些鸟啊，花啊，泉水啊等等景致，欣赏着庭院里的种种美丽，欣赏着那些丝绸帘子、油画、烛台、雕塑以及金碧辉煌的色彩，所有这一切使得这些厅堂在汤姆的眼里成了阿拉丁的宫殿。 If ever Africa shall show an elevated and cultivated race,--and come it must, some time, her turn to figure in the great drama of human improvement.--life will awake there with a gorgeousness and splendor of which our cold western tribes faintly have conceived. In that far-off mystic land of gold, and gems, and spices, and waving palms, and wondrous flowers, and miraculous fertility, will awake new forms of art, new styles of splendor; and the negro race, no longer despised and trodden down, will, perhaps, show forth some of the latest and most magnificent revelations of human life. Certainly they will, in their gentleness, their lowly docility of heart, their aptitude to repose on a superior mind and rest on a higher power, their childlike simplicity of affection, and facility of forgiveness. In all these they will exhibit the highest form of the peculiarly _Christian life_, and, perhaps, as God chasteneth whom he loveth, he hath chosen poor Africa in the furnace of affliction, to make her the highest and noblest in that kingdom which he will set up, when every other kingdom has been tried, and failed; for the first shall be last, and the last first. 将来有一天如果阿非利加民族成为一个先进的文明种族，那么非洲大陆将会兴起一种辉煌灿烂的文明，而这一天终将会来到的，人类进化的伟大历史进程中总会有非洲民族大显身手的机会，而他们创造的文明在我们这些冷静的西方人的脑海里只是曾经有过一点模糊的影子罢了。在那片遥远而神秘的土地上，到处是黄金、珠宝和香料，遍地都生长着奇花异草，还有那随风摇曳的棕榈树。而在这片土地上还将孕育出崭新的艺术和风格。那个时候，这里的人民将不再受到压迫和歧视，他们一定会为人类的生活带来最新最美的启示。他们之所以能做到这些是由于这个民族生来淳朴、善良、谦逊，更容易相信万能的上帝，领会他的智慧，遵从他的意志。他们那如孩童般的纯洁爱心使他们能够宽以待人。他们将在这些方面体现出一种最崇高最特别的基督精神。非洲人民是一个处于水深火热之中的苦难民族，因为上帝对自己深爱的选民总要给以惩罚。在上帝将要建立的天国里（一切别的国度都曾试图建造这个天国，可都失败了），非洲人将被放置在最高贵的位置，因为到那个时候，原本在前的将要在后，原本在后的将要在前。
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