第二课：Marrakech马拉喀什见闻
1 As the corpse went past the flies left the restaurant table in a cloud and rushed after it, but they came back a few minutes later.
一具尸体抬过，成群的苍蝇从饭馆的餐桌上嗡嗡而起追逐过去，但几分钟过后又飞了回来。
2 The little crowd of mourners -- all men and boys, no women--threaded their way across the market place between the piles of
pomegranates and the taxis and the camels, walling a short chant over and over again. What really appeals to the flies is that the corpses here are never put into coffins, they are merely wrapped in a piece of rag and carried on a rough wooden bier on the shoulders of four friends. When the friends get to the burying-ground they hack an oblong hole a foot or two deep, dump the body in it and fling over it a little of the dried-up, lumpy earth, which is like broken brick. No gravestone, no name, no identifying mark of any kind. The burying-ground is merely a huge waste of hummocky earth, like a derelict building-lot. After a month or two no one can even be certain where his own relatives are buried.
一支人数不多的送葬队伍——其中老少尽皆男性，没有一个女的——沿着集贸市场，从一堆堆石榴摊子以及出租汽车和骆驼中间挤道而行，一边走着一边悲痛地重复着一支短促的哀歌。苍蝇之所以群起追逐是因为在这个地方死人的尸首从不装进棺木，只是用一块破布裹着放在一个草草做成的木头架子上，有四个朋友抬着送葬。朋友们到了安葬场后，便在地上挖出一个一二英尺深的长方形坑，将尸首往坑里一倒。再扔一些像碎砖头一样的干土块。不立墓碑，不留姓名，什么识别标志都没有。坟场只不过是一片土丘林立的荒野，恰似一片已废弃不用的建筑场地。一两个月过后，就谁也说不准自己的亲人葬于何处了。
3 When you walk through a town like this -- two hundred thousand inhabitants of whom at least twenty thousand own literally nothing except the rags they stand up in-- when you see how the people live, and still
more how easily they die, it is always difficult to believe that you are walking among human beings. All colonial empires are in reality founded upon this fact. The people have brown faces--besides, there are so many of them! Are they really the same flesh as your self? Do they even have names? Or are they merely a kind of undifferentiated brown stuff, about as
individual as bees or coral insects? They rise out of the earth，they sweat and starve for a few years, and then they sink back into the nameless
mounds of the graveyard and nobody notices that they are gone. And even the graves themselves soon fade back into the soil. Sometimes, out for a walk as you break your way through the prickly pear, you notice that it is rather bumpy underfoot, and only a certain regularity in the bumps tells you that you are walking over skeletons.
当你穿行在这样的城镇——其居民20万中至少有2万是除开一身聊以蔽体的破衣烂衫之外完全一无所有——当你看到那些人是如何生活，又如何轻易地死去时，你永远难以相信自己是行走在人类之中。实际上，这是所有的殖民帝国赖以建立的基础。这里的人都有一张褐色的脸，而且，人数如此之多！他们真的和你一样同属人类吗？难道他们也会有名有姓吗？也许他们只是像彼此之间难以区分的蜜蜂或珊瑚虫一样的东西。谁也不会注意到他们的离去。就是那些小坟丘本身也过不了很久便会变成平地。有时当你外出散步，穿过仙人掌丛时，你会感觉到地上有些绊脚的东西，只有这些有规则的突起的土包才会告诉你，你正踩在死人骷髅上。
4 I was feeding one of the gazelles in the public gardens. 我正在公园里给其中一只瞪羚喂食。
5 Gazelles are almost the only animals that look good to eat when they are still alive, in fact, one can hardly look at their hindquarters without thinking of a mint sauce. The gazelle I was feeding seemed to know that this thought was in my mind, for though it took the piece of bread I was holding out it obviously did not like me. It nibbled nibbled rapidly at the bread, then lowered its head and tried to butt me, then took another nibble and then butted again. Probably its idea was that if it could drive me away
the bread would somehow remain hanging in mid-air.
动物中也恐怕只有瞪羚还活着时就让人觉得是美味佳肴。事实上，人们只要看到它们那两条后腿就会联想到薄荷酱。我现在喂着的这只瞪羚好象已经看透了我的心思。它虽然叼走了我拿在手上的一块面包，但显然不喜欢我这个人。它一面啃食着面包，一面头一低向我顶过来，再啃一下面包又顶过来一次。它大概还因为把我赶开之后那块面包仍会悬在空中。
6 An Arab navvy working on the path nearby lowered his heavy hoe and sidled slowly towards us. He looked from the gazelle to the bread and from the bread to the gazelle, with a sort of quiet amazement, as though he had never seen anything quite like this before. Finally he said shyly in French: \"1 could eat some of that bread.\"
一个正在附近小道上干活的阿拉伯挖土工放下笨重的锄头，羞怯地侧着身子慢慢朝我们走过来。他把目光从瞪羚身上移向面包，又从面包转回到瞪羚身上，带着一点惊讶的神色，似乎以前从未见过这种情景。终于，他怯生生的用法语说道：“那面包让我吃一点吧。”
7 I tore off a piece and he stowed it gratefully in some secret place under his rags. This man is an employee of the municipality.
我撕下一块面包，他感激地把面包放进破衣裳贴身的地方。这人是市政当局的雇工。
8 When you go through the Jewish Quarters you gather some idea of what the medieval ghettoes were probably like. Under their Moorish
Moorish rulers the Jews were only allowed to own land in certain restricted areas, and after centuries of this kind of treatment they have ceased to bother about overcrowding. Many of the streets are a good deal less than six feet wide, the houses are completely windowless, and sore-eyed children cluster everywhere in unbelievable numbers, like clouds of flies. Down the centre of the street there is generally running a little river of urine.
当你走过这儿的犹太人聚居区时，你就会知道中世纪犹太人区大概是个什么样子。在摩尔人的统治下，犹太人只能在划定的一些地区内保有土地。受这样的待遇经
过了好几个世纪后，他们已经不再为拥挤不堪而烦扰了。这儿很多街道的宽度远远不足六英尺，房屋根本没有窗户，眼睛红肿的孩子随处可见，多的像一群群苍蝇，数也数不清。街上往往是尿流成河。
9 In the bazaar huge families of Jews, all dressed in the long black robe and little black skull-cap, are working in dark fly-infested booths that look like caves. A carpenter sits cross-legged at a prehistoric lathe, turning chair-legs at lightning speed. He works the lathe with a bow in his right hand and guides the chisel with his left foot, and thanks to a lifetime of sitting in this position his left leg is warped out of shape. At his side his grandson, aged six, is already starting on the simpler parts of the job.
在集市上，一大家一大家的犹太人，全都身着黑色长袍，头戴黑色便帽，在看起来像洞窟一般阴暗无光，苍蝇麋集的摊篷里干活。一个木匠两脚交叉坐在一架老掉牙的车床旁，正以飞快的速度旋制椅子腿。他右手握弓开动车床，左脚引动旋刀。由于长期保持这种姿势，左脚已经弯翘变形了。他的一个年仅六岁的小孙子竟也在一旁开始帮着干一些简单的活计了。
10 I was just passing the coppersmiths' booths when somebody noticed that I was lighting a cigarette. Instantly, from the dark holes all round, there was a frenzied rush of Jews, many of them old grandfathers with flowing grey beards, all clamouring for a cigarette. Even a blind man somewhere at the back of one of the booths heard a rumour of cigarettes and came
crawling out, groping in the air with his hand. In about a minute I had used up the whole packet. None of these people, I suppose, works less than
twelve hours a day, and every one of them looks on a cigarette as a more or less impossible luxury.
我正要走过一个铜匠铺子时，突然有人发现我点着一支香烟。这一下子那些犹太人从四面八方的一个个黑洞窟里发疯似地围上来，其中有很多白胡子老汉，都吵着要讨支烟抽。甚至连一个盲人听到这讨烟的吵嚷声也从一个摊篷后面爬出来。伸手在空中乱摸。一分钟光景，我那一包香烟全分完了。我想这些人中没有谁会每天工作少于12个小时，可是他们个个都把一支香烟看成是一件十分难得的奢
侈品。
11 As the Jews live in self-contained communities they follow the same trades as the Arabs, except for agriculture. Fruit sellers, potters, silversmiths, blacksmiths, butchers, leather-workers, tailors, water-carriers, beggars,
porters -- whichever way you look you see nothing but Jews. As a matter of fact there are thirteen thousand of them, all living in the space of a few acres. A good job Hitler wasn't here. Perhaps he was on his way, however. You hear the usual dark rumours about Jews, not only from the Arabs but from the poorer Europeans.
犹太人生活在一个自给自足的社会里，他们从事阿拉伯人所从事的行业，只是没有农业。他们中有卖水果的，有陶工、银匠、铁匠、屠夫、皮匠、裁缝、运水工，还有乞丐、脚夫——放眼四顾，到处是犹太人。事实上，在这不过几英亩的空间内居住着的犹太人就足足有一万三千之多。也算这些犹太人好运气，希特勒未曾光顾这里。不过，他也许曾经准备来的。你常听到的有关犹太人的风言风语（不利传言），不仅可以从阿拉伯人那里听到，而且还可以从较穷的欧洲人那里听到。 12 \"Yes mon vieux, they took my job away from me and gave it to a Jew. The Jews! They' re the real rulers of this country, you know. They’ve got all the money. They control the banks, finance -- everything.\"
“我的老兄啊，他们把我的饭碗夺走给了犹太人。想必你也知道这些犹太人吧，他们才是这个国家真正的主宰。我们的钱都进了他们的腰包。银行、财政——一切都被他们控制住了。”
13 \"But\for about a penny an hour?\"
“可是，”我说道，“大多数普通犹太人不也是为了一点微薄的工钱而辛勤劳作的苦力吗？”
14 \"Ah, that's only for show! They' re all money lenders really. They' re cunning, the Jews.\"
“噢！那不过是做出样子来给人看的（做秀）。事实上他们都是些放债获利的富豪。
这些犹太人就是鬼得很。”
15 In just the same way, a couple of hundred years ago, poor old women used to be burned for witchcraft when they could not even work enough magic to get themselves a square meal.
与此恰恰相似的是，几百年前，常常也有些苦命的老太婆被当成巫婆给活活烧死，然而事实上她们就连为自己变出一顿象样饭菜的巫术都没有。
16 All people who work with their hands are partly invisible, and the more important the work they do, the less visible they are. Still, a white skin is always fairly conspicuous. In northern Europe, when you see a labourer ploughing a field, you probably give him a second glance. In a hot country, anywhere south of Gibraltar or east of Suez, the chances are that you don't even see him. I have noticed this again and again. In a tropical landscape one's eye takes in everything except the human beings. It takes in the
dried-up soil, the prickly pear, the palm tree and the distant mountain, but it always misses the peasant hoeing at his patch. He is the same colour as the earth, and a great deal less interesting to look at.
所有靠自己的双手干活的人一般都有点不太引人注目，他们所干的活儿越是重要，就越不为人所注目。不过，白皮肤总是比较显眼的。在北欧，若是发现田里有一个工人在耕地，你多半会再看他一眼。而在一个热带国家，直布罗陀以南或苏伊士运河以东的任何一个地方，你就可能看不到田里耕作的人。我一次又一次地注意到了这个情形。在热带地区，一切自然景色可以尽收眼底，惟独看不见人。人们可以看到干巴的土地、仙人掌、棕榈树，还有远处的群山，但往往遗漏了在地里锄地的农夫。他的肤色和土壤的颜色一样，却远远不及土壤中看。
17 It is only because of this that the starved countries of Asia and Africa are accepted as tourist resorts. No one would think of running cheap trips to the Distressed Areas. But where the human beings have brown skins their poverty is simply not noticed. What does Morocco mean to a Frenchman? An orange grove or a job in Government service. Or to an Englishman? Camels, castles, palm trees, Foreign Legionnaires, brass trays, and bandits. One could probably live there for years without noticing that for nine-tenths of the people the reality of life is an endless back-breaking struggle to wring a little
food out of an eroded soil.
正因如此，贫困潦倒的亚非国家倒成了旅游胜地。没有人会想组织游客去贫民窟去旅游，尽管费用低廉。但在居住着棕色皮肤的人的地方，他们的贫困却完全无人注意。摩洛哥对于一个法国人来说意味着什么呢？无非是一个能买到橘园或者谋取一份政府差使的地方。对于一个英国人呢？不过是骆驼、城堡、棕榈树、外籍兵团、黄铜盘子和匪徒等富于浪漫色彩的字眼而已。就算在那儿居住多年的人们也未曾注意到，对于当地百分之九十的居民而言，生活是一场为了从贫瘠的土地上榨出一点食物而进行的永无停息、艰苦卓绝的抗争。
18 Most of Morocco is so desolate that no wild animal bigger than a hare can live on it. Huge areas which were once covered with forest have turned into a treeless waste where the soil is exactly like broken-up brick. Nevertheless a good deal of it is cultivated, with frightful labour. Everything is done by hand. Long lines of women, bent double like inverted capital Ls, work their way slowly across the fields, tearing up the prickly weeds with their hands, and the peasant gathering lucerne for fodder pulls it up stalk by stalk instead of reaping it, thus saving an inch or two on each stalk. The plough is a wretched wooden thing, so frail that one can easily carry it on one's shoulder, and fitted underneath with a rough iron spike which stirs the soil to a depth of about four inches. This is as much as the strength of the animals is equal to. It is usual to plough with a cow and a donkey yoked together. Two donkeys would not be quite strong enough, but on the other hand two cows would cost a little more to feed. The peasants possess no narrows, they merely plough the soil several times over in different
directions, finally leaving it in rough furrows, after which the whole field has to be shaped with hoes into small oblong patches to conserve water. Except for a day or two after the rare rainstorms there is never enough water. A long the edges of the fields channels are hacked out to a depth of thirty or forty feet to get at the tiny trickles which run through the subsoil.
摩洛哥的土地大部分荒无人烟，能够在此存活的野生动物还没有野兔大。大片曾经有森林覆盖着的土地已经变成寸草不生的荒野，土壤如同碎砖头一般。但在人们的辛苦劳作下，相当多的土地却被开垦了出来。所有的活儿都是手工完成的。
排着长队的女人们弯着腰，像倒着的大写字母L一样，一面沿着田地慢慢往前走，一面用手拔掉带刺的野草。农民们在采集紫花苜蓿作牲口饲料时，不是用镰刀割断而是用手一株株地拔起，这样收割苜蓿剩下的一两英寸的根茎就不至于浪费。犁是木头制的劣等品，完全不结实，一个人可以轻而易举地扛在肩上。犁的底部安着一个粗糙的铁钉，它可以翻地约四英寸深。这和拉犁牲口的力量相当。通常是将一头牛和一头驴子套在一起拉犁。两头驴子的力量不够，另一方面，改用两头牛的话，所需的饲料又更多。农民们没有耕地用的耙，他们只是顺着不同的方向把地犁上几遍，犁出一道道不平的垄沟，最后再用锄头把整块地整成一块块用来蓄水的长方形小畦。除了罕见的暴风雨过后的一两天之外，其余时间这里都缺水。农民们沿着田边挖出一道道深达30或40英尺的沟渠，以便把下层土壤的涓涓细流汇聚起来。
19 Every afternoon a file of very old women passes down the road outside my house, each carrying a load of firewood. All of them are
mummified with age and the sun, and all of them are tiny. It seems to be generally the case in primitive communities that the women, when they get beyond a certain age, shrink to the size of children. One day poor creature who could not have been more than four feet tall crept past me under a vast load of wood. I stopped her and put a five-sou piece ( a little more than a farthing into her hand. She answered with a shrill wail, almost a
scream, which was partly gratitude but mainly surprise. I suppose that from her point of view, by taking any notice of her, I seemed almost to be
violating a law of nature. She accepted her status as an old woman, that is to say as a beast of burden. When a family is travelling it is quite usual to see a father and a grown-up son riding ahead on donkeys, and an old woman following on foot, carrying the baggage.
每天下午都会有一队年老的妇人背着柴火，从我家门口的那条路走过。她们都因为年纪和日晒的缘故变得如木乃伊那般干瘪，个个身材瘦小。在原始社会，通常妇女们到达一定年龄后，身材会缩成孩子般大小。有一天，一个不超过四英尺高
的可怜家伙背着重重的木头，从我面前缓缓走过。我拦住了她，往她手中塞了一个面值五个苏的钱币(约多于四分之一便士)。她的反应是一声近乎尖叫的刺耳哭喊，这喊叫部分是出于感激，但多半是诧异。我想，在她看来，我这样注意到她，几乎是违反了自然规律。她接受了自己既是老妇人，也是驮畜的社会地位。每当一家人四处远行时，通常可以看到父亲和已成年的儿子骑着驴子走在前面，而一位老妇人则背着行囊步行跟在后面。
20 But what is strange about these people is their invisibility. For
several weeks, always at about the same time of day, the file of old women had hobbled past the house with their firewood, and though they had registered themselves on my eyeballs I cannot truly say that I had seen them. Firewood was passing -- that was how I saw it. It was only that one day I happened to be walking behind them, and the curious up-and-down motion of a load of wood drew my attention to the human being beneath it. Then for the first time I noticed the poor old earth-colored bodies,
bodies reduced to bones and leathery skin, bent double under the crushing weight. Yet I suppose I had not been five minutes on Moroccan soil before I noticed the overloading of the donkeys and was infuriated by it. There is no question that the donkeys are damnably treated. The Moroccan donkey is hardly bigger than a St. Bernard dog, it carries a load which in the British Army would be considered too much for a fifteen-hands mule, and very often its packsaddle is not taken off its back for weeks together. But what is peculiarly pitiful is that it is the most willing creature on earth, it follows its master like a dog and does not need either bridle or halter. After a dozen years of devoted work it suddenly drops dead, whereupon its master tips it into the ditch and the village dogs have torn its guts out before it is cold. 然而这些人的奇特之处就在于他们无影无形。几个星期以来，每天几乎在同一个时段，都会有一队老妇人背着柴火在我房前蹒跚而过。尽管这一幕已经映人了我的眼帘，但仍然不能说我果真看到了她们。我所目睹到的只是成捆的柴火在向前蹒跚而行。直到那一天我碰巧走在她们后面的时候，我看到一捆柴火很奇怪地时上时下，这才让我注意到原来下面还有人。我这才第一次注意到这些可怜的 老
妇人的土色躯体，一些瘦得只剩皮包骨头、在重压之下弯曲变形的躯体。但是我觉得我来到摩洛哥土地还不到五分钟就已经注意到驴子的负荷过重，并为此颇感愤怒。毫无疑问，这儿的驴子受到了虐待。摩洛哥的驴子几乎和圣伯纳犬一样大小，但它承受的负荷在英国军队里让一头高约一点五米的骡子驮都嫌重，而且，它身上的驮鞍经常一连几个星期都不卸下。但是，尤其让人觉得可悲的是，摩洛哥驴子是地球上最温顺的动物。不需要安上笼头或者缰绳，它就如同一条狗一样听从主人的吩咐。拼命工作十几年后，它便倒下猝死，这时主人便把它丢进沟里，在尸体变冷之前，它的五脏六腑早已被村狗掏出来吃掉。
21 This kind of thing makes one's blood boil, whereas-- on the whole -- the plight of the human beings does not. I am not commenting, merely pointing to a fact. People with brown skins are next door to invisible.
Anyone can be sorry for the donkey with its galled back, but it is generally owing to some kind of accident if one even notices the old woman under her load of sticks.
这类事情令人义愤填膺，然而，一般而言，人的困境却没有引起同样的反响。我并不是在发表议论，而仅仅是在指出一个事实。棕色人近乎于无形。人人都会同情一头脊背磨伤的驴子，但若要注意到柴火堆下的老妇人，只能是归于某种巧合。 22 As the storks flew northward the Negroes were marching southward -- a long, dusty column, infantry , screw-gun batteries, and then more infantry, four or five thousand men in all, winding up the road with a clumping of boots and a clatter of iron wheels.
白鹳展翅北飞时，黑人却正行军南下——一列长长的、满面灰尘的行军队伍，步兵，炮兵，接着是人数更多的步兵，总共有四五千人，正靴声霍霍，轮声辘辘地蜿蜒前进。
23 They were Senegalese, the blackest Negroes in Africa, so black that sometimes it is difficult to see whereabouts on their necks the hair begins. Their splendid bodies were hidden in reach-me-down khaki uniforms, their feet squashed into boots that looked like blocks of wood, and every tin hat
seemed to be a couple of sizes too small. It was very hot and the men had marched a long way. They slumped under the weight of their packs and the curiously sensitive black faces were glistening with sweat.
他们是塞内加尔人，是非洲肤色最黑的黑人，黑得有时让人难以看清他们脖颈上的头发从何而生。他们健美的身体上穿着旧的卡其布制服，脚上套着一双看上去像木块似的靴子，头上戴着一顶码子过小的钢盔。天气非常炎热，这些黑人已经走了很长的一段路。他们疲惫不堪地背着沉重的行李，好奇敏感的脸颊上汗水闪闪发光。
24 As they went past, a tall, very young Negro turned and caught my eye. But the look he gave me was not in the least the kind of look you might expect. Not hostile, not contemptuous, not sullen, not even
inquisitive. It was the shy, wide-eyed Negro look, which actually is a look of profound respect. I saw how it was. This wretched boy, who is a French citizen and has therefore been dragged from the forest to scrub floors and catch syphilis in garrison towns, actually has feelings of reverence before a white skin. He has been taught that the white race are his masters, and he still believes it.
他们正走过时，一个高大年轻的黑人转过头，和我的目光相遇。但是他的神情完全出乎我的意料。既不是充满敌意，也不是轻蔑傲慢，不是愠怒愤恨，更不是好奇无知。那副神情腼腆羞怯、双眼圆睁，实际上蕴涵了深厚的敬意。我了解这种情况。这个可怜的男孩是法国公民，因此他从森林里被拖出来，去给驻军所在的城镇擦洗地板，并染上了梅毒。事实上他对白人充满敬意。别人给他灌输白人是主子的思想，对此他一直深信不疑。
25 But there is one thought which every white man (and in this
connection it doesn't matter twopence if he calls himself a socialist) thinks when he sees a black army marching past. \"How much longer can we go on kidding these people? How long before they turn their guns in the other direction?\"
但是每个白人(以及在这点上，那些自称是社会学家的人)在看到这群黑人行军经
过时，心中总会冒出这样一个想法。“我们还能继续愚弄这些人多久?还要多久他们的枪口就会对准我们?”
26 It was curious really. Every white man there had this thought stowed somewhere or other in his mind. I had it, so had the other onlookers, so had the officers on their sweating chargers and the white NCOS marching in the ranks. It was a kind of secret which we all knew and were too clever to tell; only the Negroes didn't know it. And really it was like watching a flock of cattle to see the long column, a mile or two miles of armed men, flowing peacefully up the road, while the great white birds drifted over them in the opposite direction, glittering like scraps of paper.
这想法真够奇怪的。在场的每个白人心里都隐藏着这样的想法。我有，其他旁观者有，骑在汗水兮兮的战马上的军官有，走在行军队伍中的军士也有。这是我们大家心里都明白但心照不宣的秘密，只有黑人才不知道。的确，看到这列一两英里长的队伍静静地前行，就好比在观看一群家畜，掠过他们头顶的大白鹳正朝着相反的方向飞去，好像片片白色碎纸一样闪闪发光。
(from Reading for Rhetoric, by Caroline Shrodes ,Clifford A. Josephson, and James R. Wilson) (选自卡罗琳·什罗茨、克利福德·A·约瑟夫森以及詹姆士·R·威尔逊合编《修辞读物》)
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