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It is a thing well known to both American and English whale-ships, and as well a thing placed upon authoritative record years ago by Scoresby, that some whales have been captured far north in the Pacific, in whose bodies have been found the barbs of harpoons darted in the Greenland seas.
有一件为英美捕鲸船所深知熟闻的事,也是多年以前载入斯哥斯比的权威性史册的事,那就是:若干在太平洋的极北地区所捕获的鲸,在它们身上都发现有许多是在格陵兰海上所带上的标枪钩。
Nor is it to be gainsaid, that in some of these instances it has been declared that the interval of time between the two assaults could not have exceeded very many days.
这倒不是要否认过去那种认为前后两次打击,时间不可能相隔很久的说法,
Hence, by inference, it has been believed by some whalemen, that the Nor'West Passage, so long a problem to man, was never a problem to the whale.
而是说,若干捕鲸者们相信,这个对于人类已是久成问题的西北航线,如今就推论上说来,对于大鲸却绝对不成为问题了。
So that here, in the real living experience of living men, the prodigies related in old times of the inland Strello mountain in Portugal (near whose top there was said to be a lake in which the wrecks of ships floated up to the surface);
所以,这里说明着,那种关于古代葡萄牙内地的斯特列洛山的奇迹(据说在那山顶附近,本来有个湖,其中有些浮在湖面的破船),
and that still more wonderful story of the Arethusa fountain near Syracuse (whose waters were believed to have come from the Holy Land by an underground passage);
以及关于叙拉古喷泉的水,大家都认为是通过地道来自圣地的)等等无稽的传说,
these fabulous narrations are almost fully equalled by the realities of the whalemen.
就当代人类的真实的生活经验说来,简直就跟捕鲸者的实际情形完全相同了。
Forced into familiarity, then, with such prodigies as these; and knowing that after repeated, intrepid assaults, the White Whale had escaped alive;
那么,既然类似的一些传说,已经成为众所熟知的事情,人们也知道白鲸被一再猛攻后,还是能够逃得了生命,
it cannot be much matter of surprise that some whalemen should go still further in their superstitions;
这就难怪有些捕鲸人越来越趋迷信,宣称莫比－迪克不只是无处不在的,
declaring Moby Dick not only ubiquitous, but immortal (for immortality is but ubiquity in time);
而且是不朽的(因为不朽就刚好是无处不在的);
that though groves of spears should be planted in his flanks, he would still swim away unharmed;
认为尽管它身上插遍了簇簇的枪头,它还能无恙地游走了,
or if indeed he should ever be made to spout thick blood, such a sight would be but a ghastly deception;
或者万一它确会弄得浓血猛射,这种情景也不过是一种鬼蜮伎俩而已,
for again in unensanguined billows hundreds of leagues away, his unsullied jet would once more be seen.
因为再一会儿,它那洁白的喷水,又会在几百英里外的毫无血迹的波涛中再度出现。
