Look! here, far water-locked; beyond all hum of human weal or woe; in these most candid and impartial seas; where to traditions no rocks furnish tablets; where for long Chinese ages, the billows have still rolled on speechless and unspoken to, as stars that shine upon the Niger's unknown source; here, too, life dies sunwards full of faith, but see! no sooner dead, than death whirls round the corpse, and it heads some other way.
瞧!老远的那个大水闸闸住了;听不到人间祸福的营营声;在这个最公正无私的海洋上;根据传说,那里没有可以立纪念碑的石块,那里的波涛跟中国的开国年代一般久远,依然在不声不响地滚滚起伏,一如那些照耀着尼加(尼加——非洲中西部的河名。)那条人所未知的河流的星星;在这里,生命也是充满忠诚地面向太阳而逝;可是,看呀,一完了蛋,死神就在死尸周围打了一转,然后向着其它方向转去——。
Oh, thou dark Hindoo half of nature, who of drowned bones hast builded thy separate throne somewhere in the heart of these unverdured seas; thou art an infidel, thou queen, and too truly speakest to me in the wide-slaughtering Typhoon, and the hushed burial of its after calm. Nor has this thy whale sunwards turned his dying head, and then gone round again, without a lesson to me.
你这个难解畸形的印度神呀,你用淹死了的骸骨,在这个光秃秃的大海中心的什么地方建起你那单独的宝座;你是个异教徒,你的皇后在凶残的飓风里老老实实地告诉过我了,飓风平息后也就寂然无声了。你这大鲸呀,以行将要死的头向着太阳,倒是给了我一个教训。
Oh, trebly hooped and welded hip of power! Oh, high aspiring, rainbowed jet! — that one strivest, this one jettest all in vain! In vain, oh whale, dost thou seek intercedings with yon all-quickening sun, that only calls forth life, but gives it not again.
啊,深沟高垒披坚执锐的强者!啊,巍然高耸、虹彩似的喷水!——那一个在拚命挣扎,这一个却在徒劳地喷水!枉费的呀,鲸啊,你想跟那个能够唤起生命、非常富有生气的太阳求情讨饶,它现在却再也起不了作用了。