第二届“《语世界》杯”翻译大赛原文.docVIP

【翻译比赛原文】 His First Day as Quarry-BoyBy Hugh Miller (1802～1856)It was twenty years last February since I set out, a little before sunrise, to make my first acquaintance with a life of labour and restraint; and I have rarely不常, 很少地, 难得地had a heavier heart than on that morning.I was but a slim, loose-jointed（关节松弛的，自由行动的 boy at the time, fond of the pretty intangibilities（无形，不可触知） of romance, and of dreaming when broad awake; and, woful（悲伤的，不幸的） change! I was now going to work at what Burns has instanced, in his ‘Twa Dogs’, as one of the most disagreeable of all employments,—to work in a quarry. 那时，我还是个身体单薄、关节松弛的孩子，醒着的时候喜欢幻想一些遥不可及的浪漫。可悲的变化呀！现在我要去采石场干活了，彭斯Bating（减少，抑制） the passing uneasinesses（不安） occasioned（引起） by a few gloomy（悲观的，暗淡的） anticipations（预期，期盼）, the portion of my life which had already gone by had been happy beyond the common lot命运; 运气; 生活状况. I had been a wanderer among rocks and woods, a reader of curious books when I could get them, a gleaner （拾穗者）of old traditionary（传说的） stories; 我流连于岩石、树林间，读着我所能得到的稀奇古怪的书，俯拾那些古老的传奇故事；and now I was going to exchange all my day-dreams, and all my amusements（娱乐，乐趣，消遣）, for the kind of life in which men toil （长时间或辛苦地工作every day that they may be enabled to eat, and eat every day that they may be enabled to toil! 现在，我将以我所有的白日梦和乐趣换取另一种生活，一种日日辛劳以饱腹、日日饱腹以辛劳的生活。 The quarry in which I wrought（work的过去式和过去分词） lay on the southern shore of a noble inland bay, or frith狭窄的海岔,河口三角港rather, with a little clear stream on the one side, and a thick fir wood冷杉木on the other. It had been opened in the Old Red Sandstone老红砂岩of the district, and was overtopped 高出,高耸…之上by a huge bank of diluvial冲积的clay粘土，泥土, which rose over it in some places to the height of nearly thirty feet, and which at this time was rent断口，裂缝and shivered颤抖, wherever it presented an open front前开口to the weather, by a recent frost霜冻, 严寒天气. A heap (一)堆of loose fragments碎屑, which had fallen from above, blocked up the face of the quarry and my first employment was to clear them away