英语听书《白鲸记》第875期

But will any whaleman believe these stories? No. The whale of to-day is as big as his ancestors in Pliny's time. And if ever I go where Pliny is, I, a whaleman (more than he was), will make bold to tell him so. Because I cannot understand how it is, that while the Egyptian mummies that were buried thousands of years before even Pliny was born, do not measure so much in their coffins as a modern Kentuckian in his socks; and while the cattle and other animals sculptured on the oldest Egyptian and Nineveh tablets, by the relative proportions in which they are drawn, just as plainly prove that the high-bred, stall-fed, prize cattle of Smithfield, not only equal, but far exceed in magnitude the fattest of Pharaoh's fat kine; in the face of all this, I will not admit that of all animals the whale alone should have degenerated.

但是，可有任何一个捕鱼人相信这些说法么？没有。现代的鲸正跟普利尼时代的它的祖先一般大小。如果我能够跑到普利尼那地方去，我，作为一个捕鲸人（这就比他强了），一定会斗胆跟他这样说。因为我就不明白：为什么那些甚至早在普利尼还未出世的几千年前就埋葬起的、已在棺材里的埃及木乃伊，其大小甚至还不及那些穿着轻软鞋的现代的肯塔基人，同时，为什么那些雕刻在古埃及和尼尼微的石碑上的牲畜动物（就所雕刻的相对的比例说来），恰好明明白白地证明出那种斯密斯非尔德（斯密斯非尔德——十二世纪开始的伦敦斯密斯非尔德区的一个著名牲畜市场。据说在一八四九年，在每周售出的四千只畜群中，每只平均重量为六百四十磅。）的纯种、用干草饲养的超等牲畜，不仅在体躯上相等于、而且远超于法老时代的肥大的母牛（参阅《旧约·创世记》第四十一章一至三十三节，法老梦见七只肥牛，又梦见七只瘦牛，随后召约瑟来解梦。约瑟说七年是丰年，七年是荒年。），在这一切事实面前，我不承认在各种动物中，独独大鲸竟会退化了。

But still another inquiry remains; one often agitated by the more recondite Nantucketers. Whether owing to the almost omniscient look-outs at the mast-heads of the whaleships, now penetrating even through Behring's straits, and into the remotest secret drawers and lockers of the world; and the thousand harpoons and lances darted along all continental coasts; the moot point is, whether Leviathan can long endure so wide a chase, and so remorseless a havoc; whether he must not at last be exterminated from the waters, and the last whale, like the last man, smoke his last pipe, and then himself evaporate in the final puff.

但是，还有另一个值得追究的问题，也是一个经常为那些比较高深的南塔开特人所提出的问题。究竟是否因为捕鲸船桅顶上那些几乎是无所不知的守望者，一会儿甚至长驱直入白令海峡，一会儿又冲进了世界的最荒僻的角角落落；无数的标枪和捕鲸枪都掷遍了各处的海岸的缘故；值得讨论的地方就是，究竟鲸能否长期经受得起这样无所不至的追击，这样无情的打击；还是到头来它一定不会从海里绝迹，而那条最后的鲸，也不至于象一个最后的人那样，吸起他的最后一筒烟后，就此连他自己也在最后一口烟里烟消雾散了呢。

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