登陆注册
19619200000011

第11章 II. MIDSUMMER-DAY'S DREAM.(3)

It was not the most advisable thing, as I have allowed, but it was inevitable, and it afforded them a spectacle which is by no means wanting in sublimity, and which is certainly unique,--the spectacle of that great city on a hot day, defiant of the elements, and prospering on with every form of labor, and at a terrible cost of life. The man carrying the hod to the top of the walls that rankly grow and grow as from his life's blood, will only lay down his load when he feels the mortal glare of the sun blaze in upon heart and brain; the plethoric millionaire for whom he toils will plot and plan in his office till he swoons at the desk; the trembling beast must stagger forward while the flame-faced tormentor on the box has strength to lash him on; in all those vast palaces of commerce there are ceaseless sale and purchase, packing and unpacking, lifting up and laying down, arriving and departing loads; in thousands of shops is the unspared and unsparing weariness of selling; in the street, filled by the hurry and suffering of tens of thousands, is the weariness of buying.

Their afternoon's experience was something that Basil and Isabel could, when it was past, look upon only as a kind of vision, magnificent at times, and at other times full of indignity and pain. They seemed to have dreamed of a long horse-car pilgrimage through that squalid street by the river-side, where presently they came to a market, opening upon the view hideous vistas of carnage, and then into a wide avenue, with processions of cars like their own coming and going up and down the centre of a foolish and useless breadth, which made even the tall buildings (rising gauntly up among the older houses of one or two stories) on either hand look low, and let in the sun to bake the dust that the hot breaths of wind caught up and gent swirling into the shabby shops. Here they dreamed of the eternal demolition and construction of the city, and farther on of vacant lots full of granite boulders, clambered over by goats. In their dream they had fellow-passengers, whose sufferings made them odious and whom they were glad to leave behind when they alighted from the car, and running out of the blaze of the avenue, quenched themselves in the shade of the cross-street. A little strip of shadow lay along the row of brown-stone fronts, but there were intervals where the vacant lots cast no shadow. With great bestowal of thought they studied hopelessly how to avoid these spaces as if they had been difficult torrents or vast expanses of desert sand; they crept slowly along till they came to such a place, and dashed swiftly across it, and then, fainter than before, moved on. They seemed now and then to stand at doors, and to be told that people were out and again that they were in; and they had a sense of cool dark parlors, and the airy rustling of light-muslined ladies, of chat and of fans and ice-water, and then they came forth again; and evermore "The day increased from heat to heat"

At last they were aware of an end of their visits, and of a purpose to go down town again, and of seeking the nearest car by endless blocks of brown-stone fronts, which with their eternal brownstone flights of steps, and their handsome, intolerable uniformity, oppressed them like a procession of houses trying to pass a given point and never getting by.

Upon these streets there was, seldom a soul to be seen, so that when their ringing at a door had evoked answer, it had startled them with a vague, sad surprise. In the distance on either hand they could see cars and carts and wagons toiling up and down the avenues, and on the next intersecting pavement sometimes a laborer with his jacket slung across his shoulder, or a dog that had plainly made up his mind to go mad. Up to the time of their getting into one of those phantasmal cars for the return down-townwards they had kept up a show of talk in their wretched dream; they had spoken of other hot days that they had known elsewhere; and they had wondered that the tragical character of heat had been so little recognized. They said that the daily New York murder might even at that moment be somewhere taking place; and that no murder of the whole homicidal year could have such proper circumstance; they morbidly wondered what that day's murder would be, and in what swarming tenement-house, or den of the assassin streets by the river-sides,--if indeed it did not befall in some such high, close-shuttered, handsome dwelling as those they passed, in whose twilight it would be so easy to strike down the master and leave him undiscovered and unmourned by the family ignorantly absent at the mountains or the seaside. They conjectured of the horror of midsummer battles, and pictured the anguish of shipwrecked men upon a tropical coast, and the grimy misery of stevedores unloading shiny cargoes of anthracite coal at city docks. But now at last, as they took seats opposite one another in the crowded car, they seemed to have drifted infinite distances and long epochs asunder. They looked. hopelessly across the intervening gulf, and mutely questioned when it was and from what far city they or some remote ancestors of theirs had set forth upon a wedding journey. They bade each other a tacit farewell, and with patient, pathetic faces awaited the end of the world.

同类推荐
  • 角力记

    角力记

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 类边长安志

    类边长安志

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 相和歌辞·王昭君

    相和歌辞·王昭君

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 平书订

    平书订

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 一切道经音义妙门由起

    一切道经音义妙门由起

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
热门推荐
  • 读名人传记悟平凡人生

    读名人传记悟平凡人生

    本书选定的名人,每一个人物,均有充分的历史依据,具体说有五条标准:其一,贡献大小;其二,口碑影响;其三,浩然正气;其四,创始影响;其五,警世取喻。在入选的这些名人中,严格按前述五条标准,再加一个分类遴选对世界历史进程产生重大影响的人物,分为若干类,每类按时间顺序排列,用以勾勒人类文明进程的历史轨迹,比单纯的排序具有历史内涵与启发意义。他们或是引领社会潮流的思想巨擘,或是运筹帷幄的政治领袖,或是评点世间万象的文坛泰斗,或是影响后世的科学巨人,或是撩亮人心的艺术巨匠,或是富甲天下的工商巨头,或是影响世人的传奇英雄,林林总总,横贯全世界、全人类。
  • 兰陵如梦

    兰陵如梦

    意外的来到,意外的遇见,意外的发生.闭上眼回味,轻轻地拨动心弦,如梦。
  • 仙难求

    仙难求

    自太古时期,修仙者中十万人有一人成仙,仙难成,太古一劫,断了仙路,仙人不显于世,亿万人中无一人成仙,仙难求,若无法成仙,又如何修仙?
  • 医品嫡女

    医品嫡女

    她一个现代军医,一场意外穿越到玄月国纨绔太师之女花了了的身体里面,渣男渣女在身边,恶毒继母如猛虎,她四面楚歌,皇帝一道圣旨让她嫁给残废王!坑爹啊!残废王居然还要杀她,可是身体自带系统居然要她救他?切!她才不救呢,可是……【情节虚构,请勿模仿】
  • 嫩草我染

    嫩草我染

    大哥你行行好,收留我了吧,我会做的事情有很多,我能打字,能复印,能修灯泡下水道;会做饭,会暖床,会搬梯子上房梁。文能妙笔生花,武能二等擒拿,跳芭蕾把狗溜,边发短信开宝马。如今女子不娇娘,敢跟男人抢新郎。求大哥您就收留我了吧。”情节虚构,切勿模仿。
  • 星武战圣

    星武战圣

    浩瀚的的星空中神灵林立,苍茫的大地上奇才辈出。前行的道路上百折不挠,逆天改命,与人斗,与神斗,与天斗!纵然九死一生也无怨无悔,神挡杀神,佛阻灭佛。就算远古万神重临大地,使得斗转星移,也要偷天换日,铸就出不灭战躯,战!战!战!
  • 末世之绝境逢生

    末世之绝境逢生

    宅男在这时代是普遍存在的,作为一名资深宅男,除了上学就是呆在家里看动漫,电影。而这天,发生的一切彻底的改变了我的命运
  • 极品宠妃

    极品宠妃

    敌国的军队兵临城下,顾鸾不顾自己已有身孕,瞒着紫瑶华,决定代替紫瑶华出征。战场上,成凤萧还有路平遥不想跟顾鸾为敌,不一会发现紫瑶华穿着同样的战服出来应战。战事激烈,战场上双方死伤无数,双方算作平手,顾鸾要挟士兵,不论怎么样都要出去,见到重伤的紫瑶华,顾鸾伤心不已。在紫瑶华重伤期间,顾鸾决定亲自诱敌,在一番角逐之后顾鸾假意被抓,来到苏慕言埋伏的地方,两人中计,于是路平遥丢下盟友逃跑,撤兵回到东平国,只剩成凤萧。南诏国与西黎国正式签订了附属国条约。此后,两人成为一段佳话。
  • 蝴蝶掠过:时光悄悄流逝

    蝴蝶掠过:时光悄悄流逝

    世外依然喧嚣,所有的一切都在不停地轮回。“呐,千年以后,你们还会记得我吗?”
  • 仙武迷途

    仙武迷途

    凡人百年,恩怨纠葛,沧桑历尽,大限一到尘归土;武者一生,与天争,与人争,与己争;仙人一世,波谲诡异,向天争命。异地醒来、身无长物,本只打算默默一生的紫陌身边却是意外连连、屡遭逼迫、身不由己,且看沉默寡言的他如何在沉默中发出属于自己的怒吼。