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Fellow Travelers

同行者

August 28th, 1931

1931年8月28日

The next day in the afternoon four of us started out for the hop-fields. The most interesting of the men with me was a youth named Ginger¹, who is still my mate when I write this. He is a strong, athletic² youth of twenty six, almost illiterate³ and quite brainless, but daring enough for anything. Except when in prison, he has probably broken the law every day for the last five years. As a boy he did three years in Borstal，came out, married at eighteen on the strength of a successful burglary, and shortly afterwards enlisted⁴ in the artillery⁵. His wife died, and a little while afterwards he had an accident to his left eye and was invalided⁶ out of the service. They offered him a pension or a lump sum, and of course he chose the lump sum and blew it alle in about a week. After that he took to burglary again' and has been in prison six times, but never for a long sentence, as they have only caught him for small jobs; he has done one or two jobs which brought him over ￡ 500. He has always been perfectly⁷ honest towards me, as his partner, but in a general way he will steal anything that is not tied down. I doubt his ever being a successful burglar, though, for he is too stupid to be able to foresee risks. It is all a great pity, for he could earn a decent living for he chose. He has a gift for street selling, and has done a lot of jobs at selling on commission, but when he has had a good day he bolts instantly with the takings. He is a marvelous hand at picking up bargains and can always, for instance, persuade the butcher to give him a pound of eatable meat for two pence, yet at the same time he is an absolute fool about money, and never saves a halfpenny. He is given to singing songs of the Little Grey Home in the West type, and he speaks of his dead wife and mother in terms of the most touching⁸ sentimentality. I should think he is a fairly typical petty criminal.

第二天下午我们一行四人开始启程，前往种植着蛇麻草的田地。和我同行的人 中最有趣的一个叫金格，当我写下这些文字的时候他仍然和我在一起。他26岁，体 格强健，朝气蓬勃，几乎一字不识，笨头笨脑，但是敢于冒险，敢做任何事。除了 在监狱的日子，他在过去5年中可能天天都在干着违法的勾当。年少时，他在少年 犯感化院待了3年，出来后凭借一次成功的盗窃在18岁时娶了妻子，后来当了炮兵。 他妻子死后不久，由于一次事故，他左眼受伤，不能继续留在军中，从此伤残退 役。军队给他提供抚恤金，有月付和一次付清两种选择，他选了后者，一周不到就 挥霍耗尽。此后他又重操旧业，开始行窃，到如今已经蹲过6次监狱，但每次都判 刑不长，因为他们只是因为小偷小摸而逮捕他。他曾经抢劫一两次，捞到了500多 英镑。因为我是他的同伴，他向来都对我开诚布公。总的说来，任何东西他都会顺手牵羊。但我怀疑他是否是一位成功的窃賊，因为他过于愚蠢，无法预知风险。我 觉得只要他愿意，他是可以过上体面生活的，这实属一大憾事。他天生擅长做街头 买卖，曾经好些次得到了销售提成呢。但是一旦有点好日子，他立即逃之夭夭。他 还是一个能买到便宜货的顶级好手，例如，他总能说服屠夫给他一磅肉，而只花两 分钱。但与此同时，对于钱财他却是一个十足的傻瓜，从来不会存得半分半子儿。 他会倾情演唱和《西边的灰色小屋》类似的感伤歌曲，当他提起死去的妻子和母亲 时，也总是声泪俱下，悲痛万分。我想他是一个极为典型的小罪犯。

Of the other two, one was a boy of twenty named Young Ginger, who seemed rather a likely lad, but he was an orphan⁹ and had had no kind of upbringing, and lived the last year chiefly on Trafalgar Square. The other was a little Liverpool Jew of eighteen, a thorough guttersnipe. I do not know when I have seen anyone who disgusted me so much as this boy. He was as greedy as a pig about food, perpetually scrounging around dustbins, and he had a face that recalled some low-down carrion-eating beast. And we could never persuade him to wash more of himself than his nose and a small circle round it, and he mentioned quite casually¹⁰ that he had several different kinds of louse on him. He too was an orphan, and had been “on the toby" almost from infancy¹¹.

至于其他两个同伴，一个20岁，名叫小金格，他看上去像个放荡不羁的小伙， 他是个孤儿，没有多少教养，过去一年主要在特拉法加广场上度过。另外一个是一 个利物浦的犹太人，18岁，完全是个流浪汉。在我见过的所有人中，我不知道是否 还有比他更令我作呕的人了。他对食物贪婪得像猪一般，总是不停地在垃圾桶边转 悠’他的脸让我想起某种低贱的以腐肉为生的野兽。我们绝不可能劝服他把自己洗 漱干净，他洗脸时总是只洗自己的鼻子和鼻子周围一圈的范围。他非常若无其事地 跟我们讲他身上长着几种不同类别的虱子。他也是一个孤儿，几乎从婴儿起就流落 街头。

课堂笔记：
1.在英国历史上，肯特郡的波斯特尔镇（Borstal)建立了一套通过惩罚、教育和职业训练 来改良少年犯的体系，1982年英国通过了《犯罪分子公正法案》，后该体系被青少年拘 留中心（youth custody¹² centers )取而代之。
2.“blow”在此表示“挥霍钱财”的意思，与此同义的英文表达还有：to spend extravagantly¹³ ； to spend money like water； to play ducks and drakes with Sth.等。
3.常用搭配“take to sth./doing sth.”表示“养成某种习惯”之意。
4.常用搭配 “be a good / great / marvelous / splendid hand at sth. / doing sth.” 的意思为“是某方面的好手”。词组“pick up”在此表示“够买，买到”之意，“bargain”表示“便宜 货”的含义。
5.歌曲“Little Grey Home in the West”(《西边的灰色小屋》）创作于1911年，是一首曾经流行于第一次世界大战期间的感伤歌曲。句子“sb. be given to doing sth.”表示“某人 尽全力做某事”。
6.特拉法尔加广场（Trafalgar Square)，英国伦敦著名的广场，坐落在伦敦市中心，不远 处是王宫。适中的地理位置和美丽的广场建筑，使它成为伦敦的名胜之一。特拉法尔加 广场是为纪念著名的特拉法尔加港海战而修建的。
7.toby是“街道，道路”之意，“on the toby”即“流落街头”的意思。