BILLY BUDD Herman Melville.docx

1、BILLY BUDD Herman MelvilleBILLY BUDD Herman Melville ArtIn placid hours well-pleased we dream,Of many a brave unbodied scheme.But form to lend, pulsed life create,What unlike things must meet and mate:A flame to melt-A wind to freeze;Humilityyet pride and scorn;Instinct and study; love and hate;Auda

2、city-reverence. These must mate,And fuse with Jacobs mystic heart,To wrestle with the Angel-Art. Billy Budd, Sailor (An inside narrative) DEDICATED To JACK CHASE ENGLISHMAN Wherever that great heart may now be Here on earth or harbored in Paradise Captain of the Maintop In the year 1843 In the U.S.

3、Frigate United StatesCHAPTER 1 IN THE time before steamships, or then more frequently than now, a stroller along the docks of any considerable sea-port would occasionally have his attention arrested by a group of bronzed mariners, man-of-wars men or merchant-sailors in holiday attire ashore on liber

4、ty. In certain instances they would flank, or, like a body-guard quite surround some superior figure of their own class, moving along with them like Aldebaran among the lesser lights of his constellation. That signal object was the Handsome Sailor of the less prosaic time alike of the military and m

5、erchant navies. With no perceptible trace of the vainglorious about him, rather with the off-hand unaffectedness of natural regality, he seemed to accept the spontaneous homage of his shipmates. A somewhat remarkable instance recurs to me. In Liverpool, now half a century ago, I saw under the shadow

6、 of the great dingy street-wall of Princes Dock (an obstruction long since removed) a common sailor, so intensely black that he must needs have been a native African of the unadulterate blood of Ham. A symmetric figure much above the average height. The two ends of a gay silk handkerchief thrown loo

7、se about the neck danced upon the displayed ebony of his chest; in his ears were big hoops of gold, and a Scotch Highland bonnet with a tartan band set off his shapely head. It was a hot noon in July; and his face, lustrous with perspiration, beamed with barbaric good humor. In jovial sallies right

8、and left, his white teeth flashing into he rollicked along, the centre of a company of his shipmates. These were made up of such an assortment of tribes and complexions as would have well fitted them to be marched up by Anacharsis Cloots before the bar of the first French Assembly as Representatives

9、 of the Human Race. At each spontaneous tribute rendered by the wayfarers to this black pagod of a fellow- the tribute of a pause and stare, and less frequent an exclamation,- the motley retinue showed that they took that sort of pride in the evoker of it which the Assyrian priests doubtless showed

10、for their grand sculptured Bull when the faithful prostrated themselves. To return. If in some cases a bit of a nautical Murat in setting forth his person ashore, the Handsome Sailor of the period in question evinced nothing of the dandified Billy-be-Damn, an amusing character all but extinct now, b

11、ut occasionally to be encountered, and in a form yet more amusing than the original, at the tiller of the boats on the tempestuous Erie Canal or, more likely, vaporing in the groggeries along the tow-path. Invariably a proficient in his perilous calling, he was also more or less of a mighty boxer or

12、 wrestler. It was strength and beauty. Tales of his prowess were recited. Ashore he was the champion; afloat the spokesman; on every suitable occasion always foremost. Close-reefing top-sails in a gale, there he was, astride the weather yard-arm-end, foot in the Flemish horse as stirrup, both hands

13、tugging at the earring as at a bridle, in very much the attitude of young Alexander curbing the fiery Bucephalus. A superb figure, tossed up as by the horns of Taurus against the thunderous sky, cheerily hallooing to the strenuous file along the spar. The moral nature was seldom out of keeping with

14、the physical make. Indeed, except as toned by the former, the comeliness and power, always attractive in masculine conjunction, hardly could have drawn the sort of honest homage the Handsome Sailor in some examples received from his less gifted associates. Such a cynosure, at least in aspect, and so

15、mething such too in nature, though with important variations made apparent as the story proceeds, was welkin-eyed Billy Budd, or Baby Budd, as more familiarly under circumstances hereafter to be given he at last came to be called, aged twenty-one, a foretopman of the British fleet toward the close o

16、f the last decade of the eighteenth century. It was not very long prior to the time of the narration that follows that he had entered the Kings Service, having been impressed on the Narrow Seas from a homeward-bound English merchantman into a seventy-four outward-bound, H.M.S. Indomitable; which shi

17、p, as was not unusual in those hurried days, having been obliged to put to sea short of her proper complement of men. Plump upon Billy at first sight in the gangway the boarding officer Lieutenant Ratcliff pounced, even before the merchantmans crew was formally mustered on the quarter-deck for his d

18、eliberate inspection. And him only he elected. For whether it was because the other men when ranged before him showed to ill advantage after Billy, or whether he had some scruples in view of the merchantman being rather short-handed, however it might be, the officer contented himself with his first

19、spontaneous choice. To the surprise of the ships company, though much to the Lieutenants satisfaction, Billy made no demur. But, indeed, any demur would have been as idle as the protest of a goldfinch popped into a cage. Noting this uncomplaining acquiescence, all but cheerful one might say, the shi

20、pmates turned a surprised glance of silent reproach at the sailor. The Shipmaster was one of those worthy mortals found in every vocation, even the humbler ones- the sort of person whom everybody agrees in calling a respectable man. And- nor so strange to report as it may appear to be- though a plou

21、ghman of the troubled waters, life-long contending with the intractable elements, there was nothing this honest soul at heart loved better than simple peace and quiet. For the rest, he was fifty or thereabouts, a little inclined to corpulence, a prepossessing face, unwhiskered, and of an agreeable c

22、olor- a rather full face, humanely intelligent in expression. On a fair day with a fair wind and all going well, a certain musical chime in his voice seemed to be the veritable unobstructed outcome of the innermost man. He had much prudence, much conscientiousness, and there were occasions when thes

23、e virtues were the cause of overmuch disquietude in him. On a passage, so long as his craft was in any proximity to land, no sleep for Captain Graveling. He took to heart those serious responsibilities not so heavily borne by some shipmasters. Now while Billy Budd was down in the forecastle getting

24、his kit together, the Indomitables Lieutenant, burly and bluff, nowise disconcerted by Captain Gravelings omitting to proffer the customary hospitalities on an occasion so unwelcome to him, an omission simply caused by preoccupation of thought, unceremoniously invited himself into the cabin, and als

25、o to a flask from the spirit-locker, a receptacle which his experienced eye instantly discovered. In fact he was one of those sea-dogs in whom all the hardship and peril of naval life in the great prolonged wars of his time never impaired the natural instinct for sensuous enjoyment. His duty he alwa

26、ys faithfully did; but duty is sometimes a dry obligation, and he was for irrigating its aridity, whensoever possible, with a fertilizing decoction of strong waters. For the cabins proprietor there was nothing left but to play the part of the enforced host with whatever grace and alacrity were pract

27、icable. As necessary adjuncts to the flask, he silently placed tumbler and water-jug before the irrepressible guest. But excusing himself from partaking just then, he dismally watched the unembarrassed officer deliberately diluting his grog a little, then tossing it off in three swallows, pushing th

28、e empty tumbler away, yet not so far as to be beyond easy reach, at the same time settling himself in his seat and smacking his lips with high satisfaction, looking straight at the host. These proceedings over, the Master broke the silence; and there lurked a rueful reproach in the tone of his voice

29、: Lieutenant, you are going to take my best man from me, the jewel of em. Yes, I know, rejoined the other, immediately drawing back the tumbler preliminary to a replenishing; Yes, I know. Sorry. Beg pardon, but you dont understand, Lieutenant. See here now. Before I shipped that young fellow, my for

30、ecastle was a rat-pit of quarrels. It was black times, I tell you, aboard the Rights here. I was worried to that degree my pipe had no comfort for me. But Billy came; and it was like a Catholic priest striking peace in an Irish shindy. Not that he preached to them or said or did anything in particul

31、ar; but a virtue went out of him, sugaring the sour ones. They took to him like hornets to treacle; all but the buffer of the gang, the big shaggy chap with the fire-red whiskers. He indeed out of envy, perhaps, of the newcomer, and thinking such a sweet and pleasant fellow, as he mockingly designat

32、ed him to the others, could hardly have the spirit of a game-cock, must needs bestir himself in trying to get up an ugly row with him. Billy forebore with him and reasoned with him in a pleasant way- he is something like myself, Lieutenant, to whom aught like a quarrel is hateful- but nothing served. So, in the second dog-watch one day the Red Whiskers in presence of the others, under pretence of showing Billy just whence a sirloin steak was cut- for the fellow had once been a butcher- insultingly gave him a dig under the ribs. Quick as lightning Billy