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In reality they all lived in a kind of hieroglyphic world, where the real thing was never said or done or even thought,
他们实际上都生活在一种用符号表示的天地里，在那里真实的事情从来不说、不做，甚至也不想，
but only represented by a set of arbitrary signs;
而只是用一套随心所欲的符号来表示；
as when Mrs. Welland, who knew exactly why Archer had pressed her to announce her daughter's engagement at the Beaufort ball
就像韦兰太太那样，她十分清楚阿切尔为什么催她在博福特的舞会上宣布女儿的订婚消息
(and had indeed expected him to do no less),
（而且她确实也希望他那样做），
yet felt obliged to simulate reluctance, and the air of having had her hand forced,
却认为必须假装不情愿，装出勉为其难的样子，
quite as, in the books on Primitive Man that people of advanced culture were beginning to read,
这颇似文化超前的人们开始阅读的关于原始人的书中描绘的情景：
the savage bride is dragged with shrieks from her parents' tent.
原始时代未开化的新娘是尖叫着被人从父母的帐篷里拖走的。
The result, of course, was that the young girl who was the centre of this elaborate system of mystification
其结果必然是，处于精心策划的神秘体制中心的年轻姑娘
remained the more inscrutable for her very frankness and assurance.
因为坦诚与自信反而越发不可思议。
She was frank, poor darling, because she had nothing to conceal, assured because she knew of nothing to be on her guard against;
她坦诚——可怜的宝贝——因为她没有什么需要隐瞒；她自信，因为她不知道有什么需要防范；
and with no better preparation than this, she was to be plunged overnight into what people evasively called "the facts of life."
仅仅有这点准备，一夜之间她便投身于人们含糊称谓的“生活常规”之中去了。
The young man was sincerely but placidly in love.
阿切尔真诚却又冷静地坠人爱河，
He delighted in the radiant good looks of his betrothed, in her health, her horsemanship, her grace and quickness at games,
他喜爱未婚妻光华照人的容貌、她的身体、她的马术、她在游戏中的优雅与敏捷，
and the shy interest in books and ideas that she was beginning to develop under his guidance.
以及在他指导下刚刚萌发的对书籍与思想的兴趣。
(She had advanced far enough to join him in ridiculing the Idyls of the King, but not to feel the beauty of Ulysses and the Lotus Eaters.)
（她已经进步到能与他一起嘲笑《国王牧歌》，但尚不能感受《尤利西斯》与《食忘忧果者》的美妙。）
She was straightforward, loyal and brave;
她直爽、忠诚、勇敢，
she had a sense of humour (chiefly proved by her laughing at HIS jokes);
并且有幽默感（主要证明是听了他的笑话后大笑）。
and he suspected, in the depths of her innocently-gazing soul, a glow of feeling that it would be a joy to waken.
他推测，在她天真、专注的心灵深处有一种热烈的感情，唤醒它是一种快乐。
But when he had gone the brief round of her he returned discouraged by the thought that all this frankness and innocence were only an artificial product.
然而对她进行一番解剖之后，他重又变得气馁起来，因为他想到，所有这些坦率与天真只不过是人为的产物。
Untrained human nature was not frank and innocent;
未经驯化的人性是不坦率、不天真的，
it was full of the twists and defences of an instinctive guile.
而是出自本能的狡猾，充满了怪僻与防范。
And he felt himself oppressed by this creation of factitious purity,
他感到自己就受到这种人造的假纯洁的折磨。
so cunningly manufactured by a conspiracy of mothers and aunts and grandmothers and long-dead ancestresses,
它非常巧妙地由母亲们、姑姨们、祖母们及早已过世的祖先们合谋制造出来——
because it was supposed to be what he wanted, what he had a right to,
因为据认为他需要它并有权得到它——
in order that he might exercise his lordly pleasure in smashing it like an image made of snow.
以便让他行使自己的高贵意志，把它像雪人般打得粉碎。
