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There was a certain triteness in these reflections:
这些想法未免有些迂腐，
they were those habitual to young men on the approach of their wedding day.
它们属于临近婚礼的年轻人惯常的思考，
But they were generally accompanied by a sense of compunction and self-abasement of which Newland Archer felt no trace.
不过伴随这些思考的往往是懊悔与自卑，但纽兰·阿切尔却丝毫没有这种感觉。
He could not deplore (as Thackeray's heroes so often exasperated him by doing)
他不想哀叹（这是萨克雷的主人公们经常令他恼怒的做法）
that he had not a blank page to offer his bride in exchange for the unblemished one she was to give to him.
他没有一身的清白奉献给他的新娘，以换取她的白壁无瑕。
He could not get away from the fact that
他不想回避这样的事实：
if he had been brought up as she had they would have been no more fit to find their way about than the Babes in the Wood;
假如他受的教养跟她一样，他们的适应能力就无异于那些容易上当的老好人。
nor could he, for all his anxious cogitations, see any honest reason
而且，绞尽脑汁也看不出有何正当理由，
(any, that is, unconnected with his own momentary pleasure, and the passion of masculine vanity)
（即与他个人的一时寻欢与强烈的男性虚荣心不相干的）
why his bride should not have been allowed the same freedom of experience as himself.
不让他的新娘得到与他同样的自由与经验。
Such questions, at such an hour, were bound to drift through his mind;
这样一些问题，在这样一种时刻，是必然会浮上他心头的；
but he was conscious that their uncomfortable persistence and precision were due to the inopportune arrival of the Countess Olenska.
然而他意识到，它们那样清晰、那样令人不快地压在他的心头，全是因为奥兰斯卡伯爵夫人来得不合时宜，
Here he was, at the very moment of his betrothal—a moment for pure thoughts and cloudless hopes—
使他刚好在订婚的时刻——思想纯净、前景光明的时刻——
pitchforked into a coil of scandal which raised all the special problems he would have preferred to let lie.
突然被推人丑闻的混浊漩涡，引出了所有那些他宁愿束之高阁的特殊问题。
"Hang Ellen Olenska!" he grumbled, as he covered his fire and began to undress.
“去他的埃伦·奥兰斯卡！”他抱怨地咕哝道，一面盖好炉火，开始脱衣。
He could not really see why her fate should have the least bearing on his;
他真的不明白她的命运为何会对他产生影响，
yet he dimly felt that he had only just begun to measure the risks of the championship which his engagement had forced upon him.
然而他朦胧地感觉到，他只是刚刚开始体验订婚加给他的捍卫者这一角色的风险。
A few days later the bolt fell.
几天之后，意外的事情发生了。
The Lovell Mingotts had sent out cards for what was known as "a formal dinner"
洛弗尔·明戈特家散发请柬，要举办所谓“正式宴会”
(that is, three extra footmen, two dishes for each course, and a Roman punch in the middle),
（即增加3名男仆，每道菜两份，中间上罗马潘趣酒），
and had headed their invitations with the words "To meet the Countess Olenska," in accordance with the hospitable American fashion,
并在请柬开头用了“为欢迎奥兰斯卡伯爵夫人”这样的措辞，这是好客的美国方式——
which treats strangers as if they were royalties, or at least as their ambassadors.
把陌生人当成王亲贵族或者至少是他们的大使对待。
