Charlotte's Web

E.B.White

《夏洛的網》是一部描寫友情的童話。在朱克曼家的谷倉里，小豬威爾伯和蜘蛛夏洛建立了最真摯的友誼。當威爾伯的生命有危險時，看似渺小的夏洛用自己的力量救了威爾伯，但這時，蜘蛛夏洛的生命卻走到了盡頭……

《夏洛的網》是一部可以與《小王子》相媲美的世界名著。這部作品初次出版于1952年，已有20多種譯文，發行近千萬冊。

本文節選自《夏洛的網》第十六章。

In the cool of the evening，when shadows darkened the Fair Grounds，Templeton crept from the carte and looked around. Wilbur lay asleep in the straw. Charlotte was build-ing a web. Templeton's keen nose detected many fine smells in the air. The rat was hungry and thirsty. He decided to go exploring. Without saying anything to anybody，he started off.

“Bring me back a word！”Charlotte called after him. “I shall be writing tonight for the last time.”The rat mumbled something to himself and disappeared into the shadows. He did not like being treated like a messenger boy.

After the heat of the day，the evening came as a welcome relief to all. The Ferris wheel was lighted now. It went round and round in the sky and seemed twice as high as by day. There were lights on the midway，and you could hear the crackle of the gambling machines and the music of the merry-go-round and the voice of the man in the beano booth calling numbers.

黑暗模糊了展覽會場后，涼爽的傍晚來臨了。坦普爾曼從板條箱里爬出來，開始四處觀望。威伯還在稻草中間睡著。夏洛正在織一張網。坦普爾曼那敏銳的鼻子在空氣中嗅到很多好聞的味道。老鼠又餓又渴，決定出去探險了。他沒和任何人打招呼，就往外溜去。

“給我帶一個字回來！ ”夏洛在他的身后喊，“今晚我要最后一次往網里織字！ ”老鼠嘴里嘟嚷了一句什么，消失在黑暗里了。他一點兒也不愿意被看成一個小搬運工。

忙碌的白天過去后，夜晚對所有人來說，都是放松的好時候。費里斯大轉輪現在輕松多了。它一圈圈地在空中轉著，好像比白天時轉得還要高兩倍。游樂場里燈火通明，能聽到從里面傳出的游戲機的響聲，還有旋轉木馬旁的音樂聲，電話亭里的男人呼叫電話號碼的聲音。

The children felt refreshed after their nap. Fern met her friend Henry Fussy，and he invited her to ride with him in the Ferris wheel. He even bought a ticket for her，so it didn't cost her anything. When Mrs. Arable happened to look up into the starry sky and saw here little daughter sitting with Henry Fussy and going higher and higher into the air，and saw how happy Fern looked，she just shook her head. “My，my！”she said. “Henry Fussy. Think o￡that！”Templeton kept out of sight. In the tall grass behind the cattle bam he found a fold-ed newspaper. Inside it were leftleftovers from somebody's lunch：a deviled ham sandwich，a piece of Swiss cheese，part of a hard-boiled egg，and the core of a wormy apple. The rat crawled in and ate everything. Then he tore a word out of the paper，rolled it up，and started back to Wilbur's pen.

Carlotte had her web almost finished when Templeton re-turned，carrying the newspaper clipping. She had left a space in the middle of the web. At this hour，no people were around the pigpen，so the rat and the spider and the pig were by them-selves.

“I hope you brought a good one，”Charlotte said. “It's the last word I shall ever write.”“Here，”said Templeton，un-rolling the paper.

“What does it say？”asked Charlotte. “You'll have to read it for me.”“It says ‘Humble’”replied the rat.

“Humble？”said Charlotte. “‘Humble’has two mean-ings. It means ‘not proud’and it means ‘near the ground’. That's Wilbur all over. He's not proud and he's near the ground.”“Well，I hope you're satisfied，”sneered the rat. “I'm not going to spend all my time fetching and carrying. I came to this Fair to enjoy myself，not to deliver papers.”“You've been very helpful，”Charlotte said. “Run along，if you want to see more of the Fair.”The rat grinned. “I'm going to make a night of it，”he said. “The old sheep was right--this Fair is a rat's paradise. What eating！ And what drinking！ And every-where good hiding and good hunting. Bye，bye，my humble Wilbur！ Fare thee well，charlotte，you old schemer！ This will be a night to remember in a rat's life.”He vanished into the shadows.

孩子們在小睡之后又恢復了活力。芬遇到了她的朋友亨利·富塞。他邀請她一同去坐費里斯大轉輪，還送了她一張票，這樣她就不必花錢去買了。阿拉貝爾太太偶然望向繁星點點的夜空，看到她的小女兒正和亨利·富塞坐在一起，轉得越來越高。