Days, weeks passed, and under easy sail, the ivory Pequod had slowly swept across four several cruising-grounds; —
日子过去了，好几周的时间，在轻松的航行下，象牙号小白鲸慢慢地穿越了四个不同的巡航地点； —

that off the Azores; off the Cape de Verdes; —
亚速尔群岛附近；佛得角； —

on the Plate (so called), being off the mouth of the Rio de la Plata; —
在白银海（如此命名），就在拉普拉塔河口附近； —

and the Carrol Ground, an unstaked, watery locality, southerly from St. Helena.
还有卡罗尔地，一个没有标杆的，从圣赫勒拿向南的水域。

It was while gliding through these latter waters that one serene and moonlight night, when all the waves rolled by like scrolls of silver; —
正当它滑过这些水域的时候，一个宁静、月光照耀的夜晚，所有的波浪像银色的卷轴一样滚动着； —

and, by their soft, suffusing seethings, made what seemed a silvery silence, not a solitude; —
由于它们柔和的、弥漫的涌动，形成了一种银色的寂静，而不是一种孤独； —

on such a silent night a silvery jet was seen far in advance of the white bubbles at the bow. —
在这样一个寂静的夜晚，遥远的白色泡沫前面看到了一道银色的射流。 —

Lit up by the moon, it looked celestial; —
在月光下照亮，它看起来像是天上的； —

seemed some plumed and glittering god uprising from the sea. Fedallah first descried this jet. —
似乎是一位羽冠闪闪发光的神灵从海中升起。费达拉首先发现了这道射流。 —

For of these moonlight nights, it was his wont to mount to the main-mast head, and stand a look-out there, with the same precision as if it had been day. —
因为在这样的月光之夜，他惯于爬到主桅头上，在那里站岗，就像白天一样准确。 —

And yet, though herds of whales were seen by night, not one whaleman in a hundred would venture a lowering for them. —
然而，虽然有时会在夜间看到一群鲸鱼，但百分之99的捕鲸人都不会冒降低船艇的风险去捕捉它们。 —

You may think with what emotions, then, the seamen beheld this old Oriental perched aloft at such unusual hours; —
你可以想象水手们看到这位老东方人在这种不寻常的时间坐在那里时的心情； —

his turban and the moon, companions in one sky. —
他的头巾和月亮，是同一片天空中的同伴。 —

But when, after spending his uniform interval there for several successive nights without uttering a single sound; —
但是，当他在连续几个晚上在那里保持相同的时间间隔而没有发出一点声音后； —

when, after all this silence, his unearthly voice was heard announcing that silvery, moon-lit jet, every reclining mariner started to his feet as if some winged spirit had lighted in the rigging, and hailed the mortal crew. —
当所有的这种沉默之后，他那非凡的声音宣布那道银色、月光照耀的射流时，每个躺着的水手都会像有翅膀的灵魂落在索具上，向凡人船员致敬。 —

“There she blows!” Had the trump of judgment blown, they could not have quivered more; —
“那里喷水了！”如果是最后的审判的号角响起，他们也不可能更加颤栗。 —

yet still they felt no terror; rather pleasure. —
然而他们并没有感到恐惧，反而感到愉悦。 —

For though it was a most unwonted hour, yet so impressive was the cry, and so deliriously exciting, that almost every soul on board instinctively desired a lowering.
因为尽管这是一个非同寻常的时刻，但呼喊声却是如此令人印象深刻，如此狂热激动，几乎船上每个灵魂都本能地渴望着下船。

Walking the deck with quick, side-lunging strides, Ahab commanded the t’gallant sails and royals to be set, and every stunsail spread. —
Ahab 用快速的侧步大步走着船甲板，命令拉起风帆和皇家帆，并展开每一种顶桅风帆。 —

The best man in the ship must take the helm. —
船上最好的人必须驾驶舵。 —

Then, with every mast-head manned, the piled-up craft rolled down before the wind. —
然后，每根桅顶都有人站着，累积起来的船只在风中滚动。 —

The strange, upheaving, lifting tendency of the taffrail breeze filling the hollows of so many sails, made the buoyant, hovering deck to feel like air beneath the feet; —
航向风填满了许多帆的空洞，使得踉跄的甲板感觉像脚下的空气； —

while still she rushed along, as if two antagonistic influences were struggling in her–one to mount direct to heaven, the other to drive yawingly to some horizontal goal. —
然而她仍然飞奔着，似乎有两种对立的力量在她身上争斗——一种直向天堂，另一种偏离目标的水平。 —

And had you watched Ahab’s face that night, you would have thought that in him also two different things were warring. —
如果你那天晚上观察 Ahab 的脸，会觉得他的内心也在战争。 —

While his one live leg made lively echoes along the deck, every stroke of his dead limb sounded like a coffin-tap. —
他的一只活腿在甲板上发出响亮的回声，他的僵腿每一步声音都像敲打棺材。 —

On life and death this old man walked. But though the ship so swiftly sped, and though from every eye, like arrows, the eager glances shot, yet the silvery jet was no more seen that night. —
在生与死之间，这个老人走着。但尽管船只飞驰，尽管每个眼睛都像箭一样急切地射击，但那银色的涌泉那天晚上再也没有被看见。 —

Every sailor swore he saw it once, but not a second time.
每个水手发誓他曾经看到过，但再也没第二次。

This midnight-spout had almost grown a forgotten thing, when, some days after, lo! —
这一次半夜的喷涌几乎变成了一个被遗忘的事物，然而，几天后，哦！ —

at the same silent hour, it was again announced: again it was descried by all; —
在同一个寂静的时刻，它再次被宣告：再次被所有人发现； —

but upon making sail to overtake it, once more it disappeared as if it had never been. —
但在扬帆追赶它时，它又消失了，就好像从未存在过一样。 —

And so it served us night after night, till no one heeded it but to wonder at it. —
因此，它开始每天夜晚为我们服务，直到只有人们对它感到惊奇而已。 —

Mysteriously jetted into the clear moonlight, or starlight, as the case might be; —
神秘地喷出清澈的月光，或星光，视情况而定； —

disappearing again for one whole day, or two days, or three; —
接着又消失了整整一天，或两天，甚至三天； —

and somehow seeming at every distinct repetition to be advancing still further and further in our van, this solitary jet seemed for ever alluring us on.
并且以某种方式，在每一次独特的重复中似乎仍在不断向前进，这孤独的水柱似乎永远地引诱着我们前行。

Nor with the immemorial superstition of their race, and in accordance with the preternaturalness, as it seemed, which in many things invested the Pequod, were there wanting some of the seamen who swore that whenever and wherever descried; —
根据他们种族的传统迷信，配合着在许多事物中看到的超自然现象，白鲸号上有一些水手声称每次看到那个不可捉摸的喷水柱； —

at however remote times, or in however far apart latitudes and longitudes, that unnearable spout was cast by one selfsame whale; —
无论在多么久远的时代，或者在多么遥远的纬度和经度，都是同一只鲸鱼喷出来的； —

and that whale, Moby Dick. For a time, there reigned, too, a sense of peculiar dread at this flitting apparition, as if it were treacherously beckoning us on and on, in order that the monster might turn round upon us, and rend us at last in the remotest and most savage seas.
那只鲸鱼，摩比·迪克。一段时间，人们也感到一种特别的恐惧，好像这个闪现的幻影在背叛地引诱着我们不断前行，让这头怪物最终在最遥远和最野蛮的海域里转身撕裂我们。

These temporary apprehensions, so vague but so awful, derived a wondrous potency from the contrasting serenity of the weather, in which, beneath all its blue blandness, some thought there lurked a devilish charm, as for days and days we voyaged along, through seas so wearily, lonesomely mild, that all space, in repugnance to our vengeful errand, seemed vacating itself of life before our urn-like prow.
这些模糊而可怕的暂时忧虑，从天气的平静中获得了奇妙的力量，那蓝天无云的下面似乎隐藏着一种魔力，在这几天里，我们一路航行，穿越着这些无比平静、孤独的海域，以至于所有的空间似乎在对我们的复仇使命感到厌恶时，都在排空生命，远离我们如乌尔帆般的船首。

But, at last, when turning to the eastward, the Cape winds began howling around us, and we rose and fell upon the long, troubled seas that are there; —
但最后，当我们转向东方时，开普角的风开始在我们周围呼啸，我们在那里上下颠簸在漫长而骚动的海洋中； —

when the ivory-tusked Pequod sharply bowed to the blast, and gored the dark waves in her madness, till, like showers of silver chips, the foamflakes flew over her bulwarks; —
当象牙毛利船急剧地对着狂风低下腰体，感觉到黑暗的波浪在她的狂怒中变得愈发猛烈，直到如同银色的薄片一样，白浪飞越她的舷舶； —

then all this desolate vacuity of life went away, but gave place to sights more dismal than before.
于是，生命的这种荒凉空虚全部消失了，但却让位于比以前更加阴郁的景象。

Close to our bows, strange forms in the water darted hither and thither before us; —
在我们的船头附近，水中出现了奇怪的形态在我们前后左右游动； —

while thick in our rear flew the inscrutable sea-ravens. —
而在我们的后方密密麻麻地飞过了深不可测的海鸟。 —

And every morning, perched on our stays, rows of these birds were seen; —
每天早晨，在我们的货物索上停歇的这些鸟整整一排； —

and spite of our hootings, for a long time obstinately clung to the hemp, as though they deemed our ship some drifting, uninhabited craft; —
尽管我们怒叱，它们却顽固地固守着麻绳，仿佛它们认为我们的船是某种漂流的、无人居住的船只； —

a thing appointed to desolation, and therefore fit roosting-place for their homeless selves. —
一个被预定为荒废和因此成了它们无家可归的自己的合适栖息地。 —

And heaved and heaved, still unrestingly heaved the black sea, as if its vast tides were a conscience; —
黑色的海浪不断地翻滚起伏，仿佛它巨大的潮汐是一种良知； —

and the great mundane soul were in anguish and remorse for the long sin and suffering it had bred.
所有生命的基本灵魂为了它长期孳生的罪恶和苦难感到痛苦和懊悔。

Cape of Good Hope, do they call ye? Rather Cape Tormentoto, as called of yore; —
他们称你为好望角？不如说叫做拷问角，就像以往所称呼的那样； —

for long allured by the perfidious silences that before had attended us, we found ourselves launched into this tormented sea, where guilty beings transformed into those fowls and these fish, seemed condemned to swim on everlastingly without any haven in store, or beat that black air without any horizon. —
因为长期被那些曾经对我们保持的诡异沉默所吸引，我们发现自己被投入到这个受折磨的海域，那些有罪的生物变成了那些飞鸟和这些鱼，似乎被判定永久地在这里游荡，没有任何目的地，或在那黑色的空气中拍打着没有任何地平线。 —

But calm, snow-white, and unvarying; still directing its fountain of feathers to the sky; —
但它仍然宁静、雪白、稳定，仍然将它的羽毛喷向天空； —

still beckoning us on from before, the solitary jet would at times be descried.
时不时地，那孤独的喷泉可以被看到。

During all this blackness of the elements, Ahab, though assuming for the time the almost continual command of the drenched and dangerous deck, manifested the gloomiest reserve; —
在这一切元素的黑暗中，尽管在潮湿而危险的甲板上一直表现出几乎持续的指挥，艾哈布表现出了最为阴郁的保留； —

and more seldom than ever addressed his mates. —
而且比以往更少地与他的伙伴交谈。 —

In tempestuous times like these, after everything above and aloft has been secured, nothing more can be done but passively to await the issue of the gale. —
在像这样的风暴时期，当上方和高处的一切都已经得到安全保障之后，除了 passively 等待风暴的结果之外，别无他法。 —

Then Captain and crew become practical fatalists. —
然后船长和船员成为实际的宿命论者。 —

So, with his ivory leg inserted into its accustomed hole, and with one hand firmly grasping a shroud, Ahab for hours and hours would stand gazing dead to windward, while an occasional squall of sleet or snow would all but congeal his very eyelashes together. —
这样，艾哈布把他的象牙腿插入习惯的孔中，一只手牢牢抓住着绳索，几个小时凝视着风向死去的地方，偶尔一阵雨夹雪几乎把他的睫毛凝结在一起。 —

Meantime, the crew driven from the forward part of the ship by the perilous seas that burstingly broke over its bows, stood in a line along the bulwarks in the waist; —
同时，由于危险的海浪破浪冲过船头而导致船员被迫从船的前部赶到甲板； —

and the better to guard against the leaping waves, each man had slipped himself into a sort of bowline secured to the rail, in which he swung as in a loosened belt. —
为了更好地防范跳跃的海浪，每个人都把自己滑入一种系在栏杆上的抛锚绳索中，就像在宽松的腰带中摇荡。 —

Few or no words were spoken; and the silent ship, as if manned by painted sailors in wax, day after day tore on through all the swift madness and gladness of the demoniac waves. —
几乎没有多少言语被说出；寂静的船，仿佛由蜡制的船员操纵，日复一日地穿过所有狂乱和狂喜的狂魔般的海浪。 —

By night the same muteness of humanity before the shrieks of the ocean prevailed; —
夜间，海洋尖叫声前的人类寂静仍然占据主导地位； —

still in silence the men swung in the bowlines; still wordless Ahab stood up to the blast. —
仍然没有言语，人们挂在抛锚绳索上；仍然默默的艾哈布屹立在狂风中。 —

Even when wearied nature seemed demanding repose he would not seek that repose in his hammock. —
即使疲倦的自然似乎需要休息，他也不会在吊床上寻找那种休息。 —

Never could Starbuck forget the old man’s aspect, when one night going down into the cabin to mark how the barometer stood, he saw him with closed eyes sitting straight in his floor-screwed chair; —
星巴克永远不会忘记老人的表情，有一天晚上他走进船舱查看气压计的时候，看到他闭着眼睛坐在他的地板螺旋椅上； —

the rain and half-melted sleet of the storm from which he had some time before emerged, still slowly dripping from the unremoved hat and coat. —
从他之前不久走出来的暴风雨中慢慢滴落的雨和半融化的雪仍然缓缓地从没有移走的帽子和外套上滴落。 —

On the table beside him lay unrolled one of those charts of tides and currents which have previously been spoken of. —
在他身边的桌子上展开了一张以前提到过的潮汐和洋流图。 —

His lantern swung from his tightly clenched hand. —
他的灯笼从他紧握的手中摇摆。 —

Though the body was erect, the head was thrown back so that the closed eyes were pointed towards the needle of the tell-tale that swung from a beam in the ceiling.*
虽然身体直立，但头部向后仰，闭着的眼睛朝着从天花板横梁上摆动的指针。

*The cabin-compass is called the tell-tale, because without going to the compass at the helm, the Captain, while below, can inform himself of the course of the ship.
船舱指南针被称为”告示牌”，因为船长在下面时，可以通过它了解船的航向，而无需去驾驶舱的指南针。

Terrible old man! thought Starbuck with a shudder, sleeping in this gale, still thou steadfastly eyest thy purpose.
可怕的老人！史塔巴克想着发抖，你在这场狂风中睡觉，但仍然坚定地注视着你的目标。