Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea

海底二万里

   CHAPTER 7

   第二部 第七章

   The Mediterranean in Forty-Eight Hours

   地中海四十八小时

   THE MEDITERRANEAN, your ideal blue sea: to Greeks simply "the sea," to Hebrews "the great sea," to Romans mare nostrum. Bordered by orange trees, aloes, cactus, and maritime pine trees, perfumed with the scent of myrtle, framed by rugged mountains, saturated with clean, transparent air but continuously under construction by fires in the earth, this sea is a genuine battlefield where Neptune and Pluto still struggle for world domination. Here on these beaches and waters, says the French historian Michelet, a man is revived by one of the most invigorating climates in the world.

   地中海,是最碧蓝的海,希伯来人的“大海”,希腊人酌“海”,罗马人的“我们的海”,周围广植橘树、芦卉、仙人掌、海松树,喷出番石榴花的芳香,四周峻峭的群山坏抱,空气纯洁清新,可是被地下烈火不停地熬煎,这海正是海王涅豆尼和阎王蒲留敦①争夺世界霸权一直到现在还没停止的战场。米歇列说,就是在地中海,在它的岸上,在它的水中,是人类在地球上锻炼自己的最强大有力的一个场所……

   But as beautiful as it was, I could get only a quick look at this basin whose surface area comprises 2,000,000 square kilometers. Even Captain Nemo's personal insights were denied me, because that mystifying individual didn't appear one single time during our high-speed crossing. I estimate that the Nautilus covered a track of some 600 leagues under the waves of this sea, and this voyage was accomplished in just twenty-four hours times two. Departing from the waterways of Greece on the morning of February 16, we cleared the Strait of Gibraltar by sunrise on the 18th.

   虽然这侮很美,但我只能很约略地瞳望一下。地中海面积共二百万平方公里。就是尼摩船长本人关于这海的知帜,我也得不到,因为这个神秘人物在这次快速度的航海中,一次也没有出来。我估计诺第留斯号在这海底下所走过的路程约有六百里,而这次旅行,他用四十八小时的时间就完成了。2月16日早晨从希腊一带海面出发,18日太阳从东方升起的时候,我们就通过直布罗陀海峡了。

   It was obvious to me that this Mediterranean, pinned in the middle of those shores he wanted to avoid, gave Captain Nemo no pleasure. Its waves and breezes brought back too many memories, if not too many regrets. Here he no longer had the ease of movement and freedom of maneuver that the oceans allowed him, and his Nautilus felt cramped so close to the coasts of both Africa and Europe.

   对我来说,事情很明显,这地中海正处在尼摩船长要逃避的人所居住的陆地中间,他不喜欢这海。这海水和这海风给他带来了纵然不是过多的悔恨,也一定是过多的回忆。在这海里,海洋赋予他的那种自由自在的神情姿态,那种独来独往的行动,他现在没有了;他的诺第留斯号在这些非洲和欧洲相接近的海岸中间,也感到气闷。

   Accordingly, our speed was twenty-five miles (that is, twelve four-kilometer leagues) per hour. Needless to say, Ned Land had to give up his escape plans, much to his distress. Swept along at the rate of twelve to thirteen meters per second, he could hardly make use of the skiff. Leaving the Nautilus under these conditions would have been like jumping off a train racing at this speed, a rash move if there ever was one. Moreover, to renew our air supply, the submersible rose to the surface of the waves only at night, and relying solely on compass and log, it steered by dead reckoning.

   因此,我们的速度是每小时二十五海里,即每里为四千米的十二里①。那不用说,尼德-兰很难过,只有放弃他的逃走计划。这样每秒十二至十三米的速度,他不可能使用那只小艇。在这种条件下离开诺第留斯号,那等于从飞奔的火车上往下跳,简直是粗心大意的行为。并且,我们的船夜间才浮上水面来,调换新鲜空气,它单单根据罗盘的度数和测程器的指示来行驶。

   Inside the Mediterranean, then, I could catch no more of its fast-passing scenery than a traveler might see from an express train; in other words, I could view only the distant horizons because the foregrounds flashed by like lightning. But Conseil and I were able to observe those Mediterranean fish whose powerful fins kept pace for a while in the Nautilus's waters. We stayed on watch before the lounge windows, and our notes enable me to reconstruct, in a few words, the ichthyology of this sea.

   所以,我从地中海内部往外看,就像快车上的旅客所看到的他眼前疾驰的风景一样,这是说,只看到远远的天际,但是像闪电一般飞过的眼前景致却反而看不见。不过,康塞尔和我,我们仍然可能看见一些地中海的鱼类,它们的鳍力量可以让它们在诺第留斯号的附近水流中停留一些时候。我们在客厅的玻璃边等待机会,我们的笔记对我校正地中海鱼类学有很大帮助。

   Among the various fish inhabiting it, some I viewed, others I glimpsed, and the rest I missed completely because of the Nautilus's speed. Kindly allow me to sort them out using this whimsical system of classification. It will at least convey the quickness of my observations.

   In the midst of the watery mass, brightly lit by our electric beams, there snaked past those one-meter lampreys that are common to nearly every clime. A type of ray from the genus Oxyrhynchus, five feet wide, had a white belly with a spotted, ash-gray back and was carried along by the currents like a huge, wide-open shawl. Other rays passed by so quickly I couldn't tell if they deserved that name "eagle ray" coined by the ancient Greeks, or those designations of "rat ray," "bat ray," and "toad ray" that modern fishermen have inflicted on them. Dogfish known as topes, twelve feet long and especially feared by divers, were racing with each other. Looking like big bluish shadows, thresher sharks went by, eight feet long and gifted with an extremely acute sense of smell. Dorados from the genus Sparus, some measuring up to thirteen decimeters, appeared in silver and azure costumes encircled with ribbons, which contrasted with the dark color of their fins; fish sacred to the goddess Venus, their eyes set in brows of gold; a valuable species that patronizes all waters fresh or salt, equally at home in rivers, lakes, and oceans, living in every clime, tolerating any temperature, their line dating back to prehistoric times on this earth yet preserving all its beauty from those far-off days. Magnificent sturgeons, nine to ten meters long and extremely fast, banged their powerful tails against the glass of our panels, showing bluish backs with small brown spots; they resemble sharks, without equaling their strength, and are encountered in every sea; in the spring they delight in swimming up the great rivers, fighting the currents of the Volga, Danube, Po, Rhine, Loire, and Oder, while feeding on herring, mackerel, salmon, and codfish; although they belong to the class of cartilaginous fish, they rate as a delicacy; they're eaten fresh, dried, marinated, or salt-preserved, and in olden times they were borne in triumph to the table of the Roman epicure Lucullus.

But whenever the Nautilus drew near the surface, those denizens of the Mediterranean I could observe most productively belonged to the sixty-third genus of bony fish. These were tuna from the genus Scomber, blue-black on top, silver on the belly armor, their dorsal stripes giving off a golden gleam. They are said to follow ships in search of refreshing shade from the hot tropical sun, and they did just that with the Nautilus, as they had once done with the vessels of the Count de La Pérouse. For long hours they competed in speed with our submersible. I couldn't stop marveling at these animals so perfectly cut out for racing, their heads small, their bodies sleek, spindle-shaped, and in some cases over three meters long, their pectoral fins gifted with remarkable strength, their caudal fins forked. Like certain flocks of birds, whose speed they equal, these tuna swim in triangle formation, which prompted the ancients to say they'd boned up on geometry and military strategy. And yet they can't escape the Provençal fishermen, who prize them as highly as did the ancient inhabitants of Turkey and Italy; and these valuable animals, as oblivious as if they were deaf and blind, leap right into the Marseilles tuna nets and perish by the thousands.

   在被阵阵电光照碍通亮的水流中间,有一些长一米的八目鳗婉蜒地游来游去,这种鱼差不多在所有气候不同的地方都有。稣鱼类的尖嘴鱼,宽五英尺,肚腹白色,脊背友色带斑点,像宽大的围巾被水流漂着滚来滚去。其他的鲫鱼类走过得很快,我想法认识它们是否应得希腊人给它们的“鹰”的称号,或者近代渔人很离奇地给它们的“老鼠”、“蟾涂”和“编幅”的名字。好些鸯形鲛有十二英尺长,这是潜水人特别害怕的东西,这些鲛彼此在水里比赛速度。梅狐狸,长八英尺,嗅觉极端敏锐,像淡蓝色的陰影一样在水中出现。扁鱼是绸鱼属,有些长至十三分米,全身银白和天蓝,缠上条纹,特别显出它们的鳍的深黑色调;这是古时专用来祭美神维纳斯的鱼,它们的眼睛嵌在金色眉睫里。美丽的鳍鱼,长丸至十米,是走动很快的动物,有力的尾巴仲撞客厅的玻璃,显出它们有小栗色斑点的淡蓝脊背,它们跟鲛鱼相像,但没有鲛鱼的气力大。这鱼在所有的海洋中都可碰见,春季,它们喜欢上溯到大河里。但在地中海的这些不同鱼类中,当诺第留斯号上浮接近水面时我可以最有益处地观察到的,是属于骨质鱼组的第六十三属。那是脊背蓝黑,肚腹带银甲,背上线条发出金黄微光的鳍鲸鱼。这类鱼是以跟着船只一齐走出名的,在热带的炎热天空下,它们找到了船的凉快陰影来躲藏:果然事情是这样,它们陪着诺第留斯号,像从前陪着拉-比路斯的船只一样。在长久的时间内,它们同我们的船比赛竞走。我不停地欣赏这些鱼,它们生来就是为便于赛跑的,它们的头很小,身子很光滑,作纺锤形,有些身长超过三米,它们的胸鳍特别有力,尾巴作叉形。它们行动时作三角形,像可以和它们比快的某种鸟类一样,因此,古时人就说它们是熟习几何学和战略砌。

   Just for the record, I'll mention those Mediterranean fish that Conseil and I barely glimpsed. There were whitish eels of the species Gymnotus fasciatus that passed like elusive wisps of steam, conger eels three to four meters long that were tricked out in green, blue, and yellow, three-foot hake with a liver that makes a dainty morsel, wormfish drifting like thin seaweed, sea robins that poets call lyrefish and seamen pipers and whose snouts have two jagged triangular plates shaped like old Homer's lyre, swallowfish swimming as fast as the bird they're named after, redheaded groupers whose dorsal fins are trimmed with filaments, some shad (spotted with black, gray, brown, blue, yellow, and green) that actually respond to tinkling handbells, splendid diamond-shaped turbot that were like aquatic pheasants with yellowish fins stippled in brown and the left topside mostly marbled in brown and yellow, finally schools of wonderful red mullet, real oceanic birds of paradise that ancient Romans bought for as much as 10,000 sesterces apiece, and which they killed at the table, so they could heartlessly watch it change color from cinnabar red when alive to pallid white when dead.

   我单单为记忆起见,举出康塞尔或我只能望见一下的那些地中海的鱼类。那是拳状电鳗,淡白色,游走时像不可捉摸的气体一样。有海鳝鱼,像长三至四米的蛇一样,带青、蓝和黄的美丽颜色。有海鳍鱼,长三英尺,肝是美味好吃的。有带条鱼,浮来浮去,像细长的海藻。有纺拂,诗人称为琴鱼,水手称为笛鱼,嘴上装有三角形和多齿形的两块薄片,形状像老荷马的乐器。有燕子笛鱼,走得很快,像燕子一样,所以得了这个名称。有金著稠,头红色,脊鳍上满是丝线条。有芦葵鱼,身上带有黑色、灰色、栗色、蓝色、黄色、青色的斑点,它能发出钟铃的叮当银质声响。有华美的蝶鱼,这鱼是海中的山鸡,全身作菱形,淡黄色的鳍,带粟子色的小斑点,左边上部,通常带有栗色和黄色花纹。最后有美丽的海诽鳃,那真正是海里面的无双鸟。

   And as for other fish common to the Atlantic and Mediterranean, I was unable to observe miralets, triggerfish, puffers, seahorses, jewelfish, trumpetfish, blennies, gray mullet, wrasse, smelt, flying fish, anchovies, sea bream, porgies, garfish, or any of the chief representatives of the order Pleuronecta, such as sole, flounder, plaice, dab, and brill, simply because of the dizzying speed with which the Nautilus hustled through these opulent waters.

   至于海中哺侞类,我觉得走过亚德里亚海口时看到了两三条大头鲸,它们具有真甲鲸属的脊鳍;几条圆球头属的海猪,它们是地中海的特产,头的前部有一条条的光辉花纹。又有十来条海豹,白肚腹,黑皮毛,大家知道它们的名字是“和尚”,它们的样子完全跟多明尼克①派的修土一样,身长三米。

   As for marine mammals, on passing by the mouth of the Adriatic Sea, I thought I recognized two or three sperm whales equipped with the single dorsal fin denoting the genus Physeter, some pilot whales from the genus Globicephalus exclusive to the Mediterranean, the forepart of the head striped with small distinct lines, and also a dozen seals with white bellies and black coats, known by the name monk seals and just as solemn as if they were three-meter Dominicans.

   For his part, Conseil thought he spotted a turtle six feet wide and adorned with three protruding ridges that ran lengthwise. I was sorry to miss this reptile, because from Conseil's description, I believe I recognized the leatherback turtle, a pretty rare species. For my part, I noted only some loggerhead turtles with long carapaces.

   在康塞尔方面,他觉得望见了一只六英尺宽的大龟,背有三条纵长的伸出去的突起棱骨。

   As for zoophytes, for a few moments I was able to marvel at a wonderful, orange-hued hydra from the genus Galeolaria that clung to the glass of our port panel; it consisted of a long, lean filament that spread out into countless branches and ended in the most delicate lace ever spun by the followers of Arachne. Unfortunately I couldn't fish up this wonderful specimen, and surely no other Mediterranean zoophytes would have been offered to my gaze, if, on the evening of the 16th, the Nautilus hadn't slowed down in an odd fashion. This was the situation.

   至于植虫动物,我曾在短时间内,欣赏一种美丽的橙黄色唇形水熄,这些东西钩在船左舷嵌板的玻璃上,那是一条很长、很细的丝带,长出无穷无尽的枝叶,末梢是最精美的花边,就是阿拉克妮的敌手也织不出来。可惜我不能打到这个美丽的品种,幸而诺第留斯号在16日晚上速度特别缓慢了,要不然地中海的其他植虫动物一定不可能出现在我眼前。下面是当时的情况。

   By then we were passing between Sicily and the coast of Tunisia. In the cramped space between Cape Bon and the Strait of Messina, the sea bottom rises almost all at once. It forms an actual ridge with only seventeen meters of water remaining above it, while the depth on either side is 170 meters. Consequently, the Nautilus had to maneuver with caution so as not to bump into this underwater barrier.

   我们正从西西里岛和突尼斯海岸中间走过。在崩角和墨西拿海峡间的狭窄海中,海底突然上升;在这一带简直就形成了一条山脊,水深只有十六米,至于两边海底每边有一、百七十米深。所以诺第留斯号要很小心地行驶,怕撞上这道海底栅栏。

   I showed Conseil the position of this long reef on our chart of the Mediterranean.

   我在地中海地图上,指给康塞尔看那条很长的暗礁所。占据的部位。

   "But with all due respect to master," Conseil ventured to observe, "it's like an actual isthmus connecting Europe to Africa."

   “不过,请先生原谅,”康塞尔说,“那就真正是连结欧洲。和非洲的一条地峡了。”

   "Yes, my boy," I replied, "it cuts across the whole Strait of Sicily, and Smith's soundings prove that in the past, these two continents were genuinely connected between Cape Boeo and Cape Farina."

   “对,老实人,”我回答,“它完全堵住了利比亚海峡,史。密斯的测量也证明了这两个大陆从前是在崩角和夫利那角、间连结起来的。”

   "I can easily believe it," Conseil said.

   “我很相信是这样.康塞尔说。

   "I might add," I went on, "that there's a similar barrier between Gibraltar and Ceuta, and in prehistoric times it closed off the Mediterranean completely."

   “要知道,”我立即又说,“类似的一道栅栏也存在于直布罗陀和叙达之间,在地质学的纪元时期把地中海完全封锁起来。”

   "Gracious!" Conseil put in. "Suppose one day some volcanic upheaval raises these two barriers back above the waves!"

   "That's most unlikely, Conseil."

   "If master will allow me to finish, I mean that if this phenomenon occurs, it might prove distressing to Mr. de Lesseps, who has gone to such pains to cut through his isthmus!"

   "Agreed, but I repeat, Conseil: such a phenomenon won't occur. The intensity of these underground forces continues to diminish. Volcanoes were quite numerous in the world's early days, but they're going extinct one by one; the heat inside the earth is growing weaker, the temperature in the globe's lower strata is cooling appreciably every century, and to our globe's detriment, because its heat is its life."

   "But the sun--"

   "The sun isn't enough, Conseil. Can it restore heat to a corpse?"

   "Not that I've heard."

   "Well, my friend, someday the earth will be just such a cold corpse. Like the moon, which long ago lost its vital heat, our globe will become lifeless and unlivable."

   "In how many centuries?" Conseil asked.

   "In hundreds of thousands of years, my boy."

   "Then we have ample time to finish our voyage," Conseil replied, "if Ned Land doesn't mess things up!"

   Thus reassured, Conseil went back to studying the shallows that the Nautilus was skimming at moderate speed.

   康塞尔用心研究诺第留斯号缓慢地、挨近地面走过的那浅水海底。

   On the rocky, volcanic seafloor, there bloomed quite a collection of moving flora: sponges, sea cucumbers, jellyfish called sea gooseberries that were adorned with reddish tendrils and gave off a subtle phosphorescence, members of the genus Beroe that are commonly known by the name melon jellyfish and are bathed in the shimmer of the whole solar spectrum, free-swimming crinoids one meter wide that reddened the waters with their crimson hue, treelike basket stars of the greatest beauty, sea fans from the genus Pavonacea with long stems, numerous edible sea urchins of various species, plus green sea anemones with a grayish trunk and a brown disk lost beneath the olive-colored tresses of their tentacles.

   这浅水海底,在多石的和火成岩的地下,有整部的活花草盛开着;有海绵:有海参;有透明的海胆;有带淡红色的蔓,发出轻微的磷光:有海袋,俗名海黄瓜,浸在七色阳光的及射光线中;有巡行游走的车盘,宽一米,它们的大红颜色.把海水都染红了;有最美的咸丛海水仙;有茎很长的石纹花;有许多种类不同,可以食用的海栗;有青色的海苑葵,茎于是淡灰色,花盘是栗子色,藏在触须形成的橄揽色毛发里面,很不容易看清楚。

   Conseil kept especially busy observing mollusks and articulates, and although his catalog is a little dry, I wouldn't want to wrong the gallant lad by leaving out his personal observations.

   康塞尔特别注意观察软体动物和节肢动物,虽然关于这一部分的术语有些枯燥,但我不愿对不起这个老实人,把他个人的观察遗漏了。

   From the branch Mollusca, he mentions numerous comb-shaped scallops, hooflike spiny oysters piled on top of each other, triangular coquina, three-pronged glass snails with yellow fins and transparent shells, orange snails from the genus Pleurobranchus that looked like eggs spotted or speckled with greenish dots, members of the genus Aplysia also known by the name sea hares, other sea hares from the genus Dolabella, plump paper-bubble shells, umbrella shells exclusive to the Mediterranean, abalone whose shell produces a mother-of-pearl much in demand, pilgrim scallops, saddle shells that diners in the French province of Languedoc are said to like better than oysters, some of those cockleshells so dear to the citizens of Marseilles, fat white venus shells that are among the clams so abundant off the coasts of North America and eaten in such quantities by New Yorkers, variously colored comb shells with gill covers, burrowing date mussels with a peppery flavor I relish, furrowed heart cockles whose shells have riblike ridges on their arching summits, triton shells pocked with scarlet bumps, carniaira snails with backward-curving tips that make them resemble flimsy gondolas, crowned ferola snails, atlanta snails with spiral shells, gray nudibranchs from the genus Tethys that were spotted with white and covered by fringed mantles, nudibranchs from the suborder Eolidea that looked like small slugs, sea butterflies crawling on their backs, seashells from the genus Auricula including the oval-shaped Auricula myosotis, tan wentletrap snails, common periwinkles, violet snails, cineraira snails, rock borers, ear shells, cabochon snails, pandora shells, etc.

   在软体动物门中,他举出许多的柿形海扇,彼此堆起来伪驴蹄形双壳贝,三角形的端那螺,鳍黄色和壳透明的三齿稍子贝,橙黄色的腹脚贝,带淡青色小斑点的卵形贝,名为海兔的腹足贝,古锨形贝,多肉的无触角贝,地中海特产的伞贝,壳中产生一种很宝贵的螺铀的海耳贝,火焰形海扇无头贝(据说,法国南部人爱吃这种贝甚于牡蛎),马赛人很宝贵的毛砚,又白又肥的双层草贝.又有一些介蛤,北美沿海出产很丰富,在纽约零售的数量非常之多。还有颜色变化很多的潜在自身壳洞中的盖形梳贝;我很爱吃的带胡椒味豹石子贝;顶上有凸起的壳,侧面有突出的带线条痕迹的薄鳃类蛤,大红瘤丛生的辛提贝;尖端弯曲和有些像小艇形的肉食贝:头上戴冠的铁贝;螺丝形介壳的人形柱贝;灰色海神贝;带有白点,蒙上丝绦的头巾,类似小蛐蜒的琴贝;爬在背上的洼涡贝;耳朵贝;其中有带椭圆形壳的琉璃草耳朵贝;茶褐色的丝挂贝;海螺,海蛤,菊贝,岩贝,薄片贝,宝石贝,花瓶贝等等。

   As for the articulates, in his notes Conseil has very appropriately divided them into six classes, three of which belong to the marine world. These classes are the Crustacea, Cirripedia, and Annelida.

   至于节肢动物,康塞尔在他的笔记上,很正确地把它们分为六纲,其中有三纲是属于海产动物。这王纲是甲壳纲,蔓足纲和坏虫纲。

   Crustaceans are subdivided into nine orders, and the first of these consists of the decapods, in other words, animals whose head and thorax are usually fused, whose cheek-and-mouth mechanism is made up of several pairs of appendages, and whose thorax has four, five, or six pairs of walking legs. Conseil used the methods of our mentor Professor Milne-Edwards, who puts the decapods in three divisions: Brachyura, Macrura, and Anomura. These names may look a tad fierce, but they're accurate and appropriate. Among the Brachyura, Conseil mentions some amanthia crabs whose fronts were armed with two big diverging tips, those inachus scorpions that-- lord knows why--symbolized wisdom to the ancient Greeks, spider crabs of the massena and spinimane varieties that had probably gone astray in these shallows because they usually live in the lower depths, xanthid crabs, pilumna crabs, rhomboid crabs, granular box crabs (easy on the digestion, as Conseil ventured to observe), toothless masked crabs, ebalia crabs, cymopolia crabs, woolly-handed crabs, etc. Among the Macrura (which are subdivided into five families: hardshells, burrowers, crayfish, prawns, and ghost crabs) Conseil mentions some common spiny lobsters whose females supply a meat highly prized, slipper lobsters or common shrimp, waterside gebia shrimp, and all sorts of edible species, but he says nothing of the crayfish subdivision that includes the true lobster, because spiny lobsters are the only type in the Mediterranean. Finally, among the Anomura, he saw common drocina crabs dwelling inside whatever abandoned seashells they could take over, homola crabs with spiny fronts, hermit crabs, hairy porcelain crabs, etc.

   甲壳纲分为丸目,其中第一目包括十脚节肢动物,这些动物通常是头部和胸部连接起来,口腔器官由好几对节时组成,又有四对、五对或六对胸部的脚或走动的脚。康塞尔遵照我们的老师密尔-爱德华的方法,把十脚节肢动物分为三部:短尾部,长尾部和无尾部。这些名字稍微有点通俗,但很明白,很正确。在短尾部中,康塞尔举出“阿马地’蟹,前头有两支分开的长刺:蝎子蟹——我不知道因为什么~一希腊人拿这蟹来象征智慧。棍形海蜘蛛,刺形海蚁蛛,这些东西可能是迷路到达浅海底中来了,因为它们通常是在水很深的地方。十足蟹,矢形蟹,菱形蟹,粒形蟹——康塞尔指出,这蟹很容易消化;无齿的伞花蟹,螃蟹,西蟹,毛绒蟹等。在长尾部中,分为五科:装甲科,掘脚科,无定位科,虾科,足目科;康塞尔举出普通的龙虾(母龙虾肉是很受人重视的),熊虾,或海蝉,河虾,以及各种食用的虾但他没有说到无定位科的区别,其中有对虾这一属,因为地虾是地中海中唯一的对虾属。

   There Conseil's work came to a halt. He didn't have time to finish off the class Crustacea through an examination of its stomatopods, amphipods, homopods, isopods, trilobites, branchiopods, ostracods, and entomostraceans. And in order to complete his study of marine articulates, he needed to mention the class Cirripedia, which contains water fleas and carp lice, plus the class Annelida, which he would have divided without fail into tubifex worms and dorsibranchian worms. But having gone past the shallows of the Strait of Sicily, the Nautilus resumed its usual deep-water speed. From then on, no more mollusks, no more zoophytes, no more articulates. Just a few large fish sweeping by like shadows.

   诺第留斯号已经通过了利比亚海峡的浅水海底,到了深海水中,速度又照常了一自后,便看不见软体动。物、节胶动物、植虫动物了。只有一些大鱼,像黑影一般走过。

   During the night of February 16-17, we entered the second Mediterranean basin, whose maximum depth we found at 3,000 meters. The Nautilus, driven downward by its propeller and slanting fins, descended to the lowest strata of this sea.

   在2月16日至17日的夜间,我们进入了地中海的第二道水域,最深的地方有三千米。诺第留斯号受机轮的推动,随侧面的纵斜机板溜下,一直潜到最下的水层。

   There, in place of natural wonders, the watery mass offered some thrilling and dreadful scenes to my eyes. In essence, we were then crossing that part of the whole Mediterranean so fertile in casualties. From the coast of Algiers to the beaches of Provence, how many ships have wrecked, how many vessels have vanished! Compared to the vast liquid plains of the Pacific, the Mediterranean is a mere lake, but it's an unpredictable lake with fickle waves, today kindly and affectionate to those frail single-masters drifting between a double ultramarine of sky and water, tomorrow bad-tempered and turbulent, agitated by the winds, demolishing the strongest ships beneath sudden waves that smash down with a headlong wallop.

   在最深的水层,虽然没有自然的新奇东西,但阵阵的海水也给我看到了各种动人和可怕的场面。正是在这时候,我们走过了地中海发生遇难沉船事件最多的地方。从阿尔及利亚沿海至普罗文沙海岸,不知道有多少船只遇难了有多少船只沉没了!

   So, in our swift cruise through these deep strata, how many vessels I saw lying on the seafloor, some already caked with coral, others clad only in a layer of rust, plus anchors, cannons, shells, iron fittings, propeller blades, parts of engines, cracked cylinders, staved-in boilers, then hulls floating in midwater, here upright, there overturned.

   因此,在这次从海底深水处走过的快速行驶中,我看见很多沉没的船躺在海底,有的已经被珊瑚胶粘住了,有的仅仅蒙上一层铁锈,锚、大炮、子弹、各种铁架、机轮叶、机器零件、破碎的圆筒、损坏的锅炉,以及那些浮在水中的船壳,有的直立,有的翻倒。

   Some of these wrecked ships had perished in collisions, others from hitting granite reefs. I saw a few that had sunk straight down, their masting still upright, their rigging stiffened by the water. They looked like they were at anchor by some immense, open, offshore mooring where they were waiting for their departure time. When the Nautilus passed between them, covering them with sheets of electricity, they seemed ready to salute us with their colors and send us their serial numbers! But no, nothing but silence and death filled this field of catastrophes!

   这些遇难的船只、有的因为相撞、有的由于碰上了花岗石的暗礁才沉没的。我看见有些船笔直地沉下去,桅墙直立,船具被水浸坏了。它们好像停泊在阔大的外港中,正等待准时开行。当诺第留斯号从它们中间走过,它的电光波照耀它们的时候,好像这些船招展它们的旗,向它致敬,把它们的编号向它报告!不,在这灾祸的场所上,只有寂静和死亡!

   I observed that these Mediterranean depths became more and more cluttered with such gruesome wreckage as the Nautilus drew nearer to the Strait of Gibraltar. By then the shores of Africa and Europe were converging, and in this narrow space collisions were commonplace. There I saw numerous iron undersides, the phantasmagoric ruins of steamers, some lying down, others rearing up like fearsome animals. One of these boats made a dreadful first impression: sides torn open, funnel bent, paddle wheels stripped to the mountings, rudder separated from the sternpost and still hanging from an iron chain, the board on its stern eaten away by marine salts! How many lives were dashed in this shipwreck! How many victims were swept under the waves! Had some sailor on board lived to tell the story of this dreadful disaster, or do the waves still keep this casualty a secret? It occurred to me, lord knows why, that this boat buried under the sea might have been the Atlas, lost with all hands some twenty years ago and never heard from again! Oh, what a gruesome tale these Mediterranean depths could tell, this huge boneyard where so much wealth has been lost, where so many victims have met their deaths!

   我看到地中海底下,当诺第留斯号愈来愈走近直布罗陀海峡的时候,这些遇难沉没船只的残骸也就堆积得愈来愈多了。欧洲和非洲海岸在这里狭窄起来,在这狭窄的空间隙中,相碰相憧是常有的事,我看见下面有许多铁制的船身,汽船的离奇古怪的残骸,有的倒下,有的竖立,好像十分庞大的动物。其中一只船,侧面破裂了,烟囱弯了,它的机轮只剩下骨架,它的舵已经离开尾柱,但铁链仍然把舵系注,它的后面铁盘已经受海盐的侵蚀,现出十分难看的形状!有多少人在这船遇难中丧了生!有多少牺牲者被拖到水底下去了!是不是有水手保全了性命,给人们讲述这次可怕的灾祸呢?或者水波仍然保持着这次遇难事件的秘密呢?

   Meanwhile, briskly unconcerned, the Nautilus ran at full propeller through the midst of these ruins. On February 18, near three o'clock in the morning, it hove before the entrance to the Strait of Gibraltar.

   然而,诺第留斯号,无情地和迅速地开足机轮从这些残骸中间跑过去。2月18日,早晨三点左右,它出现在直布罗陀海峡的口上。

   There are two currents here: an upper current, long known to exist, that carries the ocean's waters into the Mediterranean basin; then a lower countercurrent, the only present-day proof of its existence being logic. In essence, the Mediterranean receives a continual influx of water not only from the Atlantic but from rivers emptying into it; since local evaporation isn't enough to restore the balance, the total amount of added water should make this sea's level higher every year. Yet this isn't the case, and we're naturally forced to believe in the existence of some lower current that carries the Mediterranean's surplus through the Strait of Gibraltar and into the Atlantic basin.

   海峡中有两道水流:一道是上层水流,很久以来就有人知道是它把大西洋的水引人地中海的,又有一道相反的下层水流,现在由于推理证明了它的存在。是的,地中海水的总量,由大西洋潮水和流入其中的大河水,不停地增加,这海水的水平应该每年上涨,因为水汽的蒸发作用不能保持水量的平衡。不过,事实上并不是这样,因此,人们就自然而然地承认有一道下层水流的存在,把地中海过剩的水从直布罗陀海峡输送到大西洋去。

   And so it turned out. The Nautilus took full advantage of this countercurrent. It advanced swiftly through this narrow passageway. For an instant I could glimpse the wonderful ruins of the Temple of Hercules, buried undersea, as Pliny and Avianus have mentioned, together with the flat island they stand on; and a few minutes later, we were floating on the waves of the Atlantic.

   对的,这事实是正确的。就是这道相反的下层水流,诺第留斯号现在要来利用。它迅速地进人这条狭窄的水道。在这一瞬间,我可以望见一下那座根据蒲林尼和阿维纽斯①的话而沉在海底下的壮丽惊人的赫克留斯庙的废墟。,以及在下面支承这庙的小岛,几分钟后,我们就浮在大西洋水波上面了。