第一百一十六章 垂死的鲸
第一百一十六章 垂死的鲸
此生常有这样的事：当幸运的宠儿从右侧与我们擦肩而过，我们虽此前垂头丧气，却也能沾得几缕疾风，眼见松瘪的船帆欢欣鼓胀。裴廓德号似正如此。自邂逅欢快的“单身汉”号次日，便见鲸群，戮四鲸，其一为亚哈所杀。
时已垂暮；猩红搏杀中所有投枪已毕：浮于可爱落日之海天，日与鲸同寂然死去；彼时，那蔷薇色空气中卷起如许甜美与哀婉，如许缭绕祈祷，几乎令人以为，自马尼拉群岛深绿修道谷远道而来，那西班牙陆风竟恣意扮作水手，负着这些晚祷圣歌出海去了。
亚哈虽稍慰，却只慰入更深的阴郁；他已操舟离鲸，静坐凝望 tranquil 小舟中那鲸最后的衰微。抹香鲸临死皆有异景——首转向日，如是而殁——此异景于如此静谧黄昏入目，于亚哈竟传递前所未有之奇谲。
“他辗转以向彼——何其缓，又何其笃，以最后将死之动，呈其恭顺祈俯之额。彼亦拜火；日之最忠、最阔、最似诸侯之臣。——嗟乎，此过宠之眼，竟见此过宠之景。看！此处，远被水锁；超乎人世祸福之喧；于此最坦最公之海；传统无礁为碑；悠长华夏岁月，浪仍无言滚转，如星照尼日尔未知之源；此处，生亦信满而向日死；然看！才死，死便旋尸，首向他向。
“哦，自然之暗色印度半体，以溺骨于无绿海心筑尔孤座；尔乃异教徒，女王，于广杀台风与事后静葬之寂，语我太真。尔鲸亦未尝无教于我，死首向日，旋又他向。
“哦，三箍三焊之力髋！哦，高志虹喷！——一者妄争，一者妄喷，皆空！鲸乎，尔向那普活之日求情亦空，彼唯召生，不赋生还。然尔，暗之半，以更傲亦更暗之信摇我。尔诸不可名之交融浮我下；我浮于曾生者之息，昔为气，今为水。
“故贺，永贺，海乎，于尔永恒摇荡，野禽得唯息。生于地，乳于海；虽丘谷育我，尔浪乃我乳兄！”
Not seldom in this life, when, on the right side, fortune’s favourites
sail close by us, we, though all adroop before, catch somewhat of the
rushing breeze, and joyfully feel our bagging sails fill out. So seemed
it with the Pequod. For next day after encountering the gay Bachelor,
whales were seen and four were slain; and one of them by Ahab.
It was far down the afternoon; and when all the spearings of the
crimson fight were done: and floating in the lovely sunset sea and sky,
sun and whale both stilly died together; then, such a sweetness and
such plaintiveness, such inwreathing orisons curled up in that rosy
air, that it almost seemed as if far over from the deep green convent
valleys of the Manilla isles, the Spanish land-breeze, wantonly turned
sailor, had gone to sea, freighted with these vesper hymns.
Soothed again, but only soothed to deeper gloom, Ahab, who had sterned
off from the whale, sat intently watching his final wanings from the
now tranquil boat. For that strange spectacle observable in all sperm
whales dying—the turning sunwards of the head, and so expiring—that
strange spectacle, beheld of such a placid evening, somehow to Ahab
conveyed a wondrousness unknown before.
“He turns and turns him to it,—how slowly, but how steadfastly, his
homage-rendering and invoking brow, with his last dying motions. He too
worships fire; most faithful, broad, baronial vassal of the sun!—Oh
that these too-favouring eyes should see these too-favouring sights.
Look! here, far water-locked; beyond all hum of human weal or woe; in
these most candid and impartial seas; where to traditions no rocks
furnish tablets; where for long Chinese ages, the billows have still
rolled on speechless and unspoken to, as stars that shine upon the
Niger’s unknown source; here, too, life dies sunwards full of faith;
but see! no sooner dead, than death whirls round the corpse, and it
heads some other way.
“Oh, thou dark Hindoo half of nature, who of drowned bones hast builded
thy separate throne somewhere in the heart of these unverdured seas;
thou art an infidel, thou queen, and too truly speakest to me in the
wide-slaughtering Typhoon, and the hushed burial of its after calm. Nor
has this thy whale sunwards turned his dying head, and then gone round
again, without a lesson to me.
“Oh, trebly hooped and welded hip of power! Oh, high aspiring,
rainbowed jet!—that one strivest, this one jettest all in vain! In
vain, oh whale, dost thou seek intercedings with yon all-quickening
sun, that only calls forth life, but gives it not again. Yet dost thou,
darker half, rock me with a prouder, if a darker faith. All thy
unnamable imminglings float beneath me here; I am buoyed by breaths of
once living things, exhaled as air, but water now.
“Then hail, for ever hail, O sea, in whose eternal tossings the wild
fowl finds his only rest. Born of earth, yet suckled by the sea; though
hill and valley mothered me, ye billows are my foster-brothers!”
