Unit 10A - Pompeii
Pompeii
Robert Silverberg
Not very far from Naples, a strange city sleeps under the hot Italian sun. It is the city of Pompeii, and there is no other city quite like it in all the world. Nothing lives in Pompeii except crickets and beetles and lizards, yet every year thousands of people travel from distant countries to visit it.
Pompeii is a dead city. No one has lived there for nearly two thousand years—not since the summer of the year AD 79, to be exact.
Until that year Pompeii was a prosperous city of 25,000 people. Nearby was the Bay of Naples, an arm of the blue Mediterranean. Rich men came down from wealthy Rome to build seaside villas. Farmlands surrounded Pompeii. Rising behind the city was the 4,000-foot Mount Vesuvius, a grass-covered slope where the shepherds of Pompeii took their goats to graze. Pompeii was a busy city and a happy one.
It died suddenly, in a terrible rain of fire and ash. The tragedy struck on the 24th of August, AD 79. Mount Vesuvius, which had slept quietly for centuries, erupted with savage violence. Tons of hot ash fell on Pompeii, hiding it from sight. For three days the sun did not break through the clouds of volcanic ash that filled the sky. And when the eruption ended, Pompeii was buried deep. A city had perished.
Centuries passed... Pompeii was forgotten. Then, seventeen hundred years later, it was discovered again. Beneath the protecting shroud of ash, the city lay intact. Everything was as it had been the day Vesuvius erupted. There were still loaves of bread in the ovens of the bakeries. In the wine shops, the wine jars were in place, and on one counter could be seen a stain where a customer had thrown down his glass and fled.
To go to Pompeii today is to take a trip backward in time. The old city comes to life all around you. You can almost hear the clatter of horses' hoofs on the narrow streets, the cries of children and the laughter of the shopkeepers. The sky is cloudlessly blue, with the summer sun high in the sky. The grassy slopes of great Vesuvius rise to the heavens behind the city, and sunlight shimmers on the waters of the bay a thousand yards from the city walls. Ships from every nation are in port and strange languages can be heard in the streets.
Such was Pompeii on its last day. And so it is today, now that the volcanic ash has been cleared away. A good imagination is all you need to restore it to activity.
At dawn on August 24, in the year AD 79, Pompeii's 25,000 people awakened to another hot day in that hot summer. There was going to be a contest in the arena that night and the whole town was looking forward to the bloody fights of the gladiators. The children headed toward school, carrying slates and followed by their dogs. In the forum the town's important men had gathered after breakfast to read the political signs that had been posted during the night. Elsewhere in the forum the wool merchants talked business. The banker was going over his account books. At the inn late-rising travelers from the East awakened and yawned and called for breakfast.
The quiet morning moved slowly along. There was nothing very unusual about Pompeii. But tragedy was on its way. Beneath Vesuvius' vine-covered slopes a mighty force was about to break loose. At one o'clock in the afternoon the critical point was reached. The mountain blew up, raining death on thousands. Down in Pompeii, for miles from the summit, a tremendous explosion was heard.
"What was that?" People cried from one end of town to another. They stared at each other, puzzled, troubled. Were the gods fighting in heaven?
"Look!" somebody shouted. "Look at Vesuvius!"
Thousands of eyes turned upward. Thousands of arms pointed. A black cloud was rising from the shattered summit of the mountain. Higher and higher it rose. Like the trunk of a tree, it rose in the air, branching out as it climbed.
Minutes passed. The sound of the explosion died away, but it still reverberated in everyone's ears. The cloud over Vesuvius continued to rise, black as night, higher and higher. A strange rain began to fall on Pompeii—a rain of stones. The stones were light. They were pumice stones, consisting mostly of air bubbles. These poured down as though there had been a sudden cloudburst. The pumice stones did little damage.
"What is happening?" Pompeiians asked one another. They rushed to the temples—the Temple of Jupiter, the Temple of Apollo, the Temple of Isis. Priests tried to calm the citizens. The sky was dark. An hour went by and darkness still shrouded everything. All was confusion. The people of Pompeii now knew that doom was at hand. Their fears were redoubled when a tremendous rain of hot ash began to fall. The wooden roofs of some of the houses began to catch fire as the heat of the ash reached them. Other buildings were collapsing under the weight of the pumice stones.
In these first few hours, only the quick-witted managed to escape. A wealthy wool merchant called his family together and crammed jewelry and money into a sack. Lighting a torch, he led his little band out into the nightmare of the streets. Many hundreds of Pompeiians fled in those first few dark hours. Stumbling in the darkness, they made their way to the city gates, then out and down to the harbor. They boarded boats and got away, living to tell the tale of their city's destruction. Others preferred to remain within the city, huddling inside the temples, or in the public baths or in the cellars of their homes. They still hoped the nightmare would end.
It was evening now. And a new trouble was in store for Pompeii. The earth trembled and quaked! Roofs went crashing in ruin, burying hundreds who had hoped to survive the eruption. In the forum the tall columns toppled. The entire city seemed to shake in the grip of a giant fist.
Three feet of pumice stones now covered the ground. Ash floated in the air. Poisonous gas came drifting from the crater, though people could still breathe. Roofs were collapsing everywhere. The cries of the injured and dying filled the air. Rushing throngs, blinded by the darkness and the smoke, rushed up one street and down the next, trampling the fallen in a crazy fruitless dash toward safety. Dozens of people plunged into dead-end streets and found themselves trapped by crashing buildings. They waited there, too frightened to run further, expecting the end.
The poison gas thickened as the terrible night advanced. It was possible to protect oneself from the pumice stones but not from the gas, and Pompeiians died by the hundreds. Carbon monoxide gas prevents the body from absorbing oxygen. Victims of carbon monoxide poisoning get sleepier and sleepier until they lose consciousness, never to regain it. All over Pompeii, people lay down on beds of pumice stones, overwhelmed by the gas, and death came quietly to them.
All through the endless night, Pompeiians wandered about the streets or crouched in their ruined homes or clustered in the temples to pray. By morning few remained alive. Not once had Vesuvius stopped hurling pumice stones and ash into the air, and the streets of Pompeii were filling quickly. At midday on August 25, exactly twenty-four hours after the beginning of the first eruption, a second eruption occurred. A second cloud of ash rose above Vesuvius' summit. The wind blew ash as far as Rome. But most of the new ash descended on Pompeii.
The deadly shower of stones and ash went into its second day. But it no longer mattered to Pompeii whether the eruption continued another day or another year. For by midday on August 25, Pompeii was a city of the dead.
参考译文——庞贝
庞贝
罗伯特·西尔弗伯格
距那不勒斯不远，一座奇特的城市在意大利炽热的太阳下沉睡，这就是庞贝古城，世界上没有哪一座城市与它雷同。除了蟋蟀、甲壳虫、蜥蜴，这里没有其他生物。不过每年还是有成千上万的人从遥远的国度到此参观。
庞贝是座死城。确切地说，自从公元79年夏天以来，将近2000年里无人在此居住。
在那年之前，庞贝是一座拥有25000人口的繁荣城市。附近的那不勒斯湾就像是蓝色的地中海的一条长长的臂膀。有钱人从富裕的罗马到这里来建海边别墅。庞贝被农田环绕，其后方是高达4000英尺的维苏威山。山坡上长满了青草，庞贝的牧羊人常把羊群赶到这里放牧。那时的庞贝是座繁忙的城市，也是座欢乐的城市。
但它突然间就在烈火和灰尘中消亡了。这场悲剧发生在公元79年8月24日。维苏威山在沉睡了几个世纪后以巨大的威力爆发。成吨炙热的火山灰落向庞贝城，将它淹没。连续三天，阳光都没有穿透天空中火山灰形成的尘雾。火山爆发之后，庞贝被深埋地下，一座城市就这样消失了。
十几个世纪过去了……庞贝被遗忘了。后来，1700年以后，它重新被人发现。在厚厚的火山灰的保护下，这座城市完好无损。一切都如维苏威火山爆发的那天一样；面包房烤炉里长长的面包还在；葡萄酒店里，酒坛子还在原处，在一张柜台上还可以看到一位顾客逃跑时扔下酒杯留下的污迹。
如今去庞贝就是回到以前的时光，庞贝古城在你身边栩栩如生。你几乎可以听到狭窄的街道里马蹄的哒哒声、孩子的哭喊声和店主们的说笑声。蓝蓝的天空万里无云，夏日的太阳高高地悬在空中。山坡上绿草如茵的维苏威火山在庞贝城后耸入云霄，阳光照在距离庞贝一千码之外的海湾上，水面闪闪发光。来自不同国家的船只停泊在港口，在街上可以听到各种陌生的语言。
这就是庞贝末日时的景象，也是今天火山灰被清除后的景象。只要有丰富的想象力，你就可以让这座古城一下子活过来。
公元79年8月24日清晨，25000庞贝人睡醒，迎来了那个炎热夏季的又一个烈日。这天夜里在竞技场将有一场角斗，全城的人都期盼着角斗士之间血腥的搏斗。孩子们手拿石板奔向学校，身后跟着各自的狗。在市中心广场，市里的要人早饭后聚集在一起阅读夜里张贴出的通告；在广场的其他地方，羊毛商们在谈生意；钱庄老板正在核对账目；旅店里，来自东方的起晚的游客刚刚睡醒，打着哈欠嚷嚷着要吃早饭。
平静的上午渐渐过去，庞贝城没有任何异样的情况发生。然而灾难已经悄悄逼近。就在山坡上覆盖着攀藤植物的维苏威火山下，一股巨大的力量就要爆发了。下午一点钟的时候，重大的时刻终于到来，维苏威火山爆发了，给成千上万人带来了死亡。在距离火山口数千英里的庞贝城内，人们听到了巨大的爆炸声。
“那是什么？”从城的这头到城的那头，人们叫喊着，他们面面相觑，迷惑不解而又万分恐慌。难道众神在天上打架了？
“快看！”有人喊道，“看维苏威山！”
成千双眼睛向上看去，成千只胳膊向上指着。一股黑色的烟云从炸开的山顶升起，越升越高。黑云不断上升，而且就像树干上的树枝一样，分成几股向四周扩散。
几分钟过去了，爆炸声渐渐消失，但这声音仍在每个人的耳中回响。维苏威山上空的烟云继续越升越高，黑得跟深夜一样。此时庞贝上空开始下起一场特别的雨——石雨。这是浮石，主要由气泡构成。石头很轻，但却像是一场倾盆大雨。浮石几乎没有造成什么破坏。
“出了什么事？”庞贝人你问我，我问你。他们跑到庙里——朱庇特主神庙、阿波罗太阳神庙、伊西斯生育女神庙。祭司们尽力让市民冷静下来。天空漆黑一片，一个小时过去了，黑暗仍然笼罩着一切。到处都是乱哄哄的。此刻庞贝人知道他们的末日就要到了。当滚烫的火山灰像密集的雨点一样开始降落时，他们的恐惧开始加剧。落到木质屋顶上的火山灰的巨大热量使得有些房子着了火，还有些建筑物在大量浮石的重压下纷纷倒塌。
在最初的几个小时里，只有一些特别机智的人逃了出来。一位有钱的羊毛商把他的家人聚集在一起，将首饰和钱塞入大口袋，点着火把带领他的那一小群家人走进乱哄哄的街道。几百个庞贝人在城市陷入黑暗的最初几个小时逃了出去，他们在黑暗中跌跌撞撞，艰难地走向城门，出了城后直奔港口，登上船逃离了危险，这才活下来将他们城市毁灭的故事告诉他人。其他人选择留在城里，聚集在庙里，公共澡堂里，或者自己家的地窖里，他们仍然希望噩梦会结束。
已经是晚上了，庞贝正将面临新的灾难。大地晃动了起来！屋顶顷刻倒塌，将希望躲过火山喷发的几百人埋在废墟下。广场上高大的柱子倒了，整个城市就像被一只巨拳紧握着颤动。
此时已有三英尺厚的浮石覆盖着大地；火山灰在空中飘荡；虽然人们尚能呼吸，可有毒的气体还在从火山口飘出。四处的房屋都在倒塌，到处都可以听到伤者和奄奄一息的人的哭喊声。在黑暗和烟雾中，人们什么都看不见，为了寻找安全地带，徒劳地到处乱窜，踏着摔倒的人的身体，从一条街跑到另一条街。大群人闯进死胡同，发现自己被困在纷纷倒塌的建筑物中。他们待在那里，吓得再也跑不动了，只能等待死亡降临。
夜越来越深，毒气越来越浓。人们躲得过浮石，但躲不过毒气。成百成百的庞贝人死于毒气。一氧化碳气体使人体不能吸收氧气，中毒者越来越疲倦，直到失去意识，再也无法醒来。在庞贝的各个角落，人们气体中毒后躺在浮石堆上，静静地死去。
在整个漫长的夜里，庞贝人在街上漫无目的地游荡，或者蹲在已经毁坏的家里，或是聚集在寺庙里祈祷。到次日清晨，几乎没有人还活着。维苏威山始终不停地向天空喷发浮石和火山灰，庞贝的街道很快就被填满了。8月25日中午，在火山喷发正好24小时之后，发生了第二次爆发。火山灰形成的烟云再次从维苏威山顶升起，风把火山灰吹到了遥远的罗马，但是大部分还是落到了庞贝。
浮石和火山灰构成的致命“阵雨”持续到第二天。至于爆发是再持续一天，还是一年，对庞贝城已经无关紧要了。因为到8月25日正午时，庞贝已是一座死城。
Key Words:
savage ['sævidʒ]
adj. 野性的，凶猛的，粗鲁的，荒野的
violence ['vaiələns]
n. 暴力，猛烈，强暴，暴行
volcanic [vɔl'kænik]
adj. 火山的，猛烈的
except [ik'sept]
vt. 除，除外
prep. & conj.
slope [sləup]
n. 倾斜，斜坡，斜面，斜线，斜率
vt. 使
eruption [i'rʌpʃən]
n. 爆发，喷发，出疹，长牙
counter ['kauntə]
n. 计算器，计算者，柜台
[计算机] 计数器
volcanic [vɔl'kænik]
adj. 火山的，猛烈的
intact [in'tækt]
adj. 完好无缺的，原封不动的，未经触碰的
shroud [ʃraud]
n. 寿衣，覆盖物，[航海]船之横桅索 v. 包以尸衣，
restore [ri'stɔ:]
vt. 恢复，修复，使复原
stain [stein]
n. 污点，瑕疵，染料，着色剂
critical ['kritikəl]
adj. 批评的，决定性的，危险的，挑剔的
explosion [iks'pləuʒən]
n. 爆炸，爆发，激增
mighty ['maiti]
adj. 强有力的，强大的，巨大的
unusual [ʌn'ju:ʒuəl]
adj. 不平常的，异常的
contest ['kɔntest,kən'test]
n. 竞赛，比赛
vt. 竞赛，争取
summit ['sʌmit]
n. 顶点;最高阶层
vi. 参加*会议，
arena [ə'ri:nə]
n. 竞技场
wool [wul]
n. 羊毛，毛线，毛织品
troubled ['trʌbld]
adj. 动乱的，不安的；混乱的；困惑的
puzzled
adj. 困惑的；搞糊涂的；茫然的
shattered ['ʃætəd]
adj. 破碎的；极度疲劳的 v. 打碎；削弱；使心烦意
confusion [kən'fju:ʒən]
n. 混乱，混淆，不确定状态
minutes ['minits]
n. 会议记录，(复数)分钟
explosion [iks'pləuʒən]
n. 爆炸，爆发，激增
trunk [trʌŋk]
n. 树干，躯干，干线， 象鼻，(汽车后部)行李箱
cloudburst ['klaudbə:st]
n. 倾盆大雨，豪雨
harbor ['hɑ:bə]
n. 海港，避难所
vt. 庇护，心怀，窝藏<
jewelry ['dʒu:əlri]
n. 珠宝，珠宝类
frightened ['fraitnd]
adj. 受惊的，受恐吓的
poisonous ['pɔizənəs]
adj. 有毒的，恶意的
survive [sə'vaiv]
vt. 比 ... 活得长，幸免于难，艰难度过
wool [wul]
n. 羊毛，毛线，毛织品
dash [dæʃ]
v. 猛冲，猛掷，泼溅
n. 猛冲，破折号，冲
band [bænd]
n. 带，箍，波段
n. 队，一群，乐队
destruction [di'strʌkʃən]
n. 破坏，毁灭，破坏者
merchant ['mə:tʃənt]
n. 商人，店主，专家
poison ['pɔizn]
n. 毒药，败坏道德之事，毒害
vt. 毒害，
regain [ri'gein]
v. 恢复，重回，复得
summit ['sʌmit]
n. 顶点;最高阶层
vi. 参加*会议，
eruption [i'rʌpʃən]
n. 爆发，喷发，出疹，长牙
consciousness ['kɔnʃəsnis]
n. 意识，知觉，自觉，觉悟
protect [prə'tekt]
vt. 保护，投保
advanced [əd'vɑ:nst]
adj. 高级的，先进的
参考资料：
- 现代大学英语精读(第2版)第二册:U10A Pompeii(1)_大学教材听力 - 可可英语
- 现代大学英语精读(第2版)第二册:U10A Pompeii(2)_大学教材听力 - 可可英语
- 现代大学英语精读(第2版)第二册:U10A Pompeii(3)_大学教材听力 - 可可英语
- 现代大学英语精读(第2版)第二册:U10A Pompeii(4)_大学教材听力 - 可可英语
- 现代大学英语精读(第2版)第二册:U10A Pompeii(5)_大学教材听力 - 可可英语
现代大学英语精读(第2版)第二册:U10A Pompeii(6)_大学教材听力 - 可可英语