Of Human Bondage 人性的枷锁 Chapter 31

Hayward, after saying for a month that he was going South next day and delaying from week to week out of inability to make up his mind to the bother of packing and the tedium ¹ of a journey, had at last been driven off just before Christmas by the preparations for that festival. He could not support the thought of a Teutonic merry-making. It gave him goose-flesh to think of the season's aggressive cheerfulness, and in his desire to avoid the obvious he determined ² to travel on Christmas Eve., ,Philip was not sorry to see him off, for he was a downright person and it irritated him that anybody should not know his own mind. Though much under Hayward's influence, he would not grant that indecision pointed ³ to a charming sensitiveness; and he resented the shadow of a sneer ⁴ with which Hayward looked upon his straight ways. They corresponded. Hayward was an admirable letter-writer, and knowing his talent took pains with his letters. His temperament ⁵ was receptive to the beautiful influences with which he came in contact, and he was able in his letters from Rome to put a subtle fragrance ⁶ of Italy. He thought the city of the ancient Romans a little vulgar, finding distinction only in the decadence ⁷ of the Empire; but the Rome of the Popes appealed to his sympathy, and in his chosen words, quite exquisitely ⁸, there appeared a rococo ⁹ beauty. He wrote of old church music and the Alban Hills, and of the languor ¹⁰ of incense ¹¹ and the charm of the streets by night, in the rain, when the pavements shone and the light of the street lamps was mysterious. Perhaps he repeated these admirable letters to various friends. He did not know what a troubling effect they had upon Philip; they seemed to make his life very humdrum ¹². With the spring Hayward grew dithyrambic. He proposed that Philip should come down to Italy. He was wasting his time at Heidelberg. The Germans were gross and life there was common; how could the soul come to her own in that prim ¹³ landscape? In Tuscany the spring was scattering ¹⁴ flowers through the land, and Philip was nineteen; let him come and they could wander through the mountain towns of Umbria. Their names sang in Philip's heart. And Cacilie too, with her lover, had gone to Italy. When he thought of them Philip was seized with a restlessness he could not account for. He cursed his fate because he had no money to travel, and he knew his uncle would not send him more than the fifteen pounds a month which had been agreed upon. He had not managed his allowance very well. His pension and the price of his lessons left him very little over, and he had found going about with Hayward expensive. Hayward had often suggested excursions, a visit to the play, or a bottle of wine, when Philip had come to the end of his month's money; and with the folly ¹⁵ of his age he had been unwilling ¹⁶ to confess he could not afford an extravagance., ,Luckily Hayward's letters came seldom, and in the intervals ¹⁷ Philip settled down again to his industrious ¹⁸ life. He had matriculated at the university and attended one or two courses of lectures. Kuno Fischer was then at the height of his fame and during the winter had been lecturing brilliantly on Schopenhauer. It was Philip's introduction to philosophy. He had a practical mind and moved uneasily amid the abstract; but he found an unexpected fascination ¹⁹ in listening to metaphysical disquisitions; they made him breathless; it was a little like watching a tight-rope dancer doing perilous ²⁰ feats ²¹ over an abyss; but it was very exciting. The pessimism ²² of the subject attracted his youth; and he believed that the world he was about to enter was a place of pitiless woe ²³ and of darkness. That made him none the less eager to enter it; and when, in due course, Mrs. Carey, acting ²⁴ as the correspondent for his guardian's views, suggested that it was time for him to come back to England, he agreed with enthusiasm. He must make up his mind now what he meant to do. If he left Heidelberg at the end of July they could talk things over during August, and it would be a good time to make arrangements., , ,At last he left Heidelberg. For three months he had been thinking of nothing but the future; and he went without regret. He never knew that he had been happy there. Fraulein Anna gave him a copy of Der Trompeter von Sackingen and in return he presented her with a volume of William Morris. Very wisely neither of them ever read the other's present.,In myself I could observe the following sources of tedium. 从我自己身上，我所观察到的烦闷的根源有下列一些。,I have determined on going to Tibet after graduation.我已决定毕业后去西藏 。