[新概念3课文原文及翻译]新概念第3册课文及翻译Lesson37~39

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新概念第3册课文及翻译Lesson37

　　【课文】

　　We have learnt to expect that trains will be punctual. After years of conditioning, most of us have developed an unshakable faith in railway timetables. Ships may be delayed by storms; air flights may be cancelled because of bad weather; but trains must be on time. Only an exceptionally heavy snow fall might temporarily dislocate railway services. It is all too easy to blame the railway authorities when something does go wrong. The truth is that when mistakes occur, they are more likely to be ours than theirs.

　　After consulting my railway timetable, I noted with satisfaction that there was an express train to Westhaven. It went direct from my local station and the journey lasted a mere hour and seventeen minutes. When I boarded the train, I could not help noticing that a great many local people got on as well. At the time, this did not strike me as odd. I reflected that there must be a great many people besides myself who wished to take advantage of this excellent service. Neither was I surprised when the train stopped at Widley, a tiny station a few miles along the line. Even a mighty express train can be held up by signals. But when the train dawdled at station after station, I began to wonder. It suddenly dawned on me that this express was not roaring down the line at ninety miles an hour, but barely chugging along at thirty. One hour and seventeen minutes passed and we had not even covered half the distance. I asked a passenger if this was the Westhaven Express, but he had not even heard of it. I determined to lodge a complaint as soon as we arrived. Two hours later, I was talking angrily to the station master at Westhaven. When he denied the train's existence, I borrowed his copy of the timetable. There was a note of triumph in my voice when I told him that it was there in black and white. Glancing at it briefly, he told me to look again. A tiny asterisk conducted me to a footnote at the bottom of the page. It said: 'This service has been suspended.'

　　【课文翻译】

　　我们已经习惯于相信火车总是准点的。经过多年的适应，大多数人对火车时刻表产生了一种不可动摇的信念。轮船船期可能因风暴而推延，飞机航班可能因恶劣天气而取消，唯有火车必然是准点的。只有非同寻常的大雪才可能暂时打乱铁路运行。因此，一旦铁路上真出了问题，人们便不加思索地责备铁路*。事实上，差错很可能是我们自己，而不是铁路*的。

　　我查看了列车时刻表，满意地了解到有一趟去威斯特海温的快车。这是趟直达车，旅途总共才需1小时17分钟。上车后，我不禁注意到许多当地人也上了车。一开始，我并不感到奇怪，我想除我之外，想利用快车之便的也一定大有人在。火车开出几英里即在一个小站威德里停了下来。对此，我不觉得奇怪，因为即便是特别快车也可能被信号拦住。但是，当火车一站接着一站往前蠕动时，我便产生了怀疑。我突然感到这趟快车并没以时速90英里的速度呼啸前进，而是卟哧卟哧地向前爬行，时速仅30英里。1小时17分过去了，走了还不到一半路程。我问一位乘客，这是不是开往威斯特海温的那趟快车，他说从未听说过有这么一趟快车。我决定到目的地就给铁路部门提意见。两小时后，我气呼呼地同威斯特海温站站长说起此事。他说根本没有这趟车。于是我借他本人的列车时刻表，我带着一种胜利者的调子告诉他那趟车白纸黑字。明明白白印在时刻表上。他迅速地扫视了一眼，让我再看一遍。一个小小的星形符号把我的目光引到了那页底部一个说明上。上面写着：“此趟列车暂停运行。”

新概念第3册课文及翻译Lesson38

　　【课文】

　　Future historians will be in a unique position when they come to record the history of our own times. They will hardly know which facts to select from the great mass of evidence that steadily accumulates. What is more they will not have to rely solely on the written word. Films, videos. CDs and CD-ROMs are just some of the bewildering amount of information they will have. They will be able, as it were, to see and hear us in action. But the historian attempting to reconstruct the distant past is always faced with a difficult task. He has to deduce what he can from the few scanty cluesavailable. Even seemingly insignificant remains can shed interesting light on the history of early man.

　　Up to now, historians have assumed that calendars came into being with the advent of agriculture, for then man was faced with a real need to understand something about the seasons. Recent scientific evidence seems to indicate that this assumption is incorrect.

　　Historians have long been puzzled by dots, lines and symbols which have been engraved on walls, bones, and the ivory tusk of mammoths. The nomads who made these markings lived by hunting and fishing during the last Ice Age, which began about 35,000 B.C. and ended about 10,000 B.C. By correlating markings made in various parts of the world, historians have been able to read this difficult code. They have found that it is connected with the passage of days and the phases of the moon. It is, in fact, a primitive type of calendar. It has long been known that the hunting scenes depicted on walls were not simply a form of artistic expression. They had a definite meaning, for they were as near as early man could get to writing. It is possible that there is a definite relation between these paintings and the markings that sometimes accompany them. It seems that man was making a real effort to understand the seasons 20,000 years earlier than has been supposed.

　　【课文翻译】

　　未来的历史学家在写我们这一段历史的时候会别具一格。对于逐渐积累起来的庞大材料，他们几乎不知道选取哪些好，而且，也不必完全依赖文字材料。电影、录像、光盘和光盘驱动器只是能为他们提供令人眼花缭乱的大量信息的几种手段。他们能够身临其境般地观看我们做事，倾听我们讲话。但是，历史学家企图重现遥远的过去可是一项艰巨的任务，他们必须根据现有的不充分的线索进行推理。即使看起来微不足道的遗物，也可能揭示人类早期历史的一些有趣的内容。

　　历史学家迄今认为日历是随农业的问世而出现的，因为当时人们面临着了解四季的实际需要，但近期科学研究发现，好像这种假设是不正确的。

　　长期以来，历史学家一直对雕刻在墙壁上、骨头上、古代长毛象的象牙上的点、线和形形色色的符号感到困惑不解。这些痕迹是游牧人留下的，他们生活在从公元前约 35，000年到公元前10000年的冰川期的末期，以狩猎、捕鱼为生。历史学家通过把世界各地留下的这种痕迹放在一起究，终于弄懂了这种费解的代码。他们发现代码与昼夜更迭和月亮圆缺有关，事实上是一种最原始的日历。大家早就知道，画在墙上的狩猎图景并不是单纯的艺术表现形式，它们有着一定的含义，因为它们已接近古代人的文字形式。有时，这种图画与墙壁上的刻痕共存，它们之间可能有一定的联系。看来人类早就致力于探索四季变迁了，比人们想像的要早20,000年。

新概念第3册课文及翻译Lesson39

　　【课文】

　　The rough road across the plain soon became so bad that we tried to get Bruce to drive back to the village we had come from. Even though the road was littered with boulders and pitted with holes, Bruce was not in the least perturbed. Glancing at his map, he informed us that the next village was a mere twenty miles away. It was not that Bruce always underestimated difficulties. He simply had no sense of danger at all. No matter what the conditions were, he believed that a car should be driven as fast as it could possibly go.

　　As we bumped over the dusty track, we swerved to avoid large boulders.The wheels scooped up stones which hammered ominously under the car. We felt sure that sooner or later a stone would rip a hole in our petrol tank or damage the engine. Because of this, we kept looking back, wondering if we were leaving a trail of oil and petrol behind us.

　　What a relief it was when the boulders suddenly disappeared, giving way to a stretch of plain where the only obstacles were clumps of bushes. But there was worse to come. Just ahead of us there was a huge fissure. In response to renewed pleadings, Bruce stopped. Though we all got out to examine the fissure, he remained in the car. We informed him that the fissure extended for fifty yards and was two feet wide and four feet deep. Even this had no effect. Bruce went into a low gear and drove at a terrifying speed, keeping the front wheels astride the crack as he followed its zig-zag course. Before we had time to worry about what might happen, we were back on the plain again. Bruce consulted the map once more and told us that the village was now only fifteen miles away. Our next obstacle was a shallow pool of water about half a mile across. Bruce charged at it, but in the middle, the car came to a grinding halt. A yellow light on the dash- board flashed angrily and Bruce cheerfully announced that there was no oil in the engine!

　　【课文翻译】

　　穿越平原的道路高低不平，开车走了不远，路面愈加崎岖。我们想劝说布鲁斯把车开回我们出发的那个村庄去。尽管路面布满石头，坑坑洼洼，但布鲁斯却一点儿不慌乱。他瞥了一眼地图，告诉我们前面再走不到20英里就是一个村庄。这并不是说布鲁斯总是低估困难，而是他压根儿没有一点儿危险感。他认为不管路面情况如何，车必须以速度前进。

　　我们在尘士飞扬的道路上颠簸，车子东拐西弯，以躲开那些大圆石。车轮搅起的石块锤击车身，发出不祥的锤击声。我们想念迟早会飞起一个石块把油箱砸开一个窟窿，或者把发动机砸坏。因此，我们不时地掉过头，怀疑车后是否留下了机油和汽油的痕迹。

　　突然大石块不见了，前面是一片平地，的障碍只有一簇簇灌木丛。这使我们长长地松了口气。但是更糟糕的事情在等着我们，离我们不远处，出现一个大裂缝。我们再次央求布鲁斯小心，他这才把车停了下来。我们纷纷下车察看那个大裂缝，他却呆在车上。我们告诉他那个大裂缝长50码，宽2英尺，深4英尺。这也没有对他产生任何影响。布鲁斯挂上慢档，把两只前轮分别搁在裂缝的两边，顺着弯弯曲曲的裂缝，以发疯的速度向前开去。我们还未来得及担心后果，车已重新开上了平地。布鲁斯又看了一眼地图，告诉我们那座村庄离我们只有15英里了。下一个障碍是一片约半英里宽的浅水塘。布鲁斯向水塘冲去，但车开到水塘当中，嘎吱一声停住了。仪表盘一盏黄灯闪着刺眼的光芒，布鲁斯兴致勃勃地宣布发动机里没油了!

新概念第3册课文及翻译Lesson37~39.doc

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