Chapter 54 The Town-Ho's Story
第五十四章“大鲸出来了号”的故事
(As told at the Golden Inn)
（根据在幸福客店所说的蓝本）
The Cape of Good Hope, and all the watery region round about there, is much like some noted four corners of a great highway, where you meet more travellers than in any other part.
好望角和它周围一带的海洋，真象是一条大公路的著名十字路口，在那里，可以比在任何其它地方碰到更多的旅客。
It was not very long after speaking the Goney that another homeward-bound whaleman, the Town-Ho, was encountered. She was manned almost wholly by Polynesians. In the short gam that ensued she gave us strong news of Moby Dick. To some the general interest in the White Whale was now wildly heightened by a circumstance of theTown-Ho's story, which seemed obscurely to involve with the whale a certain wondrous, inverted visitation ofone of those so called judgments of God which at times are said to overtake some men. This latter circumstance, with its own particular accompaniments, forming what may be called the secret part of the tragedy about to be narrated, never reached the ears of Captain Ahab or his mates. For that secret part of the story was unknown to the captain of the Town-Ho himself. It was the private property of three confederate white seamen of that ship, one of whom, it seems, communicated it to Tashtego with Romish injunctions of secrecy, but thefollowing night Tashtego rambled in his sleep, and revealed so much of it in that way, that when he was wakened he could not well withhold the rest.
在招呼过“信天翁号”后不多久，又碰到了另一艘回航的捕鲸船“大鲸出来了号”。船上的水手，几乎全是些玻利尼西亚人。在后来举行的小小联欢会中，船上的人把有莫比－迪克的极其可靠的消息告诉了我们。对于若干本来对白鲸只具泛泛的兴趣的人，现在却给“大鲸出来了号”的故事细节弄得兴致勃勃，如疯如狂了。因为这个故事似乎还隐约地把大鲸说成是一种奇妙的、时常会突然打击什么人的所谓天罚的化身。这种说法再加上故事本身种种特殊的细节，可说就构成了即将讲述出来的悲剧的秘密部分，而且，始终没有传到亚哈船长和他的大二三副的耳朵里去。因为这个故事的秘密部分，连“大鲸出来了号”的船长本人也都不知道。这是那艘船上三个结盟的白种水手的私产，其中有一个在跟塔斯蒂哥说这故事的时候，就好象是在偷偷地讲天主教的禁令那样，可是，隔天晚上，塔斯蒂哥却在梦里无头无尾地吐露出了不少来，因此等他醒来，连他原来没有说出的部分也藏不住了。
