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● Train：列车。freight cars：货车。stretched away：长长地延伸出去。
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● 末一句Sara还是很奇怪：怎么可能从寒冷的威胁下救出这许多番茄来？saved的宾语是tomatoes。
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Sara, weightless under the quilt, could think of the celebrations of Dexter and see the vision of ripe tomatoes only in brief snatches, like the flare-up of the little fire. The rest of the time she thought only of cold, of cold going on before and after. She could not help but feel the chill of the here and now, which was not to think at all but was for her only a trembling in the dark.
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● weightless：觉得自己很轻（因此更冷）。vision：景象。
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● in brief snatches：短短的片刻之中。flare-up：突然发光。这一个譬喻把过去同现在，或者说，把回忆同当前的感觉联结了起来。又把读者带回到她屋子里来了。
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● could not help but feel：不能不感觉到。the here and now：此地此时。这种寒战的感觉不好算是思想（to think），对于她只算是黑暗中的一阵战栗（trembling）。
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She coughed patiently and turned her head to one side. She peered over the quilt just a little and saw that the fire had at last gone out. There was left only a hulk of red log, a still, red, bent shape, like one of Jason’s socks thrown down to be darned somehow. With only this to comfort her, Sara closed her eyes and fell asleep.
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● coughed：咳嗽。patiently：有耐心地。
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● peered：窥视。at last：最后总算灭了——Sara一直期待着它会灭的。
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● a hulk of red log：木柴烧红成为炭。log这个字上文已经见过, 我们很可以猜想，炉子里就只有这么一块柴，这块柴烧完了，火也灭了。（hulk：原意是废船的空壳子。）
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● shape是hulk的同位语。那块木柴成了一个静止的、红色的、弯曲的形体，就像她丈夫的一只袜子（sock），掷给她叫她织补（darn）的。somehow：用某种方式（随便她怎样织补）。
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● 从火炉里的余烬联想到家政。Sara心平气和，心理描写至此可以告一段落，Sara也入睡了。
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Every hour it was getting colder and colder. The moon, intense and white as the snow that does not fall here, drew higher in the sky, in the long night, and more distant from the earth. The farm looked as tiny and still as a seashell, with the little knob of a house surrounded by its curved furrows of tomato plants. Cold like a white pressing hand reached down and lay over the shell.
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● getting（联系动词）=becoming。
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● intense：强烈的。“月色皎洁如雪”，但是那个地方是从来不下雪的，全篇叙事均用过去式，此处忽出现现在式does not fall，这是表示常理，并不限于故事发生的那一段时间里。
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● drew（不及物动词）=moved。后随higher与distant两个subjective complements，形容主语moon。
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● still（形容词）：静止的。seashell：贝壳。请参阅本文第一段把田庄比作水中白石的描写。the little knob of a house：房子看上去只成圆圆的一小块。of在这里的用法是很特别的，这种用法很像appositive genitive，但这里of前后两名词的关系不是“相等”，而是“相像”。所谓appositive genitive的例子，如the City of Rome (Rome is the city)，the habit of smoking (smoking is the habit)；但是这个phrase的意思是：The house seemed like a little knob。同样的用法如an angel of a woman（天使般的女人），a mountain of a man（魁伟如山的人）。surrounded是过去分词。furrow：畦，即犁在田中所挖成之浅沟。
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● 末句之cold是名词，为全句主语。pressing hand：用力按的手。reached：伸。reached down：往下伸。
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In Dexter there is a great whistle which is blown when a freeze threatens. It is known everywhere as Mr. Perkins’ whistle. Now it sounded out in the clear night, blast after blast. Over the countryside lights appeared in the windows of the farms. Men and women ran out into the fields and covered up their plants with whatever they had, while Mr. Perkins’ whistle blew and blew.
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● 题意至本段始点明。whistle指工厂、火车、轮船上所用之汽笛，这里的汽笛是作“防冻警报”之用。blown：呜（笛作响）。threatens：将来袭击。
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● Mr. Perkins上文已介绍，是番茄田的主人。首两句用现在式，表示这是每年经常之事。blast：汽笛一阵地响。
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● lights appeared…：听到汽笛声，农民纷纷起床为番茄防冻。屋内种种忙乱，小说家让我们看见的，只是窗上露出光来而已，描写何等经济。
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● whatever they had：有什么（他们就用什么盖上去）。包括衣服被褥等。
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Sara felt herself waking. She knew that Mr. Perkins’ whistle was blowing, what it meant—and that it now remained for her to get Jason and go out to the field. A soft laxity, an illusion of warmth, flowed stubbornly down her body, and for a few moments she continued to lie still.
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● waking：将醒未醒。她觉得自己在醒回来，是尚未全醒也。神知在寤寐之间，最难描写，作者本段着墨不多，而慵倦疏懒之状，已跃然纸上。
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