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● holocaust原意为“燔祭”，烧全牛全羊以祭神，转为“彻底毁灭”，尤其是用火来烧毁的。signal：信号。火把台钟和花瓶一烧去，好像是一声信号似的，立刻火势大作。blotted out：涂没。满室是火，房间都看不见了。
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● 形容flames的三个形容词都很有力量：prancing原意为马用后脚站起来跳，借作“跳跃”。up-prancing：往上跳的。laughing, clapping：火焰会笑，会鼓掌吗？这三个形容词都和前面的名词dance呼应。
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● writhed：辗转反侧，受煎熬之状。in their grip：在火焰的魔掌之中。盛手镯的梳妆台终于不保了。
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● she thought的前后是没有加引号的直接引语。从墙壁被剥去，到卧室被毁，只有很短的时间，她来不及周览全室，很多东西已经不可复见了。床没有见到，帐子幕帘等也没有见到，而这些编织物（fabrics）是她所喜欢的。fabrics是curtains的同位语。
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● again to her surprise：又是使她惊奇的。她历经沧桑，自以为已经磨炼得心如铁石，冷酷无情。不料今晚大火一起，所见所思，无不触目惊心，甚至悲从中来，她自己也觉得惊奇起来了。
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● immune（形容词）：有力抗拒，不受支配或伤害。其所以“支配”或“伤害”的东西放在介词to（或from或against）之后。她本来以为（had thought）她可以不受简单情感的支配。简单的情感有两个例子，一是思乡病（nostalgia），一是当老朋友远行忘了来辞行时所感觉到的那种“淡淡的轻愁”（faint sadness）。这一类的情感，她自以为是不能支配她的了。现在床和帐子被焚，其最后一瞥，她竟亦未能见到，直如老友之不辞而别，心中难免怅然耳。
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Someone was walking that way, hailing her. “They’ve got here at last, Mrs. James. They may be able to save some of the things downstairs.”
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“It’s all right.” She did not try to compete with fire and hose roar and the bells of rescuers arriving.
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“What?” the voice shouted to her. “What did you say?”
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“Never mind.”
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● hailing：高声招呼。
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● they指来救火的人。compete：竞争。hose：（救火车上的）水管。火声、水声、警钟声，一片喧哗，讲话很费力，她没有提起嗓子说话，“她不想同那些声音竞争”。rescuers：解救的人。
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● 来人没听清楚她说什么，所以嚷着问：What？她根本没有注意来人是谁，她只听见有个声音同她说话而已，故曰：the voice shouted to her，而不说the man shouted to her。
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“They’ve already got out some of the papers from Mr. James’study, and they’ve started on the furniture. That brocade settee.“The shouting voice was triumphant, an achievement boasted. It was an achievement, men risking their lives to extract furniture from a burning house. She tried to remember if they had ever used that settee. Yes, there had been a time, and she was forgetting it on purpose…. The last time she had seen of Mr. James, she was sitting on the brocade settee….
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● papers：文件。study：书房。started：开始（抢救）。brocade：锦缎。settee：沙发似的长椅子。boasted（过去分词）：夸耀。achievement：（救火的）成绩。extract：取出。
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● if用来引起一个名词从句时=whether。
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● on purpose：故意地。过去的事情想起来太痛苦，她故意地要忘了它。
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● The last time三个字连起来当conjunction用。这一类表示时间的所谓group conjunction常用的有the moment、every time、by the time等等。为什么这只椅子所引起的回忆是痛苦的呢？因为最后一次她同她丈夫吵架的时候，她就是坐在这张椅子上。
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The fire had blown to statuesque grandeur. It had taken hold of the house trees, which were now dying. The three tall sentinel firs made their pyre apart, but the others, among them the maple outside her window, were meeting common death with the house they shaded. This was a great fire, the biggest in these parts for twenty years. The firemen drew back to safer distances. The rescued settee, which had not been carried out far enough, began to smolder, and no one would brave the heat to rescue it again.
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● blown：膨胀。statuesque：像雕像似的。grandeur：雄伟。
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● firs：枞树。sentinel：哨兵。枞树三棵，本耸立守卫，犹如哨兵，今均焚去。pyre：火葬堆。apart与common death相对照，三棵枞树分三处烧，别的树同屋子一起烧去。maple：枫树。they shaded是定语从句。they=the trees：屋本居树荫之下。
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● drew back：向后撤退。火势太大，救火人员都不敢再走上前去了。
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● smolder：焚化（火不冒出来的）。长椅本已着火，抢救出来后，没有搬多远，现在它自己烧起来了。brave（动词）：冒，犯，敢去碰。
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The fire chief, village druggist disguised in a helmet, came up to comfort her and apologize, “It’s a pity, Mrs. James, we couldn’t save anything to speak of. The way the draft carried the flame you’d have thought that house was built to be burned. Excuse me, ma’am, I guess you’re feeling bad enough.”
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● druggist：卖药的，药剂师。乡间守望相助，救火会亦为村民所组成。disguised：化装。helmet：（铜）盔。
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