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● 船上有两个人，岸上有个赶马的。这三个男人之中，只有那个掌舵的是在注意她的。而且一个是虽然经她招呼对她也不理会，一个则是状貌猥琐，相形之下，那个掌舵的更显得杰出。
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● 赶马的身材瘦小（shrunken）而佝偻（misshaped），一步一步地赶着马（brute），在沼泽地上走。
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● Mary正在看这两个人，可是她发觉掌舵的那人眼光正落在她身上，她抬起眼睛来了。
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The light was uncertain and his peaked cap threw a shadow over his face. But the figure was lithe and youthful. He smiled as she looked up, for she caught a gleam of his teeth. Then the boat had passed. Mary did not smile in return. She had taken a step back and remained there quietly. Once he looked back and awkwardly touched his cap, but she made no sign.
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● 光线模糊，那人戴了一顶鸭舌（peaked）帽，脸为黑影笼罩，看不清楚。（throw a shadow是成语）可是这个人的身体看来是年轻的，而且刚柔适中，富于弹性（lithe）。
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● as she looked up：呼应上段的She raised her eyes。
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● 此人是否在笑，她并不确切知道，可是他的牙齿露了一下白光，像是笑了。（原文只用gleam，不用white，white这个字在这里是可以省略的。）
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● Mary did not smile in return：船头上的那个红脸汉，没有理她，她却向他微笑颔首；现在掌舵的向她一笑，她反而不作表示。这是女人心理微妙处：是少女的矜持乎？抑是感触太深，不知所措乎？
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● 船已行远，可是她还是以目送之。她看见那人回过一次头，很笨拙地以手触帽，向她致敬。（awkwardly：“不知怎么是好”的尴尬表情。）
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When the boat had gone by some way she sat down on the bank, her basket of wool beside her, looking at The Golden Barque until it went into the gloom. She stayed there for some time, thinking long in the great silence of the bog. When at last she rose, the canal was clear and cold beneath her. She looked into it. A pale new moon was shining down in the water.
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● by有past之意。some way也是作副词之用：走得相当远了。bank：河岸。她坐下来，看金船消失于暮色之中。
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● thinking：她在想些什么呢？她所想的内容如果写了出来，小说的格调恐怕反而要庸俗了。
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● the canal was clear and cold：clear者，河上已经没有船。cold一字尤见分量，意味深长。此刻唯有天际淡淡新月，空照流水而已。
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Mary often stood at the door of the cabin on the headland watching the boats that crawled like black snails over the narrow streak of water through the bog. But they were not all like black snails now. There was a Golden Barque among them. Whenever she saw it she smiled, her eyes on the figure that stood by the shaft of the tiller.
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● cabin：木屋之类的敝庐，这大约就是她的家。
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● snails：蜗牛。船本来都像蜗牛爬行，可是现在在她心目中，有一条船是与众不同的了。the narrow streak of water：就是那条运河。
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● shaft：柄。她看船，其实只是要看那条金船。船上也只有那个掌舵的人可看而已。她笑，她的眼光落在那个人的身上——心事全在不言中。
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● bog：前文我把bog译作“沼泽地”，这是有字典为凭的。1957年2月26日那期的The New Yorker，内有“Bog for Sale”一文，读后才知道爱尔兰的bog和一般英美人所了解的bog并不相同，爱尔兰的bog大约并不潮湿，只是“泥炭地”而已。bog的泥土是可以用来当煤炭烧的。现在把该杂志的原文抄录几句如下：
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An Irish bog is not what people imagine. It is not a swamp. It is simply land—usually low-lying and heather-covered—from which turf has been, or can be, cut. Turf, which is called peat outside Ireland, is a layer—perhaps fifteen or twenty feet deep—of decomposed primeval forest; when cut into rectangular slabs and dried, it is in demand as domestic fuel.
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● 现在再让我们看看“家居泥炭地，眼望金槎船”的Mary在做些什么。
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One evening she was walking by the canal when The Golden Barque passed. The light was very clear and searching. It showed every plank, battered and tar-stained, on the rough hulk, but for all that it lost none of its magic for Mary. The little shrunken driver, head down, the lips moving, walking beside the horse. She heard his low mutters as he passed. The red-faced man was stooping over the side of the boat, swinging out a vessel tied to a rope, to haul up some water. He was singing a ballad in a monotonous voice. A tall, dark, spare man was standing by the funnel, looking vacantly ahead. Then Mary’s eyes travelled to the tiller.
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● searching：搜索性的；发隐抉微的；无孔不入的。初次看见金船，是在暮色苍茫雾气低迷之中。这次虽然仍旧是黄昏，光线却特别明亮，她对于金船有更进一步的认识。
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● plank：船身（hulk）上的板条。木船上一条条的板都可看得清清楚楚，那些板条已经破烂（battered）沾有柏油污迹（tar-stained）。木船敝旧如此，其非“金船”殆无疑义。但是即使如此（for all that）木船仍旧有它的魔力（magic）。
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● 前面所介绍过的几个人，这里重又出现，只是状貌声音都比较清楚了。第一个是那小个儿赶马的，她现在看得见他嘴唇的动作，听得见他在喃喃自语。另一个是那红脸汉子，他俯身船舷之外，用一只吊桶样的东西（vessel：器皿）在河里打水。一面取水，一面唱着山歌。还有一个高挑身材黑瘦（spare）子。那是以前没有出现过的。此人站在烟囱边上，茫然地往前方注视。
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● 眼睛向三个人身上一转，然后又落到掌舵那地方。请注意travelled这个字是从“旅行”衍伸出来的意义。这个字《简明牛津字典》解释作“用心地或是有次序地一件一件东西看过去”，该字典并举了这样一个例：His eye travelled over the scene.
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