海底兩萬里 第6期 第1章 飛走的暗礁(6)

　　Finally, in a much-feared satirical journal, an article by its most popular columnistfinished off the monster for good,

　　最后，某一著名尖刻的諷刺報有一位最受歡迎的編輯先生草草了事地發(fā)表一篇文章，處理了這個怪物;

　　spurning it in the style of Hippolytus repulsing the amorous advances of his stepmother Phaedra,

　　他像夷包列提那樣，在大家的笑聲中，給這佳物最后一次打擊、

　　and giving the creature its quietus amid a universal burst of laughter. Wit had defeated science.

　　把它結果了。于是機智戰(zhàn)勝了科學。

　　During the first months of the year 1867, the question seemed to be buried, and it didn't seem due for resurrection,

　　在1867年頭幾個月里，這個問題好像是人了土，不會再復潔了。

　　when new facts were brought to the public's attention.

　　但就在這個時候，人們又聽說發(fā)生了一些新的事件。

　　But now it was no longer an issue of a scientific problem to be solved, but a quite real and serious danger to be avoided.

　　現(xiàn)在的問題并不是一個急待解決的科學問題，而是必須認真設法避免的一個危險。

　　The question took an entirely new turn. The monster again became an islet, rock, or reef, but a runaway reef, unfixed and elusive.

　　問題帶了完全不同的面貌。這個怪物變成了小島、巖石、暗礁，但它是會奔馳的、不可捉摸的、行動莫測的暗礁。

　　On March 5, 1867, the Moravian from the Montreal Ocean Co.,

　　1867年8月5日，蒙特利奧航海公司的摩拉維安號

　　lying during the night in latitude 27 degrees 30' and longitude 72 degrees 15', ran its starboard quarter afoul of a rock marked on no charts of these waterways.

　　夜間駛到北緯27度30分、西經(jīng)72度15分的地方，船右舷撞上了一座巖石，

　　Under the combined efforts of wind and 400-horsepower steam, it was traveling at a speed of thirteen knots.

　　可是，任何地圖也沒有記載過這一帶海面上有這座巖石。由于風力的助航和四百匹馬力的推動，船的速度達到每小時十三海里。