Chapter 123 The Musket
第一百二十三章 滑膛槍
During the most violent shocks of the Typhoon, the man at the Pequod's jaw-bone tiller had several times been reelingly hurled to the deck by its spasmodic motions even though preventer tackles had been attached to it — for they were slack — because some play to the tiller was indispensable.
在臺風刮得頂頂厲害的時分,盡管舵柄上縛有大索,但是,因為舵柄陣陣震動,那個掌著"裴廓德號"的牙骨舵的舵手,還是好幾次被撞得蹣蹣跚跚地摔在甲板上,這是因為大索松了,舵柄勢必會搖動不定。
In a severe gale like this, while the ship is but a tossed shuttlecock to the blast, it is by no means uncommon to see the needles in the compasses, at intervals, go round and round. It was thus with the Pequod's; at almost every shock the helmsman had not failed to notice the whirling velocity with which they revolved upon the cards; it is a sight that hardly anyone can behold without some sort of unwonted emotion.
在這樣厲害的狂風中,船只好比一只在疾風里翻簸著的毽子,所以,看到羅盤里的針不時地兜來兜去,也就決不是件稀奇的事了。此時的"裴廓德號"就是這般情況。幾乎每一震動,舵手就要望一望羅盤針在盤面上的旋力;這種情景,任何人看了,心情都不免非常激動。
Some hours after midnight, the Typhoon abated so much, that through the strenuous exertions of Starbuck and Stubb — one engaged forward and the other aft — the shivered remnants of the jib and fore and main-top-sails were cut adrift from the spars, and went eddying away to leeward, like the feathers of an albatross, which sometimes are cast to the winds when that storm-tossed bird is on the wing.
大約午夜過后幾小時,臺風已經減弱了很多,靠了斯達巴克和斯塔布的緊張努力——一個管船頭,一個管船梢——前桅和主中桅上那些飄零零的三角桅都從桅桁上給拉了下來,打旋地朝下風卷去,活象一只正想起飛的信天翁,被風吹刮得連羽毛都掉下來了。
The three corresponding new sails were now bent and reefed, and a storm-trysail was set further aft; so that the ship soon went through the water with some precision again;
那三幅相當新的篷帆現(xiàn)在都被收攏來了,船梢后邊,扯起一幅風暴斜桁縱帆;所以,這艘船不一會又比較準確地破浪前進了;