Adventure in the World of Nature

在自然界中探险

One stormy autumn night when my grandnephew Roger was about twenty months old I wrapped him in a blanket and carried him down to the beach in the rainy darkness.Out there,just at the edge of where-we-couldn't-see big waves were thundering in,dimly seen white shapes that boomed and shouted and threw great handfuls of forth¹ at us. Together we laughed for pure joy-he a baby meeting for the first time the wild tumult² of oceanus, I wish the salt of half a lifetime of sea love in me.e But I think we felt the same spine-tingling response to the vast, roaring ocean and the wild night around us.

一个暴风骤雨的秋夜，我用毛毯把侄孙罗杰裹好，带着他冒雨在黑暗里穿行，径直走到海滩边，当时他大约只有20个月大。在那里，在我们无法看见的海的边缘，巨浪雷鸣般呼啸而来，依稀可见白色形状的浪花翻腾着、吼叫着，朝我们抛来大把大把的池沫。我们一起大笑，因为纯粹的快乐而放声欢笑—婴儿的他第一次见到了海洋之神异常激动的神态，我多么希望我能拥有大海一半的爱的情怀。但我想，面对辽阔咆哮的大海还有周围狂野的黑夜，我们都感受到了同样的兴奋。

A night or two later the storm had blown itself out and I took Roger again to the beach, this time to carry him along the water's edge, piercing the darkness with the yellow cone³ of our flashlight. Although there was no rain the night was again noisy with breaking waves and the insistent⁴ wind. It was clearly a time and place where great and

elemental things prevailed.

一两个晚上以后，暴风雨平息了，我带着罗杰再次来到海边。这一次我抱着他沿着水边漫步，手电筒射出的锥形的黄色光芒穿透了黑暗。虽然没有下雨，海浪的巨响和持续的风声使得夜晚一样喧闹。显然，就在此时此地，伟大的自然的力量尽显无疑。

One adventure on this particular night had to do with life, for we were searching for ghost crabs⁵, those sand-colored, fleet-legged beings which Roger had sometimes glimpsed briefly⁶ on the beaches in daytime. But the crabs are chietly nocturnal, and when not roaming the night beaches they dig little pits near the surf line where they hide, seemingly watching and waiting for what the sea may bring themm. For me the sight of these small living creatures, solitary⁷ and fragile against the brute⁸ force of the sea, had moving philosophic⁹ overtones, and I do not pretend that Roger and I reacted with similar emotions. But it was good to see his infant acceptance of a world of elemental things,fearing neither the song of the wind nor the darkness nor the roaring surf, entering with baby excitement into the search for a " ghos."

在这样一个特别的夜晚做一次冒险是和生命相关的，因为我们找寻着那些和沙子一样颜色的、行动敏捷的幽灵蟹，罗杰有时白天在海堆上匆匆瞥见过。但蟹主要在夜间活动，当它们不能在黑夜的沙滩漫游时,就在它们隐藏的冲浪线的附近挖些小坑，似乎在观察，在等待大海带给他们什么。看到这些小生灵，面对大海的强力而孤单脆弱时，我体会到了令人感动的哲学寓意，我不敢说罗杰和我有相似的反应。但是，看到婴儿的他接受着自然的世界，不怕风在唱歌，也不怕黑暗包围和海浪轰吟，带着婴儿的兴奋寻求着“幽之蟹”实在是一件令人高兴的事。

It was hardly a conventional way to entertain one so young, I suppose, but now,with Ruger a little past his fourth birthday, we are continuing that sharing of adventures in the world of nature that we began in his babyhood, and I think the results are good. The sharing includes nature in storm as well as calm, by night as well as day, and is based on having tun together rather than on teaching.

我想，这不是一个让如此年幼的孩子高兴的方式，通常人们不会这么做。但现在，罗杰刚过了他第四个生日，我们仍然继续着从他婴儿时期就开始的自然界探险之旅，我们一同感受这个旅程，而且我认为结果是美好的。我们一同感受自然，不仅有风暴，也有宁静；不仅有黑夜，也有白昼，并且我们的目的是一同欢乐，而不是教导。