Border Town (CHAPTER TWO) 边城 (第二章)

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CHAPTER TWO (Part 1)
Chadong was built between the river and the mountains. On the land side, the city wall crept along the mountain contours like a snake. On the water side, tiny boats with awnings berthed along wharves constructed on the land between the wall and the river. Boats heading downstream carried loads of tung oil, rock salt, and nutgalls—the wasp-made swellings on oak trees used to make dyes. Those going upstream transported cotton yarn and cloth, foodstuffs, household supplies, and choice seafood. Threading through each of the wharves was River Street. Land was scarce, so most people's houses were "dangling-foot houses," half on land, half on stilts built over the water. When water crept up over the street during a great springtime flood, the households of River Street would extend long ladders from the eaves of their houses across to the city wall. Cursing and shouting, they'd enter the city over the ladders, carrying cloth-wrapped bundles, bedrolls, and crocks of rice, then wait for the water to recede before coming back out of the city through the gate in the wall. If one year the waters raged especially fierce, the flood might break through the row of stilt houses in one or two places. The onlookers atop the city wall could only gape. Those who suffered the harm stared right back, speechless over their loss, as if it were just one more unhappy and unavoidable act of nature.
When the river flooded, one could watch its sudden swelling from the city wall. Within that vast surge of mountain waters from upstream, houses, oxen, sheep, and giant trees bobbed up and down. In the places where the torrent slowed, as in front of the pontoons by the customs house, people often went out in little sampans. When they spied a head of livestock, a piece of lumber, or a cargoless boat rising and falling in the waves midstream, perhaps with a crying and screaming woman or child on board, they urgently paddled out, and after meeting the object of rescue downstream, lashed it to the sampan with a long rope, then rowed back to shore. These daring souls typified the local people: they had an eye for their own gain, but also for helping other folks. They were equally joyful salvaging people and property, and they did it with such skill and bravery that onlookers felt compelled to shout hurrahs.
The river was the famous You Shui of history, whose new name is the Bai Shui or White River. After the White River got to Chenzhou and merged with the River Yuan, it became somewhat turbid, proving the adage that spring water becomes muddy when it leaves the mountains. Trace the river back upstream, and it was so clear you could see right down to the bottom, through pools thirty or fifty feet deep. When the sun shone on the deep parts, the white pebbles and striated carnelian stones at the bottom were visible clear as could be, along with fish darting to and fro as if floating in air. High mountains came down to the river on both sides—mountains covered with slender bamboos good for making paper, in all seasons such a deep emerald color as to transfix the eyes.
Households near the water appeared among peach and apricot blossoms. Come spring, one had only to look: wherever there were peach blossoms there was sure to be a home, and wherever there were people, you could stop for a drink. In the summer, purple cotton-print tunics and trousers that dazzled the eye as they dried in the sunlight became ensigns of human habitation. When autumn and winter arrived, dwellings on the cliffs and by the water came clearly into view—not one could escape notice. Walls of yellow earth and pitch-black tiles, neatly placed there for all time and in harmony with the surroundings on every side, brought the viewer a sense of extraordinary joy.
A traveler with the slightest interest in poetry or painting could sail this narrow river curled up in a little boat for a whole month without ever getting tired of it. Miracles could be discovered everywhere. The boldness, the exquisiteness of nature, at every place and every time, led one inescapably into rapture.
(第二章-1)
茶峒地方凭水依山筑城，近山的一面，城墙如一条长蛇，缘山爬去。临水一面则在城外河边留出余地设码头，湾泊小小篷船。船下行时运桐油青盐，染色的棓子。上行则运棉花棉纱以及布匹杂货同海味。贯串各个码头有一条河街，人家房子多一半着陆，一半在水，因为余地有限，那些房子莫不设有吊脚楼。河中涨了春水，到水逐渐进街后，河街上人家，便各用长长的梯子，一端搭在屋檐口，一端搭在城墙上，人人皆骂着嚷着，带了包袱、铺盖、米缸，从梯子上进城里去，水退时方又从城门口出城。某一年水若来得特别猛一些，沿河吊脚楼必有一处两处为大水冲去，大家皆在城上头呆望。受损失的也同样呆望着，对于所受的损失仿佛无话可说，与在自然安排下，眼见其他无可挽救的不幸来时相似。

涨水时在城上还可望着骤然展宽的河面，流水浩浩荡荡，随同山水从上流浮沉而来的有房子、牛、羊、大树。于是在水势较缓处，税关趸船前面，便常常有人驾了小舢板，一见河心浮沉而来的是一匹牲畜，一段小木，或一只空船，船上有一个妇人或一个小孩哭喊的声音，便急急的把船桨去，在下游一些迎着了那个目的物，把它用长绳系定，再向岸边桨去。这些诚实勇敢的人，也爱利，也仗义，同一般当地人相似。不拘救人救物，却同样在一种愉快冒险行为中，做得十分敏捷勇敢，使人见及不能不为之喝彩。

那条河水便是历史上知名的酉水，新名字叫作白河。白河下游到辰州与沅水汇流后，便略显浑浊，有出山泉水的意思。若溯流而上，则三丈五丈的深潭皆清澈见底。深潭为白日所映照，河底小小白石子，有花纹的玛瑙石子，全看得明明白白。水中游鱼来去，全如浮在空气里。两岸多高山，山中多可以造纸的细竹，长年作深翠颜色，逼人眼目。

近水人家多在桃杏花里，春天时只需注意，凡有桃花处必有人家，凡有人家处必可沽酒。夏天则晒晾在日光下耀目的紫花布衣裤，可以作为人家所在的旗帜。秋冬来时，房屋在悬崖上的，滨水的，无不朗然入目。黄泥的墙，乌黑的瓦，位置则永远那么妥贴，且与四围环境极其调和，使人迎面得到的印象，实在非常愉快。

一个对于诗歌图画稍有兴味的旅客，在这小河中，蜷伏于一只小船上，作三十天的旅行，必不至于感到厌烦，正因为处处有奇迹，自然的大胆处与精巧处，无一处不使人神往倾心。

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CHAPTER TWO (Part 2)
The source of the White River was up past the Sichuan frontier. Small boats going upstream could make it all the way on the high waters of spring to Xiushan in Sichuan. Chadong was the last river port on the Hunan side of the border. The big river broadened to half a li at Chadong, but when autumn turned to winter and the water level fell, it revealed a riverbed only two hundred feet wide. Beyond that were only shoals of black boulders. Boats arriving at this point could go no farther upstream, so all goods going in or out of East Sichuan had to be unloaded here. Products came out of the province on mulberry wood carrying poles borne on the shoulders of porters. Goods headed the other way had to be tied into bundles for transport by muscle power.
Chadong and its environs were defended by a lone battalion of garrison troops reorganized from the Green Standard Army's farmer-soldiers of yesteryear. They were joined by almost five hundred resident households in town. (Apart from those who owned fields up in the mountains or tung oil presses, and small-time capitalists who gave out loans for tung oil, rice, or cotton yarn, nearly all the others in town were on the military payroll, descended from households brought in to garrison the area.) There was also a likin transit-tax bureau, housed in a little temple below River Street outside the city wall. The bureau chief had lived in town for a long time. The battalion of soldiers was quartered in the yamen of the former Green Standard lieutenant-colonel. Were it not for the bugler who blew his daily calls from atop the city wall, reminding all that a garrison was here, one would hardly know that these people were soldiers. On winter days, clothes and green vegetables could be seen drying in the sun in front of every doorway. Sweet potatoes hung from the eaves by their vines. Bags made from palm-bark rain capes, stuffed with chestnuts and hazelnuts, also hung under the eaves. Chickens big and little disported themselves by every house, cackling. Here and there would be a man sitting on the high doorsill of his house or splitting logs with an ax, stacking his firewood in the courtyard in neat piles like pagodas. Middle-aged women wore blue cotton outfits starched stiff, with embroidered white cotton aprons hanging down across their bosoms. They chatted as they worked, stooping in the sunlight. It all reflected eternal peace. Everybody passed each day in a pure quietude that is hard to imagine. This measure of tranquility allowed everyone to consider their personal affairs and also their dreams. Each and every denizen of this small town, within the days allotted by nature, nursed his or her own hopes of love and expectations of hate. But what exactly were they thinking about? That was unfathomable.
Those who lived in the higher elevations within the city walls saw from their front doors scenes of the river and the opposite shore. When a boat approached, they could see innumerable trackers on the opposite bank pulling it upstream. Those trackers brought cakes and imported candies from downriver, which they would exchange for cash in the city after coming ashore. Whenever a boat came to town, the local children's imaginations flew to the men who did the pulling. And the adults? If they'd hatched a nest of chicks or raised a pig or two, they'd entrust them to the towmen on the downstream voyage, to exchange for gold earrings, a few yards of superior black cloth, an earthenware jug of gift-quality soy sauce, or an especially sturdy chimney for their American Standard Oil kerosene lamp. Such thoughts preoccupied most of the housewives.


白河的源流，从四川边境而来，从白河上行的小船，春水发时可以直达川属的秀山。但属于湖南境界的，则茶峒为最后一个水码头。这条河水的河面，在茶峒时虽宽约半里，当秋冬之际水落时，河床流水处还不到二十丈，其余只是一滩青石。小船到此后，既无从上行，故凡川东的进出口货物，皆由这地方落水起岸。出口货物俱由脚夫用杉木扁担压在肩膊上挑抬而来，入口货物也莫不从这地方成束成担的用人力搬去。


这地方城中只驻扎一营由昔年绿营屯丁改编而成的戍兵，及五百家左右的住户。（这些住户中，除了一部分拥有了些山田同油坊，或放账屯油、屯米、屯棉纱的小资本家外，其余多数皆为当年屯戍来此有军籍的人家。）地方还有个厘金局，办事机关在城外河街下面小庙里，经常挂着一面长长的幡信。局长则住在城中。一营兵士驻扎老参将衙门，除了号兵每天上城吹号玩，使人知道这里还驻有军队以外，其余兵士皆仿佛并不存在。冬天的白日里，到城里去，便只见各处人家门前皆晾晒有衣服同青菜。红薯多带藤悬挂在屋檐下。用棕衣作成的口袋，装满了栗子榛子和其他硬壳果，也多悬挂在屋檐下。屋角隅各处有大小鸡叫着玩着。间或有什么男子，占据在自己屋前门限上锯木，或用斧头劈树，把劈好的柴堆到敞坪里去一座一座如宝塔。又或可以见到几个中年妇人，穿了浆洗得极硬的蓝布衣裳，胸前挂有白布扣花围裙，躬着腰在日光下一面说话一面作事。一切总永远那么静寂，所有人民每个日子皆在这种单纯寂寞里过去。一分安静增加了人对于“人事”的思索力，增加了梦。在这小城中生存的，各人也一定皆各在分定一份日子里，怀了对于人事爱憎必然的期待。但这些人想些什么？谁知道。


住在城中较高处，门前一站便可以眺望对河以及河中的景致，船来时，远远的就从对河滩上看着无数纤夫。那些纤夫也有从下游地方，带了细点心洋糖之类，拢岸时却拿进城中来换钱的。船来时，小孩子的想象，当在那些拉船人一方面。大人呢，孵一巢小鸡，养两只猪，托下行船夫打副金耳环，带两丈官青布或一坛好酱油、一个双料的美孚灯罩回来，便占去了大部分作主妇的心了。

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CHAPTER TWO (Part 3)
This small town was peaceful and quiet within its walls, but its location made it the nexus for commerce with East Sichuan, so the little River Street outside the city wall was quite a different story. There were inns where merchants put up and barbers who stayed in place, not just the itinerant ones who set up their chair in the street. There were restaurants, a general store, firms dealing in tung oil and salt, and a shop selling cloth of all designs and colors—every kind of merchandise had found its place along this River Street. Still another outfit sold hardwood pulleys, bamboo cables, woks and pots, all for use onboard ships. And wharf rats made their living connecting the boatmen with their employers. Long tables in front of the little restaurants offered carp fried a crispy brown, lying in a big shallow earthenware bowl with bean curd, the fish adorned with slivers of red peppers. Next to the bowl was a big bamboo cylinder with giant red chopsticks sticking up out of it. Anyone willing to plunk down the money could edge up to that table outside the front door, take a seat, and pull out a pair of those chopsticks. A woman with a white powdered face and finely plucked eyebrows would come over and ask, "Elder Brother, Honorable Soldier, what'll it be? Sweet wine? Clear liquor?" A male customer who was witty and wanted to get a rise out of her, or who fancied the proprietress a little, would feign anger and retort, "Sweet wine, for the likes of me? Do I look like a child? Sweet wine, you say!" Potent white spirits were then dipped out of the wine vat with a wooden ladle into an earthenware bowl set immediately upon the table. This bowl of spirits was of course strong and pungent, enough to knock out many a stout fellow, so one couldn't drink another.
这小城里虽那么安静和平但地方既为川东商业交易接头处，因此城外小小河街，情形却不同了一点。也有商人落脚的客店，坐镇不动的理发馆。此外饭店、杂货铺、油行、盐栈、花衣庄，莫不各有一种地位，装点了这条河街。还有卖船上用的檀木活车、竹缆与罐锅铺子，介绍水手职业吃码头饭的人家。小饭店门前长案上，常有煎得焦黄的鲤鱼豆腐，身上装饰了红辣椒丝，卧在浅口钵头里，钵旁大竹筒中插着大把红筷子，不拘谁个愿意花点钱，这人就可以傍了门前长案坐下来，抽出一双筷子到手上，那边一个眉毛扯得极细脸上擦了白粉的妇人就走过来问：“大哥，副爷，要甜酒？要烧酒？”男子火焰高一点的，谐趣的，对内掌柜有点意思的，必装成生气似的说：“吃甜酒？又不是小孩，还问人吃甜酒！”那么，酽冽的烧酒，从大瓮里用竹筒舀出，倒进土碗里，即刻就来到身边案桌上了。

The general store sold American kerosene, the Standard Oil lamps that burned it, incense, candles, and paper goods. The oil firm was a depot for tung oil. The salt firm stored piles of rock salt of the sort produced since ancient times in Huojing town, Sichuan. The dry goods shop sold white cotton yarn, cloth, cotton, and the black silk crepe wound around the head as a turban. The ship chandler had just about everything in its trade, sometimes even an anchor weighing a hundred catties just resting outside the door and waiting for a customer to ask its price. Boat owners clad in their dark blue sateen mandarin jackets and fidgeting boatmen went in and out of the establishment of the wharf rats who got the boatmen their work; its door, on River Street, was open all day long. It was like a teahouse that sold no tea, though you could smoke a pipe of opium there. The men all said they went there to keep up on their trade, but everybody in the crew from top to bottom, from the oarsmen on board to the trackers onshore, observed a rule: no talking about numbers. Most went there to "socialize." With the "Dragon Head" lodge master at the center of things, they talked about local affairs, business conditions in the two provinces, and "news," most of which came from downriver. Meetings and fund-raising generally took place here, and it was here, too, that money-savers' circles often threw the dice to see who took home the pot this time. The trades that really held their attention were two in number: the buying and selling of boats, and of women.
杂货铺卖美孚油及点美孚油的洋灯，与香烛纸张。油行屯桐油。盐栈堆火井出的青盐。花衣庄则有白棉纱、大布、棉花以及包头的黑绉绸出卖。卖船上用物的，百物罗列，无所不备，且间或有重至百斤以外的铁锚搁在门外路旁，等候主顾问价的。专以介绍水手为事业，吃水码头饭的，则在河街的家中，终日大门敞开着，常有穿青羽缎马褂的船主与毛手毛脚的水手进出，地方象茶馆却不卖茶，不是烟馆又可以抽烟。来到这里的，虽说所谈的是船上生意经，然而船只的上下，划船拉纤人大都有一定规矩，不必作数目上的讨论。他们来到这里大多数倒是在“联欢”。以“龙头管事”作中心，谈论点本地时事，两省商务上情形，以及下游的“新事”。邀会的，集款时大多数皆在此地，扒骰子看点数多少轮作会首时，也常常在此举行。常常成为他们生意经的，有两件事：买卖船只，买卖媳妇。

Certain kinds of big-city hangers-on follow commercial prosperity, to meet the needs of merchants and also the boatmen. Even this tiny border town had those types along its River Street; they congregated in establishments housed in the dangling-foot structures. These little dames were either brought in from the surrounding countryside or they were camp followers of the Sichuan Army when it had come foraging in Hunan. They wore jackets of faux foreign satin over cotton print trousers; they plucked their eyebrows into thin lines and drew up their hair into big topknots that gave off strong scents of cheaply perfumed oil. Unoccupied during the day, they sat outside their doorways on little square stools, making shoes to while away the time, embroidering mating phoenixes on the toes in red and green silk thread and keeping an eye out for passersby. Or they'd sit by a window along the river to watch the sailors lifting cargo and listen to them sing as they climbed up the masts. Come evening, though, they'd take their turns serving the merchants and the boatmen, earnestly doing all that it was a prostitute's duty to do.
大都市随了商务发达而产生的某种寄食者，因为商人的需要，水手的需要，这小小边城的河街，也居然有那么一群人，聚集在一些有吊脚楼的人家。这种妇人不是从附近乡下弄来，便是随同川军来湘流落后的妇人，穿了假洋绸的衣服，印花标布的裤子，把眉毛扯得成一条细线，大大的发髻上敷了香味极浓俗的油类。白日里无事，就坐在门口做鞋子，在鞋尖上用红绿丝线挑绣双凤，或为情人水手挑绣花抱兜，一面看过往行人，消磨长日。或靠在临河窗口上看水手铺货，听水手爬桅子唱歌。到了晚间，则轮流的接待商人同水手，切切实实尽一个妓女应尽的义务。

Folkways in a border district are so straightforward and unsophisticated that even the prostitutes retained their everlasting honesty and simplicity. With a new customer, they got the money in advance; with business settled, they closed the door and the wild oats were sown. If they knew the customer, payment was up to him. The prostitutes depended on the Sichuan merchants for their living, but their love went to the boatmen. When the couple were sweet on each other, they'd each swear an oath when parting, biting each other on the lips and the nape of the neck, promising to stay true during their separation. The one afloat on the boat, and likewise the one staying ashore, got through the next forty, the next fifty days with their heartstrings firmly bound to the other so far away. Particularly the women, who were given to true infatuations of indescribable simplemindedness, would see their man in their dreams if he failed to return within the agreed-upon time. Often they'd envision the boat pull into shore and their man teeter on his sea legs down the gangplank, then come running directly to her side. If she'd begun to doubt him, she'd see the man up in the rigging, directing his songs toward another quarter and ignoring her. The weaker spirits would proceed to dream of drowning themselves in the river or taking an overdose of opium, whereas those made of sterner stuff would run at their man with a cleaver. Though far outside the bounds of ordinary society, when tears and laughter worked their way into these women's lives through loves won and loves lost, they were just like women of any other time or place, ruled body and soul by love and hate, with all their chills and fevers, oblivious to all else. The only thing really setting them apart was that they were a little more given to resolve, and therefore also foolishness—just that, no more.
由于边地的风俗淳朴，便是作妓女，也永远那么浑厚，遇不相熟的人，做生意时得先交钱，再关门撒野，人既相熟后，钱便在可有可无之间了。妓女多靠四川商人维持生活，但恩情所结，则多在水手方面。感情好的，互相咬着嘴唇咬着颈脖发了誓，约好了“分手后各人皆不许胡闹”，四十天或五十天，在船上浮着的那一个，同留在岸上的这一个，便皆呆着打发这一堆日子，尽把自己的心紧紧缚定远远的一个人。尤其是妇人感情真挚，痴到无可形容，男子过了约定时间不回来，做梦时，就总常常梦船拢了岸，一个人摇摇荡荡的从船跳板到了岸上，直向身边跑来。或日中有了疑心，则梦里必见男子在桅上向另一方面唱歌，却不理会自己。性格弱一点儿的，接着就在梦里投河吞鸦片烟，性格强一点儿的便手执菜刀，直向那水手奔去。他们生活虽那么同一般社会疏远，但是眼泪与欢乐，在一种爱憎得失间，揉进了这些人生活里时，也便同另外一片土地另外一些年轻生命相似，全个身心为那点爱憎所浸透，见寒作热，忘了一切。若有多少不同处，不过是这些人更真切一点，也更近于糊涂一点罢了。

Short-term commitments, long-term engagements, one-night stands—these transactions with women's bodies, given the simplicity of local mores, did not feel degrading or shameful to those who did business with their bodies, nor did those on the outside use the concepts of the educated to censure them or look down on them. These women put principles before profit and they kept their promises; even if they were prostitutes, they tended to be more trustworthy than city people who knew all about "shame."
短期的包定，长期的嫁娶，一时间的关门，这些关于一个女人身体上的交易，由于民情的淳朴，身当其事的不觉得如何下流可耻，旁观者也就从不用读书人的观念，加以指摘与轻视。这些人既重义轻利，又能守信自约，即便是娼妓，也常常较之讲道德知羞耻的城市中人还更可信任。

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CHAPTER TWO (Part 4)
The man in charge of the docks was one Shunshun, a character who'd spent his time in the ranks during the Qing dynasty and then led a squad as a sergeant in the famous Forty-ninth army regiment at the time of the revolution. Others of his rank had either become famous for their revolutionary exploits or lost their heads, but he went home, though with bad feet—the result of gout from youthful carousing. He bought a simple six-man wooden boat with his modest savings and rented it out to a boat captain down on his luck to transport goods between Chadong and Chenzhou on commission. Luck was with him; the boat sailed safely, and in six months he'd saved money enough to marry a pretty, black-haired young widow. That was his start. Several years later, he had acquired eight boats that plied the river, a wife, and two sons.
This untrammeled and free-spending fellow, able though he was in business, liked to store up friends and give out money. Shunshun was always there for those in need, so he never became greatly rich like the tung oil merchants. He knew what it was like to live on army rations and endure the hardships of travel, and what it felt like to have one's hopes dashed. Whenever a boat owner bankrupted by a shipwreck, a demobilized soldier on his way home, or a scholar or painter wanting to study abroad came to town for help because he'd heard of Shunshun's generosity, he did his utmost for them, one and all.

掌水码头的名叫顺顺，一个前清时便在营伍中混过日子来的人物，革命时在著名的陆军四十九标做个什长。同样做什长的，有因革命成了伟人名人的，有杀头碎尸的，他却带少年喜事得来的脚疯痛，回到了家乡，把所积蓄的一点钱，买了一条六桨白木船，租给一个穷船主，代人装货在茶峒与辰州之间来往。气运好，半年之内船不坏事，于是他从所赚的钱上，又讨了一个略有产业的白脸黑发小寡妇。数年后，在这条河上，他就有了大小四只船，一个铺子，两个儿子了。
但这个大方洒脱的人，事业虽十分顺手，却因欢喜交朋结友，慷慨而又能济人之急，便不能同贩油商人一样大大发作起来。自己既在粮子里混过日子，明白出门人的甘苦，理解失意人的心情，故凡因船只失事破产的船家，过路的退伍兵士，游学文墨人，凡到了这个地方闻名求助的，莫不尽力帮助。

He earned his fortune from the water, and so he sprinkled that fortune all around. He could swim, even with his bad feet. His walk was uneven, but his character and judgments were straightforward, right down the middle. Things were fairly simple out on the river; everything was decided by customary practice. Which boat was at fault in a collision, which boat had harmed another's property—usually there was an established way to decide it. But to apply all these customary laws they needed an elder of tested virtue. On an autumn day some years before, the old boss of the riverfront had passed away. Shunshun took his place. He was only fifty at the time, but he was so astute, upright, and even-tempered, so free of greed and venality, that no objections were heard on account of his youth.
His older son was now already seventeen years old; the younger, fifteen. These young men were as strong and muscular as little bulls. They could pilot boats and they could swim and hike long distances. Anything a lad who had grown up in a country town could do, they could do, and expertly.
The older was more like his father in temper—bold, unconstrained, and confident, not tied down by pettiness or convention. The younger one's personality followed that of his pretty and delicate mother. He was not so given to talk, and his eyebrows were exquisite and forceful—one look at him and you knew he was intelligent and full of passion.

一面从水上赚来钱，一面就这样洒脱散去。这人虽然脚上有点小毛病，还能泅水；走路难得其平，为人却那么公正无私。水面上各事原本极其简单，一切皆为一个习惯所支配，谁个船碰了头，谁个船妨害了别一个人别一只船的利益，皆照例有习惯方法来解决。惟运用这种习惯规矩排调一切的，必需一个高年硕德的中心人物。某年秋天，那原来执事人死去了，顺顺作了这样一个代替者。那时他还只五十岁，为人既明事明理，正直和平又不爱财，故无人对他年龄怀疑。
到如今，他的儿子大的已十八岁，小的已十六岁。两个年青人皆结实如小公牛，能驾船，能泅水，能走长路。凡从小乡城里出身的年青人所能够作的事，他们无一不作，作去无一不精。
年纪较长的，如他们爸爸一样，豪放豁达，不拘常套小节。年幼的则气质近于那个白脸黑发的母亲，不爱说话，眼眉却秀拔出群，一望即知其为人聪明而又富于感情。

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CHAPTER TWO (Part 5)
Now that the brothers had grown up, it was time to test their characters in every different line of work. The father had sent each boy in turn on journeys to distant parts. When taking a boat downstream, they suffered the same hardships as the rest of the crew. When it was time to man the oars, they chose the heaviest one, and when it was time for towing, they took the lead place among the trackers. They ate the same dried fish, hot peppers, and putrid pickled cabbage as the others, and they slept on the same stiff, hard deck planks. On the land route upriver, taking the East Sichuan trade route, they did business in Xiushan, Longtan, and Youyang, always on schedule, even while wearing straw sandals in heat and cold, rain and snow. The young men were armed with knives. They could unsheathe them in a flash, but did so only when forced. They'd move to a clearing and wait for the opponent to make his move, then let their muscles decide the outcome.
两兄弟既年已长大，必需在各种生活上来训练他们，作父亲的就轮流派遣两个小孩子各处旅行。向下行船时，多随了自己的船只充伙计，甘苦与人相共。荡桨时选最重的一把，背纤时拉头纤二纤，吃的是干鱼，辣子，臭酸菜，睡的是硬帮帮的舱板。向上行从旱路走去，则跟了川东客货，过秀山、龙潭，酉阳作生意，不论寒暑雨雪，必穿了草鞋按站赶路。且佩了短刀，遇不得已必需动手，便霍的把刀抽出，站到空阔处去，等候对面的一个，接着就同这个人用肉搏来解决。

Gang ritual decreed that "it takes a knife both to fend off adversaries and make blood brothers," so when a knife was needed, the two boys were not shy about putting it to its intended use. All their education—in the ways of trade, social manners, living in a strange environment, using a knife to defend their persons and their reputations—seemed aimed at teaching these two boys the courage and sense of duty to be a man. And this very education made both of them as strong and tough as tigers, yet also friendly and approachable, never lazy and arrogant, ostentatious, or bullying. When anyone at the Chadong frontier brought up the character of Shunshun and his boys, they always spoke their names with respect.
帮里的风气，既为“对付仇敌必需用刀，联结朋友也必需用刀”，故需要刀时，他们也就从不让它失去那点机会。学贸易，学应酬，学习到一个新地方去生活，且学习用刀保护身体同名誉，教育的目的，似乎在使两个孩子学得做人的勇气与义气。一分教育的结果，弄得两个人皆结实如老虎，却又和气亲人，不骄惰，不浮华，不倚势凌人，故父子三人在茶峒边境上为人所提及时，人人对这个名姓无不加以一种尊敬。

Since his boys' infancy, their father had seen that the elder would resemble him in all things, yet he seemed slightly partial to the younger son. This unconscious preference led him to name the elder son Tianbao (Heaven-protected), and his younger brother Nuosong (Sent by the Nuo Gods). He who was protected by Heaven might not be so favored in the worldly affairs of humans, but he who was sent by the Nuo gods, according to local understanding, must not be underestimated. Nuosong was exquisitely handsome. The boat people of Chadong were hard put to find words for his good looks. The best they could come up with was the nickname Yue Yun. None of them had ever seen Yue Yun, that most handsome warrior of the Song dynasty a thousand years earlier, but they thought they saw a resemblance to the dashing Yue Yun figure who appeared onstage in local opera.
作父亲的当两个儿子很小时，就明白大儿子一切与自己相似，却稍稍见得溺爱那第二个儿子。由于这点不自觉的私心，他把长子取名天保，次子取名傩送。意思是天保佑的在人事上或不免有龃龉处，至于傩神所送来的，照当地习气，人便不能稍加轻视了。傩送美丽得很，茶峒船家人拙于赞扬这种美丽，只知道为他取出一个诨名为“岳云”。虽无什么人亲眼看到过岳云，一般的印象，却从戏台上小生岳云，得来一个相近的神气。