Chapter 59 Chapter 55 Hurricane

Now I am writing about a major event in my life.This incident is so memorable, so scary, so inextricably linked with so many things in the past of this book; , like a tower on the plain, and I feel that even my early life was pre-shadowed by it. Even years after this happened, I still dream about it often.I was awakened by it, and I felt that my quiet bedroom was also flying with its violent waves during the long lonely night.I still dream about it often, though at longer intervals and less regularly.The slightest mention of any storm, or of a coast, immediately makes me fondly associated with it.I want to write it down as vividly and clearly as I saw it then.I am not remembering it, I am seeing it clearly because it is vivid again.

The expatriate ship was fast approaching, and my kind old nurse was in London, and when we first met she was almost heartbroken for me.I was often with her, and her brother, and the Micawbers (who were always together), but I never saw Emily. I was alone with Peggotty and her brother one evening, towards the end of our journey.Our conversation turned to Ham.She told us at length how warmly he had bid her farewell, how resolutely calm he had remained; he had been, she believed, particularly distressed of late.The subject never bored the earnest man; when it was said about him, we listened with the same interest as she spoke.

My aunt and I had then moved out of our two cottages in Highgate; I was going abroad and she was going back to her cottage in Dover.We found a temporary home in Covent Garden.As I walked towards the flat after our conversation that evening, I recalled what had been said between Ham and myself on my last visit to Yarmouth.I thought I should leave another letter for Emily when I said good-bye to Mr. Peggotty on board;It occurred to me that, after receiving my letter, she might wish to convey a parting note from me to her unhappy lover.I should leave such an opportunity to her. So, before going to bed, I sat in my bedroom and wrote her a letter.I told her I had seen him, and he begged me to tell her what I had written at the appropriate place in this book.I repeat faithfully, and if I have a right to exaggerate, I have no need to exaggerate.That speech was so sincere and kind that it didn't need embellishment by me or anyone else.I put the letter out, to be sent out early in the morning; and enclosed a line for Mr. Peggotty, begging him to forward it to her; and after that I went to bed, as it was dawn.

But I didn't fall asleep until the sun came out, so I was very tired and weak.The next day I lay in bed very late and was in a bad mood.My aunt and grandma quietly came to the bed and woke me up.I also feel her next to me when I am asleep, as I am sure we all feel. "Trow, my dear," said she, when I opened my eyes, "I was hesitating whether I should wake you. Mr. Peggotty is here; shall he come up?" I promised to say yes, and he came up after a while. "Master Weiss," said he, after we had shaken hands, "I gave Emily your letter, sir, and she wrote it; and begged me to show you. If you think there is nothing wrong with it Yes, please pass it on."

"Have you seen it?" I said. He nodded sadly.I opened the letter and saw: "I've got your message. Oh, how can I write to thank you for your kind and pure kindness to me? I've kept those words in my heart till I die. They were sharp thorns, but It is also extremely comforting. I pray for those words, oh, I pray a lot.When I know what you are, what uncle is, I think God is also, I can cry to him.farewell.Now, my dear, my friend, in this world, we say goodbye forever.In another world, if I get a pardon, I can go to you as a child.I am infinitely grateful.Unlimited blessings.May you always be safe.

This is the tear-stained letter. "May I tell her that you think there is nothing wrong with it, and promise to pass it on for her, Master Wei?" said Mr. Peggotty when I had finished reading. "No problem," I said, "but I think—" "Oh, Master Wei?" "I think," said I, "that I'll go to Yarmouth again. I'll have time enough to go back and forth before you sail. I've been thinking of him with a lonely heart; and this time I'll Hand her handwritten letter into his hands, and then you can tell her before you go that he has received it, and it will be a good deed to both of them. I solemnly accept his commission, dear good man , I want to do it as thoughtfully as possible. This journey is nothing to me. I am very depressed, and the activities are better. I will leave tonight."

Although he tried his best to dissuade me, I understand that he agrees with me to do so, and I also know that even if my thoughts were not firm at first, they are firm now.At my request, he went to the ticket office and reserved a seat for me on the mail car.That night, I got into the car and walked on the road that I had walked up and down with a sense of infinite ups and downs. "Don't you think," I asked the coachman, on the first station after leaving London, "that the weather is peculiar? I don't remember ever seeing one like it." "I don't remember either—nothing like that," he answered. "It's the wind, sir, and I think something's going to happen at sea."

The galloping cloud, dark black as if tainted with the motley color of smoke from wet wood, rolled up and down in the air in startling heaps so high that one The height of the sky is greater than the bottom of the deepest hole pierced from the sky to the ground; the moon is like crazy, desperately trying to get through the cloud pile, as if she was also lost by the amazing changes in the laws of nature. , Lost the mind.The wind had been blowing all day; and it was still loud and still blowing.After another 2 hours, the wind became stronger and stronger, and the sky became darker. As the night grew darker, the clouds gathered together and filled the already dark sky; the wind picked up and was still growing, until our horses could barely keep up with it up.During the darkest part of the night (it was the end of September, and the night was not short), the lead horse in front of the carriage turned around several times or stood still; Hastily falling like a knife, at such times we stop as soon as there is a wall or tree to hide from, because we can't hold on any longer.

When dawn broke, the wind blew even harder.In the past, when I was in Yarmouth, I had heard people on board say that hurricanes were like cannons, but I had never seen such a wind, or anything close to it.It was late when we arrived in Ipswich.Since we were 10 miles out of London, we had to move inch by inch.We found a crowd in the market place who had been up at night for fear of blowing their chimneys down.While we were changing horses, some who had gathered before the inn told us that the iron sheeting from the roof of a very high church had been thrown off into a side street, blocking that street as well.Others told us that several people from the neighboring villages had seen great trees being pulled out of the earth and lying on their sides, and whole haystacks blown over the fields and roads. .The storm has not weakened, but it has become more violent.

As we struggled on, the nearer we came to the sea (the wind was blowing from the sea with all its force ashore), the wind became more and more frighteningly strong.Long before we saw the sea.Our lips are splashed with sea spray, and we are sprayed with salt water.The sea came out, and covered miles and miles of the plain near Yarmouth; and every puddle, every ditch, beat against the banks with all its might, and mustered their little sprays against us.When we see the sea, there are always waves rising from the rolling abyss on the horizon, just like tall towers and tall buildings appearing and disappearing on the opposite bank.When we at last came to town, staggered people came to the wagon door, their hair blown high by the wind, and they expressed their amazement that the mail wagon could arrive on such a night.

After I booked a bed in that old hotel, I went to see the sea along the street where the sand and grass were flying and the sea foam was splashing. The clothes corners of passers-by at the corner of the street, walking forward with difficulty.When I came to the beach, I saw that not only the boatmen were hiding behind the buildings, but half the people in the town came; I stood among these groups and found women weeping as their husbands went out to sea in fishing or oyster boats which were too likely to sink after reaching safety.There were also gray-haired old sailors in the crowd. They shook their heads while looking at the sky above the water, whispering to each other; there were anxious and nervous ship owners, some children huddled together looking at the faces of adults, and some were excited. And restless robust boatmen, who, from behind their objects, observe the sea through binoculars as if observing an enemy. When, amid blinding gusts of wind, whirling sand and dreadful noises, I finally found a momentary break enough to look at the sea, I was overwhelmed by the sea.The tall walls of water rushed one after the other, and when they reached their peak and fell, it seemed that even the smallest of them could engulf the town.The retreating waves retreated with a bang, as if they wanted to dig a deep hole in the sea and destroy the ground.The white-topped waves crashed on the shore, shattering before they reached land, each broken wave full of all the fury, hastily recombining into another monster.The rolling mountains became deep valleys, and the rolling valleys (through which solitary petrels flew now and then) became mountains again.Masses of sea water vibrate and shake the shore with a deafening roar; with each roar the tide gathers into one form, then changes and departs, while at the same time knocks another rushing tide Retreat, drive away; on the horizon, like the tall towers and buildings on the other side, the wave shadows rise and fall; the dark clouds quickly cover it thickly; I seem to see the sky falling apart. The wind is still remembered to this day as the greatest ever blown on the coast, and never since.But I did not find Ham among the throng drawn by that unforgettable gale, and I went to his house against the gale.His door is closed.Since no one opened the door, I went to the workshop where he worked through the back alley.There I heard that he had gone to Rostorft for an urgent ship-repair job which required his skill, but he would be back in time next morning. I go back to the hotel.I showered, changed, tried to sleep but couldn't, it was 5pm.I had not been sitting by the fire in the coffee-room for five minutes when the waiter, who had poked the fire on pretext, told me that two colliers had been sunk with all their crews a few miles away.Some ships are still struggling at anchor, trying to avoid the coast with difficulty.If there was another night like last night, he said, it would kill them, and it would kill all the sailors too! I was bored and sad, and lonely and distressed; I was very disturbed by Ham's absence.The recent series of accidents have affected me indescribably seriously. I am dizzy because of such a long period of strong winds. My thinking and memory are so confused that I can no longer clearly distinguish time and space. .So if I had been in town at that time, I wouldn't have been surprised to meet people I knew must be in London at that moment, I believe.It may be said that my mind has a peculiar numbness in this regard.But it was also busy with the memories that the place naturally brought up, memories that were all the more clear and vivid. In this mood, when I heard the sad news about the ship from the waiter, I was quick to think that Ham was very unsafe.I believe, and I fear he will be wrecked returning from Rostorft by sea.The panic was so great that I resolved to go to the dock again before supper, and ask the shipwright's opinion as to the possibility of his return by sea.If the shipwrights give even the slightest reason for that, I will go to Rostoft and bring him back with me, lest he go by sea. I hurriedly ordered dinner and walked back to the dock.I came just in time, for a shipwright with a lantern was locking the workshop door.After hearing me ask him this question, he laughed out loud and said that there is no need to be afraid. No matter whether it is a sane person or a sane person, they will not sail in this kind of storm, let alone the Han who was born to sail. What about Tom and Peggotty? I knew beforehand that I would be laughed at, and I couldn't stop doing it.I walked back to the hotel.If that wind can get any stronger, then I think it's getting stronger.The howling and roaring, the clanging of doors and windows, the shaking of the chimney, the apparent swaying of the house where I lodged, and the tumult of the sea were more terrible than in the morning.But now a great darkness was added; darkness added a new horror to the storm, the horror of fantasy added to reality. I couldn't eat or drink, I couldn't sit or sleep, and I couldn't settle down to do anything.There is something in my heart that slightly echoes the storm outside, which touches my dormant memory and causes a burst of excitement in the depths of my memory.But above all, in thoughts as wild and chaotic as the roaring sea, were the storm and my concern for Ham. My dinner was removed almost as it was.I tried to pick myself up with a drink or two, but to no avail.I fell asleep in front of the fire, but I didn't lose consciousness. Not only could I feel the noise outside the house, but I knew where I was.Both consciousnesses faded under a new indescribable horror; and when I awoke, or when I emerged from the lethargy which had imprisoned me in the chair, my whole body was shaken by strange and unknown causes. Trembling with terror. I paced up and down, trying to read an old newspaper, listening to the terrible noise, seeing visions of faces, sights, and figures conjured up in the fire.Only the undisturbed ticking of the clock on the wall finally annoyed me enough to make up my mind to go to bed. On nights like that it was reassuring to hear that some of the inn servants had agreed to sit together and watch the morning.I was so tired and dizzy that I went to bed; but as soon as I lay down, all that feeling disappeared again, and I was wide awake, as if by magic. I lay for hours listening to the sound of the wind and the water.Sometimes I imagined hearing the screams at sea, sometimes I clearly heard people firing flare guns, and sometimes I heard houses collapsing in the town.A few times I got up and looked out, but I could see nothing but the dimly glowing candle I hadn't blown out, and my own face reflected in the glass looking out at me from the dark outside. not see. My restlessness finally caused me to hurriedly put on my coat and go downstairs.In the big kitchen, I saw bacon and onion petals hanging from the beams in the dimness, and the night watchman sat around a table moved to the door to avoid the big chimney with different expressions.When I appeared, a girl with an apron plugged in her ears and eyes looking at the door cried out that she thought I was a ghost;In connection with what they were just talking about, a man asked me if the spirits of the sailors on the sinking colliers would emerge in the storm? I guess, I was there for 2 hours.Once, I opened the courtyard door and looked at the empty street, and I was greeted by gravel, seaweed and spray.I couldn't close the door no matter what, so I had to call for help, and then pushed the door against the wind. When at last I came back to my deserted bedroom, it was dark; but I was now very tired, and went to bed again, and fell into a deep sleep, like falling from a tower; from a precipice.I have an impression that the wind has been blowing for a long time, although I dreamed that I was elsewhere and saw a different scene.At last, my feeble grip on reality was gone, and two close friends and I went to attack a certain town amidst the rumble of guns, though I didn't know who those two men were. The gunfire was so loud and continuous that I couldn't hear what I wanted to hear.I finally managed to move a bit, and finally woke up.It was broad daylight, eight or nine o'clock, the storm replaced the cannon, and someone knocked on my door and shouted. "What's the matter?" I called. "A ship wrecked! Nearby!" I jumped off the bed and asked, "What ship?" "A schooner bringing fresh fruit and wine from Spain or Portugal. If you want to see it, sir, hurry up! It's going to break into pieces any moment, it's supposed by those on shore." The nervous voice yelled down the stairs, and I put on my shirt as best I could and ran down the street. There are many people in front of me running towards the sea.I overtook many people and ran towards it, and soon I saw the angry sea. By this time the wind might have dropped a little, but as I dreamed that some of the hundreds of cannons were parked, the drop was hardly perceptible.The sea, which has been disturbed all night, is more terrible than what I saw yesterday.At this time, each of its forms has a momentum of expansion; the waves rise one after another, one is higher than the other, and one suppresses the other. From the sound of the wind and the waves that drowned out the voices of the people, from the crowd, from the unspeakable confusion, from my first almost suffocating struggle against the bad weather, I was dozed.I looked out to sea at the wreck, but I could see nothing but huge, foaming waves.Standing beside me a half-naked boatman pointed left with his bare arm (with an arrow stabbed in the same direction).So, my God, I saw it, it was so close to us! At six or eight feet from the deck a mast snapped and fell sideways, tangled in tangles of sail-cloth and rigging; Unimaginable—that broken, broken mass bumped against the side of the ship, as if trying to punch it through.At that time there was a great effort to chop off the part; for as the heeled ship pitched towards us, I could distinctly see the men on board working with axes, and one of them had a long People with curly hair are particularly lively and attractive.Just then, the sea that beat the heaving ship picked up another high wave, and swept people, logs, barrels, boards, topsides, and the pile of toy-like things into the churning sea , The screams from the shore overwhelmed the sound of wind and water. The secondmast was still standing, with tattered sails and broken ropes dangling from it.It was the same boatman who clung to me and said that the boat hit the rocks once, and hit the rocks again after being lifted.I also heard him say that the boat was going to break in the middle, and I thought so too, for the pitching and impact were too violent for anything made of manpower to stand it for long.When he said this, there was another exclamation of sympathy and pity from the people on the shore-four sailors, holding on to the remaining mast rigging, jumped up from the sea together with the wreck, and the highest point was the long curly hair. figure. There's a clock on board, and when the ship rolls and tosses like a maddened beast (when it's all sideways we can see its whole deck; Turning to the sea, we can only see its keel), and the bell rang.The bells sound like death knells for the less fortunate, and the bells are blown to us with the wind.The boat was out of sight for a moment, and then reappeared for a moment.Two more people were out of sight.The distress on the shore intensified.Men groaned and clenched their fists; women screamed and turned their faces away.Some people ran around along the seashore like crazy, calling for help from places where they could not be rescued.I discovered that I was one of these men too; we irrationally begged a group of sailors I knew to not let these last two desperate souls disappear before our eyes. They also explained to me very excitedly - I don't know why, I can hardly understand them because of the frenzy - 2 hours ago, the lifeboat was manned, but it couldn't go at all; If you were willing to risk wading through the water with a rope tied, so that there could be some kind of connection between the wreck and the shore, there was no other way to try.At this moment, I saw a new commotion in the crowd, and saw them move out of their own way, and Ham stepped from among them to the front. I ran to him and reiterated my request to rescue the two men.But though I was bewildered by the misery at sea, seeing the resolute look on his face and looking out to sea, I remembered that it was just as he had been on the morning of Emily's escape, and I Remembered how dangerous it was for him.I put my arms around him and beg the people I begged just now, please don't let him go, don't listen to him, don't let him die, let him get off the beach! There was another scream from the shore.Looking toward the wreck, the sail was brutally knocked down again and again, knocking down one of the two men, and then went majestically to spin the only remaining active character into a whirl. In such a scene, I would be praying to the wind to shake the resolve of a man who has made up his mind to do his best.He was used to leading half the people present.At this time, he shook my hands happily and said, "If my time has come, it has come; if not, I can wait. God bless you and bless you all! Guys, get me ready! I want went." I was pushed aside violently.People around me blocked me; I heard people persuade me in a daze, saying that he was determined to go with or without help; my blocking those people in this way would only hinder their arrangements for his safety.I don't know what I answered, nor what they said, but I just saw a commotion by the sea, and men untied the ropes from the winches there, and slipped into the circle of people I couldn't see.Later, I saw him in sailor's clothes, standing alone, holding a rope in his hand, which may be tied around his wrist; On the beach, a few assistants standing there from a distance hold a little bit of relaxation. Even my layman's eye can see that this wreck is about to burst.I saw it split in the middle, and the life of the only man on the mast seemed to hang on one shot.He still clings to the mast.On his head was a very peculiar red cap--not like a sailor's cap, but brighter in colour.The ship was leaking, the knell sounded for his death, and we all saw him waving his cap.When I saw him do that, I thought I was going crazy—because it reminded me of a dear old friend of mine. Ham stood alone looking out to sea, the tense, breathless silence behind him, and the storm before him.When a big wave receded, he looked back at those people who were holding the ropes tightly tied to him, and rushed in with the waves, and immediately fought hard with the waves, sometimes rising with the mountains, sometimes falling with the deep valleys ; at last he was pushed ashore again, and the people hastily gathered up the rope. he is hurt.I could see blood on his face from where I was standing, but he didn't expect it at all.He seemed eager to teach them to relax him a bit—perhaps I only surmised that from the motion of his arms—and set off as before. At this time, he struggled to lean towards the broken ship.Sometimes he rises with the mountains, sometimes descends with the deep valleys, sometimes sinks into the rolling foam, sometimes floats toward the shore, and sometimes floats toward the ship.He struggled bravely.It was not a long distance, but the force of the sea and the wind made the struggle terrible.Finally, he approached the wreck.He was so close, one more step forward, and he grabbed it.But at this moment, a mountain-like dark green sea surged towards the shore from the side of the boat, and he seemed to jump in at once, and the boat disappeared! I ran to the place where they collected the rope, and saw some pieces of wood turning round and round in the sea, as if a wooden barrel had just been broken.There was panic on everyone's face.They dragged him to my feet - unconscious - dead.He was carried into the nearest house, and now no one hindered me, and I remained beside him, busily exhausting all means of first aid; but he was killed by the great wave, and his good heart Forever quiet and motionless. When all hope had been given up and everything had been done, I sat down on the edge of the bed.At this moment a fisherman who had known me since Emily and I were children came to the door and called me in a low voice. "Sir," he said, his weather-beaten face now welling with tears.His lips trembled, his face was ashen. "Would you like to go over there?" I read the old things in my memory from his expression.I leaned on the arm he stretched out to help me, and asked him in a daze: "Is that body docked?" "Yes," he said. "I recognize the body?" I asked him. He said nothing. However, he led me to the beach.In the place where she and my two children were looking for shells, in the place where Mr. Peggotty's old boat was blown away by the wind last night and all the debris fell, in the midst of the ruins of the home he injured, I Saw him lying there with his head on his arms, the way I used to see him lying down at school.