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A few paces from the "Russian tree, " at a little table in front of Weber's coffee—house, there was sitting a good—looking man, about thirty, of medium height, thin and dark, with a manly and pleasant face. He sat bending forward with both arms leaning on his stick, with the calm and simple air of a man to whom the idea had not occurred that any one would notice him or pay any attention to him. His large expressive golden—brown eyes were gazing deliberately about him, sometimes screwed up to keep the sunshine out of them, and then watching fixedly some eccentric figure that passed by him while a childlike smile faintly stirred his fine moustache and lips, and his prominent short chin. He wore a roomy coat of German cut, and a soft gray hat hid half of his high forehead. At the first glance he made the impression of an honest, sensible, rather self—confident young man such as there are many in the world. He seemed to be resting from prolonged labors and to be deriving all the more simple—minded amusement from the scene spread out before him because his thoughts were far away, and because they moved too, those thoughts, in a world utterly unlike that which surrounded him at the moment. He was a Russian; his name was Grigory Mihalovitch Litvinov.
离 “俄国树” 几步远处、韦伯咖啡屋的小桌前，坐着一位英俊潇洒的男士。他三十岁左右，中等身材，身体削瘦，皮肤黝黑，面容坚毅、讨人喜欢。他身体前倾，双手拄着拐杖，神态沉静安详，从来不会想到有人会注意到他或者关注他。他那双炯炯有神的金褐色大眼睛刻意地注视着四周。有时他会眯起双眼，抵挡阳光，然后又死死地盯着从他身边走过的古怪之人。这时候，孩子般的微笑则会隐约掠过他那整齐的胡子、嘴唇和突出的短下巴。他身着宽大的德国式外衣，灰色的软帽把他高高的额头遮了一半。乍看之下，他给人的印象是他是个诚实、明智、颇有自信的年轻人，而这世上有许多这样的人。他似乎是经过了漫长的工作之后正在休息，从展现在他眼前的景致中汲取所有更加单纯的快乐，因为他的思想在远处，并且那些思想转移到了与他此刻所处的世界迥然不同的一片天地。他是个俄国人。他的名字是格里高利? 米哈伊洛维奇? 李特维诺夫。
We have to make his acquaintance, and so it will be well to relate in a few words his past, which presents little of much interest or complexity.
我们必须了解他，所以不妨三言两语讲述下他平淡无奇、简简单单的过去。
He was the son of an honest retired official of plebian extraction, but be (he) was educated, not as one would naturally expect, in the town, but in the country. His mother was of noble family, and had been educated in a government school. She was a good—natured and very enthusiastic creature, not devoid of character, however. Though she was twenty years younger than her husband, she remodelled him, as far as she could, drew him out of the petty official groove into the landowner's way of life, and softened and refined his harsh and stubborn character. Thanks to her, he began to dress with neatness, and to behave with decorum; he came to respect learned men and learning, though, of course, he never took a single book in his hand; he gave up swearing, and tried in every way not to demean himself. He even arrived at walking more quietly and speaking in a subdued voice, mostly of elevated subjects, which cost him no small effort. "Ah! they ought to be flogged, and that's all about it! " he sometimes thought to himself, but aloud he pronounced: "Yes, yes, that's so... of course; it is a great question. " Litvinov's mother set her household, too, upon a European footing; she addressed the servants by't he plural "you" instead of the familiar "thou, " and never allowed any one to gorge himself into a state of lethargy at her table. As regards the property belonging to her, neither she nor her husband was capable of looking after it at all. It had been long allowed to run to waste, but there was plenty of land, with all sorts of useful appurtenances, forest—lands and a lake, on which there had once stood a factory, which had been founded by a zealous but unsystematic owner, and had flourished in the hands of a scoundrelly merchant, and gone utterly to ruin under the superintendence of a conscientious German manager. Madame Litvinov was contented so long as she did not dissipate her fortune or contract debts. Unluckily she could not boast of good health, and she died of consumption in the very year that her son entered the Moscow university. He did not complete his course there owing to circumstances of which the reader will hear more later on, and went back to his provincial home, where he idled away some time without work and without ties, almost without acquaintances. Thanks to the disinclination for active service of the local gentry, who were, however, not so much penetrated by the Western theory of the evils of "absenteeism, " as by the home—grown conviction that "one's own shirt is the nearest to one's skin, " he was drawn for military service in 1855, and almost died of typhus in the Crimea, where he spent six months in a mud—hut on the shore of the Putrid Sea, without ever seeing a single ally. After that, he served, not of course without unpleasant experiences, on the councils of the nobility, and after being a little time in the country, acquired a passion for farming. He realized that his mother's property, under the indolent and feeble management of his infirm old father, did not yield a tenth of the revenue it might yield, and that in experienced and skillful hands it might be converted into a perfect gold mine. But he realized, too, that experience and skill were just what he lacked—and he went abroad to study agriculture and technology—to learn them from the first rudiments. More than four years he had spent in Mecklenburg, in Silesia, and in Carlsruhe, and he had traveled in Belgium and in England. He had worked conscientiously and accumulated information; he had not acquired it easily; but he had persevered through his difficulties to the end, and now with confidence in himself, in his future, and in his usefulness to his neighbors, perhaps even to the whole countryside, he was preparing to return home, where he was summoned with despairing prayers and entreaties in every letter from his father, now completely bewildered by the emancipation, the redivision of lands, and the terms of redemption—by the new regime in short. But why was he in Baden?
他是一个诚实的、平民出身的退休官员的儿子。人们自然会认为他是在镇上受的教育，但其实不是，他是在乡下上的学。他的母亲出身贵族，曾经就读于官办学校。她是个善良、充满热情的人，但并不缺乏个性。虽然她比丈夫小二十岁，但她竭尽所能地重塑他，把他从琐碎的官员生活中拉进了地主式的生活，使他苛刻固执的性格变得温文尔雅。多亏有她，他开始穿得整齐干净，与人相处彬彬有礼。他开始尊重博学之人，尊重学习。当然了他一本书都没读过，但尽管如此，他不再咒骂了，而是想方设法不做有失身份的事情。他甚至连走路的步子都变轻了，说话的嗓门也变小了，且谈的大多是高尚的话题。他为此作出的努力可不小。 “啊！他们真应该被揍一顿，就是这样！” 有时候他心里会这么想，但是他会大声地说： “是的，是的，的确是这样……当然，这是个极好的问题。” 李特维诺夫的母亲也以欧式方法来经营她的家庭。她对仆人使用 “您” 这个称呼，而并不是我们熟悉的 “你” 。而且她从不允许任何人在她的餐桌上狼吞虎咽、吃得昏昏欲睡。至于她名下的那座庄园，她和她的丈夫都根本无力照看。庄园老早就荒废了，但是那里却有广袤的土地，各种有用的配套设施、林地和一个湖泊。一位热心但缺乏组织能力的地主曾在那里建了一个工厂，工厂在一位奸商手里曾兴旺过，但却在一名尽心尽职的德国经理的监管下彻底毁了。只要没有破产或负债，李特维诺夫夫人就心满意足了。不幸的是，她身体不好，就在儿子进入莫斯科大学就读的那一年，她因患肺病去世了。他没有完成学业（原因读者稍后会知道）就回到了家乡，在那里虚度了一段时光，既不工作，又不与人交往，几乎没有相识的人。幸亏当地的乡绅不怎么喜欢服兵役，他们坚持本土 “自己的衬衫最贴身” 的信念而不怎么信奉 “弃权有害” 的西方理论，所以李特维诺夫1855年才被拉去服兵役。他差点儿因斑疹伤寒死在在克里米亚。他在克里米亚腐海之滨的一个泥屋呆了六个月，却连一个盟友都没见到。在此之后，他在贵族委员会工作，当然也有些不愉快的经历。在乡下呆了一段时间后，他对农业产生了热情。他意识到，母亲的庄园在身体衰弱的老父亲懈怠无力的经营下，收益还不到本该有的十分之一，但是在有经验的、技术熟练的人手中，它也许会变成一个极好的金矿。但是他也意识到，经验和技术恰恰是他所缺乏的东西。于是他到国外去学习农业和技术——从基础知识学起。他在梅克伦堡、西里西亚、卡尔斯鲁厄生活了四年多并且游览了比利时和英国。他认真地工作，积累知识；掌握这些知识并非易事，但他克服了诸多困难，坚持到了最后。现在他对自己和自己的未来充满了信心，自信能够帮助邻居们，也许甚至还能帮到整个乡村。他正打算回家乡，父亲正用一封封信件召唤着他，信中满是绝望的祈求和哀求。他的父亲现如今正被解放农奴、土地再分配、赎金条款——简而言之就是新政权搞得眼花缭乱。但是，他为什么在巴登呢？
Well, he was in Baden because he was from day to day expecting the arrival there of his cousin and betrothed, Tatyana Petrovna Shestov. He had known her almost from childhood, and had spent the spring and summer with her at Dresden, where she was living with her aunt. He felt sincere love and profound respect for his young kinswoman, and on the conclusion of his dull preparatory labors, when he was preparing to enter on a new field, to begin real, unofficial duties, he proposed to her as a woman dearly loved, a comrade and a friend, to unite her life with his—for happiness and for sorrow, for labor and for rest, "for better, for worse" as the English say. She had consented, and he had returned to Carlsruhe, where his books, papers and properties had been left.
嗯，他在巴登是因为他在日复一日地等待他的表妹，也是他的未婚妻——塔吉娅娜? 彼得罗芙娜? 舍斯托娃的到来。他几乎是从孩童时代就认识她，还和她在德累斯顿度过了一个春夏，当时她和她姑妈住在一起。他真心地爱着她并且深深地尊重着这位年轻的亲戚。当他完成了枯燥的准备工作，打算开辟一片新天地，开始从事一份实实在在的平民事业的时候，便向他的这位恋人、同志和朋友求婚——把她的生命和他的生命连结起来——休戚与共，风雨同舟，也就是英国人说的 “有福同享，有祸同当” 。她同意了。后来他回到了卡尔斯鲁厄，因为他的书、文件和他的财产都留在那里。
But why was he at Baden, you ask again?
但是，你又要问了，为什么他在巴登呢？
Well, he was at Baden, because Tatyana's aunt, who had brought her up, Kapitolina Markovna Shestov, an old unmarried lady of fifty—five, a most good—natured, honest, eccentric soul, a free thinker, all aglow with the fire of self—sacrifice and abnegation, an esprit fort (she read Strauss, it is true she concealed the fact from her niece) and a democrat, sworn opponent of aristocracy and fashionable society, could not resist the temptation of gazing for once on this aristocratic society in such a fashionable place as Baden... Kapitolina Markovna wore no crinoline and had her white hair cut in a round crop, but luxury and splendor had a secret fascination for her, and it was her favorite pastime to rail at them and express her contempt of them. How could one refuse to gratify the good old lady? But Litvinov was so quiet and simple, he gazed so self—confidently about him, because his life lay so clearly mapped out before him, because his career was defined, and because he was proud of this career, and rejoiced in it as the work of his own hands.
好吧，他之所以在巴登，是因为把塔吉娅娜养大的姑妈——卡比托里娜? 马尔科芙娜? 舍斯托娃的缘故。她是一个老处女，已经五十五岁，非常善良、诚实，很古怪，是个自由思想者，全身闪耀着自我牺牲和否定精神的火花。她是个自由思想家（她读过施特劳斯的作品，的确，她没把这事告诉她的侄女）和民主思想家，誓死反对贵族和上流社会。但她却一次都没能抵制住在像巴登这样时髦地方一睹贵族社交界风采的诱惑……卡比托里娜? 马尔科芙娜不穿衬裙，把一头白发剪成了圆形，但是她对奢侈显赫暗暗着迷，但同时她最喜欢的消遣就是责骂和蔑视这种生活。人们怎能拒绝满足这位善良老妇人的愿望呢？但是，李特维诺夫是如此地安静和单纯。他非常自信地环顾四周，因为他的眼前清楚地呈现出他未来生活的画面，因为他的事业已经确定了，因为他为自己的事业感到自豪，为亲手设计了自己的事业而感到高兴。