20 托列斯海峡(15)
STEPPING ASHORE had an exhilarating effect on me. Ned Land tested the soil with his foot, as if he were laying claim to it. Yet it had been only two months since we had become, as Captain Nemo expressed it, "passengers on the Nautilus," in other words, the literal prisoners of its commander.
我一脚踩在地上，感到一种难以形容的深刻印象，尼德·兰拿脚试着踢一踢土地，好像要占有它似的。其实，我们作“诺第留斯号的乘客”—照尼摩船长的说法，实际上是诺第留斯号船长的俘虏—也不过仅仅两个月。
In a few minutes we were a gunshot away from the coast. The soil was almost entirely madreporic, but certain dry stream beds were strewn with granite rubble, proving that this island was of primordial origin. The entire horizon was hidden behind a curtain of wonderful forests. Enormous trees, sometimes as high as 200 feet, were linked to each other by garlands of tropical creepers, genuine natural hammocks that swayed in a mild breeze. There were mimosas, banyan trees, beefwood, teakwood, hibiscus, screw pines, palm trees, all mingling in wild profusion; and beneath the shade of their green canopies, at the feet of their gigantic trunks, there grew orchids, leguminous plants, and ferns.
几分钟后，我们和岛岸只有一槍一弹射程的距离了。土地差不多完全是由造礁珊瑚沉积形成的，但有些干涸了的急流河床，间杂有花岗石的残余，说明这岛的形成是在原始的太古时期。整个天际都由令人赞美的森林帘幕遮掩起来。许多高大的树——其中有些树干高达二百英尺——由葛藤把它们彼此连接起来，看来真像和风摇摆着的天然吊床呢。这是合一欢树、无花果树、火鸟树、麻栗树、木芙蓉、班达树、棕树,枝叶茂盛的混杂起来.在这些树的青绿窟窿下.在它们的 的齿形树干脚边，丛生许多兰科、豆科、蕨科植物。
Meanwhile, ignoring all these fine specimens of Papuan flora, the Canadian passed up the decorative in fa一vor of the functional.
可是，加拿大人并不注意巴布亚土生植物的美丽品种，他抛开了美丽的，去追求实际有用的。