21 Corkers

Corkers There were about thirty or more masters at Repton and most of them were amazingly dull and totally colourless and completely uninterested in boys. But Corkers, an eccentric old bachelor, was neither dull nor colourless. Corkers was a charmer, a vast ungainly man with drooping bloodhound cheeks and filthy clothes. He wore creaseless flannel trousers and a brown tweed jacket with patches all over it and bits of dried food on the lapels. He was meant to teach us mathematics, but in truth he taught us nothing at all and that was the way he meant it to be. His lessons consisted of an endless series of distractions all invented by him so that the subject of mathematics would never have to be discussed. He would come lumbering into the classroom and

雷普顿大约有三十个或更多的教师，他们中的大多数人出奇地迟钝，毫无生气，对男孩完全不感兴趣。 但科克斯，一个古怪的老单身汉，既不沉闷也不乏味。 科克斯是个有魅力的人，他身材魁梧，笨拙，双颊下垂，衣服肮脏。 他穿着一条无褶皱的法兰绒裤子和一件棕色粗花呢夹克，上面到处都是补丁，翻领上还有一些干粮。 他本打算教我们数学，但实际上他什么也没教我们，这是他的本意。 他的课程是由一系列无穷无尽的消遣组成的，这些都是他发明的，这样数学这个主题就永远不用讨论了。 他会笨拙地走进教室，然后

sit down at his desk and glare at the class. We would wait expectantly, wondering what was coming next. 'Let's have a look at the crossword puzzle in today's Times,' he would say, fishing a crumpled newspaper out of his jacket pocket. 'That'll be a lot more fun than fiddling around with figures. I hate figures. Figures are probably the dreariest things on this earth.' 'Then why do you teach mathematics, sir?' somebody asked him. 'I don't,' he said, smiling slyly. 'I only pretend to teach it.' Corkers would proceed to draw the framework of the crossword on the blackboard and we would all spend the rest of the lesson trying to solve it while he read out the clues. We enjoyed that. The only time I can remember him vaguely touching upon mathematics was when he whisked a square of tissue-paper out of his pocket and waved it around. 'Look at this,' he said. 'This tissue-paper is one-hundredth of an inch thick. I fold it once, making it double. I fold it again,

坐在他的桌前，怒视着全班同学。 我们满怀期待地等待着，想知道接下来会发生什么。 “我们来看看今天《纽约时报》上的填字游戏吧，”他会一边说，一边从夹克口袋里掏出一张皱巴巴的报纸。 “那可比摆弄数字有趣多了。 我讨厌数字。数字可能是世界上最沉闷的东西了。“那你为什么教数学，先生?”有人问他。 “我不知道，”他狡黠地笑着说。 “我只是假装教。”Corkers会在黑板上画出填字游戏的框架，我们会在剩下的时间里尝试着解决它，而他会读出线索。 我们很喜欢。在我的记忆中，他唯一一次模糊地触及数学，是他从口袋里抽出一张方形纸巾，挥舞着它。 “看这个，”他说。“这张薄纸有百分之一英寸厚。 我把它折一次，变成两倍。 我再折一次，

making it four thicknesses. Now then, I will give a large bar of Cadbury's Fruit and Nut Milk Chocolate to any boy who can tell me, to the nearest twelve inches, how thick it will be if I fold it fifty times.' We all stuck up our hands and started guessing. 'Twenty-four inches, sir'… 'Three feet, sir'… 'Five yards, sir'… 'Three inches, sir.' 'You're not very clever, are you,' Corkers said. 'The answer is the distance from the earth to the sun. That's how thick it would be.' We were enthralled by this piece of intelligence and asked him to prove it on the blackboard, which he did. Another time, he brought a two-foot-long grass-snake into class and insisted that every boy should handle it in order to cure us for ever, as he

做成四层。 现在，我要把一大块吉百利水果和坚果牛奶巧克力送给任何一个男孩，他能告诉我，如果我把它折叠50次，它会有多厚，精确到12英寸。”我们都举手开始猜测。 “二十四英寸，先生”“三英尺，先生”“五码，先生”“三英寸，先生”“你不太聪明，是吗?” 答案是地球到太阳的距离。 这就是它的厚度。”我们被这个聪明才智迷住了，请他在黑板上证明一下，他照做了。 还有一次，他带了一条两英尺长的草蛇来上课，并坚持要每个男孩都要处理它，以便永远治愈我们，就像他一样

said, of a fear of snakes. This caused quite a commotion. I cannot remember all the other thousands of splendid things that old Corkers cooked up to keep his class happy, but there was one that I shall never forget which was repeated at intervals of about three weeks throughout each term. He would be talking to us about this or that when suddenly he would stop in mid-sentence and a look of intense pain would cloud his ancient countenance. Then his head would come up and his great nose would begin to sniff the air and he would cry aloud, 'By God! This is too much! This is going too far! This is intolerable!' We knew exactly what was coming next, but we always played along with him. 'What's the matter, sir? What's happened? Are you all right, sir? Are you feeling ill?'

据说是怕蛇。 这引起了相当大的骚动。 我不记得老科克为让他的学生开心而编造的其他成千上万件精彩的事情，但有一件事我永远不会忘记，那就是每学期每隔大约三个星期重复一次。 他会和我们谈论这个或那个，突然，他会说到一半就停了下来，一种强烈的痛苦的表情会笼罩在他那苍老的脸上。 然后他会抬起头来，他的大鼻子开始嗅空气，他会大声喊道:“上帝啊!这太过分了!这太过分了!这是不能容忍的!”我们清楚地知道接下来会发生什么，但我们总是和他一起玩。 “怎么了，先生?”发生了什么事? 你还好吗，先生?你不舒服吗?”

Up went the great nose once again, and the head would move slowly from side to side and the nose would sniff the air delicately as though searching for a leak of gas or the smell of something burning. 'This is not to be tolerated!' he would cry. 'This is unbearable!' 'But what's the matter, sir?' 'I'll tell you what's the matter,' Corkers would shout. 'Somebody's farted!' 'Oh no, sir!'… 'Not me, sir!'… 'Nor me, sir!'… 'It's none of us, sir!' At this point, he would rise majestically to his feet and call out at the top of his voice, 'Use door as fan! Open all windows!' This was the signal for frantic activity and everyone in the class would leap to his feet. It was a well-rehearsed operation and each of us knew exactly what he had to do. Four boys would man the door and begin swinging it back and forth at great speed. The rest would start clambering about on the gigantic windows which occupied one whole wall of the room, flinging the lower ones open, using a long pole with a hook on the end to

它的大鼻子又翘了起来，脑袋慢慢地左右移动，鼻子灵敏地嗅着空气，好像在寻找漏气或什么东西烧焦的味道。 “这是不能容忍的!”他会喊道。 “这太难以忍受了!”“可是怎么回事，先生?”“我来告诉你是怎么回事，”科克斯喊道。 “有人放屁!“噢，不，先生!”“不是我，先生!”“也不是我，先生!”“不是我们，先生!”这时，他会威严地站起来，扯着嗓子喊道:“把门当扇子用!”打开所有的窗户!”这是疯狂活动的信号，班上的每个人都会跳起来。 这是一次经过精心排练的行动，我们每个人都清楚自己要做什么。 四个男孩把守着门，开始以极快的速度来回摇晃门。 其余的人就开始爬上占据整面墙的大窗户，用一根末端有钩子的长杆，把较低的窗户打开

open the top ones, and leaning out to gulp the fresh air in mock distress. While this was going on, Corkers himself would march serenely out of the room, muttering, 'It's the cabbage that does it! All they give you is disgusting cabbage and Brussels sprouts and you go off like fire-crackers!' And that was the last we saw of Corkers for the day. School Jimers!

打开顶盖，假装痛苦地探出身子，大口吸着新鲜空气。 在这种情况下，科克斯自己会平静地走出房间，嘴里嘟囔着:“是卷心菜干的!”他们给你的只有恶心的卷心菜和抱子甘蓝，你就像放鞭炮一样生气!”那是我们那天最后一次见到科克。 学校Jimers !