内河航程 英文版 An Inland Voyage
罗伯特.路易斯.史蒂文森 Robert Louis Stevenson
PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION
To equip so small a book with a preface is, I am half afraid, tosin against proportion. But a preface is more than an author canresist, for it is the reward of his labours. When the foundationstone is laid, the architect appears with his plans, and struts foran hour before the public eye. So with the writer in his preface:he may have never a word to say, but he must show himself for amoment in the portico, hat in hand, and with an urbane demeanour.
It is best, in such circumstances, to represent a delicate shade ofmanner between humility and superiority: as if the book had beenwritten by some one else, and you had merely run over it andinserted what was good. But for my part I have not yet learned thetrick to that perfection; I am not yet able to dissemble the warmthof my sentiments towards a reader; and if I meet him on thethreshold, it is to invite him in with country cordiality.
To say truth, I had no sooner finished reading this little book inproof, than I was seized upon by a distressing apprehension. Itoccurred to me that I might not only be the first to read thesepages, but the last as well; that I might have pioneered this verysmiling tract of country all in vain, and find not a soul to followin my steps. The more I thought, the more I disliked the notion;until the distaste grew into a sort of panic terror, and I rushedinto this Preface, which is no more than an advertisement forreaders.
What am I to say for my book? Caleb and Joshua brought back fromPalestine a formidable bunch of grapes; alas! my book producesnaught so nourishing; and for the matter of that, we live in an agewhen people prefer a definition to any quantity of fruit.
I wonder, would a negative be found enticing? for, from thenegative point of view, I flatter myself this volume has a certainstamp. Although it runs to considerably upwards of two hundredpages, it contains not a single reference to the imbecility ofGod's universe, nor so much as a single hint that I could have madea better one myself.--I really do not know where my head can havebeen. I seem to have forgotten all that makes it glorious to beman.--'Tis an omission that renders the book philosophicallyunimportant; but I am in hopes the eccentricity may please infrivolous circles.
To the friend who accompanied me I owe many thanks already, indeedI wish I owed him nothing else; but at this moment I feel towardshim an almost exaggerated tenderness. He, at least, will become myreader: --if it were only to follow his own travels alongside ofmine.
R.L.S.