he continuity of consciousness, almost American: but industrial really. What next? Connie always felt there was no next. She wanted to hide her head in the sand: or, at least, in the bosom of a living man.

以后会发生什么？康妮无法想象。她只能目睹着新砌的街区在旷野中延伸，新盖的厂房在煤矿旁竖起，妙龄少女穿着丝袜，青年矿工呼朋唤友，共赴欢场。年轻一代完全体验不到旧日英伦的精神。思想延续的过程中出现裂缝，几乎是美国式的，但真正的却是现代工业的裂缝。以后会怎样？康妮总感觉以后并不存在。她希望暂时将烦恼抛开，或者至少投入某个活生生男子的怀抱。

The world was so complicated and weird and gruesome! The common people were so many, and really so terrible. So she thought as she was going home, and saw the colliers trailing from the pits, grey-black, distorted, one shoulder higher than the other, slurring their heavy ironshod boots. Underground grey faces, whites of eyes rolling, necks cringing from the pit roof, shoulders Out of shape. Men! Men! Alas, in some ways patient and good men. In other ways, non-existent. Something that men SHOULD have was bred and killed out of them. Yet they were men. They begot children. One might bear a child to them. Terrible, terrible thought! They were good and kindly. But they were only half, Only the grey half of a human being. As yet, they were "good". But even that was the goodness of their halfness. Supposing the dead in them ever rose up! But no, it was too terrible to think of. Connie was absolutely afraid of the industrial masses. They seemed so WEIRD to her. A life with utterly no beauty in it, no intuition, always "in the pit'.

如今的世界如此纷繁复杂，不合常理，令人生畏！平头百姓人数众多，让上层阶级深感惶恐。回家的路上，她这样想到，此时适逢矿工们迈着疲惫的步伐离开煤矿，沉重的镶铁长靴拖出含混的声响，他们全身灰黑，面目全非，肩膀倾斜。长期的地下作业使他们面无血色，白色的眼珠骨碌碌转着，为适应低矮的矿坑，脖子总是紧缩着，肩膀失去应有的线条。人啊！人！唉，在某些方面，他们算得上坚韧良善的好人。但在其他方面，他们却如同孤魂野鬼。人类生来便应具备的某种特质被残酷地剥夺了。但他们仍算是人。他们成为人父。可以为他们生个一儿半女。多么可怕的念头啊！他们心地良善，和蔼可亲。但他们称不上完整的人类，只拥有人类灰暗的一半。到目前为止，他们仍是“良民”。但这样的良善只存在于现有的一半。要是那休眠的另一半苏醒过来！噢，不，单纯是想象都令人生畏。康妮对工人阶级怀有深深的畏惧。对她而言，他们过于离奇。他们的生命全无美感，直觉尽失，只知在井下劳作。

Children from such men! Oh God, oh God!

这种人生养的后代！噢，天呢，噢，天呢！

Yet Mellors had come from such a father. Not quite. Forty years had made a difference, an appalling difference in manh