First Snow

 

　　The first fall of snow is not only an event but it is a magical event. You go to bed in one kind of world and wake up to find yourself in another quite different, and if this is not enchantment, then where is it to be found?

 

　　The very stealth, the eerie quietness, of the thing makes it more magical. Ifall the snow fell at once in one shattering crash, awakening us in the middle of the night the event would be robbed of its wonder. But it flutters down, soundless, hour after hour while we are asleep. Outside the closed curtains of the bedroom a vast transfbrmation scene is takiag place, just as if a myriad elves and brownies were at work, and we turn and yawn and stretch and know nothing about it. And then, what an extraordinary change it is! It is as if the house continent. Even the inside, which has not been touched, seems different, every room appearing smaller and cosier, just as if some power were trying to turn it into a woodcutter‘s hut or a snug logcabin. Outside, where the garden was yesterday, there is now a white and glistening level, and the village beyond is no longer your own familiar cluster of roofs but a village in an old German fairy-tale. You would not be surprised to learn that all the people there, the speetacled postmistress, the cobbler, the retired school master, and the rest, had suffered a change too and had become queer elvish beings, purveyors of invisible caps and magic shoes. You yourselves do not feel quite the same people you were yesterday. How could you not when so much has been changed? There is a curious stir, a little shiver of excite-ment, troubling the house, not unlike the feeling there is abroad when a journey has to be made. The children, of course, are all excitement but even the adults hang about and talk to one another longer than usual before setting down to the day‘s work. Nobody can resist the windows. It is like being on board a ship.

 

　　第一場雪

 

　　第一場雪不僅是一件大事，而且是充滿魔力的大事。入睡時世界是一個樣子，醒來時發現你在一個完全不同世界里，假如不是魔法的作用，又能到哪兒找到這樣的奇跡呢?

 

　　它的詭秘和悄無聲息更增添了它的神奇。假如所有的雪“轟”地一下子落下，半夜把我們驚醒，也就失去了它神奇的魅力。但是雪是悄悄地飄然而下，一個小時，又一個小時，而此時我們睡得正熟。在窗簾緊拉的臥室外面景色正發生著巨大的變化，就好像有無數小精靈和小仙童在工作，我們打呵欠，伸展腰腿卻全然不知發生的一切。然而這是一個多么巨大的變化啊!好像你所住的房子落到了另一塊陸地上，甚至不曾碰到的里面也似乎變了模樣，每個房間都變小了，變溫暖了，就好像是有一種力量正把它變成一座伐木工的棚屋或舒適的圓木小屋。屋外昨日的花園，如今卻是一片潔白，閃爍著光芒。遠處的村莊不再是你熱悉的一片片屋頂，而變成了德國古老神話中的村莊。那里所有的人：戴眼鏡的女郵政局長、補鞋工人、退休的小學校長以及其他的人也經歷了一場變化，變成了奇怪的精靈般的人為你提供隱形帽和魔力鞋。對這一切，你不會驚訝，你自己也覺得與昨日不同。當發生了這么大的變化之后，你怎么又能不變呢?屋內出現了一陣不同平日的小小的騷動，一種激動的微微顫動，這種感覺就好像要外出旅行時的莫名其妙的感覺。孩子當然是非常興奮，甚至于大人們在開始一天工作之前逗留交談的時間也比平日長了。無人能抗拒窗子的誘惑，好像在船上一樣。