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1▶ When Ulysses S.Grant and Robert E.Lee met in the parlor of a modest house at Appomattox Court House, Virginia, on April 9,1865, to work out the terms for the surrender of Lee's Army of Northern Virginia, a great chapter in American life came to a close, and a great new chapter began.
1865 年 4 月 9 日，尤利西斯·格兰特和罗伯特·李在弗吉尼亚州阿波马托克斯郡府一栋简朴宅邸的客厅里会面，商讨李麾下北弗吉尼亚军团的投降条件。这次会面标志着美国历史上一个伟大篇章的结束，同时也开启了一个崭新的纪元。
2▶ These men were bringing the Civil War to its virtual finish. To be sure, other armies had yet to surrender, and for a few days the fugitive Confederate government would struggle desperately and vainly, trying to find some way to go on living now that its chief support was gone. But in effect it was all over when Grant and Lee signed the papers. And the little room where they wrote out the terms was the scene of one of the poignant, dramatic contrasts in American history.
这两人正将美国内战带向事实上的终结。诚然，当时还有其他军队尚未投降，苟延残喘的南方邦联政府也还会在接下来的几天里做着徒劳无功的挣扎，试图在失去主要支柱后找到一条生路。但当格兰特和李签署文件的那一刻，一切实际上都已尘埃落定。而他们草拟条款的那间小屋，也成为了美国历史上最令人动容、最具戏剧性对比的场景之一。
3▶ They were two strong men, these oddly different generals, and they represented the strengths of two conflicting currents that, through them, had come into final collision.
这两位风格迥异的将军，都是意志坚定的强者，他们分别代表着两种相互冲突的力量，而这两种力量通过他们二人，最终碰撞⁵到了一起。
4▶ Back of Robert E.Lee was the notion that the old aristocratic concept might somehow survive and be dominant in American life.
罗伯特·李的背后，是旧贵族观念的影子，这种观念认为贵族统治可能会以某种方式在美国社会中存续并占据主导地位。
5▶ Lee was tidewater Virginia, and in his background were family, culture, and tradition ….the age of chivalry transplanted to a New World which was making its own legends and its own myths. He embodied a way of life that had come down through the age of knighthood and the English country squire. America was a land that was beginning all over again, dedicated to nothing much more complicated than the rather hazy belief that all men had equal rights and should have an equal chance in the world. In such a land Lee stood for the feeling that it was somehow of advantage to human society to have a pronounced inequality in the social structure. There should be a leisure class, backed by ownership of land; in turn, society itself should be keyed to the land as the chief source of wealth and influence. It would bring forth (according to this ideal) a class of men with a strong sense of obligation to the community; men who lived not to gain advantage for themselves, but to meet the solemn obligations which had been laid on them by the very fact that they were privileged. From them the country would get its leadership; to them it could look for the higher values—of thought, of conduct, of personal deportment—to give it strength and virtue.
李出身于弗吉尼亚州的沿海地区，他的背景中交织着家族、文化和传统……骑士精神的时代被移植到了这片新大陆，而这里正在创造属于自己的传奇和神话。他所代表的生活方式，可以追溯到骑士时代和英国的乡绅阶层。而美国则是一片重新开始的土地，除了一个相当模糊的信念——人人生而平等，并且应该在这个世界上享有平等的机会——以外，它并不致力于其他更为复杂的东西。在这样的土地上，李却坚信，社会结构中存在明显的不平等，这在某种程度上对人类社会是有益的。应该有一个以土地所有权为后盾的有闲阶级；反过来，社会本身也应该以土地为财富和影响力的主要来源。根据这一理念，这将孕育出一个对社区怀有强烈责任感的阶层；他们活着不是为了谋取私利，而是为了履行他们因享有特权而肩负的神圣义务。国家将从他们那里获得领导力；国家可以从他们那里寻求更高的价值观——思想、行为和个人风度的价值观——以赋予国家力量和美德。
6▶ Lee embodied the noblest elements of this aristocratic ideal. Through him, the landed nobility justified itself. For four years, the Southern states had fought a desperate war to uphold the ideals for which Lee stood. In the end, it almost seemed as if the Confederacy fought for Lee; as if he himself was the Confederacy ..the best thing that the way of life for which the Confederacy stood could ever have to offer. He had passed into legend before Appomattox. Thousands of tired, underfed, poorly clothed Confederate soldiers, long since past the simple enthusiasm of the early days of the struggle, somehow considered Lee the symbol of everything for which they had been willing to die. But they could not quite put this feeling into words. If the Lost Cause, sanctified by so much heroism and so many deaths, had a living justification, its justification was General Lee.
李身上体现了这种贵族理想中最高尚的元素。通过他，土地贵族证明了自己的价值。四年来，南方各州为了维护李所代表的理想而进行了一场绝望的战争。最终，这场战争看起来几乎像是南方邦联在为李而战；仿佛他本人就是南方邦联的化身……是他所代表的生活方式所能提供的最好证明。在阿波马托克斯之前，他已经成为了一个传奇。成千上万的南方邦联士兵疲惫不堪、食不果腹、衣衫褴褛，他们早已失去了战争初期那种单纯的热情，却不知何故将李视为他们甘愿为之牺牲的一切的象征。但他们无法将这种感觉完全用语言表达出来。如果说这场以无数英雄主义和死亡为祭奠的“失败事业”还有什么现实的理由，那么这个理由就是李将军。
7▶ Grant, the son of a tanner on the Western frontier, was everything Lee was not. He had come up the hard way and embodied nothing in particular except the eternal toughness and sinewy fiber of the men who grew up beyond the mountains. He was one of a body of men who owed reverence and obeisance to no one, who were self-reliant to a fault, who cared hardly anything for the past but who had a sharp eye for the future.
格兰特是一位西部边疆地区制革匠的儿子，他与李截然不同。他出身贫寒，除了那些在山区之外成长起来的人们所共有的坚韧不拔和顽强精神之外，他身上并没有什么特别之处。他是那些不向任何人卑躬屈膝、过分自信、对过去毫不在意，却对未来有着敏锐眼光的人中的一员。
8▶ These frontiersmen were the precise opposites of the tidewater aristocrats. Back of them, in the great surge that had taken people over the Alleghenies and into the opening Western country, there was a deep, implicit dissatisfaction with a past that had settled into grooves. They stood for democracy, not from any reasoned conclusion about the proper ordering of human society, but simply because they had grown up in the middle of democracy and knew how it worked. Their society might have privileges, but they would be privileges each man had won for himself. Forms and patterns meant nothing. No man was born to anything, except perhaps to a chance to show how far he could rise. Life was competition.
这些拓荒者与沿海地区的贵族截然相反。在他们身后，在那股将人们带过阿勒格尼山脉并进入西部开阔地区的巨大浪潮中，蕴藏着对过去那种固化模式的深深的、隐晦的不满。他们拥护民主，这并非出于对人类社会合理秩序的理性思考，而仅仅是因为他们在民主的环境中长大，并且了解它的运作方式。他们的社会中可能存在特权，但这些特权都是每个人通过自身努力赢得的。形式和模式毫无意义。没有人是生来就注定拥有什么的，除了一个展示自己能走多远的机会。生命就是一场竞争。
9▶ Yet along with this feeling had come a deep sense of belonging to a national community. The Westerner who developed a farm, opened a shop, or set up in business as a trader, could hope to prosper only as his own community prospered—and his community ran from the Atlantic to the Pacific and from Canada down to Mexico. If the land was settled, with towns and highways and accessible markets, he could better himself. He saw his fate in terms of the nation's own destiny. As its horizons expanded, so did his. He had, in other words, an acute dollars-and-cents stake in the continued growth and development of his country.
然而，伴随着这种感觉而来的是一种对国家共同体的深刻归属感。一个在西部开垦农田、开设商店或从事贸易的西部人，只有在他的社区繁荣时才有希望获得成功——而他的社区从大西洋延伸到太平洋，从加拿大一直延伸到墨西哥。如果这片土地得到开发，拥有城镇、公路和便利的市场，他就能改善自己的生活。他将自己的命运与国家的命运联系在一起。随着国家视野的拓展，他的视野也随之拓展。换句话说，他与国家的持续增长和发展有着切身的利害关系。
10▶ And that, perhaps, is where the contrast between Grant and Lee becomes most striking. The Virginia aristocrat, inevitably, saw himself in relation to his own region. He lived in a static society which could endure almost anything except change. Instinctively, his first loyalty would go to the locality in which that society existed. He would fight to the limit of endurance to defend it, because in defending it he was defending everything that gave his own life its deepest meaning.
也许，这就是格兰特和李之间最显著的对比所在。这位弗吉尼亚贵族不可避免地将自己与他所在的地区联系在一起。他生活在一个几乎可以忍受任何事情，唯独不能忍受变化的静态社会中。出于本能，他首先效忠于这个社会所在的地区。他会不遗余力地捍卫它，因为在捍卫它的过程中，他捍卫的是赋予他自己生命最深刻意义的一切。
11▶ The Westerner, on the other hand, would fight with an equal tenacity for the broader concept of society. He fought so because everything he lived by was tied to growth, expansion, and a constantly widening horizon. What he lived by would survive or fall with the nation itself. He could not possibly standby unmoved in the face of an attempt to destroy the Union. He would combat it with everything he had, because he could only see it as an effort to cut the ground out from under his feet.
另一方面，西部人会以同样的韧性为更广泛的社会理念而战。他之所以战斗，是因为他赖以生存的一切都与增长、扩张和不断开阔的视野息息相关。他赖以生存的一切将与国家共存亡。面对摧毁联邦的企图，他不可能无动于衷。他会用尽一切手段与之抗争，因为在他看来，这无异于釜底抽薪，动摇他生存的根基。
12▶ So Grant and Lee were in complete contrast, representing two diametrically opposed elements in American life. Grant was the modern man emerging; beyond him, ready to come on the stage, was the great age of steel and machinery, of crowded cities and a restless burgeoning vitality. Lee might have ridden down from the old age of chivalry, lance in hand, silken banner fluttering over his head. Each man was the perfect champion of his cause, drawing both his strengths and his weaknesses from the people he led.
因此，格兰特和李形成了鲜明的对比，他们代表了美国生活中两个截然相反的元素。格兰特是正在崛起的现代人的代表；在他身后，即将登上舞台的是一个钢铁和机械的伟大时代，一个充满拥挤城市和蓬勃生命力的时代。而李则像是从古老的骑士时代策马而来，手持长矛，头顶丝绸旗帜飘扬。每个人都是他们所代表的事业的最佳捍卫者，他们从所领导的人民身上汲取力量，也继承着他们的弱点。
13▶ Yet it was not all contrast, after all. Different as they were—in background, in personality, in underlying aspiration—these two great soldiers had much in common. Under everything else, they were marvelous fighters. Furthermore, their fighting qualities were really very much alike.
然而，他们之间也并非全是对比。尽管他们在出身、个性和内在抱负方面存在差异，但这两位伟大的军人也有许多共同之处。抛开其他一切不谈，他们都是出色的战士。此外，他们的战斗品质实际上也非常相似。
14▶ Each man had, to begin with, the great virtue of utter tenacity and fidelity. Grant fought his way down the Mississippi Valley in spite of acute personal discouragement and profound military handicaps. Lee hung on in the trenches at Petersburg after hope itself had died. In each man there was an indomitable quality ..the born fighter's refusal to give up as long as he can still remain on his feet and lift his two fists.
首先，每个人都具有坚韧不拔和忠诚不渝的伟大美德。尽管屡遭个人挫折和严重的军事障碍，格兰特仍然沿着密西西比河谷一路奋战。在希望破灭后，李仍然坚守在彼得斯堡的战壕里。每个人身上都有一种不屈不挠的品质……一个天生的战士，只要还能站立并举起双拳，就绝不放弃。
15▶ Daring and resourcefulness they had, too; the ability to think faster and move faster than the enemy. These were the qualities which gave Lee the dazzling campaigns of Second Manassas and Chancellorsville and won Vicksburg for Grant.
他们还都具有过人的胆识和智谋，以及比敌人思考更快、行动更快的能力。正是这些品质让李在第二次马纳萨斯战役和钱瑟勒斯维尔战役中大放异彩，并为格兰特赢得了维克斯堡战役。
16▶ Lastly, and perhaps greatest of all, there was the ability, at the end, to turn quickly from war to peace once the fighting was over. Out of the way these two men behaved at Appomattox came the possibility of a peace of reconciliation. It was a possibility not wholly realized, in the years to come, but which did, in the end, help the two sections to become one nation again ..after a war whose bitterness might have seemed to make such a reunion wholly impossible. No part of either man's life became him more than the part he played in this brief meeting in the McLean house at Appomattox. Their behavior there put all succeeding generations of Americans in their debt. Two great Americans, Grant and Lee—very different, yet under everything very much alike. Their encounter at Appomattox was one of the great moments of American history.
最后，也许最重要的是，他们在战争结束后能够迅速从战争转向和平。正是由于这两位在阿波马托克斯的所作所为，才使得和解的和平成为可能。在接下来的岁月里，这种可能性并没有完全实现，但它最终还是帮助两个地区重新统一成一个国家……而这场战争的惨烈程度，原本可能使得这种统一完全不可能。他们一生中最高光的时刻³⁷，莫过于在阿波马托克斯的麦克莱恩寓所³⁸里的这次短暂会面。他们在那里的一言一行，让后世所有美国人都对他们心怀感激。两位伟大的美国人，格兰特和李——如此不同，但在本质上却又如此相似。他们在阿波马托克斯的会面，是美国历史上最伟大的时刻之一。
Summary
English Summary:
The article reflects upon the meeting between Ulysses S. Grant and Robert E. Lee at Appomattox Court House, which marked the end of the American Civil War. It portrays Grant and Lee as representatives of two opposing forces in American society: Grant symbolizing the emerging modern, democratic, and expansionist North, and Lee embodying the traditional, aristocratic, and land-based South. Despite their differences, both men were tenacious fighters and leaders who ultimately sought reconciliation after the war. The article highlights the significance of their meeting as a pivotal moment in American history, where two contrasting visions of the nation's future converged.
中文概括:
这篇文章回顾了尤利西斯·格兰特和罗伯特·李在阿波马托克斯法院的会面，这次会面标志着美国内战的结束。文章将格兰特和李描绘成美国社会中两种对立力量的代表：格兰特象征着新兴的、民主的、扩张的北方，而李则体现了传统的、贵族的、以土地为基础的南方。尽管他们存在差异，但两人都是坚韧不拔的战士和领袖，并在战后最终寻求和解。这篇文章强调了他们会面的重要性，认为这是美国历史上的一个关键时刻，两种截然不同的国家未来愿景在此交汇。
Analysis
1. These men were bringing the Civil War to its virtual finish². To be sure, other armies had yet to surrender, and for a few days the fugitive Confederate government³ would struggle desperately and vainly, trying to find some way to go on living now that its chief support⁴ was gone.
中文解析: 这句话的主句是“These men were bringing the Civil War to its virtual finish”，意为“这些人实际上结束了内战”。“virtual finish”指的是“实质上的结束”，虽然还有一些残余部队没有投降，但这场会面已经决定了战争的结局。“To be sure”是一个插入语，表示让步，意思是“诚然，的确”。后半句进一步解释了“virtual finish”的含义：“other armies had yet to surrender”表示“还有其他军队尚未投降”，“fugitive Confederate government”指的是“逃亡的南方邦联政府”，“fugitive”意为“逃亡的，流亡的”，这里指南方邦联政府已经失去了固定的所在地。“would struggle desperately and vainly”表示“将做绝望而徒劳的挣扎”，“vainly”是“desperately”的同义词，意为“徒劳地”。“trying to find some way to go on living now that its chief support was gone”是一个现在分词短语作状语，表示南方邦联政府挣扎的目的，“chief support”指的是“主要支持”，这里指李将军的北弗吉尼亚军团，这句话的意思是南方邦联政府在失去主要支持后，试图寻找继续存在下去的方法。
总而言之，这句话的意思是：这些人实际上结束了内战。诚然，还有其他军队尚未投降，逃亡的南方邦联政府也将在几天内做绝望而徒劳的挣扎，试图在失去主要支持后继续存在下去。
2. In such a land Lee stood for the feeling that it was somehow of advantage to human society to have a pronounced inequality in the social structure.
中文解析: 这句话的主干是“Lee stood for the feeling”，意为“李代表了一种观念”。“In such a land”是一个介词短语作状语，指前面提到的“all men had equal rights and should have an equal chance in the world”的美国。“stood for”意为“代表，支持”。“the feeling”后面跟了一个that 引导的同位语从句，进一步解释这种观念的具体内容。“that it was somehow of advantage to human society to have a pronounced inequality in the social structure”中，“it”是形式主语，真正的主语是“to have a pronounced inequality in the social structure”，意为“在社会结构中存在明显的不平等”。“somehow”表示“不知何故，以某种方式”。“of advantage to human society”意为“对人类社会有利”。“pronounced”意为“明显的，显著的”。
总而言之，这句话的意思是：在这样一个（人人生而平等的）国度里，李却代表了一种观念，即认为社会结构中存在明显的不平等，不知何故竟会对人类社会有益。
3. Lee embodied a way of life that had come down through the age of knighthood⁸ and the English country squire⁹.
中文解析: 这句话的主干是“Lee embodied a way of life”，意为“李体现了一种生活方式”。“embodied”意为“体现，代表”。“a way of life”后面跟了一个that 引导的定语从句，进一步解释这种生活方式的特点。“that had come down through the age of knighthood and the English country squire”中，“come down”意为“传承下来，流传下来”。“the age of knighthood”指的是“骑士时代”，通常指欧洲中世纪时期。“the English country squire”指的是“英国的乡绅”，指英国农村地区拥有土地和庄园的地主阶层。
总而言之，这句话的意思是：李体现了一种传承自骑士时代和英国乡绅的生活方式。
4. The Westerner, on the other hand, would fight with an equal tenacity for the broader concept of society. He fought so because everything he lived by was tied to growth, expansion, and a constantly widening horizon. What he lived by would survive or fall with the nation itself.
中文解析: 这句话的核心在于对比“Westerner”和前文提到的“Virginia aristocrat”对社会的态度。“The Westerner, on the other hand, would fight with an equal tenacity for the broader concept of society”表明西部人会为了更广阔的社会理念而战，与弗吉尼亚贵族为了维护自身地区利益而战形成对比。“an equal tenacity”指的是与弗吉尼亚贵族“fight to the limit of endurance”相同的坚韧。“broader concept of society”指的是更广阔、更包容的社会理念，与南方贵族狭隘的地区观念相对。
“He fought so because everything he lived by was tied to growth, expansion, and a constantly widening horizon.”解释了西部人战斗的原因。“everything he lived by”指的是他赖以生存的一切，包括他的价值观、生活方式和经济利益。“was tied to”意为“与……紧密相连”。“growth, expansion, and a constantly widening horizon”指发展、扩张和不断拓宽的视野，这些都是西部人的核心价值观和生活方式。
“What he lived by would survive or fall with the nation itself.”进一步强调了西部人的命运与国家命运的紧密联系。“What he lived by”与上句的“everything he lived by”同义。“survive or fall”意为“存亡”。“with the nation itself”表示“与国家本身一起”。这句话的意思是他所赖以生存的一切将与国家共存亡。
总而言之，这几句话的意思是：另一方面，西部人会为了更广阔的社会理念而同样坚韧地战斗。他之所以这样战斗，是因为他所赖以生存的一切都与发展、扩张和不断拓宽的视野紧密相连。他所赖以生存的一切将与国家共存亡。
5. Lee might have ridden down from the old age of chivalry, lance in hand, silken banner fluttering over his head³².
中文解析: 这句话运用了比喻的修辞手法，将李将军比作从中世纪骑士时代走来的骑士。“might have ridden down”是一种虚拟语气，表示一种假设，意为“可能从……骑马而来”。“the old age of chivalry”指的是“古老的骑士时代”。“lance in hand”意为“手持长矛”。“silken banner fluttering over his head”意为“丝绸旗帜在他头顶飘扬”。“fluttering”意为“飘动，飘扬”。
总而言之，这句话的意思是：李可能像是从古老的骑士时代骑马而来，手持长矛，头顶飘扬着丝绸旗帜。这句话通过将李比作骑士，形象地表现了他所代表的南方贵族的传统和过时的价值观。
6. Out of the way these two men behaved at Appomattox came the possibility of a peace of reconciliation.
中文解析: 这句话是一个倒装句，正常语序应该是“The possibility of a peace of reconciliation came out of the way these two men behaved at Appomattox”。“out of”意为“出自于，源于”。“the way these two men behaved at Appomattox”指的是“这两个人在阿波马托克斯的行为方式”，具体指格兰特和李在投降仪式上的表现。“came the possibility of a peace of reconciliation”意为“出现了和解的和平的可能性”。“reconciliation”意为“和解，调和”。
总而言之，这句话的意思是：由于这两个人在阿波马托克斯的行为方式，才使得和解的和平成为可能。这句话强调了格兰特和李在投降仪式上的表现为战后南北和解奠定了基础。