照大体看来，想租房子的时候，是无眷莫问的，想做官的时候，又是朝里无裙莫做官的，想写文章的时候，是独身者不能写我的妻的，凡此种种似乎都是结婚的好。
Generally speaking, one who has no family dependants is not supposed to rent a house, one who has no petticoat influence in the government should refrain from becoming an official, an unmarried make writer is in no position to write about "my wife".
可是要想结婚，第一要有钱，第二要有闲，第三要有职，这潘驴..的五个条件，却也很不容易办到。
But, to get married, you need to have five prerequisites, namely, money, leisure, employment, good looks and potentness, of which all are not always available.
更何况结婚之后，"儿子自己要来"，在这世界人口过剩，经济恐慌，教育破产，世风不古的时候，万一不慎，同兰姆所说的一样，儿子们去上了断头台，那真是连祖宗三代的楣都要倒尽，那里还有什么"官人请！
And in a world with overpopulation, economic crisis, educational bankruptcy and deteriorating public morals, they may, just as Charles Lamb says, through their own acts of indiscretion, be sent to the gallows.
永远的憧憬和追求
My Everlasting Dream and Pursuit Xiao Hong
一九一一年，在一个小县城里边，我生在一个小地主的家里。
In 1911, I was born into a petty landlord family in a remote county town in Heilongjiang Province -- a town situated virtually at the northeastern tip of China.
父亲常常为着贪婪而失掉了人性。
Father, driven by avarice, often became very unfeeling.
他对待仆人，对待自己的儿女，以及对待我的祖父都是同样的吝啬而疏远，甚至与无情。
He would treat his servants, his own children and even my grandpa alike with meanness and indifference, not to say with ruthlessness.
有一次，为着房屋租金的事情，父亲把房客的全套的马车赶了过来。
Once, due to a dispute over house rent, he took away by force a tenant's horse-drawn cart and drove it home.
房客的亲属们哭着诉说着，向我的祖父跪了下来，于是祖父把两匹棕色的马从车上解下来还了回去。
Grandpa unharnessed the two chestnut horses and returned them to the tenant.
九岁时，母亲死去。
Mother died when I was nine.
后来就连父亲的眼睛也转了弯，每从他的身边经过，我就像自己的身上生了针刺一样；
Later, whenever I happened to walk past him, he would even have his eyes directed sideways, which made me feel like being pricked all over on thorns.
他斜视着你，他那高傲的眼光从鼻梁经过嘴角而后往下流着。
When he looked askance at me, superciliousness gushed from his eyes down the bridge of his nose and then off the corners of his mouth.
所以每每大雪中的黄昏里，围着暖炉，围着祖父，听着祖父读者诗篇，看着祖父读着诗篇时微红的嘴唇。
Often of a snowy evening, we children would hang out about grandpa by a heating stove, listening to him reading poems aloud and meanwhile watching his busy ruddy lips.
父亲打了我的时候，我就在祖父的房里，一直面向着窗子，从黄昏到深夜--窗外的白雪，好像白棉花一样飘着；
Whenever father had given me a beating, I would seek solace in grandpa's room where I would stay gazing out of the window from dusk till late into the night while snowflakes were flying like cotton and the lid of the kettle over the heating stove rattling like a musical instrument playing an accompaniment.
祖父时时把多纹的两手放在我的肩上，而后又放在我的头上，我的耳边便响着这样的声音：
Grandpa would place his wrinkled hands on my shoulder and then on my head, saying
"快快长吧！
Grow up quick, poor child!
二十岁那年，我就逃出了父亲的家庭。
I fled from home at twenty.
直到现在还是过着流浪的生活。
And so far I still live a life of a vagrant.
"长大"是"长大"了，而没有"好"。
True, I've "grown up", but I'm not yet "all right".
可是从祖父那里，知道了人生除掉了冰冷和憎恶而外，还有温暖和爱。
Nevertheless, from grandpa I 've learned that apart from coldness and hatred, there is also warmth and love in life.
所以我就向这"温暖"有"爱"的方面，怀着永久的憧憬和追求。
Hence my everlasting dream and pursuit of this "warmth" and "love".
"你去当吧！
You go and do the pawning!
你去当吧，我不去！
You go, but not me!
新做起来的我的棉袍，一次还没有穿，就跟着我进当铺去了！
Thus, my newly-made cotton-padded gown, which had not been worn even once, accompanied me to the pawnshop.