Английский язык с Марком Твеном. Принц и нищий / Mark Twain. The Prince and the Pauper

During the ensuing week (в течение последовавшей недели), the days and nights were of a monotonous sameness (дни и ночи были = отличались монотонной одинаковостью), as to events (что до событий); men whose faces Hendon remembered more or less distinctly (люди, чьи лица Хендон запомнил более или менее четко) came, by day, to gaze (поглазеть) at the 'impostor' (приходили днем поглазеть на «самозванца») and repudiate and insult him (и отречься /отказаться признать/ и оскорбить его); and by night the carousing and brawling went on (а ночью кутежи и скандалы продолжались; to go on — продолжаться: «идти дальше»), with symmetrical regularity (с симметричной = такой же регулярностью). However, there was a change of incident at last (однако, произошла перемена наконец). The jailer brought in an old man, and said to him (тюремщик привел внутрь старика и сказал ему; to bring — приносить, приводить):

'The villain is in this room (этот негодяй — в этой комнате) — cast thy old eyes about (взгляни вокруг; to cast — бросать; eyes — глаза) and see if thou canst say (и посмотри, можешь ли ты сказать) which is he (который он).'

thoroughly [`θArəlı], examine [ıg`zæmın], monotonous [mə`nOtənəs]

THE cells were all crowded; so the two friends were chained in a large room where persons charged with trifling offenses were commonly kept. They had company, for there were some twenty manacled or fettered prisoners here, of both sexes and of varying ages — an obscene and noisy gang. The king chafed bitterly over the stupendous indignity thus put upon his royalty, but Hendon was moody and taciturn. He was pretty thoroughly bewildered. He had come home, a jubilant prodigal, expecting to find everybody wild with joy over his return; and instead had got the cold shoulder and a jail. The promise and the fulfilment differed so widely, that the effect was stunning; he could not decide whether it was most tragic or most grotesque. He felt much as a man might who had danced blithely out to enjoy a rainbow, and got struck by lightning.

But gradually his confused and tormenting thoughts settled down into some sort of order, and then his mind centered itself upon Edith. He turned her conduct over, and examined it in all lights, but he could not make anything satisfactory out of it. Did she know him? — or didn't she know him? It was a perplexing puzzle, and occupied him a long time; but he ended, finally, with the conviction that she did know him, and had repudiated him for interested reasons. He wanted to load her name with curses now; but this name had so long been sacred to him that he found he could not bring his tongue to profane it.