The season developed and matured. Another year's instalment of flowers, leaves, nightingales, thrushes, finches, and such ephemeral creatures, took up their positions where only a year ago others had stood in their place when these were nothing more than germs and inorganic particles. Rays from the sunrise drew forth the buds and stretched them into long stalks, lifted up sap in noiseless streams, opened petals, and sucked out scents in invisible jets and breathings.
季節(jié)向前發(fā)展了，成熟了。在新的一年里，鮮花、樹葉、夜鶯、畫眉、金翅雀，以及諸如此類的生命短暫的生物，都出現(xiàn)在它們各自的崗位上了，僅僅在一年以前，這些位置都被其它的生物占據(jù)著，而它們不過只是一些胚芽和無機(jī)體的分子。在朝陽的光照下，苞芽滋生了，長出了長條，汁液在無聲的溪流中奔涌，花瓣綻開了，在無形的噴吐和呼吸中把香氣散發(fā)出去。

Dairyman Crick's household of maids and men lived on comfortably, placidly, even merrily. Their position was perhaps the happiest of all positions in the social scale, being above the line at which neediness ends, and below the line at which the convenances begin to cramp natural feeling, and the stress of threadbare modishness makes too little of enough.
奶牛場(chǎng)老板克里克奶牛場(chǎng)里擠奶的男女工人們，生活得舒舒適適的，平平靜靜的，甚至是快快活活的。在整個(gè)社會(huì)的所有工作崗位中，他們的崗位也許是最快樂的，因?yàn)橥Y(jié)束了貧困的人相比，他們還在其上，但是他們又不如另外那個(gè)階層的人，而那個(gè)階層的人因?yàn)橐袷厣鐣?huì)禮儀而開始?jí)阂痔烊桓星?，為了追趕時(shí)髦又弄得入不敷出，不得不承受捉襟見肘的壓力。

Thus passed the leafy time when arborescence seems to be the one thing aimed at out of doors. Tess and Clare unconsciously studied each other, ever balanced on the edge of a passion, yet apparently keeping out of it. All the while they were converging, under an irresistible law, as surely as two streams in one vale.
當(dāng)樹木似乎變成戶外最集中的事物時(shí)，樹葉生長的季節(jié)就這樣過去了。苔絲和克萊爾都在無意中相互捉摸，一直處在一種激情的邊緣之上，但是他們顯然又在壓制著自己的感情，不讓它迸發(fā)出來。他們受到不可抗拒的自然法則的支配，一直在向一起聚合，非常像一個(gè)山谷中流在一起的兩條溪流。

Tess had never in her recent life been so happy as she was now, possibly never would be so happy again. She was, for one thing, physically and mentally suited among these new surroundings. The sapling which had rooted down to a poisonous stratum on the spot of its sowing had been transplanted to a deeper soil. Moreover she, and Clare also, stood as yet on the debatable land between predilection and love; where no profundities have been reached; no reflections have set in, awkwardly inquiring, 'Whither does this new current tend to carry me? What does it mean to my future? How does it stand towards my past?'
近幾年來，苔絲的生活從來沒有像現(xiàn)在這樣快樂過，也可能再也不會(huì)像現(xiàn)在這樣快樂了。在新的環(huán)境里，她在身心兩個(gè)方面都感到很融洽。她像一棵幼樹，在原先栽種的地方，已經(jīng)把根扎進(jìn)了有毒的土層里，而現(xiàn)在已經(jīng)被移植到深厚的土壤里了。另外，她和克萊爾也還處在好感和愛戀之間的不穩(wěn)固的土壤上；還沒有達(dá)到一定的深度；也沒有什么難以解決的思慮和讓人煩惱的問題，“這股新的愛潮要把我?guī)У侥睦锶?？它?duì)我未來的前途意味著什么？它對(duì)我的過去又是怎樣的？”

Tess was the merest stray phenomenon to Angel Clare as yet - a rosy warming apparition which had only just acquired the attribute of persistence in his consciousness. So he allowed his mind to be occupied with her, deeming his preoccupation to be no more than a philosopher's regard of an exceedingly novel, fresh, and interesting specimen of womankind.
到目前為止，在安琪爾·克萊爾看來，苔絲只不過是一種偶然的現(xiàn)象——一個(gè)讓人感到溫暖的玫瑰色幻影，在他的意識(shí)里，這個(gè)幻影也只是剛剛具有了驅(qū)趕不開的性質(zhì)。因此他只好容許她在他的思想中存在，認(rèn)為自己這種專注的心情，只不過是一個(gè)哲學(xué)家對(duì)一個(gè)極其新穎、艷麗和有趣的婦女典型的關(guān)注而已。