AN ACCIDENT.

灾难

Friday, 21st.

星期五，21日

The year has begun with an accident. On my way to school this morning I was repeating to my father these words of our teacher, when we perceived that the street was full of people, who were pressing close to the door of the schoolhouse. Suddenly my father said: "An accident! The year is beginning badly!"

学年开始就发生了意外的事情。今晨到学校去，我和父亲正谈着先生所说的话。忽然见路上人满了，都奔入校门去。父亲就说：“出了什么意外的事了？学年才开始，真不凑巧！”

We entered with great difficulty. The big hall was crowded with parents and children, and all were turning towards the director's room, and we heard the words, "Poor boy! Poor Robetti!"

好不容易，我们进了学校，大大的房子里挤满了孩子和家长。老师们还没进教室，所有人转向了校长室，他们说：“可怜啊！洛佩谛！”

Over their heads, at the end of the room, we could see the helmet of a policeman, and the bald head of the director; then a gentleman with a tall hat entered, and all said, "That is the doctor." My father inquired of a master, "What has happened?"-"A wheel has passed over his foot," replied the latter. "His foot has been crushed, "said another. He was a boy belonging to the second class, who, on his way to school through the Via Dora Grossa, seeing a little child of the lowest class, who had run away from its mother, fall down in the middle of the street, a few paces from an omnibus which was bearing down upon it, had hastened boldly forward, caught up the child, and placed it in safety; but, as he had not withdrawn his own foot quickly enough, the wheel of the omnibus had passed over it. He is the son of a captain of artillery. While we were being told this, a woman entered the big hall, like a lunatic, and forced her way through the crowd: she was Robetti's mother, who had been sent for.

从人山人海中，警察的帽子看见了，校长先生的光秃秃的头也看见了。接着又走进来了一个戴着高冠的绅士，大家说：“医生来了！”父亲问一个先生：“究竟怎么了？”先生回答说：“被车子轧伤了！”“脚骨碎了！”又一先生说。原来是洛佩谛，是二年级的学生。上学来的时候，有一个一年级的小学生忽然离开了母亲的手，倒在街上了。这时，街车正往他倒下的地方驶来。洛佩谛眼见这小孩将被车子轧伤，大胆地跳了过去，把他拖救出来。不料，他来不及拖出自己的脚，被车子轧伤了自己。洛佩谛是个炮兵大尉的儿子。正在听他们叙述这些话的时候，突然有一个妇人发狂似的奔到，从人堆里挣扎进来，这就是洛佩谛的母亲。