"Do you want coffee?" the boy asked. "We'll put the gear in the boat and then get some." They had coffee from condensed milk cans at an early morning place that served fishermen. "How did you sleep old man?" the boy asked. He was waking up now although it was still hard for him to leave his sleep. "Very well, Manolin," the old man said. "I feel confident today." "So do I," the boy said. "Now I must get your sardines and mine and your fish baits. He brings our gear himself. He never wants anyone to carry anything."
「你要喝咖啡吗？」男孩问。「我们先把船具放在船上，再弄些咖啡来喝。」他们在一个专供渔夫用早餐的地方，用炼乳罐子喝了咖啡。「老先生，你睡得好吗？」男孩问。虽然很难把他的瞌睡虫驱除，但他已经逐渐醒来。「好极了，马洛林，」老人说：「我今天感到信心十足！」「我也是一样。」男孩说：「现在我要去拿你的以及我自己的沙丁鱼，还有给你的新鲜鱼饵。那人每次都是自己拿鱼具，从来不让别人拿任何东西。」
"We're different," the old man said. "I let you carry things when you were five years old." "I know it," the boy said. "I'll be right back. Have another coffee. We have credit here." He walked off, bare-footed on the coral rocks, to the ice house where the baits were stored. The old man drank his coffee slowly. It was all he would have all day and he knew that he should take it. For a long time now eating had bored him and he never carried a lunch. He had a bottle of water in the bow of the skiff and that was all he needed for the day.
「我们则不同，」老人说：「你五岁时我就让你拿东西了。」「我知道啊。」男孩说：「我马上回来。再喝一杯咖啡吧，我们在这儿可以赊帐。」他走开了，赤着脚在珊瑚礁上往贮存鱼饵的冰库走去。老人慢慢地喝着他的第二杯咖啡，这将是他在接下的一整天里，唯一吃过的食物，所以他知道他应该喝的。长久以来，吃对他来说，早已是件乏味的事，他从来不带午餐的，他只需在船头放一瓶水，就足以过一整天了。
The boy was back now with the sardines and the two baits wrapped in a newspaper and they went down the trail to the skiff, feeling the pebbled sand under their feet, and lifted the skiff and slid her into the water. "Good luck old man." "Good luck," the old man said. He fitted the rope lashings of the oars onto the thole pins and, leaning forward against the thrust of the blades in the water, he began to row out of the harbor in the dark.
现在，男孩带着沙丁鱼和包在报纸里的两副鱼饵回来了。一路上感觉着底下的沙石，他们循着小路来到了小船停泊的地方，把小船抬起来，让它滑向水里去。「祝你好运，老先生。」「祝你好运。」老人说。他把桨上的绳圈套在桨栓上，然后将桨叶向后深深地插入水中，身体同时往前一倾，老人的小船便在黑暗中挺进，划出了海港。
There were other boats from the other beaches going out to sea and the old man heard the dip and push of their oars even though he could not see them now the moon was below the hills. Sometimes someone would speak in a boat. But most of the boats were silent except for the dip of the oars. They spread apart after they were out of the mouth of the harbor and each one headed for the part of the ocean where he hoped to find fish. The old man knew he was going far out and he left the smell of the land behind and rowed out into the clean early morning smell of the ocean.
这时也有从其它海滩出发的船只正纷纷划向大海。此时月亮已经下山了，老人虽看不见那些船只，但他可以听见他们的船桨下水和划水的声音。有时船里有会说话的声音，但是大部份的船除了划桨声外，都是沈静的。船只一出了海港口便各奔东西了，每个人都各自划向希望可以捕到鱼的地方去。老人晓得他要划得很远，于是便把土地的气息抛在身后，大肆地向清晨海洋的清新气息之处划去。
He saw the phosphorescence of the Gulf weed in the water as he rowed over the part of the ocean that the fishermen called the great well because there was a sudden deep of seven hundred fathoms where all sorts of fish congregated because of the swirl the current made against the steep walls of the flour of the ocean. Here there were concentrations of shrimp and baitfish and sometimes schools of squid in the deepest holes and these rose close to the surface at night where all the wandering fish fed on them.
他看见海湾里海草所发出的磷光，原来老人划到了渔夫们所称「深井」地带的海面上了。这名称的由来，是因为在那儿海底突然出现了一个约有七百啊深的「井」，而因为海潮冲击海床上的陡壁时所激起的涡，使得各种鱼类都聚集于此，包括虾子、做鱼饵用的鱼，有时候还有大匹的乌贼，都聚集在洞的深处。这些鱼在晚上会飘浮在接近海面的地方，而在那儿漫游的鱼类便以它们为食。
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