《四季随笔》是吉辛的散文代表作。其中对隐士赖克罗夫特醉心于书籍、自然景色与回忆过去生活的描述，其实是吉辛的自述，作者以此来抒发自己的情感，因而本书是一部富有自传色彩的小品文集。

吉辛穷困的一生，对文学名著的爱好与追求，以及对大自然恬静生活的向往，在书中均有充分的反映。本书分为春、夏、秋、冬四个部分，文笔优美，行文流畅，是英国文学中小品文的珍品之一。

以下是由网友分享的《四季随笔》节选 - 春 10的内容，让我们一起来感受吉辛的四季吧!

Mentally and physically, I must be much older than my years. At three and-fifty a man ought not to be brooding constantly on his vanished youth. These days of spring which I should be enjoying for their own sake, do but turn me to reminiscence, and my memories are of the springs that were lost.

在心态和体力两个方面，我一定是比实际年龄老迈。一个五十三岁的人按理不应该总去缅怀逝去的青春。这个春天，我本该尽力享受当下的日子，却常常陷入怀旧的情绪中，回忆里尽是生命中无暇欣赏的那些春天。

Some day I will go to London and revisit all the places where I housed in the time of my greatest poverty. I have not seen them for a quarter of a century or so. Not long ago, had any one asked me how I felt about these memories, I should have said that there were certain street names, certain mental images of obscure London, which made me wretched as often as they came before me; but, in truth, it is a very long time since I was moved to any sort of bitterness by that retrospect of things hard and squalid. Now, owning all the misery of it in comparison with what should have been, I find that part of life interesting and pleasant to look back upon—greatly more so than many subsequent times, when I lived amid decencies and had enough to eat. Some day I will go to London, and spend a day or two amid the dear old horrors. Some of the places, I know, have disappeared. I see the winding way by which I went from Oxford Street, at the foot of Tottenham Court Road, to Leicester Square, and, somewhere in the labyrinth (I think of it as always foggy and gas-lit) was a shop which had pies and puddings in the window, puddings and pies kept hot by steam rising through perforated metal. How many a time have I stood there, raging with hunger, unable to purchase even one pennyworth of food! The shop and the street have long since vanished; does any man remember them so feelingly as I? But I think most of my haunts are still in existence: to tread again those pavements, to look at those grimy doorways and purblind windows, would affect me strangely.

有朝一日，我会到伦敦去，重游贫困潦倒时住过的地方。我和它们分别差不多有四分之一个世纪那么久了吧。如果不久前有人问起我对那段日子的感受，我应该会回答说，有一些街道的名字，还有伦敦的模糊印象，每次回想起来，都会让我感到沮丧。而事实上，我已经好久没有因为回忆那些艰难可怜的日子而感到辛酸了。现在，尽管我承认那段生活是比一般人艰苦，但我发现那段日子有一部分回忆起来是有趣且令人愉快的—比起后来生活体面、衣食无忧的日子更是如此。总有一天，我会到伦敦去，在那里呆上一两天，重温一下旧时亲切的噩梦。有一些地方，我知道已经不存在了。我看到一条曲折的道路，从牛津街，到托特纳姆法院路，再到莱斯特广场，在这个迷宫的某处（在我的记忆里，它总在迷雾笼罩中和昏暗的煤油灯光下），有一家店铺，橱窗里摆着派和布丁，从下面网状金属板升腾上来的蒸汽给它们保温。有多少次，我饥肠辘辘地站在那里，却拿不出一个便士来购买食物！这家店铺和那条街道都早已消失，还有谁像我这样充满感情地回忆起它们吗？不过，我想我过去经常光顾的地方大部分应该还在，重新踏上那些街道，看看那些肮脏的门道和阴暗的窗户，我应该会有一种别样的感觉。

I see that alley hidden on the west side of Tottenham Court Road, where, after living in a back bedroom on the top floor, I had to exchange for the front cellar; there was a difference, if I remember rightly, of sixpence a week, and sixpence, in those days, was a very great consideration—why, it meant a couple of meals. (I once FOUND sixpence in the street, and had an exultation which is vivid in me at this moment.) The front cellar was stone-floored; its furniture was a table, a chair, a wash-stand, and a bed; the window, which of course had never been cleaned since it was put in, received light through a flat grating in the alley above. Here I lived; here I WROTE. Yes, "literary work" was done at that filthy deal table, on which, by the bye, lay my Homer, my Shakespeare, and the few other books I then possessed. At night, as I lay in bed, I used to hear the tramp, tramp of a posse of policemen who passed along the alley on their way to relieve guard; their heavy feet sometimes sounded on the grating above my window.

我看到那条隐藏在托特纳姆法院路西边的巷子，我曾经住在顶楼后部的一个卧室里，后来不得不换到了前面的地下室。两个地方房价不同，如果我没记错的话，一周能省下六个便士。在那些日子里，六个便士可非同小可—因为它意味着好几顿饭钱。（我曾在街上捡到六便士，当时欣喜若狂，至今记忆犹新）。地下室铺着石地板；家具是一张桌子，一把椅子，一个洗脸架和一张床；窗子从装上后就没有擦过，光线透过窗格栅从上面的巷子照进来。我就在这样的环境中生活和写作。是的，“文学作品”是在一张肮脏的牌桌上写就的，顺便提一句，桌上还摆着荷马、莎士比亚的作品和几本我当时仅有的书。夜里，躺在床上，我常常听到一队换岗的警察穿过巷子，他们沉重的脚步有时会震响我窗子上方的栅板。

I recall a tragi-comical incident of life at the British Museum. Once, on going down into the lavatory to wash my hands, I became aware of a notice newly set up above the row of basins. It ran somehow thus: "Readers are requested to bear in mind that these basins are to be used only for casual ablutions." Oh, the significance of that inscription! Had I not myself, more than once, been glad to use this soap and water more largely than the sense of the authorities contemplated? And there were poor fellows working under the great dome whose need, in this respect, was greater than mine. I laughed heartily at the notice, but it meant so much.

我忆起在大英博物馆发生的一件悲喜交加之事。一次，我去盥洗室洗手，发现一排洗涤盆上方贴着一张新告示。内容大体如下：“请各位读者注意，这些洗涤盆仅供偶尔使用。”噢，这告示多么意味深长啊！我自己不是曾经不止一次愉快地使用过这里的香皂和水么，按照发布告示者的预想，我肯定很过分吧？当时还有那些在这个圆顶建筑下劳作的可怜人，他们在这方面的需求比我还要大得多。这个告示让我开怀大笑，但它对那时的我意义非凡

Some of my abodes I have utterly forgotten; for one reason or another, I was always moving—an easy matter when all my possessions lay in one small trunk. Sometimes the people of the house were intolerable. In those days I was not fastidious, and I seldom had any but the slightest intercourse with those who dwelt under the same roof, yet it happened now and then that I was driven away by human proximity which passed my endurance. In other cases I had to flee from pestilential conditions. How I escaped mortal illness in some of those places (miserably fed as I always was, and always over-working myself ) is a great mystery. The worst that befell me was a slight attack of diphtheria—traceable, I imagine, to the existence of a dust-bin UNDER THE STAIRCASE. When I spoke of the matter to my landlady, she was at first astonished, then wrathful, and my departure was expedited with many insults.

曾经的一些住处我已完全遗忘。出于种种原因，我一直在搬家—因为所有的家当一个小箱子便可应付，所以并不费事。有些时候，同住的人让我无法忍受。在那些日子，我并不挑剔，我和同住一个屋檐下的人几乎没有交往。但时不时的，我还是会因为不堪忍受邻居而搬走。还有些时候，我不得不逃离瘟疫的威胁。在那些地方我竟然没有罹患致命疾病，还真是奇迹（我一直营养不良，总是劳累过度）。我得过最重的病是轻微的白喉—我猜想可能是因为楼梯下的一个垃圾桶。我把这件事向女房东说了，她的第一反应是吃惊，继而愤怒，然后是辱骂，她几度出言不逊，我很快便搬离了那里。

On the whole, however, I had nothing much to complain of except my poverty. You cannot expect great comfort in London for four-and six pence a week—the most I ever could pay for a "furnished room with attendance" in those days of pretty stern apprenticeship. And I was easily satisfied; I wanted only a little walled space in which I could seclude myself, free from external annoyance. Certain comforts of civilized life I ceased even to regret; a stair-carpet I regarded as rather extravagant, and a carpet on the floor of my room was luxury undreamt of. My sleep was sound; I have passed nights of dreamless repose on beds which it would now make my bones ache only to look at. A door that locked, a fire in winter, a pipe of tobacco—these were things essential; and, granted these, I have been often richly contented in the squalidest garret. One such lodging is often in my memory; it was at Islington, not far from the City Road; my window looked upon the Regent's Canal. As often as I think of it, I recall what was perhaps the worst London fog I ever knew; for three successive days, at least, my lamp had to be kept burning; when I looked through the window, I saw, at moments, a few blurred lights in the street beyond the Canal, but for the most part nothing but a yellowish darkness, which caused the glass to reflect the firelight and my own face. Did I feel miserable? Not a bit of it. The enveloping gloom seemed to make my chimney-corner only the more cosy. I had coals, oil, tobacco in sufficient quantity; I had a book to read; I had work which interested me; so I went forth only to get my meals at a City Road coffee-shop, and hastened back to the fireside. Oh, my ambitions, my hopes! How surprised and indignant I should have felt had I known of any one who pitied me!

不过，大体上说，我除了贫穷外没什么可抱怨的。在伦敦一周花销四到六个便士，不要指望生活得太舒适—在当穷学徒的那段艰难时光，我能负担起的是“有家具并有人照料的房间”。而我很容易满足，我需要的仅是一个封闭的小空间，不被外界干扰。文明生活的舒适，我虽然欠缺但并不引以为憾。楼梯上的地毯在我看来相当奢侈，在我的房间地板上铺地毯是做梦都没想过的事。我睡得很香甜，我曾经使用过的那些床铺，现在只要看看就会感觉骨头酸痛，而在当时，我休息得很好，连梦都不会做。一扇锁上的门，冬天里的一炉火，一支装满烟草的烟杆—这是必需的。有了这三样东西，即使在最肮脏的顶楼，我也经常感觉心满意足。我经常回忆起这样一个住处，它位于伊斯灵顿区，离城市大街不远，房间的窗户对着摄政王运河。想起这间陋室，我就会想到我见过的可能是伦敦最大的一场雾。在接下来至少三天的时间里，我的灯不得不一直亮着；透过窗户，间或能看见运河那边的一条街上几点模糊的灯光，但是多数时候，什么都没有，只有一片有些发黄的黑暗，这使得在窗户的玻璃上，我能看见炉火和自己的脸。我感到悲惨吗？一点都不。这笼罩一切的阴暗似乎使壁炉边的暖和处所更加舒适了。我有足量的煤、油和烟草储备，我有一本书可读，我有喜欢的工作可做，所以我只需要到城市路的咖啡店用餐，然后赶快回到炉火旁。噢，我的雄心，我的希望！要是知道谁可怜我，我当时一定感觉惊讶和愤怒！

Nature took revenge now and then. In winter time I had fierce sore throats, sometimes accompanied by long and savage headaches. Doctoring, of course, never occurred to me; I just locked my door, and, if I felt very bad indeed, went to bed—to lie there, without food or drink, till I was able to look after myself again. I could never ask from a landlady anything which was not in our bond, and only once or twice did I receive spontaneous offer of help. Oh, it is wonderful to think of all that youth can endure! What a poor feeble wretch I now seem to myself, when I remember thirty years ago!

大自然时不时会进行报复。冬天的时候，我患上很严重的喉炎，有时还伴有持久难忍的头痛。当然，我从来没考虑过看医生。我只是把自己锁在屋内，如果感觉确实很糟，我就爬上床—躺在那里，不吃不喝，直到能照料自己时再起床。我从来不向女房东索要房契中不包括的任何东西，只在一两次，我接受了主动提供的帮助。噢，想到年轻时能扛过那么多苦难，真是神奇啊！相比三十年前，现在的我是一个多么可怜虚弱的家伙呀！