[据说，一个牧羊人多年来一直在昆士兰州一个盛产锡矿的小镇所在的地区放羊，当他得知那里的重大发现后，他发疯了。只差一丁点儿就错过了!不，不要错过!我曾把它握在手里，那黑色的矿石常常从我的指间流过!除了艺术或科学的可怜把戏，它们迫使它为别人的利益揭开隐藏的价值，把希望之光倾注在千万人的心中，而这希望之光不再为我照耀!我把它捧在手里，茫然地、无精打采地感到惊奇，迷恋着它暗淡的光泽，对它的价值毫不好奇?我在上面，命运在下面，在上面踩了这么多年?把它像种子一样撒在地上一千次!咒诅我出生之日的，谁能说我不义呢?把我的小屋盖在上面?每晚在它上面做梦? Pillowed on the weal of thousand lives, and dead unto my own! Planning paltry profits wrung from year-long toil, and holding lightly What lay acres wide around me, naked-bright, or grass-o'ergrown? Holding lightly?and for that I curse?no, not myself alone! For a youth made vain with riot, for the golden graces squandered, Home forsaken, dear ones alienated, Love itself aggrieved, I had sworn a full atonement, to the ends of earth had wandered, Drunk the dregs of expiation, unbelauded, unperceived? Heav'n alone beheld, and?mocks me with what ?might have been? achieved! All the cold suspicion of the world I took for my demerit, Its deceit my retribution, its malignity my meed: When Misfortune smote, unmurmuring I bowed my head to bear it, Driven to minister to brutes in my extremity of need? Who shall say now it delights not Heaven to break the bruised reed? In the round of conscious being, from the rising to the setting Of Thine imaged self, Thy merciless, unsympathizing Sun, Was there one from hard Disaster's hand so piteously shrinking Whom this boon had more advantaged? God, I ask Thee, was there one? In Thy passionless immunity, Thou knowest there was none! To the wrongs the world hath wrought me, to its coldness and disfavour, To the wreck of every venture, to enduring unsuccess, To the sweat of cheerless toil, the bread made bitter with the savour Of the leaven of regret and tears of unforgetfulness, Hadst Thou need to add Thy mockery, to perfect my distress? For I hold it cruel mockery in man, or God, or devil, To assign the poor his blindfold lot from weary day to day, In the very lap of Affluence, on Fortune's highest level, Then, upon the brink of revelation, trick his steps away, And flash the truth upon him when the chance is gone for aye! I had soothed repulse with hope, matched disappointment with defiance, Or opposed a pliant meekness to the driving storms of Fate: But?the merely ?coming short!? Oh, what remedial appliance, What demeanour of resistance shall have virtue to abate The nameless woe that trembles in the echo of Too Late! Oh, the might have been! the might have been! the sting of it! the madness! What a wave of the Inexorable chokes my fitful breath! What a rush of olden echoes voiced with manysounding sadness! What a throng of new despairs that drive me down the path of death! Who is there in heaven who careth? Who on earth who comforteth? They on earth but seek their own. In eager crowds they hasten thither Where I trod so late unconscious on futurities untold. And I! I, whose all is gone! The curse of desolation wither? Whom? - Myself, who, year-worn, turn again unto the sin of old? Or the fiends who sold me poison for my little all of gold? Both! All men! Yea, Heaven! But chiefly those who prosper where I languished! Those who reap the ripe occasion, where in many a wandering line The old traces of my footsteps, worn in fevered moods and anguished, Now are paths of rich expectancy for other feet than mine! Can I breathe without upbraiding? Shall I die without a sign? It was mine! Is mine, by Heaven! Consecrated to me only, By the sacred right of service, by the pledge of weary years! By the bond of silent witness, by communion dumb and lonely, By the seal of many sorrows, by the sacrament of tears! Mine!?The echoes laugh, and fiends of hell are answering with jeers. * * * * * Where am I? and who are these??Nay, nay. Unhand me! Let me go, sirs! I am very very rich! I've miles on miles of priceless ore! I will make your fortunes?all of you!?and I would have you know, sirs? There is not a single sheep amissing?Loose me, I implore! It is only sleep that ails me?let me sleep?for evermore!