1. New York is a city of things unnoticed. It is a city with cats sleeping under parked cars, two stone armadillos crawling up St. Patrick’s Cathedral, and thousands of ants creeping on top of the Empire State Building. The ants probably were carried there by winds or birds, but nobody is sure; nobody in New York knows any more about the ants than they do about the panhandler who takes taxis to the Bowery; or the dapper man who picks trash out of Sixth Avenue trash cans; or the medium in the West Seventies who claims, ‘I’m clairvoyant, clairaudient and clairsensuous.’aaaaa
纽约拥有众多不为人注意的事物。在这个城市有猫睡在停泊的车下，两只犰狳攀上圣帕特里克教堂，还有成千的蚂蚁爬上帝国大厦的楼顶。那些蚂蚁或许是被风或者鸟带上去的，可谁也说不准。在纽约没有人了解蚂蚁，就像他们不知道那个乞丐去保利区乞讨时乘的是出租车；还有那个衣冠楚楚的家伙专门在第  6 大街从垃圾筒里捡垃圾；还有西70 街的那位灵媒宣称：“我无所不见、无所不闻、无所不觉。”
2. New York is a city for eccentrics and a center for odd bits of information. New Yorkers blink twenty-eight times a minute, but forty when tense. Most popcorn chewers at Yankee Stadium stop chewing momentarily just before the pitch. Gumchewers on Macy's escalators stop chewing momentarily just before they, get off —— to concentrate on the last step. Coins, paper clips, ball-point pens, and little girls' pocketbooks are found by work-men when they clean the sea lions' pool at the Bronxblond
Zoo.
纽约是一个古怪者的天堂，是奇事异闻的中心。纽约人每分钟眨28 次眼睛，但在感到紧张时则眨40 次。在扬基体育馆，嚼爆米花的观众们在投球前大多会暂时停止咀嚼。在美茜百货店的自动扶梯上，吃口香糖的人们也会在下最后一级时暂时停止咀嚼。布朗克斯动物园的工人们在清理海狮池则捞出硬币、回形针、圆珠笔和小姑娘的小皮夹。
3. A Park Avenue doorman has parts of three bullets in his head ——there since World War I. Several young gypsy daughters, influenced by television and literacy, are running away from home because they don't want to grow up and become fortune-tellers. Each month a hundred pounds of hair are delivered to Louis Feder on 545 Fifth Avenue, where blond hairpieces are made from German women's hair; brunette hairpieces from Italian women's hair; but no hairpieces from American women's hair which, says Mr. Feder, is weak from too frequent rinses and permanents.
帕克街一位门房的脑袋里有  3 颗子弹的碎片——它们从第一次世界大战起就留在那里了。还有几个年轻的吉普赛人的女儿受了电视和文化的影响，她们生怕长大，生怕会变成算命的，于是离家出走。每个月，有100 磅头发运到第五大街545 号的路易斯·费达的店里。在那儿，德国女人的头发用来做金假发，意大利女人的头发用来做棕假发。但是，从来不用美国女人的头发做假发，因为费达先生说，
美国女人洗头太勤，烫发太多，因此发质太弱。
4. Some of New York's best informed men are elevator operators, who rarely talk, but always Listen —— like doormen. Sardi's doormen listen to the comments made by Broadway's first-nighters walking by after the last act. They listen closely. They listen carefully. Within ten minutes they can tell you which shows will flop and which will be hits.
在纽约，消息最灵通的要算电梯操作工了。和门房一样，他们说话不多，但时常注意听。每当百老汇某场戏剧的首演结束，莎尔蒂剧院的门房就会聆听散场观众路过时的对话。他们听得很关注，听得很仔细。十分钟内他们就能告诉你哪出戏会失败，哪出戏将走红。
5. On Broadway each evening a big, dark, 1948 Rolls-Royce pulls into Forty-sixth Street ——and out hop two little ladies armed with Bibles and signs reading, "The Damned Shall Perish." These ladies proceed to stand on the corner screaming at the multitudes of Broadway sinners, sometimes until , when their chauffeur in the Rolls picks them up and drives them back to Westchester.
在百老汇，每天傍晚都会有一辆黑的1948 年的大劳斯劳埃斯轿车开进第56 街——从车里跳出来两位小个子女士，手持《圣经》和标语，标语上写着：“遭神咒的必亡。”两位女士接着站在街角，朝着百老汇的芸芸罪人们叫喊，有时直到凌晨  3 点。这时司机会开着那辆劳斯劳埃斯来接她们，将她们送回威斯切斯特。
6. By this time Fifth Avenue is deserted by all but a few strolling
insomniacs, some cruising cabdrivers, and a group of sophisticated females who stand in store windows all night and day wearing cold, perfect smiles. Like sentries they line Fifth Avenue ——these window mannequins who gaze onto the quiet street with tilted heads and pointed toes and long rubber fingers reaching for cigarettes that aren't there.
此时，第  5 大街已是了无人迹．只有几个失眠的人在闲逛，和几辆出租车在游弋。还有一些神情肃然的女性，整天整夜肃立在商店橱窗内，脸上挂着冷漠、完美的笑容。她们像哨兵似的，沿着第  5 大街排列着——这些橱窗模特儿，凝视着静谧的街头，搔首弄姿。她们有着修长的脚趾，长长的橡皮手指向前伸着，仿佛想接那根本不存在的香烟。
7. At , Manhattan is a town of tired trumpet players and homeward-bound bartenders. Pigeons control Park Avenue and strut unchallenged in the middle of the street. This is Manhattan's mellowest hour. Most night people are out of sight —— but the day people have not yet appeared. Truck drivers and cabs are alert, yet they do not disturb the mood. They do not disturb the abandoned Rockefeller Center, or the motionless night watchmen in the Fulton Fish Market, or the gas-station attendant sleeping next to Sloppy Louie's with the radio on.
早上  5 点，曼哈顿属于那些疲惫的小号吹奏手和回家的酒吧侍应。鸽子占据了帕克大街。它们走在马路的中央，如入无人之境。这是曼哈顿最美好的时刻。过夜生活的人大多已经销声匿迹——而白天工作
的人则尚未出门。卡车和出租车司机们保持着警觉，但他们并不惊扰此时的气氛。他们不惊扰寂寥的洛克菲勒中心，以及福尔顿鱼市场那一动不动的看门人，以及开着收音机，自己倚在斯洛比·路易快餐店边上睡着了的加油站服务员。
8. At , the Broadway regulars either have gone home or to all-night coffee shops where, under the glaring light, you see their whiskers and wear. And on Fifty-first Street a radio press car is parked at the curb with a photographer who has nothing to do. So he just sits there for a few nights, looks through the windshield and soon becomes a keen observer of life after midnight.
早上  5 点，百老汇的常客们不是回家了，就是在通宵咖啡馆里。在咖啡馆眩目的灯光下，看得见男人的胡须和女人的脂粉。在第5 大街，一辆无线电采访车停在路边。车内的摄影记者百无聊赖。他只是连着几夜坐在车内，望着挡风玻璃外的一切。很快，他饶有兴味地观察起午夜后的夜生活来。
9. "At " he says, "Broadway is filled with wise guys and with kids coming out of the Astor Hotel in white dinner jackets —— kids who drive to dances in their fathers' cars. You also see cleanin
g ladies going home, always wearing kerchiefs. By some of the drinkers are getting out of hand, and this is the hour for bar fights. At the last show is over, in the nightclubs, and most of the tourists and out-of-town buyers are back in hotels. And small-time comedians are

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