| Neither did her face-with the brown ringlets on either side, and the slightly piquant nose, and the wholesome bloom, and the clear shade of tan, and the half a dozen freckles, friendly remembrancers of the April sun and breeze-precisely give us a right to call her beautiful. | Лицо Фиби с обрамляющими его темными локонами, слегка заостренным носиком, со здоровым румянцем и с полудюжиной веснушек -дружеским сувениром апрельского ветра и солнца, - также не дает нам полного права назвать ее красавицей. |
| But there was both lustre and depth in her eyes. | Но в ее глазах были блеск и глубина. |
| She was very pretty, as graceful as a bird, and graceful much in the same way; as pleasant about the house as a gleam of sunshine falling on the floor through a shadow of twinkling leaves, or as a ray of firelight that dances on the wall, while evening is drawing nigh. | Она казалась очень миловидной, грациозной, как птичка, именно, как птичка; ее присутствие в доме напоминало легкий свет солнца, падающий на пол сквозь тень движущихся листьев, или отблеск огня в камине, танцующий на стенах при наступлении вечера. |
| Instead of discussing her claim to rank among ladies, it would be preferable to regard Phoebe as the example of feminine grace and availability combined, in a state of society, if there were any such, where ladies did not exist. | Приятно было смотреть на Фиби - на этот образец женской грации, сочетавшейся с достоинствами ума, - а в какой сфере такая женщина была бы не на своем месте? |
| There it should be woman's office to move in the midst of practical affairs, and to gild them all, the very homeliest-were it even the scouring of pots and kettles-with an atmosphere of loveliness and joy. | Такая женщина каждое занятие, самое важное и самое ничтожное, скрасит своим участием в нем и окружит атмосферой любви и радости. |
| Such was the sphere of Phoebe. | Так широко и свободно лежала перед Фиби дорога жизни. |
| To find the born and educated lady, on the other hand, we need look no further than Hepzibah, our forlorn old maid, in her rustling and rusty silks, with her deeply cherished and ridiculous consciousness of long descent, her shadowy claims to princely territory, and, in the way of accomplishment, her recollections, it may be, of having formerly thrummed on a harpsichord, and walked a minuet, and worked an antique tapestrystitch on her sampler. It was a fair parallel between new Plebeianism and old Gentility. It really seemed as if the battered visage of the House of Seven Gables, black and heavy-browed as it still certainly looked, must have shown a kind of cheerfulness glimmering through its dusky windows, as Phoebe passed to and fro in the interior. |