| The darkness into which the light from the electric globes cut like a bright knife, making the Gothic lines grimmer; the soft brilliance of the altar, with its multitude of candles, with the priests performing actions whose meaning was unknown to him; the silent crowd that seemed not to participate but to wait anxiously like a crowd at a station barrier waiting for the gate to open; the stench of wet clothes and the aromatic perfume of incense; the bitter cold that lowered like a threatening unseen presence; it was not a religious emotion that he got from all this, but the sense of a mystery that had its roots far back in the origins of the human race. | От темноты, которую электрический свет прорезает, будто блестящий нож, готические линии храма кажутся еще суровей; мягкий блеск алтаря, где горит множество свечей, где священники свершают действия, значение которых ему неведомо; молчащая толпа, которая, кажется, ни в чем не принимает участия, но тревожно замерла в ожидании, будто на вокзале у барьера, в ожидании, когда откроют проход; тяжелый запах мокрой одежды, сливающийся с благоуханием ладана; жестокий холод, что сковывает, словно чье-то незримое грозное присутствие; совсем не религиозные чувства рождало все это, но ощущение тайны, корнями уходящей в истоки человечества. |
| His nerves were taut, and when on a sudden the choir to the full accompaniment of the orchestra burst with a great shout into the Adeste Fideles he was seized with an exultation over he knew not what. | Нервы молодого человека напряглись, и когда хор вдруг грянул в сопровождении оркестра Adeste Fidelis, его неведомо почему охватило ликованье. |
| Then a boy sang a canticle; the thin, silvery voice rose in the silence and the notes trickled, with a curious little hesitation at first, as though the singer were not quite sure of himself, trickled like water crystal-clear trickling over the white stones of a brook; and then, the singer gathering assurance, the sounds were caught up, as though by great dark hands, and borne into the intricate curves of the arches and up to the night of the vaulted roof. |