经典科幻文学:《银河系漫游指南》第16章4

The suns blazed into the pitch of space and a low ghostly music floated through the bridge: Marvin was humming ironically because he hated humans so much.
As Ford gazed at the spectacle of light before them excitement burnt inside him, but only the excitement of seeing a strange new planet, it was enough for him to see it as it was. It faintly irritated him that Zaphod had to impose some ludicrous fantasy on to the scene to make it work for him. All this Magrathea nonsense seemed juvenile. Isn't it enough to see that a garden is beautiful without having to believe that there are fairies at the bottom of it too?
All this Magrathea business seemed totally incomprehensible to Arthur. He edged up to Trillian and asked her what was going on.
"I only know what Zaphod's told me," she whispered. "Apparently Magrathea is some kind of legend from way back which no one seriously believes in. Bit like Atlantis on Earth, except that the legends say the Magratheans used to manufacture planets."
Arthur blinked at the screens and felt he was missing something important. Suddenly he realized what it was.
"Is there any tea on this spaceship?" he asked.
More of the planet was unfolding beneath them as the Heart of Gold streaked along its orbital path. The suns now stood high in the black sky, the pyrotechnics of dawn were over, and the surface of the planet appeared bleak and forbidding in the common light of day — grey, dusty and only dimly contoured. It looked dead and cold as a crypt. From time to time promising features would appear on the distant horizon — ravines, maybe mountains, maybe even cities — but as they approached the lines would soften and blur into anonymity and nothing would transpire. The planet's surface was blurred by time, by the slow movement of the thin stagnant air that had crept across it for century upon century.
Clearly, it was very very old.

双星在太空中闪耀着光芒，一阵可怕的音乐声却在控制桥内响了起来：马文在讽刺地哼哼着小曲，因为他简直恨透了人类。
福特盯着眼前这光的奇观，内心也感到十分兴奋，但这仅仅是见到一颗新行星的兴奋之情；他已经看得足够多了。赞福德非要把滑稽的幻想强加在这样的场面上，从而为他自己的观点服务。这种做法使他稍微有点儿生气。所有这些关于曼格拉斯的胡说八道看起来都太过幼稚了。难道只看见一个花园非常美丽还不够，还非要相信它里面有仙女吗？
所有这些关于曼格拉斯的事情对于阿瑟来说通通都是无法理解的。他靠到崔莉恩身边，问她正在发生什么事。
“我也只知道赞福德告诉我的那些。”她对他耳语道，“曼格拉斯显然是一个没有人真正相信的传说。听起来有点儿像地球上关于亚特兰蒂斯的传说，只不过这个传说里说，曼格拉斯人曾经制造过行星。”
阿瑟望着屏幕，感到自己似乎忘记了什么很重要的东西。突然，他意识到了那是什么。
“这艘飞船上有茶吗？”他问。
随着黄金之心号在它的轨道上运行，越来越多的行星表面在他们下面呈现出来。双星现在高高地悬挂在黑色的天空中，黎明的灿烂霞光已经结束，行星的表面在正常的白昼光线中显得荒凉而可怕——灰暗、布满尘土、只露出模糊的轮廓。整个星球看上去死寂而寒冷，就像地下的墓穴。有时，一些让人充满希望的影像会出现在远处的地平线上——峡谷，也许是山峰，甚至可能是城市——但当他们靠近时，这一切又都变得模糊起来，没有任何东西出现。行星的表面被时间所侵蚀，被笼罩着的稀薄空气一个世纪接着一个世纪的缓慢移动所侵蚀。
显然，它非常非常古老。