新概念英语美音版第三册:Lesson 36 A chance in a million

Lesson 36 A chance in a million
百万分之一的机遇
Listen to the tape then answer the question below.
听录音，然后回答以下问题。
What was the chance in a million?
We are less credulous than we used to be.
我们不再像以往那样轻易相信别人了。
In the nineteenth century, a novelist would bring his story to a conclusion by presenting his readers with a series of coincidences -- most of them wildly improbable.
在19世纪，小说家常在小说结尾处给读者准备一系列的巧合--大部分是牵强附会，极不可能的。
Readers happily accepted the fact that an obscure maidservant was really the hero's mother.
当时的读者却愉快地接受这样一些事实：一个低贱的女佣实际上是主人公的母亲；
A long-lost brother, who was presumed dead, was really alive all the time and wickedly plotting to bring about the hero's downfall. And so on.
主人公一位长期失散的兄弟，大家都以为死了，实际上一直活着，并且正在策划暗算主人公；如此等等，
Modern readers would find such naive solutions totally unacceptable.
现代读者会觉得这种天真的结局完全无法接受。
Yet, in real life, circumstances do sometimes conspire to bring about coincidences which anyone but a nineteenth century novelist would find incredible.
不过，在现实生活中，有时确实会出现一些巧合，这些巧合除了19世纪小说家外谁也不会相信。
When I was a boy, my grandfather told me how a German taxi driver,
当我是个孩子的时候，我祖父给我讲了一位德国出租汽车司机
Franz Bussman, found a brother who was thought to have been killed twenty years before.
弗朗兹.巴斯曼如何找到了据信已在20年前死去的兄弟的事。
While on a walking tour with his wife, he stopped to talk to a workman.
一次，他与妻子徒步旅行。途中，停下来与一个工人交谈，
After they had gone on, Mrs. Bussman commented on the workman's close resemblance to her husband and even suggested that he might be his brother.
接着他们继续往前走去。巴斯曼夫人说那工人与她丈夫相貌很像，甚至猜测他可能就是她丈夫的兄弟。
Franz poured scorn on the idea, pointing out that his brother had been killed in action during the war.
弗朗兹对此不屑一顾，指出他兄弟已经在战争中阵亡了。
Though Mrs. Busssman was fully acquainted with this story, she thought that there was a chance in a million that she might be right.
尽管巴斯曼夫人熟知这个情况，但她仍然认为自己的想法仍有百万分之一的可能性。
A few days later, she sent a boy to the workman to ask him if his name was Hans Bussman.
几天后，她派了一个男孩去问那人是否叫汉斯.巴斯曼。
Needless to say, the man's name was Hans Bussman and he really was Franz's long-lost brother.
不出巴斯曼夫人所料，那人的名字真是汉斯.巴斯曼，他确实是弗朗兹失散了多年的兄弟。
When the brothers were reunited, Hans explained how it was that he was still alive.
兄弟俩团聚之时，汉斯说明了他活下来的经过，
After having been wounded towards the end of the war, he had been sent to hospital and was separated from his unit.
战争即将结束时，他负伤被送进医院，并与部队失去联系。
The hospital had been bombed and Hans had made his way back into Western Germany on foot.
医院遭到轰炸，汉斯步行回到了西德。
Meanwhile, his unit was lost and all records of him had been destroyed.
与此同时，他所在的部队被击溃，他的所有档案材料全部毁于战火。
Hans returned to his family home, but the house had been bombed and no one in the neighbourhood knew what had become of the inhabitants.
汉斯重返故里，但他的家已被炸毁，左邻右舍谁也不知原住户的下落，
Assuming that his family had been killed during an air raid, Hans settled down in a village fifty miles away where he had remained ever since.
汉斯以为全家人都在空袭中遇难，于是便在距此50英里外的一座村子里定居下来，直至当日。