Where it is really the owners that are to blame, they ought to be shown up. The selfishness of the riparian proprietor grows with every year. If these men had their way they would close the river Thames altogether. They actually do this along the minor tributary streams and in the backwaters. They drive posts into the bed of the stream, and draw chains across from bank to bank, and nail huge notice-boards on every tree. The sight of those notice-boards rouses every evil instinct in my nature. I feel I want to tear each one down, and hammer it over the head of the man who put it up, until I have killed him, and then I would bury him, and put the board up over the grave as a tombstone.

I mentioned these feelings of mine to Harris, and he said he had them worse than that. He said he not only felt he wanted to kill the man who caused the board to be put up, but that he should like to slaughter the whole of his family and all his friends and relations, and then burn down his house. This seemed to me to be going too far, and I said so to Harris; but he answered:

"Not a bit of it. Serve `em all jolly well right, and I'd go and sing comic songs on the ruins."

I was vexed to hear Harris go on in this blood-thirsty strain (меня взволновало /слышать/, что у Гарриса такой кровожадный настрой; strain — напряжение; черта, элемент, оттенок; наклонность). We never ought to allow our instincts of justice to degenerate into mere vindictiveness (мы никогда не должны позволять нашим чувствам справедливости вырождаться в простую мстительность). It was a long while before I could get Harris to take a more Christian view of the subject (прошло много времени, прежде чем я сумел убедить Гарриса принять более христианскую точку зрения по этому вопросу; a long while — долго; subject — тема, предмет, объект), but I succeeded at last, and he promised me that he would spare the friends and relations at all events (но мне удалось наконец, и он обещал мне, что пощадит друзей и родственников, во всяком случае; to spare — беречь; жалеть, щадить; at all events — в любом случае: «при всех событиях»), and would not sing comic songs on the ruins (и не будет петь комические песни на развалинах).

You have never heard Harris sing a comic song (вы никогда не слышали, как Гаррис поет комические песни), or you would understand the service I had rendered to mankind (иначе вы бы поняли, /какую/ услугу я оказал человечеству; to render — отдавать, воздавать, оказывать /услугу, помощь/). It is one of Harris's fixed ideas that he can sing a comic song (одна из навязчивых идей Гарриса — что он умеет петь комическую песню/куплеты); the fixed idea, on the contrary, among those of Harris's friends who have heard him try (напротив, навязчивая идея среди тех друзей Гарриса, которые слышали, как он пытался /петь/), is that he can't and never will be able to (что он не умеет, и никогда не сможет /петь/), and that he ought not to be allowed to try (и что ему нельзя позволять пробовать).

vindictiveness [vn'dktvns] Christian ['krsn] view [vju:]

I was vexed to hear Harris go on in this blood-thirsty strain. We never ought to allow our instincts of justice to degenerate into mere vindictiveness. It was a long while before I could get Harris to take a more Christian view of the subject, but I succeeded at last, and he promised me that he would spare the friends and relations at all events, and would not sing comic songs on the ruins.

You have never heard Harris sing a comic song, or you would understand the service I had rendered to mankind. It is one of Harris's fixed ideas that he can sing a comic song; the fixed idea, on the contrary, among those of Harris's friends who have heard him try, is that he can't and never will be able to, and that he ought not to be allowed to try.