第一章节选――
This rose-bush, by a strange chance, has been kept alive in history; but whether it had merely survived out of the stern old wilderness, so long after the fall of the gigantic pines and oaks that originally overshadowed it, or whether, as there is far authority for believing, it had sprung up under the footsteps of the sainted Ann Hutchinson as she entered the prison-door, we shall not take upon us to determine. Finding it so directly on the threshold of our narrative, which is now about to issue from that inauspicious portal, we could hardly do otherwise than pluck one of its flowers, and present it to the reader. It may serve, let us hope, to symbolise some sweet moral blossom that may be found along the track, or relieve the darkening close of a tale of human frailty and sorrow.
由于某种奇异的机缘，这丛野玫瑰历尽劫难而永生。这丛野玫瑰是仅仅因为当初庇荫过它的那些巨大的松树和橡树早已倒下了，才使它在古老又严峻的荒野中得以幸存呢，还是据传有相当可靠的证据所说，圣徒安妮•哈钦逊进牢门时踩踏过这个地块，才使花儿从她的脚印下破土而出——我们可犯不着费神加以断定。我们要讲的故事直接从这里——就是这道不吉祥的大门开始，而偏偏就在这里摸到这丛花儿，我们几乎不能不摘下一朵野玫瑰来，呈献给读者呢。但愿这朵野玫瑰能用来象征在这个讲述人性脆弱和悲哀的故事中可以发现馥郁芳香的道德之花，也可在读到故事令人黯然神伤的结局时备不住得到一些宽慰。
