One small animal, called the ermine, has a snow-white coat and a tail with a black tip. 有一种叫“白鼬”的小动物，长着雪白的皮毛，只有尾巴尖是黑色的。

The ermine hates dirt or anything that will soil his white fur, so he keeps himself spotless. 白鼬爱干净，不愿让任何东西弄脏自己雪白的皮毛，所以全身总是一尘不染。

It is for this reason that the official robes of judges and kings are made of the fur of the ermine, 由于这个原因，法官和国王的袍服都是用白鼬毛皮做的，

as a sign that they too must be pure and clean in heart and mind. 象征他们的心灵是纯净的。

The skins of many such animals are sewn together to make a single cape or coat, which then looks white with little black tails spotted regularly over it. 将很多白鼬皮毛缝在一起就可以制成一件斗篷或大衣，整体看上去是白色上面均匀地点缀着黑色尾巴尖。

The longest railway in the World is built through the bottom part of Siberia. 世界上最长的铁路贯穿西伯利亚的底部。

It is so long it takes two weeks to go from one end of it to the other. 乘火车从一头到另一头要花两周的时间。

One end of it on the Pacific Ocean is called Vladivostok and the other end in Russia is Moscow. 铁路的一头在太平洋的海参崴，另一头在俄罗斯的莫斯科，

It is called the Trans-Siberian Railway, which means the Across Siberia Railway. 这条铁路叫做“西伯利亚大铁路”，意思是穿越整个西伯利亚的铁路。

Most of the people in Siberia live along this railway, and yet one may travel for hundreds of miles without seeing a town or even a house. 大多数西伯利亚人都住在铁路沿线。然而，你乘火车可能走数百英里也看不到一座城镇，甚至看不到一座房子。

Often the towns are far from the railroad, so that there is a long drive from the station to the town. 城镇通常离铁路较远，因此从车站到镇上驾车还有很长一段路。

The engines that draw the trains are fired by wood instead of coal, 拉动火车的火车头不是烧煤而是烧木头。

and along the railroad there are piles of wood at which the train stops to get fuel, as a car would stop to get gasoline. 铁路沿线有一堆堆的木头，火车停下就可以添加燃料，就像小汽车停下来加油一样。

The chief Siberian cities end in "sk." They are Omsk, Tomsk, and Irkutsk. 西伯利亚主要城市的名字都是以“斯（茨）克”结尾的，如鄂木斯克、托木斯克和伊尔库茨克。

A stranger once asked a man on the street how far it was to the railway station. 一个外地人曾在大街上询问到火车站有多远，

The man replied, "If you keep on going the way you are headed it is twenty-five thousand miles, but if you turn round it's two blocks." 得到的回答是，“如果你继续朝前走，有25,000英里，但是，如果你掉转头，也就两个街区而已。”