- the rose arrives at the little prince‘s planet

— I soon learned to know this flower better. On the little prince‘s planet the flowers had always been very simple. They had only one ring of petals（花瓣）; they took upno room at all; they were a trouble to nobody. One morning they would appear in the grass, and by night they would have faded （凋谢）peacefully away. But one day, from a seed blown from no one knew where, a new flower had come up; and the little prince had watched very closely over this small sprout which was not like any other small sprouts on his planet. It might, you see, have been a new kind of baobab.

— The shrub（n. 灌木）soon stopped growing, and began to get ready to produce a flower. The little prince, who was present at the first appearance of a huge bud（芽）, felt at once that some sort of miraculous apparition must emerge from it. But the flower was not satisfied to complete the preparations for her beauty in the shelter of her green chamber. She chose her colours with the greatest care. She adjusted her petals one by one.（拟人）She did not wish to go out into the world all rumpled（/'rʌmp(ə)l/untidy）, like the field poppies（罂粟田）. It was only in the full radiance of her beauty that she wished to appear. Oh, yes! She was a coquettish（/ko'kɛtɪʃ/  adj.sexy）creature! And her mysterious adornment（n. 装饰,装饰品decoration） lasted for days and days.

•   take up：1⃣️拿起；2⃣️开始从事；take up a question3⃣️ 占据(时间, 地方) 

•   fade away：逐渐消失，fade：凋谢

•   miraculous：/mɪ'rækjʊləs/ adj. 奇迹般的, 超自然的， 

•   apparition/æpə'rɪʃ(ə)n/n.appearance幽灵;(特异景象等的)出现 

•   emerge from：从某处冒出来

•   chamber：n.房间，寝室；会议厅；议院；会所

•   radiance：1⃣️n. 发光;光辉2⃣️辐射，so半径为r，rasius；雷达是rader；收音机是radio。

•   appear in：出现，she wished to appear only in the full radiance of her beauty.

- This flower is a very coquettish and complex creature

— Then one morning, exactly at sunrise, she suddenly showed herself.

And, after working with all this painstaking precision, she yawned and said:

"Ah! I am scarcely awake. I beg that you will excuse me. My petals are still all disarranged（disorder）…”

But the little prince could not restrain（v.control）his admiration:

"Oh! How beautiful you are!"

"Am I not?" the flower responded, sweetly. "And I was born at the same moment as the sun..."

The little prince could guess easily enough that she was not any too modest-- but how moving-- and exciting-- she was!

"I think it is time for breakfast," she added an instant later. "If you would have the kindness to think of my needs--"

And the little prince, completely abashed（adj.discomposed）, went to look for a sprinkling-can（喷壶）of fresh water. So, he tended（attend；take care）the flower.

     So, too, she began very quickly to torment him with her vanity-- which was, if the truth be known, a little difficult to deal with. One day, for instance, when she was speaking of her four thorns, she said to the little prince:

"Let the tigers come with their claws!”

"There are no tigers on my planet," the little prince objected. "And, anyway, tigers do not eat weeds."

"I am not a weed," the flower replied, sweetly.

"Please excuse me..."

"I am not at all afraid of tigers," she went on, "but I have a horror of drafts（穿堂风）. I suppose you wouldn‘t have a screen（屏风）for me?"

"A horror of drafts-- that is bad luck, for a plant," remarked the little prince, and added to himself, "This flower is a very complex creature..."

•   painstaking：careful adj. 1⃣️极小心的;2⃣️辛勤的, 辛苦的   

•   precision：accuracy n. 精确度, 准确(性)，precision在这里是指前面玫瑰花开放的一系列精致的妆饰。

•   was not any too modest：she was not modest”，“any”和“too”都是用来加强否定语气的——“她一点也不谦虚”。

•   but how moving-- and exciting-- she was：破折号是起解释说明的作用

•   torment：强调烦恼或痛苦的长期性。

     agony: 侧重指精神或身体痛苦的剧烈程度。

     torture: 语气比toment强，指在精神或肉体上受到的折磨所产生的痛苦

     grief: 指由某种特殊处境或原因造成的强烈的感情上的苦恼与悲痛。

     misery: 着重痛苦的可悲状态，多含不幸、可怜或悲哀的意味。

     sorrow: 语气比grief弱，指因不幸、损失或失望等所产生的悲伤。

•   drafts：1⃣️草稿，起草的，draft a bill，give me some time to draft a speech2⃣️Block drafts around doors and windows.

- The little prince said that he was too young to how to love the flowers.Love can be that complex

— "At night I want you to put me under a glass globe. It is very cold where you live. In the place I came from--"

But she interrupted herself at that point. She had come in the form of a seed. She could not have known anything of any other worlds.Embarrassed over having let herself be caught on the verge of such a naive untruth, she coughed two or three times, in order to put the little prince in the wrong.

"The screen?"

"I was just going to look for it when you spoke to me..."

Then she forced her cough a little more so that he should suffer from remorse(n.痛恨，悔恨，自责)just the same.

So the little prince, in spite of all the good will（善意） that was inseparable from his love, had soon come to doubt her. He had taken seriously words which were without importance, and it made him very unhappy.

"I ought not to have listened to her," he confided to me one day. "One never ought to listen to the flowers. One should simply look at them and breathe their fragrance. Mine（我的那些不包括玫瑰的花）perfumed all my planet. But I did not know how to take pleasure in all her grace. This tale（故事）of claws, which disturbed me so much, should only have filled my heart with tenderness and pity."

And he continued his confidences:

"The fact is that I did not know how to understand anything! I ought to have judged by deeds and not by words. She cast her fragrance and her radiance(光辉)over me. I ought never to have run away from her... I ought to have guessed all the affection that lay behind her poor little stratagems. Flowers are so inconsistent! But I was too young to know how to love her..."

• embarrassed over:表示对什么事感到尴尬。

• be on the verge of：处于边缘 

• put sb. in the wrong：把...置于错误的境地

• 无论小王子有多么全心全意爱她，小王子也很快难免会怀疑她。

• confided:v.吐露（秘密，心事等）；confided in信任

    believe in: 普通用词，常表示一种缓和、不太肯定的口气。

    trust in: 指绝对相信或信赖某人。

    confide in: 侧重忠诚可靠与可信赖。We confide in his abilities.

• take pleasure in：享受，欣赏 

• tenderness and pity：这里是小王子在说自己后悔了，这句话里既有tenderness又有pity，其实就是小王子这种初陷爱河的纠结心情，tenderness是每次想到玫瑰花时心里会出现的甜蜜，而pity又指当时没有理解玫瑰说话的含义（他刚认识玫瑰，以为玫瑰的那一套“我不怕老虎爪子”理论只是为了炫耀，其实这就是恋爱小女生的小心机～，其实是希望他来保护自己），所以现在小王子感到后悔。

这种一对反义词放在一起的例子，最熟悉的就是Adele的someone like you里面那句歌词吧， “who would have known howbitter sweetthis would taste” (其中苦乐，有谁可知)。

• cast over：笼罩 

• lie behind： 为某事之理由，是……的原因

后记：

玫瑰花明明已经精细地做了那么长的准备工作，却打着哈欠说道：

“我刚刚睡醒，真对不起，瞧我的头发还是乱蓬蓬的…”

-傲娇的小玫瑰🌹～

虽然小王子轻而易举就猜出来玫瑰一点儿也不谦虚，但在他看来，它依然美丽动人！

-温暖的小王子～

I ought to have guessed all the affection that lay behind her poor little stratagems. Flowers are so inconsistent! But I was too young to know how to love her.

我应该猜到这个可怜的小姑娘背后所藏的一切感情，但我太年轻，不知道如何去爱她。