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Feng Yue · Youlan Tao · Huashu Wang
Qiliang Cui · Bin Xu Editors
Restructuring
Translation
Education
Implications from China for the Rest of
the World
Restructuring Translation Education
Feng Yue • Youlan Tao • Huashu Wang
Qiliang Cui • Bin Xu
Editors
Restructuring Translation
Education
Implications from China for the Rest
of the World
Editors
Feng Yue Youlan Tao
College of Foreign Languages Department of Translation and Interpreting,
Fujian Normal University College of Foreign Languages and
Fuzhou, Fujian, China Literature
Fudan University
Huashu Wang Shanghai, China
School of Interpreting and Translation
Studies Qiliang Cui
Guangdong University of Foreign Studies School of International Studies
Guangzhou, Guangdong, China University of International Business
and Economics
Bin Xu Beijing, China
College of Foreign Languages
Shandong Normal University
Jinan, Shandong, China
This Springer imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.
The registered company address is: 152 Beach Road, #21-01/04 Gateway East, Singapore 189721,
Singapore
Preface
Twenty years ago, a translator would work for a few years on a translation assign-
ment from a publisher. However, this has become a rare case, as clients often expect
a 100,000-word document to be finished in just a few days. Expertise on computer-
assisted translation and management of translation projects have become a neces-
sity for translators to stay in practice. Unfortunately, this is absent in many
universities that cannot afford a fully equipped translation training studio with a
single seat averaging 60,000 RMB. Indeed, when MT, NMT, crowdsourcing, and
online collaborative translation have become the usual practice in the translation
sector, they remain unfamiliar terms to many teachers of translation in universities.
One could not help but doubt if the universities’ teaching philosophy, curriculum
development, practicum, interdisciplinary training, faculty development, and
university-enterprise collaboration reflect the advance of technology. Pure language-
focused translation training can no longer satisfy the demands of the translation
markets today. There has been an urgent call for the restructuring of translational
education.
This book deals with the problems of translation education in the context of
localization and globalization in the era of big data. By delving into the status quo
of language service worldwide, the current and future application of big data tech-
nology, and the practice of crowdsourcing, online collaborative translations, speech-
to-speech translation, and cloud-based translation, this book highlights the important
changes in the market of translation and thereby points out the inadequacies in the
teaching philosophy, curriculum design, and faculty development in China’s under-
graduate and postgraduate translation programs. More importantly, the book pro-
poses solutions that have been successfully tried out in Shandong Normal University,
Shanghai Foreign Languages University, Zhejiang University, the China University
of Petroleum, Fujian Normal University, Nankai University, and Fudan University,
which can be adapted to suit the situation of other colleges and universities. The
illustrated cases include the project of translating and typesetting books by students
for publishers, the experiment of liberal education among translators, the activity of
translating public opinion updates, the teaching of technical writing as a supplement
v
vi Preface
ix
x Contents
xi
xii List of Abbreviations
PE Postediting
RLV Regional language vendors
SATC Shanghai Association of Technical Writing
SLV Single language vendors
SQ Search quotient
SRX Segmentation Rules eXchange
TAC Translators Association of China
TBX Term Base eXchange
TM Translation memory
TMX Translation Memory eXchange
VRI Video remote interpreting
WYSIWYG What you see is what you get
XLIFF XML Localization Interchange File Format
XML Extensible Markup Language
List of Figures
xiii
xiv List of Figures
Fig. 8.5 Screenshot of the public account Energy Public Opinion�������������� 120
Fig. 11.1 The demand for language service in China in 2015����������������������� 146
Fig. 11.2 The tekom competence framework for technical
communication������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 147
Fig. 11.3 Students’ feedback on teaching syllabus���������������������������������������� 154
List of Pictures
xv
List of Tables
xvii
Part I
Challenges of Translational Profession
Chapter 1
The Evolution of the Global Language
Service Market
Huashu Wang
1.1 Introduction
The rapid development of globalization and information technology (IT) has given
rise to the language service industry, a newly emerging industry consisting of trans-
lation and localization services, the research and development of language tech-
nologies, language teaching and training, and language-related consulting services.
Going far beyond the traditional sense of the translation industry, this emerging
industry has become an important part of the global industrial chain.
As far as the present evolutions of the translation industry are concerned, the
translation itself has taken on new features in terms of specific patterns, contents,
and functions when viewed from the perspectives of work environments, activity
modes, tools and means, and the translation directions. With its connotation and
extension having been greatly enriched and expanded, a new era of translation has
begun. In recent years, the International Federation of Translators(FIT) has changed
its theme from The Changing Face of Translation and Interpreting (2015) to
Translation and Interpreting: Connecting Worlds (2016) and then to Translation
and Diversity (2017), which clearly shows that FIT hopes the global translation
community will face up to dramatic changes in translation work. In the contexts of
globalization and commercialization, language services have taken on distinctive
characteristics of the times.
H. Wang (*)
School of Interpreting and Translation Studies, Guangdong University of Foreign Studies,
Guangzhou, Guangdong, China
e-mail: wanghuashu@vip.qq.com
language service companies. Within 2 years, there are 16,520 new companies estab-
lished at a growth rate of nearly 30% and an average annual growth rate of 15%.
Furthermore, under the backdrop of a new era, there are significant increases in
international exchanges with the gradual enhancement of China’s national strengths.
Upon the implementation of the “going out” cultural strategy by China, external
publicity has been improved, and the international discourse power of the Chinese
language has been enhanced. The proposal and implementation of the “Belt and
Road Initiative” has created more and larger markets for Chinese language services.
With the rise of the Chinese economy and the spread of Chinese culture around the
world, translation services have also shifted from the “bringing in” in the past to the
“going out” at present. On the whole, Chinese language services have shifted from
“translating foreign languages into Chinese” to “translating Chinese into foreign
languages.”
The early translation activities mainly focused on the humanities, such as literature,
history, religion, and philosophy. As more and more international exchanges con-
cerning science, technology, culture, and trade are brought about by economic glo-
balization and informatization, the demands of international language service
markets have expanded rapidly, and pragmatic translation has become an increas-
ingly important part of language services as a whole, expanding to all walks of life.
Modern language services involve many vertical fields such as information technol-
ogy, finance, medicine, law, patents, automobiles, chemical engineering, energy,
etc. Nonliterary translations have become the main part of today’s language service
markets and have shown a trend of continuous growth in all aspects.
According to the ALC 2015 Industry Survey released by the Association of
Language Companies (ALC), most revenues of US language service companies
come from medical, legal, and government sectors. In contrast, the areas with the
highest proportions of annual revenues for language service enterprises in Europe
and other regions are technology, manufacturing, and software, respectively. Among
them, the revenue from the technology field accounts for about 11% in 2013, which
is about a quarter of their gross revenue for that year (see Table 1.1).
According to the China Language Service Industry Development Report 2016
(TAC 2016), 80.6% of the 423 surveyed language service companies provide trans-
lation services on legal contracts, followed by chemical engineering and energy
(77.8%), machinery manufacturing (75.9%), and construction mining (72.3%).
Thanks to China’s “going out” strategy, language service demands in such three
fields were large, attracting lots of language service companies to provide related
services. Companies specialized in the translations of software and games account
for 44.9%, and those in the field of cross-border e-commerce account for 40.2%.
With the further development of game localization and cross-border e-commerce,
the number of companies providing translations in these two fields will increase
year by year.
6 H. Wang
Table 1.1 ALC 2015 Industry Survey: language services market share
Language services USA (%) Europe (%) Other regions (%)
Medical care 29 15 19
Law 19 11 5
Government 19 12 16
Manufacturing 14 16 10
Education 14 9 8
Medicine 13 8 12
Service industry 12 8 13
Insurance 8 7 9
Finance 8 10 7
Software 7 16 14
Technology and engineering 7 24 26
Advertising 6 11 11
Safety 6 4 0
Others 14 5 6
It is evident that the businesses of language service companies both in China and
abroad are expanding and diversifying, which also reflects the vast potential of the
language service market.
Changes in translation fields and business types have brought about the diversifica-
tion of translation objectives which are no longer limited to interpretation and trans-
lation. According to The Language Services Market: 2017 released by the CSA,
traditional translation and interpreting services have remained as the most important
services for nearly 4 years, but some business areas related to localization services
such as website internationalization, multimedia localization, software localization,
internationalized services, creative translation, international testing, and machine
translation post-editing are relatively stable. In 2013 and 2014, the total market
shares of the above business areas are 25.81% and 27.84%, respectively, which not
only exceed that of on-site interpretation but also rise up as the second largest busi-
ness type in the language service industry. From 2014 to 2017, the post-editing of
machine translation business increases from 3.33% in 2014 to 4.20% in 2017, rank-
ing as the third largest business type in the industry.
According to the China Language Service Industry Development Report 2014
(TAC 2014), almost all 120 companies surveyed on the types of their main business
(specifically, 117 or 97.5% of them) reported “translation services.” Besides that,
about half of them reported “localization services” and “language service c onsulting”
as the main business, accounting for 50% and 48.33%, respectively, of the surveyed
1 The Evolution of the Global Language Service Market 7
Modern society is just like a huge organization with a high degree of division of
labor. The in-depth development of the service industry must centralize resources
on the core part through a clear division of labor. In the big data era, modern indus-
tries have already changed people’s social production methods and lifestyles
through the production lines, which have also deeply affected the language service
industry. The further development of ITO (information technology outsourcing) and
BPO (business process outsourcing) has optimized the operation modes of language
service companies so that language service companies can centralize their superior
resources to enhance their competitiveness and obtain high-quality and efficient
services at a lower cost. For example, some language service companies specialize
in software localization projects with high market value and high technology con-
tents as subcontractors, while outsourcing the text translations to more professional
service providers. When facing challenges of large-scale language service projects,
language service providers usually need to rely on division of labor and coopera-
tion. Based on the scales and language service capabilities, language service provid-
ers can be subdivided into multi-language vendors (MLV), regional language
vendors (RLV), and single language vendors (SLV). Language service providers
also show a trend of internal verticalization and specialization. For example, some
language service providers focus on the fields of information technology, biomedi-
cine, and automobiles, while other language service providers focus on the fields of
finance, law, patents, etc.
The industrialization has resulted in an increasingly detailed division of language
services. In language service companies, each project has professional processes
and procedures, and each process and procedure has a professional division of labor,
including sales managers, customer managers, translators, editors, proofreaders,
terminologists, typesetting engineers, translation technical support specialists,
localization engineers, multimedia engineers, project managers, project assistants,
test engineers, trainers, etc. The roles of managers themselves can be subdivided as
project managers, customer managers, quality managers, marketing managers,
typesetting managers, test managers, technical managers, supplier managers, and so
on. The roles within the customer-party enterprises are also being continuously
refined. For example, many large international enterprises have such roles as local-
ization project managers, localization quality managers, localization supply manag-
ers, localization engineers, and terminologists to respond to the market demands.
The market has exerted higher and higher requirements on the specialization level
for each position, which puts forward higher requirements for quality language ser-
vice personnel.
1 The Evolution of the Global Language Service Market 9
With the development of the market economy and the continuous improvements of
the service industry, it is essential to standardize translations as a diversified and
multilevel service product. A company’s translation service standard is not only
about the regulations at the level of languages and texts, but it should also consider
the project elements, product specifications, production processes, and project out-
comes of its language service. ISO and other international standardization organiza-
tions have also published a series of standards for the translation industry as below:
• ISO/TS11669:2012 Translation Projects-General Guidance
• ISO 17100:2015 Translation Services-Requirements for Translation Services
• ISO/DIS 18587: Translation Services-Post-editing of Machine Translation
Output, Requirements
• ISO/AWI 20539: Translation, Interpreting and Related Technology-Vocabulary
• ISO/NP 20771: Legal and Specialist Translation Services, Requirements
Since 2003, China has successively issued many standards and specifications for
language services, including:
• Specification for Translation Service – Part 1: Translation
• Specification for Translation Service - Part 2: Interpretation
• Target Text Quality Requirements for Translation Services
• Translation Service Requirements T/TAC 001-2016
• Basic Terminology for Localization Service
• Quotation Specification for Localization Service
• Specification for Selection of Localization Service Providers
• Quotation Specification for Translation Service
• Quotation Specification for Interpretation Service
• Localized Translation and Document Typesetting Quality Assessment
Specification, etc.
From the multiple viewpoints of service providers and customers and with regu-
lations in terms of infrastructure, human resources, technical capabilities, service
quality, project processes, service steps, and results, these standards gradually form
a complete system of service quality assurance, which is of great significance in
promoting the standardization of language services.
In addition, standards on technical writing and translation data are constantly
refined. Document productions begin to comply with specifications or standards
from the very start, such as DTD (Document Type Definition), XML (extensible
Markup Language), and DITA (Darwin Information Typing Architecture), greatly
simplifying the post-processing workload. The LISA (Localization Industry
Standards Association) has successively developed industry standards such as TMX
(Translation Memory eXchange), TBX (Term Base eXchange), SRX (Segmentation
Rule eXchange), GMX (Global Information Management Metrics eXchange), and
TBX Link. The OASIS (Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information
10 H. Wang
Standards) developed the XLIFF (XML Localization Interchange File Format) stan-
dard in 2002. It separates texts to be localized or translated from the complex for-
mats and enables the same source files to be processed with different tools,
facilitating the effective resolution of various conflicts between data compatibility
and language asset management.
1.8 Conclusion
With the diversifications of translation fields and service contents, the surges in
translation requirements, the improvements of translation processes and environ-
ments, the rapid development of translation technologies, and the continuous
improvements in translation standards, the features of language services are chang-
ing, and translation educations face new opportunities and challenges.
As market demands change, companies have put forward increasingly more pro-
fessional requirements for the capabilities of language service personnel. The
requirements of modern language service companies for full-time translators are
quite different from those of the past. The author examined the job advertisements
related to translation services of 50 major language service companies from 3 major
recruitment networks in China and found that most recruiting companies require all
candidates, whether full-time or part-time translators, to have the following capa-
bilities in addition to excellent language skills, as shown in Table 1.2.
Professional translators are not only expected to master interpretation and trans-
lation skills but also master many other skills, such as IT capabilities, translation
techniques, translation norms, marketing, and translation managements.
Consequently, translation educations should have a macroscopic vision of the lan-
guage service industry chain and must be reformed in many aspects, such as training
concepts, the designs of teaching materials, teacher training, and teaching
contents.
Translation education reform and translation research innovation are closely
related. According to statistics from the Translation Studies in China for 30 Years
(1978–2007) (Xu and Mu 2009), there are very few articles on the characteristics of
the translation industry from a macro perspective and papers related to the transla-
tion industry and its management account for only 0.6% over the past 30 years.
According to statistics from the Applied Translation Research in China for 30 Years
(1980–2010) (Fang 2012), traditional translation research still holds an overwhelm-
ing advantage, while macroscopic analysis of the language service industry is rare,
and research on applied translation lags behind the realistic needs of the industry.
Many translation researchers still focus on the translation concepts at the literary
translation stage and regard some nonliterary translation facts, behaviors, and activ-
ities in terms of concepts, standards, and methodologies for literary translation (Xie
2012). The natures of the contemporary contexts of translations have changed, but
unfortunately China’s translation educations have not been able to keep pace with
such changes.
1 The Evolution of the Global Language Service Market 11
Table 1.2 Recruitment requirements of language service companies for non-language capabilities
Capability module Main contents
IT Basic knowledge and skills on computer operating system
Basic editing and typewriting skills of office systems
Coding and format conversions: UTF, PDF, INDD, FM, DWG, and other
format conversions and OCR (optical character recognition)
Quick access to information: search quotient (SQ), an index of the required
information obtained per unit time
Translation Pre-translation: word count, repetition rate calculation, translation memory
Technologies reuse, term extraction
Translation: the use of MT/CAT tools during translation and terminology
management tools
Posttranslation: quality assurance, language asset maintenance
Project experience Project management: basic knowledge and related skills for the kickoff,
planning, implementation, and closing of projects
Organizational coordination capabilities: internal, external, and cross-
departmental coordination
Cost and schedule control capabilities: unit cost control and risk prevention
and control
Project experiences in professional fields
Professional ethics Service awareness: professional principle of translation as a service
Quality: delivery according to industry quality standards, customer quality
requirements, etc.
Time management: delivery according to basic industry requirements,
customer and project basic requirements, etc.
Confidentiality: compliance with industry’s principle of integrity, customer
requirements, etc.
The translation educators of the new era should study new problems in the new
environments based on the integrations of basic theories on modern translation and
practices of the international language service industry from a global perspective.
Educators should examine the entire language service ecosystem, in particular, the
development of the translation profession and the characteristics and needs of the
entire language service industry, and examine modern language services from a
multidimensional perspective. New tasks for translation educations in the new times
include paying close attentions to the development of the translation industry, value
chain analysis, business and marketing managements, project managements and
translation process designs, crowdsourcing, information technologies, language
technologies, knowledge managements and language asset management, translation
standards and service industry standards, translation professionalism, etc. Only by
studying new situations and constantly analyzing new problems can we deepen our
understandings of modern translation phenomena and activities, further explore the
natures of translation activities, reform the orientation of translation educations,
improve the setup of translation disciplines, and promote the sustainable develop-
ment of language service educations.
12 H. Wang
English References
ALC. (2015). Industry survey: Data and analysis [R]. The Association of Language Companies.
CSA. (2016). The language services market: 2016 [R]. Common Sense Advisory.
CSA. (2017). The language services market: 2017 [R]. Common Sense Advisory.
ISO. (2015). ISO 17100:2015 Translation services – Requirements for translation services [S].
Geneve: ISO.
TAC. (2014). China language service industry development report 2014 [R]. TAC.
TAC. (2016). China language service industry development report 2016 [R]. TAC.
Chinese References
Fang, M. (2012). Yingyong Fanyi Yanjiu 30 Nian (1980–2010). (Applied Translation Studies in
China for 30 Years (1980–2010) [J]). Shanghai Journal of Translators, (2), 22–27. [方梦之.
(2012). 应用翻译研究30年(1980—2010)[J]. 《上海翻译》, (2), 22–27].
Xie, T. (2012). Xin Shidai Yujing Qidai Zhongguo Fanyi Yanjiu de Xin Tupo (Expected new break-
throughs in Chinese translation studies in the context of the new times). Chinese Translator
Journal, (3), 13–15. [谢天振. (2012). 新时代语境期待中国翻译研究的新突破. 《中国翻
译》, (3), 13–15].
Xu, J and L. Mu. 2009. Zhongguo FanyixueYanjiu 30 Nian (1978–2007). (Translation Studies in
China in the Past Three Decades (1978–2007) [J]). Journal of Foreign Languages, (1), 77–87.
[许钧, 穆雷 (2009). 中国翻译学研究30年 (1978–2007)[J]. 《外国语》, (1), 77–87].
Chapter 2
The Development of Translation
Technology in the Era of Big Data
Huashu Wang
2.1 Introduction
H. Wang (*)
School of Interpreting and Translation Studies, Guangdong University of Foreign Studies,
Guangzhou, Guangdong, China
e-mail: wanghuashu@vip.qq.com
been made in the areas covering speech recognition, machine translation, semantic
retrieval, corpus alignment, and term extraction, quietly changing the ecological
environment of language services.
J anet was pale and silent as King drove into town. Glancing at her,
he saw that her lips were pressed together, her smooth brow
puckered a bit, and her eyes filled with a strange, thoughtful
expression. Her hands tightly gripped the handle of her parasol.
“I’m sorry it happened that way, Janet,” he said apologetically. “It
was thoughtless of me to get caught in that mob, so that you were
compelled to suffer the humiliation of witnessing such a brutal
spectacle.”
“You were not to blame,” she returned, in a low, queer voice. “I
begged you to wait. I’m glad I did.”
“You’re what—glad?” he exclaimed, astonished. “It was not a thing
for a girl like you to see and hear.”
“Still,” she declared, “I am glad I saw it. I know now that any man
with an atom of manhood in his make-up may sometimes be
compelled to fight.”
“That’s right,” he agreed, “and he can’t always pick a gentleman,
or a man of his own class, for an antagonist.”
She looked at him quickly. “Do you think Tom Locke is a
gentleman?”
“Oh, I don’t know about that; it’s doubtful, considering the
company he’s with.”
“Do gentlemen never play baseball?”
“Certainly—in college games.”
“But they never play professionally?”
“I wouldn’t say that, you know,” was his slow answer. “Some
college men go in for professional baseball after graduating. Almost
always, they need the money to give them a start in some chosen
profession or business. But not all college players are gentlemen, by
any means; far from it. At Harvard, even though baseball and football
players and members of the track team were decidedly popular in a
general way, there were none of them in my set, and I didn’t see fit to
associate with them much.”
Even as he said it, he flushed a bit, knowing she, like many others
in Kingsbridge, must be fully aware of the fact that his exasperated
father had removed him from Harvard in his sophomore year to
avoid the disgrace of his suspension, or possible expulsion, because
of certain wild escapades in which he had been concerned, along
with some others of his own particularly swift set. Nevertheless, he
had his standards of deportment and qualifications essential to the
gentleman, though, doubtless, it would be no easy matter to make
them clear to some strait-laced, narrow-minded persons.
He was nettled by the conviction that Janet was suddenly taking
altogether too much interest in the practically unknown Kingsbridge
pitcher, who, following his surprising double victory of the day, was
surely destined to become a popular idol in the town. He had known
Janet three years, having met her at a church sociable in the days
when Cyrus King was setting about in earnest, by the construction of
his mills, to turn Kingsbridge from a dull, sleepy settlement into a
hustling, chesty town. At first she had seemed to be an unusually
pretty, vivacious little girl, with somewhat more refinement and good
sense than the usual run of country maidens; but that he would ever
become genuinely and deeply interested in her had not occurred to
him as a remote possibility. Even after he had left college and begun
work in the big sawmill, although he found her much matured and
developed, and therefore still more interesting, he but slowly came to
realize that she was the possessor of some potent charm, indefinite,
elusive, indescribable, which was casting a powerful spell over him.
Not until this day, however, had he realized how firmly this spell
had gripped him. It had come upon him as a surprise which he
obstinately tried to misinterpret; for why should he, the only son and
heir of old Cy King, several times over a millionaire, permit himself to
be bewitched past self-mastery by this little country girl, daughter of
a broken-down village parson, who had not tried to bewitch him at
all? It seemed ridiculous, something to demand self-reproach; for,
least of all, when he thought of such a thing, which was rarely, had
he fancied himself silly enough to be caught in such a net. Moreover,
he knew what stormy anger the knowledge would produce in his
father if the knowledge ever came to him.
The truth had stabbed him there upon the baseball field. It had
taken the piercing form of a jealous pang, which he had sought to
conceal when he saw that Janet was becoming interested in the new
Kingsbridge pitcher; and it cut deeper and deeper as her interest
grew and developed into out-spoken admiration. He had seen her
watching that fierce fist fight, knowing all the while that she was
praying that Locke might conquer, and, though she had held herself
marvelously in hand, he seemed to fathom all the torture and dread
which filled her heart. That she should care so much what might
happen to a total stranger, even though he were the new-found idol
of the Kingsbridge fans, was sufficient to skim the scales swiftly from
Benton King’s eyes, and leave him confessing to himself, without
shame, that she was very dear to him. For, trite but true, that which
we desire very much becomes a thousand times more desirable as
our chance of possession grows less.
And now, as they drove slowly homeward, something writhed and
burned within him at the further evidence of her interest in Locke. He
was tempted to speak up boldly and say that there was not one
chance in a million that the fellow could be a gentleman; but he had
not yet lost his head, even if his heart was gone, and he had sense
enough to know that such a course might be the most unwise one he
could pursue. So he held himself in check, registering an inward vow
that he would see to it that this fellow Locke found as little chance as
might be to give him worriment over Janet.
Too soon the little parsonage, a modest story-and-a-half house,
one of the oldest in Kingsbridge, came into view. Too soon they were
at the door, and he was helping her to alight. He held her hand to the
extreme limit of good taste, held it and pressed it, saying:
“I shall be at church to-morrow. If you don’t mind, it would give me
pleasure to escort you home after the services.”
She looked at him in surprise, her lips parted in an odd little smile,
her violet eyes emphasizing her wonderment.
“Why, Bent, you’ve scarcely attended church half a dozen times
since you came home from college. What brings you out to-
morrow?”
“You!” he answered, feeling himself thrill and choke a bit. “I’m a
heathen, I admit; but I’m coming out to-morrow to worship—you.” He
had said such things before, to other girls, but he had spoken them
lightly, and without a tremor; now little electric vibrations were
running along his nerves, and, though he knew that his face was
pale, he could feel his swollen heart pulsing hard, and his temples
drumming. He had never dreamed that saying such a “little thing” to
a pretty girl would come so near unmanning him.
Her surprise had grown, but she was self-possessed. “Thou shalt
not worship false gods,” she laughed. Then, as if she saw something
in his eyes which made her fear he would go further, she hastily
gave her consent: “If you come out to church to-morrow I’ll permit
you to walk home with me—after Sabbath School. That’ll be your
reward for listening to father’s sermon. Now, for the first time in my
life, I feel that I have really done something for the heathen.”
Laughing, she ran up the steps of the trellised porch, turning a
moment to say good night, framed in an arch of June green vines.
Head bared, he gazed at that picture, and found it the fairest his
eyes had ever looked upon. There was now in his mind no question,
no doubt; he knew.
“Good night, Janet,” he said softly. “Until to-morrow, and that will
be—a year.” He had laughed at silly, lovesick chaps who said things
like that; but now, before he knew what he was saying, he had
uttered it with all the sincerity of his soul.
CHAPTER XVII
FATHER AND DAUGHTER