百年孤独 第一章
百年孤独 第一章
百年孤独 第一章梅爾加德斯是個誠實的人，他告誡說：“磁鐵幹這個卻不行。”可是霍·阿·布恩蒂亞當時還不相信吉卜賽人的誠實，因此用自己的一匹騾子和兩衹山羊換下了兩塊磁鐵。這些傢畜是他的妻子打算用來振興破敗的傢業的，她試圖阻止他，但是枉費工夫。“咱們很快就會有足夠的金子，用來鋪傢裏的地都有餘啦。”--丈夫回答她。在好兒個月裏，霍·阿·布恩蒂亞都頑強地努力履行自己的諾言。他帶者兩塊磁鐵，大聲地不斷念着梅爾加德斯教他的咒語，勘察了周圍整個地區的一寸寸土地，甚至河床。但他掘出的唯一的東西，是十五世紀的一件鎧甲，它的各部分都已銹得連在一起，用手一敲，皚甲裏面就發出空洞的回聲，仿佛一隻塞滿石子的大葫蘆。
三月間，吉卜賽人又來了。現在他們帶來的是一架望遠鏡和一隻大小似鼓的放大鏡，說是阿姆斯特丹猶太人的最新發明。他們把望遠鏡安在帳篷門口，而讓一個吉卜賽女人站在村子盡頭。花五個裏亞爾，任何人都可從望遠鏡裏看見那個仿佛近在颶尺的吉卜賽女人。“科學縮短了距離。”梅爾加德斯說。“在短時期內，人們足不出戶，就可看到世界上任何地方發生的事兒。”在一個炎熱的晌午，吉卜賽人用放大鏡作了一次驚人的表演：他們在街道中間放了一堆幹草，藉太陽光的焦點讓幹草燃了起來。磁鐵的試驗失敗之後，霍·阿·布恩蒂亞還不甘心，馬上又産生了利用這個發明作為作戰武器的念頭。梅爾加德斯又想勸阻他，但他終於同意用兩塊磁鐵和三枚殖民地時期的金幣交換放大鏡。烏蘇娜傷心得流了淚。這些錢是從一盒金魚衛拿出來的，那盒金幣由她父親一生節衣縮食積攢下來，她一直把它埋藏在自個兒床下，想在適當的時刻使用。霍·阿·布恩蒂亞無心撫慰妻子，他以科學家的忘我精神，甚至冒着生命危險，一頭紮進了作戰試驗。他想證明用放大鏡對付敵軍的效力，就力陽光的焦點射到自己身上，因此受到灼傷，傷處潰爛，很久都沒痊愈。這種危險的發明把他的妻子嚇壞了，但他不顧妻子的反對，有一次甚至準備點燃自己的房子。霍·阿·布恩蒂亞待在自己的房間裏總是一連幾個小時，計算新式武器的戰略威力，甚至編寫了一份使用這種武器的《指南》，闡述異常清楚，論據確鑿有力。他把這份《指南》連同許多試驗說明和幾幅圖解，請一個信使送給政府；這個信使翻過山嶺，涉過茫茫蒼蒼的沼地，遊過洶涌澎湃的河流，冒着死於野獸和疫病的危階，終於到了一條驛道。當時前往首都儘管是不大可能的，霍·阿·布恩蒂亞還是答應，衹要政府一聲令下，他就去嚮軍事長官們實際表演他的發明，甚至親自訓練他們掌握太陽戰的復雜技術。他等待答復等了幾年。最後等得厭煩了，他就為這新的失敗埋怨梅爾加德斯，於是吉卜賽人令人信服地證明了自己的誠實：他歸還了金幣，換回了放大鏡，並且給了霍·阿·布恩蒂亞幾幅葡萄牙航海圖和各種航海儀器。梅爾加德斯親手記下了修道士赫爾曼著作的簡要說明，把記錄留給霍·阿·布恩蒂亞，讓他知道如何使用觀象儀、羅盤和六分儀。在雨季的漫長月份裏，霍·阿·布恩蒂亞部把自己關在宅子深處的小房間裏，不讓別人打擾他的試驗。他完全拋棄了傢務，整夜整夜呆在院子裏觀察星星的運行；為了找到子午綫的確定方法，他差點兒中了暑。他完全掌握了自己的儀器以後，就設想出了空間的概念，今後，他不走出自己的房間，就能在陌生的海洋上航行，考察荒無人煙的土地，並且跟珍禽異獸打上交道了。正是從這個時候起，他養成了自言自語的習慣，在屋子裏踱來踱去，對誰也不答理，而烏蘇娜和孩子們卻在菜園裏忙得喘不過氣來，照料香蕉和海芋、木薯和山藥、南瓜和茄子。可是不久，霍·阿·布恩蒂亞緊張的工作突然停輟，他陷入一種種魄顛倒的狀態。好幾天，他仿佛中了魔，總是低聲地嘟嚷什麽，並為自己反復斟酌的各種假設感到吃驚，自己都不相信。最後，在十二月裏的一個星期、吃午飯的時候，他忽然一下子擺脫了惱人的疑慮。孩子們至死部記得，由於長期熬夜和冥思苦想而變得精疲力竭的父親，如何洋洋得意地嚮他們宣佈自己的發現：
“地球是圓的，象橙子。”
烏蘇娜失去了耐心，“如果你想發癲，你就自個幾發吧！”她嚷叫起來，“別給孩子們的腦瓜裏灌輸古卜賽人的鬍思亂想。”霍·阿·布恩蒂亞一動不動，妻子氣得把觀象儀摔到地上，也沒有嚇倒他。他另做了一個觀象儀，並且把村裏的一些男人召到自己的小房間裏，根據在場的人椎也不明白的理論，嚮他們證明說，如果一直往東航行，就能回到出發的地點。馬孔多的人以為霍·阿·布恩蒂亞瘋了，可兄梅爾加德斯回來之後，馬上消除了大傢的疑慮。他大聲地贊揚霍·阿·布恩蒂亞的智慧：光靠現象儀的探測就證實了一種理論，這種理論雖是馬孔多的居民宜今還不知道的，但實際上早就證實了；梅爾加德斯為了表示欽佩，贈給霍·阿·布恩蒂亞一套東西－－煉金試驗室設備，這對全村的未來將會産生深遠的影響。
這時，梅爾加德斯很快就衰老了。這個吉卜賽人第一次來到村裏的時候，仿佛跟霍·阿·布思蒂亞同樣年歲。可他當時仍有非凡的力氣，揪莊馬耳朵就能把馬拉倒，現在他卻好象被一些頑固的疾病折磨壞了。確實，他衰老的原因是他在世界各地不斷流浪時得過各種罕見的疾病，幫助霍·阿·布恩蒂亞裝備試驗室的時候，他說死神到處都緊緊地跟着他，可是死神仍然沒有最終决定要他的命。從人類遇到的各種瘟疫和災難中，他幸存下來了。他在波斯患過癩病，在馬來亞群島患過壞血病，在亞歷山大患過麻瘋病，在日本患過腳氣病，在馬達加斯加患過淋巴腺鼠疫，在西西裏碰到過地震，在麥哲倫海峽遇到過犧牲慘重的輪船失事。這個不尋常的人說他知道納斯特拉馬斯的秘訣。此人面貌陰沉，落落寡歡，戴着一頂大帽子，寬寬的黑色帽沿宛如烏鴉張開的翅膀，而他身上的絲絨坎肩卻布滿了多年的緑黴。然而，儘管他無比聰明和神秘莫測，他終歸是有血打肉的人，擺脫不了人世間日常生活的煩惱和憂慮。他抱怨年老多病，苦於微不足道的經濟睏難，早就沒有笑容，因為壞血病已使他的牙齒掉光了。霍·阿·布恩蒂亞認為，正是那個悶熱的晌午，梅爾加德斯把白己的秘密告訴他的時候，他們的偉大友誼纔開了頭。吉卜賽人的神奇故事使得孩子們感到驚訝。當時不過五歲的奧雷連諾一輩子都記得，梅爾加德斯坐在明晃晃的窗子跟前，身體的輪廓十分清晰；他那風琴一般低沉的聲音透進了最暗的幻想的角落，而他的兩鬢卻流着汗水，仿佛暑熱熔化了的脂肪。奧雷連諾的哥哥霍·阿卡蒂奧，將把這個驚人的形象當作留下的回憶傳給他所有的後代。至於烏蘇娜，恰恰相反，吉卜賽人的來訪給她留下了最不愉快的印象，因為她跨進房間的時候，正巧梅爾加德斯不小心打碎了一瓶升汞。
“這是魔鬼的氣味，”她說。
“根本不是，”梅爾加德斯糾正她。“別人證明魔鬼衹有硫磺味，這兒不過是一點點升汞。”
接着，他用同樣教誨的口吻大談特談朱砂的特性。烏蘇娜對他的話沒有任何興趣，就帶着孩子析禱去了。後來，這種刺鼻的氣味經常使她想起梅爾加德斯。
除了許多鐵鍋、漏鬥、麯頸瓶、篩子和過濾器，簡陋的試驗室裏還有普通熔鐵爐、長頸玻璃燒瓶、點金石仿製品以及三臂蒸餾器；此種蒸餾器是猶太女人馬利姬曾經用過的，現由吉卜賽人自己按照最新說明製成。此外，梅爾加德斯還留下了七種與六個星球有關的金屬樣品、摩西和索西莫斯的倍金方案、煉金術筆記和圖解，誰能識別這些筆記和圖解，誰就能夠製作點金石。霍·阿·布恩蒂亞認為倍金方案比較簡單，就入迷了。他一連幾個星期纏住烏蘇娜，央求她從密藏的小盒子裏掏出舊金幣來，讓金子成倍地增加，水銀能夠分成多少份，金子就能增加多少倍。象往常一樣，鳥蘇娜沒有拗過大夫的固執要求。於是，霍·阿·布恩蒂亞把三十枚金幣丟到鐵鍋裏，拿它們跟雌黃、銅屑、水銀和鉛一起熔化。然後又把這一切倒在蓖麻油鍋裏，在烈火上熬了一陣。直到最後熬成一鍋惡臭的濃漿，不象加倍的金子，倒象普通的焦糖。經過多次拼命的、冒階的試驗：蒸餾啦，跟七種天體金屬一起熔煉啦，加進黑梅斯水銀和塞浦路斯硫酸????啦，在豬油裏重新熬煮啦（因為沒有蘿蔔油），烏蘇娜的寶貴遺産變成了一大塊焦糊的渣滓，粘在鍋底了。
吉卜賽人回來的時候，烏蘇娜唆使全村的人反對他們，可是好奇戰勝了恐懼，因為吉卜賽人奏着各式各樣的樂器，鬧嚷嚷地經過街頭，他們的宣傳員說是要展出納希安茲人最奇的發明。大傢都到吉卜賽人的帳篷去，花一分錢，就可看到返老還童的梅爾加德斯－－身體康健，沒有皺紋，滿口漂亮的新牙。有些人還記得他壞血病毀掉的牙床、凹陷的面頰、皺巴巴的嘴唇，一見吉卜賽人神通廣大的最新證明，都驚得發抖。接着，梅爾加從嘴裏取出一副完好的牙齒，剎那間又變成往日那個老朽的人，並且拿這副牙齒給觀衆看了一看，然後又把它裝上牙床，微微一笑，似乎重新恢復了青春，這時大傢的驚愕卻變成了狂歡。甚至霍·阿·布恩蒂亞本人也認為，梅爾加德的知識到了不大可能達到的極限，可是當吉卜賽人單獨嚮他說明假牙的構造時，他的心也就輕快了，高興得放聲大笑。霍·阿·布恩蒂亞覺得這一切既簡單又奇妙，第二天他就完全失去了對煉金術的興趣，陷入了沮喪狀態，不再按時進餐，從早到晚在屋子裏踱來踱去。“世界上正在發生不可思議的事，”他嚮烏蘇娜嘮叨。“咱們旁邊，就在河流對岸，已有許多各式各樣神奇的機器，可咱們仍在這兒象蠢驢一樣過日子。”馬孔多建立時就瞭解他的人都感到驚訝，在梅爾加德斯的影響下，他的變化多大啊！
從前，霍·阿·布恩蒂亞好象一個年輕的族長，經常告訴大傢如何播種，如何教養孩子，如何飼養傢畜；他跟大夥兒一起勞動，為全村造福。布恩蒂亞傢的房子是村裏最好的，其他的人都力求象他一樣建築自己的住所。他的房子有一個敞亮的小客廳、擺了一盆盆鮮花的陽臺餐室和兩間臥室，院子裏栽了一棵挺大的慄樹，房後是一座細心照料的菜園，還有一個畜欄，豬、雞和山羊在欄裏和睦相處。他傢裏禁養鬥雞，全村也都禁養鬥雞。
烏蘇娜象丈夫一樣勤勞。她是一個嚴肅、活躍和矮小的女人，意志堅強，大概一輩子都沒唱過歌，每天從黎明到深夜，四處都有她的蹤影，到處都能聽到她那漿過的荷蘭亞麻布裙子輕微的沙沙聲。多虧她勤於照料，夯實的泥土地面、未曾粉刷的上墻、粗糙的自製木器，經常都是千幹淨淨的，而保存衣服的舊箱子還散發出紫蘇輕淡的芳香。
霍·阿·布恩蒂亞是村裏最有事業心的人，他指揮建築的房屋，每傢的主人到河邊去取水都同樣方便；他合理設計的街道，每座住房白天最熱的時刻都能得到同樣的陽光。建村之後過了幾年，馬孔多已經成了一個最整潔的村子，這是跟全村三百個居民過去住過的其他一切村莊都不同的。這是一個真正幸福的村子；在這村子裏，誰也沒有超過三十歲，也還沒有死過一個人。
建村的時候，霍·阿·布恩蒂亞開始製作套索和鳥籠。很快，他自己和村中其他的人傢都養了金駕、金絲雀、蜂虎和知更鳥。許多各式各樣的鳥兒不斷地嘁嘁喳喳，烏蘇娜生怕自己震得發聾，衹好用蜂蠟把耳朵塞上。梅爾加德斯一夥人第一次來到馬孔多出售玻璃球頭痛藥時，村民們根本就不明白這些吉卜賽人如何能夠找到這個小小的村子，因為這個村子是隱沒在遼闊的沼澤地帶的；吉卜賽人說，他們來到這兒是由於聽到了鳥的叫聲。
可是，霍·阿·布恩蒂亞為社會造福的精神很快消失，他迷上了磁鐵和天文探索，幻想采到金子和發現世界的奇跡。精力充沛、衣着整潔的霍·阿·布恩蒂業逐漸變成一個外表疏懶、衣冠不整的人，甚至滿臉鬍髭，烏蘇娜費了大勁纔用一把鋒利的菜刀把他的鬍髭剃掉。村裏的許多人都認為，霍·阿·布恩蒂亞中了邪。不過，他把一個袋子搭在肩上，帶着鐵鍬和鋤頭，要求別人去幫助他開闢一條道路，以便把馬孔多和那些偉大發明連接起來的時候，甚至堅信他發了瘋的人也扔下自己的家庭與活計，跟隨他去冒險。
霍·阿·布恩蒂亞壓根兒不瞭解周圍地區的地理狀況。他衹知道，東邊聳立着難以攀登的山嶺，山嶺後面是古城列奧阿察，據他的祖父--奧雷連諾·布恩蒂亞第一說，從前有個弗蘭西斯·德拉剋爵士，曾在那兒開炮轟擊鰐魚消遣；他叫人在轟死的鰐魚肚裏填進幹草，補綴好了就送去獻給伊麗莎白女王。年輕的時候，霍·阿·布恩蒂亞和其他的人一起，帶着妻子、孩子、傢畜和各種生活用具，翻過這個山嶺，希望到海邊去，可是遊蕩了兩年又兩個月，就放棄了自己的打算；為了不走回頭路，纔建立了馬孔鄉村。因此，往東的路是他不感興趣的--那衹能重複往日的遭遇，南邊是一個個永遠雜草叢生的泥潭和一沼澤地帶--據吉卜賽人證明，那是一個無邊無涯的世界。西邊呢，沼澤變成了遼闊的水域，那兒棲息着鯨魚狀的生物：這類生物，皮膚細嫩，頭和軀幹都象女了，寬大、迷人的胸脯常常毀掉航海的人。據吉卜賽人說，他們到達驛道經過的陸地之前，航行了幾乎半年。霍·阿·布恩蒂亞認為，跟文明世界接觸，衹能往北前進。於是，他讓那些跟他一起建立馬孔多村的人帶上鐵鍬、鋤頭和狩獵武器，把自己的定嚮儀具和地圖放進背囊，就去從事魯莽的冒險了。
最初幾天，他們沒有遇到特殊的睏難。他們順着遍布石頭的河岸下去，到了幾年前發現古代鎧甲的地方，並且沿着野橙子樹之間的小徑進入一片樹林。到第一個周未，他們僥幸打死了一隻牡鹿，拿它烤熟，可是决定衹吃一半，把剩下的儲備起來。他們采取這個預防措施，是想延緩以金剛鸚鵡充饑的時間；這種鸚鵡的肉是藍色的，有強烈的麝香味兒。在隨後的十幾天中，他們根本沒有見到陽光。腳下的土地變得潮濕、鬆軟起來，好象火山灰似的，雜草越來越密，飛禽的啼鳴和猴子的尖叫越來越遠--四周仿佛變得慘談凄涼了。這個潮濕和寂寥的境地猶如“原罪”以前的蠻荒世界；在這兒，他們的鞋子陷進了油氣騰騰的深坑，他們的大砍刀亂劈着血紅色的百合花和金黃色的蠑螈，遠古的回憶使他們受到壓抑。整整一個星期，他們幾乎沒有說話，象夢遊人一樣在昏暗、悲涼的境地裏行進，照明的衹有螢火蟲閃爍的微光，難聞的血腥氣味使他們的肺部感到很不舒服。回頭的路是沒有的，因為他們開闢的小徑一下了就不見了，幾乎就在他們眼前長出了新的野草。“不要緊，”霍·阿·布恩蒂亞說。“主要是不迷失方向。”他不斷地盯住羅盤的指針，繼續領着大夥兒往看不見的北方前進，終於走出了魔區。他們周圍是沒有星光的黑夜，但是黑暗裏充滿了新鮮空氣，經過長途跋涉，他們已經疲憊不堪，於是懸起吊床，兩星期中第一次安靜地睡了個大覺。醒來的時候，太陽已經升得很高，他們因此驚得發呆。在寧靜的晨光裏，就在他們前面，矗立着一艘西班牙大帆船，船體是白色、腐朽的，周圍長滿了羊齒植物和棕擱。帆船微微往右傾斜，在蘭花裝飾的索具之間，桅桿還很完整，垂着骯髒的船帆碎片，船身有一層石化貝殼和青苔形成的光滑的外殼，牢牢地陷入了堅實的土壤。看樣子，整個船身處於孤寂的地方，被人忘卻了，沒有遭到時光的侵蝕，也沒有受到飛禽的騷擾，探險隊員們小心地察看了帆船內部，裏面除了一大簇花卉，沒有任何東西。
帆船的發現證明大海就在近旁，破壞了霍·阿·布恩蒂亞的戰鬥精神。他認為這是狡詐的命運在捉弄他：他千幸萬苦尋找大海的時候，沒有找到它；他不想找它的時候，現在卻發現了它－－它象一個不可剋服的障礙橫在他的路上。多年以後，奧雷連諾上校也來到這個地區的時候（那時這兒已經開闢了驛道），他在帆船失事的地方衹能看見一片罌粟花中間燒糊的船骨。那時他者相信，這整個故事並不是他父親虛構的，於是嚮自己提出個問題：帆船怎會深入陸地這麽遠呢？可是，再經過四天的路程，在離帆船十二公裏的地方，霍·阿·布恩蒂亞看見大海的時候，並沒有想到這類問題。在大海面前，他的一切幻想都破滅了；大海翻着泡沫，混濁不堪，灰茫茫一片，值不得他和夥伴們去冒險和犧牲。
“真他媽的！”霍·阿·布思蒂亞叫道。“馬孔多四面八方都給海水圍住啦！”
探險回來以後，霍·阿·布恩蒂亞繪了一幅地圖：由於這張主觀想出的地圖，人們長時期裏都以為馬孔多是在一個半島上面，他是惱怒地畫出這張地圖的，故意誇大跟外界往來的睏難，仿佛想懲罰自己輕率地選擇了這個建村的地點，“咱們再也去下了任何地方啦，”他嚮烏蘇娜叫苦，“咱們會在這兒活活地爛掉，享受不到科學的好處了。”在自己的小試驗室裏，他把這種想法反芻似的咀嚼了幾個月，决定把馬孔多遷到更合適的地方去，可是妻子立即警告他，破壞了他那荒唐的計劃。村裏的男人已經開始準備搬傢，烏蘇娜卻象螞蟻一樣悄悄地活動，一鼓作氣唆使村中的婦女反對男人的輕舉妄動。霍·阿·布恩蒂亞說不清楚，不知什麽時候，由於什麽對立的力量，他的計劃遭到一大堆藉口和托詞的阻撓，終於變成沒有結果的幻想。有一夭早晨烏蘇娜發現，他一面低聲叨咕搬傢的計劃，一面把白己的試驗用具裝進箱子，她衹在旁邊裝傻地觀察他，甚至有點兒憐憫他。她讓他把事兒子完，在他釘上箱子，拿蘸了墨水的刷子在箱子上寫好自己的縮寫姓名時，她一句也沒責備他，儘管她已明白（憑他含糊的咕嚕），他知道村裏的男人並不支持他的想法。衹當霍·阿·布恩蒂亞開始卸下房門時，烏蘇娜纔大膽地嚮他要幹什麽，他有點難過地回答說：“既然誰也不想走，咱們就單獨走吧。”烏蘇娜沒有發慌。
“不，咱們不走，”他說。“咱們要留在這兒．因為咱們在這兒生了個兒子。”
“可是，咱們還沒有一個人死在這兒，”霍·阿·布恩蒂亞反駁說，“一個人如果沒有親屬埋在這兒，他就不足這個地方的人。”
烏蘇娜溫和而堅决他說：
“為了咱們留在這兒，如果要我死，我就死。”
霍·阿·布恩蒂亞並不相信妻子那麽堅定，他試圖字自己的幻想迷住她，答應帶她去看一個美妙的世界；那兒，衹要在地裏噴上神奇的藥水，植物就會按照人的願望長出果實；那兒，可以賤價買到各種治病的藥物。可是他的幻想並沒有打動她。
“不要成天想入非非，最好關心關心孩子吧，”她回答。“你瞧，他們象小狗兒似的被扔在一邊，沒有人管。”
霍·阿·布恩蒂亞一字一句體會妻子的話，他望了望窗外，看見兩個赤足的孩子正在烈日炎炎的萊園裏；他覺得，他們僅在這一瞬間纔開始存在，仿佛是烏蘇娜的咒語呼喚出來的。這時，一種神秘而重要的東西在他心中兀然出現，使他完全脫離了現實，浮遊在住事的回憶裏。當鳥蘇娜打掃屋子、决心一輩子也不離開這兒時，霍·阿·布恩蒂亞繼續全神貫註地望着兩個孩子，終於望得兩眼濕潤，他就用手背擦了擦眼睛，無可奈何地發出一聲深沉的嘆息。
“好啦，”他說，“叫他們來幫我搬出箱子裏的東西吧。”
大兒子霍·網卡蒂奧滿了十四歲，長着方方的腦袋和蓬鬆的頭髮，性情象他父親一樣執拗。他雖有父親那樣的體力，可能長得象父親一般魁偉，但他顯然缺乏父親那樣的想象力。他是在馬孔多建村之前翻山越嶺的艱難途程中誕生的。父母確信孩子沒有任何牲畜的特徵，都感謝上帝。奧雷連諾是在馬孔多出生的第一個人，三月間該滿六歲了。這孩子性情孤僻、沉默寡言。他在母親肚子裏就哭哭啼啼，是睜着眼睛出世的。人傢給他割掉臍帶的時候，他把腦袋扭來扭去，仿佛探察屋裏的東西，並且好奇地瞅着周圍的人，一點兒山不害怕。隨後，對於走到跟前來瞧他的人，他就不感興趣了，而把自己的註意力集中在棕擱葉鋪蓋的房頂上；在傾盆大雨下，房頂每分鐘都有塌下的危險。烏蘇娜記得後來還看見過孩子的這種緊張的神情。有一天，三歲的小孩兒奧雷連諾走進廚房，她正巧把一鍋煮沸的湯從爐竈拿到桌上。孩子猶豫不决地站在門檻邊，驚惶地說：“馬上就要摔下啦。”湯鍋是穩穩地放在桌子中央的，可是孩子剛說出這句話，它仿佛受到內力推動似的，開始製止不住地移到桌邊，然後掉到地上摔得粉碎。不安的烏蘇娜把這樁事情告訴丈夫，可他把這種事情說成是自然現象。經常都是這樣：霍·阿·布恩蒂亞不關心孩子的生活，一方面是因為他認為童年是智力不成熟的時期，另一方面是因為他一頭紮進了荒唐的研究。
但是，從他招呼孩丁們幫他取出箱子裏的試驗儀器的那夭下午起，他就把他最好的時間用在他們身上了。在僻靜的小室墻壁上，難子置信的地圖和稀奇古怪的圖表越來越多；在這間小寶裏，他教孩子們讀書、寫字和計算：同時，不僅依靠自己掌握的知識，而已廣泛利用自己無限的想象力，嚮孩子們介紹世界上的奇跡。孩子們由此知道，非洲南端有一種聰明、溫和的人，他們的消遣就是坐着靜思，而愛琴海是可以步行過去的，從一個島嶼跳上另一個島嶼，一直可以到達薩洛尼卡港。這些荒誕不經的夜談深深地印在孩子們的腦海裏，多年以後，政府軍的軍官命令行刑隊開槍之前的片刻間，奧雷連諾上校重新憶起了那個暖和的三月的下午，當時他的父親聽到遠處吉卜賽人的笛鼓聲，就中斷了物理課，兩眼一動不動，舉着手愣住了；這些吉卜賽人再一次來到村裏，將嚮村民介紹孟菲斯學者們驚人的最新發明。
這是另一批吉卜賽人。男男女女部都挺年青，衹說本族話，是一群皮膚油亮、雙手靈巧的漂亮人物。他們載歌載舞，興高采烈，鬧嚷嚷地經過街頭，帶來了各樣東西：會唱意大利抒情歌麯的彩色鸚鵝；隨着鼓聲一次至少能下一百衹金蛋的母雞；能夠猜出人意的猴子；既能縫鈕扣、又能退燒的多用機器；能夠使人忘卻辛酸往事的器械，能夠幫助消磨時間的膏藥，此外還有其他許多巧妙非凡的發明，以致霍·阿·布恩蒂亞打算發明一種記憶機器，好把這一切全都記住。瞬息間，村子裏的面貌就完全改觀人人群熙攘，鬧鬧喧喧，馬孔多的居民在自己的街道上也迷失了方向。
霍·何·布恩蒂亞象瘋子一樣東竄西竄，到處尋找梅爾加德斯，希望從他那兒瞭解這種神奇夢景的許多秘密。他手裏牽着兩個孩了，生怕他們在擁擠的人群中丟失，不時碰見鑲着金牙的江湖藝人或者六條胳膊的魔術師。人群中發出屎尿和檀香混合的味兒，叫他喘不上氣。他嚮吉卜賽人打聽梅爾加德斯，可是他們不懂他的語言。最後，他到了梅爾加德斯往常搭帳篷的地方。此刻，那兒坐着一個臉色陰鬱的亞美尼亞吉卜賽人，正在用西班牙語叫賣一種隱身糖漿，當這吉卜賽人剛剛一下子喝完一杯琥珀色的無名飲料時，霍·阿·布恩蒂亞擠過一群看得出神的觀衆，嚮吉卜賽人提出了自己的問題。吉卜賽人用奇異的眼光瞅了瞅他，立刻變成一灘惡臭的、冒煙的瀝青，他的答話還在瀝青上發出回聲：“梅爾加德斯死啦。”霍·阿·布恩蒂亞聽到這個消息，不勝驚愕，呆若木雞，試圖控製自己的悲傷，直到觀衆被其他的把戲吸引過去，亞美尼亞吉卜賽人變成的一灘瀝青揮發殆盡。然後，另一個吉卜賽人證實，梅爾加德斯在新加坡海灘上患瘧疾死了，屍體拋入了爪哇附近的大海。孩子們對這個消息並無興趣，就拉着父親去看寫在一個帳這招牌上的孟菲斯學者的新發明，如果相信它所寫的，這個膿篷從前屬於所羅門王。孩子們糾纏不休，霍·阿·布恩蒂亞衹得付了三十裏亞爾，帶着他們走進帳篷，那兒有個剃光了腦袋的巨人，渾身是毛，鼻孔裏穿了個銅環，腳跺上拴了條沉重的鐵鏈，守着一隻海盜用的箱子，巨人揭開蓋子，箱子裏就冒出一股刺骨的寒氣。箱子墜衹有一大塊透明的東西，這玩意兒中間有無數白色的細針，傍晚的霞光照到這些細針，細針上面就現出了許多五顔六色的星星。
霍·阿·布恩蒂亞感到大惑不解，但他知道孩子們等着他立即解釋，便大膽地嘟嚷說：
“這是世界上最大的鑽石。”
“不，”吉卜賽巨人糾正他。“這是冰塊。”
莫名其妙的霍·阿·布恩蒂亞嚮這塊東西伸過手去，可是巨人推開了他的手。“再交五個裏亞爾才能摸，”巨人說。霍·阿·布恩蒂亞付了五個裏亞爾，把手掌放在冰塊上呆了幾分鐘；接觸這個神秘的東西，他的心裏充滿了恐懼和喜悅，他不知道如何嚮孩子們解釋這種不太尋常的感覺，又付了十個裏亞爾，想讓他們自個兒試一試，大兒子霍·阿卡蒂奧拒絶去摸。相反地，奧雷連諾卻大膽地彎下腰去，將手放在冰上，可是立即縮回手來。“這東西熱得燙手！”他嚇得叫了一聲。父親沒去理會他。這時，他對這個顯然的奇跡欣喜若狂，競忘了自己那些幻想的失敗，也忘了葬身魚腹的梅爾加德斯。霍·阿·布恩蒂亞又付了五個裏亞爾，就象出庭作證的人把手放在《聖經》上一樣，莊嚴地將手放在冰塊上，說道：
“這是我們這個時代最偉大的發明。”
In March the gypsies returned. This time they brought a telescope and a magnifying glass the size of a drum, which they exhibited as the latest discovery of the Jews of Amsterdam. They placed a gypsy woman at one end of the village and set up the telescope at the entrance to the tent. For the price of five reales, people could look into the telescope and see the gypsy woman an arm's length away. "Science has eliminated distance," Melquíades proclaimed. "In a short time, man will be able to see what is happening in any place in the world without leaving his own house." A burning noonday sun brought out a startling demonstration with the gigantic magnifying glass: they put a pile of dry hay in the middle of the street and set it on fire by concentrating the sun's rays. José Arcadio Buendía, who had still not been consoled for the failure of big magnets, conceived the idea of using that invention as a weapon of war. Again Melquíades tried to dissuade him, but he finally accepted the two magnetized ingots and three colonial coins in exchange for the magnifying glass. ?rsula wept in consternation. That money was from a chest of gold coins that her father had put together ova an entire life of privation and that she had buried underneath her bed in hopes of a proper occasion to make use of it. José Arcadio Buendía made no at. tempt to console her, completely absorbed in his tactical experiments with the abnegation of a scientist and even at the risk of his own life. In an attempt to show the effects of the glass on enemy troops, he exposed himself to the concentration of the sun's rays and suffered burns which turned into sores that took a long time to heal. Over the protests of his wife, who was alarmed at such a dangerous invention, at one point he was ready to set the house on fire. He would spend hours on end in his room, calculating the strategic possibilities of his novel weapon until he succeeded in putting together a manual of startling instructional clarity and an irresistible power of conviction. He sent it to the government, accompanied by numerous descriptions of his experiments and several pages of explanatory sketches; by a messenger who crossed the mountains, got lost in measureless swamps, forded stormy rivers, and was on the point of perishing under the lash of despair, plague, and wild beasts until he found a route that joined the one used by the mules that carried the mail. In spite of the fact that a trip to the capital was little less than impossible at that time, José Arcadio Buendía promised to undertake it as soon as the government ordered him to so that he could put on some practical demonstrations of his invention for the military authorities and could train them himself in the complicated art of solar war. For several years he waited for an answer. Finally, tired of waiting, he bemoaned to Melquíades the failure of his project and the gypsy then gave him a convincing proof of his honesty: he gave him back the doubloons in exchange for the magnifying glass, and he left him in addition some Portuguese maps and several instruments of navigation. In his own handwriting he set down a concise synthesis of the studies by Monk Hermann. which he left José Arcadio so that he would be able to make use of the astrolabe, the compass, and the sextant. José Arcadio Buendía spent the long months of the rainy season shut up in a small room that he had built in the rear of the house so that no one would disturb his experiments. Having completely abandoned his domestic obligations, he spent entire nights in the courtyard watching the course of the stars and he almost contracted sunstroke from trying to establish an exact method to ascertain noon. When he became an expert in the use and manipulation of his instruments, he conceived a notion of space that allowed him to navigate across unknown seas, to visit uninhabited territories, and to establish relations with splendid beings without having to leave his study. That was the period in which he acquired the habit of talking to himself, of walking through the house without paying attention to anyone, as ?rsula and the children broke their backs in the garden, growing banana and caladium, cassava and yams, ahuyama roots and eggplants. Suddenly, without warning, his feverish activity was interrupted and was replaced by a kind of fascination. He spent several days as if he were bewitched, softly repeating to himself a string of fearful conjectures without giving credit to his own understanding. Finally, one Tuesday in December, at lunchtime, all at once he released the whole weight of his torment. The children would remember for the rest of their lives the august solemnity with which their father, devastated by his prolonged vigil and by the wrath of his imagination, revealed his discovery to them:
"The earth is round, like an orange."
?rsula lost her patience. "If you have to go crazy, please go crazy all by yourself!" she shouted. "But don't try to put your gypsy ideas into the heads of the children." José Arcadio Buendía, impassive, did not let himself be frightened by the desperation of his wife, who, in a seizure of rage, mashed the astrolabe against the floor. He built another one, he gathered the men of the village in his little room, and he demonstrated to them, with theories that none of them could understand, the possibility of returning to where one had set out by consistently sailing east. The whole village was convinced that José Arcadio Buendía had lost his reason, when Melquíades returned to set things straight. He gave public praise to the intelligence of a man who from pure astronomical speculation had evolved a theory that had already been proved in practice, although unknown in Macondo until then, and as a proof of his admiration he made him a gift that was to have a profound influence on the future of the village: the laboratory of an alchemist.
By then Melquíades had aged with surprising rapidity. On his first trips he seemed to be the same age as José Arcadio Buendía. But while the latter had preserved his extraordinary strength, which permitted him to pull down a horse by grabbing its ears, the gypsy seemed to have been worn dowse by some tenacious illness. It was, in reality, the result of multiple and rare diseases contracted on his innumerable trips around the world. According to what he himself said as he spoke to José Arcadio Buendía while helping him set up the laboratory, death followed him everywhere, sniffing at the cuffs of his pants, but never deciding to give him the final clutch of its claws. He was a fugitive from all the plagues and catastrophes that had ever lashed mankind. He had survived pellagra in Persia, scurvy in the Malayan archipelago, leprosy in Alexandria, beriberi in Japan, bubonic plague in Madagascar, an earthquake in Sicily, and a disastrous shipwreck in the Strait of Magellan. That prodigious creature, said to possess the keys of Nostradamus, was a gloomy man, enveloped in a sad aura, with an Asiatic look that seemed to know what there was on the other side of things. He wore a large black hat that looked like a raven with widespread wings, and a velvet vest across which the patina of the centuries had skated. But in spite of his immense wisdom and his mysterious breadth, he had a human burden, an earthly condition that kept him involved in the small problems of daily life. He would complain of the ailments of old age, he suffered from the most insignificant economic difficulties, and he had stopped laughing a long time back because scurvy had made his teeth drop out. On that suffocating noontime when the gypsy revealed his secrets, José Arcadio Buendía had the certainty that it was the beginning of a great friendship. The children were startled by his fantastic stories. Aureliano, who could not have been more than five at the time, would remember him for the rest of his life as he saw him that afternoon, sitting against the metallic and quivering light from the window, lighting up with his deep organ voice the darkest reaches of the imagination, while down over his temples there flowed the grease that was being melted by the heat. José Arcadio, his older brother, would pass on that wonderful image as a hereditary memory to all of his descendants. ?rsula on the other hand, held a bad memory of that visit, for she had entered the room just as Melquíades had carelessly broken a flask of bichloride of mercury.
"It's the smell of the devil," she said.
"Not at all," Melquíades corrected her. "It has been proven that the devil has sulphuric properties and this is just a little corrosive sublimate."
Always didactic, he went into a learned exposition of the diabolical properties of cinnabar, but ?rsula paid no attention to him, although she took the children off to pray. That biting odor would stay forever in her mind linked to the memory of Melquíades.
The rudimentary laboratory-in addition to a profusion of pots, funnels, retorts, filters, and sieves-was made up of a primitive water pipe, a glass beaker with a long, thin neck, a reproduction of the philosopher's egg, and a still the gypsies themselves had built in accordance with modern descriptions of the three-armed alembic of Mary the Jew. Along with those items, Melquíades left samples of the seven metals that corresponded to the seven planets, the formulas of Moses and Zosimus for doubling the quantity of gold, and a set of notes and sketches concerning the processes of the Great Teaching that would permit those who could interpret them to undertake the manufacture of the philosopher's stone. Seduced by the simplicity of the formulas to double the quantity of gold, José Arcadio Buendía paid court to ?rsula for several weeks so that she would let him dig up her colonial coins and increase them by as many times as it was possible to subdivide mercury. ?rsula gave in, as always, to her husband's unyielding obstinacy. Then José Arcadio Buendía threw three doubloons into a pan and fused them with copper filings, orpiment, brimstone, and lead. He put it all to boil in a pot of castor oil until he got a thick and pestilential syrup which was more like common caramel than valuable gold. In risky and desperate processes of distillation, melted with the seven planetary metals, mixed with hermetic mercury and vitriol of Cyprus, and put back to cook in hog fat for lack of any radish oil, ?rsula's precious inheritance was reduced to a large piece of burnt hog cracklings that was firmly stuck to the bottom of the pot.
When the gypsies came back, ?rsula had turned the whole population of the village against them. But curiosity was greater than fear, for that time the gypsies went about the town making a deafening noise with all manner of musical instruments while a hawker announced the exhibition of the most fabulous discovery of the Naciancenes. So that everyone went to the tent and by paying one cent they saw a youthful Melquíades, recovered, unwrinkled, with a new and flashing set of teeth. Those who remembered his gums that had been destroyed by scurvy, his flaccid cheeks, and his withered lips trembled with fear at the final proof of the gypsy's supernatural power. The fear turned into panic when Melquíades took out his teeth, intact, encased in their gums, and showed them to the audience for an instant-a fleeting instant in which he went back to being the same decrepit man of years past-and put them back again and smiled once more with the full control of his restored youth. Even José Arcadio Buendía himself considered that Melquíades' knowledge had reached unbearable extremes, but he felt a healthy excitement when the gypsy explained to him atone the workings of his false teeth. It seemed so simple and so prodigious at the same time that overnight he lost all interest in his experiments in alchemy. He underwent a new crisis of bad humor. He did not go back to eating regularly, and he would spend the day walking through the house. "Incredible things are happening in the world," he said to ?rsula. "Right there across the river there are all kinds of magical instruments while we keep on living like donkeys." Those who had known him since the foundation of Macondo were startled at how much he had changed under Melquíades' influence.
At first José Arcadio Buendía had been a kind of youthful patriarch who would give instructions for planting and advice for the raising of children and animals, and who collaborated with everyone, even in the physical work, for the welfare of the community. Since his house from the very first had been the best in the village, the others had been built in its image and likeness. It had a small, well-lighted living roost, a dining room in the shape of a terrace with gaily colored flowers, two bedrooms, a courtyard with a gigantic chestnut tree, a well kept garden, and a corral where goats, pigs, and hens lived in peaceful communion. The only animals that were prohibited, not just in his house but in the entire settlement, were fighting cocks.
?rsula's capacity for work was the same as that of her husband. Active, small, severe, that woman of unbreakable nerves who at no moment in her life had been heard to sing seemed to be everywhere, from dawn until quite late at night, always pursued by the soft whispering of her stiff, starched petticoats. Thanks to her the floors of tamped earth, the unwhitewashed mud walls, the rustic, wooden furniture they had built themselves were always dean, and the old chests where they kept their clothes exhaled the warm smell of basil.
José Arcadio Buendía, who was the most enterprising man ever to be seen in the village, had set up the placement of the houses in such a way that from all of them one could reach the river and draw water with the same effort, and he had lined up the streets with such good sense that no house got more sun than another during the hot time of day. Within a few years Macondo was a village that was more orderly and hard working than any known until then by its three hundred inhabitants. It was a truly happy village where no one was over thirty years of age and where no one had died.
Since the time of its founding, José Arcadio Buendía had built traps and cages. In a short time he filled not only his own house but all of those in the village with troupials, canaries, bee eaters, and redbreasts. The concert of so many different birds became so disturbing that ?rsula would plug her ears with beeswax so as not to lose her sense of reality. The first time that Melquíades' tribe arrived, selling glass balls for headaches, everyone was surprised that they had been able to find that village lost in the drowsiness of the swamp, and the gypsies confessed that they had found their way by the song of the birds.
That spirit of social initiative disappeared in a short time, pulled away by the fever of the magnets, the astronomical calculations, the dreams of transmutation, and the urge to discover the wonders of the world. From a clean and active man, José Arcadio Buendía changed into a man lazy in appearance, careless in his dress, with a wild beard that ?rsula managed to trim with great effort and a kitchen knife. There were many who considered him the victim of some strange spell. But even those most convinced of his madness left work and family to follow him when he brought out his tools to clear the land and asked the assembled group to open a way that would put Macondo in contact with the great inventions.
José Arcadio Buendía was completely ignorant of the geography of the region. He knew that to the east there lay an impenetrable mountain chain and that on the other side of the mountains there was the ardent city of Riohacha, where in times past-according to what he had been told by the first Aureliano Buendía, his grandfather-Sir Francis Drake had gone crocodile hunting with cannons and that he repaired hem and stuffed them with straw to bring to Queen Elizabeth. In his youth, José Arcadio Buendía and his men, with wives and children, animals and all kinds of domestic implements, had crossed the mountains in search of an outlet to the sea, and after twenty-six months they gave up the expedition and founded Macondo, so they would not have to go back. It was, therefore, a route that did not interest him, for it could lead only to the past. To the south lay the swamps, covered with an eternal vegetable scum and the whole vast universe of the great swamp, which, according to what the gypsies said, had no limits. The great swamp in the west mingled with a boundless extension of water where there were soft-skinned cetaceans that had the head and torso of a woman, causing the ruination of sailors with the charm of their extraordinary breasts. The gypsies sailed along that route for six months before they reached the strip of land over which the mules that carried the mail passed. According to José Arcadio Buendía's calculations, the only possibility of contact with civilization lay along the northern route. So he handed out clearing tools and hunting weapons to the same men who had been with him during the founding of Macondo. He threw his directional instruments and his maps into a knapsack, and he undertook the reckless adventure.
十六世紀，海盜弗蘭西斯·德拉剋圍攻列奧阿察的時候，烏蘇娜。伊古阿蘭的曾祖母被當當的警鐘聲和隆隆的炮擊聲嚇壞了，由於神經緊張，競一屁股坐在生了火的爐子上。因此，曾祖母受了嚴重的的傷，再也無法過夫妻生活。她衹能用半個屁股坐着，而且衹能坐在軟墊子上，步態顯然也是不雅觀的；所以，她就不願在旁人面前走路了。她認為自己身上有一股焦糊味兒，也就拒絶跟任何人交往。她經常在院子裏過夜，一直呆到天亮，不敢走進臥室去睡覺：因為她老是夢見英國人帶着惡狗爬進窗子，用燒紅的鐵器無恥地刑訊她。她給丈夫生了兩個兒子；她的丈夫是亞拉岡的商人，把自己的一半錢財都用來醫治妻子，希望盡量減輕她的痛苦。最後，他盤掉自己的店鋪，帶者一傢人遠遠地離開海濱，到了印第安人的一個村莊，村莊是在山腳下，他在那兒為妻子蓋了一座沒有窗子的住房，免得她夢中的海盜鑽進屋子。
在這荒僻的村子裏，早就有個兩班牙人的後裔，叫做霍塞·阿卡蒂奧·布恩蒂亞，他是栽種煙草的；烏蘇娜的曾祖父和他一起經營這樁有利可圖的事業，短時期內兩人都建立了很好的傢業。多少年過去了，西班牙後裔的曾孫兒和亞拉岡人的曾孫女結了婚。每當大夫的荒唐行為使烏蘇娜生氣的時候，她就一下子跳過世事紛繁的三百年，咒駡弗蘭西斯·德拉剋圍攻列奧阿察的那個日子。不過，她這麽做，衹是為了減輕心中的痛苦；實際上，把她跟他終生連接在一起的，是比愛情更牢固的關係：共同的良心譴責。烏蘇娜和丈夫是表兄妹，他倆是在古老的村子裏一塊兒長大的，由於沮祖輩輩的墾殖，這個村莊已經成了今省最好的一個。儘管他倆之間的婚姻是他倆剛剛出世就能預見到的，然而兩個年輕人表示結婚願望的時候，雙方的傢長都反對。幾百年來，兩族的人是雜配的，他們生怕這兩個健全的後代可能丟臉地生出一隻蜥蜴。這樣可怕的事已經發牛過一次。烏蘇娜的嬸嬸嫁給霍·阿·布恩蒂亞的叔叔，生下了一個兒子：這個兒子一輩子部穿着肥大的燈籠褲，活到四十二歲還沒結婚就流血而死，因為他生下來就長着一條尾巴——尖端有一撮毛的蠃旋形軟骨。這種名副其實的豬尾巴是他不願讓任何一個女人看見的，最終要了他的命，因為一個熟識的屠夫按照他的要求，用切肉刀把它割掉了。十九歲的霍·阿·布恩蒂亞無憂無慮地用一句話結束了爭論：“我可不在乎生出豬崽子，衹要它們會說話就行。”於是他倆在花炮聲中舉行了婚禮銅管樂隊，一連鬧騰了三個晝夜。在這以後，年輕夫婦本來可以幸福地生活，可是烏蘇娜的母親卻對未來的後代作出不大吉利的預言，藉以嚇唬自己的女兒，甚至慫恿女兒拒絶按照章法跟他結合。她知道大夫是個力大、剛強的人，擔心他在她睡着時強迫她，所以，她在上床之前，都穿上母親拿厚帆布給她縫成的一條襯褲；襯褲是用交叉的皮帶係住的，前面用一個大鐵扣扣緊。夫婦倆就這樣過了若幹月。白天，他照料自己的鬥雞，她就和母親一塊兒在刺染上綉花。夜晚，年輕夫婦卻陷入了煩惱而激烈的鬥爭，這種鬥爭逐漸代替了愛情的安慰。可是，機靈的鄰人立即覺得情況不妙，而且村中傳說，烏蘇娜出嫁一年以後依然是個處女，因為丈大有點兒毛病。霍·阿·布恩蒂亞是最後聽到這個謠言的。
“烏蘇娜，你聽人傢在說什麽啦，”他嚮妻子平靜他說。
“讓他們去嚼舌頭吧，”她回答。“咱們知道那不是真的。”
他們的生活又這樣過了半年，直到那個倒黴的星期天，霍·阿·布恩蒂亞的公雞戰勝了普魯登希奧·阿吉廖爾的公雞。輸了的普魯登希奧·阿吉廖爾，一見雞血就氣得發瘋，故意離開霍·阿·布恩蒂亞遠一點兒，想讓鬥雞棚裏的人都能聽到他的話。
“恭喜你呀！”他叫道。“也許你的這衹公雞能夠幫你老婆的忙。咱們瞧吧！”
霍·阿·布恩蒂亞不動聲色地從地上拎起自己的公雞。“我馬上就來，”他對大傢說，然後轉嚮普魯登希奧，阿吉廖爾：
“你回去拿武器吧，我準備殺死你。”
過了十分鐘，他就拿着一枝粗大的標槍回來了，這標槍還是他祖父的。鬥雞棚門口擁聚了幾乎半個村子的人，普魯登希奧·阿吉廖爾正在那兒等候。他還來不及自衛，霍·阿·布恩蒂亞的標槍就擊中了他的咽喉，標槍是猛力擲出的，非常準確；由於這種無可指摘的準確，霍塞·奧雷連諾·布恩蒂亞（註：布恩蒂亞的祖父）從前曾消滅了全區所有的豹子。夜晚在鬥雞棚裏，親友們守在死者棺材旁邊的時候，霍·阿·布恩蒂業走進自己的臥室，看見妻子正在穿她的“貞節褲”。他拿標槍對準她，命令道：“脫掉！”烏蘇娜並不懷疑丈夫的决心。“出了事，你負責，”她警告說。霍·阿·布恩蒂亞把標槍插入泥地。
“你生下蜥蜴，咱們就撫養蜥蜴，”他說。“可是村裏再也不會有人由於你的過錯而被殺死了。”
這是一個美妙的六月的夜晚，月光皎潔，涼爽宜人。他倆通古未睡，在床上折騰，根本沒去理會穿過臥室的輕風，風兒帶來了普魯登希奧·阿吉廖爾親人的哭聲。
人們把這樁事情說成是光榮的决鬥，可是兩夫婦卻感到了良心的譴責。有一天夜裏，烏蘇娜還沒睡覺，出去喝水，在院子裏的大土罐旁邊看見了普魯登希奧·阿吉廖爾。他臉色死白、十分悲傷，試圖用一塊麻屑堵住喉部正在流血的傷口。看見死人，烏蘇娜感到的不是恐懼，而是憐憫。她回到臥室裏，把這件怪事告訴了丈夫，可是丈夫並不重視她的話。“死人是不會走出墳墓的，”他說。“這不過是咱們受到良心的責備。”過了兩夜，烏蘇娜在浴室裏遇見普魯登希奧·阿吉廖爾--他正在用麻屑擦洗脖子上的凝血。另一個夜晚，她發現他在雨下徘徊。霍·阿·布恩蒂亞討厭妻子的幻象，就帶着標槍到院子裏去。死人照舊悲傷地立在那兒。
“滾開！”霍·阿·布恩蒂亞嚮他吆喝。“你回來多少次，我就要打死你多少次。”
普魯登希奧沒有離開，而霍·阿·布恩蒂亞卻不敢拿標槍嚮他擲去。從那時起，他就無法安穩地睡覺了。他老是痛苦地想起死人穿過雨絲望着他的無限凄涼的眼神，想起死人眼裏流露的對活人的深切懷念，想起普魯登希奧·阿吉廖爾四處張望。尋找水來浸濕一塊麻屑的不安神情。“大概，他很痛苦，”霍·阿·布恩蒂亞嚮妻子說。“看來，他很孤獨。”烏蘇娜那麽憐憫死人，下一次遇見時，她發現他盯着爐竈上的鐵鍋，以為他在尋找什麽，於是就在整個房子裏到處都給他擺了一罐罐水。那一夜，霍·阿·布恩蒂亞看見死人在他自己的臥室裏洗傷口，於是就屈服了。
“好吧，普魯登希奧，”他說。“我們盡量離開這個村子遠一些，决不再回這兒來了。現在，你就安心走吧。”
就這樣，他們打算翻過山嶺到海邊去。霍·阿·布恩蒂亞的幾個朋友，象他一樣年輕，也想去冒險，離開自己的傢，帶着妻室兒女去尋找土地……渺茫的土地。在離開村子之前，霍．阿·布恩蒂亞把標槍埋在院子裏，接二連三砍掉了自己所有鬥雞的腦袋，希望以這樣的犧牲給普魯登希奧·阿吉廖爾一些安慰。烏蘇娜帶走的衹是一口放着嫁妝的箱子、一點兒家庭用具、以及藏放父親遺産--金幣--的一隻盒子。誰也沒有預先想好一定的路綫。他們决定朝着與列奧阿察相反的方向前進，以免遇見任何熟人，從而無影無蹤地消失。這是一次荒唐可笑的旅行。過了一年零兩個月，烏蘇娜雖然用猴內和蛇湯毀壞了自己的肚子，卻終於生下了一個兒子，嬰兒身體各部完全沒有牲畜的徵狀。因她腳腫，腳上的靜脈脹得象囊似的，整整一半的路程，她都不得不躺在兩個男人擡着的擔架上面。孩子們比父母更容易忍受艱難困苦，他們大部分時間都鮮蹦活跳，儘管樣兒可憐--兩眼深陷，肚子癟癟的。有一天早晨，在幾乎兩年的流浪以後，他們成了第一批看見山嶺西坡的人。從雲霧遮蔽的山嶺上，他們望見了一片河流縱橫的遼闊地帶---直伸到天邊的巨大沼澤。可是他們始終沒有到達海邊。在沼澤地裏流浪了幾個月，路上沒有遇見一個人，有一天夜晚，他們就在一條多石的河岸上紮營，這裏的河水很象凝固的液體玻璃。多年以後，在第二次國內戰爭時期，奧雷連諾打算循着這條路綫突然占領列奧阿察，可是六天以後他纔明白，他的打算純粹是發瘋。然而那夭晚上，在河邊紮營以後，他父親的旅伴們雖然很象遇到船舶失事的人，但是旅途上他們的人數增多了，大夥兒都準備活到老（這一點他們做到了）。夜裏，霍·阿·布恩蒂亞做了個夢，營地上仿佛矗立起一座熱鬧的城市，房屋的墻壁都用晶瑩奪目的透明材料砌成。他打聽這是什麽城市，聽到的回答是一個陌生的、毫無意義的名字，可是這個名字在夢裏卻異常響亮動聽：馬孔多。翌日，他就告訴自己的人，他們絶對找不到海了。他叫大夥兒砍倒樹木，在河邊最涼爽的地方開闢一塊空地，在空地上建起了一座村莊。
在看見冰塊之前，霍·阿·布恩蒂亞始終猜不破自己夢見的玻璃房子。後來，他以為自己理解了這個夢境的深刻意義。他認為，不久的將來，他們就能用水這樣的普通材料大規模地製作冰磚，來給全村建築新的房子。當時，馬孔多好象一個赤熱的火爐，門閂和窗子的鉸鏈都熱得變了形；用冰磚修蓋房子，馬孔多就會變成一座永遠涼爽的市鎮了。如果霍·阿·布恩蒂亞沒有堅持建立冰廠的打算，衹是因為他當時全神貫註地教育兩個兒子，特別是奧雷連諾，這孩子一開始就對煉金術表現了罕見的才能。試驗室裏的工作又緊張起來。現在，父子倆已經沒有被新奇事物引起的那種激動心情，衹是平平靜靜地反復閱讀梅爾加德斯的筆記，持久而耐心地努力，試圖從粘在鍋底的一大塊東西裏面把烏蘇娜的金子分離出來。大兒子霍·阿卡蒂奧幾乎不參加這個工作。當父親身心都沉湎於熔鐵爐旁的工作時，這個身材過早超過年歲的任性的頭生子，已經成了一個魁梧的青年。他的嗓音變粗了·臉頰和下巴都長出了茸毛。有一天晚上，他正在臥室裏脫衣睡覺，烏蘇娜走了進來，竟然産生了羞澀和憐恤的混合感覺，因為除了丈夫，她看見赤身露體的第一個男人就是兒子，而且兒子生理上顯得反常，甚至使她嚇了一跳。已經懷着第三個孩子的烏蘇娜，重新感到了以前作新娘時的那種恐懼。
那時，有個女人常來布恩蒂亞傢裏，幫助烏蘇娜做些傢務。這個女人愉快、熱情、嘴尖，會用紙牌占卜。烏蘇娜跟這女人談了談自己的憂慮。她覺得孩子的發育是不勻稱的，就象她的親戚長了條豬尾巴。女人止不住地放聲大笑，笑聲響徹了整座屋子，仿佛水晶玻璃鈴鐺。“恰恰相反，”她說。“他會有福氣的。”
“過了幾天，為了證明自己的預言準確，她帶來一副紙牌，把自己和霍·阿卡蒂奧鎖在廚房旁邊的庫房裏。她不慌不忙地在一張舊的木工臺上擺開紙牌，口中念念有詞；這時，年輕人伫立一旁，與其說對這套把戲感到興趣，不如說覺得厭倦。忽然，占卜的女人伸手摸了他一下。“我的天！”她真正吃驚地叫了一聲，就再也說不出什麽話了。
霍·阿卡蒂奧感到，他的骨頭變得象海綿一樣酥軟，感到睏乏和恐懼，好不容易纔忍住淚水。女人一點也沒有激勵他。可他整夜都在找她，整夜都覺到她腋下發出的氣味：這種氣味仿佛滲進了他的軀體。他希望時時刻刻跟她在一起，希望她成為他的母親，希望他和她永遠也不走出庫房，希望她嚮他說：“我的天！”重新摸他，重新說：“我的天！”有一日，他再也忍受不了這種煩惱了，就到她的傢裏去。這次訪問是禮節性的，也是莫名其妙的--在整個訪問中，霍·阿卡蒂奧一次也沒開口。此刻他不需要她了。他覺得，她完全不象她的氣味在他心中幻化的形象，仿佛這根本不是她．而是另一個人。他喝完咖啡，就十分沮喪地回傢。夜裏，他翻來覆去睡不着覺，又感到極度的難受，可他此刻渴望的不是跟他一起在庫房裏的那個女人，而是下午坐在他面前的那個女人了。
過了幾天，女人忽然把霍·阿卡蒂奧帶到了她的傢中，並且藉口教他一種紙牌戲法，從她跟母親坐在一起的房間裏，把他領進一間臥窄。在這兒，她那麽放肆地摸他，使得他渾身不住地戰慄，但他感到的是恐懼，而不是快樂。隨後，她叫他夜間再未。霍·阿卡蒂奧口頭答應，心裏卻希望盡快擺脫她，--他知道自己天不能來的。然而夜間，躺在熱烘烘的被窩裏，他覺得自己應當去她那兒，即使自己不能這麽幹。他在黑暗中摸着穿上衣服，聽到弟弟平靜的呼吸聲、隔壁房間裏父親的産咳聲、院子裏母雞的咯咯聲、蚊子的嗡嗡聲、自己的心髒跳動聲--世界上這些亂七八糟的聲音以前是不曾引起他的註意的，然後，他走到沉入夢鄉的街上。他滿心希望房門是門上的，而下衹是掩上的（她曾這樣告訴過他）。擔它井沒有閂上。他用指尖一推房門，鉸鏈就清晰地發出悲鳴，這種悲鳴在他心中引起的是冰涼的回響。他盡量不弄出響聲，側着身子走進房裏，馬上感覺到了那種氣味，霍·阿卡蒂奧還在第一個房間裏，女人的三個弟弟通常是懸起吊床過夜的；這些吊床在什麽地方，他並不知道，在黑暗中也辨別不清，因此，他衹得摸索着走到臥室門前，把門推開，找準方向，免得弄錯床鋪。他往前摸過去，立即撞上了一張吊床的床頭，這個吊床低得出乎他的預料。一個正在乎靜地打鼾的人，夢中翻了個身，聲音有點悲觀他說了句夢話：“那是星期三。”當霍·阿卡蒂奧推開臥室門的時候，他無法製止房門擦過凹凸不平的地面。他處在一團漆黑中，既苦惱又慌亂，明白自己終於迷失了方向。睡在這個狹窄房間裏的，是母親、她的第二個女兒和丈夫、兩個孩子和另一個女人，這個女人顯然不是等他的。他可以憑氣味找到，然而到處都是氣味，那麽細微又那麽明顯的氣味，就象現在經常留在他身上的那種氣味。霍·阿卡蒂奧呆然不動地站了好久，驚駭地問了問自己，怎會陷入這個束手無策的境地，忽然有一隻伸開指頭的手在黑暗中摸索，碰到了他的面孔，他並不覺得奇怪，因為他下意識地正在等着別人摸他。他把自己交給了這衹手，他在精疲力盡的狀態中讓它把他拉到看不見的床鋪跟前；在這兒，有人脫掉了他的衣服，把他象一袋土豆似的舉了起來，在一片漆黑裏把他翻來覆去；在黑暗中，他的雙手無用了，這兒不再聞女人的氣味，衹有阿莫尼亞的氣味，他力圖回憶她的面孔，他的眼前卻恍惚浮現出烏蘇娜的而孔；他模糊地覺得，他正在做他早就想做的事兒，盡倚他决不認為他能做這種事兒，他自己並不知道這該怎麽做，並不知道雙手放在哪兒，雙腳放在哪兒，並不知道這是誰的腦袋、誰的腿；他覺得自己再也不能繼續下去了，他渴望逃走，又渴望永遠留在這種極度的寂靜中，留在這種可怕的孤獨中。
這個女人叫做皮拉·苔列娜。按照父母的意願，她參加過最終建立馬孔多村的長徵。父母想讓自己的女兒跟一個男人分開，她十四歲時，那人就使她失去了貞操，她滿二十二歲時，他還繼續跟她生在一起，可是怎麽也拿不定使婚姻合法化的主意，因為他不是她本村的人。他發誓說，他要跟隨她到夭涯海角，但要等他把自己的事情搞好以後；從那時起，她就一直等着他，已經失去了相見的希望，儘管紙牌經常嚮她預示，將有各式各樣的男人來找她，高的和矮的、金發和黑發的；有的從陸上來，有的從海上來，有的過三天來，有的過三月來，有的過三年來。等呀盼呀，她的大腿已經失去了勁頭，胸脯已經失去了彈性，她已疏遠了男人的愛撫，可是心裏還很狂熱。現在，霍·阿卡蒂奧對新穎而奇異的玩耍入了迷，每天夜裏都到迷宮式的房間裏來找她。有一回，他發現房門是閂上的，就篤篤地敲門；他以為，他既有勇氣敲第一次，那就應當敲到底……等了許久，她纔把門打開。白天，他因睡眠不足躺下了，還在暗暗回味昨夜的事。可是，皮拉·苔列娜來到布恩蒂亞傢裏的時候，顯得高高興興、滿不在乎、笑語聯珠，霍·阿卡蒂奧不必費勁地掩飾自己的緊張，因為這個女人響亮的笑聲能夠嚇跑在院子裏踱來踱去的鴿子，她跟那個具有無形力量的女人毫無共同之處，那個女人曾經教他如何屏住呼吸和控製心跳，幫助他瞭解男人為什麽怕死。他全神貫註於自己的體會，甚至不瞭解周圍的人在高興什麽，這時，他的父親和弟弟說，他們終於透過金屬渣滓取出了烏蘇娜的金子，這個消息簡直震動了整座房子。
事實上，他們是經過多日堅持不懈的努力取得成功的。烏蘇娜挺高興，甚至感謝上帝發明了煉金術，村裏的居民擠進試驗室，主人就拿抹上番石榴醬的烤餅招待他們，慶祝這個奇跡的出現，而霍·阿·布恩蒂亞卻讓他們參觀一個坩堝，裏面放着復原的金子，他的神情仿佛表示這金子是他剛剛發明的，他從一個人走到另一個人跟前，最後來到大兒子身邊。大兒子最近幾乎不來試驗室了。布恩蒂亞把一塊微黃的幹硬東西拿到他的眼前，問道，“你看這象什麽？”
霍·阿卡蒂奧直耿耿地回答：
“象狗屎。”
父親用手背在他嘴唇上碰了一下，碰得很重，霍·阿卡蒂奧嘴裏竟然流出血來，眼裏流出淚來。夜裏，皮拉·苔列娜在黑暗中摸到一小瓶藥和棉花，拿浸了亞爾尼加碘酒的壓布貼在腫處，為霍·阿卡蒂奧盡心地做了一切，而沒有使他産生仟何不舒服之感，竭力愛護他，而不碰痛他。他倆達到了那樣親密的程度，過了一會兒，他倆就不知不覺地在夜間幽會中第一次低聲交談起來：
“我衹想跟你在一起，”他說。“最近幾天內，我就要把一切告訴人傢，別再這麽捉迷藏了。”
皮拉·苔列娜不想勸阻他。
“那很好嘛，”她說。“如果咱倆單獨在一塊兒，咱們就把燈點上，彼此都能看見，我想叫喊就能叫喊，跟別人不相幹；而你想說什麽蠢話，就可在我耳邊說什麽蠢話。”
霍·阿卡蒂奧經過這場談話，加上他對父親的怨氣，而且他認為作法的愛情在一切情況下都是可以的，他就心安理得、勇氣倍增了。沒有任何準備，他自動把一閉告訴了弟弟。
起初，年幼的奧雷連諾衹把霍·阿卡蒂奧的豔遇看做是哥哥面臨的可怕危險，不明白什麽力量吸引了哥哥。可是，霍·阿卡蒂奧的煩躁不安逐漸傳染了他。他要哥哥談談那些細微情節，跟哥哥共苦同樂，他感到自己既害怕又快活，現在，他卻等首霍·阿卡蒂奧回來，直到天亮都沒合眼，在孤單的床上輾轉反側，仿佛躺在一堆燒紅的炭上；隨後，兄弟倆一直談到早該起床的時候，很快陷入半昏迷狀態；兩人都同樣厭惡煉金術和父親的聰明才智，變得孤僻了。“孩子們的樣兒沒有一點精神，”烏蘇娜說。“也許腸裏有蟲子。”她用搗碎的美洲土荊芥知心話來。哥哥不象以前那麽誠懇了。他從態度和藹的、容易接近的人變成了懷着戒心的、孤僻的人。他痛恨整個世界，渴望孤身獨處。有一天夜裏，他又離開了，但是沒有去皮拉·苔列娜那兒，而跟擁在吉卜賽帳篷周圍看熱鬧的人混在一起。他踱來踱去地看了看各種精彩節目，對任何一個節目都不感興趣，卻註意到了一個非展覽品---個年輕的吉卜賽女人；這女人幾乎是個小姑娘，脖子上戴着一串挺重的玻璃珠子，因此彎着身子。霍·阿卡蒂奧有生以來還沒見過比她更美的人。姑娘站在人群當中看一幕慘劇：一個人由於不聽父母的話，變成了一條蛇。
霍·阿卡蒂奧根本沒看這個不幸的人。當觀衆嚮“蛇人”詢問他那悲慘的故事細節時，年輕的霍·阿卡蒂奧就擠到第一排吉卜賽姑娘那兒去，站在她的背後，然後緊貼着她。她想挪開一些，可他把她貼得更緊。於是，她感覺到了他。她愣着沒動，驚恐得發顫，不相信自己的感覺，終於回頭膽怯地一笑，瞄了霍·阿卡蒂奧一眼，這時，兩個吉卜賽人把“蛇人”裝進了籠子，搬進帳篷。指揮表演的吉卜賽人宣佈：
“現在，女士們和先生們，我們將給你們表演一個可怕的節目--每夜這個時候都要砍掉一個女人的腦袋，連砍一百五十年，以示懲罰，因為她看了她不該看的東西。”
霍·阿卡蒂奧和吉卜賽姑娘沒有參觀砍頭。他倆走進了她的帳篷，由於衝動就接起吻來，並且脫掉了衣服；吉卜賽姑娘從身上脫掉了漿過的花邊緊身兜，就變得一絲不挂了。這是一隻千癟的小青蛙，胸部還沒發育，兩腿挺瘦，比霍·阿卡蒂奧的胳膊還細；可是她的果斷和熱情卻彌補了她的贏弱。然而，霍·阿卡蒂奧不能以同樣的熱勁兒回答她，因為他們是在一個公用帳篷裏，吉卜賽人不時拿着各種雜耍器具進來，在這兒幹事，甚至就在床鋪旁邊的地上擲骰子·帳篷中間的木竿上挂着一盞燈，照亮了每個角落。在愛撫之間的短暫停歇中，霍·阿卡蒂奧赤裸裸地躺在床上，不知道該怎麽辦，而姑娘卻一再想刺激他。過了一會，一個身姿優美的吉卜賽女人和一個男人一起走進帳篷，這個男人不屬於雜技團，也不是本村的人。兩人就在床邊脫衣解帶。女人偶然看了霍·阿卡蒂奧一眼。
“孩子，”她叫道，“上帝保佑你，走開吧！”
霍·阿卡蒂奧的女伴要求對方不要打擾他倆，於是新來的一對衹好躺在緊靠床鋪的地上。
這是星期四。星期六晚上，霍·阿卡蒂奧在頭上紮了塊紅布，就跟吉卜賽人一起離開了馬孔多。
發現兒子失蹤之後，烏蘇娜就在整個村子裏到處找他，在吉卜賽人先前搭篷的地方，她衹看見一堆堆垃圾和還在冒煙的篝火灰燼。有些村民在刨垃圾堆，希望找到玻璃串珠，其中一個村民嚮烏蘇娜說，昨夜他曾看見她的兒子跟雜技演員們在一起--霍·阿卡蒂奧推着一輛小車，車上有一隻裝着“蛇人”的籠子。“他變成吉卜賽人啦！”她嚮丈夫吵嚷，可是丈夫對於兒子的失蹤絲毫沒有表示驚慌。
“這倒不壞，”霍·阿·布恩蒂亞一面說，一面在研鉢裏搗什麽東西；這東西已經反復搗過多次，加熱多次，現在還在研鉢裏。“他可以成為一個男子漢了。”
烏蘇娜打聽了吉卜賽人所去的方向，就沿着那條路走去，碰見每一個人都要問一問，希望追上大群吉卜賽人，因此離開村子越來越遠；終於看出自己走得過遠，她就認為用不着回頭了，到了晚上八點，霍·阿·布恩蒂亞纔發現妻子失蹤，當時他把東西放在一堆肥料上，决定去看看小女兒阿瑪蘭塔是怎麽回事，因為她到這時哭得嗓子都啞了。在幾小時內，他毫不猶豫地集合了一隊裝備很好的村民，把阿瑪蘭塔交給一個自願充當奶媽的女人，就踏上荒無人跡的小道，去尋找烏蘇娜了。他是把奧雷連諾帶在身邊的。拂曉時分，幾個印第安漁人用手勢嚮他們表明：誰也不曾走過這兒。經過三天毫無效果的尋找，他們回到了村裏。
霍·阿·布恩蒂亞苦惱了好久。他象母親一樣照拂小女兒阿瑪蘭塔。他給她洗澡、換襁褓，一天四次抱她去奶媽那兒，晚上甚至給她唱歌（烏蘇娜是從來不會唱歌的）。有一次，皮拉·苔列娜自願來這兒照料傢務，直到烏蘇娜回來。在不幸之中，奧雷連諾神秘的洞察力更加敏銳了，他一見皮拉·苔列娜走進屋來，就好象恍然大悟。他明白：根據某種無法說明的原因，他哥哥的逃亡和母親的失蹤都是這個女人的過錯，所以他用那麽一聲不吭和嫉惡如仇的態度對待她，她就再也不來了。
時間一過，一切照舊。霍·阿·布恩蒂亞和他的兒子自己也不知道，他們究竟是什麽時候回到試驗室裏的，他們打掃了塵上，點燃了爐火，又專心地忙於擺弄那在一堆肥料上放了幾個月的東西了。阿瑪蘭塔躺在一隻柳條籃子裏，房間中的空氣充滿了汞氣；她好奇地望着爸爸和哥哥聚精會神地工作。烏蘇娜失蹤之後過了幾個月，試驗室裏開始發生奇怪的事。早就扔在廚房裏的空瓶子忽然重得無法挪動。工作臺上鍋裏的水無火自沸起來，咕嘟了整整半個小時，直到完全蒸發。霍·阿·布恩蒂亞和他的兒子對這些怪事都很驚訝、激動，不知如何解釋，但把它們看成是新事物的預兆。有一天，阿瑪蘭塔的籃子突然自己動了起來，在房間裏繞圈子，奧雷連諾看了非常吃驚，趕忙去把它攔住。可是霍·阿·布恩蒂亞一點也不驚異。他把籃子放在原處，拴在桌腿上面。籃子的移動終於使他相信，他們的希望快要實現了。就在這時，奧雷連諾聽見他說：
“即使你不害怕上帝，你也會害怕金屬。”
失蹤之後幾乎過了五個月，烏蘇娜回來了。她顯得異常興奮；有點返老還童，穿着村裏人誰也沒有穿過的新式衣服。霍·阿·布恩蒂亞高興得差點兒發了瘋，“原來如此！正象我預料的！”他叫了起來。這是真的，因為待在試驗室裏進行物質試驗的長時間中，他曾在內心深處祈求上帝，他所期待的奇跡不是發現點金石，也不是哈口氣讓金屬具有生命，更不是發明一種辦法，以便把金子變成房鎖和窗子的鉸鏈，而是剛剛發生的事--烏蘇娜的歸來。但她並沒有跟他一起發狂地高興。她照舊給了丈夫一個樂吻，仿佛他倆不過一小時以前纔見過面似的。說道：
“到門外去看看吧！”
霍·阿·布恩蒂亞走到街上，看見自己房子前面的一群人，他好半天才從混亂狀態中清醒過來。這不是吉卜賽人，而是跟馬孔多村民一樣的男人和女人，平直的頭髮，黝黑的皮膚，說的是同樣的語言，抱怨的是相同的痛苦。站在他們旁邊的是馱着各種食物的騾子，套上閹牛的大車，車上載着傢具和家庭用具－－一塵世生活中必不可缺的簡單用具，這些用具是商人每天都在出售的。
這些人是從沼澤地另一邊來的，總共兩天就能到達那兒，可是那兒建立了城鎮，那裏的人一年當中每個月都能收到郵件，而且使用能夠改善生活的機器。烏蘇娜沒有追上吉卜賽人，但卻發現了她丈夫枉然尋找偉大發明時未能發現的那條道路。
The discovery of the galleon, an indication of the proximity of the sea, broke José Arcadio Buendía's drive. He considered it a trick of his whimsical fate to have searched for the sea without finding it, at the cost of countless sacrifices and suffering, and to have found it all of a sudden without looking for it, as if it lay across his path like an insurmountable object. Many years later Colonel Aureliano Buendía crossed the region again, when it was already a regular mail route, and the only part of the ship he found was its burned-out frame in the midst of a field of poppies. Only then, convinced that the story had not been some product of his father's imagination, did he wonder how the galleon had been able to get inland to that spot. But José Arcadio Buendía did not concern himself with that when he found the sea after another four days' journey from the galleon. His dreams ended as he faced that ashen, foamy, dirty sea, which had not merited the risks and sacrifices of the adventure.
"God damn it!" he shouted. "Macondo is surrounded by water on all sides."
The idea of a peninsular Macondo prevailed for a long time, inspired by the arbitrary map that José Arcadio Buendía sketched on his return from the expedition. He drew it in rage, evilly, exaggerating the difficulties of communication, as if to punish himself for the absolute lack of sense with which he had chosen the place. "We'll never get anywhere," he lamented to ?rsula. "We're going to rot our lives away here without receiving the benefits of science." That certainty, mulled over for several months in the small room he used as his laboratory, brought him to the conception of the plan to move Maeondo to a better place. But that time ?rsula had anticipated his feverish designs. With the secret and implacable labor of a small ant she predisposed the women of the village against the flightiness of their husbands, who were already preparing for the move. José Arcadio Buendía did not know at what moment or because of what adverse forces his plan had become enveloped in a web of pretexts, disappointments, and evasions until it turned into nothing but an illusion. ?rsula watched him with innocent attention and even felt some pity for him on the morning when she found him in the back room muttering about his plans for moving as he placed his laboratory pieces in their original boxes. She let him finish. She let him nail up the boxes and put his initials on them with an inked brush, without reproaching him, but knowing now that he knew (because she had heard him say so in his soft monologues) that the men of the village would not back him up in his undertaking. Only when he began to take down the door of the room did ?rsula dare ask him what he was doing, and he answered with a certain bitterness. "Since no one wants to leave, we'll leave all by ourselves." ?rsula did not become upset.
"We will not leave," she said. "We will stay here, because we have had a son here."
"We have still not had a death," he said. "A person does not belong to a place until there is someone dead under the ground."
?rsula replied with a soft firmness:
"If I have to die for the rest of you to stay here, I will die."
José Arcadio Buendía had not thought that his wife's will was so firm. He tried to seduce her with the charm of his fantasy, with the promise of a prodigious world where all one had to do was sprinkle some magic liquid on the ground and the plants would bear fruit whenever a man wished, and where all manner of instruments against pain were sold at bargain prices. But ?rsula was insensible to his clairvoyance.
"Instead of going around thinking about your crazy inventions, you should be worrying about your sons," she replied. "Look at the state they're in, running wild just like donkeys."
José Arcadio Buendía took his wife's words literally. He looked out the window and saw the barefoot children in the sunny garden and he had the impression that only at that instant had they begun to exist, conceived by ?rsula's spell, Something occurred inside of him then, something mysterious and definitive that uprooted him from his own time and carried him adrift through an unexplored region of his memory. While ?rsula continued sweeping the house, which was safe now from being abandoned for the rest of her life, he stood there with an absorbed look, contemplating the children until his eyes became moist and he dried them with the back of his hand, exhaling a deep sigh of resignation.
"All right," he said. "Tell them to come help me take the things out of the boxes."
José Arcadio, the older of the children, was fourteen. He had a square head, thick hair, and his father's character. Although he had the same impulse for growth and physical strength, it was early evident that he lacked imagination. He had been conceived and born during the difficult crossing of the mountains, before the founding of Macondo, and his parents gave thanks to heaven when they saw he had no animal features. Aureliano, the first human being to be born in Macondo, would be six years old in March. He was silent and withdrawn. He had wept in his mother's womb and had been born with his eyes open. As they were cutting the umbilical cord, he moved his head from side to side, taking in the things in the room and examining the faces of the people with a fearless curiosity. Then, indifferent to those who came close to look at him, he kept his attention concentrated on the palm roof, which looked as if it were about to collapse under the tremendous pressure of the rain. ?rsula did not remember the intensity of that look again until one day when little Aureliano, at the age of three, went into the kitchen at the moment she was taking a pot of boiling soup from the stove and putting it on the table. The child, Perplexed, said from the doorway, "It's going to spill." The pot was firmly placed in the center of the table, but just as soon as the child made his announcement, it began an unmistakable movement toward the edge, as if impelled by some inner dynamism, and it fell and broke on the floor. ?rsula, alarmed, told her husband about the episode, but he interpreted it as a natural phenomenon. That was the way he always was alien to the existence of his sons, partly because he considered childhood as a period of mental insufficiency, and partly because he was always too absorbed in his fantastic speculations.
But since the afternoon when he called the children in to help him unpack the things in the laboratory, he gave them his best hours. In the small separate room, where the walls were gradually being covered by strange maps and fabulous drawings, he taught them to read and write and do sums, and he spoke to them about the wonders of the world, not only where his learning had extended, but forcing the limits of his imagination to extremes. It was in that way that the boys ended up learning that in the southern extremes of Africa there were men so intelligent and peaceful that their only pastime was to sit and think, and that it was possible to cross the Aegean Sea on foot by jumping from island to island all the way to the port of Salonika. Those hallucinating sessions remained printed on the memories of the boys in such a way that many years later, a second before the regular army officer gave the firing squad the command to fire, Colonel Aureliano Buendía saw once more that warm March afternoon on which his father had interrupted the lesson in physics and stood fascinated, with his hand in the air and his eyes motionless, listening to the distant pipes, drums, and jingles of the gypsies, who were coming to the village once more, announcing the latest and most startling discovery of the sages of Memphis.
They were new gypsies, young men and women who knew only their own language, handsome specimens with oily skins and intelligent hands, whose dances and music sowed a panic of uproarious joy through the streets, with parrots painted all colors reciting Italian arias, and a hen who laid a hundred golden eggs to the sound of a tambourine, and a trained monkey who read minds, and the multi-use machine that could be used at the same time to sew on buttons and reduce fevers, and the apparatus to make a person forget his bad memories, and a poultice to lose time, and a thousand more inventions so ingenious and unusual that José Arcadio Buendía must have wanted to invent a memory machine so that he could remember them all. In an instant they transformed the village. The inhabitants of Macondo found themselves lost is their own streets, confused by the crowded fair.
Holding a child by each hand so as not to lose them in the tumult, bumping into acrobats with gold-capped teeth and jugglers with six arms, suffocated by the mingled breath of manure and sandals that the crowd exhaled, José Arcadio Buendía went about everywhere like a madman, looking for Melquíades so that he could reveal to him the infinite secrets of that fabulous nightmare. He asked several gypsies, who did not understand his language. Finally he reached the place where Melquíades used to set up his tent and he found a taciturn Armenian who in Spanish was hawking a syrup to make oneself invisible. He had drunk down a glass of the amber substance in one gulp as José Arcadio Buendía elbowed his way through the absorbed group that was witnessing the spectacle, and was able to ask his question. The gypsy wrapped him in the frightful climate of his look before he turned into a puddle of pestilential and smoking pitch over which the echo of his reply still floated: "Melquíades is dead." Upset by the news, José Arcadio Buendía stood motionless, trying to rise above his affliction, until the group dispersed, called away by other artifices, and the puddle of the taciturn Armenian evaporated completely. Other gypsies confirmed later on that Melquíades had in fact succumbed to the fever on the beach at Singapore and that his body had been thrown into the deepest part of the Java Sea. The children had no interest in the news. They insisted that their father take them to see the overwhelming novelty of the sages of Memphis that was being advertised at the entrance of a tent that, according to what was said, had belonged to King Solomon. They insisted so much that José Arcadio Buendía paid the thirty reales and led them into the center of the tent, where there was a giant with a hairy torso and a shaved head, with a copper ring in his nose and a heavy iron chain on his ankle, watching over a pirate chest. When it was opened by the giant, the chest gave off a glacial exhalation. Inside there was only an enormous, transparent block with infinite internal needles in which the light of the sunset was broken up into colored stars. Disconcerted, knowing that the children were waiting for an immediate explanation, José Arcadio Buendía ventured a murmur:
"It's the largest diamond in the world."
"No," the gypsy countered. "It's ice."
José Arcadio Buendía, without understanding, stretched out his hand toward the cake, but the giant moved it away. "Five reales more to touch it," he said. José Arcadio Buendía paid them and put his hand on the ice and held it there for several minutes as his heart filled with fear and jubilation at the contact with mystery. Without knowing what to say, he paid ten reales more so that his sons could have that prodigious experience. Little José Arcadio refused to touch it. Aureliano, on the other hand, took a step forward and put his hand on it, withdrawing it immediately. "It's boiling," he exclaimed, startled. But his father paid no attention to him. Intoxicated by the evidence of the miracle, he forgot at that moment about the frustration of his delirious undertakings and Melquíades' body, abandoned to the appetite of the squids. He paid another five reales and with his hand on the cake, as if giving testimony on the holy scriptures, he exclaimed:
"This is the great invention of our time."
在這荒僻的村子裏，早就有個兩班牙人的後裔，叫做霍塞·阿卡蒂奧·布恩蒂亞，他是栽種煙草的；烏蘇娜的曾祖父和他一起經營這樁有利可圖的事業，短時期內兩人都建立了很好的傢業。多少年過去了，西班牙後裔的曾孫兒和亞拉岡人的曾孫女結了婚。每當大夫的荒唐行為使烏蘇娜生氣的時候，她就一下子跳過世事紛繁的三百年，咒駡弗蘭西斯·德拉剋圍攻列奧阿察的那個日子。不過，她這麽做，衹是為了減輕心中的痛苦；實際上，把她跟他終生連接在一起的，是比愛情更牢固的關係：共同的良心譴責。烏蘇娜和丈夫是表兄妹，他倆是在古老的村子裏一塊兒長大的，由於沮祖輩輩的墾殖，這個村莊已經成了今省最好的一個。儘管他倆之間的婚姻是他倆剛剛出世就能預見到的，然而兩個年輕人表示結婚願望的時候，雙方的傢長都反對。幾百年來，兩族的人是雜配的，他們生怕這兩個健全的後代可能丟臉地生出一隻蜥蜴。這樣可怕的事已經發牛過一次。烏蘇娜的嬸嬸嫁給霍·阿·布恩蒂亞的叔叔，生下了一個兒子：這個兒子一輩子部穿着肥大的燈籠褲，活到四十二歲還沒結婚就流血而死，因為他生下來就長着一條尾巴——尖端有一撮毛的蠃旋形軟骨。這種名副其實的豬尾巴是他不願讓任何一個女人看見的，最終要了他的命，因為一個熟識的屠夫按照他的要求，用切肉刀把它割掉了。十九歲的霍·阿·布恩蒂亞無憂無慮地用一句話結束了爭論：“我可不在乎生出豬崽子，衹要它們會說話就行。”於是他倆在花炮聲中舉行了婚禮銅管樂隊，一連鬧騰了三個晝夜。在這以後，年輕夫婦本來可以幸福地生活，可是烏蘇娜的母親卻對未來的後代作出不大吉利的預言，藉以嚇唬自己的女兒，甚至慫恿女兒拒絶按照章法跟他結合。她知道大夫是個力大、剛強的人，擔心他在她睡着時強迫她，所以，她在上床之前，都穿上母親拿厚帆布給她縫成的一條襯褲；襯褲是用交叉的皮帶係住的，前面用一個大鐵扣扣緊。夫婦倆就這樣過了若幹月。白天，他照料自己的鬥雞，她就和母親一塊兒在刺染上綉花。夜晚，年輕夫婦卻陷入了煩惱而激烈的鬥爭，這種鬥爭逐漸代替了愛情的安慰。可是，機靈的鄰人立即覺得情況不妙，而且村中傳說，烏蘇娜出嫁一年以後依然是個處女，因為丈大有點兒毛病。霍·阿·布恩蒂亞是最後聽到這個謠言的。
“烏蘇娜，你聽人傢在說什麽啦，”他嚮妻子平靜他說。
“讓他們去嚼舌頭吧，”她回答。“咱們知道那不是真的。”
他們的生活又這樣過了半年，直到那個倒黴的星期天，霍·阿·布恩蒂亞的公雞戰勝了普魯登希奧·阿吉廖爾的公雞。輸了的普魯登希奧·阿吉廖爾，一見雞血就氣得發瘋，故意離開霍·阿·布恩蒂亞遠一點兒，想讓鬥雞棚裏的人都能聽到他的話。
“恭喜你呀！”他叫道。“也許你的這衹公雞能夠幫你老婆的忙。咱們瞧吧！”
霍·阿·布恩蒂亞不動聲色地從地上拎起自己的公雞。“我馬上就來，”他對大傢說，然後轉嚮普魯登希奧，阿吉廖爾：
“你回去拿武器吧，我準備殺死你。”
過了十分鐘，他就拿着一枝粗大的標槍回來了，這標槍還是他祖父的。鬥雞棚門口擁聚了幾乎半個村子的人，普魯登希奧·阿吉廖爾正在那兒等候。他還來不及自衛，霍·阿·布恩蒂亞的標槍就擊中了他的咽喉，標槍是猛力擲出的，非常準確；由於這種無可指摘的準確，霍塞·奧雷連諾·布恩蒂亞（註：布恩蒂亞的祖父）從前曾消滅了全區所有的豹子。夜晚在鬥雞棚裏，親友們守在死者棺材旁邊的時候，霍·阿·布恩蒂業走進自己的臥室，看見妻子正在穿她的“貞節褲”。他拿標槍對準她，命令道：“脫掉！”烏蘇娜並不懷疑丈夫的决心。“出了事，你負責，”她警告說。霍·阿·布恩蒂亞把標槍插入泥地。
“你生下蜥蜴，咱們就撫養蜥蜴，”他說。“可是村裏再也不會有人由於你的過錯而被殺死了。”
這是一個美妙的六月的夜晚，月光皎潔，涼爽宜人。他倆通古未睡，在床上折騰，根本沒去理會穿過臥室的輕風，風兒帶來了普魯登希奧·阿吉廖爾親人的哭聲。
人們把這樁事情說成是光榮的决鬥，可是兩夫婦卻感到了良心的譴責。有一天夜裏，烏蘇娜還沒睡覺，出去喝水，在院子裏的大土罐旁邊看見了普魯登希奧·阿吉廖爾。他臉色死白、十分悲傷，試圖用一塊麻屑堵住喉部正在流血的傷口。看見死人，烏蘇娜感到的不是恐懼，而是憐憫。她回到臥室裏，把這件怪事告訴了丈夫，可是丈夫並不重視她的話。“死人是不會走出墳墓的，”他說。“這不過是咱們受到良心的責備。”過了兩夜，烏蘇娜在浴室裏遇見普魯登希奧·阿吉廖爾--他正在用麻屑擦洗脖子上的凝血。另一個夜晚，她發現他在雨下徘徊。霍·阿·布恩蒂亞討厭妻子的幻象，就帶着標槍到院子裏去。死人照舊悲傷地立在那兒。
“滾開！”霍·阿·布恩蒂亞嚮他吆喝。“你回來多少次，我就要打死你多少次。”
普魯登希奧沒有離開，而霍·阿·布恩蒂亞卻不敢拿標槍嚮他擲去。從那時起，他就無法安穩地睡覺了。他老是痛苦地想起死人穿過雨絲望着他的無限凄涼的眼神，想起死人眼裏流露的對活人的深切懷念，想起普魯登希奧·阿吉廖爾四處張望。尋找水來浸濕一塊麻屑的不安神情。“大概，他很痛苦，”霍·阿·布恩蒂亞嚮妻子說。“看來，他很孤獨。”烏蘇娜那麽憐憫死人，下一次遇見時，她發現他盯着爐竈上的鐵鍋，以為他在尋找什麽，於是就在整個房子裏到處都給他擺了一罐罐水。那一夜，霍·阿·布恩蒂亞看見死人在他自己的臥室裏洗傷口，於是就屈服了。
“好吧，普魯登希奧，”他說。“我們盡量離開這個村子遠一些，决不再回這兒來了。現在，你就安心走吧。”
就這樣，他們打算翻過山嶺到海邊去。霍·阿·布恩蒂亞的幾個朋友，象他一樣年輕，也想去冒險，離開自己的傢，帶着妻室兒女去尋找土地……渺茫的土地。在離開村子之前，霍．阿·布恩蒂亞把標槍埋在院子裏，接二連三砍掉了自己所有鬥雞的腦袋，希望以這樣的犧牲給普魯登希奧·阿吉廖爾一些安慰。烏蘇娜帶走的衹是一口放着嫁妝的箱子、一點兒家庭用具、以及藏放父親遺産--金幣--的一隻盒子。誰也沒有預先想好一定的路綫。他們决定朝着與列奧阿察相反的方向前進，以免遇見任何熟人，從而無影無蹤地消失。這是一次荒唐可笑的旅行。過了一年零兩個月，烏蘇娜雖然用猴內和蛇湯毀壞了自己的肚子，卻終於生下了一個兒子，嬰兒身體各部完全沒有牲畜的徵狀。因她腳腫，腳上的靜脈脹得象囊似的，整整一半的路程，她都不得不躺在兩個男人擡着的擔架上面。孩子們比父母更容易忍受艱難困苦，他們大部分時間都鮮蹦活跳，儘管樣兒可憐--兩眼深陷，肚子癟癟的。有一天早晨，在幾乎兩年的流浪以後，他們成了第一批看見山嶺西坡的人。從雲霧遮蔽的山嶺上，他們望見了一片河流縱橫的遼闊地帶---直伸到天邊的巨大沼澤。可是他們始終沒有到達海邊。在沼澤地裏流浪了幾個月，路上沒有遇見一個人，有一天夜晚，他們就在一條多石的河岸上紮營，這裏的河水很象凝固的液體玻璃。多年以後，在第二次國內戰爭時期，奧雷連諾打算循着這條路綫突然占領列奧阿察，可是六天以後他纔明白，他的打算純粹是發瘋。然而那夭晚上，在河邊紮營以後，他父親的旅伴們雖然很象遇到船舶失事的人，但是旅途上他們的人數增多了，大夥兒都準備活到老（這一點他們做到了）。夜裏，霍·阿·布恩蒂亞做了個夢，營地上仿佛矗立起一座熱鬧的城市，房屋的墻壁都用晶瑩奪目的透明材料砌成。他打聽這是什麽城市，聽到的回答是一個陌生的、毫無意義的名字，可是這個名字在夢裏卻異常響亮動聽：馬孔多。翌日，他就告訴自己的人，他們絶對找不到海了。他叫大夥兒砍倒樹木，在河邊最涼爽的地方開闢一塊空地，在空地上建起了一座村莊。
在看見冰塊之前，霍·阿·布恩蒂亞始終猜不破自己夢見的玻璃房子。後來，他以為自己理解了這個夢境的深刻意義。他認為，不久的將來，他們就能用水這樣的普通材料大規模地製作冰磚，來給全村建築新的房子。當時，馬孔多好象一個赤熱的火爐，門閂和窗子的鉸鏈都熱得變了形；用冰磚修蓋房子，馬孔多就會變成一座永遠涼爽的市鎮了。如果霍·阿·布恩蒂亞沒有堅持建立冰廠的打算，衹是因為他當時全神貫註地教育兩個兒子，特別是奧雷連諾，這孩子一開始就對煉金術表現了罕見的才能。試驗室裏的工作又緊張起來。現在，父子倆已經沒有被新奇事物引起的那種激動心情，衹是平平靜靜地反復閱讀梅爾加德斯的筆記，持久而耐心地努力，試圖從粘在鍋底的一大塊東西裏面把烏蘇娜的金子分離出來。大兒子霍·阿卡蒂奧幾乎不參加這個工作。當父親身心都沉湎於熔鐵爐旁的工作時，這個身材過早超過年歲的任性的頭生子，已經成了一個魁梧的青年。他的嗓音變粗了·臉頰和下巴都長出了茸毛。有一天晚上，他正在臥室裏脫衣睡覺，烏蘇娜走了進來，竟然産生了羞澀和憐恤的混合感覺，因為除了丈夫，她看見赤身露體的第一個男人就是兒子，而且兒子生理上顯得反常，甚至使她嚇了一跳。已經懷着第三個孩子的烏蘇娜，重新感到了以前作新娘時的那種恐懼。
那時，有個女人常來布恩蒂亞傢裏，幫助烏蘇娜做些傢務。這個女人愉快、熱情、嘴尖，會用紙牌占卜。烏蘇娜跟這女人談了談自己的憂慮。她覺得孩子的發育是不勻稱的，就象她的親戚長了條豬尾巴。女人止不住地放聲大笑，笑聲響徹了整座屋子，仿佛水晶玻璃鈴鐺。“恰恰相反，”她說。“他會有福氣的。”
“過了幾天，為了證明自己的預言準確，她帶來一副紙牌，把自己和霍·阿卡蒂奧鎖在廚房旁邊的庫房裏。她不慌不忙地在一張舊的木工臺上擺開紙牌，口中念念有詞；這時，年輕人伫立一旁，與其說對這套把戲感到興趣，不如說覺得厭倦。忽然，占卜的女人伸手摸了他一下。“我的天！”她真正吃驚地叫了一聲，就再也說不出什麽話了。
霍·阿卡蒂奧感到，他的骨頭變得象海綿一樣酥軟，感到睏乏和恐懼，好不容易纔忍住淚水。女人一點也沒有激勵他。可他整夜都在找她，整夜都覺到她腋下發出的氣味：這種氣味仿佛滲進了他的軀體。他希望時時刻刻跟她在一起，希望她成為他的母親，希望他和她永遠也不走出庫房，希望她嚮他說：“我的天！”重新摸他，重新說：“我的天！”有一日，他再也忍受不了這種煩惱了，就到她的傢裏去。這次訪問是禮節性的，也是莫名其妙的--在整個訪問中，霍·阿卡蒂奧一次也沒開口。此刻他不需要她了。他覺得，她完全不象她的氣味在他心中幻化的形象，仿佛這根本不是她．而是另一個人。他喝完咖啡，就十分沮喪地回傢。夜裏，他翻來覆去睡不着覺，又感到極度的難受，可他此刻渴望的不是跟他一起在庫房裏的那個女人，而是下午坐在他面前的那個女人了。
過了幾天，女人忽然把霍·阿卡蒂奧帶到了她的傢中，並且藉口教他一種紙牌戲法，從她跟母親坐在一起的房間裏，把他領進一間臥窄。在這兒，她那麽放肆地摸他，使得他渾身不住地戰慄，但他感到的是恐懼，而不是快樂。隨後，她叫他夜間再未。霍·阿卡蒂奧口頭答應，心裏卻希望盡快擺脫她，--他知道自己天不能來的。然而夜間，躺在熱烘烘的被窩裏，他覺得自己應當去她那兒，即使自己不能這麽幹。他在黑暗中摸着穿上衣服，聽到弟弟平靜的呼吸聲、隔壁房間裏父親的産咳聲、院子裏母雞的咯咯聲、蚊子的嗡嗡聲、自己的心髒跳動聲--世界上這些亂七八糟的聲音以前是不曾引起他的註意的，然後，他走到沉入夢鄉的街上。他滿心希望房門是門上的，而下衹是掩上的（她曾這樣告訴過他）。擔它井沒有閂上。他用指尖一推房門，鉸鏈就清晰地發出悲鳴，這種悲鳴在他心中引起的是冰涼的回響。他盡量不弄出響聲，側着身子走進房裏，馬上感覺到了那種氣味，霍·阿卡蒂奧還在第一個房間裏，女人的三個弟弟通常是懸起吊床過夜的；這些吊床在什麽地方，他並不知道，在黑暗中也辨別不清，因此，他衹得摸索着走到臥室門前，把門推開，找準方向，免得弄錯床鋪。他往前摸過去，立即撞上了一張吊床的床頭，這個吊床低得出乎他的預料。一個正在乎靜地打鼾的人，夢中翻了個身，聲音有點悲觀他說了句夢話：“那是星期三。”當霍·阿卡蒂奧推開臥室門的時候，他無法製止房門擦過凹凸不平的地面。他處在一團漆黑中，既苦惱又慌亂，明白自己終於迷失了方向。睡在這個狹窄房間裏的，是母親、她的第二個女兒和丈夫、兩個孩子和另一個女人，這個女人顯然不是等他的。他可以憑氣味找到，然而到處都是氣味，那麽細微又那麽明顯的氣味，就象現在經常留在他身上的那種氣味。霍·阿卡蒂奧呆然不動地站了好久，驚駭地問了問自己，怎會陷入這個束手無策的境地，忽然有一隻伸開指頭的手在黑暗中摸索，碰到了他的面孔，他並不覺得奇怪，因為他下意識地正在等着別人摸他。他把自己交給了這衹手，他在精疲力盡的狀態中讓它把他拉到看不見的床鋪跟前；在這兒，有人脫掉了他的衣服，把他象一袋土豆似的舉了起來，在一片漆黑裏把他翻來覆去；在黑暗中，他的雙手無用了，這兒不再聞女人的氣味，衹有阿莫尼亞的氣味，他力圖回憶她的面孔，他的眼前卻恍惚浮現出烏蘇娜的而孔；他模糊地覺得，他正在做他早就想做的事兒，盡倚他决不認為他能做這種事兒，他自己並不知道這該怎麽做，並不知道雙手放在哪兒，雙腳放在哪兒，並不知道這是誰的腦袋、誰的腿；他覺得自己再也不能繼續下去了，他渴望逃走，又渴望永遠留在這種極度的寂靜中，留在這種可怕的孤獨中。
這個女人叫做皮拉·苔列娜。按照父母的意願，她參加過最終建立馬孔多村的長徵。父母想讓自己的女兒跟一個男人分開，她十四歲時，那人就使她失去了貞操，她滿二十二歲時，他還繼續跟她生在一起，可是怎麽也拿不定使婚姻合法化的主意，因為他不是她本村的人。他發誓說，他要跟隨她到夭涯海角，但要等他把自己的事情搞好以後；從那時起，她就一直等着他，已經失去了相見的希望，儘管紙牌經常嚮她預示，將有各式各樣的男人來找她，高的和矮的、金發和黑發的；有的從陸上來，有的從海上來，有的過三天來，有的過三月來，有的過三年來。等呀盼呀，她的大腿已經失去了勁頭，胸脯已經失去了彈性，她已疏遠了男人的愛撫，可是心裏還很狂熱。現在，霍·阿卡蒂奧對新穎而奇異的玩耍入了迷，每天夜裏都到迷宮式的房間裏來找她。有一回，他發現房門是閂上的，就篤篤地敲門；他以為，他既有勇氣敲第一次，那就應當敲到底……等了許久，她纔把門打開。白天，他因睡眠不足躺下了，還在暗暗回味昨夜的事。可是，皮拉·苔列娜來到布恩蒂亞傢裏的時候，顯得高高興興、滿不在乎、笑語聯珠，霍·阿卡蒂奧不必費勁地掩飾自己的緊張，因為這個女人響亮的笑聲能夠嚇跑在院子裏踱來踱去的鴿子，她跟那個具有無形力量的女人毫無共同之處，那個女人曾經教他如何屏住呼吸和控製心跳，幫助他瞭解男人為什麽怕死。他全神貫註於自己的體會，甚至不瞭解周圍的人在高興什麽，這時，他的父親和弟弟說，他們終於透過金屬渣滓取出了烏蘇娜的金子，這個消息簡直震動了整座房子。
事實上，他們是經過多日堅持不懈的努力取得成功的。烏蘇娜挺高興，甚至感謝上帝發明了煉金術，村裏的居民擠進試驗室，主人就拿抹上番石榴醬的烤餅招待他們，慶祝這個奇跡的出現，而霍·阿·布恩蒂亞卻讓他們參觀一個坩堝，裏面放着復原的金子，他的神情仿佛表示這金子是他剛剛發明的，他從一個人走到另一個人跟前，最後來到大兒子身邊。大兒子最近幾乎不來試驗室了。布恩蒂亞把一塊微黃的幹硬東西拿到他的眼前，問道，“你看這象什麽？”
霍·阿卡蒂奧直耿耿地回答：
“象狗屎。”
父親用手背在他嘴唇上碰了一下，碰得很重，霍·阿卡蒂奧嘴裏竟然流出血來，眼裏流出淚來。夜裏，皮拉·苔列娜在黑暗中摸到一小瓶藥和棉花，拿浸了亞爾尼加碘酒的壓布貼在腫處，為霍·阿卡蒂奧盡心地做了一切，而沒有使他産生仟何不舒服之感，竭力愛護他，而不碰痛他。他倆達到了那樣親密的程度，過了一會兒，他倆就不知不覺地在夜間幽會中第一次低聲交談起來：
“我衹想跟你在一起，”他說。“最近幾天內，我就要把一切告訴人傢，別再這麽捉迷藏了。”
皮拉·苔列娜不想勸阻他。
“那很好嘛，”她說。“如果咱倆單獨在一塊兒，咱們就把燈點上，彼此都能看見，我想叫喊就能叫喊，跟別人不相幹；而你想說什麽蠢話，就可在我耳邊說什麽蠢話。”
霍·阿卡蒂奧經過這場談話，加上他對父親的怨氣，而且他認為作法的愛情在一切情況下都是可以的，他就心安理得、勇氣倍增了。沒有任何準備，他自動把一閉告訴了弟弟。
起初，年幼的奧雷連諾衹把霍·阿卡蒂奧的豔遇看做是哥哥面臨的可怕危險，不明白什麽力量吸引了哥哥。可是，霍·阿卡蒂奧的煩躁不安逐漸傳染了他。他要哥哥談談那些細微情節，跟哥哥共苦同樂，他感到自己既害怕又快活，現在，他卻等首霍·阿卡蒂奧回來，直到天亮都沒合眼，在孤單的床上輾轉反側，仿佛躺在一堆燒紅的炭上；隨後，兄弟倆一直談到早該起床的時候，很快陷入半昏迷狀態；兩人都同樣厭惡煉金術和父親的聰明才智，變得孤僻了。“孩子們的樣兒沒有一點精神，”烏蘇娜說。“也許腸裏有蟲子。”她用搗碎的美洲土荊芥知心話來。哥哥不象以前那麽誠懇了。他從態度和藹的、容易接近的人變成了懷着戒心的、孤僻的人。他痛恨整個世界，渴望孤身獨處。有一天夜裏，他又離開了，但是沒有去皮拉·苔列娜那兒，而跟擁在吉卜賽帳篷周圍看熱鬧的人混在一起。他踱來踱去地看了看各種精彩節目，對任何一個節目都不感興趣，卻註意到了一個非展覽品---個年輕的吉卜賽女人；這女人幾乎是個小姑娘，脖子上戴着一串挺重的玻璃珠子，因此彎着身子。霍·阿卡蒂奧有生以來還沒見過比她更美的人。姑娘站在人群當中看一幕慘劇：一個人由於不聽父母的話，變成了一條蛇。
霍·阿卡蒂奧根本沒看這個不幸的人。當觀衆嚮“蛇人”詢問他那悲慘的故事細節時，年輕的霍·阿卡蒂奧就擠到第一排吉卜賽姑娘那兒去，站在她的背後，然後緊貼着她。她想挪開一些，可他把她貼得更緊。於是，她感覺到了他。她愣着沒動，驚恐得發顫，不相信自己的感覺，終於回頭膽怯地一笑，瞄了霍·阿卡蒂奧一眼，這時，兩個吉卜賽人把“蛇人”裝進了籠子，搬進帳篷。指揮表演的吉卜賽人宣佈：
“現在，女士們和先生們，我們將給你們表演一個可怕的節目--每夜這個時候都要砍掉一個女人的腦袋，連砍一百五十年，以示懲罰，因為她看了她不該看的東西。”
霍·阿卡蒂奧和吉卜賽姑娘沒有參觀砍頭。他倆走進了她的帳篷，由於衝動就接起吻來，並且脫掉了衣服；吉卜賽姑娘從身上脫掉了漿過的花邊緊身兜，就變得一絲不挂了。這是一隻千癟的小青蛙，胸部還沒發育，兩腿挺瘦，比霍·阿卡蒂奧的胳膊還細；可是她的果斷和熱情卻彌補了她的贏弱。然而，霍·阿卡蒂奧不能以同樣的熱勁兒回答她，因為他們是在一個公用帳篷裏，吉卜賽人不時拿着各種雜耍器具進來，在這兒幹事，甚至就在床鋪旁邊的地上擲骰子·帳篷中間的木竿上挂着一盞燈，照亮了每個角落。在愛撫之間的短暫停歇中，霍·阿卡蒂奧赤裸裸地躺在床上，不知道該怎麽辦，而姑娘卻一再想刺激他。過了一會，一個身姿優美的吉卜賽女人和一個男人一起走進帳篷，這個男人不屬於雜技團，也不是本村的人。兩人就在床邊脫衣解帶。女人偶然看了霍·阿卡蒂奧一眼。
“孩子，”她叫道，“上帝保佑你，走開吧！”
霍·阿卡蒂奧的女伴要求對方不要打擾他倆，於是新來的一對衹好躺在緊靠床鋪的地上。
這是星期四。星期六晚上，霍·阿卡蒂奧在頭上紮了塊紅布，就跟吉卜賽人一起離開了馬孔多。
發現兒子失蹤之後，烏蘇娜就在整個村子裏到處找他，在吉卜賽人先前搭篷的地方，她衹看見一堆堆垃圾和還在冒煙的篝火灰燼。有些村民在刨垃圾堆，希望找到玻璃串珠，其中一個村民嚮烏蘇娜說，昨夜他曾看見她的兒子跟雜技演員們在一起--霍·阿卡蒂奧推着一輛小車，車上有一隻裝着“蛇人”的籠子。“他變成吉卜賽人啦！”她嚮丈夫吵嚷，可是丈夫對於兒子的失蹤絲毫沒有表示驚慌。
“這倒不壞，”霍·阿·布恩蒂亞一面說，一面在研鉢裏搗什麽東西；這東西已經反復搗過多次，加熱多次，現在還在研鉢裏。“他可以成為一個男子漢了。”
烏蘇娜打聽了吉卜賽人所去的方向，就沿着那條路走去，碰見每一個人都要問一問，希望追上大群吉卜賽人，因此離開村子越來越遠；終於看出自己走得過遠，她就認為用不着回頭了，到了晚上八點，霍·阿·布恩蒂亞纔發現妻子失蹤，當時他把東西放在一堆肥料上，决定去看看小女兒阿瑪蘭塔是怎麽回事，因為她到這時哭得嗓子都啞了。在幾小時內，他毫不猶豫地集合了一隊裝備很好的村民，把阿瑪蘭塔交給一個自願充當奶媽的女人，就踏上荒無人跡的小道，去尋找烏蘇娜了。他是把奧雷連諾帶在身邊的。拂曉時分，幾個印第安漁人用手勢嚮他們表明：誰也不曾走過這兒。經過三天毫無效果的尋找，他們回到了村裏。
霍·阿·布恩蒂亞苦惱了好久。他象母親一樣照拂小女兒阿瑪蘭塔。他給她洗澡、換襁褓，一天四次抱她去奶媽那兒，晚上甚至給她唱歌（烏蘇娜是從來不會唱歌的）。有一次，皮拉·苔列娜自願來這兒照料傢務，直到烏蘇娜回來。在不幸之中，奧雷連諾神秘的洞察力更加敏銳了，他一見皮拉·苔列娜走進屋來，就好象恍然大悟。他明白：根據某種無法說明的原因，他哥哥的逃亡和母親的失蹤都是這個女人的過錯，所以他用那麽一聲不吭和嫉惡如仇的態度對待她，她就再也不來了。
時間一過，一切照舊。霍·阿·布恩蒂亞和他的兒子自己也不知道，他們究竟是什麽時候回到試驗室裏的，他們打掃了塵上，點燃了爐火，又專心地忙於擺弄那在一堆肥料上放了幾個月的東西了。阿瑪蘭塔躺在一隻柳條籃子裏，房間中的空氣充滿了汞氣；她好奇地望着爸爸和哥哥聚精會神地工作。烏蘇娜失蹤之後過了幾個月，試驗室裏開始發生奇怪的事。早就扔在廚房裏的空瓶子忽然重得無法挪動。工作臺上鍋裏的水無火自沸起來，咕嘟了整整半個小時，直到完全蒸發。霍·阿·布恩蒂亞和他的兒子對這些怪事都很驚訝、激動，不知如何解釋，但把它們看成是新事物的預兆。有一天，阿瑪蘭塔的籃子突然自己動了起來，在房間裏繞圈子，奧雷連諾看了非常吃驚，趕忙去把它攔住。可是霍·阿·布恩蒂亞一點也不驚異。他把籃子放在原處，拴在桌腿上面。籃子的移動終於使他相信，他們的希望快要實現了。就在這時，奧雷連諾聽見他說：
“即使你不害怕上帝，你也會害怕金屬。”
失蹤之後幾乎過了五個月，烏蘇娜回來了。她顯得異常興奮；有點返老還童，穿着村裏人誰也沒有穿過的新式衣服。霍·阿·布恩蒂亞高興得差點兒發了瘋，“原來如此！正象我預料的！”他叫了起來。這是真的，因為待在試驗室裏進行物質試驗的長時間中，他曾在內心深處祈求上帝，他所期待的奇跡不是發現點金石，也不是哈口氣讓金屬具有生命，更不是發明一種辦法，以便把金子變成房鎖和窗子的鉸鏈，而是剛剛發生的事--烏蘇娜的歸來。但她並沒有跟他一起發狂地高興。她照舊給了丈夫一個樂吻，仿佛他倆不過一小時以前纔見過面似的。說道：
“到門外去看看吧！”
霍·阿·布恩蒂亞走到街上，看見自己房子前面的一群人，他好半天才從混亂狀態中清醒過來。這不是吉卜賽人，而是跟馬孔多村民一樣的男人和女人，平直的頭髮，黝黑的皮膚，說的是同樣的語言，抱怨的是相同的痛苦。站在他們旁邊的是馱着各種食物的騾子，套上閹牛的大車，車上載着傢具和家庭用具－－一塵世生活中必不可缺的簡單用具，這些用具是商人每天都在出售的。
這些人是從沼澤地另一邊來的，總共兩天就能到達那兒，可是那兒建立了城鎮，那裏的人一年當中每個月都能收到郵件，而且使用能夠改善生活的機器。烏蘇娜沒有追上吉卜賽人，但卻發現了她丈夫枉然尋找偉大發明時未能發現的那條道路。
The discovery of the galleon, an indication of the proximity of the sea, broke José Arcadio Buendía's drive. He considered it a trick of his whimsical fate to have searched for the sea without finding it, at the cost of countless sacrifices and suffering, and to have found it all of a sudden without looking for it, as if it lay across his path like an insurmountable object. Many years later Colonel Aureliano Buendía crossed the region again, when it was already a regular mail route, and the only part of the ship he found was its burned-out frame in the midst of a field of poppies. Only then, convinced that the story had not been some product of his father's imagination, did he wonder how the galleon had been able to get inland to that spot. But José Arcadio Buendía did not concern himself with that when he found the sea after another four days' journey from the galleon. His dreams ended as he faced that ashen, foamy, dirty sea, which had not merited the risks and sacrifices of the adventure.
"God damn it!" he shouted. "Macondo is surrounded by water on all sides."
The idea of a peninsular Macondo prevailed for a long time, inspired by the arbitrary map that José Arcadio Buendía sketched on his return from the expedition. He drew it in rage, evilly, exaggerating the difficulties of communication, as if to punish himself for the absolute lack of sense with which he had chosen the place. "We'll never get anywhere," he lamented to ?rsula. "We're going to rot our lives away here without receiving the benefits of science." That certainty, mulled over for several months in the small room he used as his laboratory, brought him to the conception of the plan to move Maeondo to a better place. But that time ?rsula had anticipated his feverish designs. With the secret and implacable labor of a small ant she predisposed the women of the village against the flightiness of their husbands, who were already preparing for the move. José Arcadio Buendía did not know at what moment or because of what adverse forces his plan had become enveloped in a web of pretexts, disappointments, and evasions until it turned into nothing but an illusion. ?rsula watched him with innocent attention and even felt some pity for him on the morning when she found him in the back room muttering about his plans for moving as he placed his laboratory pieces in their original boxes. She let him finish. She let him nail up the boxes and put his initials on them with an inked brush, without reproaching him, but knowing now that he knew (because she had heard him say so in his soft monologues) that the men of the village would not back him up in his undertaking. Only when he began to take down the door of the room did ?rsula dare ask him what he was doing, and he answered with a certain bitterness. "Since no one wants to leave, we'll leave all by ourselves." ?rsula did not become upset.
"We will not leave," she said. "We will stay here, because we have had a son here."
"We have still not had a death," he said. "A person does not belong to a place until there is someone dead under the ground."
?rsula replied with a soft firmness:
"If I have to die for the rest of you to stay here, I will die."
José Arcadio Buendía had not thought that his wife's will was so firm. He tried to seduce her with the charm of his fantasy, with the promise of a prodigious world where all one had to do was sprinkle some magic liquid on the ground and the plants would bear fruit whenever a man wished, and where all manner of instruments against pain were sold at bargain prices. But ?rsula was insensible to his clairvoyance.
"Instead of going around thinking about your crazy inventions, you should be worrying about your sons," she replied. "Look at the state they're in, running wild just like donkeys."
José Arcadio Buendía took his wife's words literally. He looked out the window and saw the barefoot children in the sunny garden and he had the impression that only at that instant had they begun to exist, conceived by ?rsula's spell, Something occurred inside of him then, something mysterious and definitive that uprooted him from his own time and carried him adrift through an unexplored region of his memory. While ?rsula continued sweeping the house, which was safe now from being abandoned for the rest of her life, he stood there with an absorbed look, contemplating the children until his eyes became moist and he dried them with the back of his hand, exhaling a deep sigh of resignation.
"All right," he said. "Tell them to come help me take the things out of the boxes."
José Arcadio, the older of the children, was fourteen. He had a square head, thick hair, and his father's character. Although he had the same impulse for growth and physical strength, it was early evident that he lacked imagination. He had been conceived and born during the difficult crossing of the mountains, before the founding of Macondo, and his parents gave thanks to heaven when they saw he had no animal features. Aureliano, the first human being to be born in Macondo, would be six years old in March. He was silent and withdrawn. He had wept in his mother's womb and had been born with his eyes open. As they were cutting the umbilical cord, he moved his head from side to side, taking in the things in the room and examining the faces of the people with a fearless curiosity. Then, indifferent to those who came close to look at him, he kept his attention concentrated on the palm roof, which looked as if it were about to collapse under the tremendous pressure of the rain. ?rsula did not remember the intensity of that look again until one day when little Aureliano, at the age of three, went into the kitchen at the moment she was taking a pot of boiling soup from the stove and putting it on the table. The child, Perplexed, said from the doorway, "It's going to spill." The pot was firmly placed in the center of the table, but just as soon as the child made his announcement, it began an unmistakable movement toward the edge, as if impelled by some inner dynamism, and it fell and broke on the floor. ?rsula, alarmed, told her husband about the episode, but he interpreted it as a natural phenomenon. That was the way he always was alien to the existence of his sons, partly because he considered childhood as a period of mental insufficiency, and partly because he was always too absorbed in his fantastic speculations.
But since the afternoon when he called the children in to help him unpack the things in the laboratory, he gave them his best hours. In the small separate room, where the walls were gradually being covered by strange maps and fabulous drawings, he taught them to read and write and do sums, and he spoke to them about the wonders of the world, not only where his learning had extended, but forcing the limits of his imagination to extremes. It was in that way that the boys ended up learning that in the southern extremes of Africa there were men so intelligent and peaceful that their only pastime was to sit and think, and that it was possible to cross the Aegean Sea on foot by jumping from island to island all the way to the port of Salonika. Those hallucinating sessions remained printed on the memories of the boys in such a way that many years later, a second before the regular army officer gave the firing squad the command to fire, Colonel Aureliano Buendía saw once more that warm March afternoon on which his father had interrupted the lesson in physics and stood fascinated, with his hand in the air and his eyes motionless, listening to the distant pipes, drums, and jingles of the gypsies, who were coming to the village once more, announcing the latest and most startling discovery of the sages of Memphis.
They were new gypsies, young men and women who knew only their own language, handsome specimens with oily skins and intelligent hands, whose dances and music sowed a panic of uproarious joy through the streets, with parrots painted all colors reciting Italian arias, and a hen who laid a hundred golden eggs to the sound of a tambourine, and a trained monkey who read minds, and the multi-use machine that could be used at the same time to sew on buttons and reduce fevers, and the apparatus to make a person forget his bad memories, and a poultice to lose time, and a thousand more inventions so ingenious and unusual that José Arcadio Buendía must have wanted to invent a memory machine so that he could remember them all. In an instant they transformed the village. The inhabitants of Macondo found themselves lost is their own streets, confused by the crowded fair.
Holding a child by each hand so as not to lose them in the tumult, bumping into acrobats with gold-capped teeth and jugglers with six arms, suffocated by the mingled breath of manure and sandals that the crowd exhaled, José Arcadio Buendía went about everywhere like a madman, looking for Melquíades so that he could reveal to him the infinite secrets of that fabulous nightmare. He asked several gypsies, who did not understand his language. Finally he reached the place where Melquíades used to set up his tent and he found a taciturn Armenian who in Spanish was hawking a syrup to make oneself invisible. He had drunk down a glass of the amber substance in one gulp as José Arcadio Buendía elbowed his way through the absorbed group that was witnessing the spectacle, and was able to ask his question. The gypsy wrapped him in the frightful climate of his look before he turned into a puddle of pestilential and smoking pitch over which the echo of his reply still floated: "Melquíades is dead." Upset by the news, José Arcadio Buendía stood motionless, trying to rise above his affliction, until the group dispersed, called away by other artifices, and the puddle of the taciturn Armenian evaporated completely. Other gypsies confirmed later on that Melquíades had in fact succumbed to the fever on the beach at Singapore and that his body had been thrown into the deepest part of the Java Sea. The children had no interest in the news. They insisted that their father take them to see the overwhelming novelty of the sages of Memphis that was being advertised at the entrance of a tent that, according to what was said, had belonged to King Solomon. They insisted so much that José Arcadio Buendía paid the thirty reales and led them into the center of the tent, where there was a giant with a hairy torso and a shaved head, with a copper ring in his nose and a heavy iron chain on his ankle, watching over a pirate chest. When it was opened by the giant, the chest gave off a glacial exhalation. Inside there was only an enormous, transparent block with infinite internal needles in which the light of the sunset was broken up into colored stars. Disconcerted, knowing that the children were waiting for an immediate explanation, José Arcadio Buendía ventured a murmur:
"It's the largest diamond in the world."
"No," the gypsy countered. "It's ice."
José Arcadio Buendía, without understanding, stretched out his hand toward the cake, but the giant moved it away. "Five reales more to touch it," he said. José Arcadio Buendía paid them and put his hand on the ice and held it there for several minutes as his heart filled with fear and jubilation at the contact with mystery. Without knowing what to say, he paid ten reales more so that his sons could have that prodigious experience. Little José Arcadio refused to touch it. Aureliano, on the other hand, took a step forward and put his hand on it, withdrawing it immediately. "It's boiling," he exclaimed, startled. But his father paid no attention to him. Intoxicated by the evidence of the miracle, he forgot at that moment about the frustration of his delirious undertakings and Melquíades' body, abandoned to the appetite of the squids. He paid another five reales and with his hand on the cake, as if giving testimony on the holy scriptures, he exclaimed:
"This is the great invention of our time."