His book is, however, （7）a useful companion to the explorer's autobiography, “The Life of My Choice”. Hopefully, it will also refer readers back to Sir Wilfred's two great books, and to sentences as lovely as this: “Memories of that first visit to the Marshes have never left me: （8）firelight on a half-turned face, the crying of geese, duck ★flighting[16] in to feed, a boy's voice singing somewhere in the dark, canoes moving in procession down a waterway, the setting sun seen crimson through the smoke of burning reed-beds, narrow waterways that wound still deeper into the Marshes.”

话说回来，梅特兰的这本书还是对威福瑞自传《我所选择的人生》起到了有益的助阵作用。但愿这本传记也能让读者重新想起威福瑞那两本伟大著作，想起这些动人的语句：“沼泽地的第一次旅行始终萦怀：映照在侧头而望的脸上的火光，群鹅的鸣叫，结对飞入觅食的鸭子，黑暗某处男孩的歌声，顺水而行的独木舟，透过芦苇垫燃烧发出的浓烟看到那绯红的落日，狭窄的河道蜿蜒而入沼泽深处。”