The Home of My People

     When Lewis and Clark stepped onto the Weippe Prairie in present-day Idaho in September 1805, they
met the Nez Perce Indians. In the following years, the white explorers (探险者) began to fight with the
Indians for their land. Some Nez Perce chiefs signed agreements with the U.S. government, selling part
of their lands. But the government always broke those agreements and demanded more land.
     Other chiefs refused to go along with the government's plans. The most famous was Chief Joseph,
whose people lived in the Wallowa Valley(present-day Oregon).  "In order to have all people understand
how much land we owned," he once explained,"my father planted poles around it and said:  'Inside is the
home of my people…It circled around the graves (坟墓) of our fathers, and we will never give up these
graves to any man. '
     But in 1874, the U.S. government declared the valley open for white settlement and ordered the Nez
Perce onto a reservation (保留地). Seeing that resistance was useless, Chief Joseph agreed to move.
     Later, fighting broke out between the Nez Perce and U.S. soldiers. Chief Joseph tried to lead his people
to Canada, winning several battles against the soldiers during their flight. But finally, he was forced to give
in.

1. Which historic site (on the map)lies in the south of today's Nez Perce Reservation?

A. Buffalo Eddy.
B. Dug Bar.
C. Joseph Canyon Viewpoint.
D. Chief Looking Glass Camp.

2. What can we learn about the Nez Perce lands from the map?

A. They were in the state of Oregon.
B. They have become a historic site.
C. They have become much smaller.
D. They were limited to the Wallowa Valley.

3. From Paragraph 3, we know that the Indians wanted to ______.

A. show off their land
B. keep their land
C. turn their place into a graveyard
D. build their homes around the poles

     Whoever has made a voyage up the Hudson River must remember the Catskill Mountains. They are a
branch of the great Appalachian family, and can be seen to the west rising up to a noble height and towering
over the surrounding country. When the weather is fair and settled, they are clothed in blue and purple, and
print their beautiful shapes on the clear evening sky, but sometimes when it is cloudless, gray steam gathers
around the top of the mountains which, in the last rays of the setting sun, will shine and light up like a crown
of glory (华丽的皇冠).
     At the foot of these mountains, a traveler may see light smoke going up from a village.
     In that village, and in one of the houses (which, to tell the exact truth, was sadly time-worn and weather-
beaten), there lived many years ago, a simple, good-natured fellow by the name of Rip Van Winkle.
     Rip's great weakness was a natural dislike of all kinds of money-making labor. It could not be from lack
of diligence (勤劳), for he could sit all day on a wet rock and fish without saying a word, even though he
was not encouraged by a single bite. He would carry a gun on his shoulder for hours, walking through woods
and fields to shoot a few birds or squirrels. He would never refuse to help a neighbor, even in the roughest
work. The women of the village, too, used to employ him to do such little jobs as their less helpful husbands
would not do for them. In a word, Rip was ready to attend to everybody's business but his own.
     If left to himself, he would have whistled ( 吹口哨) life away in perfect satisfaction; but his wife was
always mad at him for his idleness (懒散). Morning, noon, and night, her tongue was endlessly going, so that
he was forced to escape to the outside of the house-the only side which, in truth, belongs to a henpecked
husband.

1. Which of the following best describes the Catskill Mountains?

A. They are on the west of the Hudson River.
B. They are very high and beautiful in this area.
C. They can be seen from the Appalachian family.
D. They gather beautiful clouds in blue and purple.

2. The hero of the story is probably _____.

A. hard-working and likes all kinds of work
B. idle and hates all kinds of jobs
C. simple, idle but very dutiful
D. gentle, helpful but a little idle

3. The underlined words "henpecked husband" in the last paragraph probably means a man who _____.

A. likes hunting
B. is afraid of hens
C. loves his wife
D. is afraid of his wife

4. What would be the best title for the text?

A. Catskill Mountains.
B. A Mountain Village.
C. Rip Van Winkle.
D. A Dutiful Husband.

     Fidenzio Salvatori is determined that the city of Toronto will have an outdoor marketplace for merchants
from its immigrant community, complete with dancing and other forms of amusement from their native
countries. "Toronto is truly multicultural (多元文化的)," he said in a newspaper interview. "It's a city from
many places, and a multicultural marketplace will help Torontonians to understand and appreciate the rich
variety of cultural groups in our city."
    Salvatori, aged 23, will soon complete his studies at the University of Toronto. He was eleven years old
when he came to Canada from Italy with his parents. "Most of Toronto's immigrants are from lands where
the marketplace has always been part of daily life," he said.
     Salvatori has been interested in getting an open-air market for Toronto for the last three years. This year,
with the help of two fellow students, he prepared a proposal on the subject and presented it to the city's
Executive Committee, asking for their support. The proposal pointed out Toronto's rich variety of national
groups, "whose customs include market shopping."
     Under a Canadian government program for multiculturalism, the three students have received two thousand
dollars with which they will do a study to find out whether Toronto's immigrant businessmen would support
and open-air market. They hope the merchants will support the plan strongly. "A study done earlier this year
showed that 90 percent of shoppers would be in favor of it," Salvatori said. "At first it would be an experiment.
But we think it will prove to be good business for the merchants, as well as a tourist attraction."

1. What is Fidenzio Salvatori's purpose of having an outdoor marketplace for Toronto?

A. To provide different forms of amusement
C. To inspire its immigrant community
B. To keep the cultural variety of the city
D. To satisfy its immigrant merchants

2. Fidenzio Salvatori, with two other students, has got two thousand dollars from the government _____.

A. to make an experiment
B. to start a marketplace
C. to perform a research
D. to operate a business

3. According to Salvatori, the marketplace may also help to improve Toronto's ________.

A. market management
B. community service
C. travel industry
D. city planning

4. It can be inferred from the text that the Canadian government supports _______.

A. the protection of different cultures
B. the plan of an open-air market
C. the request of merchants
D. the attitude of shoppers

     We live in a technological society where most goods are mass-produced by unskilled labor. Because
of this, most people that craft (手艺) no longer exists. 
     One of the ways these people wrongly support their view is by pointing to 100-year-old homes which
are still solid, and arguing that it is the craftsmanship that is responsible for their durability (持久性). "Homes
in those days were well-built," they say. No doubt these homes were well-built, but what these people have
done is mix up the quality of material used in the house with the quality of the craftsmanship.
     Homes today could be built to last just as long as those old homes if people were willing or able to pay
the price. For example, more people can no longer afford solid oak stairways, although they were once fairly
common in older homes. Nor can they afford the high labor cost of employing a carpenter (木匠) to built
the stairway. Yet if someone can pay the high cost, there are still plenty of carpenters around able to make
those stairways. And not only would these carpenters know how to built them, they would probably do a
better job than carpenters of old.
     One thing the modern carpenter has which enables him to do a better job is much more advanced tools.
Such tools as laser beams and power planes help them lay out a house better and make more precision cuts
(精确切割) on the wood. Also, it is not uncommon any more to find carpenters with college degrees and
carpenters with a solid knowledge of mathematics, which would enable them to deal with more difficult
house designs.
     The problem of modern quality, then, really boils down to the problem of material, for the modern
carpenter is just as able to produce craftsmanship as the carpenter of fifty years ago, but only if given proper
material.

1. Compared to the carpenters in the past, modern carpenters are ______.

A. more successful
B. more learned
C. more imaginative
D. more hardworking

2. what does the underlined word "they" (paragraph2) refer to?

A. Carpenters who are fond of oak stairways.
B. Carpenters who have college degrees.
C. people who think highly of carpenters of old
D. people who think that modern material is of low quality.

3. What does the third paragraph mainly discuss?

A. People in the past preferred to use oak to built stairways.
B. It is now expensive to employ a carpenter.
C. Modern houses last as long as the old one.
D. Good carpenters still exist in modern times.

4. What would be the best title for the text?

A. Is Craft Dead?
B. Craft, Back to life?
C. History of craftsmanship
D. Carpenters Today and Yesterday

     If you ask people to name the one person who had the greatest effect on the English language, you will
get answers like "Shakespeare," "Samuel Johnson," and "Webster," but none of these men had any effect at
all compared to a man who didn't even speak English -William the Conqueror.
     Before 1066,in the land we now call Great Britain lived peoples belonging to two major language groups.
In the west-central region lived the Welsh, who spoke a Celtic language,and in the north lived the Scots,
whose language, though not the same as Welsh, was also Celtic.In the rest of the country lived the Saxons,
actually a mixture of Anglos, Saxons,and other Germanic and Nordic people,who spoke what we now call
Anglo-Saxon (or Old English ), a Germanic language. If this state of affairs had lasted, English today would
be close to German.
     But this state of affairs did not last. In 1066 the Normans led by William defeated the Saxons and began
their rule over England.For about a century,French became the official language of England while Old English
became the language of peasants. As a result,English words of politics and the law come from French rather
than German. In some cases,modern English even shows a distinction (区别) between upper-class French
and lower-class Anglo-Saxon in its words.We even have different words for some foods, meat in particular,
depending on whether it is still out in the fields or at home ready to be cooked,which shows the fact that the
Saxon peasants were doing the farming, while the upper-class Normans were doing most of the eating.
     When Americans visit Europe for the first time, they usually find Germany more "foreign" than France
because the German they see on signs and advertisements seems much more different from English than
French does.Few realize that the English language is actually Germanic in its beginning and that the French
influences are all the result of one man's ambition.

1. The two major languages spoken in what is now called Great Britain before 1066 were _____. 

A. Welsh and Scottish
B. Nordic and Germanic
C. Celtic and Old English
D. Anglo-Saxon and Germanic

2. Which of the following groups of words are,by inference,rooted in French?

A. president,lawyer,beef
B. president, bread,water
C. bread,field,sheep
D. folk,field,cow

3. Why does France appear less foreign than Germany to Americans on their first visit to Europe?

A. Most advertisements in France appear in English.
B. They know little of the history of the English language.
C. Many French words are similar to English ones.
D. They know French better than German.

4. What is the subject discussed in the text?

A. The history of Great Britain.
B. The similarity between English and French
C. The rule of England by William the Conqueror.
D. The French influences on the English language.

     Tristan da Cunha, a 38-square-mile island, is the farthest inhabited island in the world, according to the
Guinness Book Records. It is 1,510 miles southwest of its nearest neighbor, St. Helena, and 1, 950 miles
west of Africa. Discovered by the Portuguese admiral (葡萄牙海军上将) of the same name in 1506 and
settled in 1810, the island belongs to Great Britain and has a population of a few hundred.
     Coming in a close second-and often wrongly mentioned as the most distant land-is Easter Island, which
lies 1, 260 miles east of its nearest neighbor. Pitcairn Island, and 2, 300 miles west of South America.
     The mountainous 64-square-mile island was settled around the 5th century, supposedly by people who
were lost at sea. They had no connection with the outside world for more than a thousand years, giving them
plenty of time to build more than 1, 000 huge stone figures, called moat, for which the island is most famous.
     On Easter Sunday, 1722, however, settlers from Holland moved in and gave the island its name. Today,
2,000 people live on the Chilean territory (智利领土). They share one street, a small airport and a few hours
of television per day.

1. It can be learned from the text that the island of Tristan da Cunha _____.

A. was named after its discoverer
B. got its name from Holland settlers
C. was named by the British government
D. got its name from the Guinness Book of Records

2. Which of the following is most famous for moat?

A. Tristan da Cunha.
B. Pitcairn Island.
C. Easter Island.
D. St. Helena.

3. Which country does Easter Island belong to?

A. Britain.
B. Holland.
C. Portugal.
D. Chile.

     There is one foreign product the Japanese are buying faster than others and its popularity has caused an
uneasy feeling among many Japanese.
     That product is foreign words.
     Gairaigo-words that come from outside-have been part of the Japanese language for centuries. Mostly
borrowed from English and Chinese, these terms are often changed into forms no longer understood by native
speakers.
     But in the last few years the trickle (涓涓细流) of foreign words has become a flood, and people fear the
increasing use of foreign words is making it hard for the Japanese to understand each other and could lead to
many people forgetting the good qualities of traditional (传统的) Japanese.
     "The popularity of foreign words is part of the Japanese interest in anything new, says university lecturer
and writer Takashi Saito. "By using a foreign word you can make a subject seem new, which makes it easier
for the media (媒体) to pick up."
     "Experts (专家) often study abroad and use English terms when they speak with people in their own fields.
Those terms are then included in government white papers," said Muturo Kai, president of the National
Language Research Institute. "Foreign words find their way easily into announcements made to the general
public, when they should really be explained in Japanese."
     Against the flow of new words, many Japanese are turning back to the study of their own language. Saito's
Japanese to Be Read Aloud is one of many language books that are now flying off booksellers shelves.
     "We were expecting to sell the books to young people," said the writer. "but it turns out they are more
popular with the older generation, who seem uneasy about the future of Japanese."

1. What advantages do foreign words have over traditional Japanese terms?

A. The ideas expressed in foreign words sound new.
B. Foreign words are best suited for announcements.
C. Foreign words make new subjects easier to understand.
D. The use of foreign words makes the media more popular.

2. In the opinion of Takashi Saito, Japanese people _____.

A. are good at learning foreign languages
B. are willing to learn about new things
C. trust the media
D. respect experts

3. Which of the following plays an important part in the spread of foreign words?

A. The media and government papers.
B. Best-selling Japanese textbooks.
C. The interest of young Japanese.
D. Foreign products and experts.

4. The book Japanese to Be Read Aloud _____.

A. sells very well in Japan
B. is supported by the government
C. is questioned by the old generation
D. causes misunderstanding among the readers

     One difference from the other cities is that London has two centres: the City of London, the centre of
business, and Westminster, the centre of the official offices. The City of London is in fact a small area and
only about 5,000 people live there but it is the centre of British business. The City of Westminster not only
has the Houses of Parliament (议院) but also the different official offices which control the country.?
     Other famous areas are the West End and the East End. The West End is the part that visitors usually
see because it has many famous shops, such as Selfridges and Simpsons, and many museums such as the
National Art Building and the Museum of Mankind. Most of the big London theatres and cinemas are also
in the West End. The East End has always been poor and not interesting but the home of the true Londoner,
the "Cockney". People say that a Cockney has to be born within the sound of Bow Bells: this means that he
could hear the sound of the bells in a church (教堂) in Bow, a place of the East End. The East End used to
have the docks (船坞) and some factories but now the docks and many of the factories have moved out of
London.
     London is now a mixture of peoples who came from many countries but are now just Londoners. Many
people came from the old British colonies (殖民地). But there are also large groups of people from Poland,
from Italy, from France, and from many other countries. Now you can buy food from any country and hear
any language spoken in London. The only difficulty is finding a restaurant where you can eat English food.

1. The "Cockney" is _____.??

A. the home of the true Londoner?
B. the Londoner?
C. a Londoner who was born in Bow and lives in the East End?
D. the Londoner who likes cocks

2. The East End is known for it _____.?

A. has famous places?
B. is very poor?
C. has docks?
D. has theatres and museums ?

3. The last sentence of the passage tells us _____.? ?

A. there are few restaurants whose owners are English?
B. there are many Londoners who were not English before?
C. English food has changed after long years of the mixture of people
D. the English food is too expensive to eat