In 1859，during the Gold Rush，a twenty- year-old immigrant（移民）from Bavaria named Levi Strauss stepped off the boat in San Francisco. He had with him a special cloth called Serge de Nimes that was later called denim in America. Levi Strauss hoped to sell the denim as material to make tents and covers for wagons to the men who were going to the goldfields to look for gold.

“You should have brought trousers to sell. In the goldfields we need strong trousers that don‘t wear out，”one young miner advised Strauss. So Levi Strauss took some of his denim to the nearest tailor and had him make the miner a pair of trousers. The miner was so pleased that he told other miners about the wonderful newcomer，Levi，and soon Levi Strauss had to open a shop，producing enough trousers for the miners. The miners wanted trousers that were comfortable to ride in and were low cut so that they could bend over easily to pick up the gold from under their feet. Besides they wanted the trousers to have big useful pockets. One miner complained that the gold in his pockets kept tearing them. So Levi put metal corners in the pockets to make them stronger. Very soon，miners and cowboys from all over came to get fitted up with Levi‘s trousers. Today more than a hundred years later， Levi’s trousers walk the world a Levi‘s blue jeans（牛仔裤）。

1.The denim cloth was originally（起初）meant for____.

A. making tent covers and wagons

B. making tents for wagons

C. making trousers for the miners

D. making wagon covers and tents

2.What kind of material do you think is denim？

A.A strong type of cloth that is not torn by strong wears.

B.A special type of cloth that cannot be washed away by rain.

C.A smooth type of cloth that is for underwear.

D.A wonderful type of cloth that is as good as metal.

3.A miner advised Strauss to sell trousers because ____.

A. the miners didn‘t have enough trousers

B. the miner‘s trousers had not been strong enough

C. the miner‘s trousers did not wear out easily

D. the tailor on the goldfield could not make trousers

4.Why did the miners need strong pockets in the trousers？

A. Their pockets kept tearing the gold.

B. Their pockets were not made of metal.

C. The gold they found was too sharp and heavy to tear their pockets.

D. The gold they collected easily tore their pockets.

When I was in medical college, I went camping with some of my friends on the seaside. After ____16____(arrive) there, we rented a room and left our luggage there. The sea and the weather were beautiful, ____17____ we finished lunch and then decided to rent a boat.
We started to row, but about one mile out, the weather suddenly changed. ___18____ the weather was not good, we didn’t want to give up, but finally my friends and I agreed that we should go back. We tried to change the boat’s direction, but ___19____oarlock(桨) broke. Therefore, we were unable to turn back. What we could do was wait ___20___ help.
The sea changed a lot, the waves got very high, and the boat began to shake like a cradle(摇篮). One of my friends started to cry ; ____21___ started to feel sick. There hours passed, and nobody came to help us. We were just praying. _____22_____(fortunate), after five long hours of waiting, two big boats came to rescue ____23___ and we escaped. If they ____24____(not come) to get us, we would have crossed the border between Turkey and Greece because the border was very close.
This story is ____25____(excite) story of my life because we could have died, but luck was with us and we escaped.

The dream of flying like Buzz Lightyear never dies. For years, space-age inventors have tested one wearable jet pack after another. And time after time, the designs have been grounded by dangerous fuels, excessive weight, or very loud noise levels. Now a Canadian inventor has sidestepped those weaknesses with an aquatic jet pack. Designed for travel over lakes or oceans, it’s driven by pressurized water, not burning rocket fuel.

When Raymond Li first told the idea for the aquatic jet pack to his friends, they said he must be nuts. How could a jet pack carry that much water? Its thrust-to-weight rate would be so low and it would never become airborne. Thrust-to-weight rate is a measure of the forward force produced compared with the weight of the vehicle. A vehicle with a low thrust-to-weight rate is relatively heavy for the amount of force it generates.
Li's genius idea was to place the jet pack’s engine and its water pump in a separate boat. The pump would draw water from the lake the boat was floating on. It would then force the water under pressure through a hose connected to the jet pack. The hose would be long enough to let the pack go up as high as 8.5 meters (28 feet) in the air.
Today, Li's invention, the Jetlev-Flyer, is ready to go into production. The pack itself, complete with jet nozzles （管嘴） and handlebars, weighs just 14 kilograms. The boat is a floating pod. To take off, the operator hits a trigger on a handlebar, which starts the pump, and then turns the throttle. Two streams of high-velocity water shoot through the hose and out the nozzles, lifting the operator into the air. The operator hovers there or pushes down on the handlebars, zooming forward at speeds of up to 64 kilometers per hour, pulling the pod behind.
【小题1】All the following factors contribute to the failure of inventing a wearable jet pack EXCEPT ______.

—Shall I sit at this end of the boat or the other end?

 —If you keep still, you can sit at _____end.

 A. neither   B. each   C. either D.any

你将阅读的是一篇关于鲨鱼袭击的文章。有五处段落从文章中被取出了。请从A-F这六个选项中选出正确的选项填入空格中。选项中有一项是多余选项。

When I was eight, my parents, my younger brother, Stewart, and a girl called Margo Edwards, who was at school with us, went on holiday to Mozambique. One day, we took out a small rowing boat with an outboard motor on it, and went fishing on a lagoon at a place called San Martina.

Suddenly, as if out of nowhere, there was this disturbance in the water. I remember at first everyone thought it was a dolphin, but it wasn't leaping in and out of the water, and before long we could see this grey fin moving purposefully towards us.

It then circled around our rowing boat, and I remember my father saying: 'Well, I think that's a shark . . .'

My mother was screaming, and father was shouting obscenities at this thing, which he was to bash (痛击) back with one of the oars. I had never seen my parents in obvious terror before, and that's something which never leaves you.

My mother clutched the three of us around her. I remember she had a navy blue robe, with huge starfishes and sunflowers on it, and us three kids gratefully huddled together inside it.

As soon as we were in the fishing boat there was this almost hysterical laughter, and I remember feeling very cold, and being unable to stop trembling.

We all talked about it continually, too, and probably made out we were far braver than we were. And there was lots of re-enactment(表演). I remember that we made mud pools. One of us would be crawling along, playing the shark, and the others screaming and shouting: 'Kill the shark'.