8、A friend of ours was walking down a deserted Mexican beach at sunset．As he walked along, he began to see another man in the distance．As he drew   1　, he, who had been feeling so tired of teaching those naughty children at school, suddenly   2   the local native kept   3 down, picking something up and throwing it out into the water．Time and again he kept hurling （猛投） things out into the ocean．

As our friend   4   even closer, he found that the man was picking up starfish that had been washed up on the beach and, one   5  , he was   6   them back into the water．

Our friend was   7  ．He got close to the man and said, “Good evening, friend．I was  8  what you are doing．”

“I am throwing these starfish back into the ocean．You see, it’s   9   tide right now and all of these starfish have been   10   up onto the shore． 11   I don’t throw them back into the sea, they’ll die up here from   12   of oxygen．”

“I   13   that,” our friend replied, “but there must be thousands of starfish on this beach．You can’t  14   get to all of them．There are   15   too many．And don’t you realize this is probably happening on hundreds of beaches all up and down this   16  ．Can’t you see that you are not able to make a   17  ?”

The local native  18  , bent down and picked up yet   19   starfish, and as he threw it back into the sea, he   20  , “Made a difference to that one!”

1．A．farther                  B．nearer                 C．older                   D．stronger

2．A．observed               B．realized                C．discovered           D．noticed

3．A．slipping                 B．moving                C．bending               D．falling

4．A．marched               B．approached          C．swam                 D．ran

5．A．at a time                B．from time to time C．at times               D．in no time

6．A．giving                   B．throwing             C．dragging             D．waving

7．A．frightened             B．moved                 C．shocked             D．puzzled

8．A．recording              B．wondering           C．following             D．forecasting

9．A．low                      B．huge                   C．rising                  D．changeable

10．A．cleaned               B．dried                   C．pushed                D．washed

11．A．If                        B．Though               C．Because              D．Unless

12．A．quality                 B．lack                    C．balance               D．damage

13．A．challenge             B．suspect               C．understand          D．excuse

14．A．luckily                 B．possibly               C．hardly                 D．quickly

15．A．simply                 B．basically              C．approximately      D．especially

16．A．island                  B．coast                   C．ocean                  D．tide

17．A．sacrifice              B．choice                 C．profit                  D．difference

18．A．smiled                 B．prayed                C．sighed                 D．frowned

19．A．another               B．that                    C．one                    D．other

20．A．praised               B．commented          C．replied                D．added