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Passage 1: Town and Country Life in England There is a big difference between town life and country life in England. In the country, everybody knows everybody else. They know what time you get up, what time you go to bed and what you have for dinner. If you want help, you will always get it and you will be glad to help others.In a large town like London, however, it can sometimes happen that you have never seen your next door neighbor and you do not know his name or anything about him. People in London are often very lonely. This is because people go to different places in the evenings and at weekends. If you walk through the streets in the center of London on Sunday, it is like a town without people. One is sorry for old people living on their own. They could die in their homes and would not be discovered for weeks or even months. (154 words)Passage 2: A Change in Women’s LifeThe important change in women’s life-pattern has only recently begun to have its full effect on women’s economic position. Even a few years ago most girls left school at the first opportunity, and most of them took a full-time job. However, when they married, they usually left work at once and never returned to it. Today the school-leaving age is sixteen, many girls stay at school after that age, and though women tend to marry younger, more married women stay at work at least until shortly before their first child is born. Very many more afterwards return to full-time or part-time work. Such changes have led to a new relationship in marriage, with the husband accepting a greater share of the duties and satisfactions of family life and with bothhusband and wife sharing more equally in providing themoney, and running the home, according to the abilitiesand interests of each of them. (154 words)Passage 3: A Popular Pastime of the English PeopleOne of the best means of understanding the people ofany nation is watching what they do with theirnon-working time.Most English men, women and children lovegrowing things, especially flowers. Visitors to Englandin spring, summer, or autumn are likely to see gardensall the way along the railway lines. There are flowers atthe airports and flowers in factory grounds, as well as ingardens along the roads. Each English town has at leastone park with beautifully kept flower beds. Publicbuildings of every kind have brilliant window boxesand sometimes baskets of flowers are hanging on them.But what the English enjoy most is growing thingsthemselves. If it is impossible to have a garden, then awindow box or something growing in a pot will do.Looking at each other’s gardens is a popular pastimewith the English. (144 words)Passage 4: British and American Police OfficersReal policemen, both in Britain and the U.S., hardlyrecognize any common points between their lives andwhat they see on TV—if they ever get home in time.Some things are almost the same, of course, but thepolicemen do not think much of them.The first difference is that a policeman’s real lifedeals with the law. Most of what he learns is the law.He has to know actually what actions are against thelaw and what facts can be used to prove them in court.He has to know nearly as much law as a lawyer, andwhat’s more, he has to put it into practice on his feet, inthe dark and, running down a narrow street aftersomeone he wants to talk to.Little of his time is spent in talking with beautifulgirls or in bravely facing cruel criminals. He will spendmost of his working life arranging millions of words onthousands of forms about hundreds of sad, ordinarypeople who are guilty—or not of stupid, unimportantcrimes. (177 words)Passage 5: Living SpaceHow much living space does a person need? Whathappens when his space needs are not met? Scientistsare doing experiments on rats to try to determine theeffects of overcrowded conditions on man. Recentstudies have shown that the behavior of rats is greatlyaffected by space. If rats have enough living space, theyeat well, sleep well and produce their young well. But iftheir living conditions become too crowded, theirbehavior and even their health change obviously. Theycan not sleep and eat well, and signs of fear and worrybecome clear. The more crowded they are, the morethey tend to bite each other and even kill each other.Thus, for rats, population and violence are directlyrelated. Is this a natural law for human society as well?Is enough space not only satisfactory, but necessary forhuman survival? These are interesting questions. (147words)Passage 6: The United NationsIn 1945, representatives of 50 nations met to planthis organization. It was called the United Nations.After the war, many more nations joined.There are two major parts of the United Nations. One is called the General Assembly. In the General Assembly, every member nation is represented and has an equal vote.The second part is called the Security Council. It has representatives of just 15 nations. Five nations are permanent members: the United States, Russia, France, Britain, and China. The 10 other members are elected every two years by the General Assembly.The major job of the Security Council is to keep peace in the world. If necessary, it can send troops from member nations to try to stop little wars before they turn into big ones.It is hard to get the nations of the Security Council to agree on when this is necessary. But they did vote to try to stop wars. (156 words)Passage 7: PlasticWe use plastic wrap to protect our foods. We put our garbage in plastic bags or plastic cans. We sit on plastic chairs, play with plastic toys, drink from plastic cups, and wash our hair with shampoo from plastic bottles! Plastic does not grow in nature. It is made by mixing certain things together. We call it a produced or manufactured material. Plastic was first made in the 1860s from plants, such as wood and cotton. That plastic was soft and burned easily.The first modern plastics were made in the 1930s. Most clear plastic starts out as thick, black oil. That plastic coating inside a pan begins as natural gas.Over the years, hundreds of different plastics have been developed. Some are hard and strong. Some are soft and bendable. Some are clear. Some are many-colored. There is a plastic for almost every need.Scientists continue to experiment with plastics. Theyhope to find even ways to use them! (160 words)Passage 8: Display of GoodsAre supermarkets designed to persuade us to buymore?Fresh fruit and vegetables are displayed nearsupermarket entrances. This gives the impression thatonly healthy food is sold in the shop. Basic foods thateveryone buys, like sugar and tea, are not put near eachother. They are kept in different aisles so customers aretaken past other attractive foods before they find whatthey want. In this way, shoppers are encouraged to buyproducts that they do not really need.Sweets are often placed at children’s eye level at thecheckout. While parents are waiting to pay, childrenreach for the sweets and put them in the trolley.More is bought from a fifteen-foot display of onetype of product than from a ten-foot one. Customersalso buy more when shelves are full than when they arehalf empty. They do not like to buy from shelves withfew products on them because they feel there issomething wrong with those products that are there.(166 words)Passage 9: Albert EinsteinAlbert Einstein was born in Germany in 1879. Hisfather owned a factory that made electrical devices. Hismother enjoyed music and books. His parents wereJewish but they did not observe many of the religion’srules. Albert was a quiet child who spent much of histime alone. He was slow to talk and had difficultylearning to read. When Albert was five years old, hisfather gave him a compass. The child was filled withwonder when he discovered that the compass needlealways pointed in the same direction—to the north. Heasked his father and his uncle what caused the needle tomove. Their answers about magnetism and gravity weredifficult for the boy to understand. Yet he spent a lot oftime thinking about them. He said later that he feltsomething hidden had to be behind things. (143 words)Passage 10: Private CarsWith the increase in the general standard of living,some ordinary Chinese families begin to afford a car.Yet opinions of the development of a private car varyfrom person to person.It gives a much greater degree of comfort andmobility. The owner of a car is no longer forced to relyon public transport, and hence no irritation caused bywaiting for buses or taxis. However, others stronglyobject to developing private cars. They maintain that asmore and more cars are produced and run in the street, alarge volume of poisonous gas will be given off,polluting the atmosphere and causing actual harm to thehealth of people.Whether private cars should be developed in China isa difficult question to answer, yet the desire for thecomfort and independence a private car can bring willnot be eliminated. (143 words)Passage 11: A Henpecked Husband and His WifeThere was once a large, fat woman who had a small,thin husband. He had a job in a big company and wasgiven his weekly wages every Friday evening. As soonas he got home on Fridays, his wife used to make himgive her all his money, and then she used to give himback only enough to buy his lunch in his company every day.One day, the small man came home very excited. He hurried into the living-room. His wife was listening to the radio and eating chocolates there.―You will never guess what happened to me today, dear,‖ he said.He waited for a few seconds and then added, ―I won ten thousand dollars on the lottery!‖―That is wonderful!‖said his wife delightedly. But then she pulled a long face and added angrily, ―But how could you afford to buy the ticket?‖ (148 words) Passage 12: A Young Man’s PromiseOne day a young man was writing a letter to his girl friend who lived just a few miles away in a nearby town. He was telling her how much he loved her and how wonderful he thought she was. The more he wrote the more poetic he became. Finally, he said that in order to be with her he would suffer the greatest difficulties, he would face the greatest dangers that anyone could imagine. In fact, to spend only one minute with her, he would swim across the widest river, he would enter the deepest forest, and he would fight against the fiercest animals with his bare hands.He finished the letter, signed his name, and then suddenly remembered that he had forgotten to mention something quite important. So, in a postscript below his name, he added:―By the way, I’ll be over to see you on Wednesday night, if it doesn't rain.‖ (154 words)Passage 13: A Kind NeighborMr. and Mrs. Jones’apartment was full of luggage, packages, furniture and boxes. Both of them were verybusy when they heard the doorbell ring. Mrs. Joneswent to open it and she saw a middle-aged lady outside.They lady said she lived next door. Mrs. Jones invitedher to come in and apologized because there was noplace for her to sit. ―Oh, that’s OK,‖said the lady. ―Ijust come to welcome you to your new home. As youknow, in some parts of this city neighbors are notfriendly at all. There are some apartment houses wherepeople don’t know any of their neighbors, not even theones next door. But in this building everyone is veryfriendly with everyone else. We are like one big family.I’m sure you’ll be very happy here.‖Mr. and Mrs.Jones said, ―But madam, we are not new dwellers in theapartment. We’ve lived here for two years. We’removing out tomorrow.‖ (163 words)Passage 14: That Isn’t Our FaultMr. and Mrs. Williams got married when he wastwenty-three, and she was twenty. Twenty-five yearslater, they had a big party, and a photographer came andtook some photographs of them.Then the photographer gave Mrs. Williams a cardand said, ―They’ll be ready next Wednesday. You canget them from studio.‖―No,‖ Mrs. Williams said, ―please send them to us.‖The photographs arrived a week later, but Mrs.Williams was not happy when she saw them. She gotinto her car and drove to the photographer’s studio. Shewent inside and said angrily, ―You took somephotographs of me and my husband last week, but I’mnot going to pay for them.‖―Oh, why not?‖ the photographer asked.―Because my husband looks like a monkey,‖Mrs.Williams said.―Well,‖the photographer answered, ―that isn’t ourfault. Why didn’t you think of that before you marriedhim?‖ (148 words)Passage 15: A Guide’s AnswerIn 1861, the Civil War started in the United Statesbetween the Northern and the Southern states. The warcontinued with great bitterness until 1865, when theNortherners were victorious. However, even today,many Southerners have not forgotten their defeat, orforgiven the Northerners.A few years ago, a party of American tourists wasgoing round one of the battlefields of the Civil Warwith a guide who came from one of the Southern states.At each place, the guide told the tourists stirring storiesabout how a few Southern soldiers had conqueredpowerful forces of Northerners there.At last, one of the tourists, a lady who came from theNorth, stopped the guide and said to him, ―But surelythe Northern army must have won at least one victoryin the Civil War?‖―Not as long as I’m the guide here, Madam,‖answered the Southern guide. (147 words)Passage 16: A Qualified PilotThe captain of a small ship had to go along a rockycoast, but he was unfamiliar with it, so he tried to find aqualified pilot to guide him. He went ashore in one ofthe small ports, and a local fisherman pretended that hewas a pilot because he needed some money. The captaintook him on board and asked him where to steer theship.After half an hour the captain began to suspect that the fisherman did not really know what he was doing and where he was going.―Are you sure you are a qualified pilot?‖ he asked. ―Oh, yes,‖answered the fisherman. ―I know every rock on this part of the coast.‖Suddenly there was a terrible crash from under the ship. At once the fisherman added, ―And that’s one of them.‖ (138 words)Passage 17: Living Things ReactYou and all organisms live in an environment. An environment is made up of everything that surrounds an organism. It can include the air, the water, the soil, and even other organisms.An organism responds to changes in its environment. When an organism responds to a change, it reacts in certain ways. All living things respond in some way. Have you ever noticed how plants and insects respond to light? Plants bend toward light. Insects fly toward light.Living things also respond in other ways. The leaves on some trees respond to a change in season. In autumn, they change colors and then fall off the branches. Animals also respond to a change in season. Squirrels save nut for the winter. Bears sleep through the winter in a cave.You respond to your environment in many ways, too. You may shiver if you are cold. What other ways do you respond to changes in your environment? (156 words)Passage 18: Flowering PlantsWhat are the parts of a flower?Flowers can have male parts and female parts. Thefemale parts make eggs that become seeds. The maleparts make pollen. Pollen is a powdery material that isneeded by the eggs to make seeds. To make seeds,pollen and eggs must come together. The wind, insects,and birds bring pollen to eggs. Many animals loveflowers’ bright colors. They also like a sugary liquid inflowers. This is called nectar. While they drink nectar,pollen rubs off on their bodies. As they move, some ofthis pollen gets delivered to the female flower parts.Over time, the female parts turn into fruits thatcontain seeds. Animals often eat the fruits and the seedspass through their bodies as waste. The animals do notknow they are working for the plants by planting seedsas they travel to different places! (137 words)Passage 19: Finding the Direction and LocationHow can you tell which direction? By day, look forthe Sun. It is in the east in the morning and the west inthe afternoon. At night, use the Big Dipper to help youfind the North Star. It would be better to bring acompass because its needle always points north.How do you know how far you have gone? Youcould count every step. Each step is about two feet.You’d better wear a pedometer which is a tool thatcounts steps. If you know where you started, whichdirection you are heading, and how far you have gone,you can use a good map to figure out exactly where youare.Today there is a new way for travelers to figure outwhere they are. It is the GPS. Is has 24 satellites thatorbit the earth and constantly broadcast their positions.Someday you may carry a small receiver as you hikeand use GPS to find out if you are there yet! (167words)Passage 20: WavesHow does light get from the sun to the earth? Howdoes music get from the stage to the audience? Theymove the same way – in waves!Light and sound are forms of energy. All waves carryenergy, but they may carry it differently. Light andsound travel through different kinds of matter. Forexample, light waves cannot move through walls, butsound waves can. That is why you can hear peopletalking in another room even though you cannot seethem. The energy of some waves is destructive. Anearthquake produces seismic waves.Catch a wave. Ask a friend to stand a few feet awayfrom you. Stretch a spring between you. Shake thespring to transfer energy to it. What happens? Thespring bounces up and down in waves. When the wavesreach your friend, they bounce back to you!Light waves travel 300,000 kilometers (186,000miles) per second! They can also travel through avacuum. That is why light from the sun and distant starscan travel through space to the earth! (175 words)Passage 21: SoilsThere are many different kinds of soils. Differentsolids have different types of rock and minerals in them.Some soils have more water in them than others. Somesoils might have more plant and animal material inthem, too.Different kinds of soils are found in different parts ofthe world. There are several kinds of soils found in theUnited States. In some areas, the soil has a lot of clay.Other soils are very sandy. Loam is a kind of soil that has a good mixture of clay and sand.In some places, soil layers are very thick. Lots of plants grow in places with a thick soil layer. In dry and windy places soil layers are much thinner. Layers of soil on mountains are then because gravity pulls the soil downhill.The type of soil in a particular place affects what kinds of plants can grow there. (150 words)Passage 22: CrisisLife is a contest! Who will win? A bluebird and sparrow both compete for space to build their nests. A fast-growing maple tree and slower-growing dogwood compete for the sunlight they both need. Oil competes with coal and nuclear power as an energy source for electric power plants.There is a problem. There is a limited amount of space for birds, sunlight for trees, and energy for people! If we do not cut back on our uses of some of our resources, someday they will be gone!How can we use energy today and know we will have enough to go around in the future? We can choose alternate, or replacement, energy resources. It takes the earth millions of years to create coal, oil, and gas. They are nonrenewable resources.Solar energy, wind energy and water energy are renewable. What other ways can we conserve our resources? How can we make sure there is always enough to go around? (159 words)Passage 23: America’s Worst SurpriseDecember 7, 1941 was one of the worst days in American history. Nearly all Americans who are old enough to remember that day can still remember whatthey were doing at the moment they heard ―the news‖.The news was that America had been attacked!Shortly before 2:00 P.M., a radio dispatch came intoWashington from Honolulu, Hawaii. ―Air Raid, PearlHarbor—this is no drill.‖ Japanese planes had begun anattack on the largest American military base in thePacific. They first destroyed planes on the ground. Thenthey bombed the ships in the harbor.No one had expected the attack. So no one wasprepared for it. And it did not take long for the Japaneseto do their damage. When the smoke cleared, the Navycounted its losses. Eighteen ships had been sunk orbadly damaged. Nearly 150 planes had been destroyed.More than 2,400 Americans had been killed and morethan 1,200 wounded. (157 words)Passage 24: Great Depression in the U.S.In 1929, the bills started to come in. Americanindustry had produced too many goods. Americanscould not afford to buy all of them. So factories had tocut down on their production. Many workers lost theirjobs. Investors tried to get their money back. Butbusinesses did not have enough money to pay them.Banks tried to get their money back from investors. Butthe investors could not pay, either. Too many peopleowed money. And few of them could pay their bills.During the next few years, business got worse andworse. By 1932, banks all over the country wereclosing.People without money could not buy goods. So morebusinesses closed. More and more people lost their jobs.By 1932, more than 12 million Americans were jobless.Millions more were earning barely enough to live on.The country was in a great depression they had neverexperienced before. (151 words)Passage 25: A Place of Our OwnWe are all usually very careful when we buysomething for the house. Why? Because we have to livewith it for a long time. We paint a room to make itbrighter, so we choose the colors carefully.We buy new curtains in order to match the newlydecorated room, so they must be the right color. Wemove the furniture round so as to make more space—orwe buy new furniture—and so on. It is an endlessbusiness.Rich or poor, we take time to furnish a room. Perhapssome people buy furniture in order to impress theirfriends. But most of us just want to enjoy oursurroundings. We want to live as comfortably as we canafford to. We spend a large part of our lives at home.We want to make a small corner in the world which wecan recognize as our own. (151 words)Passage 26: Travel for WorkYou can see them in every airport in the world.They are businessmen and women who have to travelfor their work.When they first applied for the job, they may havethought of good food and hotels, huge expense accountsand fashionable cities. Now they have to sit in airportlounges, tired and uncomfortable in their smart clothes,listening to the loudspeaker announces ―The flight toTokyo, or Berlin, or New York is delayed for anothertwo hours.‖Some people say to me, ―How lucky youare to be able to travel abroad in your work! You can gosightseeing without paying any money by yourself!‖They think that my job is like a continual holiday. It is not.There are advantages, of course, and I do think I am lucky, but only because I can go to places I would never visit if I was a tourist. (149 words)Passage 27: IntelligenceAre some people born clever and others born stupid? Or is intelligence developed by our environment and our experience?Strangely enough, the answer to these questions is yes. To some extend our intelligence is given us at birth, and no amount of special education can make a genius out of a child born with low intelligence. On the other hand, a child who lives in a boring environment will develop his intelligence less than one who lives in rich and varied surroundings. Thus, the limits of a person’s intelligence are fixed at birth, whether or not he reaches those limits will depend on his environment. This view, held by most experts now, can be supported in a number of ways. As is easy to show that intelligence is to some extend something we are born with. The closer the blood relationship between two people is the closer they are likely to be in intelligence. (154 words) Passage 28: A Free Dress Every WeekThe temptation to steal is greater than ever before especially in large shops and people are not so honest as they once were.A detective recently watched a well-dressed woman who always went into a large store on Monday mornings. One Monday, there were fewer people in the shop than usual when the woman came in, so it was easier for the detective to watch her. The woman firstbought a few small articles. After a little time, she choseone of the most expensive dresses in the shop andhanded it to an assistant who wrapped it up for her asquickly as possible. The woman simply took the parceland walked out of the shop without paying. When shewas arrested, the detective found out that the shopassistant was her daughter. Believe it or not, the girl―gave‖ her mother a free dress every week! (148 words)Passage 29: TimeTime is tangible. One can gain time, spend time,waste time, save time, or even kill time. Commonquestions in American English reveal this concretequality as though time were a possession. ―Do you haveany time?‖, ―Can you get some time for this?‖, ―Howmuch free time do you have?‖ The treatment of time asa possession influences the way that time is carefullydivided.Generally, Americans are taught to do one thing at atime and may be uncomfortable when an activity isinterrupted. In businesses, the careful scheduling oftime and the separation of activities are commonpractices. Appointment calendars are printed with 15-,30-, and 60-minute time slots. The idea that ―there is atime and place for everything‖extends to Americansocial life. Visitors who drop by without prior noticemay interrupt their host’s personal time. Thus, callingfriends on the telephone before visiting them isgenerally preferred to visitor s’dropping by. (157words)Passage 30: CartoonistsIn a good cartoon, the artist can tell in a few lines asmuch as a writer can tell in half a dozen paragraphs.The cartoonist not only tells a story but he also tries topersuade the reader to his way of thinking. He has greatinfluence on public opinion. In a political campaign, heplays an important part. Controversial issues inCongress or at meetings of the United Nations maykeep the cartoonist well-supplied with currentmaterials.A clever cartoonist may cause laughter because heoften uses humor in his drawings. If he is sketching afamous person, he takes a prominent feature andexaggerates it. Cartoonists, for instance, like to lengthenan already long nose and to widen an already broad grin.This exaggeration of a person’s characteristics is calledcaricature. The artist uses such exaggeration to put hismessage across. (144 words)Passage 31：Water PollutionWater is very important to us. Factories and plantsneed water for industrial uses and large pieces offarmland need it for irrigation. Without water to drink,people die in a short time.Today most water sources are so dirty that peoplemust purify water before drinking. Water becomes dirtyin many ways: industrial pollution is one of them. Withthe development of industry, plants and factories pourtons of industrial wastes into rivers every day. Therivers have become seriously polluted, and the water isbecoming unfit for drinking or irrigation. The samething has also happened to our seas and oceans. So, theproblem of water pollution is almost worldwide.Scientists of many countries have done a lot ofwork to stop pollution. The polluted water in some。