It gives me great pleasure today to say a few words in praise of a man we will all miss very much. To be honest, I can’t imagine we will do without him when he’s gone. Bill Masters almost single-handed built up our sales force in the Houston area and developed the market position that we enjoy today. In only six years, he has brought the firm from a very low fifth position in the area sales to the point where we now outsell all but one of our competitors. Not only have we got 37 per cent of the market under Bill’s leadership; we are increasing our share with each passing month.
As you know, the company has moved Bill to northern California to work his sales magic in one of this company’s competitive areas. But we know that if anyone can do it, Bill Masters can, and I know you all join me in wishing him the best of luck in his new work. The speech was made ________.
| A．at a welcome meeting | B．after someone died |
| C．when somebody was leaving | D．when they had a new manager |
How long did Masters work there?
| A．37 years. | B．Less than 5 years. |
| C．About six years. | D．Since he began to work. |
When Bill started to work in Houston area, he had to help him.
| A．many people | B．nobody | C．about 37 people | D．very few people |
Bill increased the company’s sale________.
| A．by 37 per cent every month | B．to the second largest in the area |
| C．to be the fifth largest in the area | D．five times as much as before |
In the United States, friendships can be close, constant, intense, generous, and real, yet fade away in a short time if things change. Neither side feels hurt by this. Both may exchange Christmas greeting for a year or two, perhaps a few letters for a while—then no more. If the same two people meet again by chance, even years later, they pick up the friendship where it's left off and are delighted.
In the States, you can feel free to visit people's homes and share their holidays without fear that you are taking on a lasting obligation. Do not hesitate to accept hospitality because you cannot give it in return. No one will expect you to do so for they know you are far from home. Americans will enjoy welcoming you and be pleased if you accept their hospitality easily.
Once you arrive there, the welcome will be full and warm and real. Most visitors find themselves easily invited into many homes there. In some countries it is considered inhospitable to entertain at home, offering what is felt as "merely" home cooked food, not "doing something" for your guest. It is felt that restaurant entertaining shows more respect and welcome. Or for various other reasons, such as crowded space, language difficulties, or family custom, outsiders are not invited into homes.
In the United States, both methods are used, but it is often considered more friendly to invite a person to one's home than to go to a public place, except in pure business relationships. So, if your host or hostess brings you home, do not feel that you are being shown inferior treatment..
. In the United States, friendships might ________ if things become different.
| A．disappear little by little | B．last forever |
| C．be heartbreaking | D．end suddenly |
.
All the following factors but ________ prevent people from inviting their friends home for
dinner according to the passage.
| A．different languages | B．naughty children |
| C．different customs | D．small houses |
.
. We can infer that ________ in America according to this passage.
| A．friendships are difficult to get but easy to lose |
| B．it is hard for a person to pick up the friendship when he comes across his long lost friend |
| C．you might be considered as a person hungry for social activities if you accept an invitation too easily |
| D．people care little about where they are invited to go for dinner |
.
. Why is giving a dinner party at home considered less hospitable in some countries?
| A．Because eating at the restaurant is a sign of respect. |
| B．Because having dinner at home seems less friendly. |
| C．Because dishes prepared at home are less delicious. |
| D．Because a dinner at the restaurant is more expensive. |
He has lived through various dangers but time may be running out for the Palestinian leader, Yasser Arafat.
On September
11, Israel announced its decision to remove him, following several Palestinian suicide bomb attacks on Israel. “He should be punished for the killings,” an Israeli official said, “He has done nothing to stop the terrorist groups.”
But the decision has angered many other countries. China said that Arafat is the true leader, elected by the Palestinian people, and removing him would harm the peace in the Middle East. Other governments share this idea.
Arafat himself said: “They can kill me, but never get me out of my country.” He has spent most of his life in danger as the most important aim of Israel. But, just like a cat with nine lives, Arafat escaped every time.
For years he has made a practice of sleeping in a different bed each night, thinking a moving person is harder to hit. In 1985, Israel sent fighter planes to kill Arafat. The wild bombing destroyed his office in Tunis but Arafat himself was unhurt. In 1992, the aircraft in which he was flying over North Africa broke in two during a crash landing. The pilot was killed but he managed to remain alive.
What is so unbelievable is that he always remains calm in great danger. Israeli tanks and planes attacked his office building in Ram Allah in December 2001. When they saw the attackers coming, Arafat’s bodyguards took no notice of his orders to stay still and carried him to safety underground. Seconds later, several bombs were dropped nearby. Though safe, his bodyguards were so frightened that they were wet in sweat.
But, Arafat, with Israeli tanks onl
y 200 meters away, showed no fear at all. He stayed in the damaged office, talking by phone with foreign leaders in hope of preventing further attacks from Israel.
All these experiences have made him a beloved leader to his people and an enemy to some others.
But has he used up the last of his nine lives? Only time will tell..According to the passage, which statement is true?
| A．In 1992, Arafat’s plane crashed in South Africa. |
| B．Israeli officers thought Arafat himself sent the terrorist groups to Israel. |
| C．China is the only country against Israel’s decision of removing Arafat. |
| D．Being Palestinian leader, Arafat would rather die in his own country than be driven away |
from his people... What did the author mean by saying “just like a cat has nine lives” when he talked about Arafat?
| A．Arafat is as clever as a cat. |
| B．Arafat can live as long as a cat. |
| C．Arafat can stay alive after accidents or disasters as if he has nine lives. |
| D．Arafat should have died for at least 8 times. |
.The underlined phrase “took no notice of” can be replaced by __________.
| A．obeyed | B．ignored | C．disagreed | D．dissatisfied |
.. What’s the writer’s attitude towards Arafat’s future, judging from the last sentence of the passage?
| A．Hopeful. | B．Interesting. | C．Satisfactory. | D．Doubtful. |
Time spent in a bookshop can be most enjoyable, whether you are a
book-lover or merely you are there to buy a book as a present. You may even have entered the shop just to find shelter from a sudden shower. Whatever the reason, you can soon become totally unaware of your surroundings. You soon become engrossed in some book or other, and usually it is only much later that you realise you have spent far too much time there and must dash off to keep some forgotten appointment—without buying a book, of course.
This opportunity to escape the realities of everyday life is, I think, the main attraction of a bookshop. There are not many places where it is possible to do this. You can wander round such places to your heart's content. If it is a good shop, no assistant will disturb you with usual greetings, "Can I help you, sir?" Of course you may want to find out where a particular section is. Then, and only then, are his services necessary. However, when he has led you there, the assistant should retire carefully and look as if he is not interested in selling a single book.
You have to be careful not to be attracted by the variety of books in a bookshop. It is very easy to enter the shop looking for a book on ancient coins and to come out carrying a copy of the latest best-selling novel. This sort of thing can be very dangerous. Apart from running up a huge account, you can waste a great deal of time wandering from section to section..
. Which may not be included in the writer's experiences while he is in a bookshop?
A．Getting relaxed without buying a bo ok. |
| B．Quarrelling with the shop assistant. |
| C．Buying other books instead of those he wanted. |
| D．Forgetting some important appointment. |
.
. What does the writer mean by saying "time spent in a bookshop can be most enjoyable"?
| A．You may free yourself from the real life. |
| B．Reading is free of charge there. |
| C．There is nobody disturbing you there. |
| D．You can enter without any certain reason. |
.
What does the underlined wordengrossed most probably mean in the first paragraph?
| A．Lost. | B．Forbidden. | C．Puzzled. | D．Impressed. |
.
. The writer wrote the passage in order to ________.
| A．suggest a good way of running a bookshop |
| B．encourage people to do some reading in bookshops |
| C．share his experience in bookshops |
| D．give some advice on buying books in a bookshop |
One Saturday afternoon in February, 1943, a farmer in Mexico stopped working for a moment and looked across his fields of corn. Suddenly he saw a thin line of white smoke curling up out of his field, about 200 feet from where he stood. As he went toward the smoke to see what it was, he heard a strange noise. The line of smoke became bigger. It looked as if some great force were pushing it up into the sky.
The farmer rushed home to get his wife. While he was urging his wife to hurry from the house, the earth shook violently. When he stood up after the earth stopped shaking, he looked across the field and saw that great flames were rising from his cornfield. A volcano was being born!
They hurried across the shaking earth to the village of Particutin, which was toward their farm. They found the village was seriously destroyed and the road from the village was filled with frightened people hurrying to safety.
Particutin did not become dark that night. The volcano lighted up the sky for miles around. Flames rushed out of the ground. The volcano threw hot stones a thousand feet through the air. Great explosion shook the earth and heavy black ashes fell from the sky, covering the roofs in Mexico city, 180 miles away.
But that was not all. On 
the third evening a float of lava（火山岩）began to boil up from the centre of the volcano. It came over the edge in a heavy flow, 2,000 feet wide, and travelled slowly across the valley, bringing certain death to everything that could not move from its path..
. From the passage we can conclude EXCEPT that .
| A．the volcano threw out a lot of ashes and hot stones |
| B．the volcano lasted several days |
| C．many people had to escape from the village |
| D．it caused many deaths and great loss |
.
. You can find the passage in a .
| A．newspaper | B．government report |
| C．leaflet for travellers | D．handbook |
.
. Which of the following is true according to the passage?
| A．At the beginning the farmer heard a strange cry. |
| B．The farmer was working in the field when the disaster happened. |
| C．The farmer’s wife was working in the field at that moment. |
| D．The village was badly damaged. |
.
What does the passage mainly tell us?
| A．The damage of a volcano. | B．A terrible volcano. |
| C．An unforgettable memory. | D．A farmer’s experience. |
One of the qualities that most people admire in others is the willingness to admit one's mistakes. It is extremely hard sometimes to say a simple thing like "I was wrong about that," and it is even harder to say, "I was wrong, and you were right about that."
I had an experience recently with someone admitting to me that he had made a mistake fifteen years ago. He told me he had been the manager of a certain grocery store in the neighbourhood where I grew up, and he asked me if I remembered the egg boxes. Then he related an incident and I began to remember vaguely the incident he was describing.
I was about eight years old at the time, and I had gone into the store with my mother to do the weekly grocery shopping. On that particular day, I must have found my way to the dairy food department where the incident took place.
There must have been a special sale on eggs that day because there was an impressive display of eggs in dozen and half-dozen boxes. The boxes were stacked three or four feet high. I must have stopped in front of a display to admire the stacks. Just then a woman came by pushing her grocery cart and knocked off the stacks of boxes. For some reason, I decided it was up to me to put the display back together, so I went to work.
The manager heard the noise and came rushing over to see what had happened. When he appeared, I was on my knees inspecting some of the boxes to see if any of the eggs were broken, but to him it looked as if I was the culprit (做错事的人). He severely scolded me and wanted me to pay for any broken eggs. I tried to explain it wasn’t me who had broken them, but it did no good. Even though I quickly forgot all about the incident, obviously the manager did not..
. How old was the author when he wrote this article?
| A．About 8. | B．About 18. | C．About 23. | D．About 15. |
.
Who was to blame for knocking off the stacks of boxes?
| A．The author. | B．The man ager. |
C．A woman. | D．The author's mother. |
.
. Which of the following statements is not true?
| A．The woman who knocked off the stacks of boxes was seriously criticized by the manager. |
| B．The author was severely criticized by the manager. |
| C．A woman carelessly knocked off the stacks of boxes. |
| D．It was the author who put the display back together. |
.
. The tone of the article expresses the author's .
A．regret for the mistake he made in th e store |
| B．admiration for the manager's willingness to admit mistakes |
| C．anger against the woman who knocked off the stacks of boxes |
| D．anger to the manager for his wrong accusation |