Dec. 24, 1848
Dear Johnston,
Your request for eighty dollars, I do not think it best to satisfy now. At the various times when I have helped you a little, you have said to me, “We can get along very well again,” but in a very short time I find you in the same difficulty again. Now this can only happen by some fault in your behavior. What that fault is, I think I know. You are not lazy, and still you are an idler(游手好闲). I doubt whether since I saw you, you have done a good whole day’s work, in any other day. You do not very much dislike to work, and still you do not work much, merely because it does not seem to you that you could get much for it.
This habit of uselessly wasting time is the whole difficulty; it is vastly important to you, and still more so to your children, that you should break this habit. It is more important to them, because they have longer to live, and can keep out of an idle habit before they are in it, easier than they can get out after they are in.
You are now in need of some ready money; and what I suggest is, that you shall go to work hard, for somebody who will give you money for it.
Let father and your boys take charge of your things at home-prepare for a crop, and make the crop, and you go to work for the best money wages, or to pay back any debt you owe. And to secure you a fair reward for your labor, I now promise you that for every dollar you will, between this and the first of May, get for your own labor, I will then give you one other dollar. By this, if you hire yourself at ten dollars a month, from me you will get ten more, making twenty dollars a month for your work.
Now if you will do this, you will soon be out of debt, and what is better, you will have a habit that will keep you from getting in debt again. But if I should now clear you out, next year you will be just as deep in as ever. You say you would almost give your place in Heaven for $ 70 or $80. Then you value your place in Heaven cheaply, for I am sure you can with the offer I make you get the seventy or eighty dollars for four or five months’ work. You say if I furnish you the money you will deed(抵押) me the land, and if you don’t pay the money back, you will deliver possession-Nonsense! If you can’t now live with the land, how will you then live without it? You have always been kind to me, and I do not now mean to be unkind to you. On the contrary, if you will but follow my advice, you will find it worth more than eight time eighty dollars to you.
Affectionately
Your brother
A. Lincoln Abraham Lincoln wrote the letter to Johnston mainly to ________.
| A．show his concern for him | B．recommend him to save money |
| C．decline his request and motivate him | D．introduce him a new job |
What’s the problem with Johnston, according to Lincoln?
| A．He was very lazy. | B．He wasted time a lot. |
| C．He couldn’t get much from work. | D．He disliked working. |
In the letter Lincoln suggested that Johnston should ________.
| A．keep himself from getting into trouble | B．go to work hard for somebody |
| C．manage well the things at home | D．keep the children out of the idle habit |
If Johnston got one dollar for his work, Lincoln promised to _________.
| A．reward him with labor | B．pay off his debt |
| C．hire him at 10 dollars a month | D．give him another dollar |
In order to get 80 dollars from Lincoln, Johnston promised to ________.
| A．take away his place in Heaven | B．deed Lincoln the land |
| C．live without the land | D．do good work every day |
“Eat local.” It’s one way to reduce human effect on the planet. Eating local means to try to buy and consume foods that are grown in places close to home. However, most of the food sold at supermarkets is not locally grown or produced. Trucks and planes deliver these foods from hundreds or thousands of miles away. During the transportation, greenhouse(温室)gases are produced, causing global warming. So the shorter the distance your foods must travel, the less the harm is done to the environment.
But how do you get local food if you live in a large city, hundreds of miles away from farms？Environmental health scientist Dickson Despommier and his students came up with the idea of a “vertical(垂直的)farm”. 
A vertical farm is a glass-walled structure that could be built as tall as a skyscraper(摩天大楼). Since the garden is built upwards, rather than outwards, it requires much less space than an ordinary farm. The world is quickly running out of room for ordinary farming. Vertical farms could be a key to this situation. Despommier imagines a 30-story building with a greenhouse on every floor. The walls of the building would be clear, to allow crops to get as much sunlight as possible. Depending on a city’s water resources, Despommier thinks hydroponic(水培的) farming is another method for the vertical farm which needs no soil to grow plants.
Despommier says the hydroponic greenhouses would use a system that would use a city’s waste water and fill it with nutritions to make the crops grow. If this method works, it would provide food to a city and save millions of tons of water.
The idea of a vertical farm has attracted the attention of government officials around the world. Scott Stringer, a government official from New York City, thinks the city is suitable for the vertical farming. “Obviously we don’t have much land left for us,” Stringer said. “But the sky is the limit in Manhattan. ”
Despommier admits that there is still a lot of work to do to make vertical farms a reality. “But I think vertical farming is an idea that can work in a big way,” he says.Why are people advised to eat local?
| A．Because it means convenience(方便) to people. |
| B．Because it can help people save a lot of money. |
| C．Because local food has more nutrition. |
| D．Because it is environmentally friendly. |
Which is one of the vertical farm’s benefits when compared with ordinary farming?
| A．It produces healthier food. |
| B．It does less harm to the cities. |
| C．It needs less space of the city. |
| D．It requires less transport costs. |
By saying “the sky is the limit in Manhattan”, Stringer means _____.
| A．people can make full use of vertical space of Manhattan |
| B．there is a limit for using empty land in Manhattan |
| C．the height of buildings in Manhattan is limited |
| D．Manhattan can spread as far as possible |
What can we learn about the vertical farming in the passage?
| A．No soil is needed to grow plants in a vertical farm. |
| B．It has solved the problem of the food shortage in a big way. |
| C．It is a 30-story building with a greenhouse on every floor. |
| D．Crops are mainly grown in the rainwater in a vertical farm. |
When an official at the U. S. Open Pocket Pool(台球)Championship saw a 9-year-old girl playing at one of the tournament tables, he told her that spectators(观众)were not allowed to play. But much to his surprise, the girl was actually a competitor. That was nine years ago, and today, with five U. S. Open Women’s titles behind her and a recently won world championship, no one is likely to mistake Jean Balukas for a spectator again.
It doesn’t seem too surprising that Jean became caught up in pool——her father owns a pool hall within walking distance of the family’s home in Brooklyn. When she was just tall enough to see over the table, she fell in love with the game soon. Five years later Jean was ready to enter her first U. S. Open. She still remembers the letter the officials sent her reminding her that she wouldn’t be allowed to stand on a box to play.
As Jean improved, she found it increasingly difficult to play games at her father’s pool hall. “If I’d beat one of the guys, his friends would laugh at them about losing to me,” she says. Now Jean comes to the hall only weeks before a tournament when she plays Johnny Goon, her father’s pool manager.
That Johnny can beat her shows the gap that now exists in pool — as in other sports — between the top men and women competitors. “I’m supposedly the top woman player, but I’d have a hard time beating the number 50 man,” says Jean. “If I was a boy and played pool, I’d be a nobody.”
Jean thinks that women pool players still have a long way to go because pool has been a man’s game for so long. “When they think of pool players, people have this picture in their head of gambling(赌博) and smoke,” she says.
Jean won four of the seven games in these two years. She was as surprised as anyone else at her performance, even though she was a New York City tennis champion and center for her high-school basketball team. Jean does not take full credit for her achievements, saying, “I think what I have in sports is a gift from God, and that’s why I can get out there and do so well.”We can learn from the first passage that Jean Balukas_____.
| A．had become well-known at the age of 9 |
| B．had achieved great fame at the age of 18 |
| C．was often asked to play with men players |
| D．was refused to play in the U. S. Open for her young age |
The letter Jean received before her first U. S. Open_____.
| A．told her to arrive in time for the game |
| B．showed people’s doubt about her ability |
| C．told her about the basic rules of the game |
| D．invited her to compete in the U. S. Open |
Jean Balukas believed that women pool players_____.
| A．fall far behind men players |
| B．aren’t suitable for a man’s game |
| C．are impossible to beat any man player |
| D．have a bad reputation(名声) for gambling and smoking |
By saying the underlined words in the last paragraph Jean meant that _____.
| A．women players had a long way to go |
| B．she wouldn’t stop before her great achievement |
| C．she had much confidence in the game |
| D．she achieved her success because of her born gift |
News that Microsoft was making a $44.6 billion bid to buy Yahoo was greeted with heated discussion by many Internet users on Friday. Here are some responses:
Mark Galeassi of Kansas City, Missouri
This is the best move for both parties. Yahoo has the ideas and Microsoft has the money to finally market these ideas correctly. Microsoft and Yahoo are a perfect fit and the deal will be good for consumers.
Scott G of New Jersey
I was a Yahoo user for years along with Hotmail from Microsoft. Then Google came along: Google Earth, Google Toolbar and Gmail. Google is so innovative (创新的) with everything they do. Yahoo and Microsoft... same old story... I don’t think the merger (合并) will do anything for either company except improve the Yahoo shareholders’ bank accounts.
Michael Glosser of Estero, Florida
Right now, Yahoo offers a lot of features and tools at no cost for all different levels of Internet users. Microsoft seeks nothing but profit. Undoubtedly, they’ll do nothing other than find ways to start removing Yahoo’s formerly non-priced features. Microsoft’s greed will ruin the great thing that Yahoo currently is.
Toni Suarez of Hacienda Heights, California
Perhaps it would bring better high technology innovations to e-mail and help in researching and developing a better Internet!
Antonio Simmons of Parkville, Maryland
Microsoft purchasing Yahoo would be nothing more than an attempt from Microsoft to further impose upon the users their poor-quality software and obtain more wealth for the company. In my opinion, they will never be able to compete with Google because Yahoo and Microsoft’s current search engines are too inferior (差的) to compete. Even if combined, they still lack.Who is in favor of the merger of Microsoft and Yahoo?
| A．Antonio Simmons. | B．Michael Grosser. |
| C．Scott G. | D．Mark Galeassi. |
In the opinion of Scott G , _______.
| A．the merger will contribute to Microsoft |
| B．Yahoo and Microsoft are lacking in innovation |
| C．Google is getting short of management experience |
| D．the merger will allow Microsoft to overtake Google |
Michael Grosser is afraid that _______.
| A．the merger will cost Yahoo’s free features |
| B．the merger will lead to Microsoft’s defeating Yahoo |
| C．the increased competition will force Google out of the game |
| D．Internet users will have to buy Microsoft’s expensive software |
What is Antonio Simmons’ attitude towards Google?
| A．Doubtful. | B．Disapproval. | C．Positive. | D．Negative. |
The American book Who Moved My Cheese has been a bestseller all over the world. It teaches people how to face changes in their lives. Now its author Spence Johnson has written a book just for teens. The book tells us that when facing change in our lives, like a new school or new friends, don't be afraid. Instead, use this change to make a better life. The book gives an example of a change at school. A school is changing from having two terms to three terms because there are too many students.
Several teens are talking about this. Most of them are unhappy and worried. But Chris is not. He laughs and tells a story about two mice, two "little people" and some cheese.
The four are in a maze looking for the cheese. Here, cheese means something important in life, like moving to a new class or getting into college. But they find the cheese is gone. The mice realize that they can't change what has happened and have to find more cheese. This means finding different dreams. The little people, however, can't do this. They are afraid of change so they find no cheese.
After Chris finishes the story, the friends understand one thing: to get more cheese, move in a new direction quickly. His friends understand how this can be used in the changes all teens face, such as doing well at school or having good relationships or just feeling good about yourself.What does the text mainly discuss ______?
| A．Never change in our life | B．Change when you like to do |
| C．Change with the changes | D．Pay attention to the changes |
The underlined word "four" (paragraph 3) refers to ______.
| A．Mice and little people | B．Students | C．Cheese | D．Readers |
In our lives, we should learn from _________.
| A．mice | B．little people | C．Chris | D．Spence Johnson |
Which of the following statements is true?
| A．The author is Britain. |
| B．There are three terms in every school. |
| C．Most teens don't understand Chris' story. |
| D．The book tells teens how to face changes in their lives. |
Animal experts in Croatia say a bear has learned how to trick people to let him in by knocking at the door.
They believe the 220- kilogram brown bear probably learned the trick while nudging (轻推) a door to get it to open.
Experts have a guess that the nudging was mistaken by the owners for knocking and that the bear, pleased by the result, repeated the trick.
The Loknar family from Gerovo in western Croatia said the bear had knocked at their door three times and they were now refusing to answer the door.
‘We jumped out of the window as he came in through the door and went into the kitchen to take some food for the first time.” Mum Nevenka Loknar told a reporter from a local newspaper. “I opened the door and saw him standing there and I didn’t believe my eyes at first, then I ran for it as he walked in as if it was the most normal- thing in the world.”
Bears are a common thing in the woods around here, but no one has ever heard of a bear that knocks at the door.
Mum Nevenka Loknar said, “The bear is so intelligent. It’s incredible. We’ve tried to put up lots of obstacles to stop him coming in, like a wire fence but he still gets through. I wouldn’t be surprised if he knew how to use wire cutters (钢丝剪).”According to experts in Croatia, how did the bear learn the trick?
| A．By knocking at the door several times. | B．By accident. |
| C．By learning from the owner of a family. | D．By imitation. |
What does the underlined word “it” in paragraph 5 refer to?
| A．Eating at the kitchen. | B．Knocking at the door. |
| C．Walking into the house. | D．Answering the door. |
It is ________ in Gerovo that a bear knocks at the door.
| A．unusual | B．a troubling problem |
| C．common | D．an exciting experience |
Mum Nevenka Loknar was surprised that the bear ________.
| A．didn’t attack her family |
| B．knew how to use wire cutters |
| C．jumped across her wire fence three times |
| D．was clever at getting through the obstacles |