英语阅读（十五）
A
When my first wartime Christmas came, I was in basic training in New Jersey and not sure if I would make it home for the holidays. Only on the afternoon of December 23 was the list of men who would have three-day passes posted. I was one of the lucky soldiers.
It was Christmas Eve when I arrived home, and a little snow had fallen. Mother opened the front door. I could see beyond her, into the corner of the living room where the tree had always stood. There were lights, all colors, and ornaments shining against the green of a pine.
“Where did it come from?” I asked.
“I asked Gates boy to cut it, ”my mother said. “I wouldn’t have had one just for myself, but when called-on, such a rush! He just brought it in this afternoon…”.
The pine reached to the proper height, almost to the ceiling, and the Tree Top Crystal Star was its place. A few green branches reached about a little awkwardly (难看) at the side, I thought, and there was a bit of bare trunk showing in the middle. But the tree filled the room with warm light and the whole house with the pleasant smell of Christmas.
“It’s not like the one you used to find,” my mother went on. “Yours were always in good shape. I suppose the Gates boy didn’t know where to look. But I couldn’t be fussy (挑剔).”
“Don’t worry,” I told her. “It’s perfect.”
It wasn’t, of course, but at the moment I realized something for the first time: all Christmas trees are perfect.
1．From the passage we can infer that .
A．the writer spent his first Christmas during the war
B．soldiers did not all go home for Christmas during the war
C．all the soldiers had three-day passes
D．the writer could not go home for Christmas
2．From the passage, we can conclude that .
A．the writer used to cut very beautiful Christmas trees
B．his mother didn’t like Christmas trees
C．his mother didn’t want to have a Christmas tree because it was wartime
D．the writer didn’t like the tree cut by someone else
3．The best title for this passage would be .
A．How to Choose a Christmas Tree
B．How Soldiers Spent Their Christmas
C．The Perfect Christmas Tree
D．The Christmas with an Ugly Christmas Tree
B
Scientists found that our Earth is not cold, hard rock all the way through. Not at all. Only the crust, the outside of the earth is cold, solid rock.
Below this cold solid crust of the Earth, there is hot rock that melts in places. Every now and then some of the hot, melted rock is pushed out.
This hot, melted rock expands, and can push its way out through a weak spot in the Earth’s crust. When this happens, a volcano is made.
The melted rock below the Earth’s crust can flow, like toothpaste (牙膏), if it is squeezed. If you squeeze a partly filled tube of toothpaste in one place, what happens?
The toothpaste flows to another part of the tube. If you press down on one part of the tube with a finger, what happens? This tube rises in another place, as the toothpaste flows there, making a hill.
Strangely enough, when a volcano forms, the Earth may be behaving like a tube of toothpaste. If the Earth is pressed down in one place, it may rise in another place. Hot, melted rock within the Earth may flow to another place as the Earth is pressed down. When this hot, melted rock breaks through the Earth’s crust, a volcano forms.
A volcano is only one kind of mountain. Other kinds of mountains form when the Earth’s crust is raised. But each time the Earth is raised in one place, something is pressing against the Earth in another place.
4．Scientific findings have proved that .
A．the earth is cold with hard rock being everywhere
B．the earth is hot
C．the earth is neither hot nor cold
D．the outside of the earth is cold while there is hot rock below this cold hard rock
5．What is a volcano?
A．It is a tube of toothpaste.
B．It is a kind of mountain.
C．When the cold hard rock becomes hot and melts, it is a volcano.
D．When the cold hard rock becomes hard and melts, it is pushed out. Thus a volcano is formed.
6．Which of the following is true?
A．If there is hot and melted rock, there will be a volcano.
B．A mountain is formed when the hot and melted rock pushes out.
C．A volcano is like a tube of toothpaste.
D．A mountain is formed when the melted rock below the Earth’s crust flows.
C
Last week, I bought an alarm system for about $ 450. It consisted of a control unit with three small units. I put the control unit in the sitting-room and fastened the other units by the front door, back door and living-room windows. The instructions told us to choose three numbers, so we chose 491, the last three numbers of our telephone number.
Now I must explain how the alarm works:
1.There is a power siren in the control unit. It makes a very loud noise.
2.Each of the small units sends out beams or rays in different directions. If anything moves, it
breaks a beam. This sends a signal to the control unit. The siren makes a noise which you can
hear 50 meters away.
3.When we go to bed, I press the three buttons numbered 4,9 and 1. Then we have 30 seconds
to get out of the room before the alarm starts to work.
That might I slept soundly because I was sure that no burglar could get into our house. However, at about 2:10a.m., I woke up and heard the siren.
“There must be a burglar in the house,” Mary said. “What shall we do?”
“I’ll go and see who’s there,” I said. “Stay here. Don’t make a noise.”
I went downstairs quietly. When I reached the living-room, I switched on my torch and looked round the room. Then I turned the light on. I switched the siren off and searched the rooms downstairs. There was nothing wrong except that the back door was unlocked. I locked it, re-set the alarm and went back to bed.
About an hour later, the alarm started again. I jumped out of bed, fell over a chair in the dark and bumped into the bedroom door. Mary woke up and started hitting me with a torch. “Hey! Wait a minute!” I whispered. “It’s only me. I’ m going downstairs to see what’s wrong.”
I went down into the living-room and listened for a moment. The only sound I could hear was the siren. I turned on the light and then switched the siren off. As I did so, I glanced across at the curtains in front of the windows. I saw a house lizard (a kind of small animal) disappear behind the curtains.
“Oh!” I said to myself. “That’s our burglar.”
When the lizard moved, it started the siren. I guessed that the alarm had been made in Europe, where there are no house lizards.
Well, I won’t finish this story but if you want an alarm system free of charge, let me know. I’ll send you ours. We bought a dog this morning. It knows the difference between a lizard and a burglar.
7．The writer bought an alarm system to .
A．make sure that he got up early every day
B．warn him when there were lizards in his house
C．frighten burglars and tell him that somebody had got into the house
D．make Mary feel safe to live in the large room
8．The writer used numbers 4,9,1 to .
A．set the alarm system
B．make a telephone call
C．give numbers to each of the three units in the downstairs rooms
D．name his alarm system
9．The purpose of the three units was to .
A．send a message to the control unit and start the siren
B．sound their own sirens when the control unit told them to
C．check that the control unit worked properly all the time
D．give them enough light
10．If the writer set the alarm and remained in the room for more than half a minute, .
A．nothing would happen B．the control unit would not work
C．the siren would make a noise D．the dog would bark
11．The purpose of the writer in writing the passage is to .
A．tell us that the alarm system doesn’t work
B．tell us an interesting experience
C．show us how the alarm system works
D．make it clear that he wants to give away his alarm system
D
Professor Martin’s report says that children who attend a number of different schools, because their parents have to move around the country, probably make slow progress in their studies. There are also signs, says Professor Martin, that an unusually large number of such children are mentally affected.
The professor says “It’s true, my personal feeling is that children should stay in one school. Our findings are based on research and not on any personal feelings that I or many assistants may have on the subject.”
Captain Thomas James, an Army lecturer for the past 20 years and himself a father of two, said, “I’ve never heard of such rubbish. Taking me for example, no harm is done to the education of my children, who change schools regularly——if they keep to the same system, as in our Army schools. In my experience——and I’ve known quite a few of them——Army children are as well adjusted as any others, if not more so. What the professor doesn’t appear to appreciate is the fact that in such situation children will adapt (适应) much better than grown-ups.”
When this was put to Professor Martin, he said that at no time had his team suggested that all children were backward or mentally affected in some way, but simply that in their experience there was a clear tendency (倾向性)。
“Our findings show that while the very bright children can deal with regular changes without harming his or her general progress in studies, the majority of children suffer from constantly having to enter a new learning situation”.
12．Professor’s Martin’s report suggests that .
A．it may not be good for children to change schools too often
B．parents should not move around the country
C．the reason of children making slow progress is that they have changed schools
D．more and more children are mentally affected
13．According to the passage, Professor Martin’s personal feeling .
A．is the opposite of what his report has shown
B．is in a way supported by his research
C．has played a big part in his research
D．is based on the experience of his own children
14．From the passage, we can conclude that Captain James’ children .
A．have been affected by changing schools
B．go to ordinary state schools
C．can get used to the Army school education
D．discuss their education regularly with their father
15．About children and grown-ups, Captain James says that children .
A．are generally well-adjusted B．are usually less experienced
C．can adapt much more easily D．can deal with changes quickly
16．According to Professor Martin, suffer from changing schools regularly.
A．Army children B．quite a few children
C．bright children D．slow children
E
Maureen stood by the lake. Suddenly the other children came running through the trees with sharp cries of excitement. They rushed up to the lake, leaning over the crystal-clear water, watching the crowds of tiny fish. Some children demanded loudly to go to the boats, but all at once those who had been left behind at the ice-cream stall (小摊) came running up to make some announcement or other, and they all left the water and dashed back the way they had come. With growing excitement, Maureen ran after them.
When she saw what they had been running for, she stopped running. They were buying things again. The toy stall was open and they were crowded around it. Behind the stall a calm middle-aged woman was selling a great variety of small rubbish. She took money from the forest of small hands in exchanging for little boats, plastic dolls, yellow pencils and rubbers, anything. Maureen leaned against a tree, looking on. The idea of spending washed against her face like a strong current, trying to draw her in.
Nona Parker pushed out to the edge of the group and laid what she had bought on the ground so that she could see what money she had left in her white purse. Under Maureen’s eyes lay a boat, a mouth oran, and little plates of doll’s food in colored plaster——a brown load of bread, a joint of beef, a pink pudding——all tiny and terribly desirable. Maureen was so full of the wish for the things like that she couldn’t bear to look at it. She turned her head sharply. Her face against the tree, she shut her eyes and prayed eagerly for some money, for the price of a set of toy plates.
In a moment, she opened her eyes, but she didn’t turn back to the stall. It was too painful to see the others buying whatever they wanted. She rubbed almost round the tree, her eyes on the ground. And there at her very feet was a ten pence piece.
17．Maureen stopped running after the other children because she .
A．was too shy to push her way in
B．thought the other children were rich
C．knew the stall was selling rubbish
D．couldn’t afford to buy anything
18．Maureen’s strong desire for the plates of doll’s food grew when .
A．she happened to see what Nona had bought
B．Nona showed off her things to other children
C．she saw other children buying things freely
D．she was pushed to the edge of the group
19．When the children reached the toy stall .
A．they were disappointed at the badly-made toys
B．they were excited by the unusual toys
C．they carefully chose what they were going to buy
D．they were eager to get whatever they were offered
20．Seeing the others buying so many wonderful things, Maureen felt .
A．ashamed B．helpless C．hurt D．discouraged
参考答案
(十五) 1---5 BACDB 6---10 BCAAC 11---15 BABCC 16---20 BDADC