Directions: Fill in the blanks with words from the box below. Change the form where necess

Many will know that the word "muscle" comes from the Latin for "mouse" (rippling under the skin, so to speak ). But what about "chagrin", derived from the Turkish for roughened leather, or scaly sharkskin. Or "lens" which comes from the Latin "lentil" or "window" meaning "eye of wind" in old Norse? Looked at closely, the language comes apart in images, like those strange paintings by Giuseppe Arcimboldo where heads are made of fruit and vegetables.

Not that Henry Hitchings's book is about verbal surrealism. That is an extra pleasure in a book which is really about the way the English language has roamed the world helping itself liberally to words, absorbing them, forgetting where they came from, and moving on with an ever-growing load of exotics, crossbreeds and subtly shaded near-synonyms. It is also about migrations within the language's own borders, about upward and downward mobility, about words losing their roots, turning up in new surroundings, or lying in wait, like "duvet" which was mentioned by Samuel Johnson, for their moment.

All this is another way of writing history. The Arab etymologies of " saffron ", "crimson" and "sugar" speak of England's medieval trade with the Arab world. We have "cheque" and "tariff" from this source too, plus "arithmetic" and "algorithm"-just as we have "etch" and "sketch" from the Dutch, musical terms from the Italians and philosophical ones from the Germans. French nuance and finesse are everywhere. At every stage, the book is about people and ideas on the move, about invasion, refugees, immigrants, traders, colonists and explorers.

This is a huge subject and one that is almost bound to provoke question-marks and explosions in the margins-soon forgotten in the book's sheer sweep and scale. A balance between straight history and word history is sometimes difficult to strike, though. There is a feeling, occasionally, of being bundled too fast through complex linguistic developments and usages, or of being given interesting slices of history for the sake, after all, of not much more than a "gong" or a "moccasin". But it is churlish to carp. The author's zest and grasp are wonderful. He makes you want to check out everything-" carp" and "zest" included. Whatever is hybrid, fluid and unpoliced about English delights him.

English has never had its Acad mie Francaise, but over the centuries it has not lacked furious defenders against foreign "corruption". There have been rearguard actions to preserve its "manly" pre-Norman origins, even to reconstruct it along Anglo-Saxon lines: "wheel- saddle" for bicycle, "painlore" for pathology. But the omnivorous beast is rampant still. More people speak it as their second language than as their first. Forget the language of Shakespeare. It's "Globish" now, the language of aspiration. No one owns it, a cause for despair to some. Mr. Hitchings admits to wincing occasionally, but almost on principle he is more cheerful than not.

According to the text, which of the following is TRUE?

A．Muscle derives from Italian.

B．Chagrin derives from Turkish.

C．Crimson derives from Persian.

D．Sketch derives from German.

For Tony Blair, home is a messy sort of place, where the prime minister's job is not to uphold eternal values but to force through some unpopular changes that may make the country work a bit better. The area where this is most obvious, and where it matters most, is the public services. Mr. Blair faces a difficulty here which is partly of his own making. By focusing his last election campaign on the need to improve hospitals, schools, transport and policing, he built up expectations. Mr. Blair has said many times that reforms in the way the public services work need to go alongside increases in cash.

Mr. Blair has made his task harder by committing a classic negotiating error. Instead of extracting concessions from the other side before promising his own, he has pledged himself to higher spending on public services without getting a commitment to change from the unions. Why, given that this pledge has been made, should the health unions give ground in return? In a speech on March 20th, Gordon Brown, the chancellor of the exchequer, said that "the something-for-nothing days are over in our public services and there can be no blank cheques". But the government already seems to have given health workers a blank cheque.

Nor are other ministries conveying quite the same message as the treasury. On March 19th, John Hutton, a health minister, announced that cleaners and catering staff in new privately-funded hospitals working for the National Health service will still be government employees, entitled to the same pay and conditions as other health-service workers. Since one of the main ways in which the government hopes to reform. the public sector is by using private providers, and since one of the main ways in which private providers are likely to be able to save money is by cutting labor costs, this move seems to undermine the government's strategy.

Now the government faces its hardest fight. The police need reforming more than any other public service. Half of them, for instance, retire early, at a cost of ￡1 billion ($1.4% billion) a year to the taxpayer. The police have voted 10-1 against proposals from the home secretary, David Blunkett, to reform. their working practices.

This is a fight the government has to win. If the police get away with it, other public service workers will reckon they can too. And, if they all get away it, Mr. Blair's domestic policy—which is what voters are most likely to judge him on a the next election—will be a failure.

In Britain, Tony Blair's chief task is to ______.

A．deal with disorders.

B．see to public services.

C．attend to reforms.

D．live up to expectations.

For Tony Blair, home is a messy sort of place, where the prime minister's job is not to uphold eternal values but to force through some unpopular changes that may make the country work a bit better. The area where this is most obvious, and where it matters most, is the public services. Mr. Blair faces a difficulty here which is partly of his own making. By focusing his last election campaign on the need to improve hospitals, schools, transport and policing, he built up expectations. Mr. Blair has said many times that reforms in the way the public services work need to go alongside increases in cash.

Mr. Blair has made his task harder by committing a classic negotiating error. Instead of extracting concessions from the other side before promising his own, he has pledged himself to higher spending on public services without getting a commitment to change from the unions. Why, given that this pledge has been made, should the health unions give ground in return? In a speech on March 20th, Gordon Brown, the chancellor of the exchequer, said that "the something-for-nothing days are over in our public services and there can be no blank cheques". But the government already seems to have given health workers a blank cheque.

Nor are other ministries conveying quite the same message as the treasury. On March 19th, John Hutton, a health minister, announced that cleaners and catering staff in new privately-funded hospitals working for the National Health Service will still be government employees, entitled to the same pay and conditions as other health-service workers. Since one of the main ways in which the government hopes to reform. the public sector is by using private providers, and since one of the main ways in which private providers are likely to be able to save money is by cutting labor costs, this move seems to undermine the government's strategy.

Now the government faces its hardest fight. The police need reforming more than any other public service. Half of them, for instance, retire early, at a cost of ￡1 billion ($1.4% billion) a year to the taxpayer. The police have voted 10—1 against proposals from the home secretary, David Blunkett, to reform. their working practices.

This is a fight the government has to win. If the police get away with it, other public-service workers will reckon they can too. And, if they all get away it, Mr. Blair's domestic policy—which is what voters are most likely to judge him on a the next election—will be a failure.

In Britain, Tony Blair's chief task is to

A．deal with disorders.

B．see to public services.

C．attend to reforms.

D．live up to expectations.

For Tony Blair, home is a messy sort of place, where the prime minister's job is not to uphold eternal values but to force through some unpopular changes that may make the country work a bit better. The area where this is most obvious, and where it matters most, is the public services. Mr. Blair faces a difficulty here which is partly of his own making. By focusing his last election campaign on the need to improve hospitals, schools, transport and policing, he built up expectations. Mr. Blair has said many times that reforms in the way the public services work need to go alongside increases in cash.

Mr. Blair has made his task harder by committing a classic negotiating error. Instead of extracting concessions from the other side before promising his own, he has pledged himself to higher spending on public services without getting a commitment to change from the unions. Why, given that this pledge has been made, should the health unions give ground in return? In a speech on March 20th, Gordon Brown, the chancellor of the exchequer, said that "the something-for-nothing days are over in our public services and there can be no blank cheques." But the government already seems to have given health workers a blank cheque.

Nor are other ministries conveying quite the same message as the treasury. On March 19th, John Hutton, a health minister, announced that cleaners and catering staff in new privately funded hospitals working for the National Health service will still be government employees, entitled to the same pay and conditions as other health-service workers. Since one of the main ways in which the government hopes to reform. the public sector is by using private providers, and since one of the main ways in which private providers are likely to be able to save money is by cutting labor costs, this move seems to undermine the government's strategy.

Now the government faces its hardest fight. The police need reforming more than any other public service. Half of them, for instance, retire early, at a cost of ￡1 billion ($1.4 billion) a year to the taxpayer. The police have voted 10-1 against proposals from the home secretary, David Blunkett, to reform. their working practices.

This is a fight the government has to win. If the police get away with it, other public-service workers will reckon they can too. And, if they all get away with it, Mr. Blair's domestic policy—which is what voters are most likely to judge him on the next election—will be a failure.

What may be the attitude of many public-service workers towards the strategy of Blair's government?

A．Resentful.

B．Accommodative.

C．Supportive.

D．Apprehensive.

Task 2

Directions: This task is the same as Task 1. The 5 questions or unfinished statements are numbered 41 through 45.

Whenever traveling on Shanghai Airlines (SAL) flights with paid tickets, you will earn air miles according to the class shown on your tickets. When you have accumulated enough air miles, you can apply for a premium (奖励) ticket or other premium items.

Passengers (12 years old and over) are eligible (合格的) to join SAL FFP (Frequent Flying Passenger) Club unless it is banned (禁止) by the law of the country where they live.

Please fill out the application form. on the back and rhail it to the Customer Service Center of SAL. SAL Customer Service Center will mail the membership card and manual to you within 30 working days after receiving your Application From.

Please show your membership card when you check in at an airport.

Please retain a photocopy of the ticket, the original boarding pass as well as a photocopy of your receipts after traveling or making purchases at SAL partner businesses until you confirm the record has been charged to your account.

If you flew SAL 3 months before your registration of SAL FFP Club, please mail to SAL Customer Service Center a copy of your ticket and the original hoarding pass with your card number on it for recording air miles.

The Application Form. can be used by one person only, and copies are void (无效).

For more information, please refer to the SAL FFP Program Guide.

What does SAL stand for in this passage?

A．Shanghai Airport.

B．Shanghai Airlines.

C．Shenzhen Airport.

D．South Airlines.

SECTION B PASSAGES

Directions: In this section, you will hear several passages. Listen to the passages carefully and then answer the questions that follow.

听力原文： The belief that four-leaf clovers are good luck comes from the Druids, ancient residents of the British Isles. Several times a year, they gathered in oak groves to settle legal disputes and offer sacrifices. Then they ended their rituals by hunting for four-leaf clovers. Why? They believed a four-leaf clover enabled its owner to see evil spirits and witches, and therefore avoid them. Ancient people believed spirits living in springs and fountains demanded a tribute--usually flesh. Young Mayan girls, for example, were sometimes tossed into the Well of Sacrifice (where they would "marry" the spirits). Today, we just throw the spirits a penny or two for luck. In the Middle Ages, churchmen insisted that knocking on wood was part of the tradition of prayer, since Christ was crucified on a wooden cross. They were right hut the tradition started several thousands of years earlier, with a different deity. Both Native Americans and ancient Greeks developed the belief (independently) that oak trees were the domains of an important god. By knocking on an oak, they were communicating with him and asking for his forgiveness. The Greeks passed their tradition on to the Romans, and it became part of European lore. The oak's "power" was eventually transferred to all wood.

According to the lecturer, what did people used to throw into wells?

A．Coins.

B．Food.

C．Flowers.

D．People.

The Bermuda Triangle

There is a place in the Atlantic Ocean where ships and airplanes seem to disappear more often than anywhere else on Earth. It seems to form. a triangle between Miami, Bermuda, and the ocean east of Puerto Rico. This place is called the Bermuda Triangle. Over 100 planes and ships have been lost there since 1945. Over 1,000 people have disappeared.

It is almost as if the lost planes had gone into a hole in the sky, as if the ships had been suddenly sucked down into a huge whirlpool. The strangest thing is that nothing is ever found: no bodies in the water or washed up on the beach.

The biggest single loss of planes happened in December of 1945. Five Navy planes from Florida were flying together. There were 14 men in them. They radioed back to their base that their flying instruments were not working, they did not know where they were. The base radioed back to them to follow the sun west. They answered that they could not see the sun, even though the weather was good. They also said that the ocean didn't look as it should. Finally they said they could not hear the base. But the base tower could still hear them talking about strange" white water". The last thing the tower heard was:" Don't come after us. It looks like..." Then there was silence.

In the, meantime, 13 men in another plane had been sent to help them. But they sent just one message. It said that they were coming to the place where the planes were lost. Then it also disappeared and was never heard from again. After checking and searching for many months, a Navy officer said, "It's al most as if they had gone to Mars."

Sometimes a plane or ship will disappear right after sending a message saying that everything is OK. During Christmas of 1963 a DC-3 passenger plane was coming into Miami for a landing. The pilot asked for landing directions. Then he said, "Would you believe it? The passengers are still singing Christmas carols!" Then suddenly the plane's radio went off the air. Neither the plane nor any of the passengers in it were ever heard from again.

It is known that pilots of planes often have trouble with their instruments in the Bermuda Triangle. Many people have studied the Triangle to find out what could be causing such things to happen there. In 1965 a Navy plane was sent to study the magnetic field in the Bermuda Triangle. Soon after flying into the area, the plane disappeared. The 10 men in it were gone, too.

Instrument trouble alone can't be the whole answer. Most of the ships and planes have vanished close to land, in good weather, and often in daytime. Whatever happens seems to happen very quickly. A small boat once disappeared right off Miami harbor. Its owner, Dan Burack, had stopped at Buoy No. 9 to admire the Christmas lights on shore. He suddenly sent a call for help to the Coast Guard. He didn't say what was wrong. A Coast Guard boat hurried to Buoy No. 9. On its radio, the men heard Burack say," I've never seen one like that before." Nobody knows what he meant. By the time the Coast Guard boat got there, Burack's boat and its passengers had disappeared.

Many large ships have vanished, too. One weighed 20,000 tons. Another had more than 300 people on board. The radio on one large ship from Japan sent a very strange last message. It said, "Danger like dagger now. Come quickly! We cannot escape." After this message, the ship vanished from the sea.

Something in the Bermuda Triangle causes flight instruments to go out of order. This might explain how planes get lost and crash. But it would not explain why planes would vanish suddenly in good weather and sometimes when they are coming in for a landing. Some of the ships could have been turned over or destroyed by accidents. Or a small boat could be run into and sunk by a larger one. This is not likely, though. And in any case, something would have been

A．Y

B．N

C．NG