问答题 .  SECTION A MULTIPLE-CHOICE QUESTIONS
    In this section there are three passages followed by fourteen multiple choice questions. For each multiple choice question, there are four suggested answers marked A, B, C and D. Choose the one that you think is the best answer and mark your answers on ANSWER SHEET TWO.
    PASSAGE ONE
    (1)I know now that the man who sat with me on the old wooden stairs that hot summer night over thirty-five years ago was not a tall man. But to a five-year-old, he was a giant. We sat side by side, watching the sun go down behind the old Texaco service station across the busy street, a street that I was never allowed to cross unless accompanied by an adult, or at the very least, an older sibling.
    (2)Cherry-scented smoke from Grandpa's pipe kept the hungry mosquitoes at bay while gray, wispy swirls danced around our heads. Now and again, he blew a smoke ring and laughed as I tried to target the hole with my finger. I, clad in a cool summer night, and Grandpa, his sleeveless T-shirt, sat watching the traffic. We counted cars and tried to guess the color of the next one to turn the corner.
    (3)Once again, I was caught in the middle of circumstances. The fourth born of six children, it was not uncommon that I was either too young or too old for something. This night I was both. While my two baby brothers slept inside the house, my three older siblings played with friends around the corner, where I was not allowed to go. I stayed with Grandpa, and that was okay with me. I was where I wanted to be. My grandfather was babysitting while my mother, father and grandmother went out.
    (4)"Thirsty?" Grandpa asked, never removing the pipe from his mouth.
    (5)"Yes," was my reply.
    (6)"How would you like to run over to the gas station there and get yourself a bottle of Coke?"
    (7)I couldn't believe my ears. Had I heard it right? Was he talking to me? On my family's modest income, Coke was not a part of our budget or diet. A few tantalizing sips was all I had ever had, and certainly never my own bottle.
    (8)"Okay," I replied shyly, already wondering how I would get across the street. Surely Grandpa was going to come with me.
    (9)Grandpa stretched his long leg out straight and reached his huge hand deep into the pocket. I could hear the familiar jangling of the loose change he always carried. Opening his fist, he exposed a mound of silver coins. There must have been a million dollars there. He instructed me to pick out a dime. After he deposited the rest of the change back into his pocket, he stood up.
    (10)"Okay," he said, helping me down the stairs and to the curb, "I'm going to stay here and keep an ear out for the babies. I'll tell you when it's safe to cross. You go over to the Coke machine, get your Coke and come back out. Wait for me to tell you when it's safe to cross back."
    (11)My heart pounded. I clutched my dime tightly in my sweaty palm. Excitement took my breath away.
    (12)Grandpa held my hand tightly. Together we looked up the street and down, and back up again. He stepped off the curb and told me it was safe to cross. He let go of my hand and I ran. I ran faster than I had ever run before. The street seemed wide. I wondered if I would make it to the other side. Reaching the other side, I turned to find Grandpa. There he was, standing exactly where I had left him, smiling proudly. I waved.
    (13)"Go on, hurry up," he yelled.
    (14)My heart pounded wildly as I walked inside the dark garage. I had been inside the garage before with my father. My surroundings were familiar. I heard the Coca-Cola machine motor humming even before I saw it. I walked directly to the big old red-and-white dispenser. I knew where to insert my dime. I had seen it done before and had fantasized about this moment many times.
    (15)The big old monster greedily accepted my dime, and I heard the bottles shift. On tiptoes I reached up and opened the heavy door. There they were: one neat row of thick green bottles, necks staring directly at me, and ice cold from the refrigeration. I held the door open with my shoulder and grabbed one. With a quick yank, I pulled it free from its bondage. Another one immediately took its place. The bottle was cold in my sweaty hands. I will never forget the feeling of the cool glass on my skin. With two hands, I positioned the bottleneck under the heavy brass opener that was bolted to the wall. The cap dropped into an old wooden box, and I reached in to retrieve it. I was cold and bent in the middle, but I knew I needed to have this souvenir. Coke in hand, I proudly marched back out into the early evening dusk. Grandpa was waiting patiently. He smiled.
    (16)"Stop right there," he yelled. One or two cars sped by me, and once again, Grandpa stepped off the curb. "Come on, now," he said, "run." I did. Cool brown foam sprayed my hands. "Don't ever do that alone," he warned. I held the Coke bottle tightly; fearful he would make me pour it into a cup, ruining this dream come true. He didn't. One long swallow of the cold beverage cooled my sweating body. I don't think I ever felt so proud.
    (17)There we sat, side by side, watching the sun go down behind the old Texaco service station across the busy street. A street I had been allowed to cross by myself. Grandpa stretched his long legs down over two stairs. I dangled mine, a bit closer to the first step this time, I'm sure.
    PASSAGE TWO
    (1)Vibrations in the ground are a poorly understood but probably widespread means of communication between animals.
    (2)In 1975, tens of thousands of people were evacuated from a city, a few hours before a large earthquake struck it. Scientists regard earthquakes as unpredictable, and pre-emptive evacuations such as this as therefore impossible. What gave the game away, according to the local authorities, was the strange behaviour of animals such as rats, snakes, birds, cows and horses.
    (3)It could have been a lucky coincidence. It seems unlikely that these animals could have detected seismic "pre-shocks" that were missed by the sensitive vibration-detecting equipment that clutters the world's earthquake laboratories. But it is possible. And the fact that many animal species behave strangely before other natural events such as storms, and that they have the ability to detect others of their species at distances which the familiar human senses could not manage, is well established. Such observations have led some to suggest that these animals have a kind of extra-sensory perception. What is more likely, though, is that they have an extra sense-a form of perception that people lack. The best guess is that they can feel and understand vibrations that are transmitted through the ground.
    (4)Almost all the research done into animal signaling has been on sight, hearing and smell, because these are senses that people possess. Humans have no sense organs designed specifically to detect terrestrial vibrations. But, according to researchers who have been meeting in Chicago at a symposium of the society for Integrative and Comparative Biology, this anthropocentric approach has meant that interactions via vibrations of the ground (a means of communication known as seismic signaling) have been almost entirely over-looked. These researchers believe that such signals are far more common than biologists had realized-and that they could explain a lot of otherwise inexplicable features of animal behavior.
    (5)Until recently, the only large mammal known to produce seismic signals was the elephant seal, a species whose notoriously aggressive bulls slug it out on beaches around the world for possession of harems of females. But Caitlin O'Connell-Rodwell of Stanford University, who is one of the speakers at the symposium, suspects that a number of large terrestrial mammals, including rhinos, lions and elephants also use vibration as a means of communication. At any rate they produce loud noises that are transmitted through both the ground and the air-and that can travel farther in the first than in the second. Elephants, according to Dr O'Connell-Rodwell, can transmit signals through the ground this way for distances of as much as 50km when they trumpet, make mock charges or stomp their feet.
    (6)Seismic vibrations do not qualify as signals unless they are being received and understood. But it has already been shown that some smaller animals, such as frogs and crickets, pick up information from the seismic part of what everybody had assumed to be simple acoustic (ie, airborne) signals. One way this was found out was by vibrating whole frogs while recording the electrical impulses from particular cells in their inner ears that were suspected of responding to seismic stimulation. Frogs, of course, are easily manipulated. Doing something similar to an elephant requires a higher degree of co-operation from the subject. Dr O'Connell-Rodwell is, however, trying. She is attempting to train several tame elephants to respond to such signals by shutting them inside a gently vibrating truck.
    (7)Even without this evidence, it seems likely that elephants do make use of seismic communication. They have specialised cells that are vibrationally sensitive in their trunk. And vibrations transmitted through their skeletons may also be picked up by their exceptionally large middle-ear bones.
    (8)A seismic sense could help to explain certain types of elephant behavior. One is an apparent ability to detect thunderstorms well beyond the range that the sound of a storm can carry. Another is the foot-lifting that many elephants display prior to the arrival of another herd. Rather than scanning the horizon with their ears, elephants tend to freeze their posture and raise and lower a single foot. This probably helps them to work out from which direction the vibrations are traveling—rather as a person might stick a finger first in one ear and then in the other to work out the direction that a sound is coming from.
    (9)According to Peggy Hill, a biologist from the University of Tulsa who organised the symposium, work on seismic signalling is blossoming. Part of the reason is that the equipment needed to detect seismic vibrations (and thus short-circuit human sensory inadequacies) has become cheap. Geophones—which transform vibrations into electrical signals—were once military technology. They were developed by the American army to detect footsteps during the Vietnam war. Now, they can be picked up for as little as $40.
    (10)In the past decade many insects, spiders, scorpions, amphibians, reptiles and rodents, as well as large mammals, have been shown to use vibrations for purposes as diverse as territorial defense, mate location and prey detection. Lions, for example, have vibration detectors in their paws and probably use them in the same way as scorpions use their vibration detectors-to locate meals.
    (11)Dr. Hill herself spent years trying to work out how prairie mole crickets, a highly territorial species of burrowing insect, manage to space themselves out underground. After many failed attempts to provoke a reaction by playing recordings of cricket song to them, she realized that they were actually more interested in her own footfalls than in the airborne music of their fellow crickets. This suggests that it is the seismic component of the song that the insects are picking up and using to distribute themselves.
    (12)Whether any of this really has implications for such things as earthquake prediction is, of course, highly speculative. But it is a salutary reminder that the limitations of human senses can cause even competent scientists to overlook obvious lines of enquiry. Absence of evidence, it should always be remembered, is not evidence of absence.
    PASSAGE THREE
    (1)The English, in fact, are strongly gifted with the rural feeling. They possess a quick sensibility to the beauties of nature, and a keen relish for the pleasures and employments of the country. This passion seems inherent in them. Even the inhabitants of cities, born and brought up among brick walls and bustling streets, enter with facility into rural habits, and evince a tact for rural occupation. The merchant has his snug retreat in the vicinity of the metropolis, where he often displays as much pride and zeal in the cultivation of his flower-garden, and the maturing of his fruits, as he does in the conduct of his business, and the success of a commercial enterprise. Even those less fortunate individuals, who are doomed to pass their lives in the midst of din and traffic, contrive to have something that shall remind them of the green aspect of nature. In the most dark and dingy quarters of the city, the drawing-room window resembles frequently a bank of flowers; every spot capable of vegetation has its grass-plot and flower-bed; and every square its mimic park, laid out with picturesque taste, and gleaming with refreshing verdure.
    (2)Those who see the Englishman only in town, are apt to form an unfavorable opinion of his social character. He is either absorbed in business, or distracted by the thousand engagements that dissipate time, thought, and feeling, in this huge metropolis. He has, therefore, too commonly, a look of hurry and abstraction. Wherever he happens to be, he is on the point of going somewhere else; at the moment he is talking on one subject, his mind is wandering to another; and while paying a friendly visit, he is calculating how he shall economize time so as to pay the other visits allotted to the morning. An immense metropolis, like London, is calculated to make men selfish and uninteresting. In their casual and transient meetings, they can but deal briefly in commonplaces. They present but the cold superficies of character—its rich and genial qualities have no time to be warmed into a flow.
    (3)It is in the country that the Englishman gives scope to his natural feelings. He breaks loose gladly from the cold formalities and negative civilities of town; throws off his habits of shy reserve, and becomes joyous and free-hearted. He manages to collect round him all the conveniences and elegancies of polite life, and to banish its restraints. His country-seat abounds with every requisite, either for studious retirement, tasteful gratification, or rural exercise. Books, paintings, music, horses, dogs, and sporting implements of all kinds, are at hand. He puts no constraint, either upon his guests or himself, but, in the true spirit of hospitality, provides the means of enjoyment, and leaves every one to partake according to his inclination.
    (4)The taste of the English in the cultivation of land, and in what is called landscape gardening, is unrivalled. They have studied Nature intently, and discovered an exquisite sense of her beautiful forms and harmonious combinations. Those charms which, in other countries, she lavishes in wild solitudes, are here assembled round the haunts of domestic life. They seem to have caught her coy and furtive graces, and spread them, like witchery, about their rural abodes.
    (5) Nothing can be more imposing than the magnificence of English park scenery. Vast lawns that extend like sheets of vivid green, with here and there clumps of gigantic trees, heaping up rich piles of foliage. The solemn pomp of groves and woodland glades, with the deer trooping in silent herds across them; the hare, bounding away to the covert; or the pheasant, suddenly bursting upon the wing. The brook, taught to wind in natural meanderings, or expand into a glassy lake—the sequestered pool, reflecting the quivering trees, with the yellow leaf sleeping on its bosom, and the trout roaming fearlessly about its limpid waters; while some rustic temple, or sylvan statue, grown green and dank with age, gives an air of classic sanctity to the seclusion.
    (6)These are but a few of the features of park scenery; but what most delights me, is the creative talent with which the English decorate the unostentatious abodes of middle life. The rudest habitation, the most unpromising and scanty portion of land, in the hands of an Englishman of taste, becomes a little paradise. With a nicely discriminating eye, he seizes at once upon its capabilities, and pictures in his mind the future landscape. The sterile spot grows into loveliness under his hand; and yet the operations of art which produce the effect are scarcely to be perceived. The cherishing and training of some trees; the cautious pruning of others; the nice distribution of flowers and plants of tender and graceful foliage; the introduction of a green slope of velvet turf; the partial opening to a peep of blue distance, or silver gleam of water;-all these are managed with a delicate tact, a pervading yet quiet assiduity, like the magic touchings with which a painter finishes up a favorite picture.
    (7)The residence of people of fortune and refinement in the country, has diffused a degree of taste and elegance in rural economy that descends to the lowest class. The very laborer, with his thatched cottage and narrow slip of ground, attends to their embellishment. The trim hedge, the grass-plot before the door, the little flower-bed bordered with snug box, the woodbine trained up against the wall, and hanging its blossoms about the lattice; the pot of flowers in the window; the holly, providently planted about the house, to cheat winter of its dreariness, and to throw in a semblance of green summer to cheer the fireside; all these bespeak the influence of taste, flowing down from high sources, and pervading the lowest levels of the public mind. If ever Love, as poets sing, delights to visit a cottage, it must be the cottage of an English peasant.
    (8)The fondness for rural life among the higher classes of the English has had a great and salutary effect upon the national character. I do not know a finer race of men than the English gentlemen. Instead of the softness and effeminacy which characterize the men of rank in most countries, they exhibit a union of elegance and strength, a robustness of frame and freshness of complexion, which I am inclined to attribute to their living so much in the open air, and pursuing so eagerly the invigorating recreations of the country.1.  From the first three paragraphs, we can infer that ______.(PASSAGE ONE)