Passage 43 Sometimes it is impossible to send all the mail that arrives at the post office. Perhaps there is an inadequate or illegible address and there is no return address. The post office cannot just throw the mail away, so it becomes "dead mail". Dead mail is then sent to one of the U.S. Postal Service’s dead mail offices in Atlanta, New York, Philadelphia, St. Paul, and San Francisco. Seventy-five million pieces of mail can end up in these offices in one year. The staff ’of the dead mail offices has different ways to deal with all of these pieces of dead mail. First of all, they look for clues that can help them deliver the mail; they open packages in the hope that something inside will show where the package came from or is going to. (43) Dead mail will also be listed on a computer so that people can call in and cheek to see if a missing item is there. However, all of the mail cannot simply be stored forever: there is just too much of it. When a lot of dead mail has piled up, the dead mail offices hold public auctions. Every three months, the public is invited to the offices and containing items found in dead mail packages are sold to the highest bidder (出价人). Which is the best title for the passage
A. Dead Mail
B. Mail Auction
C. Unknown Mail
D. The Dead Mail Office
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Passage 29 The first English window was just a slit in the wall. (29) It was cut long, so that it would let in as much light as possible, and narrow, to keep out the bad weather. However, the slit let in more wind than light. This is why it was called "the wind’s eye". The word window itself comes from two Old Norse words for wind and eye. Before windows were used, the ancient halls and castles of northern Europe and Britain were dark and smoky. Their great rooms were high, with only a hole in the roof to let out the smoke from torches and cooking fires. As time went on, people wanted more light and air in their homes. They made the wind’s eyes wider so as to admit air and light. They stretched canvas across them to keep out the weather. The underlined word "canvas" probably means______.
A. a thick board served as a wall
B. hard and coarse cloth used as curtains
C. a stove that gives out warmth
D. a candle to light the house
Passage 23 In order to learn a foreign language well, it is necessary to overcome the fear of making mistakes. (23) If the primary goal of language use is communication, then mistakes are secondary considerations that may be dealt with gradually as awareness of those mistakes increases. On the other hand, students should not ignore their mistakes. The language learner may observe how native speakers express themselves, and how native expressions differ from the way the learner might say them. For example, a Spanish speaker who has been saying "I do it" to express willingness to do something in the immediate future, could, by communicating with native speakers of English, observe that native speakers actually say "I’ll do it". This difference can serve as a basis for the student to change his way of using the present tense in English. But a student who is unwilling to communicate in the first place would lose this opportunity to learn by trial and error. The author’s major conclusion about the function of mistakes in foreign language learning is that______.
A. mistakes are not important in the process of learning a language
B. learners are often very afraid of making mistakes
C. native speakers often do not tell foreign language learners about their mistake
D. making mistakes can help the learner discover the rules of the language
Passage 42 Some countries have large numbers of earthquakes. Japan is one of them. Others do not have many; for example, there are few earthquakes in Britain. There is often a great noise during an earthquake. The earth shakes. Houses fall down. Railway lines are broken. Sometimes many people are killed in an earthquake. Earthquakes often happen near volcanoes, but this is not always true. The centers of some are under the sea. The bottom of the sea suddenly moves. The powerful forces inside the earth break the rocks. The coast is shaken and great waves appear. These waves travel long distances and rush over the land when they reach it. (42) They are strong enough to break down houses and other buildings; sometimes they break more buildings than the earthquake itself. What kind of buildings stands up best in an earthquake A building with concrete walls is perhaps the best. A steel frame will make it even stronger. The frame holds the different parts together, and the walls do not easily fall. There is less chance of fire because concrete and steel do not burn. This kind of building is the safest. The waves caused by an earthquake______.
A. disappear quickly
B. are beautiful to look at
C. travel distantly
D. are helpful to mankind
Passage 40 Every artist knows in his heart that he is saying something to the public. Not only does he want to say it well, but he wants it to be something which has not been said before. He hopes that the public will listen and understand--he wants to teach them, and he wants them to learn from him. What visual artists like painters want to teach is easy to make out but difficult to explain, because painters translate their experiences into shapes and colors, not words. (40) They seem to feel that a certain selection of shapes and colors, out of the countless billions possible, is exceptionally interesting for them and worth showing to us. Without their work we would never have noticed these particular shapes and colors, or have felt the delight which they brought to the artist. Most artists take their shapes and colors from the world of nature and from human bodies in motion and stillness; their choices indicate that these aspects of the world are worth looking at, that they contain beautiful sights. Contemporary artists might say that they merely choose subjects that provide an interesting pattern, and that there is nothing more in it, yet even they do not choose entirely without reference to the character of their subjects. If one painter chooses to paint an injured leg and another a lake in moonlight, each of them is directing our attention to a certain aspect of the world. Each painter is telling us something, showing us something, emphasizing something--all of which means that, consciously or unconsciously, he is trying to teach us. Compared with a painter of unpleasant subjects, a painter who draws a lake in moonlight is______.
A. conveying more meaning
B. more skilled
C. pointing to something different
D. communicating less