新概念3课文

Lesson 1

A puma at large
Where must the puma have come from?
Pumas are large cat-like animals which are found in America.
When reports came into London Zoo
that a wild puma had been spotted forty-five miles south of London
they were not taken seriously.
However as the evidence began to accumulate
experts from the Zoo felt obliged to investigate
for the descriptions given by people who claimed to have seen the puma
were extraordinarily similar.
The hunt for the puma began in a small village
where a woman picking blackberries saw 'a large cat’only five yards away from her.
It immediately ran away when she saw it
and experts confirmed that a puma will not attack a human being unless it is cornered.
The search proved difficult
for the puma was often observed at one place in the morning
and at another place twenty miles away in the evening.
Wherever it went it left behind it a trail of dead deer and small animals like rabbits.
Paw prints were seen in a number of places and puma fur was found clinging to bushes.
Several people complained of ‘cat-like noises’ at night
and a businessman on a fishing trip saw the puma up a tree.
The experts were now fully convinced that the animal was a puma
but where had it come from?
As no pumas had been reported missing from any zoo in the country
this one must have been in the possession of a private collector
and somehow managed to escape.
The hunt went on for several weeks but the puma was not caught.
It is disturbing to think
that a dangerous wild animal is still at large in the quiet countryside.

Lesson 2

Thirteen equals one
Was the vicar pleased that the clock was striking? Why?
Our vicar is always raising money for one cause or another,
but he has never managed to get enough money to have the church clock repaired.
The big clock which used to strike the hours day and night
was damaged many years ago and has been silent ever since.
One night,however,our vicar woke up with a start:the clock was striking the hours!
Looking at his watch, he saw that it was one o’clock,
but the bell struck thirteen times before it stopped.
Armed with a torch,the vicar went up into the clock tower to see what was going on.
In the torchlight, he caught sight of a figure
whom he immediately recognized as Bill Wilkins,our local grocer.
‘Whatever are you doing up here Bill?’ asked the vicar in surprise.
‘I’m trying to repair the bell,’ answered Bill.
‘I’ve been coming up here night after night for weeks now.
You see,I was hoping to give you a surprise.’
‘You certainly did give me a surprise!’ said the vicar.
‘You’ve probably woken up everyone in the village as well.
Still,I’m glad the bell is working again.’
'That’s the trouble, vicar,'answered Bill. ‘It’s working all right,
but I’m afraid that at one o’clock it will strike thirteen times
and there’s nothing I can do about it.’
'We’ll get used to that,Bill,'said the vicar.
‘Thirteen is not as good as one,but it’s better than nothing.
Now let’s go downstairs and have a cup of tea.’

Lesson 3

An unknown goddess
How did the archaeologists know that the statue was a goddess?
Some time ago,
an interesting discovery was made by archaeologists on the Aegean island of Kea.
An American team explored a temple
which stands in an ancient city on the promontory of Ayia Irini.
The city at one time must have been prosperous,
for it enjoyed a high level of civilization.
Houses–often three storeys high–were built of stone.
They had large rooms with beautifully decorated walls.
The city was even equipped with a drainage system,
for a great many clay pipes were found beneath the narrow streets.
The temple which the archaeologists explored
was used as a place of worship from the fifteenth century B.C. until Roman times.
In the most sacred room of the temple,
clay fragments of fifteen statues were found.
Each of these represented a goddess and had,at one time, been painted.
The body of one statue was found among remains dating from the 15th century B.C.
Its missing head happened to be among remains of the fifth century B.C.
This head must have been found in Classical times and carefully preserved.
It was very old and precious even then.
When the archaeologists reconstructed the fragments,
they were amazed to find that the goddess turned out to be a very modern-looking woman.
She stood three feet high and her hands rested on her hips.
She was wearing a full-length skirt which swept the ground.
Despite her great age, she was very graceful indeed,
but,so far,the archaeologists have been unable to discover her identity.

Lesson 4

The double life of Alfred Bloggs
Why did Alf want a white-collar job?
These days,people who do manual work
often receive far more money than people who work in offices.
People who work in offices are frequently referred to as ‘white-collar workers’
for the simple reason that they usually wear a collar and tie to go to work.
Such is human nature,
that a great many people are often willing to sacrifice higher pay
for the privilege of becoming white-collar workers.
This can give rise to curious situations,
as it did in the case of Alfred Bloggs
who worked as a dustman for the Ellesmere Corporation.
When he got married, Alf was too embarrassed to say anything to his wife about his job.
He simply told her that he worked for the Corporation.
Every morning,he left home dressed in a smart black suit.
He then changed into overalls and spent the next eight hours as a dustman.
Before returning home at night,he took a shower and changed back into his suit.
Alf did this for over two years and his fellow dustmen kept his secret.
Alf’s wife has never discovered that she married a dustman and she never will,
for Alf has just found another job.
He will soon be working in an office.
He will be earning only half as much as he used to,
but he feels that his rise in status is well worth the loss of money.
From now on,he will wear a suit all day
and others will call him ‘Mr.Bloggs’,not ‘Alf’.

Lesson 5

The facts
What was the consequence of the editor’s insistence on facts and statistics?
Editors of newspapers and magazines often go to extremes
to provide their readers with unimportant facts and statistics.
Last year a journalist had been instructed by a well-known magazine
to write an article on the president’s palace in a new African republic.
When the article arrived,
the editor read the first sentence and then refused to publish it.
The article began:
Hundreds of steps lead to the high wall which surrounds the president’s palace.’
The editor at once sent the journalist a fax
instructing him to find out the exact number of steps and the height of the wall
The journalist immediately set out to obtain these important facts,
but he took a long time to send them.
Meanwhile,the editor was getting impatient, for the magazine would soon go to press.
He sent the journalist two more faxes,but received no reply.
He sent yet another fax informing the journalist
that if he did not reply soon he would be fired.
When the journalist again failed to reply,
the editor reluctantly published the article as it had originally been written.
A week later,the editor at last received a fax from the journalist.
Not only had the poor man been arrested, but he had been sent to prison as well.
However,he had at last been allowed to send a fax in which he informed the editor
that he had been arrested while counting the 1,084 steps
leading to the 15 foot wall which surrounded the president’s palace.

Lesson 6

Smash-and-grab
How did Mr.Taylor try to stop the thieves?
The expensive shops in a famous arcade near Piccadilly were just opening.
At this time of the morning,the arcade was almost empty.
Mr.Taylor,the owner of a jewellery shop was admiring a new window display.
Two of his assistants had been working busily since 8 o’clock
and had only just finished.
Diamond necklaces and rings
had been beautifully arranged on a background of black velvet.
After gazing at the display for several minutes,Mr.Taylor went back into his shop.
The silence was suddenly broken when a large car,
with its headlights on and its horn blaring,roared down the arcade.
It came to a stop outside the jeweller’s.
One man stayed at the wheel
while two others with black stockings over their faces jumped out
and smashed the window of the shop with iron bars.
While this was going on,Mr.Taylor was upstairs.
He and his staff began throwing furniture out of the window.
Chairs and tables went flying into the arcade.
One of the thieves was struck by a heavy statue,
but he was too busy helping himself to diamonds to notice any pain.
The raid was all over in three minutes,
for the men scrambled back into the car and it moved off at a fantastic speed.
Just as it was leaving,
Mr.Taylor rushed out and ran after it throwing ashtrays and vases,
but it was impossible to stop the thieves.
They had got away with thousands of pounds worth of diamonds.

Lesson 7

Mutilated Ladies
Why did Jane cook John’s wallet?
Has it ever happened to you?
Have you ever put your trousers in the washing machine
and then remembered there was a large bank note in your back pocket?
When you rescued your trousers,did you find the note was whiter than white?
People who live in Britain needn’t despair when they make mistakes like this
(and a lot of people do)!
Fortunately for them, the Bank of England has a team called Mutilated Ladies
which deals with claims from people who fed their money to a machine or to their dog.
Dogs,it seems,love to chew up money!
A recent case concerns Jane Butlin
whose fiance,John, runs a successful furniture business.
John had a very good day
and put his wallet containing 3,000 into the microwave oven for safekeeping. Then he and Jane went horse-riding. When they got home, Jane cooked their dinner in the microwave oven and without realizing it,cooked her fiance's wallet as well. Imagine their dismay when they found a beautifully-cooked wallet and notes turned to ash! John went to see his bank manager who sent the remains of wallet and the money to the special department of the Bank of England in Newcastle:the Mutilated Ladies! They examined the remains and John got all his money back. 'So long as there's something to identify, we will give people their money back,' said a spokeswoman for the Bank. 'Last year,we paid 1.5 million on 21,000 claims.’

Lesson 8

A famous monastery
What are the St.Bernard dogs used for?
The Great St.Bernard Pass connects Switzerland to Italy.
At 2,473 metres,it is the highest mountain pass in Europe.
The famous monastery of St.Bernard,
which was founded in the eleventh century,lies about a mile away.
For hundreds of years,
St.Bernard dogs have saved the lives of travellers crossing the dangerous Pass.
These friendly dogs,which were first brought from Asia,
were used as watchdogs even in Roman times.
Now that a tunnel has been built through the mountains,the Pass is less dangerous,
but each year,the dogs are still sent out into the snow
whenever a traveller is in difficulty.
Despite the new tunnel,
there are still a few people who rashly attempt to cross the Pass on foot.
During the summer months,the monastery is very busy,
for it is visited by thousands of people who cross the Pass in cars.
As there are so many people about,the dogs have to be kept in a special enclosure.
In winter,however,life at the monastery is quite different.
The temperature drops to -30 degrees,
and very few people attempt to cross the Pass.
The monks prefer winter to summer for they have more privacy.
The dogs have greater freedom,too,
for they are allowed to wander outside their enclosure.
The only regular visitors to the monastery in winter are parties of skiers
who go there at Christmas and Easter.
These young people,
who love the peace of the mountains,
always receive a warm welcome at St.Bernard’s monastery.

Lesson 9

Flying cats
How do cats try to protect themselves when falling from great heights?
Cats never fail to fascinate human beings.
They can be friendly and affectionate towards humans,
but they lead mysterious lives of their own as well.
They never become submissive like dogs and horses.
As a result,humans have learned to respect feline independence.
Most cats remain suspicious of humans all their lives.
One of the things that fascinates us most about cats is the popular belief
that they have nine lives.
Apparently,there is a good deal of truth in this idea.
A cat’s ability to survive falls is based on fact.
Recently the New York Animal Medical Centre
made a study of 132 cats over a period of five months.
All these cats had one experience in common: they had fallen off high buildings,
yet only eight of them died from shock or injuries.
Of course,New York is the ideal place for such an interesting study,
because there is no shortage of tall buildings.
There are plenty of high-rise windowsills to fall from!
One cat,Sabrina, fell 32 storeys,yet only suffered from a broken tooth.
'Cats behave like well-trained paratroopers,'a doctor said.
It seems that the further cats fall,the less they are likely to injure themselves.
In a long drop,they reach speeds of 60 miles an hour and more.
At high speeds, falling cats have time to relax.
They stretch out their legs like flying squirrels.
This increases their air-resistance
and reduces the shock of impact when they hit the ground.

Lesson 10

The loss of the Titanic
What’d have happened if only two of the 16 water-tight compartments had been flooded?
The great ship,Titanic sailed for New York from Southampton on April 10th,1912.
She was carrying 1,316 passengers and a crew of 891.
Even by modern standards,the 46,000 ton Titanic was a colossal ship.
At that time,however,she was not only the largest ship that had ever been built,
but was regarded as unsinkable,for she had sixteen water-tight compartments.
Even if two of these were flooded,she would still be able to float
The tragic sinking of this great liner will always be remembered,
for she went down on her first voyage with heavy loss of life.
Four days after setting out,
while the Titanic was sailing across the icy waters of the North Atlantic,
a huge iceberg was suddenly spotted by a lookout.
After the alarm had been given,
the great ship turned sharply to avoid a direct collision.
The Titanic turned just in time, narrowly missing the immense wall of ice
which rose over 100 feet out of the water beside her.
Suddenly,there was a slight trembling sound from below,
and the captain went down to see what had happened.
The noise had been so faint that no one thought that the ship had been damaged.
Below,the captain realized to his horror that the Titanic was sinking rapidly,
for five of her sixteen watertight compartments had already been flooded!
The order to abandon ship was given
and hundreds of people plunged into the icy water.
As there were not enough life-boats for everybody,1,500 lives were lost.

Lesson 11

Not guilty
What was the Customs Officer looking for?
Customs Officers are quite tolerant these days, but they can still stop you when you are going through the Green Channel
and have nothing to declare.
Even really honest people are often made to feel guilty.
The hardened professional smuggler, on the other hand, is never troubled by such feelings,
even if he has five hundred gold watches hidden in his suitcase.
When I returned from abroad recently,a particularly officious young Customs Officer
clearly regarded me as a smuggler.
‘Have you anything to declare?’ he asked, looking me in the eye.
'No,'I answered confidently.
‘Would you mind unlocking this suitcase please?’
‘Not at all,’ I answered.
The Officer went through the case with great care.
All the things I had packed so carefully were soon in a dreadful mess.
I felt sure I would never be able to close the case again.
Suddenly,I saw the Officer’s face light up.
He had spotted a tiny bottle at the bottom of my case
and he pounced on it with delight.
‘Perfume,eh?’ he asked sarcastically.
‘You should have declared that.
Perfume is not exempt from import duty.’
'But it isn’t perfume, I said. 'It’s hair gel.'Then I added with a smile,
'It’s a strange mixture I make myself.
As I expected,he did not believe me.
‘Try it!’ I said encouragingly.
The Officer unscrewed the cap and put the bottle to his nostrils.
He was greeted by an unpleasant smell which convinced him that I was telling the truth.
A few minutes later,I was able to hurry away with precious chalk marks on my baggage.

Lesson 12

Life on a desert island
What was exceptional about the two men’s stay on the desert island?
Most of us have formed an unrealistic picture of life on a desert island.
We sometimes imagine a desert island to be a sort of paradise where the sun always shines.
Life there is simple and good.
Ripe fruit falls from the trees and you never have to work.
The other side of the picture is quite the opposite.
Life on a desert island is wretched.
You either starve to death or live like Robinson Crusoe,
waiting for a boat which never comes.
Perhaps there is an element of truth in both these pictures,
but few of us have had the opportunity to find out.
Two men who recently spent five days on a coral island
wished they had stayed there longer.
They were taking a badly damaged boat
from the Virgin Islands to Miami to have it repaired.
During the journey,their boat began to sink.
They quickly loaded a small rubber dinghy with food,matches,and cans of beer
and rowed for a few miles across the Caribbean
until they arrived at a tiny coral island.
There were hardly any trees on the island and there was no water,
but this did not prove to be a problem.
The men collected rainwater in the rubber dinghy.
As they had brought a spear gun with them,they had plenty to eat.
They caught lobster and fish every day,and as one of them put it ‘ate like kings’.
When a passing tanker rescued them five days later,
both men were genuinely sorry that they had to leave.

Lesson 13

‘It’s only me’
What did the man expect to find under the stairs?
After her husband had gone to work,
Mrs.Richards sent her children to school and went upstairs to her bedroom.
She was too excited to do any housework that morning,
for in the evening she would be going to a fancy-dress party with her husband.
She intended to dress up as a ghost
and as she had made her costume the night before,she was impatient to try it on.
Though the costume consisted only of a sheet,it was very effective.
After putting it on, Mrs.Richards went downstairs.
She wanted to find out whether it would be comfortable to wear.
Just as Mrs.Richards was entering the dining-room,
there was a knock on the front door.
She knew that it must be the baker.
She had told him to come straight in if ever she failed to open the door
and to leave the bread on the kitchen table.
Not wanting to frighten the poor man,
Mrs.Richards quickly hid in the small storeroom under the stairs.
She heard the front door open and heavy footsteps in the hall.
Suddenly the door of the storeroom was opened and a man entered.
Mrs.Richards realized that it must be the man from the Electricity Board
who had come to read the metre.
She tried to explain the situation,saying ‘It’s only me’,but it was too late.
The man let out a cry
and jumped back several paces.
When Mrs.Richards walked towards him, he fled,slamming the door behind him.

Lesson 14

A noble gangster
How did Hawkwood make money in times of peace?
There was a time when the owners of shops and businesses in Chicago
had to pay large sums of money to gangsters in return for ‘protection’.
If the money was not paid promptly,
the gangsters would quickly put a man out of business by destroying his shop.
Obtaining ‘protection money’ is not a modern crime.
As long ago as the fourteenth century,an Englishman,Sir John Hawkwood,
made the remarkable discovery that people would rather pay large sums of money
than have their life work destroyed by gangsters.
Six hundred years ago,Sir John Hawkwood arrived in Italy with a band of soldiers
and settled near Florence.
He soon made a name for himself
and came to be known to the Italians as Giovanni Acuto.
Whenever the Italian city-states were at war with each other,
Hawkwood used to hire his soldiers to princes
who were willing to pay the high price he demanded.
In times of peace,
when business was bad,
Hawkwood and his men would march into a city-state,
and after burning down a few farms,
would offer to go away if protection money was paid to them.
Hawkwood made large sums of money in this way.
In spite of this, the Italians regarded him as a sort of hero.
When he died at the age of eighty, the Florentines gave him a state funeral
and had a picture painted which was dedicated to the memory of ‘the most valiant soldier and most notable leader,
Signor Giovanni Haukodue’.

Lesson 15

Fifty pence worth of trouble
Did George get anything for his fifty pence? What?
Children always appreciate small gifts of money.
Mum or dad,of course,provides a regular supply of pocket money,
but uncles and aunts are always a source of extra income.
With some children, small sums go a long way.
If fifty pence pieces are not exchanged for sweets,
they rattle for months inside money boxes.
Only very thrifty children manage to fill up a money box.
For most of them,fifty pence is a small price to pay for a nice big bar of chocolate.
My nephew,George,has a money box but it is always empty.
Very few of the fifty pence pieces and pound coins I have given him
have found their way there.
I gave him fifty pence yesterday and advised him to save it.
Instead,he bought himself fifty pence worth of trouble.
On his way to the sweet shop,he dropped his fifty pence
and it bounced along the pavement and then disappeared down a drain.
George took off his jacket,rolled up his sleeves
and pushed his right arm through the drain cover.
He could not find his 50 pence piece anywhere,
and what is more,
he could not get his arm out.
A crowd of people gathered round him
and a lady rubbed his arm with soap and butter,
but George was firmly stuck.
The fire brigade was called and two fire fighters freed George using a special type of grease.
George was not too upset by his experience
because the lady who owns the sweet shop heard about his troubles
and rewarded him with a large box of chocolates.

Lesson 16

Mary had a little lamb
Was Dimitri right to apologize to his neighbour? Why not?
Mary and her husband Dimitri lived in the tiny village of Perachora in southern Greece.
One of Mary’s prize possessions was a little white lamb which her husband had given her.
She kept it tied to a tree in a field during the day and went to fetch it every evening.
One evening, however the lamb was missing.
The rope had been cut, so it was obvious that the lamb had been stolen.
When Dimitri came in from the fields,his wife told him what had happened.
Dimitri at once set out to find the thief.
He knew it would not prove difficult in such a small village.
After telling several of his friends about the theft,
Dimitri found out that his neighbour, Aleko, had suddenly acquired a new lamb.
Dimitri immediately went to Aleko’s house and angrily accused him of stealing the lamb.
He told him he had better return it or he would call the police.
Aleko denied taking it and led Dimitri into his backyard.
It was true that he had just bought a lamb he explained, but his lamb was black.
Ashamed of having acted so rashly, Dimitri apologized to Aleko for having accused him.
While they were talking it began to rain and Dimitri stayed in Aleko’s house until the rain stopped.
When he went outside half an hour later, he was astonished to find that the little black lamb was almost white.
Its wool, which had been dyed black, had been washed clean by the rain!

Lesson 17

The longest suspension bridge in the world
How is the bridge supported?
Verrazano, an Italian about whom little is known, sailed into New York Harbour in 1524 and named it Angouleme.
He described it as ‘a very agreeable situation located within two small hills in the midst of which flowed a great river.’
Though Verrazano is by no means considered to be a great explorer, his name will probably remain immortal,
for on November 21st, 1964, the longest suspension bridge in the world was named after him.
The Verrazano Bridge, which was designed by Othmar Ammann, joins Brooklyn to Staten Island.
It has a span of 4,260 feet.
The bridge is so long that the shape of the earth had to be taken into account by its designer.
Two great towers support four huge cables.
The towers are built on immense underwater platforms made of steel and concrete.
The platforms extend to a depth of over 100 feet under the sea.
These alone took sixteen months to build.
Above the surface of the water, the towers rise to a height of nearly 700 feet.
They support the cables from which the bridge has been suspended.
Each of the four cables contains 26,108 lengths of wire.
It has been estimated that if the bridge were packed with cars, it would still only be carrying a third of its total capacity.
However, size and strength are not the only important things about this bridge.
Despite its immensity, it is both simple and elegant,
fulfilling its designer’s dream to creat ‘an enormous object drawn as faintly as possible’.

Lesson 18

Electric currents in modern art
How might some of the exhibits have been dangerous?
Modern sculptur