专四英语阅读练习(含答案)

2021年3月1日发(作者：测量学习)

（一）

People have been painting pictures for at least30,000 years. The earliest pictu

res were painted bypeople who hunted animals. They used to paintpictures of

the animals they wanted to catch and es of this kind have been fou

nd on the walls ofcaves in France and Spain. No one knows why theywere pai

nted there. Perhaps the painters thoughtthat their pictures would help them t

o catch theseanimals. Or perhaps human beings have always wanted to tell st

ories in pictures.

About 5,000 years ago, the Egyptians and other people in the Near East bega

n to use picturesas kind of writing. They drew simple pictures or signs to repr

esent things and ideas, and also torepresent the sounds of their language. Th

e signs these people used became a kind of

alphabet

.The Egyptians used to r

ecord information and to tell stories by putting picture writingand pictures tog

ether. When an important person died, scenes and stories from his life werep

ainted and carved on the walls of the place where he was buried. Some of the

se pictures arelike modern

comic

strip

stories. It has been said that Egypt is

the home of the

comic

strip

.But, for the Egyptians, pictures still had magic p

ower. So they did not try to make their way ofwriting simple. The ordinary pe

ople could not

understand

it.

By the year 1,000 BC, people who lived in the area around the Mediterranean

Sea haddeveloped a simpler system of writing. The signs they used were ver

y easy to write, and therewere fewer of them than in the Egyptian system. Th

is was because each sign, or letter,represented only one sound in their langua

ge. The Greeks developed this system and formedthe letters of the Greek

alp

habet

. The Romans copied the idea, and the Roman

alphabet

isnow used all

over the world.

These days, we can write down a story, or record information, without using p

ictures. But westill need pictures of all kinds: drawing, photographs, signs and

diagrams. We find themeverywhere: in books and newspapers, in the street,

and on the walls of the places where welive and work. Pictures help us to

und

erstand

and remember things more easily, and they canmake a story much

more interesting.?

1. Pictures of animals were painted on the walls of caves in France and Spain

because ?___ ___?.?

A. the hunters wanted to see the pictures?

B. the painters were animal lovers?

C. the painters wanted to show imagination?

D. the pictures were thought to be helpful?

2. The Greek

alphabet

was simpler than the Egyptian system for all the follo

wing reasonsEXCEPT that ?______.

A. the former was easy to write?

B. there were fewer signs in the former?

C. the former was easy to pronounce?

D. each sign stood for only one sound?

3. Which of the following statements is TRUE??

A. The Egyptian signs later became a

particular

alphabet

.?

B. The Egyptians liked to write

comic

?

strip

stories.?

C. The Roman

alphabet

was developed from the Egyptian one.?

D. The Greeks copied their writing system from the Egyptians.?

4. In the last paragraph, the author thinks that pictures ?______?.?

A. should be made

comprehensible

?

B. should be made interesting?

C. are of much use in our life?

D. have disappeared from our life

参考答案：

1. D)

< p>
根据文章第一段第五行

“Perhaps

the paintersthought that their pictures would help them to catchthes

e

animals.”

可知古代人以为在墙上画画会对他们有所帮助，故选项

D

为正确答案。

?

2. C)

在做此类题时要注意题干的要求。

通过阅读文章第四段很清楚就知道选项

C

“

前者容

易发 音

”

在文中没有提及，故为正确答案。

?

3. A)

可用排除法来做本题。通过阅读文章很清楚选 项

B

和

D

为错 误陈述。

选项

C

< br>“

罗马字母是从埃及字母发展而来的

”

< br>根据文章第四段第四，五句可知为错误论述，

因此只有选项

A

为正确答案。

4. C)

文章最后一段讲述了图画在今天的用途，故选项

C

< br>为正确答案。

（二）

As the

merchant

class expanded in the eighteenth?century North American C

olonies, the

silversmith

and the coppersmith businesses rose to serve

a few silversmiths were

available

in New Yorkor Boston in the late seventee

nth century, but in theeighteenth century they could be found in all majorcolo

nial cities. No other colonial artisans rivaled

thesilversmiths’

prestige

. They h

andled the mostexpensive materials and possessed direct connections to pros

perous colonial merchants. Theirproducts, primarily silver plates and bowls, re

flected their exalted

status

and testified to

theircustomers’

prominence. Silve

r stood as one of the surest ways to store wealth at a time beforeneighborhoo

d banks existed. Unlike the silver coins from which they were made, silver arti

cleswere readily

identifiable

. Often formed to individual specifications, they

always carried the

silversmith

’s

distinctive

markings and

consequently

co

uld be traced and ers generally

secure

the silver for the silv

er object they ordered. They saved coins, tookthem to smiths, and discussed

the type of pieces they desired. Silversmiths complied with theserequests by

melting the money in a small

furnace

, adding a bit of copper to form a stron

ger

alloy

, and casting the

alloy

in

rectangular

blocks. They hammered these

ingots to the

appropriate

thickness

by hand, shaped them and pressed desi

gns into them for

adornment

.Engraving was also done by hand. In

addition

to plates and bowls, some customers soughtmore

intricate

products, such a

s silver teapots. These were made by shaping or casting partsseparately and t

hen soldering them together. Colonial coppersmithing also come of age in the

early eighteenth century and prospered in northern cities.

Copper’s

ability to

conduct

heat

efficiently

and to

resist

corrosion

contributed to its attractive

ness. But because it wasexpensive in colonial America, coppersmiths were ne

ver very

numerous

. Virtually all copperworked by Smiths was imported as sh

eets or obtained by recycling old copper goods. Copperwas used for practical i

tems, but it was not admired for its beauty. Coppersmiths employed it tofashi

on pots and kettles for the home. They shaped it in much the same manner a

s silver or

melted

it in a foundry with lead or

tin

. They also mixed it with zinc

to make brass for maritimeand scientific instruments.?

ing to the passage, which of the following eighteenth century develop

ments had strong

impact

on silversmiths? ?

A. A decrease in the cost of silver. ?

B. The

invention

of heat

efficient

furnaces. ?

C. The growing economic

prosperity

of colonial merchants. ?

D. The development of new tools used to shape silver. ?

colonial America, where did silversmiths usually

obtain

the material to

make silver articles? ?

A. From their own mines. ?

B. From importers. ?

C. From other silversmiths. ?

D. From customers.

passage mentions all of the following as uses for copper in Colonial Am

erica EXCEPT ?______?.?

A. cooking pots ?

B. scientific instruments ?

C. musical instruments ?

D. maritime instruments

ing to the passage, silversmiths and coppersmiths in colonial America

were similar inwhich of the following ways? ?

A. The amount of

social

prestige

they had.?

B. The way they shaped the

metal

they worked with. ?

C. The cost of the goods they made. ?

D. The

practicality

of the goods they made.

参考答案：

1. C)

根据文章第一句

“As

the

merchant

classexpanded in the eighteenth?century North AmericanC

o lonies,...”

可知，随着在十八世纪的北美殖民地商人阶级膨胀起来，也就是 说那时的商人

财富有了很大的发展，银匠铜匠们有机会发挥他们的专长了，这与选项

C

正好相符。

?

2. D)

根据文章第十四、五行

“ Customers

generallysecures

…object

they ordered. They saved coins, took th

em to smiths,

< p>
and...”

可知顾客要做银器，首先要积攒银币，然后拿到银匠处加工 成他们

想要的形状。选项

D“

来自客户

”

与之相符。

3. C)

文章末尾在提到铜的用途时惟独没有提到乐器。

?

4. B)

根据文章倒数第四行

“They

shaped it in much the same manner as silver or

melted

it in afoundry

with lead or

tin

. ”

可知银匠和铜匠在银器和铜器的塑型方式上是一样的，

故选项

B

为正确

答案。

（三）

?

Nature's Gigantic Snow Plough

On January 10,

1962, an

enormous

piece of

glacier

broke away and tumbled down the side

of amountain in Peru. A mere seven

minutes

later, whencascading ice finally

came to a stop ten miles downthe mountain, it had taken the lives of 4,000 p

eople.

This

disaster

is one of the

< p>
most“

devastating

”examp les

of a very common e

vent: an

avalanche

of snow or ice. Because it is

extremely

cold at very high

altitudes, snow rarely melts. It just keeps piling up higher andhigher. Glaciers

are

eventually

created when the weight of the snow is so great that the low

erlayers are pressed into solid ice. But most avalanches occur long before this

happens. As snowaccumulates on a

steep

slope

, it reaches a

critical

point

at which the slightest

vibration

willsend it sliding into the valley below.

Even an

avalanche

of light power can be dangerous, but the Peruvian

catast

rophe

wasparticularly terrible because it was caused by a heavy

layer

of ice.

It is estimated that the icethat broke off weighed three million tons. As it cra

shed down the

steep

mountainside like agigantic snow

plough

, it swept up tr

ees, boulders and tons of

topsoil

, and completely crushedand destroyed the

six villages that lay in its path.

At present there is no way to

predict

or

avoid

such

enormous

avalanches,

but, luckily, theyare very

rare

. Scientists are

constantly

studying the smalle

r, more common avalanches, to tryto

understand

what causes them. In the f

uture, perhaps dangerous masses of snow and icecan be found and removed

before they take human lives.?

1. The first paragraph catches the reader's attention with a ?_____?.

A. first hand report?

B.

dramatic

description

?

C. tall tale?

D.

vivid

world picture ?

2. In this passage

devastating

A.

violently

ruinous

?

B. spectacularly interesting?

C. stunning?

D.

unpleasant

?

3. The passage is mostly about ?______?.?

A. avalanches

B. glaciers

C. Peru

D. mountains

参考答案：

1. A)

< p>
文章的第一段就像一个新闻报道，

报道了在秘鲁发生的雪崩的灾难性后果，

一下子就

吸引了读者的注意力。

?

2. A)

根据语境线索可判断出词义为

A

。

?

3. A)

通读全文可知，文章主要是讲述雪崩的形成。