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1、LessonlWe can read of things that happened 5,0 0 0 yearsago in the Near East,where people first learned towrite.But there are some parts of the world whereeven now people cannot write.The only way thatthey can preserve their history is to recount it assagas一一legends handed down from onegeneration of
2、 story-tellers to another.Theselegends are useful because they can tell ussomething about migrations of people who livedlong ago,but none could write down what they did.Anthropologists wondered where the remoteancestors of the Polynesian peoples now living inthe Pacific Islands came from.The sagas o
3、f thesepeople explain that some of them came fromIndonesia about 2,0 0 0 years ago.But the first people who were like ourselves livedso long ago that even their sagas,if they had any,are forgotten.So archaeologists have neitherhistory nor legends to help them to find out wherethe first modern men1 c
4、ame from.Fortunately,however,ancient men made tools ofstone,especially flint,because this is easier toshape than other kinds.They may also have usedwood and skins,but these have rotted away.Stone does not decay,and so the tools of longago have remained when even the bones of themen who made them hav
5、e disappeared withouttrace.Lesson2Why,you may wonder,should spiders be ourfriends?Because they destroy so many insects,and insects include some of the greatest enemiesof the human race.Insects would make itimpossible for us to live in the world；they woulddevour all our crops and kill our flocks and
6、herds,if it were not for the protection we get frominsect-eating animals.We owe a lot to the birdsand beasts who eat insects but all of them puttogether kill only a fraction of the numberdestroyed by spiders.Moreover,unlike some ofthe other insect eaters,spiders never do the leastharm to us or our b
7、elongings.Spiders are not insects,as many people think,noreven nearly related to them.One can tell thedifference almost at a glance for a spider alwayshas eight legs and an insect never more than six.How many spiders are engaged in this work on ourbehalf?One authority on spiders made a censusof the
8、spiders in a grass field in the south ofEngland,and he estimated that there were morethan 2,250,000 in one acre,that is something like6,000,000 spiders of different kinds on a footballpitch.Spiders are busy for at least half the year inkilling insects.It is impossible to make more thanthe wildest gu
9、ess at how many they kill,but theyare hungry creatures,not content with only threemeals a day.It has been estimated that the weightof all the insects destroyed by spiders in Britain inone year would be greater than the total weight ofall the human beings in the country.Lesson3Modern alpinists try to
10、 climb mountains by a routewhich will give them good sport,and the moredifficult it is,the more highly it is regarded.In thepioneering days,however,this was not the case atall.The early climbers were looking for the easiestway to the top because the summit was the prizethey sought,especially if it h
11、ad never beenattained before.It is true that during theirexplorations they often faced difficulties anddangers of the most perilous nature,equipped in amanner which would make a modern climbershudder at the thought,but they did not go out oftheir way to court such excitement.They had asingle aim,a s
12、olitary goal一一the top!It is hard for us to realize nowadays how difficult itwas for the pioneers.Except for one or two placessuch as Zermatt and Chamonix,which had rapidlybecome popular,Alpine villages tended to beimpoverished settlements cut off from civilizationby the high mountains.Such inns as t
13、here werewere generally dirty and flea-ridden；the foodsimply local cheese accompanied by bread oftentwelve months old,all washed down with coarsewine.Often a valley boasted no inn at all,andclimbers found shelter wherever theycould一一sometimes with the local priest(who wasusually as poor as his paris
14、hioners),sometimeswith shepherds or cheese-makers.Invariably thebackground was the same：dirt and poverty,andvery uncomfortable.For men accustomed toeating seven-course dinners and sleepingbetween fine linen sheets at home,the change tothe Alpsmust have been very hard indeed.Lesson4In the Soviet Unio
15、n several cases have beenreported recently of people who can read anddetect colours with their fingers,and even seethrough solid doors and walls.One case concernsan eleven-year-old schoolgirl,Vera Petrova,whohas normal vision but who can also perceivethings with different parts of her skin,and throu
16、ghsolid walls.This ability was first noticed by herfather.One day she came into his office andhappened to put her hands on the door of alocked safe.Suddenly she asked her father whyhe kept so many old newspapers locked awaythere,and even described the way they were doneup in bundles.Veras curious ta
17、lent was brought to the notice ofa scientific research institute in the town ofUlyanovsk,near where she lives,and in April shewas given a series of tests by a specialcommission of the Ministry of Health of theRussian Federal Republic.During these tests shewas able to read a newspaper through an opaq
18、uescreen and,stranger still,by moving her elbowover a childs game of Lotto she was able todescribe the figures and colours printed on it；and,in another instance,wearing stockings andslippers,to make out with her foot the outlines andcolours of a picture hidden under a carpet.Otherexperiments showed
19、that her knees and shouldershad a similar sensitivity.During all these tests Verawas blindfold；and,indeed,except when blindfoldshe lacked the ability to perceive things with herskin.It was also found that although she couldperceive things with her fingers this ability ceasedthe moment her hands were
20、 wet.Lesson5The gorilla is something of a paradox in theAfrican scene.One thinks one knows him very well.For a hundred years or more he has been killed,captured,and imprisoned,in zoos.His boneshave been mounted in natural history museumseverywhere,and he has always exerted a strongfascination upon s
21、cientists and romantics alike.He is the stereotyped monster of the horror filmsand the adventure books,and an obvious(thoughnot perhaps strictly scientific)linkwith our ancestral past.Yet the fact is we know very little about gorillas.Noreally satisfactory photograph has ever been takenof one in a w
22、ild state,no zoologist,howeverintrepid,has been able to keep the animal underclose and constant observation in the dark junglesin which he lives.Carl Akeley,the Americannaturalist,led two expeditions in thenineteen-twenties,and now lies buried among theanimals heloved so well.But even he was unable
23、to discoverhow long the gorilla lives,or how or why it dies,norwas he able to define the exact social pattern ofthe family groups,or indicate the final extent oftheir intelligence.All this and many other thingsremain almost as much a mystery as they werewhen the French explorer Du Chaillu firstdescr
24、ibed the animal to the civilized world acentury ago.The Abominable Snowman whohaunts the imagination of climbers in theHimalayas is hardly more elusive.Lesson6People are always talking about1 the problem ofyouth If there is one-which I take leave todoubt一一then it is older people who create it,notthe
25、 young themselves.Let us get down tofundamentals and agree that the young are afterall human beings一一people just like their elders.There is only one difference between an old manand a young one：the young man has a gloriousfuture before him and the old one has a splendidfuture behind him：and maybe th
26、at is where therub is.When I was a teenager,I felt that I was just youngand uncertain一一that I was a new boy in a hugeschool,and I would have been very pleased to beregarded as something so interesting as aproblem.For one thing,being a problem gives youa certain identity,and that is one of the things
27、 theyoung are busily engaged in seeking.I find young people exciting.They have an air offreedom,and they have not a dreary commitmentto mean ambitions or love of comfort.They arenot anxious social climbers,and they have nodevotion to material things.All this seems to meto link them with life,and the
28、 origins of things.Itsas if they were in some sense cosmic beings inviolent an lovely contrast with us suburbancreatures.All that is in my mind when I meet ayoung person.He may be conceited,ill-mannered,presumptuous of fatuous,but I do notturn for protection to dreary cliches about respectfor elders
29、一一as if mere age were a reason forrespect.I accept that we are equals,and I willargue with him,as an equal,if I think he is wrong.Lesson7I am always amazed when I hear people sayingthat sport creates goodwill between the nations,and that if only the common peoples of the worldcould meet one another
30、at football or cricket,theywould have no inclination to meet on thebattlefield.Even if one didnt know from concreteexamples(the 1936 Olympic Games,for instance)that international sporting contests lead to orgiesof hatred,one could deduce it from generalprinciples.Nearly all the sports practised nowa
31、days arecompetitive.You play to win,and the game haslittle meaning unless you do your utmost to win.On the village green,where you pick up sides andno feeling of local patriotism is involved,it ispossible to play simply for the fun and exercise：but as soon as the question of prestige arises,assoon a
32、s you feel that you and some larger unit willbe disgraced if you lose,the most savagecombative instincts are aroused.Anyone who hasplayed even in a school football match knows this.At the international level sport is frankly mimicwarfare.But the significant thing is not thebehaviour of the players b
33、ut the attitude of thespectators：and,behind the spectators,of thenations,who work themselves into furies overthese absurd contests,and seriously believe一一atany rate for short periods一一that running,jumpingand kicking a ball are tests of national virtue.Lesson8Parents have to do much less for their ch
34、ildrentoday than they used to do,and home hasbecome much less of a workshop.Clothes can bebought ready made,washing can go to thelaundry,food can be bought cooked,canned orpreserved,bread is baked and delivered by thebaker,milk arrives on the doorstep,meals can behad at the restaurant,the works1 can
35、teen,and theschool dining-room.It is unusual now for father to pursue his trade orother employment at home,and his children rarely,if ever,see him at his place of work.Boys aretherefore seldom trained to follow their fathersoccupation,and in many towns they have a fairlywide choice of employment and
36、 so do girls.Theyoung wage-earner often earns good money,andsoon acquires a feeling of economicindependence.In textile areas it has long beencustomary for mothers to go out to work,but thispractice has become so widespread that theworking mother is now a not unusual factor in achilds home life,the n
37、umber of married women inemployment having more than doubled in the lasttwenty-five years.With mother earning and hisolder children drawing substantial wages father isseldom the dominant figure that he still was at thebeginning of the century.When mother workseconomic advantages accrue,but children
38、losesomething of great value if mothers employmentprevents her from being home to greet them whenthey return from school.Lesson9Not all sounds made by animals serve aslanguage,and we have only to turn to thatextraordinary discovery of echo-location in bats tosee a case in which the voice plays a str
39、ictlyutilitarian role.To get a full appreciation of what this means wemust turn first to some recent human inventions.Everyone knows that if he shouts in the vicinity of awall or a mountainside,an echo will come back.The further off this solid obstruction the longertime will elapse for the return of
40、 the echo.A soundmade by tapping on the hull of a ship will bereflected from the sea bottom,and by measuringthe time interval between the taps and the receiptof the echoes the depth of the sea at that pointcan be calculated.So was born theecho-sounding apparatus,now in general use inships.Every soli
41、d object will reflect a sound,varying ac-cording to the size and nature of theobject.A shoal of fish will do this.So it is acomparatively simple step from locating the seabottom to locating a shoal of fish.With experience,and with improved apparatus,it is now possiblenot only to locate a shoal but t
42、o tell if it is herring,cod,or other well-known fish,by the pattern of itsecho.A few years ago it was found that certain batsemit squeaks and by receiving the echoes theycould locate and steer clear of obstacles一一orlocate flying insects on which they feed.Thisecho-location in bats is often compared
43、withradar,the principle of which is similar.Lessonl0In our new society there is a growing dislike oforiginal,creative men.The manipulated do notunderstand them；the manipulators fear them.Thetidy committee men regard them with horror,knowing that no pigeonholes can be found forthem.We could do with a
44、 few original,creativemen in our political lifeif only to create someenthusiasm,release some energy一一but where arethey?We are asked to choose between variousshades of the negative.The engine is falling topieces while the joint owners of the car arguewhether the footbrake or the handbrake should beap
45、plied.Notice how the cold,colourless men,without ideas and with no other passion but acraving for success,get on in this society,capturing one plum after another and taking thejuice and taste out of them.Sometimes you mightthink the machines we worship make all the chiefappointments,promoting the hu
46、man beings whoseem closest to them.Between mid-night anddawn,when sleep will not come and all the oldwounds begin to ache,I often have a nightmarevision of a future world in which there are billionsof people,all numbered and registered,with not agleam of genius anywhere,not an original mind,arich pe
47、rsonality,on the whole packed globe.Thetwin ideals of our time,organization and quantity,will have won for ever.Lessonl1Alfred the Great acted as his own spy,visitingDanish camps disguised as a minstrel.In thosedays wandering minstrels were welcomeeverywhere.They were not fighting men,and theirharp
48、was their passport.Alfred had learned manyof their ballads in his youth,and could vary hisprogramme with acrobatic tricks and simpleconjuring.While Alfreds little army slowly began to gatherat Athelney,the king himself set out to penetratethe camp of Guthrum,the commander of theDanish invaders.These
49、 had settled down for thewinter at Chippenham：thither Alfred went.Henoticed at once that discipline was slack：theDanes had the self-confidence of conquerors,and their security precautions were casual.Theylived well,on the proceeds of raids onneighbouring regions.There they collected womenas well as
50、food and drink,and a life of ease hadmade them soft.Alfred stayed in the camp a week before hereturned to Athelney.The force there assembledwas trivial compared with the Danish horde.ButAlfred had deduced that the Danes were no longerfit for prolonged battle:and that theircommissariat had no organiz