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Section 3 Reading Comprehension(3)
文章出处:  发布时间:2006-07-09


  (A) The role of the railroad in the economy of the United States.

  (B) Major nineteenth-century writers.

  (C) The conflict between expanding industry and preserving nature.

  (D) The railroad as a subject for literature.

  24 The word "it" in line 7 refers to

  (A) railroad

  (B) manifestation

  (C) speed

  (D) nature

  25 In the first paragraph, the author implies that writers' reactions to the

  development of railroads were

  (A) highly enthusiastic

  (B) both positive and negative

  (C) unchanging

  (D) disinterested

  26 The word "lamented" in line 10 is closest in meaning to

  (A) complained about

  (B) analyzed

  (C) explained

  (D) reflected on

  27 According to the passage, the railroad played a significant role in

  literature in all of the following kinds of books EXCEPT

  (A) thrillers

  (B) boys' books

  (C) important novels

  (D) romances

  28 The phrase "first rank" in line 16 is closest in meaning to

  (A) largest category

  (B) highest quality

  (C) earliest writers

  (D) most difficult language

  29 The word "them" in line 18 refers to

  (A) novels

  (B) years

  (C) individuals

  (D) works

  30 The author mentions all of the following as being true about the literature

  of railroads EXCEPT that

  (A) many of its writers had experience working on railroads

  (B) many of the books were set in railroad stations and yards

  (C) the books were well known during the railroads' prime years.

  (D) quite a few of the books are still popular today.

  31 The words "faded from" in line 21 are closest in meaning to

  (A) grew in

  (B) disappeared from

  (C) remained in

  (D) developed from

  32 What is the author's attitude toward the "railroad novels" and other books

  about railroads

  written between 1890 and 1920?

  (A) They have as much literary importance as the books written by Emerson,

  Thoreau, and Adams.

  (B) They are good examples of the effects industry and business had on the

  literature of the

  United States.

  (C) They contributed to the weakening of traditional values.

  (D) They are worth reading as sources of knowledge about the impact of railroads on life in the United States.

  Questions 33-44

  By the 1820's in the United States, when steamboats were common on western waters, these boats were mostly powered by engines built in the West (Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, or Louisville), and of a distinctive western design specially suited to western needs. The first steam engines in practical use in England and the United States were of low-pressure design. This was the type first developed by James Watt, then manufactured by the firm of Boulton and Watt, and long the standard industrial engine. Steam was accumulated in a large, double-acting vertical cylinder, but the steam reached only a few pounds of pressure per square inch. It was low-pressure engines of this type that were first introduced into the United States by Robert Fulton. He imported such a Boulton and Watt engine from England to run the Clermont. But this type of engine was expensive and complicated, requiring many precision-fitted moving parts. The engine that became standard on western steamboats was of a different and novel design. It was the work primarily of an unsung hero of American industrial progress,

   Oliver Evans(1755-1819). The self-educated son of a Delaware farmer. Evans early became obsessed by the possibilities of mechanized production and steam power. As early as 1802 he was using a stationary steam engine of high-pressure design in his mill. Engines of this type were not unknown, but before Evans they were generally considered impractical and dangerous.Within a decade the high-pressure engine, the new type, had become standard on western waters. Critics ignorant of western conditions often attacked it as wasteful and dangerous. But people who really knew the Ohio, the Missouri, and the Mississippi
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