Humans have sewn by hand for thousands of yea...

Humans have sewn by hand for thousands of years. It was said that the first thread was made from animal muscle and sinew (肌腱). And the earliest needles were made from bones. Since those early days, many people have been involved in the process of developing a machine that could do the same thing more quickly and with greater efficiency.

Charles Wiesenthal, who was born in Germany, designed and received a patent on a double-pointed needle that eliminated the need to turn the needle around with each stitch (缝合) in England in 1755. Other inventors of that time tried to develop a functional sewing machine, but each design had at least one serious imperfection.

Frenchman Barthelemy Thimonnier finally engineered a machine that really worked. However, he was nearly killed by a group of angry tailors when they burned down his garment factory. They feared that they would lose their jobs to the machine.

American inventor Elias Howe, born on July 9, 1819, was awarded a patent for a method of sewing that used thread from two different sources. Howe’s machine had a needle with an eye at the point, and it used the two threads to make a special stitch called a lockstitch. However, Howe faced difficulty in finding buyers for his machines in America. In frustration, he traveled to England to try to sell his invention there. When he finally returned home, he found that dozens of manufacturers were adapting his discovery for use in their own sewing machines.

Isaac Singer, another American inventor, was also a manufacturer who made improvements to the design of sewing machines. He invented an up-and-down-motion mechanism that replaced the side-to-side machines. He also developed a foot treadle (脚踏板) to power his machine. This improvement left the sewer’s hands free. Undoubtedly, it was a huge improvement of the hand-cranked machine of the past. Soon the Singer sewing machine achieved more fame than the others for it was more practical. It could be adapted to home use and it could be bought on hire-purchase. The Singer sewing machine became the first home appliance, and the Singer company became one of the first American multinationals.

However, Singer used the same method to create a lockstitch that Howe had already patented. As a result, Howe accused him of patent infringement (侵犯). Of course, Elias Howe won the court case, and Singer was ordered to pay Howe royalties (版税). In the end, Howe became a millionaire, not by manufacturing the sewing machine, but by receiving royalty payments for his invention.

1.Barthelemy Thimonnier’s garment factory was burned down because __________.

A. people did not know how to put out the fire

B. Elias Howe thought Thimonnier had stolen his invention

C. the sewing machines couldn’t work finally

D. workers who feared the loss of their jobs to a machine set fire

2.Why did the court force Isaac Singer to pay Elias Howe a lifetime of royalties?

A. Because the judge was against Singer for his unfriendly attitude.

B. Because Howe had already patented the lockstitch used by Singer.

C. Because Singer had borrowed money from Howe and never repaid it.

D. Because Singer and Howe had both invented the same machine.

3.Which of the following would be the best title for this passage?

A. A Stitch in Time Saves Nine

B. The Case between Howe and Singer

C. Patent Laws on the Sewing Machine

D. The Early History of the Sewing Machine

高二英语阅读理解中等难度题查看答案及解析

Temples have existed for thousands of years. They are the proof of cultures and civilization that existed many years ago.

Gobekli Tepe, Turkey

Located on a hilltop in southwestern Turkey where it snows a lot in winter, the Gobekli Tepe is considered the world’s oldest temple. It is nearly 11,000 years old. There are carvings on the rock statues, mainly of lions, foxes, snakes, cranes and wild ducks, as well as scenes of people hunting. Because heavy snow makes it hard to get to the top of the hill, visitors are not recommended to go there in winters.

White Temple, Thailand

Immediately upon entering White Temple, you will realize this contemporary, unconventional temple stands out, even in a country dotted with temples. The White Temple is incredibly different and unique in its architecture, art and design. In fact, it is designed in a very modern way. This temple is all white. It is very hot in summer in Thailand, so going to White Temple in other three seasons is a wise choice.

Sagrada Familia, Spain

This symbolic Barcelona building is famously unfinished. It is said to be finished by 2026, but no body believes it. However, visitors believe its incompleteness is part of its charm, which sets it apart from other temples in the world. You will have to wait in a long line if you visit Sagrada Familia in summer holiday. Visitors are not that many in spring and winter.

Kinkaku-ji, Japan

This temple is absolutely the most popular one in Japan. Whether you visit during the fall when there are red leaves against the golden wall, in winter when the gold is topped with pure white snow, in spring with cherry blossoms, or in summer allowing you to smell the earthy smell after rain – there is never a bad time to visit this beautiful temple.

1.Which temple will you choose to go if you are a fan of modern architecture?

A. Gobekli Tepe.　　 B. White Temple.

C. Sagrada Familia.　　 D. Kinkaku-ji.

2.What makes Sagrada Familia special according to the passage?

A. It is unfinished.　　 B. It is all white.

C. It is the oldest temple.　　 D. It is untraditional.

3.Which temple is favorable to go all year round?

A. Gobekli Tepe.　　 B. White Temple.

C. Sagrada Familia.　　 D. Kinkaku-ji.

高二英语阅读理解中等难度题查看答案及解析

For thousands of years, the most important two buildings in any British village have been the church and the pub. Traditionally, the church and the pub are at the heart of any village or town, where the people gather together to socialize and exchange news.

As a result, British pubs are often old and well preserved. Many of them have become historic sites. The most famous example is the pub in the city of Nottingham called “The Old Trip to Jerusalem”, which dates back to the year 1189 AD and is probably the oldest pub in England.

However, British pubs are not just for kings and queens; they welcome people from all classes and parts of society. On a cold night, the pub’s landlord or landlady can always find a warm place for you by the fire. There is always honest and hearty food and plenty of drink available at an affordable price.

That’s how things used to be. Things are beginning to change. It is said that the credit crunch(信贷紧缩) is causing 39 British pubs a week to go out of business. People do not have enough spare money to spend on beer. Recently, the UK government banned smoking in all pubs, and that may also have affected the number of customers going to pubs.

This decline is happening despite the fact that in 2005 the UK government started to allow pubs to stay open after 1l pm. Previously, with 1l pm as closing time, customers would have to drink quite quickly, meaning they sometimes got more drunk than they would if allowed to drink slowly. The British habit of drinking a lot very quickly is known as “binge drinking”, and it causes long-term health problems for people and problems with violent crime for communities.

In order to save their businesses, pubs are trying to change with the market. British pubs now offer something for everyone. A lot of pubs used to be “Working Men’s Clubs”, meaning that women could not usually enter. Today, however, women can freely enter 99% of pubs without experiencing any problems. Perhaps things are changing for the better after all.

1. The passage mainly tells us something about ______.

A. the importance of British pubs

B. the decline of British pubs

C. the long history of British pubs

D. the past and present of British pubs

2. Which may not be the cause of the decline of British pubs?

A. The present closing time.

B. The ban of smoking.

C. The lack of enough spare money.

D. The credit crunch.

3.We can infer from the passage that ______.

A. binge drinking means drinking less beer

B. closing the pubs early will reduce social problems

C. British people used to like drinking slowly

D. British government aims to discourage people from binge drinking

4. We can see from the last paragraph that the author _______.

A. holds an optimistic attitude towards the British pubs

B. thinks that British pubs should offer everything you need

C. thinks that women in the pubs will cause less social problems

D. is against the admission of too many women to the pubs

高二英语阅读理解中等难度题查看答案及解析

For thousands of years, the most important two buildings in any British village have been the church and the pub. Traditionally, the church and the pub are at the heart of any village or town, where the people gather together to socialize and exchange news.

As a result, British pubs are often old and well preserved. Many of them have become historic sites. The most famous example is the pub in the city of Nottingham called “The Old Trip to Jerusalem”, which dates back to the year 1189 AD and is probably the oldest pub in England.

However, British pubs are not just for kings and queens; they welcome people from all classes and parts of society. On a cold night, the pub’s landlord or landlady can always find a warm place for you by the fire. There is always honest and hearty food and plenty of drink available at an affordable price.

That’s how things used to be. Things are beginning to change. It is said that the credit crunch(信贷紧缩) is causing 39 British pubs a week to go out of business. People do not have enough spare money to spend on beer. Recently, the UK government banned smoking in all pubs, and that may also have affected the number of customers going to pubs.

This decline is happening despite the fact that in 2005 the UK government started to allow pubs to stay open after 1l pm. Previously, with 1l pm as closing time, customers would have to drink quite quickly, meaning they sometimes got more drunk than they would if allowed to drink slowly. The British habit of drinking a lot very quickly is known as “binge drinking”, and it causes long-term health problems for people and problems with violent crime for communities.

In order to save their businesses, pubs are trying to change with the market. British pubs now offer something for everyone. A lot of pubs used to be “Working Men's Clubs”, meaning that women could not usually enter. Today, however, women can freely enter 99% of pubs without experiencing any problems. Perhaps things are changing for the better after all.

1.The passage mainly tells us something about ______.

A. the past and present of British pubs

B. the decline of British pubs

C. the long history of British pubs

D. the importance of British pubs

2.Which may not be the cause of the decline of British pubs?

A. The credit crunch.

B. The present closing time.

C. The ban of smoking.

D. Having no spare money.

3.We can infer from the passage that ______.

A. British people used to like drinking slowly

B. closing the pubs early will reduce social problems

C. binge drinking means drinking less beer

D. British government aims to discourage people from binge drinking

4.We can see from the last paragraph that the author _______.

A. is against the admission of too many women to the pubs

B. holds an optimistic attitude towards the British pubs

C. thinks that women in the pubs will cause less social problems

D. thinks that British pubs should offer everything you need

高二英语阅读理解困难题查看答案及解析

For thousands of years, the most important two buildings in any British village have been the church and the pub. Traditionally, the church and the pub are at the heart of any village or town, where the people gather together to socialize and exchange news.

As a result, British pubs are often old and well preserved. Many of them have become historic sites. The most famous example is the pub in the city of Nottingham called “The Old Trip to Jerusalem”, which dates back to the year 1189 AD and is probably the oldest pub in England.

However, British pubs are not just for kings and queens; they welcome people from all classes and parts of society. On a cold night, the pub’s landlord or landlady can always find a warm place for you by the fire. There is always honest and hearty food and plenty of drink available at an affordable price.

That’s how things used to be. Things are beginning to change. It is said that the credit crunch(信贷紧缩) is causing 39 British pubs a week to go out of business. People do not have enough spare money to spend on beer. Recently, the UK government banned smoking in all pubs, and that may also have affected the number of customers going to pubs.

This decline is happening despite the fact that in 2005 the UK government started to allow pubs to stay open after 1l pm. Previously, with 1l pm as closing time, customers would have to drink quite quickly, meaning they sometimes got more drunk than they would if allowed to drink slowly. The British habit of drinking a lot very quickly is known as “binge drinking”, and it causes long-term health problems for people and problems with violent crime for communities.

In order to save their businesses, pubs are trying to change with the market. British pubs now offer something for everyone. A lot of pubs used to be “Working Men's Clubs”, meaning that women could not usually enter. Today, however, women can freely enter 99% of pubs without experiencing any problems. Perhaps things are changing for the better after all.

1. The passage mainly tells us something about ______.

A. the past and present of British pubs         B. the decline of British pubs

C. the long history of British pubs             D. the importance of British pubs

2.Which may not be the cause of the decline of British pubs?

A. The credit crunch.                   B. The present closing time.

C. The ban of smoking.                  D. Having no spare money.

3.We can infer from the passage that ______.

A. British people used to like drinking slowly

B. closing the pubs early will reduce social problems

C. binge drinking means drinking less beer

D. British government aims to discourage people from binge drinking

4.We can see from the last paragraph that the author _______.

A. is against the admission of too many women to the pubs

B. holds an optimistic attitude towards the British pubs

C. thinks that women in the pubs will cause less social problems

D. thinks that British pubs should offer everything you need

高二英语阅读理解中等难度题查看答案及解析

For thousands of years the most important two buildings in any British village have been the church and the pub. In fact，until a place has a church and a pub，it isn’t really considered a community worthy of a name. Traditionally，the church and the pub are at the heart of any village or town, since it is where people gather to give and receive news. In fact, the word ‘pub’ is short for public house’.

That's how it used to be, but things are beginning to change. It is said that the credit decline is causing 39 British pubs a week to go out of business. People don’t have lots of spare money to spend on beer. Recently, the UK government banned smoking in all pubs, and that may also have affected the number of customers going to pubs.

This decline is happening despite the fact that in 2005 the UK government started to allow pubs to stay open after 11 p. m. Previously，with 11 p. m. as closing time，customers would have to drink quite quickly，meaning they sometimes got more drunk than they would if allowed to drink slowly. The British habit of drinking a lot very quickly is known as ‘binge drinking’(狂饮)，and it causes some long-term health problems for people and problems with violent crime for communities. The UK government is changing the law to discourage binge drinking, and regularly spends money on television advertisements to warn people of the problems of drinking too much.

In order to save their businesses, pubs are trying to change with the market. Now, there are a number of different types of pubs.

As you can see, British pubs now offer something for everyone. A lot of pubs used to be working men’s clubs, meaning that women could not usually enter. Today, however, women can freely enter 99% of pubs without experiencing any problems. Perhaps things are changing for the better after all.

高二英语信息匹配中等难度题查看答案及解析

We human beings haven’t been good friends to animals. For thousands of years, we have been polluting the environment, making it hard for animals to live on the planet. We have been killing animals for their fur, feathers or meat, or simply because they are dangerous. As a result, many kinds of animals have disappeared forever. Hundreds more are on the endangered list today.

Should we care about animals? Of course we should. If animals of a certain kind all disappear, they will never come back again. Animals are more than just resources of things we need. Every kind of animal has its place in the balance of nature. Destroying any kind of animal can lead to many problems. For example, when farmers killed large numbers of hawks, the corn and grain that the farmers stored were destroyed by rats and mice. Why?  Because hawks eat rats and mice. With less and less hawks to keep down their numbers, rats and mice multiplied quickly. And if people kill too many birds, more and more insects will eat the crops.

Luckily, we’ve realized that we shouldn’t kill animals any more. And people are working hard to save those animals that would disappear soon. The government also passed laws to protect the endangered animals. In fact, quite a few countries have passed such laws. These laws forbid the killing of any kind of animal on the endangered list. We should try our best to protect and save the endangered animals.

1.The text calls on us to__________.

A．keep animals at home                    B．protect the environment

C．protect the endangered animals            D．know more about the balance of nature.

2.Why do people kill animals?

A．Animals cause many serious problems.

B．They kill animals for something they need.

C．Animals destroy their natural resources.

D．They kill animals to protect the environment

3.The example that farmers killed hawks shows that__________.

A．there were too many rats and mice

B．hawks are the most important in the nature

C．animals are good food resources

D．every kind of animal is important in nature

高二英语阅读理解中等难度题查看答案及解析

Languages have been coming and going for thousands of years, but in recent times there has been less coming and a lot more going. When the world was still populated by hunter-gatherers, small, tightly knit(联系) groups developed their own patterns of speech independent of each other. Some language experts believe that 10,000 years ago, when the world had just five to ten million people, they spoke perhaps 12,000 languages between them.

Soon afterwards, many of those people started settling down to become farmers, and their languages too became more settled and fewer in number. In recent centuries, trade, industrialization, the development of the nation-state and the spread of universal compulsory education, especially globalisation and better communications in the past few decades, all have caused many languages to disappear, and dominant languages such as English, Spanish and Chinese are increasingly taking over.

At present, the world has about 6,800 languages. The distribution of these languages is hugely uneven. The general rule is that mild zones have relatively few languages. Often spoken by many people while hot, wet zones have lots, often spoken by small numbers. Europe has only around 200 Languages: the Americas about 1,000, Africa 2,400; and Asia and the Pacific perhaps 3,200, of which Papua New Guinea alone accounts for well over 800. The median number(中位数) of speakers is a mere 6.000, which means that half the worlds languages are spoken by fewer people than that.

Already well over 400 of the total of 6,800 languages are close to extinction(消亡), with only a few elderly speakers left. Pick, at random, Busuu in Cameroon (eight remaining speakers), Chiapaneco in Mexico(150). Lipan Apache in the United States(two or three) or Wadjigu in Australia (one, with a question-mark): none of these seems to have much chance of survival.

1.What can we infer about languages in hunter-gatherer times?

A. They developed very fast.　　 B. They were large in number.

C. They had similar patters.　　 D. They were closely connected

2.Which of the following best explains "dominant" underlined in paragraph 2？

A. Complex.　　 B. Advanced.

C. Powerful.　　 D. Modern.

3.How many languages are spoken by less than 6, 000 people at present?

A. About 6,800 .　　 B. About 3,400

C. About 2,400　　 D. About 1,200.

4.What is the main idea of the text?

A. New languages will be created.

B. Peoples lifestyles are reflected in languages.

C. Human development results in fewer languages.

D. Geography determines language evolution.

高二英语阅读理解困难题查看答案及解析

For a few years, I have been wearing a ring on my right hand. It’s not always the16 ring, but it’s always a ring that has17 on it so that when I look at it, I’m 18 or reminded of something important. I have made a 19 of buying rings like this whenever I see one in a store. Sometimes I give them away as 20 to someone like Jennie.

I first met Jennie in the 21  waiting room and we had talked several times. One night I sat down beside her and 22 how her son was doing because I knew that he was in very23  condition. She told me that she didn’t know what to do any more because it seemed none of the 24 from the doctors was good. They weren’t at all sure her son was going to 25 the accident that had hurt him so badly. With26  in her eyes she said, “They’re 27 my hope.”

I knew then that it was 28 just a coincidence that I was wearing the ring that I had on that day. As she 29 to talk, I 30 slipped the ring off my finger and placed it in Jennie’s hand. I told her to wear it to remember that God loved her and He would be with her31 all of this. 32 Jennie looked down at the ring, she got excited and then held it tightly,33 the word written on the ring was “HOPE”.

The last day I was at the hospital, I saw Jennie in the distance as I got on the lift. She 34 and held up the hand with the ring on it as she called out to me saying, “Look, I 35 have Hope!”

1.A．special            B．expensive        C．same             D．valuable

2.A．words              B．pictures         C．names            D．symbols

3.A．admired            B．encouraged       C．trusted          D．puzzled

4.A．plan               B．point            C．list             D．habit

5.A．gifts              B．prizes           C．awards           D．thanks

6.A．railway            B．school           C．hospital         D．airport

7.A．asked              B．explained        C．thought          D．found

8.A．favorable          B．normal           C．serious          D．excellent

9.A．advice             B．news             C．instructions     D．comfort

10.A．defeat            B．experience       C．predict          D．survive

11.A．apologies         B．tears            C．anger            D．doubt

12.A．keeping up        B．bringing down    C．cutting off      D．taking away

13.A．other than        B．rather than      C．more than        D．less than

14.A．continued         B．refused          C．attempted        D．started

15.A．cautiously        B．quietly          C．nervously        D．shyly

16.A．over              B．beyond           C．through          D．within

17.A．Until             B．While            C．Since            D．When

18.A．for               B．so               C．yet              D．and

19.A．shouted           B．waved            C．cheered          D．hesitated

20.A．ever  B．only C．still    D．Just

高二英语完型填空中等难度题查看答案及解析

— When will the new bridge be completed?

— It is said that it _______ by the end of this year.

高二英语单项填空简单题查看答案及解析