翻譯社提供以下資訊
Directions: Read the underlined sentences carefully, and then translate them into Chinese. You may check your answers after you finish them.
Passage One
Disraeli was as sparkling a letter-writer as he was a novelist. His letters show that his capability to observe was matched only by his ability to describe, and they are made more lively by his overdeveloped sense of self-dramatization as well as by his permanent sense of the greatness of his own destiny. He goes through these pages like some beautiful bird of paradise, spreading his multicolored feathers and never passing long enough to become boring.
As early as 1830, when only 26, he is found advising Benjamin Austin to carefully keep his letters for his descendents. Fortunately Austin and others followed his advice. As a result over 10,000 letters in his own hand have survived, quite apart from dictated letters and other memoranda. Disraeli rarely kept a diary, and poured his thoughts, desires and reflections into his correspondence.
What treasures there lie in store! We leave him in 1837 with his longed-for election to Parliament, but ahead seeming appear the high peaks of his career with the twin mountains of his two premierships and his friendship with the Queen Victoria had largely been destroyed, but this was not so. A new, bright and searching light will eventually shine on that extraordinary political and romantic relationship.
Passage Two
The concept of obtaining fresh water from icebergs that are towed to populated areas and arid regions of the world was once treated as a joke more appropriate to cartoons than real life. But now it is being considered quite seriously by many nations, especially since scientists have warned that the human race will outgrow its fresh water supply faster than it runs out of food.
Glaciers are a possible source of fresh water that have been overlooked until recently. Three-quarters of the Earth’s fresh water supply is still tied up in glacial ice, a reservoir of untapped fresh water so immense that it could sustain all the rivers of the world for 1,000 years. Floating on the oceans every year are 7,659 trillion metric tons of ice encased in 10,000 icebergs that break away from the polar ice caps, more than ninety percent of them from Antarctica.
Huge glaciers that stretch over the shallow continental shelf give birth to icebergs throughout the year. Icebergs are not like sea ice, which is formed when the sea itself freezes; rather, they are formed entirely on land, breaking off when glaciers spread over the sea. As they drift away from the polar region, icebergs sometimes move mysteriously in a direction opposite to the wind, pulled by pieces of ice , icebergs have been known to drift as for north as 35 degrees south of the equator in the Atlantic Ocean. To corral them and steer them to parts of the world where they are needed would not be too difficult.
The difficulty arises in other technical matters, such as the prevention of rapid melting in warmer climates and the funneling of fresh water to shore in great volume. But even if the icebergs lost half of their volume in towing, the water they could provide would be far cheaper than that produced by desalination, of removing salt from water.
Passage Three
There is perhaps, no other sport in the world quite so exciting as skiing. For viewers, it is a spectacle of unsurpassed beauty. For skiers, it is a vivid personal experience, a thrilling test of mind, muscle, and nerves. And more and more, Americans are discovering this thrill for themselves. Not too long ago, skiing had virtually no part in the American sports scene. If it was thought of at all, it was purely as a European sport. Then came the 1932 Winter Olympics at Lake Placid, New York Americans got their first good look at skiing and made for the hills. Today ski trains make regular runs from our cities to the great, white outdoors. Lodges and Chalets dot the mountain sides offering skiers the warmth of their firesides.
In addition to joy and exhilaration, skiing offers other attractions. It is a comparatively inexpensive sport, and for the young, the art of skiing is often mastered in a very short time.
The special thrill of skiing is well described by Buddy Werner. “It is all up to you,” he says. “ No teammates can help. You’re alone. It’s you against the snow, the mountains, the terrain, yourself. You’re a warrior.”
Passage Four
The advantages and disadvantages of large population have long been a subject of discussion among economists. It has been argued that the supply of good land is limited. To feed a large population, inferior land must be cultivated and the good land worked intensively. Thus, each person produces less and this means a lower average income than could be obtained with a smaller population. Other economists have argued that a large population gives more scope for specialization and the development of facilities such as ports, roads and railways, which are not likely to be built unless there is a big demand to justify them.
One of the difficulties in carrying out a world-wide birth control program lies in the fact that official attitudes to population growth vary from country to country depending on the level of industrial development and the availability of food and raw materials. In the developing countries where a vastly expanded population is pressing hard upon the limits of food, space and natural resources, it will be the first concern of government to place a limit on the birthrate, whatever the consequences may be. In a highly industrialized society the problem may be more complex. A decreasing birthrate may lead to unemployment because it results in a declining market for manufactured goods. When the pressure of population on housing declines, prices also decline and the building industry is weakened. Faced with considerations such as these, the government of a developed country may well prefer to see a slowly increasing population, rather than one which is stable or in decline.
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