While parents, particularly mothers, have always been attached to their infants (婴儿), societal conditions frequently made this attachment difficult to maintain (保持). First of all, the high infant death rate in the premodern times meant that such attachments often ended in hopelessness. Perhaps to prevent the sadness that infant death caused, a number of societal practices developed which worked against early attachment of mother and child.

    One of these premodern attachment-discouraging practices was to leave infants unnamed until they had survived into the second year. Another practice that discouraged maternal (母亲的) attachment was tightly wrapping (包裹) infants. Wrapping effectively prevented the close physical interactions like stroking (抚摸) and kissing that are so much a part of modern mothers' and fathers' affection for their infants.

    A third practice which had the same distancing effect was wet-nursing. Breast-feeding (母乳哺育) was not popular among the well-to-do in the early modern times; infants were often fed by wet nurses hired for the purpose. In some places, such as nineteenth-century France, city infants were sent to wet nurses in the country. Often a wet nurse would feed her own child first, leaving little milk for the city infant—who, in many cases, died. In Rouen, the death rate for children sent to a wet nurse was 35 percent.

68. Babies were unnamed until they were two so that _______.

    A. an old social custom could be kept up        B. maternal attachment could be maintained

    C. they could have better chances to survive   D. their parents would not be too sad if they died

69. Why were babies wrapped?

    A. To protect them from the cold.          B. To distance their mothers from them.

    C. To make them feel more comfortable. D. To make it easy for their mothers to hold them.

70. Wet nurses were women who________.

    A. babysat city infants                           B. fed babies of other families

    C. sent their babies to the country           D. failed to look after their babies

71. Which is the best title for the passage?

    A. Societal Conditions in Premodern Times

    B. Practices of Reducing Maternal Attachment

    C. Poor Health Service and High Infant Death Rate

    D. Differences between Modem and Premodern Parents

It was a village in India. The people were poor. However, they were not unhappy. After all, their forefathers had lived in the same way for centuries.
Then one day. Some visitors from the city arrived. They told the villagers there were some people elsewhere who liked to eat frog’s legs. However, they did not have enough frogs of their own, and so they wanted to buy frogs from other places.
This seemed like money for nothing. There were millions of frogs in the fields around, and they were no use to the villagers. All they had to do was catch them. Agreement was reached, and the children were sent into the fields to catch frogs. Every week a truck arrived to collect the catch and hand over the money. For the first time, the people were able to dream of a better future. But the dream didn’t last long.    
The change was hardly noticed at first, but it seemed as if the crops were not doing so well. More worrying was that the children fell ill more often, and, there seemed to be more insects around lately.
The villagers decided that they couldn’t just wait to see the crops failing and the children getting weak. They would have to use the money earned to buy pesticides(杀虫剂) and medicines. Soon there was no money left.
Then the people realized what was happening. It was the frog. They hadn’t been useless. They had been doing an important job---eating insects. Now with so many frogs killed, the insects were increasing more rapidly. They were damaging the crops and spreading diseases.
Now, the people are still poor. But in the evenings they sit in the village square and listen to the sounds of insects and frogs. These sounds of the night now have a much deeper meaning

  1. 1.

    From paragraph I we learn that the villagers ______.

    1. A.
      worked very hard for centuries
    2. B.
      dreamed of having a better life
    3. C.
      were poor but somewhat content
    4. D.
      lived a different life from their forefathers
  2. 2.

    Why did the villagers agree to sell frogs?

    1. A.
      the frogs were easy money
    2. B.
      They needs money to buy medicine
    3. C.
      they wanted to please the visitors
    4. D.
      the frogs made too much noise
  3. 3.

    What might be the cause of the children’s sickness?

    1. A.
      the crops didn’t do well
    2. B.
      there were too many insects
    3. C.
      the visits brought in diseases
    4. D.
      the pesticides were overused
  4. 4.

    What can we infer from the last sentence of the text?

    1. A.
      Happiness comes from peaceful life in the country
    2. B.
      Health is more important than money
    3. C.
      The harmony between man and nature is important
    4. D.
      good old day will never be forgotten

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