"It's warm,it's fun and it won't break the bank (耗尽资源) "goes the ad for a wellknown package holiday group. The top billing given to temperature in the slogan illustrates just how im?portant climate is to holidaymakers. It's one of the first things you notice when you step off the plane―part of the " sense of place" which academics talk about.

Australia is a big country,stretching from the tropics to the roaring forties,and it has a correspondingly wide range of climates. There's something to suit everyone!Scubadivers like the warm waters off the tropical Queensland coast;sunlovers feel at home in central Australia's hot,dry climate. The cool temperate climate of the Australian Alps in the southeast of the conti?nent attracts skiers in winter and walkers in summer.

What is the best time of year to visitAustralia? It depends on what part of the country you will be visiting and what you would like to do. If you can stay for several months,you can plan your trip to catch the best weather everywhere.

Australia can be divided into six main climatic regions or zones on the basis of air tempera?ture and humidity. Our map shows where each region is. A description of each region's climate is given below,from the viewpoint of someone accustomed to a temperate climate. People from tropical climates will tolerate the heat better than indicated in the zone descriptions,but will feel less comfortable in the cooler parts of the country. The climate zones are:

(   ) 1. In which of the following media does this passage mostly appear?

   A. Fiction. B. TV programme. C. Newspaper. D. Website.

(   ) 2. When is the best time of year to visit Australia?

   A. In summer. B. It depends.

   C. In winter. D. All the year around.

(   ) 3. Which part of Australia attracts ski lovers in winter?

   A. TheAustraliaAlps. B. The southwest of the continent.

   C. The southeast of centralAustralia. D. The northeast ofAustralia.

(   ) 4. What is the best title for this passage?

   A. Travelling inAustralia   B. Climate Tips for Travellers inAustralia

   C. Welcome toAustralia   D. The Best Time to VisitAustralia

Some plants get so hungry they eat flies,spiders,and even small frogs. What's more amazing is that these plants occur naturally (in special environments) in every state. In fact,they're found on every continent except Antarctica.

You've probably seen a Venus' flytrap (捕蝾草) .It's often sold in museum gift stores,de?partment stores,and even supermarkets. A small plant,it grows 6 to 8 inches tall in a contain?er. At the end of its stalks (茎) are specially modified leaves that act like traps. Inside each trap is a lining of tiny trigger (触发) hairs. When an insect lands on them,the trap suddenly shut. Over the course of a week or so,the plant feeds on its catch.

The Venus' flytrap is just one of more than 500 species of meateating plants,says Barry Meyers-Rice,the editor of the International Carnivorous Plant Society's Newsletter. Note: Despite any sciencefiction stories (科幻小说) you might have read,no meateating plant does any danger to humans.

Dr. Meyers-Rice says a plant is meateating,only if it does all four of the following: " at?tract,kill,digest,and absorb" some form of insects,including flies,butterflies,and moths. Meateating plants look and act like other green plants―well,most of the time.

All green plants make sugar through a process called photosynthesis (光合作用) .Plants use the sugar to make food. What makes " meateating" plants different is their bugcatching leaves. They need insects for one reason;nitrogen (氮) .Nitrogen is a nutrient that they can't obtain by any other way. Why?

Almost all green plants on our planet get nitrogen from the soil. " Meateating" plants can't. They live in places where nutrients are hard or almost impossible to get from the soil be?cause of its acidity (酸度) .So they've come to rely on getting nitrogen from insects and small animals. In fact,nutrientrich soil is poisonous to "meateating" plants. Never fertilize (施肥) them!But don't worry,either,if they never seem to catch any insects. They can survive,but they'll grow very slowly.

(   ) 1. What is a Venus flytrap?

   A. It is a small plant which grows in a container.

   B. It grows 6-8 inches tall.

   C. It can attract,kill,digest and absorb some form of insects.

   D. It is a kind of plant which gets hungry easily.

(   ) 2. What can we learn from the passage?

   A. It is the bugcatch leaves make Venus flytrap different from other plants.

   B. All green plants get nitrogen from the soil.

   C. " Meateating" plants are found on every continent.

   D. Some "meateating" plants in the world do danger to humans.

(   ) 3. Why does the writer say "Never fertilize ' meateating' plants?"

   A. Though growing slowly,they don't need nitrogen.

   B. Probably because the source of nitrogen is adequate.

   C. Simply because the nutrientrich soil will do harm to them.

   D. Perhaps they can get fertilize by themselves.

(   ) 4. Which of the following might be the best title for the text?

   A. Meateating Plant Does No Danger to Humans

   B. Let These Plants Swat (重击) the Bugs for You

   C. No Need to Fertilize Meateating Plants

   D. No Insects,No "Meateating" Plants

Many of the home electric goods which are advertised as liberating the modern woman tend to have the opposite effect,because they simply change the nature of work instead of eliminating it. Machines have a certain novelty (新奇的) value,like toys for adults. It is certainly less tiring to put clothes in a washing machine,but the time saved does not really amount to much:the machine has to be watched,the clothes have to be carefully sorted out first,stains removed by hand,buttons pushed and water changed,clothes taken out,aired and ironed. It would be more liberating to pack it all off to a laundry and not necessarily more expensive,since no capital in?vestment is required. Similarly,if you really want to save time you do not make cakes with an electric mixer,you buy one in a shop. If one compares the image of the woman in the women's magazine with the goods advertised by those periodicals,one realizes how useful a projected im?age can be commercially. A careful balance has to be struck; if you show a laboursaving de?vice,follow it up with a complicated recipe on the next page;on no account hint at the notion that a woman could get herself a job,but instead foster her sense of her own usefulness,empha?sizing the creative aspect of her function as a housewife. So we get cake mixes where the cook simply adds an egg herself,to produce "that lovely homebaked flavour the family love",and knitting patterns that can be made by hand,or worse still,on knitting machines,which became tremendously fashionable when they were first introduced. Automatic cookers are advertised by pictures of pretty young mothers taking their children to the park,not by professional women presetting (预先设置) the dinner before leaving home for work.

(   ) 1. What does the underlined word " eliminating" mean?

   A. Wiping out. B. Doing away with. C. Throwing out. D. Carring off.

(   ) 2. What is the shortcoming of the home electric goods advertised as liberating the mod?ern women according to the author?

   A. They have absolutely no value for the housewives.

   B. They really save the housewife very little time.

   C. They save the housewife's time but not her money.

   D. The can remove unpleasant aspects of housework.

(   ) 3. In the writer's opinion,the goods advertised in women's magazines are really meant to         .

   A. free housewives from housework

   B. encourage housewives to go out to work

   C. make housewives into excellent cooks

   D. give them a false sense of fulfillment

(   ) 4. What is the main meaning of this passage?

   A. Consuming anything just relying on the basic need not the advertising.

   B. Tremendous fashion can't bring you a certain novelty value.

   C. Advertising is reliable and always describes things true to the fact.

   D. Women have to redouble their efforts to get the real liberation.

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