题目内容

5、You don’t have to be alive to protect the environment. Who wants to give something back?

Ray Ward does. And he’s not the only one. The British businessman has bought a million – pound plot of woodland outside London where he plans to set up a green funeral company. All the people buried there will be giving something back.

It’s hard to live a green life in a modern country. Everything you do seems to create pollution or threaten wildlife. Maybe that’s why people are waiting until they die to make a positive contribution to the environment.

The aim of conventional burials is to preserve the body as long as possible. The aim of green burials is exactly the reverse （opposite）. People are buried in cardboard or light wicker（柳条） coffins so nature takes its course as quickly as possible.

Eventually, Ray Ward hopes to have a full grown forest on his land, which people will pay to fertilize themselves. No headstones or other memorials are allowed, though, the detailed notes on exactly where people are buried will be kept for the benefit of relatives. But the idea is that the whole forest will be their memorial.

It’s not a new idea. Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the former US President, often expressed a wish to be buried in the White House Rose Garden. Future presidents would look at the flowers and think of him.

In Britain, people were traditionally buried in vast cemeteries found on the outskirts（郊区） of nearly all the major towns and cities and built during the 19th century. But Britain is a crowded country, and as population continued to increase, space became short.

That’s why 70 present of British people are now cremated when they die. But there are problems here, too. Large amounts of poisonous gases are released when bodies are burned, especially from the metal used to feel teeth.

Natural burials adds to the richness of the soil instead of poisoning the air. And because natural burials takes place all over the countryside, there are no space limitations as there are in ordinary burials. And demand is growing so much that this spring will see Britain’s first ever national Green Funeral Exhibition.

1．Obviously the writer is trying to talk about __________.

       A．funerals in modern Britain                       

       B．the new idea of Ray Ward

       C．contribution that can be made after death

       D．the new trends of the funeral business

2．Which of the following means “ordinary burials”?

       A．Conventional burials.                          B．Green burials. 

       C．Natural burials.                                 D．Green funerals.

3．If you choose a picture to go with the passage as an editor, you will select _________.

       A．a picture in which people mourn at the funeral

       B．a picture in which there is a light wicker coffin

       C．a picture in which there is a green village

       D．a picture in which people are planting trees

4．Which paragraph is organized by means of comparison?

       A．Paragraph 1.                               B．Paragraph 2.        

       C．Paragraph 3.                        D．Paragraph 7.