【推荐2】I’m Black Beauty, a male horse. Before I was taken to Mr Gordon, my mother Duchess spoke to me, “All young horses have to leave mothers. Whatever happens, try to be gentle and stay away from bad behaviors.”

Then I came to Mr Gordon’s house.

In the stable（马厩）next to mine was a little fat gray horse.

I put my head up and said, “Nice to meet you! What’s your name?” He seemed unhappy. “I’m Merrylegs. You are my neighbour?”

I said yes.

“Well,” he continued, “I hope you are well-behaved. I don’t like anyone who bites people.” Then he went on, “Mr Gordon should be the best owner!”

A tall brown female horse shouted at him, “No one knows how long a good home will last!”

Merrylegs lowered his voice and whispered, “She’s Ginger with a bad habit of biting people.”

The angry voice came again, “You don’t know anything! ________ you would bite too.”

“Poor Ginger! What made her so unhappy?” I thought to myself.

The next day when I worked with Ginger, she told the whole story.

“I was taken away early from Mother and there was no kind master to look after me. My training started with several men forcing me against a wall. One held my nose and another pulled my mouth open to put a bit（马嚼子）in. They never gave me a chance to understand what they wanted.”

“How could that be?” I said.

“After the training, I was sold to a man in London, who drove me with a bearing rein（缰绳）. It is a kind of rein that pulls your neck all the way back. Imagine your neck on fire with pain?”

“Horrible!” I cried.

“After that, a gentleman found me and he thought that it was wrong for a fine horse to go bad like that. So I was brought here, not long before you came. We are lucky here, at least they treat us gently,” Ginger said.

I felt sorry about her painful experiences which showed exactly why she bit（咬）people. “She was rude to people but she couldn’t be that way always. What can I do for her? I couldn’t stop thinking about it.”

                                                                         ——Adapted from Black Beauty

Portia gave the decision. “One pound of the merchant’s (商人) flesh (肉) is yours. It is what the contract (合同) says. You may take his flesh!”

Shylock held his knife and told Antonio to get ready. “Wait!” exclaimed Portia. “You will not do anything that is not written in the contract. Is that right, Shylock?”

“Yes, that’s right,” said Shylock. He wondered what the wise young judge was going to say. “Well,” said the young judge, “I have read the contract carefully, and it does not say anything about taking his blood. It says ‘a pound of flesh’. You can take your pound of flesh, but you may not take one drop of his blood. If you take any of his blood, the duke (公爵) will take everything you own!”

Now it was Graziano’s turn to bless the judge and call him wise.

“You wanted justice (公平),” Portia told Shylock, “and you’ll have more justice than you wanted.”

Shylock didn’t want to give everything he owned to the duke. He decided not to take his pound of flesh. He said he would take the money.

“Give me ninety thousand dollars,” he said, “and I will have pity on Antonio and let him go.”

Bassanio was happy to give him the money. He was very pleased that his friend Antonio would not die.

“Wait!” Portia said again. “He does not want the money. It is not written in the contract.”

Shylock   said   he   just wanted   to have   his   money back   and wouldn’t even   need interest. Bassanio was ready to give it to him, but again Portia stopped him.

“He said he only wanted the thing written in the contract.”

Shylock understood that he would not get his pound of flesh. He understood that he would not get his money. He decided to go home.

“Wait!” said Portia, for the third time. “The law of Venice, says that if you plan to kill a citizen of Venice, you will lose everything that you own. Half of what you have will belong to the person you tried to kill, and the other half will belong to the duke.”

Taken from The Merchant of Venice

【推荐2】Lucy ran out of the empty room into the hall and found the other three. “It’s all right,” she repeated, “I’ve come back.”

“Poor old Lu, where have you been hiding?” said Peter.

“I’ve been away for hours since I went into the wardrobe (衣橱).” Lucy replied. “Don’t be silly, Lucy,” said Susan. “We’ve just come out of that room a moment ago, and you were not there then.”

“She’s not being silly at all,” said Peter, “She’s just making up a story for fun.” “No, Peter. I’m not,” she said. “It’s a magic wardrobe. There’s a forest inside it, and it’s snowing, and it’s called Narnia. Come and see.”

The others did not know what to think, but all went back with Lucy into the room because of her excitement. She opened the door of the wardrobe and cried, “Now please see for yourselves.”

“It’s just a usual wardrobe. Look! There’s the back of it,” said Susan.

Then everyone looked in and what they all saw was a perfectly usual wardrobe. There was no forest and no snow, only the back of the wardrobe with hooks (挂钩) on it.

“A good lie, Lu.” Peter said, “you have really taken us in, I must agree. We believed you.” Lucy grew very red in the face and tried to say something, though (虽然) she hardly knew what she was trying to say. The others who thought she was lying made her very unhappy. And so things went on until the next wet day.

They decided to play hide-and-seek (捉迷藏) because there was still no sign of a break in the weather. Susan was “It” and as soon as the others ran away, she began to look for them. Just then, Lucy went to the room again where the wardrobe was. She believed that she was right…