A Yunnan snub-nosed monkey named Bailian, or White Face, was a superstar within his troop in Xiangguqing village, Yunnan province. Local people have many     1     (appeal) anecdotes about him.

The primate lived for 30 years,       2     is almost 90 human years. However, in October, Bailian was found dead in the wild.

In his prime (盛年),     3    a commanding male, he had a large family with four     4    (wife) and three offspring. However, in 2012, he was challenged and defeated by a younger, stronger monkey.

He     5     (replace) as one of the troop leaders, and all his family members left him,with one     6     (except). A female monkey, 10 years older than Bailian, stayed with him, and     7     male monkey took good care of her until she died in 2016.

Overwhelmed by grief, Bailian groomed her fur as usual and carried her body with him     8    he moved with the other monkeys in the troop. When forest rangers removed the decaying body, Bailian tried    9     (stop) them — baring his teeth and howling as if in great pain.

In 2019, he formed his second family, this time with a 6-year-old female, and     10     (father) an infant the following year.

However, his happiness was short-lived. In October 2020, Bailian broke his legs in a fight and lost his family once again. Rescued by forest rangers, he resumed his nomadic lifestyle until his death.

The Fable of the Chicken

Once upon     1     time, all the animals were called to an early morning meeting. As they gathered in the public square, one of them, the chicken, was seen by her neighbors     2    (go) in the opposite direction. “Hey, Chicken! Why are you going away from the square?” they asked. “Didn’t you receive the     3    (invite)?”

“    4    , I did.” replied the chicken. “And I would of course come to the meeting. The thing is, I have some very important personal business     5     I must attend to. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I really must go home. Please let everyone at the meeting know how sorry I am. Tell them that although I won’t be there in body, I’ll certainly be there     6     spirit! Whatever you decide, you can count on     7    ( I ) complete support. Bye!”

The question that the animals were due to debate     8    (be) what to do with the issue of humans making frequent animal sacrifices (祭献). After a lively but     9     (surprise) short debate, the decision about which animal to offer     10    (reach) without any disagreement. They chose the chicken.

The story started with the killing of a 19-year-old female elephant at the hands of hunters in northern Kenya in 2016. Her two calves (幼崽) then started a journey to the area where their mother     1    (kill). They were too young to deal with the hidden danger in the wild     2     the protection of adults.

According to that sad but inspiring true story, elephant-lover Sun Xiao wrote a children’s book Samburu, I’m Back. Sun is     3     witness to the story told in his book. He was, at the time, in Kenya working for Save the Elephants, a UK charity     4     (base) in Nairobi, capital of Kenya. When he and his peers found the two calves wandering in the wild, they tried to change their course.     5     (lucky), through great efforts they managed to transport them to an elephant reserve.

In the past decade, Sun     6     (devote) himself to spreading knowledge of elephants via a     7     (various) of methods, such as writing children’s storybooks     8     (feature) the elephants, sharing photos he took of elephants       9     posting hundreds of articles he wrote on social networks. He intended to raise public awareness of the urgent need to protect the creatures from hunters,     10     kill them for their ivory tusks.