1 . Early last summer, I bought some yam（山药）roots for food but days later, a tuber （块茎）left was sprouting（发芽）. Thinking it was a waste of money to throw it away, I _____ the tuber into a flower pot hoping that it might take root and ______ something that could be put on the dinner table.

In the following months, I ____ the tuber regularly. Thankfully, the _____ yam grew well. Soon it was autumn, and I decided to ______ .

I pulled out the leaves of the yam and began to dig with my fingers carefully for I knew the yam could ______easily. Suddenly my fingers __ the yam root. When almost no __ was left, I tried to pull the root but failed.

In ______   , I turned the pot over. Half of the yam root had grown through one of the three holes ______

The whole tuber, _____ two parts, one in and one out of the pot, was in the _____ of a handwritten L. Unlike ordinary yam roots, the part outside the pot was not round—it was _____ , looking like a hand of an old farmer who works hard to make a ______ . The very end of the part outside the pot was _____ . Obviously, the skin must have been rubbed off during its __ with the heavy pot. The very tip of the unusual part seemed to be bleeding.

The sight filled me with ______ . Then and there my opinion of the plant _____ . I came to understand that the tuber, though ______ wounded, had struggled hard. Such was a yam, an ordinary-looking plant with ________characteristics.

As the world    1    （large）cotton consumer and the second largest producer of cotton, China has a long history of cotton cultivation. It is worth    2    （mention）that Xinjiang cotton is highly regarded because of its high yield and high quality.

    3    （locate）in the inland of Eurasia（欧亚大陆）, Xinjiang has a typical mild continental climate. Drought, little rain, sufficient heat, big temperature    4    （different）between day and night and long day make a good growth environment for cotton.

Though Xinjiang has little rainfall, it has a large number of snow-capped mountains, from which meltwater gives cotton abundant water resource. Meanwhile,    5    contrast to the instable rainfall in the monsoon（季风）regions, mountain snowmelt has the characteristics of stable water transportation,    6    is very suitable for the growth of cotton.

Xinjiang is lightly populated and has a vast planting area. It has    7    area of 1.66 million square kilometers and a population of about 23 million. The cotton planting area    8    （cover）25,019.3 square kilometers in 2020，according to the Department of Agriculture and Rural Affairs of Xinjiang.

The combination of advantaged    9    （nature）conditions and mechanical technology makes Xinjiang cotton have good quality. Endless white cotton has also become one of the    10    （symbol）of great beauty in Xinjiang.