1 . In the South Atlantic Ocean, there is an island called Tristan da Cunha, which is a six day boat ride from the nearest town Cape Town in South Africa. There’s no airport on Tristan. Every month or so, a boat will bring visitors but not many. The boat will also bring mail and supplies. You can only see about 270 people, 300 cows, 500 sheep, and a whole lot of penguins there.

The British tried to build a military base there in 1816. They gave up after a year. But a soldier and his family talked a few people into staying. Those people slowly built a community. Few trees grow on the island. So they found wood that washed ashore. They used it to build homes and boats. For food, they raised cows, sheep and pigs. They fished and planted potatoes. They promised to share everything they had. Sometimes ships brought supplies to Tristan. But for many years, no one there used money. Instead, people on the island traded potatoes for supplies. It cost five potatoes to send a piece of mail.

Today, nearly everyone on Tristan is a farmer. The island’s main industry is fishing. It has a single factory that cans fish.

Several times, bad luck has nearly destroyed the town on Tristan. In 1885, men died in a boat accident. That left 13 women and only 4 adult men on the island. Still, everyone stayed. In 1961, a bigger disaster stuck. The town was destroyed by a volcanic eruption. All 290 people on the island moved to England. But soon, nearly all of them moved back to the island and rebuilt their town.

What’s so special about life on this lonely island? For islanders like Harold Green, that’s an easy question to answer. Green has lived on Tristan his whole life. He left when the volcano erupted. But England was too loud and too crowded for him. He came back because the island is peaceful.

1. What was used as money on Tristan in the past?

A．Fish.

B．Wood.

C．Sheep.

D．Potatoes

2. What made all the Tristan islander move to England in 1961?

A．A deadly boat accident.

B．A terrible natural disaster.

C．The attraction of modern life.

D．The building of a British military base.

3. How does Harold Green feel about his life on Tristan?

A．Bored

B．Hopeful.

C．Satisfied

D．Regretful.

4. What does the text mainly introduce?

A．A lonely island.

B．A special lifestyle.

C．A famous fishing town.

D．A popular tourist attraction.

2 . It’s very important to develop new technology wisely so that everyone can benefit from it. Some people believe our technology plan should focus on building spaceships.     1     Which is the better course of action?

For those who dream of exploring outer space, the development of high-tech spaceships is important. But just one spaceship can cost billions of dollars.     2     Even the most specialized robots could be designed and built much more cheaply than spaceships. Besides, robots could be used for practical purposes right here on Earth.

Many people who focus on future space exploration talk about solving the key mysteries of space and perhaps even how life comes into being.     3     Robots will play many new roles in people’s life in the future, but even the robots we have now benefit us in practical ways. For example, they can work in dangerous conditions, such as places with very high or low temperatures. They can take apart bombs, build products, or carry out important surgery.     4    

In a word, it’s clearly better to give attention, time, and money to the technological development of robots.     5     They also benefit people in ways that are more practical than any benefit from a spaceship.

A．It is way more costly than building a robot.

B．Others believe it should focus on building robots.

C．They are less expensive to develop and more useful.

D．These are all useful things that benefit people right now.

E．Here are some of the advantages of having robots around the house.

F．Technology plays an important role in helping humans work more easily.

G．While this kind of knowledge is interesting, it is not what people need most right now.