Unit 11 The Story of an Eyewitness习题答案综合教程四

Unit 11 The Story of an Eyewitness

Key to the Exercises

Text comprehension I.

II. Judge, according to the text, whether the following statements are true or false. 1.

T (Refer to Paragraph 1: The earthquake brought about a loss of thousands of dollars worth of housing while the conflagration burned up hundreds of millions of dollars worth of property.)

2. T (Refer to Paragraph 1, in which it is said that \is no estimating within hundreds of millions the actual damage wrought,\meaning that it is impossible to estimate the actual damage within hundreds of millions of dollars.)

3. F (Refer to Paragraph 6, where it is indicated that the purpose of man's dynamiting the city was to prevent the advancement of the furious fire rather than maliciously destroy the city.)

4. F (Refer to Paragraph 6, where it is shown that organized firefighters made efforts to combat the flames.)

5. F (Refer to Paragraphs 11?2, which tell us that the men broke their heart over their trunks because they were compelled to abandon their trunks, which contained their family treasures and which they had been dragging along with great difficulty for a dozen hours.)

6. T (Refer to Paragraphs 13?4, which show that twenty hours after the earthquake, miles and miles of magnificent buildings and skyscrapers still stood intact.)

III. Answer the following questions. 1.

Refer to Paragraph 4. They refer to the shrewd man-made conveniences of life and safeguards in San Francisco such as the streets, the steel rails, the telephone and telegraph systems.

2. Refer to Paragraph 5. No. Away from the burning city, it was dead calm. Inside it, however, the flames were becoming more and more rampant and the heated air became lighter and lighter and rose continuously. Thus a discrepancy of air pressure was formed. Consequently, under the higher pressure from outside, air was pouring in upon the city where the atmospheric pressure was lower.

3. Refer to Paragraph 6. It was very hard or even impossible for man to halt the advancement of the flames. His efforts to combat the conflagration turned out to be useless.

Decide which of the following best states the author's purpose of writing. B

4. Refer to Paragraph 7. As the author sees it, it will be impossible to know the exact number of the victims of the earthquake because all their traces have been erased by the flames.

5. Refer to Paragraph 11, which tells us that one of the tasks of the soldiers was to keep the trunk-pullers moving so as to reduce the loss of lives in the disaster.

6. Refer to Paragraph 16. Man had tried his best to fight against the flames, and yet the conflagration was getting all the more rampant. Moreover, water and dynamite, with which the firemen fought against the flames, were exhausted. So they had no choice but to admit defeat.

IV. Explain in your own words the following sentences. 1.

Except for some dwelling houses on its outskirts, San Francisco has almost completely disappeared from the world and only remains in people's memories. 2. Nothing could stop the forceful advancement of the flames.

3. The courageous and brave deeds in the firefighting would fill up a library if related in writing and exhaust the Carnegie medal fund if rewarded.

4. Sometimes all members of a family fastened themselves with straps to a carriage or delivery wagon that was heavily loaded with their possessions.

5. Two United States soldiers sat astride on their horses and calmly watched the conflagration, their shapes contrasting sharply with the wall of flame behind them.

Structural analysis of the text

The topic sentence is \is no estimating within hundreds of millions the actual damage wrought,\in Paragraph 1. It is developed in the following paragraphs by a chronological description of the destruction caused by the earthquake and the subsequent conflagrations as witnessed by the author. Furthermore, the author describes the physical destruction of the city first and then the quiet and calm reactions of the city dwellers.

Rhetorical features of the text

In Paragraphs 8 and 14 there are similar structures:

\in the slightest degree panic-stricken.\fighting with dynamite.\

These parallel sentences help to illustrate the destructive power of the earthquake and conflagrations.

Vocabulary exercises I. 1.

Explain the underlined part in each sentence in your own words. moved slowly back and forth

2. ingenious devices and protective measures 3. resisting 4. fill with a supply

5. polite or considerate in manner 6. threat

II. Fill in the blank in each sentence with a word or phrase from the box in its appropriate form. 1.

was weighted down

2. out of gear 3. wipe out 4. burdened with 5. crumbled 6. played out 7. to sweep down 8. a flicker of

III. Fill in the blanks with the appropriate forms of the given words. 1.

withdrawal 2. adjust

6. devastation 8. vacancy

3. enumerate 4. hysterically 5. courteous 7. disruption

IV. Choose the word that can replace the underlined part in each sentence without changing its original meaning. 1. C 2. D 3. A 4. D 5. B 6. A 7. C 8. B

V. Give a synonym or an antonym of the word underlined in each sentence in the sense it is used. 1.

Synonym: invention (creation, innovation) 2. Synonym: enormous (immense, mammoth)

3. Antonym: economically (thriftily, frugally, sparingly) 4. Antonym: smooth (level, even) 5. Synonym: plod (drudge, labor)

6. Antonym: unsociable (discourteous, ill-mannered) 7. Synonym: plot (patch)

8. Synonym: edge (boundary, margin)

VI. Explain the meaning of the underlined part in each sentence. 1. way

2. controlled

6. making

3. for example 4. finished 5. be able to deal with it

Grammar exercises I. 1.

Identify the subject and the predicate verb in the following sentences. subject: the earthquake

predicate verb: came

2. subject: the suck predicate verb: was 3. subject: her people 4. subject: trunks

predicate verb: were predicate verb: were

5. subject: picket lines of soldiers

predicate verb: were flung

predicate verb: was

6. subject: no fire

7. subject: two United States cavalrymen

predicate verb: were

8. subject: the tottering walls of the Examiner Building, the burned-out Call Building, the smouldering ruins of Grand Hotel, and the gutted, devastated, dynamited Palace Hotel

II. Rewrite the following sentences. Begin with the words given. 1.

Under no circumstances will we tolerate that. 2. So absurd was his manner that everybody stared.

3. Only with full agreement of everyone can we hope to succeed. 4. Here is the book you want. 5. Down sprang the cat.

6. Sitting at the kitchen table was the misbehaving child. 7. Hidden in the cellar were several barrels of wine. 8. Never have I seen such a mess.

III. Choose the appropriate clause or sentence to complete the passage. 1. B 2. A

IV. Put the words in brackets in the right order. 1.

All our many 2. The other ten 3. the few next 4. Few such

3. B

4. B 5. A

predicate verb: stood