新概念英语第三册41至50课

[ti:Illusions of Pastoral Peace]

[00:00.13]Lesson 41

[00:02.40]Illusions of pastoral peace

[00:10.97]What particular anxiety spoils the country dweller's visit to the theatre?

[00:17.94]The quiet life of the country has never appealed to me.

[00:22.45]City born and city bred,

[00:24.90]I have always regarded the country as something you look at through a train window, or something you occasionally visit during the weekend.

[00:35.61]Most of my friends live in the city, yet they always go into raptures at the mere mention of the country.

[00:45.18]Though they extol the virtues of the peaceful life,

[00:49.15]only one of them has ever gone to live in the country and he was back in town within six months.

[00:57.41]Even he still lives under the illusion that country life is somehow superior to town life.

[01:06.07]He is forever talking about the friendly people, the clean atmosphere, the closeness to nature and the gentle pace of living.

[01:16.04]Nothing can be compared, he maintains, with the first cockcrow, the twittering of birds at dawn,

[01:24.79]the sight of the rising sun glinting on the trees and pastures.

[01:30.55]This idyllic pastoral scene is only part of the picture.

[01:35.95]My friend fails to mention the long and friendless winter evenings in front of the TV--virtually the only form of entertainment.

[01:46.87]He says nothing about the poor selection of goods in the shops,

[01:51.66]or about those unfortunate people who have to travel from the country to the city every day to get to work.

[02:00.73]Why people are prepared to tolerate a four-hour journey each day for the dubious privilege of living in the country is beyond me.

[02:11.87]They could be saved so much misery and expense if they chose to live in the city where they rightly belong.

[02:21.99]If you can do without the few pastoral pleasures of the country, you will find the city can provide you with the best that life can offer.

[02:32.11]You never have to travel miles to see your friends.

[02:36.17]They invariably live nearby and are always available for an informal chat or an evening's entertainment.

[02:45.81]Some of my acquaintances in the country come up to town once or twice a year to visit the theatre as a special treat.

[02:54.74]For them this is a major operation which involves considerable planning.

[03:01.50]As the play draws to its close, they wonder whether they will ever catch that last train home.

[03:08.77]The city dweller never experiences anxieties of this sort.

[03:14.16]The latest exhibitions, films, or plays are only a short bus ride away.

[03:21.46]Shopping, too, is always a pleasure.

[03:25.24]There is so much variety that you never have to make do with second best.

[03:32.30]Country people run wild when they go shopping in the city and stagger home loaded with as many of the exotic items as they can carry.

[03:43.18]Nor is the city without its moments of beauty.

[03:47.08]There is something comforting about the warm glow shed by advertisements on cold wet winter nights.

[03:55.15]Few things could be more impressive than the peace that descends on deserted city streets at weekends

[04:02.61]when the thousands that travel to work every day are tucked away in their homes in the country.

[04:10.08]It has always been a mystery to me why city dwellers, who appreciate all these things,

[04:17.67]obstinately pretend that they would prefer to live in the country.

[ti:Modern Cavemen]

[00:00.20]Lesson 42

[00:02.20]Modern cavemen

[00:09.46]With what does the writer compare the Gouffre Berger?

[00:15.31]Cave exploration, or pot-holing, as it has come to be known, is a relatively new sport.

[00:23.34]Perhaps it is the desire for solitude or the chance of making an unexpected discovery that lures people down to the depths of the earth.

[00:34.42]It is impossible to give a satisfactory explanation for a pot-holer's motives.

[00:40.92]For him, caves have the same peculiar fascination which high mountains have for the climber.

[00:48.99]They arouse instincts which can only be dimly understood.

[00:54.42]Exploring really deep caves is not a task for the Sunday afternoon rambler.

[01:00.19]Such undertakings require the precise planning and foresight of military operations.

[01:08.04]It can take as long as eight days to rig up rope ladders and to establish supply bases before a descent can be made into a very deep cave.

[01:20.61]Precautions of this sort are necessary, for it is impossible to foretell the exact nature of the difficulties which will confront the pot-holer.

[01:32.06]The deepest known cave in the world is the Gouffre Berger near Grenoble.

[01:38.66]It extends to a depth of 3, 723 feet.

[01:44.33]This immense chasm has been formed by an underground stream which has tunnelled a course through a flaw in the rocks.

[01:53.65]The entrance to the cave is on a plateau in the Dauphine Alps.

[02:00.13]As it is only six feet across, it is barely noticeable.

[02:05.39]The cave might never have been discovered had not the entrance been spotted by the distinguished French pot-holer, Berger.

[02:15.00]Since its discovery, it has become a sort of pot-holers' Everest.

[02:20.66]Though a number of descents have been made, much of it still remains to be explored.

[02:27.85]A team of pot-holers recently went down the Gouffre Berger.

[02:33.27]After entering the narrow gap on the plateau,

[02:36.96]they climbed down the steep sides of the cave until they came to a narrow corridor.

[02:43.62]They had to edge their way along this,

[02:46.29]sometimes wading across shallow streams, or swimming across deep pools.

[02:52.62]Suddenly they came to a waterfall which dropped into an underground lake at the bottom of the cave.

[03:00.69]They plunged into the lake, and after loading their gear on an inflatable rubber dinghy, let the current carry them to the other side.

[03:11.67]To protect themselves from the icy water, they had to wear special rubber suits.

[03:18.58]At the far end of the lake, they came to huge piles of rubble which had been washed up by the water.

[03:26.87]In this part of the cave, they could hear an insistent booming sound

[03:32.17]which they found was caused by a small waterspout shooting down into a pool from the roof of the cave.

[03:40.42]Squeezing through a cleft in the rocks, the pot-holers arrived at an enormous cavern, the size of a huge concert hall.

[03:49.72]After switching on powerful arc lights,

[03:53.00]they saw great stalagmites--some of them over forty feet high--rising up like tree-trunks to meet the stalactites suspended from the roof.

[04:05.43]Round about, piles of limestone glistened in all the colours of the rainbow.

[04:12.14]In the eerie silence of the cavern, the only sound that could be heard was made by water which dripped continuously from the high dome above them.

[ti:Fully Insured]

[00:00.29]Lesson 43

[00:03.01]Fully insured

[00:10.94]Who owned the pie dish and why?

[00:15.55]Insurance companies are normally willing to insure anything.

[00:20.85]Insuring public or private property is a standard practice in most countries in the world.

[00:28.14]If, however, you were holding an open air garden party or a fete it would be equally possible to insure yourself in the event of bad weather.

[00:40.27]Needless to say, the bigger the risk an insurance company takes, the higher the premium you will have to pay.

[00:49.90]It is not uncommon to hear that a shipping company has made a claim for the cost of salvaging a sunken ship.

[00:58.02]But the claim made by a local authority to recover the cost of salvaging a sunken pie dish must surely be unique.

[01:08.34]Admittedly it was an unusual pie dish, for it was eighteen feet long and six feet wide.

[01:17.40]It had been purchased by a local authority so that an enormous pie could be baked for an annual fair.

[01:26.40]The pie committee decided that the best way to transport the dish would be by canal so they insured it for the trip.

[01:36.61]Shortly after it was launched, the pie committee went to a local inn to celebrate.

[01:43.28]At the same time, a number of teenagers climbed on to the dish and held a little party of their own.

[01:51.27]Dancing proved to be more than the dish could bear,

[01:55.25]for during the party it capsized and sank in seven feet of water.

[02:01.76]The pie committee telephoned a local garage owner who arrived in a recovery truck to salvage the pie dish.

[02:10.67]Shivering in their wet clothes, the teenagers looked on while three men dived repeatedly into the water to locate the dish.

[02:21.41]They had little difficulty in finding it, but hauling it out of the water proved to be a serious problem.

[02:30.27]The sides of the dish were so smooth that it was almost impossible to attach hawsers and chains to the rim without damaging it.