专四
The chief problem in coping with foreign motorists is not so much remembering that they are different from yourself, but that they are enormously variable. Cross a frontier without adjusting and you can be in deep trouble.
One of the greatest gulfs separating the driving nations is the Atlantic Ocean. More precisely, it is the mental distance between the European and the American motorist, partic, ularly the South American motorist. Compare, for example, an English driver at a set of traffic lights with a Brazilian.
Very rarely will an English man try to anticipate the green light by moving off prematurely. You will find the occasional sharpie who watches for the amber to come up on the adjacent set of lights. However, he will not go until he receives the lawful signal. Brazilians view the thing quite differently. If, in fact, they see traffic lights at all, they regard them as a kind of roadside decoration.
The natives of North America are much more disciplined. They demonstrate this in their addiction to driving in one lane and sticking to it--even if it means settling behind some great truck for many miles.
To prevent other drivers from failing into reckless ways, American motorists try always to stay close behind the vehicle in front, which can make it impossible, when all the vehicles are moving at about 55 mph, to make a real lane change. European visitors are constantly falling into this trap. They return to the Old Word still flapping their arms in frustration because while driving in the States in their car they kept failing to get off the highway when they wanted to and were swept along to the next city.
However, one nation above all others lives scrupulously by its traffic regulations--the Swiss. In Switzerland, if you were simply to anticipate a traffic light, the chances are that the motorist behind you would take your number and report you to the police. What is more, the police would visit you; and you would be convicted.
The Swiss take their rules of the road so seriously that a driver can be ordered to appear in court and charged for speeding on hearsay alone, and very likely found guilty. There are slight regional variations among the French, German and Italian speaking areas, but it is generally safe to assume that any car bearing a CH sticker will be driven with a high degree of discipline.The fact that the Brazilians regard traffic lights as a kind of roadside decoration suggests that
A．traffic lights are part of street scener
B．they simply ignore traffic light
C．they want to put them at roadside
D．there are very few traffic light
【解析】推理题。根据第3段前三句可知英国人会严格地遵守交通灯，而第4句话题一转，提到巴西人对待交通灯的态度是截然不同的，就算看到了路灯，也只当它们是装饰，交通灯对他们不起任何作用。因此不难理解“将红绿灯视作摆设”的寓意——无视交通规则，故选项B为正确答案。
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A．the Atlantic Ocean and other ocean
B．English drivers and American driver
C．European drivers and American driver
D．European drivers and South American driver
A．wait for the green light to be o
B．forbid others to move before the green ligh
C．move off before the green light is o
D．follow others when the green light is o
In a few weeks researchers will begin scouring the Florida seafloor for a 177-year-old shipwreck--and the resting place of dozens of slaves who drowned in chains. Despite its drama, the story of the Guerrero remains little-known.
Around 7 pm on the evening of December 19th, 1827, keeper John Whalton was tending to his lightship, a sort of mobile lighthouse. He was anchored a few miles off Key Largo when, he said later, “I saw the flash and heard the report of seven or eight guns.”
Whalton was about to witness the tragic ending of a desperate chase in the waters off what was then the US Territory of Florida. The Guerrero, with hundreds of Africans enchained in its hold and crewed by 90 Spaniards who were little more than pirates, was fleeing the Nimble, a British warship that was enforcing the international ban on slave trade.
British officials had gotten a tip that the Guerrero was bound for Cuba, where bribed officials would look the other way while the Guerrero's human cargo was exchanged for goods worth a fortune in Europe. The Nimble and the Guerrero were swapping cannon fire as they skirted much too close to the shore. As Whalton watched, both ships piled onto Carysfort Reef, one of the many reefs that lie three or four miles (about five or six kilometres) off the Florida Keys.
The Nimble was aground but not badly damaged. The Guerrero, however, struck with such force that its masts snapped and collapsed, and the massive poles plunged into the hold where the Africans were imprisoned. The ship sank immediately in the shallow water, and some 40 captives drowned.
The men aboard the Nimble could hear the screams from two miles (about three kilometres) away. “The cries of 561 slaves and (Guerrero's) crew were appalling beyond description,” The Niles Weekly Register, a Baltimore newspaper, later reported. What is true about John Whalton?
A．He was serving the army at the time when the tragedy happene
B．Hardly had he seen the flash when he was notified of the conditio
C．Both the Guerrero and the Nimble were in the view of Joh
D．The lightship where he was on duty anchored just a few miles from the Guerrer
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