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One evening,
however, after Rachel had come home, her mother heard a noise which sounded like suppressed weeping in the girl’s room, and on going in found her lying, half undressed, upon the bed, evidently in the greatest distress. As soon as she saw her mother, she exclaimed, “Ah, mother, mother, why did you let me go to the forest with Helen?” Mrs. M. was astonished at so strange a question, and proceeded to make inquiries. Rachel told her a wild story. She said -- Clarke closed the book with a snap, and turned his chair towards the fire. When his friend sat one evening in that very chair, and told his story, Clarke had interrupted him at a point a little subsequent to this, had cut short his words in a paroxysm of horror. “My God!” he had exclaimed, “think, think what you are saying. It is too incredible, too monstrous; such things can never be in this quiet world, where men and women live and die, and struggle, and conquer, or maybe fail, and fall down under sorrow, and grieve and suffer strange fortunes for many a year; but not this, Phillips, not such things as this. There must be some explanation, some way out of the terror. Why, man, if such a case were possible, our earth would be a nightmare.” But Phillips had told his story to the end, concluding: “Her flight remains a mystery to this day; she vanished in broad sunlight; they saw her walking in a meadow, and a few moments later she was not there.” Clarke tried to conceive the thing again, as he sat by the fire, and again his mind shuddered and shrank back, appalled before the sight of such awful, unspeakable elements enthroned as it were, and triumphant in human flesh. Before him stretched the long dim vista of the green causeway in the forest, as his friend had described it; he saw the swaying leaves and the quivering shadows on the grass, he saw the sunlight and the flowers, and far away, far in the long distance, the two figures moved toward him. One was Rachel, but the other? Clarke had tried his best to disbelieve it all, but at the end of the account, as he had written it in his book, he had placed the inscription: ET DIABOLUS INCARNATE EST. ET HOMO FACTUS EST. The City of Resurrections “HERBERT! Good God! Is it possible?” “Yes, my name’s Herbert. I think I know your face, too, but I don’t remember your name. My memory is very queer.” “Don’t you recollect Villiers of Wadham?” “So it is, so it is. I beg your pardon, Villiers, I didn’t think I was begging of an old college friend. Good-night.” “My dear fellow, this haste is unnecessary. My rooms are close by, but we won’t go there just yet. Suppose we walk up Shaftesbury Avenue a little way? But how in heaven’s name have you come to this pass, Herbert?” “It’s a long story, Villiers, and a strange one too, but you can hear it if you like.” “Come on, then. Take my arm, you don’t seem very strong.” The ill-assorted pair moved slowly up Rupert Street; the one in dirty, evil-looking rags, and the other attired in the regulation uniform of a man about town, trim, glossy, and eminently well-to-do. Villiers had emerged from his restaurant after an excellent dinner of many courses, assisted by an ingratiating little flask of Chianti, and, in that frame of mind which was with him almost chronic, had delayed a moment by the door, peering round in the dimly-lighted street in search of those mysterious incidents and persons with which the streets of London teem in every quarter and every hour. Villiers prided himself as a practised explorer of such obscure mazes and byways of London life, and in this unprofitable pursuit he displayed an assiduity which was worthy of more serious employment. Thus he stood by the lamp-post surveying the passers-by with undisguised curiosity, and with that gravity known only to the systematic diner, had just enunciated in his mind the formula: “London has been called the city of encounters; it is more than that, it is the city of Resurrections,” when these reflections were suddenly interrupted by a piteous whine at his elbow, and a deplorable appeal for alms. He looked around in some irritation, and with a sudden shock found himself confronted with the embodied proof of his somewhat stilted fancies. There, close beside him, his face altered and disfigured by poverty and disgrace, his body barely covered by greasy ill-fitting rags, stood his old friend Charles Herbert, who had matriculated on the same day as himself, with whom he had been merry and wise for twelve revolving terms. Different occupations and varying interests had interrupted the friendship, and it was six years since Villiers had seen Herbert; and now he looked upon this wreck of a man with grief and dismay, mingled with a certain inquisitiveness as to what dreary chain of circumstances had dragged him down to such a doleful pass. Villiers felt together with compassion all the relish of the amateur in mysteries, and congratulated himself on his leisurely speculations outside the restaurant. They walked on in silence for some time, and more than one passer-by stared in astonishment at the unaccustomed spectacle of a well-dressed man with an unmistakable beggar hanging on to his arm, and, observing this, Villiers led the way to an obscure street in Soho. Here he repeated his question. “How on earth has it happened, Herbert? I always understood you would succeed to an excellent position in Dorsetshire. Did your father disinherit you? Surely not?” “No, Villiers; I came into all the property at my poor father’s death; he died a year after I left Oxford. He was a very good father to me, and I mourned his death sincerely enough. But you know what young men are; a few months later I came up to town and went a good deal into society.
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After the meal, the boy, who was about seven years old at the time, left his father at
work, and, as he said, went to look for flowers in the wood, and the man, who could hear him shouting with delight at his discoveries, felt no uneasiness. Suddenly, however, he was horrified at hearing the most dreadful screams, evidently the result of great terror, proceeding from the direction in which his son had gone, and he hastily threw down his tools and ran to see what had happened. Tracing his path by the sound, he met the little boy, who was running headlong, and was evidently terribly frightened, and on questioning him the man elicited that after picking a posy of flowers he felt tired, and lay down on the grass and fell asleep. He was suddenly awakened, as he stated, by a peculiar noise, a sort of singing he called it, and on peeping through the branches he saw Helen V. playing on the grass with a “strange naked man,” who he seemed unable to describe more fully. He said he felt dreadfully frightened and ran away crying for his father. Joseph W. proceeded in the direction indicated by his son, and found Helen V. sitting on the grass in the middle of a glade or open space left by charcoal burners. He angrily charged her with frightening his little boy, but she entirely denied the accusation and laughed at the child’s story of a “strange man,” to which he himself did not attach much credence. Joseph W. came to the conclusion that the boy had woke up with a sudden fright, as children sometimes do, but Trevor persisted in his story, and continued in such evident distress that at last his father took him home, hoping that his mother would be able to soothe him. For many weeks, however, the boy gave his parents much anxiety; he became nervous and strange in his manner, refusing to leave the cottage by himself, and constantly alarming the household by waking in the night with cries of “The man in the wood! father! father!” In course of time, however, the impression seemed to have worn off, and about three months later he accompanied his father to the home of a gentleman in the neighborhood, for whom Joseph W. occasionally did work. The man was shown into the study, and the little boy was left sitting in the hall, and a few minutes later, while the gentleman was giving W. his instructions, they were both horrified by a piercing shriek and the sound of a fall, and rushing out they found the child lying senseless on the floor, his face contorted with terror. The doctor was immediately summoned, and after some examination he pronounced the child to be suffering form a kind of fit, apparently produced by a sudden shock. The boy was taken to one of the bedrooms, and after some time recovered consciousness, but only to pass into a condition described by the medical man as one of violent hysteria. The doctor exhibited a strong sedative, and in the course of two hours pronounced him fit to walk home, but in passing through the hall the paroxysms of fright returned and with additional violence. The father perceived that the child was pointing at some object, and heard the old cry, “The man in the wood,” and looking in the direction indicated saw a stone head of grotesque appearance, which had been built into the wall above one of the doors. It seems the owner of the house had recently made alterations in his premises, and on digging the foundations for some offices, the men had found a curious head, evidently of the Roman period, which had been placed in the manner described. The head is pronounced by the most experienced archaeologists of the district to be that of a faun or satyr. [Dr. Phillips tells me that he has seen the head in question, and assures me that he has never received such a vivid presentment of intense evil.] From whatever cause arising, this second shock seemed too severe for the boy Trevor, and at the present date he suffers from a weakness of intellect, which gives but little promise of amending. The matter caused a good deal of sensation at the time, and the girl Helen was closely questioned by Mr. R., but to no purpose, she steadfastly denying that she had frightened or in any way molested Trevor. The second event with which this girl’s name is connected took place about six years ago, and is of a still more extraordinary character. At the beginning of the summer of 1882, Helen contracted a friendship of a peculiarly intimate character with Rachel M., the daughter of a prosperous farmer in the neighbourhood. This girl, who was a year younger than Helen, was considered by most people to be the prettier of the two, though Helen’s features had to a great extent softened as she became older. The two girls, who were together on every available opportunity, presented a singular contrast, the one with her clear, olive skin and almost Italian appearance, and the other of the proverbial red and white of our rural districts. It must be stated that the payments made to Mr. R. for the maintenance of Helen were known in the village for their excessive liberality, and the impression was general that she would one day inherit a large sum of money from her relative. The parents of Rachel were therefore not averse from their daughter’s friendship with the girl, and even encouraged the intimacy, though they now bitterly regret having done so. Helen still retained her extraordinary fondness for the forest, and on several occasions Rachel accompanied her, the two friends setting out early in the morning, and remaining in the wood until dusk. Once or twice after these excursions Mrs. M. thought her daughter’s manner rather peculiar; she seemed languid and dreamy, and as it has been expressed, “different from herself,” but these peculiarities seem to have been thought too trifling for remark. Clarke had a fine contempt for published literature; the most ghostly story ceased to interest him if it happened to be printed; his sole pleasure was in the reading, compiling, and rearranging what he called his “Memoirs to prove the Existence of the Devil,” and engaged in this pursuit the evening seemed to fly and the night appeared too short. On one particular evening, an ugly December night, black with fog, and raw with frost, Clarke hurried over his dinner, and scarcely deigned to observe his customary ritual of taking up the paper and laying it down again. He paced two or three times up and down the room, and opened the bureau, stood still a moment, and sat down. He leant back, absorbed in one of those dreams to which he was subject, and at length drew out his book, and opened it at the last entry. There were three or four pages densely covered with Clarke’s round, set penmanship, and at the beginning he had written in a somewhat larger hand: Singular Narrative told me by my Friend, Dr. Phillips. He assures me that all the facts related therein are strictly and wholly True, but refuses to give either the Surnames of the Persons Concerned, or the Place where these Extraordinary Events occurred. Mr. Clarke began to read over the account for the tenth time, glancing now and then at the pencil notes he had made when it was told him by his friend. It was one of his humours to pride himself on a certain literary ability; he thought well of his style, and took pains in arranging the circumstances in dramatic order. He read the following story:— The persons concerned in this statement are Helen V., who, if she is still alive, must now be a woman of twenty-three, Rachel M., since deceased, who was a year younger than the above, and Trevor W., an imbecile, aged eighteen. These persons were at the period of the story inhabitants of a village on the borders of Wales, a place of some importance in the time of the Roman occupation, but now a scattered hamlet, of not more than five hundred souls. It is situated on rising ground, about six miles from the sea, and is sheltered by a large and picturesque forest. Some eleven years ago, Helen V. came to the village under rather peculiar circumstances. It is understood that she, being an orphan, was adopted in her infancy by a distant relative, who brought her up in his own house until she was twelve years old. Thinking, however, that it would be better for the child to have playmates of her own age, he advertised in several local papers for a good home in a comfortable farmhouse for a girl of twelve, and this advertisement was answered by Mr. R., a wellto-do farmer in the above-mentioned village. His references proving satisfactory, the gentleman sent his adopted daughter to Mr. R., with a letter, in which he stipulated that the girl should have a room to herself, and stated that her guardians need be at no trouble in the matter of education, as she was already sufficiently educated for the position in life which she would occupy. In fact, Mr. R. was given to understand that the girl be allowed to find her own occupations and to spend her time almost as she liked. Mr. R. duly met her at the nearest station, a town seven miles away from his house, and seems to have remarked nothing extraordinary about the child except that she was reticent as to her former life and her adopted father. She was, however, of a very different type from the inhabitants of the village; her skin was a pale, clear olive, and her features were strongly marked, and of a somewhat foreign character. She appears to have settled down easily enough into farmhouse life, and became a favourite with the children, who sometimes went with her on her rambles in the forest, for this was her amusement. Mr. R. states that he has known her to go out by herself directly after their early breakfast, and not return till after dusk, and that, feeling uneasy at a young girl being out alone for so many hours, he communicated with her adopted father, who replied in a brief note that Helen must do as she chose. In the winter, when the forest paths are impassable, she spent most of her time in her bedroom, where she slept alone, according to the instructions of her relative. It was on one of these expeditions to the forest that the first of the singular incidents with which this girl is connected occurred, the date being about a year after her arrival at the village. The preceding winter had been remarkably severe, the snow drifting to a great depth, and the frost continuing for an unexampled period, and the summer following was as noteworthy for its extreme heat. On one of the very hottest days in this summer, Helen V. left the farmhouse for one of her long rambles in the forest, taking with her, as usual, some bread and meat for lunch. She was seen by some men in the fields making for the old Roman Road, a green causeway which traverses the highest part of the wood, and they were astonished to observe that the girl had taken off her hat, though the heat of the sun was already tropical. As it happened, a labourer, Joseph W. by name, was working in the forest near the Roman Road, and at twelve o’clock his little son, Trevor, brought the man his dinner of bread and cheese.
You will think this all high-flown(especially of language or ideas) extravagant and grand-sounding. language, Clarke, but it is hard to be literal
limited to the explicit meaning of a word or text.. And yet; I do not know whether what I am hinting at cannot be set forth述闡 set forth, elaborate, expoundand in plain simple, unadorned, and even a little boring. lonely terms. For instance, this world of ours is pretty well girded动词：佩带，围住，讥诮 now with the telegraph wires and cables; thought思想, with something less than the speed of thought, flashes from sunrise to sunset, from north to south, across the floods and the desert places. Suppose假设 that an electrician of today were suddenly to perceive that he and his friends have merely been playing with pebbles and mistaking them for the foundations of the world; suppose that such a man saw uttermost space lie open before the current, and words of men flash forth to the sun and beyond the sun into the systems beyond, and the voice of articulate-speaking men echo in the waste void that bounds our thought. As analogies go, that is a pretty good analogy of what I have done; you can understand now a little of what I felt as I stood here one evening; it was a summer evening, and the valley looked much as it does now; I stood here, and saw before me the unutterable, the unthinkable gulf that yawns profound between two worlds, the world of matter and the world of spirit; I saw the great empty deep stretch dim before me, and in that instant a bridge of light leapt from the earth to the unknown shore, and the abyss was spanned. You may look in Browne Faber’s book, if you like, and you will find that to the present day men of science are unable to account for the presence, or to specify the functions of a certain group of nerve-cells in the brain. That group is, as it were, land to let, a mere waste place for fanciful theories. I am not in the position of Browne Faber and the specialists, I am perfectly instructed as to the possible functions of those nerve-centers in the scheme of things. With a touch I can bring them into play, with a touch, I say, I can set free the current, with a touch I can complete the communication between this world of sense and — we shall be able to finish the sentence later on. Yes, the knife is necessary; but think what that knife will effect. It will level utterly the solid wall of sense, and probably, for the first time since man was made, a spirit will gaze on a spirit-world. Clarke, Mary will see the god Pan!” “But you remember what you wrote to me? I thought it would be requisite that she —” He whispered the rest into the doctor’s ear. “Not at all, not at all. That is nonsense. I assure you. Indeed, it is better as it is; I am quite certain of that.” “Consider the matter well, Raymond. It’s a great responsibility. Something might go wrong; you would be a miserable man for the rest of your days.” “No, I think not, even if the worst happened. As you know, I rescued Mary from the gutter, and from almost certain starvation, when she was a child; I think her life is mine, to use as I see fit. Come, it’s getting late; we had better go in.” Dr. Raymond led the way into the house, through the hall, and down a long dark passage. He took a key from his pocket and opened a heavy door, and motioned Clarke into his laboratory. It had once been a billiard-room, and was lighted by a glass dome in the centre of the ceiling, whence there still shone a sad grey light on the figure of the doctor as he lit a lamp with a heavy shade and placed it on a table in the middle of the room. Clarke looked about him. Scarcely a foot of wall remained bare; there were shelves all around laden with bottles and phials of all shapes and colours, and at one end stood a little Chippendale book-case. Raymond pointed to this. “You see that parchment Oswald Crollius? He was one of the first to show me the way, though I don’t think he ever found it himself. That is a strange saying of his: ‘In every grain of wheat there lies hidden the soul of a star.’“ There was not much furniture in the laboratory. The table in the centre, a stone slab with a drain in one corner, the two armchairs on which Raymond and Clarke were sitting; that was all, except an odd-looking chair at the furthest end of the room. Clarke looked at it, and raised his eyebrows. “Yes, that is the chair,” said Raymond. “We may as well place it in position.” He got up and wheeled the chair to the light, and began raising and lowering it, letting down the seat, setting the back at various angles, and adjusting the foot-rest. It looked comfortable enough, and Clarke passed his hand over the soft green velvet, as the doctor manipulated the levers. “Now, Clarke, make yourself quite comfortable. I have a couple hours’ work before me; I was obliged to leave certain matters to the last.” Raymond went to the stone slab, and Clarke watched him drearily as he bent over a row of phials and lit the flame under the crucible. The doctor had a small handlamp, shaded as the larger one, on a ledge above his apparatus, and Clarke, who sat in the shadows, looked down at the great shadowy room, wondering at the bizarre effects of brilliant light and undefined darkness contrasting with one another. Soon he became conscious of an odd odour, at first the merest suggestion of odour, in the room, and as it grew more decided he felt surprised that he was not reminded of the chemist’s shop or the surgery. Clarke found himself idly endeavouring to analyse the sensation, and half conscious, he began to think of a day, fifteen years ago, that he had spent roaming through the woods and meadows near his own home. It was a burning day at the beginning of August, the heat had dimmed the outlines of all things and all distances with a faint mist, and people who observed the thermometer spoke of an abnormal register, of a temperature that was almost tropical. Strangely that wonderful hot day of the fifties rose up again in Clarke’s imagination; the sense of dazzling all-pervading sunlight seemed to blot out the shadows and the lights of the laboratory, and he felt again the heated air beating in gusts about his face, saw the shimmer rising from the turf, and heard the myriad murmur of the summer. “I hope the smell doesn’t annoy you, Clarke; there’s nothing unwholesome about it. It may make you a bit sleepy, that’s all.” Clarke heard the words quite distinctly, and knew that Raymond was speaking to him, but for the life of him he could not rouse himself from his lethargy. He could only think of the lonely walk he had taken fifteen years ago; it was his last look at the fields and woods he had known since he was a child, and now it all stood out in brilliant light, as a picture, before him. Above all there came to his nostrils the scent of summer, the smell of flowers mingled, and the odour of the woods, of cool shaded places, deep in the green depths, drawn forth by the sun’s heat; and the scent of the good earth, lying as it were with arms stretched forth, and smiling lips, overpowered all. His fancies made him wander, as he had wandered long ago, from the fields into the wood, tracking a little path between the shining undergrowth of beech-trees; and the trickle of water dropping from the limestone rock sounded as a clear melody in the dream. Thoughts began to go astray and to mingle with other thoughts; the beech alley was transformed to a path between ilex-trees, and here and there a vine climbed from bough to bough, and sent up waving tendrils and drooped with purple grapes, and the sparse grey-green leaves of a wild olive-tree stood out against the dark shadows of the ilex. Clarke, in the deep folds of dream, was conscious that the path from his father’s house had led him into an undiscovered country, and he was wondering at the strangeness of it all, when suddenly, in place of the hum and murmur of the summer, an infinite silence seemed to fall on all things, and the wood was hushed, and for a moment in time he stood face to face there with a presence, that was neither man nor beast, neither the living nor the dead, but all things mingled, the form of all things but devoid of all form. And in that moment, the sacrament of body and soul was dissolved, and a voice seemed to cry “Let us go hence,” and then the darkness of darkness beyond the stars, the darkness of everlasting. When Clarke woke up with a start he saw Raymond pouring a few drops of some oily fluid into a green phial, which he stoppered tightly. “You have been dozing,” he said; “the journey must have tired you out. It is done now. I am going to fetch Mary; I shall be back in ten minutes.” Clarke lay back in his chair and wondered. It seemed as if he had but passed from one dream into another. He half expected to see the walls of the laboratory melt and disappear, and to awake in London, shuddering at his own sleeping fancies. But at last the door opened, and the doctor returned, and behind him came a girl of about seventeen, dressed all in white. She was so beautiful that Clarke did not wonder at what the doctor had written to him. She was blushing now over face and neck and arms, but Raymond seemed unmoved. “Mary,” he said, “the time has come. You are quite free. Are you willing to trust yourself to me entirely?” “Yes, dear.” “Do you hear that, Clarke? You are my witness. Here is the chair, Mary. It is quite easy. Just sit in it and lean back. Are you ready?” “Yes, dear, quite ready. Give me a kiss before you begin.” The doctor stooped and kissed her mouth, kindly enough. “Now shut your eyes,” he said. The girl closed her eyelids, as if she were tired, and longed for sleep, and Raymond placed the green phial to her nostrils. Her face grew white, whiter than her dress; she struggled faintly, and then with the feeling of submission strong within her, crossed her arms upon her breast as a little child about to say her prayers. The bright light of the lamp fell full upon her, and Clarke watched changes fleeting over her face as the changes of the hills when the summer clouds float across the sun. And then she lay all white and still, and the doctor turned up one of her eyelids. She was quite unconscious. Raymond pressed hard on one of the levers and the chair instantly sank back. Clarke saw him cutting away a circle, like a tonsure, from her hair, and the lamp was moved nearer. Raymond took a small glittering instrument from a little case, and Clarke turned away shudderingly. When he looked again the doctor was binding up the wound he had made. “She will awake in five minutes.” Raymond was still perfectly cool. “There is nothing more to be done; we can only wait.” The minutes passed slowly; they could hear a slow, heavy, ticking. There was an old clock in the passage. Clarke felt sick and faint; his knees shook beneath him, he could hardly stand. Suddenly, as they watched, they heard a long-drawn sigh, and suddenly did the colour that had vanished return to the girl’s cheeks, and suddenly her eyes opened. Clarke quailed before them. They shone with an awful light, looking far away, and a great wonder fell upon her face, and her hands stretched out as if to touch what was invisible; but in an instant the wonder faded, and gave place to the most awful terror. The muscles of her face were hideously convulsed, she shook from head to foot; the soul seemed struggling and shuddering within the house of flesh. It was a horrible sight, and Clarke rushed forward, as she fell shrieking to the floor. Three days later Raymond took Clarke to Mary’s bedside. She was lying wideawake, rolling her head from side to side, and grinning vacantly. “Yes,” said the doctor, still quite cool, “it is a great pity; she is a hopeless idiot. However, it could not be helped; and, after all, she has seen the Great God Pan.” Mr. Clarke’s Memoirs MR. Clarke, the gentleman chosen by Dr. Raymond to witness the strange experiment of the god Pan, was a person in whose character caution and curiosity were oddly mingled; in his sober moments he thought of the unusual and eccentric with undisguised aversion, and yet, deep in his heart, there was a wide-eyed inquisitiveness with respect to all the more recondite and esoteric elements in the nature of men. The latter tendency had prevailed when he accepted Raymond’s invitation, for though his considered judgment had always repudiated the doctor’s theories as the wildest nonsense, yet he secretly hugged a belief in fantasy, and would have rejoiced to see that belief confirmed. The horrors that he witnessed in the dreary laboratory were to a certain extent salutary; he was conscious of being involved in an affair not altogether reputable, and for many years afterwards he clung bravely to the commonplace, and rejected all occasions of occult investigation. Indeed, on some homeopathic principle, he for some time attended the seances of distinguished mediums, hoping that the clumsy tricks of these gentlemen would make him altogether disgusted with mysticism of every kind, but the remedy, though caustic, was not efficacious. Clarke knew that he still pined for the unseen, and little by little, the old passion began to reassert itself, as the face of Mary, shuddering and convulsed with an unknown terror, faded slowly from his memory. Occupied all day in pursuits both serious and lucrative, the temptation to relax in the evening was too great, especially in the winter months, when the fire cast a warm glow over his snug bachelor apartment, and a bottle of some choice claret stood ready by his elbow. His dinner digested, he would make a brief pretence of reading the evening paper, but the mere catalogue of news soon palled upon him, and Clarke would find himself casting glances of warm desire in the direction of an old Japanese bureau, which stood at a pleasant distance from the hearth. Like a boy before a jam-closet, for a few minutes he would hover indecisive, but lust always prevailed, and Clarke ended by drawing up his chair, lighting a candle, and sitting down before the bureau. Its pigeon-holes and drawers teemed with documents on the most morbid subjects, and in the well reposed a large manuscript volume, in which he had painfully entered the gems of his collection.limited to the explicit meaning of a word or text. “I am glad you came, Clarke; very glad indeed. I was not sure you could spare the time.” “I was able to make arrangements for a few days; things are not very lively just now. But have you no misgivings, Raymond? Is it absolutely safe?” The two men were slowly pacing the terrace in front of Dr. Raymond’s house. The sun still hung above the western mountain-line, but it shone with a dull red glow that cast no shadows, and all the air was quiet; a sweet breath came from the great wood on the hillside above, and with it, at intervals, the soft murmuring call of the wild doves. Below, in the long lovely valley, the river wound in and out between the lonely hills, and, as the sun hovered and vanished into the west, a faint mist, pure white, began to rise from the hills. Dr. Raymond turned sharply to his friend. “Safe? Of course it is. In itself the operation is a perfectly simple one; any surgeon could do it.” “And there is no danger at any other stage?” “None; absolutely no physical danger whatsoever, I give you my word. You are always timid, Clarke, always; but you know my history. I have devoted myself to transcendental medicine for the last twenty years. I have heard myself called quackWhy is a Fake Doctor Called a Quack? and charlatanSynonyms for "charlatan" include "shyster", "quack", or "faker" and impostor, but all the while I knew I was on the right path. Five years ago I reached the goal, and since then every day has been a preparation for what we shall do tonight.” “I should like to believe it is all true.” Clarke knit his brows, and looked doubtfully at Dr. Raymond. “Are you perfectly sure, Raymond, that your theory is not a phantasmagoria — a splendid vision, certainly, but a mere vision after all?” Dr. Raymond stopped in his walk and turned sharply. He was a middle-aged man, gaunt and thin, of a pale yellow complexion, but as he answered Clarke and faced him, there was a flush on his cheek. “Look about you, Clarke. You see the mountain, and hill following after hill, as wave on wave, you see the woods and orchard, the fields of ripe corn, and the meadows reaching to the reed-beds by the river. You see me standing here beside you, and hear my voice; but I tell you that all these things — yes, from that star that has just shone out in the sky to the solid ground beneath our feet — I say that all these are but dreams and shadows; the shadows that hide the real world from our eyes. There is a real world, but it is beyond this glamour and this vision, beyond these ‘chases in Arras, dreams in a career,’ beyond them all as beyond a veil. I do not know whether any human being has ever lifted that veil; but I do know, Clarke, that you and I shall see it lifted this very night from before another’s eyes. You may think this all strange nonsense; it may be strange, but it is true, and the ancients knew what lifting the veil means. They called it seeing the god Pan.” Clarke shivered; the white mist gathering over the river was chilly. “It is wonderful indeed,” he said. “We are standing on the brink of a strange world, Raymond, if what you say is true. I suppose the knife is absolutely necessary?” “Yes; a slight lesion in the grey matter, that is all; a trifling rearrangement of certain cells, a microscopical alteration that would escape the attention of ninetynine brain specialists out of a hundred. I don’t want to bother you with ‘shop,’ Clarke; I might give you a mass of technical detail which would sound very imposing, and would leave you as enlightened as you are now. But I suppose you have read, casually, in out-of-the-way corners of your paper, that immense strides have been made recently in the physiology of the brain. I saw a paragraph the other day about Digby’s theory, and Browne Faber’s discoveries. Theories and discoveries! Where they are standing now, I stood fifteen years ago, and I need not tell you that I have not been standing still for the last fifteen years. It will be enough if I say that five years ago I made the discovery that I alluded to when I said that ten years ago I reached the goal. After years of labour, after years of toiling and groping in the dark, after days and nights of disappointments and sometimes of despair, in which I used now and then to tremble and grow cold with the thought that perhaps there were others seeking for what I sought, at last, after so long, a pang of sudden joy thrilled my soul, and I knew the long journey was at an end. By what seemed then and still seems a chance, the suggestion of a moment’s idle thought followed up upon familiar lines and paths that I had tracked a hundred times already, the great truth burst upon me, and I saw, mapped out in lines of sight, a whole world, a sphere unknown; continents and islands, and great oceans in which no ship has sailed (to my belief) since a Man first lifted up his eyes and beheld the sun, and the stars of heaven, and the quiet earth beneath. In the southeastern Pacific Ocean, on the piece of land known as Easter Island (now a territory of Chile), stand several hundred massive stone monoliths. These carvings, called “moai,” are recognizable by their oversized heads, with their heavy brows, long noses, elongated ears, and protruding lips. While they average four meters in height and 12.5 tonnes, the largest is almost 10 meters tall and the heaviest weighs a full 86 tons. The upright sculptures are scattered around Easter Island, many installed on platforms called “ahu” along the coast, while others are more inland and several stand near the main volcanic quarry of Rano Raraku. The Rapa Nui people of the island built a total of 887 of these impressive statues between the 12th and 16th centuries. They were, it is said, symbols of religious and political authority, embodiments of powerful chiefs or ancestors which faced inland toward the island’s villages, perhaps watching over their creators, keeping them safe.
[2] While the very creation of such monoliths – most out of volcanic ash with stone hand chisels – is an impressive feat, what is more remarkable (not to mention mysterious) is how they were transported to their resting places. In the past, most researchers associated the building and transportation of the moai with widespread deforestation on the island and eventual collapse of the Rapa Nui civilization. This hypothesis is based, in part, on the fact that the pollen record suddenly disappears at the same time as the Rapa Nui people stopped constructing the moai and transporting them with the help of wooden logs. How exactly would logs facilitate the movement of the statues? Most proponents of this method believe that the people created “rollers” by arranging parallel logs on which the prone statues were pulled, or pushed. They would not have required an entire roadway of logs, since logs from the back could be placed at the front, creating a moving platform of sorts. To make it easier to roll, and keep in position, the statue would be placed on two logs arranged in a V shape. [3] One proponent of this idea of rolling the statues in a prone position is Jo Anne Van Tilburg, of UCLA. Van Tilburg created sophisticated computer models that took into account available materials, routes, rock, and manpower, even factoring in how much the workers would have to have eaten. Her models supported the idea that rolling prone statues was the most efficient method. As further evidence, Van Tilburg oversaw the movement of a moai replica by the method she had proposed. They were successful, but evidence that it was possible is not necessarily evidence that it actually happened. [4] Van Tilburg was not the only one to have experimented with rolling the statues. In the 1980s, archaeologist Charles Love experimented with rolling the moai in an upright position, rather than prone, on two wooden runners. Indeed, a team of just 25 men was able to move the statue a distance of 150 feet in a mere two minutes. However, the route from the stone quarries where the statues were built to the coast where they were installed was often uneven, and Love’s experiments were hampered Stymie by the tendency of the statues to tip over. While Love’s ideas were dismissed by many, the idea of the statutes tipping over along the route was consistent with the many moai found on their sides or faces beside the island’s ancient roads. And local legend held that the statues “walked” to their destinations, which would seem to support an upright mode of transportation. In fact, rolling was not the only possible way of transporting the moai in an upright position. [5] In the 1980s, Pavel Pavel and Thor Heyerdahl had experimen ted with swiveling the statues forward. With one rope tied around the head and another around the base, they were able to move a five-ton moai with only eight people, and a nine-ton statue with 16. However, they abandoned their efforts when their technique proved too damaging; as they shuffled the statues forward, the bases were chipped away. This confounding factor led most to believe that an upright, rope-assisted walking method was incorrect. [6] But many now believe that they were, in fact, transported upright. In 2012, Carl Lipo of California State University Long Beach and Terry Hunt of the University of Hawaii teamed up with archaeologist Sergio Rapu to refine the upright walking idea. They found that the statues that appeared to be abandoned in transit had bases with a curved front edge. This meant they would naturally topple forward and would need to be modified once they reached their destinations. But that curved edge also meant that they could easily be rocked forward using a small team of people and three ropes attached to the head. Indeed, their experiments demonstrated the feasibility of this method, and their theory has gained traction. tip over = to fall down, overturn, swivelling = to rotate, to turn, revolve cast = to throw; toss stymied - to obstruct, to hinder the progress of something stymie/ˈstʌɪmi/ One of the best questions that astronaut Dr. Mae Jemison has ever received was from a 12-year-old girl: "How did being a dancer help you be an astronaut?" Jemison, who became the first African American woman in space during her 1992 shuttle mission, was the child of two scientists. She looked up at the stars with wonder. She wanted to be a scientist, a dancer, an architect and a designer. Jemison took studio art classes, making ceramics, silk screenings and other forms of art. She didn't know that she would become an astronaut; she thought maybe she could be those other things in space. "At the core of them are creativity, because I wanted to help influence where the world went," Jemison said. "I wanted to use my energy and my ideas to design new things, to explore the world around me. And we're very physical beings, so dance is a way of physically exploring the world."Mae Jemison became the first African American woman to travel in space when she went into orbit aboard the Space Shuttle Endeavour on September 12, 1992. Jemison explained to the girl that dancers must be disciplined, practicing and rehearsing constantly and paying attention to those around them while maintaining the choreography in their head. Dancing also requires the ability to take criticism and apply it. Jemsion is an advocate for maintaining the arts in schools, in addition to science, technology, engineering and mathematics, a group of fields known as STEM. "The sciences help us understand and convey ideas about the world as it's experienced by everyone," Jemison said. "And I think of the arts as helping us to convey understanding of the world as it's experienced by the individual. Both of them are required for creativity. Both of them are required to move the world forward. It makes us full, rounded human beings. And it also keeps us interested." Diversity of all kinds is crucial to push the boundaries of space exploration; art is often lost in that part of the story. But for 50 years, art has also been helping tell the story of how humans are exploring space. Artistic astronauts Alan Bean, the lunar module pilot for Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon, had taken art classes before he became an astronaut. The artwork he created after returning to Earth tells the story of his mission, as well as the missions of other Apollo astronauts. When he resigned from NASA in 1981, he set out to share the truth and beauty of what they had seen. His artwork has been exhibited at the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum. "Alan Bean and his astroartistry recreate the drama and excitement of man's exploration of the moon as only could be chronicled by one who has been there," astronaut Neil Armstrong said, according to Bean's website. Throughout his works, Bean used pieces of his spacesuit, the imprints of moon boots, marks from tools like a hammer and core tube bit he used on the lunar surface, and even small pieces of foil insulation and dust from the Apollo 12 landing site, known as the Ocean of Storms. Alan Bean at his art studio in Houston in October 14, 2008. Bean, who died in 2018, was inspired by other explorer artists. "My paintings record the beginnings of a quest never to end, our journey out among the stars," he wrote on his website. Fellow astronaut John Glenn said, "he saw the same monochromatic world as the other astronauts, yet with an artist's eye he also saw intrinsic beauty in the rocks and boulders and their textures and shapes." He was the first artist to land on the moon, but he wasn't the only astronaut with a passionate connection to art. Astronaut Nicole Stott, who spent 104 days living and working in space during two missions became the first to paint with watercolors in space during her 2009 mission. Stott shares her unique view of space and the Earth through her work, aiming to promote the importance of science and art as well as the desire to care for our planet. She said that every astronaut has that moment when they come back to Earth: What do I do next? She couldn't stop thinking about painting in space. "Being able to look out the window and see something and paint my interpretation of it seemed meaningful," Stott recalled. "Maybe my artwork is a way to uniquely share my experience. It's been a really wonderful way to connect with people about appreciating where we live on this single planet. We need to take care of it." Stott is also the founder of the Space for Art Foundation, a nonprofit that creates space-inspired art therapy programs, research and exhibits. The Spacesuit Art Project was one of the recent aims of her foundation, which continues the quest for awareness around childhood cancer. Kate Rubins wore the "Courage" suit on the International Space Station in 2016. The project completed three suits made of art created by children in hospitals: Hope, Courage and Unity. On September 16, 2016, the stark whiteness of the International Space Station became an art gallery when astronaut and cancer researcher Kate Rubins donned the Courage suit and called down to Earth to speak with some of the patients. Hope, Courage and Unity: The story behind the young cancer patients who painted space suits "The spaceflight experience I've had is going to allow me opportunities to participate in projects like this," Stott said. "It's the most meaningful thing I've ever supported." "It's always nice to meet a kindred spirit," Bean said when he met Stott, according to her website. "I'm delighted that Nicole is the first astronaut of the Space Shuttle/Space Station era to choose art as her next step in life. All of us that have been fortunate enough to fly in space find it difficult to describe the beauty of our universe in words alone. I am thankful that Nicole has chosen to help share these amazing sights we have all seen through her very beautiful artwork."A window to space Art was a priority for NASA's second administrator, Jim Webb. He established NASA's art program in 1962 and allowed artists to start coming to the agency in 1963. He saw a need for art to capture the history that was being made and portray it for the American people. And the artists were given free rein. The leading artists of the time were invited to capture history. Norman Rockwell's famous painting of astronauts Gus Grissom and John Young originated during the early days of the program in 1965. NASA loaned a spacesuit to Rockwell so he could accurately capture the details. Norman Rockwell's painting "Grissom and Young." "Art is part of what makes us human," said Bill Barry, NASA's chief historian. "It captures the feeling of what it means to explore, which is what discovery is all about." Much of the art from that program is at the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum. Separate from that program, art is still being produced out of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, through The Studio, and from artists Robert Hurt and Tim Pyle at the California Institute of Technology. The Studio brings together artists and designers who work with scientists and engineers at NASA to inspire awe about the work and research being done at the agency. In 2016, they released a series of posters inspired by the Works Progress Administration posters of the late 1930s and early 1940s that encouraged people to visit national parks. The Studio's "Visions of the Future" posters portrayed places in our solar system being visited by missions, as well as envisioning exoplanets. The posters went viral it spreads widely, especially on the Internet or mobile phones. Joby Harris, a visual strategist and designer at The Studio, said they were motivated by the question "why would you want to go there?" He hoped that the exoplanet posters in particular might inspire the next generation to figure out how we might reach them, since current technology would require thousands of years. The power in the art they're creating is leaving room for people to create themselves by piquing 1. arouse (interest or curiosity).feel irritated or resentful.their interest and inviting their curiosity, he said. It's a different experience than looking at photos taken by cameras mounted on spacecraft. "What I love about art that's so different from photography is that it's so organic, especially when it has to do with the future," Harris said. "Art fills in the blanks between the facts where space is undefined. And when data goes through another human, it becomes emotional and real." Before working at The Studio, Harris was a concept designer and effects artist for films and TV shows, designing props, spacesuits and spaceships, like the suits seen in "Solaris" and "Star Trek: Enterprise." The artists work with scientists to talk about ongoing missions in experiential ways and ask what excites them about the missions. "The posters opened up the value of NASA creating art that ignites peoples imaginations again," Harris said. For the past 15 years at Caltech, the artistic duo of Robert Hurt and Tim Pyle has been creating illustrations of how gravitational waves, myriad exoplanets and even the top of the Milky Way might look if we could see them for ourselves. The images look so realistic that the captions have to remind people that they're artistic renderings. Illustrators get us up close with 'Tatooine' and other alien planets Hurt took the route of an astronomer in college, and Pyle pursued film production, but both are creative. In addition to creating the images that people now associate with the TRAPPIST-1 exoplanet system, found 40 light-years from Earth, Hurt and Pyle have expanded into videos and virtual reality experiences in recent years. In 2018, they rented a spaceship set for a day and brought in two actors from the TV show "The Expanse" to film an episode of NASA's "Universe of Learning." In the five-minute video, the explorers visit a planetary system in hopes of finding a planet in the habitable zone, which may be just the right temperature to support liquid water on its surface and thus life. It offers a play on "The Twilight Zone." The material Pyle and Hurt create opens the NASA science releases to cross boundaries. Sometimes, when they sit down with the scientists who author studies on the discoveries of exoplanets and ask "what do you think it looks like?" it's the first time the scientists have thought about it visually. Then, they literally begin "world-building." When working on the concept for Kepler-186f, the first Earth-size planet in the habitable zone that could support liquid water on its surface, Pyle was careful to make it look less inviting than our own Earth, in case it was misconstrued as a friendly, habitable place. They made sure it was more muddy brown rather than green and blue. "Probably the most famous graphic I've done is a top-down view of what the Milky Way would look like if we could go outside our galaxy and look at it," Hurt said. "The irony is, we live inside it, you think we would know it better than anything, but it turns out that's not so true. It's like being dropped down in Times Square and being asked to draw a map of all of Manhattan." Pyle enjoyed working on this concept because he hadn't seen any examples of it before. It's an example of a brown dwarf with a strong weather system. Instead of liquid rain, the storms most likely consist of molten iron, sand or salts. Hurt's depiction of a supermassive black hole is another iconic image that has come to be closely associated with the term. It also depicts an outflowing jet of energetic particles, believed to be powered by the black hole's spin. A fan of the show "Babylon 5," Pyle enjoyed working on this depiction of the Epsilon Eridani star system, where the space station is located on the show. It is also the closest known planetary system to our own. "A star that's cool enough to have stormy planet-like clouds forming in its atmosphere," Pyle said. "I worked with an exoplanet theorist who helped refine the look of the cloud structure." Hurt offers another look at a young star surrounded by a dusty protoplanetary disk that contains the raw material to form planets as the star system matures. What would a storm of comets around a star look like? Hurt's illustration of Eta Corvi shows how comets are torn to shreds after colliding with a rocky body. Artists such as Tim Pyle and Robert Hurt create renderings of exoplanets and other things in the universe we may never be able to otherwise see. Their rendering of the TRAPPIST-1 star, an ultra-cool dwarf, shows the seven Earth-size planets that were discovered orbiting it. The design also shows where planets lie in the habitable zone around the planet. Ice around the outside of the image indicates it's too cold there for water to maintain liquid form, while steam close to the star shows its too hot. Sometimes, the reality of the data they're working with aligns with scenes from the "Star Wars" films, such as Pyle's rendering of the Kepler-16 binary star system that creates a double sunset like the one on Luke Skywalker's home world, Tatooine. "To me, planets around binary star systems will always be 'Tatooine' planets," Pyle said. This illustration was created to accompany a release revealing that mature planetary systems are more frequent around binary stars than single stars like our sun. Kamino is an ocean world in "Star Wars: Attack of the Clones." Kepler-22b is an exoplanet that could similarly be covered in a super ocean. Kepler-452b is an Earth-size planet that orbits a star similar to our sun. It's been compared with the planet Coruscant in the "Star Wars" films and has been called "Earth's older, bigger cousin." Hurt was inspired by the volcanic world Mustafar from "Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith" to create this illustration of the hot, rocky exoplanet called 55 Cancri e. It is his favorite illustration from the past year, a "lava-covered world with sheets of gas pouring off of it." Believe it or not, this is not a depiction of Alderaan being obliterated by the Death Star in "Star Wars: A New Hope." This is Pyle's concept of a young star surrounded by a debris disk or gas and dust, the birthplace of new planets. When working on the concept for Kepler-186f, the first Earth-size planet in the habitable zone that could support liquid water on its surface, Pyle was careful to make it look less inviting than our own Earth, in case it was misconstrued as a friendly, habitable place. They made sure it was more muddy brown rather than green and blue. "Probably the most famous graphic I've done is a top-down view of what the Milky Way would look like if we could go outside our galaxy and look at it," Hurt said. "The irony is, we live inside it, you think we would know it better than anything, but it turns out that's not so true. It's like being dropped down in Times Square and being asked to draw a map of all of Manhattan." Pyle enjoyed working on this concept because he hadn't seen any examples of it before. It's an example of a brown dwarf with a strong weather system. Instead of liquid rain, the storms most likely consist of molten iron, sand or salts. Hurt's depiction of a supermassive black hole is another iconic image that has come to be closely associated with the term. It also depicts an outflowing jet of energetic particles, believed to be powered by the black hole's spin. A fan of the show "Babylon 5," Pyle enjoyed working on this depiction of the Epsilon Eridani star system, where the space station is located on the show. It is also the closest known planetary system to our own. "A star that's cool enough to have stormy planet-like clouds forming in its atmosphere," Pyle said. "I worked with an exoplanet theorist who helped refine the look of the cloud structure." Hurt offers another look at a young star surrounded by a dusty protoplanetary disk that contains the raw material to form planets as the star system matures. What would a storm of comets around a star look like? Hurt's illustration of Eta Corvi shows how comets are torn to shreds after colliding with a rocky body. Artists such as Tim Pyle and Robert Hurt create renderings of exoplanets and other things in the universe we may never be able to otherwise see. Their rendering of the TRAPPIST-1 star, an ultra-cool dwarf, shows the seven Earth-size planets that were discovered orbiting it. The design also shows where planets lie in the habitable zone around the planet. Ice around the outside of the image indicates it's too cold there for water to maintain liquid form, while steam close to the star shows its too hot. Sometimes, the reality of the data they're working with aligns with scenes from the "Star Wars" films, such as Pyle's rendering of the Kepler-16 binary star system that creates a double sunset like the one on Luke Skywalker's home world, Tatooine. "To me, planets around binary star systems will always be 'Tatooine' planets," Pyle said. This illustration was created to accompany a release revealing that mature planetary systems are more frequent around binary stars than single stars like our sun. Kamino is an ocean world in "Star Wars: Attack of the Clones." Kepler-22b is an exoplanet that could similarly be covered in a super ocean. Kepler-452b is an Earth-size planet that orbits a star similar to our sun. It's been compared with the planet Coruscant in the "Star Wars" films and has been called "Earth's older, bigger cousin." Hurt was inspired by the volcanic world Mustafar from "Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith" to create this illustration of the hot, rocky exoplanet called 55 Cancri e. It is his favorite illustration from the past year, a "lava-covered world with sheets of gas pouring off of it." Believe it or not, this is not a depiction of Alderaan being obliterated by the Death Star in "Star Wars: A New Hope." This is Pyle's concept of a young star surrounded by a debris disk or gas and dust, the birthplace of new planets. When working on the concept for Kepler-186f, the first Earth-size planet in the habitable zone that could support liquid water on its surface, Pyle was careful to make it look less inviting than our own Earth, in case it was misconstrued as a friendly, habitable place. They made sure it was more muddy brown rather than green and blue. "At end of day, we want a bullet list of two or three primary science points that we want someone who looks at the image to take in," Hurt said. "The artwork, by nature, has to fill in thousands of hypotheses of things we don't know, but as long as all of that is generated around framework of what we do know, that is a successful science illustration. The purpose I really want this artwork to serve is that when someone glances at this image, if they can come into the article already knowing what its about on some level, not only does it drive curiosity, but it promotes understanding. And it gives them the perfect position to be some of the first to learn about a scientific discovery. They have the joy of being able to the shape the way the story is told. Each day could bring a new discovery. They've gotten goosebumpy Affected by, or characteristic of, and teary-eyed learning about some of the first detections of things they never thought they'd see in their lifetimes.So what do they want to illustrate next? "A life-covered exoplanet would be awesome. And we're learning more about the origin and history of the universe. But mostly, I'm looking forward to what I don't know I'm looking forward to," Pyle said. logos = science =section internist內科醫生 internal內部的 intern實習生=apprentice學徒 internal bleeding external hard drive外接硬碟 gyne女人的 olog=science gynecologist婦科 obstetrix 產婆 obstetrician 產科醫生 ob/gyn ped=paidos=kid iatri=care cian=profesional person pediatrician 兒科醫生 gogy=agogos=lead pedagogy = teach way ped=pedis=foot biped= both foots expedition = 探險 derma = skin dermatologist=skin doctor epi=upon .over ;epicenter = earthquake center dem=people group epidermis 表皮 epidemic 疫情 itis =發炎inflammation dermatitis = skin sick hepatitis 肝炎inflammation of the liver ophthalmologist =eye doctor otho=make straight don=teeth orthodontist = teeth correct doctor cardiologist = heart doctor kardia= heart= cardi cardiogram = heartbeat chart gram =pic cardiac arrest =心臟縐停 heart attack = 心血管阻塞 do cardio exercise有氧運動 neurologist 神经学家 neuron =nerve 神经 neuritis =nflammation of a nerve got some nerve+ving A man and a woman who take friendship too far end up in bed together and mingle their bodily fluids.
摘自 WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE'S "THE WINTER'S TALE": A RETELLING IN PROSE 作者：DAVID BRUCE It was a cry that mingled fright with surprise. 那是一聲夾著恐懼與驚訝的喊叫。Near the bridge, the waters of the two streams mingled. 在橋的附近，兩條溪流的水匯合了。He rarely mingles with persons of his own rank in society. 他幾乎不與和他身分相同的人交往。 (h)onestly= pronounces without h. The h is silent (h)our Andjela V, 14:15 -She will not be able to attend. The woman has sprained her ankle. that's why she won't be able to perform her dance. skeptical= not to believe in something, to be unsure, or critical about something The teacher was skeptical about his story that he has met aliens. The teacher didn't believe that he met aliens. Andjela V, 14:27 1. YOUR CHOICE: In my opinion, the woman should follow her second suggestion and simply find a replacement dancer only for her role. 2. FIRST REASON: To begin with, by merely replacing her, all of the other dancers will not have to change roles. It is much more simple to replace just one person, than to make the whole group learn new steps. 3. DETAILS: This means that, except for one dancer, everyone will be dancing routines they are familiar with. Andjela V, 14:32 This means that other dancer can continue to follow their regular routines. 4. SECOND REASON: Second of all, perhaps the replacement dancer will not be as bad as the woman thinks she will. 5. DETAILS: If the replacement dancer studies hard, she may be able to learn all the steps. Andjela V, 14:47 The woman's problem is that she sprained her ankle but she has a dance performance soon, and she has the leading role in it. In my opinion, she should follow her second suggestion and simply find a replacement dancer only for her role. To begin with, by merely replacing her, all of the other dancers will not have to change roles. This means that, except for one dancer, everyone will be dancing routines they are familiar with. This means there will be fewer mistakes and less confusion. Second of all, perhaps the replacement dancer will not be as bad as the woman thinks she will. The replacement dancer will have three days to prepare for the show. So, If the replacement dancer studies hard, she may be able to learn all the steps. At worst, she'll do her best, and doing one's best is all you can ask of a person. No student of a foreign language needs to be told that grammar is complex. By changing word sequences and by adding a range of auxiliary verbs and suffixes, we are able to communicate tiny variations in meaning. We can turn a statement into a question, state whether an action has taken place or is soon to take place, and perform many other word tricks to convey subtle differences in meaning. Nor is this complexity inherent to the English language. All languages, even those of so-called 'primitive' tribes have clever grammatical components. The Cherokee pronoun system, for example, can distinguish between 'you and I', 'several other people and I' and 'you, another person and I'. In English, all these meanings are summed up in the one, crude pronoun 'we'. Grammar is universal and plays a part in every language, no matter how widespread it is. So the question which has baffled many linguists is - who created grammar? At first, it would appear that this question is impossible to answer. To find out how grammar is created, someone needs to be present at the time of a language's creation, documenting its emergence. Many historical linguists are able to trace modern complex languages back to earlier languages, but in order to answer the question of how complex languages are actually formed, the researcher needs to observe how languages are started from scratch. Amazingly, however, this is possible. Some of the most recent languages evolved due to the Atlantic slave trade. At that time, slaves from a number of different ethnicities were forced to work together under colonizer's rule. Since they had no opportunity to learn each other's languages, they developed a make-shift language called a pidgin. Pidgins are strings of words copied from the language of the landowner. They have little in the way of grammar, and in many cases it is difficult for a listener to deduce when an event happened, and who did what to whom. [A] Speakers need to use circumlocution in order to make their meaning understood. [B] Interestingly, however, all it takes for a pidgin to become a complex language is for a group of children to be exposed to it at the time when they learn their mother tongue. [C] Slave children did not simply copy the strings of words uttered by their elders, they adapted their words to create a new, expressive language. [D]Complex grammar systems which emerge from pidgins are termed creoles, and they are invented by children. Further evidence of this can be seen in studying sign languages for the deaf. Sign languages are not simply a series of gestures; they utilise the same grammatical machinery that is found in spoken languages. Moreover, there are many different languages used worldwide. The creation of one such language was documented quite recently in Nicaragua. Previously, all deaf people were isolated from each other, but in 1979 a new government introduced schools for the deaf. Although children were taught speech and lip reading in the classroom, in the playgrounds they began to invent their own sign system, using the gestures that they used at home. It was basically a pidgin. Each child used the signs differently, and there was no consistent grammar. However, children who joined the school later, when this inventive sign system was already around, developed a quite different sign language. Although it was based on the signs of the older children, the younger children's language was more fluid and compact, and it utilised a large range of grammatical devices to clarify meaning. What is more, all the children used the signs in the same way. A new creole was born. Some linguists believe that many of the world's most established languages were creoles at first. The English past tense –ed ending may have evolved from the verb 'do'. 'It ended' may once have been 'It end-did'. Therefore it would appear that even the most widespread languages were partly created by children. Children appear to have innate grammatical machinery in their brains, which springs to life when they are first trying to make sense of the world around them. Their minds can serve to create logical, complex structures, even when there is no grammar present for them to copy. 1 In paragraph 1, why does the writer include information about the Cherokee language?Correct! Correct A To show how simple, traditional cultures can have complicated grammar structures B To show how English grammar differs from Cherokee grammar C To prove that complex grammar structures were invented by the Cherokees. D To demonstrate how difficult it is to learn the Cherokee language 2 What can be inferred about the slaves' pidgin language?Correct! Correct A It contained complex grammar. B It was based on many different languages. C It was difficult to understand, even among slaves. D It was created by the land-owners. 3 All the following sentences about Nicaraguan sign language are true EXCEPT:Correct! Correct A The language has been created since 1979. B The language is based on speech and lip reading. C The language incorporates signs which children used at home. D The language was perfected by younger children. 4 In paragraph 3, where can the following sentence be placed? It included standardised word orders and grammatical markers that existed in neither the pidgin language, nor the language of the colonizers. A B C D 5 'From scratch' in paragraph 2 is closest in meaning to: A from the very beginning B in simple cultures C by copying something else D by using written information 6 'Make-shift' in paragraph 3 is closest in meaning to: A complicated and expressive B simple and temporary C extensive and diverse D private and personal 7 Which sentence is closest in meaning to the highlighted sentence? Grammar is universal and plays a part in every language, no matter how widespread it is. A All languages, whether they are spoken by a few people or a lot of people, contain grammar. B Some languages include a lot of grammar, whereas other languages contain a little. C Languages which contain a lot of grammar are more common that languages that contain a little. D The grammar of all languages is the same, no matter where the languages evolved. 8 All of the following are features of the new Nicaraguan sign language EXCEPT: A All children used the same gestures to show meaning. B The meaning was clearer than the previous sign language. C The hand movements were smoother and smaller. D New gestures were created for everyday objects and activities. 9 Which idea is presented in the final paragraph? A English was probably once a creole. B The English past tense system is inaccurate. C Linguists have proven that English was created by children. D Children say English past tenses differently from adults. 10 Look at the word 'consistent' in paragraph 4. This word could best be replaced by which of the following? A natural B predictable C imaginable D uniform |
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