【正文】 new di ctionary. Muray had never been to col lege. At the age of fourten, he l eft his vil age schol in Scotl and and taught himsel f whil e worki ng in a bank. Later he becam e a great teacher. After O xford gave him the job, Murray had a pl ace built i n the garden behi nd hi s house to do hi s work. Part of it was one m eter underground. In wi nter i t fel t l i ke a barn, he had to wear a heavy coat and put his fet in a box to kep warm. Every morning, Muray got out of bed at five o’clock and worked several hours before breakfast. O ften he woul d work by the candl e li ght into the eveni ng. Muray hoped to fi ni sh the new di cti onary i n ten years. But after fi ve years, he was stil l addi ng words for the l etter A! then others went to work wi th Murray, i ncl udi ng hi s two daughters. He worked on the di cti onary until he was very old. Fortyfour years l ater, i n1928, other edi tors fi nished i t. It incl uded m ore than 15, 000 pages i n twel ve books. And you thought your di ctionary was bi g! Unit 3 JOURNEY DOWN THE M EKO NG PART 1 THE DREAM AND THE PLAN My nam e is Wang Kun. Ever si nce m i dl e schol, my sister Wang Wei and I have dream ed about taki ng a great bi ke trip. Two years ago she bought an expensive mountai n bike and then she persuaded me to buy one. Last year, she vi si ted our cousi ns, Dao Wei and Yu H ang at their col ege i n Kunm ing. They are Dai and grew up i n western Yunan Provi nce near the Lancang Ri ver, the Chi nese part of the river that is cal led the Mekong Ri ver i n other countri es. Wang Wei son got them interested in cycl ing to. After graduati ng from col lege. we fi nal y got the chance to take a bi ke trip. I asked m y si ster, Where are we goi ng? It was my sister who first had the i dea to cycl e al ong the entire Mekong River from where i t begins to where it ends. N ow she i s pl aning our schedule for the tri p. I am fond of m y si ster but she has one seri ous short ing. She can be real ly stubborn. Al though she didn39。t。 it also had wi de streets with trees in rows and old French houses. Unli ke Vienti ane, ships coul d travel the Mekong Ri ver the center of the ci ty we visited the palace and a beautiful white elephant. It can only be seen outsi de the pal ace on speci al days. We ate an early super and went to see a great temple wi th fl ors m ade of sl iver. The next morni ng our group sl ept l ate. We were very tired from the long bi ke ri de the day before. Cycli ng i n the hi l s had been di fcui lt. Now our coui ns had the chance to make jokes about Wangwei and m e. Perhaps, they sai d, they were the strong ones!We had l unch at a nice outdoor cafe,then rode out of the ci ty. Two days later we crossed the border into Vietnam. We began to see many more people,but I wasn’t surprised . I read in an atlas before our tri p that Vietnam has al most seven times the popul ation of Cambodia. We met a farmer who gave us directi ons and told us that he grows a new rice crop four times every year so he can fed more also tol d us that the northern part of his country has many mountains and it is much coler than here in the south,where it is fl though the fl at delta made it easi er for us to cycl e. we got warm very qui we drank l ots of water and ate lots of bananas. Son the del ta separated into ni ne smal er ri vers. Two days later,after we had passed thousands of ri ce fiel ds,we came to the sea. We were tired but also in high spirits: our dream to cycle al ong the Mekong River had finaly e true. Unit 4 A NIGHT THE EARTH DID’T SLEEP Strange thi ngs were happening i n the countri si de of northest there days the water i n the vil lage wel ls rose and fel l, rose and fel .Farmers noti ced that the wel wal ls had dep cracks in them. A smel y gas cam e out of the cracks. In the farmeryards, the chickens and even the pigs were too nervous to ce ran out of the fi el ds looking for pl aces to hi de. fi sh jumped out of their bowls and about 3: 0am on July 28,1976, some people saw bri ght l ights i n the sky. The sound of the pl anes could be heard outside the city, who thought li tle of these events,were asl ep as usual that night. At3:42 am everythi ng began to seemed as i f the world was at an end!Eleven kil om etres directl y bel ow the city the greast earthquake of 20th century had begun. It was fel t in Bei ji ng, whi ch i s m ore thantwo hundred ki l om etres h l ive i n the mountai ns of the eastern USA speak wi th an older ki nd of Engli sh di al ect. When Ameri cans moved from one pl ace to another, they took their di al ects wi th them . So peopl e from the m ountai ns i n the southeastern USA speak with almost the sam e di al ects as peopl e i n the northwestern USA. The USA i s a l arge country in which many di fferent dialects are spoken. Although many Americans move a lot, they stil recognize and understand each other’s dialects. TH E O XFO RD EN GLISH DICTION ARY You m ay think that Engl ish di cti onari es have been used for m any, m any centuri es. The spel li ng of Engl ish has al ways been a probl em but i t was m ore of a probl em i n the days before a dicti onary. Then peopl e coul d spel l word i n di fferent ways which you m ight fi nd i t interesting. But it m ade reading Engli sh m uch m ore diffi cul t. So dicti onari es were i nvented to encourage everybody to spell the same. In fact, an English dictionary like the kind you use today wasn’t made until the time of the late Qing Dynasty. There men did most of the important earl y work on dicti onari es: Sam uel Johnson, N oah Webster, and Jam es Muray. These men spent nearly all of their lives trying to collect words for their dictionaries. For them, it wasn’t only a job。 m y si ster doesn39。l ive i n the mountai ns of the eastern USA speak wi th an older ki nd of Engl ish dial ect. When Ameri cans m oved from one place to another, they took thei r dialects wi th them. So peopl e from