上海外语教育出版社——新世纪英语高二全部课文
（包括Additional Reading）及重点词组
高二第二学期
17. Words and their stories
EAGER BEAVER An eager beaver is a person who is always willing to do and is excited about doing what is expected of him.
Suppose, for example, that a teacher tells his students they each must solve one hundred math problems before coming to school the next day. The children complain about so much homework. But one student does not protest at all. That student is an eager beaver. He loves to do math problems, and does not mind all the homework.
The expression is said to have come from the name of a hard-working animal---the beaver.
Beavers are strange-looking creatures. They spend a lot of time in the water, building dams to create little lakes or ponds. They use their huge teeth and work hard to cut down trees, remove branches and put them across streams. They use their tails to pack mud on the branches to make the dams solid. Few other animals work so hard.
Historians say the beaver had an important part in the settlement of North America.
There were hundreds of millions of beavers when European settlers first arrived. The settlers put great value on the fur of beavers. In fact, for two hundred years or more, beavers provided the most valuable fur in North America. Beaver skins often used as money.
Young men looking for adventure headed west across the country to search for beavers. In their search, they explored much of the western territories. The trading posts, where they exchanged beaver skins for the goods they needed, became villages, and later towns and cities.
IT’S IN THE BAG The bag---one of the simplest and most useful things in every man or woman’s life---has given the world many strange expressions that are not very simple. A number of these expressions are widely used in the United States today. Some were imported from England a long time ago.
When you are sure of something, you can say, “It’s in the bag.”
This phrase seemed to have arrived with the modern paper bag. Before, Americans used to say, “It’s all wrapped up.”Then, things you bought were wrapped in plain brown paper, or sometimes in old newspaper.
Another widely used expressions is “to let the cat out of the bag”, meaning to reveal a well-kept secret.
No one can explain how the cat got into the bag, or why it remained there. But there is an old story about it. Long ago tradesman sold things in large cloth bags. Once a woman asked for a
pig. The tradesman held up his cloth bag. Inside there was supposed to be a live pig. The woman asked to see it. When the dishonest tradesman opened the bag, out jumped a squealing cat, not a pig. The tradesman’s secret was out: he was tricky, and now everybody knew it.
18. English proverbs
Characters
Teacher of English: Ms Smith (MS)
Students: Li (LI), Mao (MA), Anne (AN), Rivera (RI)
MS: Good morning, everyone. I hope you all know what we are here for. The topic of our discussion this morning is “English Proverbs”.
LI: So, I’m in the right group.
MA: Me, too.
RI: Me, too.
MS: But I was told we would have four…and yet…
AN: I’m coming. Good morning. Am I late?
MS: Morning. “Speak of angels and you hear their songs.”
AN: Is that a proverb referring to my coming?
MS: Exactly.
LI: We have a saying in Chinese, which I think is very close in meaning…
MA: Speak of Cao Cao and he appears.
MS: Right. Well, “first things first”. A proverb is a traditional saying which offers advice or presents a moral in a short and brief manner. A proverb normally is a sentence, into which the writer often works rhyme. For instance, “East or west, home is best.” Sometimes it comes out in the form of a phrase.
MA: I’ve seen dictionaries of proverbs.
MS: Well, there are thousands of proverbs. They fall into three main categories. Those of the first type take the form of abstract statements. They express general truths. Here are two good examples: “One is never too old to learn.” and “A man who neglects his studies in youth will regret it in later years.”
RI: I think there is some truth in both proverbs. To encourage a person who has had little education for some reason as a young man, we may use the former. With us, I guess the latter works.
MS: So you have to keep this in mind. Never use proverbs out of context. “One man’s meat is another man’s poison.”
LI: I see. Then, what is the second type?
MS: The second type uses specific observations from everyday experience to make a general point.
AN: “Don’t put all your eggs in one basket.”Does it fall into the second category?
MS: You’re right, dear. Then the third type consists of sayings from particular areas of traditional customs and beliefs. “After dinner,
