The Great Fire of London in September 1666 was one of the most famous incidents in the history of Great Britain. It was the second tragedy to hit London during one year. Just as London was recovering from the Great Plague, the citizens had to run away again – but now not because of a new disease, but because of a terrible fire.
The fire started on the night of September 2, 1666, in Pudding Lane, in a baker’s shop. The shop was owned by Thomas Farriner, the king’s baker. His maid didn’t put out the ovens at the end of the night. Soon the wooden home of Farriner was on fire. Farriner’s family left the house in panic and ran away. Thomas Farriner didn’t raise the alarm, though at that time it was possible to stop the fire.
The maid tried to climb out of the building too but failed. She was one of the few victims of the fire. Once it started, the fire spread quickly. London was basically made out of wood and after the hot summer, the city was very dry. Strong winds fanned the flames.
Besides, in the 17th century the city buildings were built close to each other and the fire spread with terrifying speed. Londoners tried to stop the fire, but their buckets of water could do nothing against such a terrible disaster. Unfortunately the Lord Mayor did not take any measures to stop the fire and the fire spread further.
After four days while helpless citizens were watching the destruction of their homes, the wind died and the fire was stopped. Then the accounting took place. Fully 80% of the city was destroyed including the spiritual centre of the city, Old St Paul's Cathedral. Surprisingly, very few people were killed.
Well, one person's disaster is another person's opportunity. Within days of the fire's end, an architect, Christopher Wren, proposed his plan to Charles II: it was a plan for the complete rebuilding of the city. Wren suggested making wide streets in the centre of London to open the city to light and air.
Charles II realized that Wren’s plan was very expensive and it would be difficult to put it into practice. Instead, Charles II offered that Wren rebuild the city's churches, including London’s main church – St Paul's Cathedral. Christopher Wren was completing this task for the next fifty years.
Christopher Wren also was responsible for building the London Monument, a memorial commemorating the fire. The Monument is a column with a height of 202 feet, which is the exact distance from the monument to the place where the fire began.
The original plans for the Monument provided a statue of Charles II on top, but Charles objected to the honour. He was afraid that the people of London would then associate him with the disaster. Wren replaced the statue with a simple bowl with flames. Nowadays the Monument is open for visitors all year round. Anyone can climb the 311 steps to the top of the Monument and enjoy a wonderful view of the city.
Начало формы
| |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| The king’s baker immediately warned the neighbours about the fire. | |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| The Lord Mayor ordered to destroy lots of buildings to stop the fire. | |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| Wren’s plan of London’s rebuilding was approved by the king. | |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| Christopher Wren agreed to create a monument to remind people about the Great Fire. | |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| There is a statue of King Charles II on top of the monument. | |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| Tourists can go up to the top of the London Monument. | |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| The London Monument is the only one in the capital dedicated to the Great Fire. | |||||||||
|
# 46 (BD2D24)
The Owl
Joan Harrison was walking along the street. She was shy and always felt lonely and upset. Joan worked as a secretary in an office in the city centre. It was lunch time and she went out to get some air. She was looking absently at the shop-windows when she saw a brown wooden owl in one of them. Suddenly Joan stopped. Joan was totally indifferent to birds and she had never understood people who collected useless statues. But for some reason she could not take her eyes off the owl. The wooden owl drew Joan to itself.
Joan decided to buy the owl. She earned a little, just to pay for her room and food. She couldn’t afford new clothes. Even a ticket to the cinema was a heavy expense for her. But this time Joan was sure that she had to buy the wooden owl.
Joan opened the door of the shop. She asked the shop assistant about the price of the wooden owl. It was fifty pounds. Joan understood that it was sheer madness to buy such an expensive wooden bird. But she did it without any hesitation.
Joan left ten pounds in advance and promised to bring the rest of the money in the evening. After work she ran home, took all her savings and rushed back to the shop in excitement. Joan brought the wooden owl home and put it onto the table. Joan smiled and touched the owl’s head. Suddenly, she felt happy and self-confident.
The next morning she left her house in a very good mood. Now, having the owl at home, Joan made it a habit to say good-bye and touch the owl’s head before leaving. Amazingly, after this simple gesture she was cheerful and energetic the whole day. One morning, when patting the owl on the head, Joan remembered her wish to join the evening pottery class at college. She had often thought about it but always changed her mind at the last moment. Now she decided to fulfill her wish.
At the pottery class Joan achieved considerable results. Her teacher said she had a unique style. Nobody knew that she worked hard at home. Under the owl’s observation Joan experimented with forms and colours. Once she took part in the students’ show at the college, and the Art Museum asked her to sell her works for two thousand pounds. The sum covered all her debts and she could afford to buy a new dress and shoes and even more.
The next step was the annual National Art Festival, at which a secretary, Joan Harrison, presented her personal exhibition. Her fame and income were growing. Joan left her office and became a potter. A year later she and the art director of the museum were happily married. They moved to a large country house and now Joan had her own pottery.
Joan took the lucky owl with her. It took its honorary place in the large living room. In her last years she often remembered the shop where she had bought the owl, her evening classes and her first steps in pottery. Joan was so proud of the owl that each piece of her pottery had a picture of the owl on it. Lots of famous artists and important people visited Joan and her husband, but Joan never gave her owl to anybody until her dying day.
Начало формы
| |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| Joan had a well-paid job. | |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| The shop assistant showed Joan several wooden owls. | |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| The wooden owl improved Joan’s mood. | |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| Joan joined the pottery class because of her friends’ advice. | |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| Joan successfully participated in Art exhibitions. | |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| There was an image of the owl on every Joan’s works. | |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| The wooden owl disappeared after Joan’s death. | |||||||||
|
# 47 (200A06)
Sports in Great Britain
It is interesting how many of today’s sports games originated in Britain – football, rugby, tennis, boxing, rowing and horse racing among them. Of course, horse racing was popular with the Greeks and Arabs long before the British began to put them into practice; and people had been playing football in one form or another for thousands of years all over the world. But it was the British who created special rules for these sports and sports games.
Football is a good example. In the Middle Ages people in Europe, Japan and Asia all played some forms of the game. A sort of football was also very popular in England, especially as a contest between villages. But at that time there were very few rules. When the students of English schools started to play football, rules then became necessary. They were changed several times and by the middle of the 19th century football had become very much the game that we know and like today. By the way, the first serious football rules were written at Cambridge University.
A similar story can be told about some other sports. Why did this happen in Britain before other countries? There are some possible explanations: after the Norman invasion of 1066, Britain was quite a peaceful country. As a result people had time to develop sports. Later, after Britain’s industrial revolution, English factories were based on highly organized work and strict time keeping. The same discipline was applied to sport. So uniforms, referees and punishments were introduced to football and other games. British authorities thought that team games were good training for future military and industrial careers.
Every country has its own list of favourite sports. What is the British list? There are lots of games apart from football. Schoolgirls, for example, play a game which seems a lot like basketball. It is called netball. Netball is different from basketball in many details: for example, the ball is lighter, the court is bigger and netball has seven players in each team (not five). There is something very strange about netball – it is never played by boys. There is no biological reason for this, it is simply a tradition. It is popular throughout the English-speaking world, and the Australians and New Zealanders usually win the competitions.
But the most famous and popular British sport is cricket. Cricket is an important part of English summer life. You can watch it all day on TV or even listen to it on the radio. News programmes keep you up-to-date with the score. Men, when they meet, always exchange a few words about the state of the game.
One of cricket’s distinguishing features is that the games are very long. In an ordinary game at a boys’ school it takes up to a whole afternoon. But the big international games are up to five days long.
Начало формы
| |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| The rules for modern football were created in Great Britan. | |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| All the students had to play football and other team games at British schools. | |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| Basketball and netball are the same game under different names. | |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| Netball was invented in a British boarding school for girls. | |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| Teams from Great Britain always win the international netball competitions. | |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| The British mass media pay lots of attention to cricket. | |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| According to the rules, a game of cricket lasts no longer than an hour and a half. | |||||||||
|
# 48 (AC795C)
The White House
For more than 200 years, the White House has been known as the symbol of the President's administration, and of the United States.
The history of the White House began when President George Washington signed an Act of Congress in December of 1790 which declared that the federal government would live in a district "not exceeding ten miles square on the river Potomac." The creation of the new American capital began. Later it was named Washington after the first American President.
George Washington, together with the city planner Pierre L'Enfant, chose the place for the new president’s home. A competition was held to find an architect to design the President's House. Nine proposals were handed in, and architect James Hoban won the competition. He proposed to build an impressive three-storey house.
The construction began in October of 1792. Although President Washington watched over the construction of the house, he never lived in it. Originally the White House was grey and was called the Presidential Palace. In 1800, when it was nearly completed, its first residents, President John Adams and his wife moved in. Ever since, each President of the United States has lived in this residence.
The Presidential Palace was seriously damaged in the great fire of 1814. The British invaded Washington and burned many buildings. After the war James Hoban, the original architect, partially rebuilt the President’s home. To cover the marks of the fire, the building was painted white. At various times in history, the building has been known as the President's Palace, the President's House, and the Executive Mansion. President Theodore Roosevelt officially gave it the name of the White House in 1901.
The White House is the president's private home and each president has made his own changes and additions in it. At first the president's office was located in the living area, on the second floor of the White House. When Theodore Roosevelt brought his large family to the White House in 1901, he felt that his office and his home should be completely separated. Two wings were added to the first floor of the building: the East Wing and the West Wing. The President's Office was moved into the West Wing and was called the Oval Office.
In 1805 President Thomas Jefferson opened the house for public tours. However, since September 11, 2001 the public tours have been prohibited.
There are 132 rooms in the residence now. For recreation, the White House has a variety of facilities available to its residents, including a tennis court, a jogging track, a swimming pool, a movie theatre, and a bowling alley.
The garden around the White House was first planted by John Adams, the first resident of the White house. Later it was redesigned by many presidents and their first ladies. The part of the garden outside the Oval Office is used now as a place for official ceremonies.
Начало формы
| |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| The President’s House was built according to George Washington’s design. | |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| George Washington was the first resident of the new President’s Palace. | |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| The White House had several names during its history. | |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| President Theodore Roosevelt enlarged the territory of the White House. | |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| Nowadays the White House is open for tourists on week days. | |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| The White House offers different sport facilities to its residents. | |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| The garden of the White House presents a rich collection of exotic plants. | |||||||||
|
# 49 (ECF99C)
Potatoes
The potato comes from the high and cool areas of the Andes of Peru. It began to be grown as food more than 7,000 years ago. When Europeans came to South America, they took the potato back to Europe.
In 1589, Sir Walter Raleigh, an English explorer and historian known for his expeditions to the Americas, first brought the potato to Ireland and planted the new vegetable there. In spite of the fact that the potatoes grew very well in the poor soil of Ireland, it took nearly 200 years for them to become a widely grown crop in Ireland and Great Britain. People didn’t like its unusual appearance and originally bitter taste. Besides, the potato was not mentioned in the Bible and it was often associated with the devil.
According to legend, Sir Walter Raleigh presented potato plants to Queen Elizabeth I. A special royal potato dinner was made and the noble men were invited to taste the new American vegetable. But the royal cooks didn’t know how to cook potatoes: they cut off and threw away the ugly-looking tubers and brought to the royal table a dish of boiled leaves (which are very poisonous). Most of the guests died after that royal dinner and potatoes were forbidden for many years.
Only two hundred years later farmers in Great Britain and Ireland began growing potatoes. Soon the rest of Europe started to follow Britain. The only country which did not accept potatoes was France. To overcome the negative attitude of the French people towards the new vegetable, King Louis XVI started to wear a potato flower as a decoration. He tried to make the people understand the benefit of potatoes as food. Even after the French king had given an order to his citizens to grow potatoes, they still were against the unfamiliar vegetable. The farmers refused to eat potatoes because of its unusual smell and taste. Then King Louis XVI decided to trick his people. In order to show the value of the potato, the king ordered to have it planted in a royal field and put guards to watch over the field. When the local farmers saw the guards at the royal field, they decided that the thing so carefully guarded must be valuable. One day, the guards were allowed to go off duty. The local farmers went into the field, dug out some potatoes and planted them in their fields. The king’s plan was a success. From this small start, the habit of growing and eating potatoes spread all over the country.
As Europeans began to grow potatoes, they realized the advantages of the new vegetable. The potato harvest was enough to feed their own families and to sell some to the citizens of towns and cities. The new food stimulated the development of cities and industries. Besides, the health of the people improved as they included potatoes in their diets. Now the potato is grown and enjoyed everywhere.
Начало формы
| |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| The British people liked potatoes at once. | |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| The potato dish for the royal dinner was prepared in a wrong way. | |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| King Louis XVI supported the idea of growing potatoes for food. | |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| It was necessary to wear potato flowers for royal ceremonies in France. | |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| French farmers stole some potatoes from the King’s field. | |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| The potato helped the development of the European countries. | |||||||||
|
Конец формы
Начало формы
| Nowadays the potato is the most popular vegetable in Europe. | |||||||||
|
# 50 (24A1A5)