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  3. Most West African lorries are not in what one would call the first flush of youth, and I had learnt by bitter experience not to

Most West African lorries are not in what one would call the first flush of youth, and I had learnt by bitter experience not to

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问题     Most West African lorries are not in what one would call the first flush of youth, and I had learnt by bitter experience not to expect anything very much of them. But the lorry that arrived to take me up to the mountains was worse than anything I had seen before: it tottered on the borders of senile decay. It stood there on buckled wheels, wheezing and gasping with exhaustion from having to climb up the gentle slope to the camp, and I consigned myself and my loads to it with some fear. The driver, who was a cheerful fellow, pointed out that he would require my assistance in two very necessary operations: first, I had to keep the hand brake pressed down when travelling downhill, for unless it was held thus almost level with the floor it sullenly refused to function. Secondly, I had to keep a stern eye on the clutch, a willful piece of mechanism that seized every chance to leap out of its socket with a noise like a strangling leopard. As it was obvious that not even a West African lorry-driver could be successful in driving while crouched under the dashboard, I had to take over control of those instruments if I valued my life. So, while I ducked at intervals to put on the brake, amid the rich smell of burning rubber, our noble lorry jerked its way towards the mountains at a steady twenty miles per hour: sometimes, when a downward slope favoured it, it threw caution to the winds and careered(猛冲)along in a reckless fashion at twenty-five.
    For the first thirty miles the red earth road wound its way through the lowland forest, the giant trees standing in solid ranks alongside and their branches entwined(盘绕)in an archway of leaves above us. Slowly and almost imperceptibly the road.started to climb upwards, looping its way in languid curves round the forested hills. In the back of the lorry the boys lifted up their voices in song:
    Home again, home again,
    When shall I see ma home?
    The driver hummed the refrain(副歌)softly to himself glancing at me to see if I would object. To his surprise I joined in and so while the lorry rolled onwards, the boys in the back maintained the chorus while the driver and I harmonized and sang complicated bits.
    Breaks in the forest became more frequent the higher we climbed, and presently a new type of undergrowth began to appear: massive tree-ferns standing at the roadside on their thick, squat, hairy trunks. These ferns were the guardians of a new world, for suddenly, as though the hills had shrugged themselves free of a cloak, the forest disappeared. It lay behind us in the valley, while above us the hillside rose majestically, covered in a coat of waist-high grass. The lorry crept higher and higher, the engine gasping and shuddering with this unaccustomed activity. I began to think that we should have to push the wretched thing up the last two or three hundred feet, but to everyone’s surprise we made it, and the lorry crept on to the brow of the hill, trembling with fatigue, spouting steam from its radiator like a dying whale. We crawled to a standstill and the driver switched off the engine.
    " We must wait small-time, engine get hot," he explained, pointing to the forequarters of the lorry, which were by now completely invisible under a cloud of steam. Thankfully I descended from the red-hot inside of the cab and strolled down to where the road dipped into the next valley. From this vantage point I could see the country we had travelled through and the country we were to enter.
That it tottered on the borders of senile decay means that the lorry was______.
选项 A、about to break down
B、a very old vehicle
C、unable to travel the distance
D、a dangerous vehicle
答案B
解析 语义理解题。根据题干关键信息it tottered on the borders of senile decay定位到文章首段第二句，从定位句可以看出，tottered是指“步履蹒跚”，senile是指“高龄的，年迈的，老衰的”，decay可指“(健康、体力)衰退的，衰弱的”，由此可知，这句话形容的是这辆车非常老旧。如果对这几个词的词义不清楚，可从文中的描述进一步分析，第一段第三句中提到，弯曲变形的车轮支撑着它，爬上缓坡开往营地的路程让它气喘吁吁，精疲力竭。上个坡都气喘吁吁，这与对老年人体力的描述类似，而且下文司机还要求作者帮忙按住手刹，否则它会一声不响地罢工。这些都说明这辆车极度老旧，因此[B]为正确答案。文中这句话只是描述了车的老旧，并未说它会抛锚，[A]属于过度推断，故排除；后文证实，作者最后靠着这辆车到达了山顶，[C]与文章事实不符，故排除；文中作者确实提到了“危险”，但指的是如果自己不帮司机忙的话，乘车会很危险，所以[D]陈述错误，故排除。
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