2016年湖北学位英语考试阅读强化试题及答案一
Questions 1 to 5 are based on the following passage:
The agriculture revolution in the nineteenth century involved two things: the invention of labor-saving machinery and the development of scientific agriculture.Labor-saying machinery naturallyappeared first where labor was scarce. "In Europe", said Thomas Jefferson, "the object is to make the most of their land, labor being sufficient; here it is to make the most of our labor, land being abundant". It was in America, therefore, that the great advance in nineteenth-century agricultural machinery first came. At the opening of the century, with the exception of a crude(粗糙的) plow,farmers could have carried practically all of the existing, agricultural tools on their backs. By 1860,most of the machinery in use today had been designed in an early form. The most important of the early inventions was the iron plow. As early as 1860 Charles Newbolt of New Jersey had been working on the idea of a east-iron plow and spent his entire fortune in introducing his invention. The farmers, however, would home none of it, claiming that the iron poisoned the soil and make the weeds grow. Nevertheless, many people devoted their attention to the plow, until in 1869, James Oliver of south Bend, Indiana, turned out the first chilled-steel plow.
1. The word "here" (Line 5, Paragraph 1) refers to ( ).
A. Europe
B. America
C. New Jersey
D. Indiana
2. Which of the following statements is NOT true?
A. The need for labor helped the invention of machinery inAmerica
B. The farmer rejected Charles Newboh's plow for fear of ruin of their fields
C. Both Europe andAmerica had great need for farmer machinery
D. It was inIndiana that the first chilled-steel plow was produced
3. The passage is mainly about ( ).
A. the agriculture revolution
B. the invention of labor-saving machinery
C. the development of scientific agriculture
D. the farming machinery inAmerica
4. At the opening of the nineteenth century, farmers inAmerica ( ).
A. preferred light tools
B. were extremely self-reliant(自给的)
C. had many tools
D. had very few tools
5. It is implied but not stated in the passage that ( ) o
A. there was a shortage of workers on American farms
B. the most important of the early invention was the iron plow
C. after 1869, many people devoted their attention to the plow
D. Charles Newbolt had made a fortune by his cast-iron plow