Two old beggars (乞丐) were sitting on a busy street corner of a big city. They watched _______ as a lot of people walked by without looking at them. Sometimes, a kind-hearted woman or a small child would _______ a few coins in the hats in front of them.

Today was not a _______ day for begging. The men were able to _______ enough for a big meal. As it was getting dark, they started to _______ their things.

Just as they were getting ready to leave, they _______ a man walking toward them. He was a _______ man. They could tell that from his fine clothes. The first beggar said to the second with _______, “He’s coming our way!” The man stopped, _______ into his pocket and took something out. What looked like a piece of hard ________, wrapped (包裹) in white paper, hit each of their waiting hats. The rich man turned and ________ his way.

“He could have easily left us a few ________ or a bill, but he laughed at us with a piece of rock candy,” said the first beggar. He looked at the offering ________. “There’s no way we can ________ this — we have no teeth.” With these words, he picked up the thing and threw it away. Then he collected his things and ________ .

The second beggar wanted to do the same, ________ a second thought made him change his ________.“I haven’t had anything like this for ages,” he thought. “How ________ of that man to offer me something so sweet!” With that, he opened the white paper. To his ________, there was no hard rock candy inside. ________, a shiny white pearl (珍珠) worth thousands of dollars fell into his hand.

   It was Thanksgiving morning. I was busy preparing the traditional Thanksgiving turkey when the doorbell rang. I opened the front door and saw two small children in rags（衣衫褴褛）on the top step.

"Any old papers，lady？" asked one of them.

I was busy. I wanted to say "no" until I looked down at their feet. They were wearing thin little sandals（凉鞋），wet with heavy snow.

"Come in and I'll make you a cup of hot coffee."

They walked in and sat down at the table. Their wet sandals left marks on the floor. I served them coffee and bread to fight against the cold outside. Then I went back to the kitchen and started cooking.

The silence in the front room struck me. I looked in. The girl held the empty cup in her hands，looking at it. The boy asked in a flat voice，"Lady，are you rich？"

"Am I rich？Pity，no！"

I looked at my worn-out slipcovers（家具套）.The girl put her cup back in its saucer（茶碟）carefully and said，"Your cups match your saucers." They left after that，holding their papers against the wind. They had reminded me that I had so much for which to be grateful.

Plain blue china cups and saucers were only worth five pence. But they matched.

I tasted the potatoes and stirred（搅动）the meat soup. Potatoes and brown meat soup，a roof over our heads，my man with a regular job，these matched，too.

I moved the chairs back from the fire and cleaned the living room. The muddy marks of the little sandals were still wet on my floor. Let them be for a while，I thought，just in case I should begin to forget how rich I was.

Once a traveler came into a village, 【小题1】（hunger）. The villagers tried to stop the traveler from staying, 【小题2】（fear）he wanted them to give him food. They told him that there's no food anywhere 【小题3】（find）. The traveler gave an 【小题4】（explain）that he didn't need any food and that, 【小题5】 fact, he was planning to make a soup to share with all of them. The villagers watched 【小题6】（strange）as he built a fire and filled a large pot with water. Then he pulled a stone from a bag, dropping the stone into the pot. He tasted the soup and said 【小题7】delicious the stone soup was. As the villagers began to show interest, he said how good the soup 【小题8】（be）with just a little cabbage in it. A villager brought out a cabbage to share. This event repeated 【小题9】（it）until the soup had cabbage, carrots and onions-indeed, a large soup that fed everyone in the village.

Are you like one of the villagers, holding back？If you come forward and share your gifts, you will encourage others to do the same. The reward is 【小题10】 gift that can benefit（使受益）many.

   Steve and Mark were good friends. They decided to spend their vacation in Haiti. Since they _____ no French, they took a French wordbook with them and hoped it would help them in difficult situations.

The flight was _____ , and the hotel was very comfortable. Each day after breakfast, Steve and Mark_____a picnic lunch and dinner and went off to visit _____ of interest. After a while, the boys became tired of eating picnic meals and decided to eat a big fish dinner in a good restaurant. Unfortunately, they _____ their wordbook in the hotel.

They _____ the menu carefully. After ten minutes, Steve said to Mark, “ I don’t understand this menu.” “Neither do I,” said Mark. “I see poison on this menu. Are they _____ here?” “Maybe. They even spelled poison _____ They spelled it p-o-i-s-s-o-n instead of p-o-i-s-o-n. But it must mean the same thing. Maybe we should go to _____ restaurant. Because I don’t ______ to eat something that will kill me. “ But Mark was ______ So he said, “There is no other restaurant near here, and I’m tired of walking around the city. Let’s order something else instead. It’s _____ here, so the food must be good.”

The boys looked at the menu again. They finally decided to order steak,______ they really wanted fish. The boys just pointed to the word steak, and the waiter ______.

As they were eating they ______ some tourists speaking English. “ This ______ is delicious.”

“We’re lucky we picked a restaurant that’s famous for its fish”.

Steve and Mark wondered about what they ______ . “Famous for its fish? There was no fish on the ______ !” said Mark.

Finally, Steve decided to find out what all this was about. “ Excuse me, how did you order fish when it wasn’t on the menu?” “ Sure it’s on the menu. It’s right here. Poisson.” Steve shouted, “ Poisson. That’s poison ! We were ______ why a restaurant like this could have poison on the menu.”

The tourists ______ One of them said, “ No. Poisson is French for fish.”