A total of 17 paintings worth between 10 and 15 million euros were stolen at a museum in northern Italy, local officials said on Friday.

Three armed men with masked faces broke into the Castelvecchio Museum in Verona on Thursday night, a local newspaper reported. Located inside a castle which was built in 1354 ,the Castelvecchio Museum is one of the most important museums in the northern city.

The stolen paintings included masterworks from Andrea Mantegna, Jacopo Tintoretto, Peter Paul Rubens, Jacopo Bellini, Hans de Jode and other world-famous artists. The group controlled the only private security guard who was there and the cashier, and then forced the guard to accompany them to the rooms where they stole the paintings.

Verona Mayor Flavio Tosi, who stayed at the scene until late in the night, said that surely someone sent them, because they acted professionally, and knew what they were looking for. The paintings stolen, he added, basically  were the most valuable works on display. An investigation was opened into the theft.

The museum displays a very important collection of Italian and European art in 29 rooms including early Christian finds, Lombard gold work, sculptures from the 10th to the 14th century, medieval arms  and armor, and paintings from the 14th to the 18th century.

The museumi's director, Paola Marini, called herself shocked by the theft. The experienced art historian, who is about to leave her post after over 20years, was receiving an award in a nearby restaurant when she was informed of what had happened.

The theft came just a day after two stolen paintings recently recovered by Italian heritage police were displayed in Rome during a ceremony attended by President Sergio Mattarella and Culture Minister Dario Franceschini.

   54-year- old Abdul has a special job. He has been working as a living statue (活雕像) for over three decades, standing perfectly still for six hours a day and resisting people’s attempts to make him move or smile, anything that proves he is a living person.

Abdul, known as “India’s Statue Man”, has been performing his daily routine ever since 1985, soon after getting a job as a security guard. His boss had ever traveled to the UK, where he was so impressed by the statue-like members of the Royal Guard outside Buckingham Palace that he wanted to do something similar back home. So he had his guards receive three months of training, where they would sit perfectly still for around four hours. They weren’t allowed to talk, smile, eat, drink, or even shoo away a fly if it sat on their faces. In the end, Abdul proved the best of the group, so he got the strange job.

Abdul isn’t the only person in the world acting as a living statue, but what makes him special is the fact that he can do it for as long as six hours without even blinking his eyes. Once, a $155 prize was put up for anyone who can make him move a muscle. But try as they might, no one had ever succeeded. Actually, Abdul tries to move about as much as he can in his spare time, and only eats healthy home-cooked food to keep his body in shape. But he claims yoga has been the biggest help. In the 12 years, Abdul has become a celebrity in India and other Asian countries. Many Bollywood celebrities have come to witness this living statue and try to make him move, but none have succeeded finally.

Abdul earns about 10,000 rupees ($156) a month, which is enough to support his family, but definitely not enough to encourage his children to follow in his footsteps. It’s just too stressful and taxing (费力的) on the body. “Despite all the hardship and health problems, I love my job and I am thankful to people for the love and respect they have showered on me,” he says. “When the time comes, I want to die playing a statue.”

   The 30 miles of steep（陡峭的）roads that snake through the mountains of Logan Canyon in Utah are enough to make most drivers' hands sweat. But Andersen, a 46-year-old father of four, wasn't expecting any trouble on the road last New Year's Eve, when he set off for a ski trip to the Bear River Mountains with nine-year-old daughter Mia, four-year-old son Baylor, and nine-year-old neighbour Kenya. Andersen had driven through the Logan Canyon hundreds of times over the years.

The weather was fine-but the higher they drove, the more slippery the roads became. Rounding a sharp U-turn at mile marker 473, Andersen saw a truck that had skated off the road and immediately tapped his brakes. In an instant, the car was sliding at 25 miles per hour towards the shoulder of the highway, then rolling down a steep ten-foot dam towards the extremely cold Logan River. As it hit the water, the car tipped towards the passenger side, hesitated, and then rolled onto its roof and sank into the river.

There was no time to tell the kids what to do. The crash had broken a few windows, and within seconds, the upside-down car was filled with water. "It was frightening how fast we were completely underwater, "remembers Andersen, a soft-spoken product development manager. "You're thinking, is this how it's all going to end？"

Having lost the sense of direction, Andersen began to search the freezing water for the kids. Miahad been right next to him in the front seat；now, in the blackness, he couldn't find her. "I thought, if I didn't get out, maybe none of us were going to get out." Andersen got out of his seat belt, swam through a broken window, and, deeply and quickly, breathed air at the surface. That's when he saw a group of men, about ten in all, appear at the top of the dam. One after another, they raced down into the water. Leading all the three children to safety, they began to shout at the father, "Who else is in the car？"Andersen says respectfully, "It was like the sight of angels（天使）."

Once there lived a rich man 【小题1】wanted to do something for the people of his town.【小题2】 first he wanted to find out whether they deserved his help.

In the centre of the main road into the town, he placed【小题3】very large stone. Then he 【小题4】(hide ) behind a tree and waited. Soon an old man came along with his cow.

“Who put this stone in the centre of the road?” said the old man, but he did not try to remove the stone. Instead, with some difficulty he passed around the stone and continued on his way.【小题5】man came along and did the same thing; then another came,and another. All of them complained about the stone but not tried to remove 【小题6】. Late in the afternoon a young man came along. He saw the stone,【小题7】(say) to himself: “The night【小题8】(be) very dark. Some neighbors will come along later in the dark and will fall against the stone.”

Then he began to move the stone. He pushed and pulled with all his  【小题9】(strong) to move it. How great was his surprise at last!【小题10】 the stone, he found a bag of money.