When I was 13, my journey in a great valley changed my attitude towards the recording of a travel. During the trip, I was busy recording every event, name and place I came across. I felt proud to {#blank#}1{#/blank#} my time, keeping a {#blank#}2{#/blank#}description of my travels. On my last night there, after I {#blank#}3{#/blank#} the tent, I went out with diary in hand. The sky was clear with the bright moon, and the walls of the valley looked frightening behind their curtains of shadows（阴影）. The beauty of nature at dusk {#blank#}4{#/blank#} my heart entirely. I took out my pen right away... At that moment, I understood that the beautiful scenery I saw {#blank#}5{#/blank#} was more meaningful than the tiring words that I had {#blank#}6{#/blank#} in my diary. Since then I have {#blank#}7{#/blank#} only to keep a special thought or feeling in my diary. The unforgettable moments I {#blank#}8{#/blank#} would be the sweet and lasting memories for my life.

    The United Nations' series of "language days" are designed to promote the use of the six official languages of the UN as well as to celebrate cultural and linguistic diversity (语言多样性). Chinese Language Day is the 20th April. It's a time chosen to fit in with the Chinese{#blank#}1{#/blank#} of Guyu (古语), which honours Cangjie—the four-eyed {#blank#}2{#/blank#} figure who is traditionally understood to have created Chinese characters in the time of the Yellow Emperor, 5000 years ago.

    Mandarin (普通话) is the most-spoken language in the world, with over 1.5 billion speakers. When most people think of "Chinese", it is Mandarin that they are {#blank#}3{#/blank#}. But Mandarin Chinese is far from the only variant of the Chinese language—or the only language spoken in China. In fact, there are a great number of Chinese languages. Remember—this is a country which is both very large and very, very old. Different regions are within the {#blank#}4{#/blank#} expanse of territory, that is, China can be {#blank#}5{#/blank#} not only by great distances but also by broadly geographical features such as mountain ranges.

    It is hard to guess how many dialects actually exist. In general, dialects can be {#blank#}6{#/blank#} classified into one of the seven large groups: Putonghua (Mandarin), Gan, Kejia (Hakka), Min, Wu, Xiang, and Yue (Cantonese). Each language group contains a large number of dialects.

    Understanding the situation is {#blank#}7{#/blank#} by the fact that, while many Chinese people in different geographical areas of the country may not understand each other when they speak their regional dialect, they may share the same written language even if their pronunciation of different characters within that language may{#blank#}8{#/blank#}.

A {#blank#}9{#/blank#} feature across all Chinese languages is tone. For instance, Mandarin has four tones and Cantonese has six tones. Tone, in terms of language, is the pitch (音高) in which syllables (音节) in words are spoken. In Chinese, different words {#blank#}10{#/blank#} different keys. Some words even have pitch variations in one single syllable.

    The Historical Change of Reader's Digest

    During World War I, Mr. DeWitt Wallace was wounded in a battle. During his recovery in the hospital, he read a lot of magazines and {#blank#}1{#/blank#} a lot of interesting information. At the same time, he also found that few people had time to read so many magazines that he realized the idea of excerpting (摘录) these articles and publishing them.

    He was {#blank#}2{#/blank#} to publish a pocket magazine they called Reader's Digest with his wife Lila Acheson. They opened an office downstairs in an illegal hotel in Greenwich Village, New York, and spent only $5,000 in capital and began {#blank#}3{#/blank#} subscribers. After a period of hard work, the first volume was {#blank#}4{#/blank#} published on February 5, 1922. Its purpose is to inform the readers in daily life and give the readers entertainment, encouragement and guidance. The first article, {#blank#}5{#/blank#} How to Stay Young Mentally, was one and a half pages long.

    In 1920, he put {#blank#}6{#/blank#} selected articles into Reader's Digest samples and displayed them to major publishers in the United States. He hoped that someone would be willing to publish them, but they were all {#blank#}7{#/blank#}. Mr. Wallace did not give up and decided to publish it himself. He worked at home with his wife, and finally published the first issue of Reader's Digest in February 1922. The first was printed in 5,000 copies, {#blank#}8{#/blank#} at 25 cents, and sent to 1,500 payment subscribers by mail. By 1935, the circulation of Reader's Digest had reached one million copies.

    The Chinese {#blank#}9{#/blank#} of Reader's Digest was first published in March 1965. The first editor-in-chief was Lin Taiyi, the daughter of Mr. Lin Yutang, master of literature. In November 2004, Reader's Digest and Shanghai Press and Publication Bureau announced the {#blank#}10{#/blank#} of a long-term publishing cooperation.

What Is a Paragraph Break?

It is one of the most important punctuation marks. A paragraph break is an indentation (缩造) or a single line space{#blank#}1{#/blank#}the division between one paragraph and the next in a body of text.

Generally, paragraph breaks serve to{#blank#}2{#/blank#}the transition from one idea to another in a stretch of text, and from one speaker to another in an exchange of dialogue.

Few readers would think of the paragraph break as a punctuation mark, but it certainly is. In ancient times there were no paragraphs. Sentences simply flowed into one another without{#blank#}3{#/blank#}.During medieval (中世纪) times, the mark evolved into the paragraph symbol and eventually became the modern-day paragraph break, which is{#blank#}4{#/blank#}now only by a line break or indentation.

Today, the paragraph break is used to give readers a break. The art of creating paragraphs is called paragraphing, the{#blank#}5{#/blank#}of dividing a text into paragraphs. Paragraphing is a kindness to your reader because it divides your thinking into manageable bites. Paragraphs that are too long{#blank#}6{#/blank#}readers with dense blocks of text to read through, while more frequent paragraphing provides readers with convenient{#blank#}7{#/blank#}points at which to take a break and relaunch themselves into thinking.

To fully understand when to insert a paragraph break, it's helpful to know that a paragraph is a group of closely related sentences that develop a central idea. Therefore, each paragraph discusses one{#blank#}8{#/blank#}topic. Also, a paragraph break is cmploycd before each new topic is introduced. In this way, the writing will flow, and readers will be able to proceed through the writing in a logical fashion instead of{#blank#}9{#/blank#}all the way to get to the last line.

Paragraphs used to be longer, but with the development of the Internet, which gives readers access to literally millions of sources of information, paragraphs have become increasingly{#blank#}10{#/blank#}. The style for many websites, for example, uses paragraphs no more than two to three sentences.