The deadliest Ebola outbreak in history that has so far killed almost 1000 people in Guinea, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Nigeria in West Africa has caused fear around the world.

    The outbreak is unprecedented（空前的）both in infection numbers and in geographic scope. Officials from the World Health Organization (WHO) said earlier this month the outbreak “is moving faster than our efforts to control it”, reported CNN. So far, the battle against the virus doesn't appear to be slowing down.

    The Ebola virus is terrifying no matter where it strikes: It's a disease with no cure that causes headaches and fever, severe diarrhea(腹泻), vomiting and bleeding and has been known to kill up to 90 percent of its victims.

    It is understandable for people to be panicked, but those living outside Africa shouldn't be particularly concerned about contracting the virus, says a Washington Post article.

    This is because transmission of Ebola requires direct contact with an infected person's blood, vomit or other bodily fluids during the period that he or she is contagious(接触传染的). It is something that is extremely unlikely for anyone but healthcare workers. The virus is not spread by coughing or sneezing.

    Media outlets in the US and the UK are using terrifying headlines, wrongly claiming that people infected with the virus have traveled to their countries.

    James Ball at The Guardian says the Ebola outbreak in Africa is tragic, but it is important to keep a sense of proportion. Other infectious diseases, including common influenza, are far, far deadlier.

    Weddings in the United States vary as much as the people do. There are church weddings with a great deal of fanfare(仪式上的短曲); there are weddings on mountain tops with guests barefooted; there have been weddings on the ocean floor with oxygen tanks for the guests. But many weddings, no matter where or how they are performed, include certain traditional customs.

    Before a couple is married, they become engaged. And then invitations are sent to those who live nearby, their close friends and their relatives who live far away. When everything is ready, then comes the most exciting moment.

    The wedding itself usually lasts between 30 and 40 minutes. The wedding party enters the church while the wedding march is played. The bride carrying a bouquet enters last with her father who will “give her away”. The groom enters the church from a side door. When the wedding party is gathered by the altar, the bride and groom exchange vows(誓言). It is traditional to use the words “to have and to hold from this day forward, for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, till death do us part.” Following the vows, the couple exchange rings. Wearing the wedding rings on the fourth finger of the left hand is an old custom.

    After the ceremony, there is often a party, called a “reception” which gives the wedding guests an opportunity to congratulate the new couple.

    The car in which the couple leaves the church is decorated with balloons. The words “Just Married” are painted on the trunk or back window. And then the couple go in their honeymoon.

根据短文内容，选择最佳答案，并将选定答案的字母标号填在题前括号内。

    Sunday is more like Monday than it used to be. Places of business that used to keep daytime“business hours” are now open late into the night. And on the Internet, the hour of the day and the day of the week have become irrelevant（不相关的）. A half century ago in the United States, most people experienced strong and precise dividing lines between days of rest and days of work, school time and summer time. Today the boundaries still exist, but they seem not clear.

    The law in almost all states used to require stores to close on Sunday; in most, it no longer does. It used to keep the schools open in all seasons except summer; in most, it still does. And whether the work week should strengthen its legal limits, or whether it should become more “flexible,” is often debated. How should we, as a society, organize our time? Should we go even further in relaxing the boundaries of time until we live in a world in which every minute is much like every other?

    These are not easy questions even to ask. Part of the difficulty is that we rarely recognize the “law of time” even when we meet it face to face. We know as children that we have to attend school a certain number of hours, a certain number of days, a certain number of years — but unless we meet the truant officer (学监), we may well think that we should go to school due to social custom and parents' demand rather than to the law. As adults we are familiar with “extra pay for overtime working,” but less familiar with the fact that what constitutes（构成）“overtime” is a matter of legal definition. When we turn the clock forward to start daylight-saving time, have we ever thought to ourselves: “Here is the law in action”? As we shall see, there is a lot of law that has great influence on how we organize and use time: compulsory education law, overtime law, and daylight-saving law — as well as law about Sunday closing, holidays, being late to work, time zones, and so on. Once we begin to look for it, we will have no trouble finding a law of time to examine and assess.

    We all think plants were expected to get larger with increased carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, but changes in temperature, humidity(湿度)and nutrient availability seem to have trumped the benefits of increased carbon dioxide" said researchers from the National University of Singapore.

    45 percent of the species studied now reach smaller adult sizes than they did in the past. The researchers pointed out that warmer temperatures and changing habitats, caused by climate change, are possible reasons for shrinking creatures.

    " We do not yet know the mechanisms(机制)involved, or why some organism are getting smaller while others are unaffected," the researchers said. "Until we understand more, we could be risking negative consequences that we can't yet quantify."

    The change is big in cold-blooded animals. Only two decades of warmer temperatures are enough to make retiles (爬行动物)smaller. An increase of only 1 degree centigrade caused nearly a 10 percent increase in metabolism(新陈代谢). Greater use of energy resulted in tiny tortoises and little lizards. Fish are smaller now too. Though overfishing has played a part in reducing numbers, experiments show that warmer temperatures also stop fish growing.

    Warm-blooded animals aren't immune(免除)from the size change caused by climate change. Many birds are now smaller. Soay sheep are thinner. Red deer are weaken And polar bears are smaller, compared with historical records.

    This is not the first time this has happened in Earth's history. 55 million years ago, a warming event similar to the current climate change caused bees, spiders and ants to shrink by 50 to 75 percent over several thousand years. That event happened over a longer time than the current climate change.

    The speed of modem climate change could mean organisms may not respond or adapt quickly enough, especially those with long generation times climate change will be shown in the future.

Kindle E-reader, 8th generation

    Free Touchscreen Display

    Price: $79. 99

    ● Thin and light for one-handed reading

    New Kindle is 11% thinner and 16% lighter than the previous generation Kindle, making it easy and comfortable to hold in one hand.

    ● Read like real Paper

    Kindle creates text similar to what you see in a physical book. The blacks and whites on the screen are uniform, improving text and image quality.

    ●Long-life battery

    Kindle doesn't need power to show a page of text, allowing you to read for weeks on a single charge.

    ● Thousands of books, no distraction (分心)

    Kindle is designed to be an e-reader. It satisfies your love of reading without interruptions like e-mails and phone calls.

    ●Look it up without leaving your page

    Smart Lookup combines entries from The New Oxford American Dictionary with information from Wikipedia, so you can know meanings, characters and more without losing your place.

    ●Adjust your text size

    Choose from eight text sizes to prevent tired eyes, so you can keep reading longer.

    Customer reviews:

    ※ Damon, May 21, 2019

    The price is great with an extra $ 20 off and this new Kindle is smaller in my hands than my old one. I was sad to lose my old Kindle, but this one is terrific.

    ※ Jason, January 26, 2019

    I miss the original Kindlers size—this one is too small. Also, the screen is overly sensitive and things pop up (弹出) and the battery doesn't last as long as the original Kindle. But my biggest disappointment is that this Kindle doesn't allow you to transfer everything from the original Kindle、so I lost all of the information from my old one. Overall, disappointing.

    ※ Susan, November 17, 2018

    I had the original Kindle, and the battery lasted for weeks. This battery only seems to last a few days, however. The other problem I have with this version of the Kindle is the touch screen. It is annoying when you are reading and start turning the wrong way. Sometimes, it's hard to get the page to turn the way you'd like it to.

    One of the best-loved American writers was William Sydney Porter, or O. Henry. From 1893 he lived with his family in a house in Austin, Texas, which is now a museum. Visitors to Austin can see the house. It was saved from destruction (破坏) and turned into a museum in 1934. The museum is a good way to learn about the interesting life of the American writer.

    William Porter rented this house in Austin and lived there with his wife Athol and daughter Margaret for about two years. Many objects in the museum came from the Porters. Others did not. An important piece in the room is the original photo over here. It was taken there in the house about 1895. The piano there dates back to the 1860s. His wife took lessons on it when she first moved to Austin.

    Porter wasn't a successful writer in the beginning. He worked on a farm, in a land office and bank. He also loved words and writing. The museum has a special proof (证明) of Porter's love of language—his dictionary. It is said that he had read every word in that dictionary.

    Later William Porter was forced to leave Austin because he was charged (指控) with wrongdoing at the bank and lost his job. Because he was afraid of a trial (审判), he left the country secretly. But he returned because his wife was dying. After her death, he faced the trial and served three and a half years in a prison in Ohio.

    William Porter would keep his time in prison a secret. But there was one good thing about it. It provided him with time to write. By the time he was freed, he had published 14 stories and became well-known as O. Henry. Porter later moved to New York City and found great success there. He published over 180 stories in the last eight years of his life.