Gordon Hewitt, a mean (吝啬的) person who used to read his paper in his car to save electricity, died last week. He has left behind ￡250, 000 in the bank after a lifetime of saving.

    When you first saw Mr. Hewitt, you might think that he was poor: he wore his old coat, his trousers didn't fit well and his shoes were worn out. He sold newspapers on the streets.

In fact, he had a quarter-of-a-million pounds in at least 20 savings. He married twice and lived in the same house all his life. His money was left to six different people.

   60-year-old neighbor Jean Buckley remembers Mr. Hewitt's mean ways of life, “He used to sit in his Robin reading a newspaper with the light on so that he didn't have to turn the light on in his house. He would walk miles to find somewhere warm, even through the rain. ”

    68-year-old neighbor David Cheeseman said, “I have known him for over 50 years and he was always strange and funny in his manner. I told him many times to look after himself and have heat in his house. He just laughed. He wouldn't spend a penny unless he had to. He went to every church to sit in the warm, have a cup of tea or meal. He had a dryer(烘干机)in his house but never used it. He washed clothes and put them on even they were wet. He said it cost money to use the dryer. ”

    You might think that Olympic athletes are the healthiest people in the world. It's true that many are. However, it's also true that many Olympic athletes had to overcome (克服) illness early in their lives.

    One excellent example is Wilma Rudolph. She competed in track-and-field (田径) events in the 1960s Olympics. She didn't win just one gold medal (奖章).She won three. At the time, people called her ”the fastest woman in the world”.

    Actually, as a young child, Wilma could not take part in sports. She had serious illnesses, and then, at the age of 4, she got polio (小儿麻痹症).She lost the function of her left leg, and the doctor said she could never walk again.

Wilma's family did everything they could to help her walk again. Wilma and her mother used to travel 100 miles to get treatments for her leg. Her brothers and sisters took turns to give her leg a daily massage (按摩).Four times a day, they helped her do special exercises for her leg. Amazingly, by the time Wilma was 9 years old, she was able to walk again. Before long, she started playing basketball and running. In high school, she was a track star and then she went to the Olympics.

    Wilma stopped being a runner when she was 22 years old. She then became a teacher and a track coach. Her story encouraged many people to work hard and to overcome difficulties.

    This is Cara and Ben. They are twins(双胞胎). They are twelve. This is their bedroom. It's a nice room. There are two beds in the room. The yellow bed is Cara's and that green one is Ben's. The twins have one desk and two chairs. The chairs look the same. Cara's sweater is on his bed. Ben's coat is on his chair. Their clock, books and pencil-cases are on the desk. Their school bags are behind the chairs.

    Today I am going along with Rowan Dougall, a postman in Queensland in the far north of Australia, on his daily delivery（投递 trip. Every day, Rowan sets off with his post bags in the tail of his little plane--not much bigger than a large family car, and flies across one of the wildest places on Earth, Australia's Cape North, to reach the very faraway inland areas called the Outback.

    We fly just 300 metres above dangerous crocodiles(鳄鱼) and snakes. This is one of the longest and most expensive postman trips in the world.  However, a 50-cent stamp not only gets a letter posted to a neighbouring town, it will get it hand-delivered by flying postman to the furthest areas of the Outback. To help with the costs, the plane takes three or four paying local people or tourists, and I am one of them. In the back of the plane, there is a pile of post--envelopes of all sizes, newspapers, and a few parcels(包裹). Somehow I expected this post to look special, maybe to include some hats or cowboy boots, but this looks no more exciting than the post delivered to me in England. I look at some of the names and addresses, wondering about the people who are waiting for these letters and parcels.

    Rowan's route is 2,000 km long, with 15 stops, and I get a chance to meet Sandy, who has just received an order of clothes from a store. "I look forward to this weekly delivery," she says, "but I do miss actually going shopping myself." Rowan is checking the time. There are another ten stops to make before dusk(黄昏). Time to leap back on the plane and up into the air.

    Uncle Li and Uncle Wang are good friends. They live next to each other and their farms are both at the foot of the mountain. So they can help each other. But neither of them likes to use his head. They're both poor though they work hard. Most villagers have built new houses，but they still live in the low and broken houses. They never find out why.

    Once Uncle Li went to town to buy some medicine for his wife. In the town he heard the apples in a city were expensive. He told Uncle Wang about it as soon a she went back. They decided to carry some apples to the city. They borrowed some money from their friends and bought nearly 1, 000 kilograms of apples in the villages and carried them to the city on a tractor. Bad luck！A lot of apples have already been carried there when they arrived. A few days later they had to sell them at a low price. They felt unhappy and returned to their village.

    "I can't understand why we sustained（蒙受）losses in business while others always profit（盈利）. "Uncle Li asked one day.

    "The tractor was too small，"Uncle Wang said without thinking. "We'll carry more apples on a truck next time！"

    "I agree!" said Uncle Li. "How foolish we were!"