B

    Hans Christian Andersen was born in Denmark in 1805. He lived with his parents in a town   called Odense. They were a very poor family and they couldn't afford to send Hans Christian to school.

    As a little boy, Hans Christian enjoyed making up fairy tales（童话）and puppet（木偶）shows.

    When he was only eleven years old, his father died and he had to go out to work to make money to help his mother.

    Three years later, Hans Christian left home and went to the city of Copenhagen to be famous and rich. To begin with he didn't do very well there, but at last he was able to go back to school and then on to university to continue his education.

    He wrote fairy tales and stories and soon became famous. At first he wrote the stories that he had heard when he was a child and then began to make up new tales. During his seventy-one year life, Hans Christian wrote over three hundred stories.

    Many of his stories are still enjoyed by children today. Among his best-known stories are: the Emperor's New Clothes, the Ugly Duckling, the Snow Queen, the Princess and the Pea, and the Little Mermaid.

    In ancient China, there was a man called Zhou Yong. Before his father died, he left Zhou Yong a great number of gold ingots (元宝). Zhou hid them in a safe place in his home. One day, Zhou decided to travel far away. He was afraid that someone would steal the gold ingots. But they were too heavy for him to bring along with him. So he put all the ingots into a jar (坛子) and gave it to his friend Wang Wu, telling Wang that the jar was full of fresh red dates (红枣).

    A year later, one day before Zhou came back, Wang's wife wondered what was in the jar. So she secretly opened it. She was shocked when she saw so many ingots inside. She told Wang about it and they took the ingots out and filled the jar with fresh red dates.

    When Wang returned the jar to Zhou, Zhou found the ingots were missing. They argued about it for a while, then they went to see the county magistrate (县官).

    When the magistrate asked Wang what had happened, he answered, "Zhou said that there were fresh red dates in it when he gave me the jar a year ago."

    The magistrate examined the jar and the fresh red dates in it carefully. Then he said: "Bring the ingots back, Wang Wu!"

    Wang still denied (否认)having taken them. But after the magistrate explained what he knew, Wang finally admitted (承认)that he had taken the ingots.

When Yang Fan was taking a walk around the Yuliang Island, she saw a black swan (天鹅) in the grass. Yang Fan knew that swans could be fierce (凶猛的). But as she got close to this one, it didn't move.

She was sure that the swan needed help. Although she had an important meeting to have, she still decided to do something for the swan. So Yang called her workmate first to pull off the meeting. Then she covered the bird's head with her jacket to keep its cool, picked it up carefully and held it in her arms. She decided to send it to the Animal Care Center, but the center was across the Han River, far from the park. She didn't know how to carry the swan there. Luckily, some strangers driving by gave her and the swan a lift to a nearby bus stop.

On the bus, no one seemed surprised by "the unusual passenger". Instead, they were worried. Someone helped Yang Fan call the center on the way. And Li Tao, an animal-care manager, picked her up at the bus stop and drove them to the center. There, the animal doctors found that the swan was poisoned (中毒), caused by eating something used to kill mice. The swan was well looked after at the center. She even made a friend—a little dog. Thanks to people's love and care, luckily, she was cured (治愈) two months later and sent back to the nature.

"It's a moving story. Yang Fan travelled about two hours and it was really a long way." Says Li Tao. "And all the strangers wanted to give her and the swan a hand." He adds, "I am happy to see that more and more people have realized the importance of protecting the wild life since we are trying to build a civilized (文明) city."

Last week I went to an art show. A painting caught my eyes. To my amazement(惊奇), it was painted by Steven, one of my {#blank#}1{#/blank#} Then many things about him came into my mind. Steven was from a poor family. His parents{#blank#}2{#/blank#} not afford to buy him some basic things that he needed. Once our school provided gloves for poor children. I put Steven's name on the list. He was so {#blank#}3{#/blank#} when he received a pair. He loved to wear them and they were always {#blank#}4{#/blank#} than anybody else's. Steven had a gift(天赋) for painting and he could {#blank#}5{#/blank#} understand what I described in class. But he didn't have money to buy the paper for painting. So sometimes, I {#blank#}6{#/blank#} him some. He practiced hard. And I often showed his paintings of the class. He was greatly {#blank#}7{#/blank#}.

 One day just before the summer vacation, he came to {#blank#}8{#/blank#} some art books. When the new term began, he showed some of {#blank#}9{#/blank#} paintings to me. I felt shocked. They were very good. Then we talked a lot. He said he would keep on. Later he was admitted(录取) to a famous art university. After graduation, he had many difficulties, but he never gave up. He was always {#blank#}10{#/blank#} his best to improve himself. His hard work and strong mind led to his success.