英语专业阅读补充材料.doc

A Fable for Tomorrow There was once a town in the heart of America where all life seemed to live in harmony with its surroundings. The town lay in the midest of a checkerboard(西洋跳棋盘） of prosperous （繁盛的）farms, with fields of grain and hillsides of orchards（围起来的果园）. Along the roads, laurel, viburnum and alder, great ferns and wildflowers delighted the traveler`s eyes through much of the year. Even in winter the roadsides were places of beauty, where countless birds came to feed on the berries and on the seed heads of dried weeds（杂草） rising above the snow. The countryside was, in fact, famous for the abundance and variety of its bird life, and when the flood of migrants was pouring in spring and fall people traveled from great distances to observe them. Others came to fish the streams, which flowed clear and cold out of the hills and contained shady pools where trout（鳟鱼） lay. So it had been from the days many years ago when the first settlers raised their houses, sank their wells, and built their barns. Then the strange blight（枯萎，荒芜） crept（匍匐，爬）over（偷偷袭近） the area and everything began to change. Some evil spell（咒语） had settled on the community: mysterious maladies(疾病) swept the flocks of chickens; the cattle and sheep sickened and died. Everywhere was a shadow of death. The farmers spoke of much illness among their families. In the town the doctors had become more and more puzzled by new kinds of sickness appearing among their patients. There had been several sudden and unexplained deaths, not only among adults but even among children, who would be stricken suddenly while at play and die within a few hours. There was a strange stillness. The birds, for example, where had they gone? Many people spoke of them, puzzled and disturbed. The feeding stations in the backyards were deserted. The few birds seen anywhere were moribund（垂死的）; they trembled violently and could not fly. It was a spring without voices. On the mornings that had once throbbed with the dawn chorus of rob