Short Advanced Reading Comprehension Test 21 With MCQs and Answers

(Please note: The following questions are related to a specific reading passage, available solely before the first question. Remember, referring back to the reading text while answering the questions may be helpful to ensure accuracy.)

British towns suffer from the same traffic congestion, noise and polluting fumes as all towns in the western world, but as yet only London, Newcastle, Glasgow and to a small extent Liverpool have useful railways going underground through the central areas. Elsewhere there are plans for building underground railways but they have little hope of making any progress with them so long as public expenditure is restricted. In general, the north has better public transport than the south, with cheaper and regular bus services using better roads and sharing fewer cars.

As it is pointed out in the passage, most British towns have no underground railway system ____.

We can understand from the passage that ____.

According to the author, underground railways are a brilliant means of transport since ____.

England is famous for its gardens, and most people like gardening. This is most likely one reason why so many people prefer to live in houses rather than in flats. Mainly in suburban areas, it is possible to pass row after row of ordinary small houses, each one with its neatly kept patch of grass surrounded by a great variety of flowers and shrubs. Enthusiasts of gardening get a great deal of helpful advice from the television and magazines.

The passage stresses that because many English people are fond of gardening, ____.

The passage emphasizes that people interested in gardening ____.

The passage is related to _____.

Public libraries, maintained by the local authorities, are well developed and progressive, and everywhere allow people to borrow books without charge. The books in the lending section are always kept on open shelves, and library staff are very helpful in getting books on request from other libraries through the exchange system. Most libraries report an increase in borrowing over the past few years, so television does not seem to have stopped people from reading as it was feared that it would.

It is explained in the passage that any book that is not available in one library _____.

As emphasized in the passage, people nowadays _____.

The passage gives us the impression that public libraries _____.

Fahrenheit is the system of measuring the temperature, how hot or cold something is, used by many people in Britain. The freezing point of Fahrenheit is 32 degrees. So a cold winter's day in Britain would have a temperature of 38 F (3 centigrade), and a hot summer's day would have a temperature of 90 F (32 centigrade). The Fahrenheit scale was invented by the German scientist Gabriel Fahrenheit in 1710. Today in Britain, most people over twenty-five know the Fahrenheit scale, but the centigrade system (Celsius) is being used more and more. Weather forecasts on television and in newspapers show the temperature in both scales.

It is revealed in the passage that the term "Fahrenheit" _____.

It is conveyed in the passage that in the long run, the Celsius system _____.

The passage talks about _____.

The Falklands are a group of small islands in the South Atlantic near Argentina, with a population of 1,200 British citizens. They have been a British territory since 1833. Disputes about who owns the islands go back to the eighteenth century. Argentina has long alleged that these islands, which they call the Malvinas, belong to them. They occupied the islands in April 1982 and the Falklands War lasted till July 1982 when British forces won them back. The Falklands War had a massive impact on Britain and is still controversial. Some people see it as a restoration of Britain's old imperial power.

It is pointed out in the passage that both Britain and Argentina _____.

It is clearly indicated in the passage that the Falklands War _____.

One may infer from the passage that even today, Britain's hold over the Falklands Islands _____.

On a cow-calf ranch, the first job of the summer starts after the spring branding when the calves are turned out. Freshly worked calves go through a period of stress which may last only a few days or up to a week. Stress is caused by several factors; loss of blood, the shock of dehorning and castration soreness and even a reaction to the vaccine. In small calves, the stress is usually not severe. Their horns are small and the surgery that removes them is not radical. The same holds true of their castration so they don't lose much blood and don't suffer much shock. For several days, they may lie around, their heads will be sore, and they may not drink much milk. But after that, they bounce right back and are healed in a week's time. The healing process takes longer with larger calves, and they are the ones most vulnerable to stress. One day a nice, fat steer calf is walking slowly or lying off to himself, which you expect to see in a large calf that is stiff and sore. Then the following day you find him dead. You can never be sure absolutely what it was that killed him, but you assume it had something to do with stress.

Cutting off the horns of calves and their castration _____.

Small calves suffer less severe pain and are healed in a shorter time _____.

Larger calves are more susceptible to stress than smaller ones _____.

Japan is a nation built completely on the tips of giant, sub-oceanic volcanoes. Little of the land is flat and suitable for agriculture. Terraced hillsides make use of every available square foot of arable land. Small homes built very close together further conserve the land. Japan also suffers from natural disasters such as earthquakes and hurricanes. Conventionally, homes are made of light construction materials, so a house falling down during a disaster will not crush its occupants and also can be quickly and inexpensively rebuilt. During the feudal period until the Meiji restoration of 1868, each feudal lord sought to restrain his subjects from moving from one village to the next for fear that a neighbouring lord might amass enough peasants with which to produce a large agricultural surplus, hire an army, and pose a threat. Apparently, bridges were not commonly built across rivers and streams until the late nineteenth century since bridges increased mobility between villages.

Rough terrain makes the land uncultivable _____.

Before the Meiji restoration of 1868, _____.

If traditional homes were built of heavy materials, _____.

If any country ever rivalled France's own passion for the French language, it was Vietnam. They did not share their former colonial master's veneration of the French as one of civilisation's crowning glories. The emerging Francophone nation of Vietnam has one small difficulty: hardly any of its people want to learn French. The lingua franca of world trade, in Vietnam as elsewhere, is English. At every level of Vietnam's educational system, students learning English outnumber those studying French by roughly 10 to 1. Not even the most ardent Francophiles see much hope of reversing that ratio. "We are not crazy enough to think French can replace English," concedes Alain Fleury, the French embassy's cultural counsellor. France's first priority in Vietnam is only to keep the language from becoming extinct.

It is inferred from the passage that _____.

In Vietnam, the number of students learning English _____.

Vietnam _____.