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  3. Passage One (1) When Caroline Meeber boarded the afternoon train for Chicago, her total outfit consisted of a small trunk,

Passage One (1) When Caroline Meeber boarded the afternoon train for Chicago, her total outfit consisted of a small trunk,

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问题     Passage One
    (1)   When Caroline Meeber boarded the afternoon train for Chicago, her total outfit consisted of a small trunk, a cheap imitation alligator-skin satchel, a small lunch in a paper box, and a yellow leather snap purse, containing her ticket, a scrap of paper with her sister’s address in Van Buren Street, and four dollars in money. It was in August, 1889. She was eighteen years of age, bright, timid, and full of the illusions of ignorance and youth. Whatever touch of regret at parting characterised her thoughts, it was certainly not for advantages now being given up. A gush of tears at her mother’s farewell kiss, a touch in her throat when the cars clacked by the flour mill where her father worked by the day, a pathetic sigh as the familiar green environs (周边地区) of the village passed in review, and the threads which bound her so lightly to girlhood and home were irretrievably broken.
    (2)  To be sure there was always the next station, where one might descend and return. There was the great city, bound more closely by these very trains which came up daily. Columbia City was not so very far away, even once she was in Chicago. What, pray, is a few hours—a few hundred miles? She looked at the little slip bearing her sister’s address and wondered. She gazed at the green landscape, now passing in swift review, until her swifter thoughts replaced its impression with vague conjectures of what Chicago might be.
    (3)  When a girl leaves her home at eighteen, she does one of two things. Either she falls into saving hands and becomes better, or she rapidly assumes the cosmopolitan standard of virtue and becomes worse. Of an intermediate balance, under the circumstances, there is no possibility. The city has its cunning wiles, no less than the infinitely smaller and more human tempter. There are large forces which allure with all the soulfulness (深情) of expression possible in the most cultured human. The gleam of a thousand lights is often as effective as the persuasive light in a wooing and fascinating eye. Half the undoing of the unsophisticated and natural mind is accomplished by forces wholly superhuman. A blare of sound, a roar of life, a vast array of human hives, appeal to the astonished senses in equivocal terms. Without a counsellor at hand to whisper cautious interpretations, what falsehoods may not these things breathe into the unguarded ear! Unrecognised for what they are, their beauty, like music, too often relaxes, then weakens, then perverts the simpler human perceptions.
    (4)  Caroline, or Sister Carrie, as she had been half affectionately termed by the family, was possessed of a mind rudimentary in its power of observation and analysis. Self-interest with her was high, but not strong. It was, nevertheless, her guiding characteristic. Warm with the fancies of youth, pretty with the insipid prettiness of the formative period, possessed of a figure promising eventual shapeliness and an eye alight with certain native intelligence, she was a fair example of the middle American class—two generations removed from the emigrant. Books were beyond her interest—knowledge a sealed book. In the intuitive graces she was still crude. She could scarcely toss her head gracefully. Her hands were almost ineffectual. The feet, though small, were set flatly. And yet she was interested in her charms, quick to understand the keener pleasures of life, ambitious to gain in material things. A half-equipped little knight she was, venturing to reconnoitre (侦查) the mysterious city and dreaming wild dreams of some vague, far-off supremacy, which should make it prey and subject—the proper penitent (忏悔者) , groveling at a woman’s slipper.
    (5)   "That," said a voice in her ear, "is one of the prettiest little resorts in Wisconsin. "
    (6)   "Is it?" she answered nervously.
    (7)  The train was just pulling out of Waukesha. For some time she had been conscious of a man behind. She felt him observing her mass of hair. He had been fidgetting, and with natural intuition she felt a certain interest growing in that quarter. Her maidenly reserve, and a certain sense of what was conventional under the circumstances, called her to forestall and deny this familiarity, but the daring and magnetism of the individual, born of past experiences and triumphs, prevailed. She answered.
    (8)  He leaned forward to put his elbows upon the back of her seat and proceeded to make himself volubly agreeable.
    (9)  "Yes, that is a great resort for Chicago people. The hotels are swell. You are not familiar with this part of the country, are you?"
    (10)   "Oh, yes, I am," answered Carrie. "That is, I live at Columbia City. I have never been through here, though. "
    (11)  "And so this is your first visit to Chicago," he observed.
    (12)  All the time she was conscious of certain features out of the side of her eye. Flush, colourful cheeks, a light moustache, a grey fedora (软呢帽) hat. She now turned and looked upon him in full, the instincts of self-protection and coquetry (卖弄风情) mingling confusedly in her brain.
    (13)  "I didn’t say that," she said.
    (14)  "Oh," he answered, in a very pleasing way and with an assumed air of mistake, "I thought you did. "
    (15)  Here was a type of the travelling canvasser for a manufacturing house—a class which at that time was first being dubbed by the slang of the day " drummers". He came within the meaning of a still newer term, which had sprung into general use among Americans in 1880, and which concisely expressed the thought of one whose dress or manners are calculated to elicit the admiration of susceptible young women—a "masher". His suit was of a striped and crossed pattern of brown wool, new at that time, but since become familiar as a business suit. The low crotch of the vest revealed a stiff shirt bosom of white and pink stripes. From his coat sleeves protruded a pair of linen cuffs of the same pattern, fastened with large, gold plate buttons, set with the common yellow agates (玛瑙) known as "cat’s-eyes". His fingers bore several rings—one, the ever-enduring heavy seal—and from his vest dangled a neat gold watch chain, from which was suspended the secret insignia (徽章) of the Order of Elks. The whole suit was rather tight-fitting, and was finished off with heavy-soled tan shoes, highly polished, and the grey fedora hat. He was, for the order of intellect represented, attractive, and whatever he had to recommend him, you may be sure was not lost upon Carrie, in this, her first glance.
What might be the likely outcome of a young girl leaving her home to a big city?
选项 A、She might fight and claw her way to the top.
B、She might be caught in a dilemma.
C、She might degenerate under the temptation of city life.
D、She might remain as she was in the past.
答案C
解析 细节题。根据题干提示定位至第三段。该段前两句提到，当一个女孩在十八岁时离家，她的结局不外乎两种：一种是遇到好人相助，变得更好，一种是很快接受大都市巨大的道德标准而堕落下去。该段第四句到最后一句都在讲述大都市巨大的诱惑力以及喧嚣繁华的都市生活如何令那些头脑较简单者最终堕入歧途。由此可知，年轻女孩离家前往大都市的可能结果之一是受大都市生活的诱惑而堕落，故[C]为答案，同时排除[A]，另一个结果是得到他人的帮助才令境况得以改善，而不是全靠自己用尽计谋并且一路奋战到出人头地。原文并未提到是否会陷入进退两难的境地，故排除[B]；该段第三句提到，在这种情况下，没有可能保持中间状态，也就是说，不可能保持原样，既没有变好，也没有变坏，[D]与原文表述相反，故排除。
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