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  3. I came across an old country guide the other day. It listed all the tradesmen in each village in my part of the country, and it

I came across an old country guide the other day. It listed all the tradesmen in each village in my part of the country, and it

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问题     I came across an old country guide the other day. It listed all the tradesmen in each village in my part of the country, and it was impressive to see the great variety of services which were available on one’s own doorstep in the late Victorian countryside.
    Nowadays a superficial traveler in rural England might conclude that the only village tradesmen still flourishing were either selling frozen food to the inhabitants or selling antiques to visitors. Nevertheless, this would really be a false impression. Admittedly there has been a contraction of village commerce, but its vigor is still remarkable.
    Our local grocer’s shop, for example, is actually expanding in spite of the competition from supermarkets in the nearest town. Women sensibly prefer to go there and exchange the local news while doing their shopping, instead of queueing up anonymously at a supermarket. And the proprietor knows well that personal service has a substantial cash value.
    His prices may be a bit higher than those in the town, but he will deliver anything at any time. His assistants think nothing of bicycling down the village street in their lunch, hour to take a piece of cheese to an old-age pensioner who sent her order by word of mouth with a friend who happened to be passing. The more affluent customers telephone their shopping lists and the goods are on their doorsteps within an hour. They have only to hint at a fancy for some commodity outside the usual stock and the grocer a red-faced figure, instantly obtains it for them.
    The village gains from this sort of enterprise, of course. But I also find it satisfactory because a village shop offers one of the few ways in which a modest individualist can still get along in the world without attaching himself to the big battalions of industry or commerce.
    Most of the village shopkeepers I know, at any rate, are decidedly individualist in their ways. For exampie, our shoemaker is a formidable figure: a thick-set, irritable man whom children treat with marked respect, knowing that an ill-judged word can provoke an angry eruption at any time. He stares with contempt at the pairs of cheap, mass-produced shoes taken to him for repair: has it come to this, he seems to be saying, that he, a craftsman, should have to waste his skills upon such trash? But we all know he will in fact do excellent work upon them. And he makes beautiful shoes for those who can afford such luxury.
The services available in villages nowadays are
选项 A、fewer but still very active.
B、less successful than earlier but managing to survive.
C、active in providing food and antiques.
D、surprisingly energetic considering the little demand for them.
答案D
解析 [解析] 事实细节题。文章首段末尾提到，it was impressive to see the great variety of services...available...。可见，作者对于可以得到的服务种类的繁多感到印象深刻。第二段尾句总结虽然乡村贸易有所缩减，但活力无限，选项[D]里的energetic与原文中的vigor相对应，little demand与原文中的contration相对应，所以[D]同义转述了原文，为答案。原文提到乡村贸易缩减，但并没说services也减少了(fewer)，故排除[A]。[B]项说“不如以前成功但勉强能够生存”，很明显也不对。[C]描述的是原文中提到的superficial traveler的肤浅印象，也是错误表述。
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