It was midnight in Pairs and we were rolling toward the Avenue Bosguet. As we came to the Pont Alexander III, the cab slowed down, for the traffic light was red against us, and then, without stopping, we sailed through the red light in a sudden burst of speed. The same performance was repeated at the AlmaBridge. As I paid the driver, I asked him why he had driven through two red lights.
“You ought to be ashamed of yourself, breaking the law and endangering your life that way,”I protested(抗议).
He looked at me, astonished.“Ashamed of myself? I am a law-abiding(遵纪守法的) citizen and have no desire to get killed either.”He cut me off before I could protest.
“No, just listen to me before you complain. What did I do? Went through a red light. Well, did you ever stop to consider what a red light is, what it means?”
“Certainly.”I replied.“It is a stop signal and means that traffic is falling in the opposite direction.”
“Half-right,”said the driver,“but incomplete. It is only an automatic signal. And it does not mean that there is cross traffic. Did you see any cross traffic during our trip? Of course not. I slowed down the light, looked carefully to the right and to the left. Not another car on streets at this hour. Well, then! What would you have me do? Should I stop like a dumb animal because an automatic, brainless machine turns red every forty seconds? No, monsieur(先生),”he thundered, hitting the door with a huge fist.“I am a man, not a machine. I have eyes and a brain and judgment, given by God. It would be a sin(过失) against nature to surrender(使屈服) them to the dictates of a machine. Ashamed of myself, you say I would only be ashamed of myself if I let those blinking lamps do my thinking for me. Good night, monsieur.”
Is this bad, or is this good? Frankly I am no longer sure. I never doubted that it was wrong to drive through a red light, but now I find my old Anglo-Saxon standards somewhat shaken.
1．At the Alma Bridge _______.
A．the writer stopped the cab and paid the driver
B．the cab went through a red light again
C．there was a performance the writer had already watched
D．the writer began to scold the driver
2．The chief reason that the driver dared to drive through the red light was that ______.
A．he found there was no cross traffic there and then
B．he thought it a shame to be controlled by a machine
C．he knew no others would see him at this hour
D．he didn’t trust any brainless machine
3．According to the passage, the driver thought what he had done is_______.
A．law-abiding
B．law-breaking
C．something to be proud of
D．something to be ashamed of
4．The writer is probably _______.
A．an old man B．a French person
C．an English person D．an American
Key：
1．B 由文中第一段倒数第三行“The same performance was repeated at the Alma Bridge”明显看出B为最佳答案。
2．A 由文中第六段开头“答案不完全对，它仅仅是一个自动信号，它并不意味着有车经过……我在红灯前慢下来，仔细地看了看左右……”可以得出A为正确答案。
3．C 由文中倒数第二段倒数第二行“I would only be ashamed of myself if I let those blinking lamps do my thinking for me”可以看出C为最佳答案。
4．C 由文中最后一段最后一句“…I find my old Anglo-Saxon standards…”可以看出C为正确答案。
