In the Classroom [iə — ea]

A: Excuse me for interfering, is there a spare chair?

B: Yes, merely come in and sit here near us. You may be interested

in this sphere.

A: No, thanks. I'm sorry. But we need a chair there.

B: Where?

A: Downstairs.

Joan: Joe! Joe! Joe! Hello!

Joe (groans): Oh! What is it, Joan?

Joan: Look out of the window.

Joe: No. My eyes are closed, and I'm going to go to sleep again.

Joan: Don't go to sleep, Joe, look at the snow!

Joe: Snow? But it's only October. I know there's no snow.

Joan: Come over to the window, Joe.

Joe: You're joking Joan. There's no snow.

Joan: Oh, I'll put my coat on and go out and make a snowball and throw it at your nose, Joe Jones!

3.5. Texts

THREE MEN IN A BOAT

By Jerome K. Jerome

Extract 1

They upset salt over everything, and as for the butter! I never saw ↑two men do more with one and two pence worth of butter in my ↑whole life than they did. After George had got it off his slipper, they tried to put it in the kettle.

It wouldn't go in and what was in wouldn't come out. They ↓did scrape it out at last and put it down on a chair and Harris sat on it and it stuck to him and they went looking for it all over the room.

"I'll take my oath I put it down on that chair, said George, staring at the empty seat.

"I saw you do it my self not a minute ago, said Harris.

Then they started round the room again looking for it, and then they met again in the centre, and stared at one another.

"Most extraordinary thing I ever heard of, said |George.

"So mysterious!" said Harris.

Then George got round at the back of Harris and saw it.

"Why, here it is all the time, he exclaimed indignantly.

'"Where?" cried Harris, spinning round.

"Stand still, can't you, roared George, flying after him.

And they got it off and packed it in the teapot. ↓Montmorency was in it all, of course. ↓Montmorency's am bition in life is to get in the way and be sworn at. If he can ↓squirm in anywhere where he particularly is ↑not wanted, and be a perfect nuisance, and make people mad, and have things thrown at his head ↑then he feels his day has ↑not been wasted.

Extract 2

His victim was a large black Tom. I never saw a larger cat, nor a more disreputable-looking cat. It had lost half its tail, one of its ears, and a fairly appreciable proportion of its nose. It was along, sinewy looking animal. It had a calm, contented air about it.

Montmorency went for that poor cat at the rate of twenty miles an hour; but the cat did not hurry up—did not seem to have grasped the idea that its life was in danger. It trotted quietly on, until its would-be assassin was within a yard of it, and then it turned round and sat down in the middle of the road, and looked at Montmorency with a gentle, inquiring expression, that said:

"Yes, you want me?"

Montmorency does not lack pluck; but there was something about the look of that cat that might have chilled the heart of the bold­est dog. He stopped abruptly, and looked back at Tom.

↓Neither .spoke; but the conversation that one could imagine was clearly as follows:

The Cat: "Can I do anything for you?"

Montmorency: "No— no thanks."

The Cat: "Don't you mind speaking, if you really want anything, you know.”

Montmorency backing down the High Street “Oh, no – not at all certainly don't ↓you trouble. I – I’m afraid I've ↓made a mistake. I thought I knew you. Sorry I disturbed you."

The Cat: "Not at all quite a pleasure. Sure you don't want anything, now?"

Montmorency (still backing): “Not at all, thanks not at all ↓very kind of you. Good morning."

THE MAN OF PROPERTY

By John Galsworthy

(an extract)

"A Forsyte, replied young Jolyon is ↓not an un common animal. There are hundreds among the members of this Club. Hundreds out there in the streets, you meet them wherever you go!" .

"And how do you tell them, may I ask?" said Bosinney.

"By their sense of property. A Forsyte takes a practical — one might say a ↑common sense view of things, and a ↓prac­tical view of things is based ↑funda mentally on a sense of property. A Forsyte, you will notice, never gives himself a way."

“Joking?"

Young Jolyon's eye twinkled.

"Not much. As a Forsyte my self, I have, no business to talk. But I'm a kind of ↓thoroughbred mongrel; now, there’s ↓no mistaking you. You're as different from me as I am from my Uncle James, who is the ↓perfect specimen of a For­syte. His sense of property is extreme, while you have prac­tically none. Without me in between, you would seem like a different species. I'm the missing link. We are, of course all of us the slaves of property, and I admit that it's a ↓question of degree, but what I call a Forsyte is a ↓man who is de↑cidedly more than less a slave of property. He knows a ↓good thing, he knows a safe thing, and his grip on prop­erty it doesn't matter whether it be wives houses money or reputation is his 'hall-mark."

A TELEPHONE CONVERSATION

Ann: Hal↑lo is that ↑you, Mary? How ↓are you? Why didn’t you go to classes yesterday?

Mary: Hal↑lo, Ann. I felt ↑very ↓ill ↑yesterday. I couldn't ↑even get↓up.

Ann: What was the ↓matter with you?

Mary: I don't ↓know, I haven't seen the doctor ↑yet. I had a high ↓temperature.

Ann: Can you go to the Institute to ↑day?

Mary: ↓No, I'm a fraid I ↓can't. The doctor's coming this ↓morning. I feel I should ↑stay in bed for a ↑few↓days. I'm very sorry I have to t miss sev­eral ↓lectures.

Ann: That's all ↑right. You mustn't come if you are↑ill. You should certainly stay in ↓bed. You can have my ↓notes if you ↑like. Can I come to ↑see you today?

Mary: ↓Certainly. Please come round after ↓classes.

Ann: I'm ↓sor↑ry, but I have to go to the ↓library after ↑classes to get some ↓books for my ↓talk.

Mary: "↓Don't go to the ↑library. I’ve got a ↑lot of interesting books at ↓home. You can take ↓any of them.

.Ann: All ↑right. Can I get to your place by the 41 ↑tram?

Mary: ↓Yes, but ↓don't come by ↓tram. There's a new underground ↑station near my ↓house ↑now.