Appendix

1. Read the following tongue-twisters. Practise saying them as quickly as possible, learn them by heart.

Whether the weather be fine

Or whether the weather be not

Whether the weather be cold

Or whether the weather be hot

We'll weather the weather

Whatever the weather

Whether we like it or not.

2. Read and translate the poem.

Afternoon in February

by Henry W.Longfellow

The day is ending,

The night is descending;

The marsh is frozen,

The river dead.

Through clouds like ashes

The red sun flashes

On village windows

That grimmer red.

The snow recommences;

The buried fences

Mark no longer

The road o'er the plain.

3. Read and translate the dialogue below.

Olaf: Why do English people so often say something about the weather when they begin a conversation with strangers?

Mr. Green: Well, of course, in England the weather's always changing. We never know what to expect. If you were in a country where the weather doesn't change much, it would be difficult to say much about it. But you asked why we talk about the weather to strangers. That's an interesting question. It's probably because the weather's a subject it's quite safe to talk about. It's a way of reaching agreement. I begin by saying, "A cold morning, isn't it?" The other man says, "It certainly is". I say, "It's been cold all week", and the other man says, "Yes, we're having a very cold spring". So far we've agreed about everything. Perhaps I make a remark about something I've seen in the newspaper. I say, perhaps, "I see the Italians have beaten us at football again". The other man says, "Yes, seven-nil this time". Well, when we've exchanged remarks on subjects of this kind, on which there can be no disagreement, we're beginning to feel friendly. If we'd started with subjects on which disagreement was possible, politics, for example, we might not have become friendly. Language isn't used only for giving or asking for facts.

Mrs.Green: Remarks about the weather are a safe way of opening communication with a stranger. When I go abroad, to a country where I can't speak the language, I always try to learn a few phrases, like "Good morning", "Good afternoon", "Isn't it a nice day", "Please" and "Thank you". People are suspicious of strangers who are completely silent.

Mr.Green: Oh,yes. These words are certainly useful when you come to this country. (A.S. Hornby. Oxford Progressve English for Adult Learners)

3. Read and translate the story.

Weather Forecast

George took the paper, and read us out the weather forecast which promised "rain, cold, wet to fine, occasional local thunderstorms, east wind, with general depression over Midland Counties (London and Channel). Bar falling".

I think that all this silly, irritating tomfoolishness which plagues us, this "weather forecast" fraud is the most aggravating. It "forecasts" what happened yesterday or the day before, and just the opposite of what is going to happen today.

I remember how a holiday of mine was completely ruined one day late autumn because we paid attention to the weather report of the local newspaper. "Heavy showers, with thunderstorms, may be expected today", it said on Monday, and so we gave up our picnic, and stopped indoors all day waiting for the rain. And people passed the house going off merrily, the sun shone out and there was not a cloud in the sky.

"Ah!" We said, as we stood looking out at them through the window, "they will come home soaked!"

And we chuckled when we thought how wet they were going to get, and came back and stirred the fire and got our books. At twelve o'clock the sun was pouring into the room and the heat became quite oppressive, and we wondered, when those heavy showers and occasional thunderstorms were going to begin.

"Ah! They'll come in the afternoon", we said to each other. "Oh, won't those people get wet!"

At one o'clock the landlady came in and asked if we weren't going out as it was such a lovely day.

"No, no", we replied with a knowing chuckle, "not we. We don't mean to get wet - nо, no".

And when the afternoon was nearly gone, and still there was no sign of rain, we tried to cheer ourselves up with the idea that it would come down all at once, just as the people had started for home, and were out of the reach of any shelter, and that they would thus get more drenched than ever. But not a drop fell, and it was a grand day, and a lovely night after it.

The next morning we read that it was going to be a "warm, fine day; much heat", and we dressed ourselves in flimsy things, and went out, and, half-an-hour after we started, it began to rain hard, and a bitterly cold wind sprang up and both kept steadily for the whole day, and we came home with colds and rheumatism all over us and went to bed.

The weather is a thing that is beyond me. I never can understand it. The barometer is useless; it is as misleading as the newspaper forecast.

There was one hanging up in a hotel at Oxford at which I was staying last spring, and, when I got there it was pointing to "set fair". It was simply pouring with rain outside, and had been all day; and I couldn't quite make matters out. I tapped the barometer, and it jumped up and pointed to "very dry". A man stopped as he was passing and said he expected it meant tomorrow. I fancied that maybe it was thinking of the week before last.

I tapped it again the next morning, and it went up still higher, and the rain came down faster than ever. On Wednesday I went and hit it again, and the pointer went round towards "set fair", "very dry", and "much heat", until it stopped by the peg, and couldn't go any further.

Meanwhile, the rain came down in a steady torrent, and the lower part of the town was under water as the river has overflowed.

Somebody said that it was evident we were going to have a prolonged spell of grand weather some time ...

The fine weather never came that summer. I think that the instrument perhaps referred to the following spring.

Then there are those new styles of barometers, the long, straight ones. I never can make head or tail of them.

But then who wants to know what the weather is going to be? It is bad enough when it comes. The prophet we like is the old man who, on the gloomy-looking morning of some day when we want it to be fine, looks round the horizon with a knowing eye, and says:

"Oh, no, sir, I think it will clear up all right. It will break all right enough, sir".

"Ah, he knows", we say as we wish him good morning, and start off; "wonderful how these old fellows can ten!"

And we feel an affection for that man which is not at all lessened when it does not clear up but continues to rain steadily all day. "Ah, well", we feel, "he did his best".

For the man that prophesies us bad weather, on the contrary, we entertain only bitter and revengeful thoughts.

"Going to clear up, do you think?" we shout cheerily as we pass.

"Well, no, sir; I'm afraid it's settled down for the day", he replies, shaking his head.

"Stupid old fool!" we mutter, "what he knows about it?" And, if his portent is correct, we come back feeling still more angry against him and with a vague notion that somehow or other he has got something to do with it.

It was too bright and sunny on this special morning when George read about "Bar falling", "atmospheric disturbance, passing in an oblique line over Southern Europe", and "pressure increasing" and he could not make us wretched. So he sneaked the cigarette that I had carefully rolled up for myself and went.

(After Jerome K. Jerome)