Use of english Part I

Read the text below and decide which answer (А, В, С or D) best fits each gap. There is an example at the beginning.

The Orient Express

In 1867, a wealthy Belgian called Georges Nagelmackers took a long (0) … across the United States in one of George Pullman's transcontinental trains with their rubber shock absorbers and luxurious compartments. Before the 1860s, train carriages were little more than boxes on wheels, in which passengers were (1) ... jolted around. The revolutionary Pullman sleepers meant that Americans could now travel from one side of their vast country to the other in (2) …. comfort.

Realising how (3) … it would be to be able to travel across Europe in similar (4) …. , Nagelmackers spent the next decade (5) …. with the authorities to allow his own specially designed sleeper trains to cross European (6) … .

It was not until 1919 that Nagelmackers' dream of a fast, first-class service from Paris in the west to Constantinople in the east finally became (7) … .The Orient Express, as this train is called, immediately (8) …. the imagination of the public and became the subject of (9) … tales and legends. Not just the fictional James Bond in From Russia with Love, but many real-life spies are known to have (10) …. out secret assignments on the train, and a (11) … element in the plot of Agatha Christie's novel Murder on the Orient Express is based on an actual incident from 1929.

For half a century, the train flourished. As passenger flights gradually replaced rail travel, (12) … , the Orient Express became increasingly uncompetitive and only a few carriages remain today.

0. A. passage	B. voyage	C. expedition	D. trip
1. A. painfully	B. harmfully	C. wrongfully	D. hurtfully
2. A. high	B. entire	C. total	D. major
3. A. fair	B. advantageous	C. accessible	D. suitable
4. A. custom	B. method	C. style	D. form
5. A. discussing	B. dealing	C. contracting	D. negotiating
6. A. borders	B. limits	C. lines	D. margins
7. A. practice	B. reality	C. truth	D. certainty
8. A. took	B. kept	C. pulled	D. caught
9. A. immeasurable	B. countless	C. immense	D. infinite
10. A. held	B. brought	C. carried	D. sent
11. A. compulsory	B. crucial	C. primary	D. necessary
12. A. nonetheless	B. however	C. moreover	D. additionally

Part II

For questions 1-15, read the text below and think of the word which best fits each gap. Use only one word in each gap. There is an example at the beginning (0).