4Th February

Dear Daddy-Long-Legs,

Jimmie McBride has sent me a Princeton banner as big as one end of the room; I am very grateful to him for remembering me, but I don't know what on earth to do with it. Sallie and Julia won't let me hang it up; our room this year is furnished in red, and you can imagine what an effect we'd have if I added orange and black. But it's such nice, warm, thick felt, I hate to waste it. Would it be very improper to have it made into a bath robe? My old one shrank when it was washed.

I've entirely omitted of late telling you what I am learning, but though you might not imagine it from my letters, my time is exclusively occupied with study. It's a very bewildering matter to get educated in five branches at once.

'The test of true scholarship,' says Chemistry Professor, 'is a painstaking passion for detail.'

'Be careful not to keep your eyes glued to detail,' says History Professor. 'Stand far enough away to get a perspective of the whole.'

You can see with what nicety we have to trim our sails between chemistry and history. I like the historical method best. If I say that William the Conqueror came over in 1492, and Columbus discovered America in 1100 or 1066 or whenever it was, that's a mere detail that the Professor overlooks. It gives a feeling of security and restfulness to the history recitation, that is entirely lacking in chemistry.

Sixth-hour bell – I must go to the laboratory and look into a little matter of acids and salts and alkalis. I've burned a hole as big as a plate in the front of my chemistry apron, with hydrochloric acid. If the theory worked, I ought to be able to neutralize that hole with good strong ammonia, oughtn't I?

Examinations next week, but who's afraid?

Yours ever,

Judy

TASKS

1. Read the text and find in it the words and word combinations from the list, supply them with Russian equivalents.

to be in command of the situation

to run for president

a politician

to engage sb’s attention/leisure

to count

an employee

a plain girl

to limp

to rub sb the right way

to descend from

a cookie jar

a bath robe

to shrink

to have a painstaking passion for detail

2. Learn these words and expression by heart and be ready for the oral translation of sentences with them.

3. Translate the underlined passages.

4. Express the opposite idea using the words from ex.1.

- to rub sb the wrong way

- unusual, extraordinary

- to lose control of the situation

- an employer

5. Explain in English the meanings of these:

- to run for president

- politician

- cookie

- bath robe

- passion

6. Complete the sentences with the words in ex. 1

1. This man is a prominent politician, they say he is___________________________this year.

2. It’s important for sociologists to know how people____________their_____________.

3.They__________________from a very old family: their______________are related to some kind of duke or prince.

4. My sweater____________________when I washed it. What a shame!

5. After all in language learning it’s the particulars that________________.