Auction，a public sale of property to the highest bidder。（翻译)（)。

A.for the highest price offered

B.at fixed prices

C.at prices lower than their true value

D.at prices offered by the auctioneer

Short Answers

1 Auctions are public sales of goods conducted by an officially approved auctioneer. He

asks the crowd assembled in the auction-room to make offers, or "bids", for the various

items on sale. He encourages buyers to b 记 higher figures, and finally names the highest

bidder as the buyer of the good. Practically all goods whose (lualities vary are sold by

auction. Among these are coffee, skins, wool, tea, furs, species, fruit and vegetables and

wines. Auction sales are also useful for land and property, antique furniture, pictures, rare

kooks, old china and works of art

2 An auction is usually advertised beforehand with full particulars of the articles to be

sold; and where and when they can be viewed by prospective buyers. TI the advertisement

cannot give full details, catalogues are printed, and each group of goods to be sold together,

called a "lot", is usually given a number. The auctioneer need not begin with Lot 1 and

continue in numerical order; he may wait until he registers the fact that certain dealers are in

the rocm and then produces the lots they are likely to be interested in. The auctioneer's

services are paid for in the form. of a percentage of the price the goods

are sold for. The

auctioneer therefore has a direct interest in pushing up the bidding as high as possible

3 The auctioneer must know fairly accurately the current market values of the goods

he is selling, and he should be acquainted with regular buyers of such goods. Fe will not

waste time by starting the bidding too low. He will also play on the rival among his buyers

and succeed in getting a high price by encouraging two business competitors to bid against

each other. It is largely in his advice that a seller will fix a "reserved" price, that is, a price

below which the goods cannot be sold. Even the best auctioneers, however, find it difficult

to stop a 'knock-out", whereby dealers illegally arranged themselves as the only bidder, in

the hope of buying goods at extremely low prices. If such a "knock-out" comes off, the real

auction sale takes place privately afterwards among the dealers

Questions31-35:

31. What are auctinns？

32. What are the goods which can be sold by auction？ (Name at least three)

33. Mhat is a "lot"？

34. How are the auctloneer, s services pa 记 for？

35. What wifl happen if a "knock-out" is achieved？

million at the fine art auctioneers(拍卖), Christie's, in London. The【22】was triple the previous record of ￡ 8 million paid in 1985 for Mantegna's Adoration of the Magi. At least ten bidders【23】for the painting, half【24】telephone, anonymously battling it out in leaps of ￡ 500,000. Van Gogh wrote in a letter of 1889 that one of these Scots or Americans【25】to pay 500 francs--about ￡ 25 at that time-- for【26】a painting.

Christie's chairman【27】reporters after the sale, "it's a rare picture." A spokesman for the firm added, "It's fantastic." Not【28】who was at the auction agreed. One commented, "More money【29】sense."

Many people do【30】uneasy that a picture could be auctioned for such an unbelievable sum. They find distasteful the contrast【31】this sort of money and the impoverished life of the painter【32】Van Gogh, once a lay preacher among the miners of Belgium, was more【33】in producing work that dignified labor than he was in selling for a profit. Depressive, poor, unrecognized and【34】suicidal, he remains a romantic figure in the public【35】.

(41)

A．bought

B．sold

C．displayed

D．shown

Passage Four Questions 36 to 40 are based on the following passage.

In 1854 my great-grandfather, Morris Marable, was sold on an auction block in Georgia for $500. For his white slave master, the sale was just “business as usual.” But to Morris Marable and his heirs, slavery was a crime against our humanity. This pattern of human rights violations against enslaved African-Americans continued under racial segregation for nearly another century.

The fundamental problem of American democracy in the 21st century is the problem of “structural racism” the deep patterns of socio-economic inequality and accumulated disadvantage that are coded by race, and constantly justified in public speeches by both racist stereotypes and white indifference. Do Americans have the capacity and vision to remove these structural barriers that deny democratic rights and opportunities to millions of their fellow citizens？

This country has previously witnessed two great struggles to achieve a truly multicultural democracy.

The First Reconstruction (1865-1877) ended slavery and briefly gave black men voting rights, but gave no meaningful compensation for two centuries of unpaid labor. The promise of “40 acres and a mule (骡子)”was for most blacks a dream deferred (尚未实现的).

The Second Reconstruction (1954-1968), or the modern civil rights movement, ended legal segregation in public accommodations and gave blacks voting rights. But these successes paradoxically obscure the tremendous human costs of historically accumulated disadvantage that remain central to black Americans’ lives.

The disproportionate wealth that most whites enjoy today was first constructed from centuries of unpaid black labor. Many white institutions, including some leading universities, insurance companies and banks, profited from slavery. This pattern of white privilege and black inequality continues today.

Demanding reparations (赔偿) is not just about compensation for slavery and segregation. It is, more important, an educational campaign to highlight the contemporary reality of “racial deficits” of all kinds, the unequal conditions that impact blacks regardless of class. Structural racism’s barriers include “equity inequity.” the absence of black capital formation that is a direct consequence of America’s history. One third of all black households actually have negative net wealth. In 1998 the typical black family’s net wealth was $16,400, less than one fifth that of white families. Black families are denied home loans at twice the rate of whites.

Blacks remain the last hired and first fired during recessions. During the 1990-91 recession, African-Americans suffered disproportionately. At Coca-Cola, 42 percent of employees who lost their jobs were blacks. At Sears, 54 percent were black, Blacks have significantly shorter life spans, in part due to racism in the health establishment. Blacks are statistically less likely than whites to be referred for kidney transplants or early-stage cancer surgery.

36. To the author, the auction of his great-grandfather is a typical example of ________.

A) crime against humanity

B) unfair business transaction

C) racial conflicts in Georgia

D) racial segregation in America

I sold all my houses ().

A、in auction

B、by auction

C、at auction

D、to auction

此题为判断题(对，错)。

此题为判断题(对，错)。