Read the poem “The world is too much with us”, by William Wordsworth, and answer the question.

1 The world is too much with us; late and soon

2 Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers:

3 Little see in nature that is ours;

4 We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon:

5 The sea that bares her bosom to the moon;

6 The winds that will be howling at all hours,

7 And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers;

8 For this, for everything we are out of tune;

9 It moves us not. - Great God! I'd rather be

10 A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn;

11 So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,

12 Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;

13 Have sights of Proteus rising from the sea;

14 Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn.

The Pocket Book of Verse - Great English and American Poems

The road not taken

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,

And sorry I could not travel both

And be one traveler, long I stood

And looked down one as far as I could

To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,

And having perhaps the better claim,

Because it was grassy and wanted wear;

Though as for that the passing there

Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay

In leaves no step had trodden black.

Oh, I kept the first for another day!

Yet knowing how way leads on to way,

I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages hence:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.

RIEDINGER, E. A. A brief view of American Literature. São Paulo: Waldir Lima, s/a.

The poem expresses

To travel or not to travel? A Swine Flu Dilemma

Fearing that their vacations could comprise of surf, sand and swine flu, potential travelers are turning to health organizations for guidance on whether to pack their bags or stay home. And while opinions from health officials have come thick and fast, their often contradictory advice doesn’t make it any easier to decide whether to fly or not to fly.

On Monday, the European Union’s health commissioner Androulla Vassiliou told reporters in Luxembourg that she was ‘’not worried at this stage’’ about a pandemic sweeping across Europe, but she urged travelers to avoid Mexico and the United States anyway. That prompted a swift rebuke from Richard Besser, the acting director of the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in Atlanta, who rejected her advisory as ‘’quite premature’’. Even so, the CDC website ‘’recommends that U.S. travelers avoid all nonessential travel to Mexico”. As for the World Health Organization, it’s calling on nations to keep their borders open and to avoid restricting international travel, and emphasizes that a pandemic is not evitable. Despite that plea, Argentina and Cuba have suspended all flights from Mexico, and tour operators and airlines across the globe – including some based in Canada, Germany and the U.K. – have canceled flights and holiday packages to sunshine destinations like Cancún and Cozumel.

Available at < http://www.time.com/health/article/0,8599,1894660,00.html/ >,

visited on June 26, 2009.

Consider the following statements related to the text in order to answer question.

I. Health officials are not in agreement about how to instruct people to behave concerning the swine flu.

II. Health authorities, both in the United States and in Europe, are advising people to avoid traveling to Mexico.

III. The World Health Organization is instructing nations to maintain the normal flow of international traveling.

IV. All health organizations agree about the risks of a pandemic.

According to the text, which statements are correct?

Ten things not to do in New York

If you’re planning a trip to New York City, you need travel advice from someone who knows her way around. Because while there’s a lot to do in New York City plenty of iconic places to eat and drink and see there are also a lot of things not to do: crowded tourist traps, overhyped eateries, and not-so-authentic experiences are among the ones you should feel free to skip, especially if your time in town is limited. (On the other hand, even locals agree that a few of New York City’s most famous tourist attractions are actually worth every elbow bump, every admission dollar, and every minute you spend in line: the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Statue of Liberty, and Ellis Island, to name a few).

What not to do in New York is a touchy subject that’s bound to inspire some strong reactions. Which is precisely why we couldn’t resist putting forth our own list: Like most New Yorkers, the Concierge.com staff has an opinion or two (or two thousand) about what’s really worth doing and what’s not. For your enjoyment, outrage and debate, therefore, there are ten of New York’s most played-out, overrated, nonessential nonatractions - and what to do instead. Take it from the locals.

Available at < http://www.concierge.com/ideas/hotspot/tours/500723 >, visited on June 26, 2009.

Which of the alternatives presents the same use of the pronoun WHICH as in the sentence: “Which is precisely why we couldn’t resist putting forth our own list”?

Read the poem “The world is too much with us”, by William Wordsworth, and answer the question.

1 The world is too much with us; late and soon

2 Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers:

3 Little see in nature that is ours;

4 We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon:

5 The sea that bares her bosom to the moon;

6 The winds that will be howling at all hours,

7 And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers;

8 For this, for everything we are out of tune;

9 It moves us not. - Great God! I'd rather be

10 A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn;

11 So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,

12 Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;

13 Have sights of Proteus rising from the sea;

14 Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn.

The Pocket Book of Verse - Great English and American Poems

It is correct to state that one of the main ideas expressed in the poem is that

Read the following excerpt from Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The scarlet letter in order to answer the question.

The scarlet letter

‘’The door of the jail being flung open from within, there appeared, in first place, like a black shadow emerging into the sunshine, the grim and grisly presence of a guard, with a sword by his side. This personage prefigured and represented in his aspect the whole dismal severity of the Puritanic code of law, which it was his business to administer in its final and closest application to the offender. Stretching forth his left hand, he laid his right upon the shoulder of a young woman, whom he thus drew forward; until, on the edge of the prison door, she repelled him, by an action marked with natural dignity and force of character, and stepped into the open air, as if by her own free will. She bore in her arms a child, a baby some three months old, who winked and turned aside its little face from the too vivid light of day; because its existence, until now, had brought it acquainted only with the gray twilight of a dungeon, or other darksome apartment on the prison.

When the young woman – the mother of this child – stood fully revealed before the crowd, it seemed to be her first impulse to clasp the infant closely to her bosom; not so much by an impulse of motherly affection, as that thereby she might conceal a certain token, which was wrought or fastened into her dress. In a moment, however, wisely judging that one token of her shame would but poorly serve to hide another, she took the baby on her arm, and, with a burning blush, and yet a haughty smile, and a glance that would not be abashed, looked around at her townspeople and neighbors. On the breast of her gown, in fine red cloth, surrounded with an elaborate embroidery and fantastic flourishes of gold thread, appeared the letter ‘’A’’. It was so artistically done, and with so much fertility and gorgeous luxuriance decoration to the apparel which she wore; and which was of a splendor in accordance with the taste of the age, but greatly beyond what was allowed by the regulations of the colony.

The young woman was tall, with a figure of perfect elegance, on a large scale. She had dark and abundant hair, so glossy that it threw off the sunshine with a gleam, and a face which, besides being beautiful from regularity of feature and richness of complexion, had the impressiveness belonging to a marked brow and deep black eyes. She was lady-like, too, after the manner of the feminine gentility of those days; characterized by a certain state and dignity, rather than by the delicate, evanescent, and indescribable grace, which is now recognized as its indication. And never had Hester Prynne appeared more lady-like, in the antique interpretation of the term, than as she issued from the prison. Those who had before known her, and had expected to behold her dimmed and obscured by a disastrous cloud, were astonished, and even startled, to perceive how her beauty shone out, and made a halo of the misfortune and ignominy in which she was enveloped. It may be true, that, to a sensitive observer, there was something exquisitely painful in it. Her attire, which, indeed, she had wrought for the occasion, in prison, and had modeled much after her own fancy, seemed to express the attitude of her spirit, the desperate recklessness of her mood, by its wild and picturesque peculiarity. But the point which drew all the eyes of the surrounding crowd, and, as it were, transfigured the wearer, - so that both men and women who had been familiarly acquainted with Hester Prynne, were now impressed as if they beheld her for the first time, - was that SCARLET LETTER, fantastically embroidered and illuminated upon her bosom. It had the effect of a spell, taking her out of the ordinary relations with humanity, and inclosing her in a sphere by herself”.

HAWTHORNE, N. The scarlet letter. New York: Dover Publications, 1994.

Considering the passage, it is possible to state about Hester’s character and about her attitude towards the severity of the puritan code of law, that

Considering the use and possible structures of cleft sentences, the alternative in which ONE of the sentences in the pair is NOT CORRECT is