King Juan Carlos of Spain once insisted “kings don’t abdicate, they dare in their sleep.” But embarrassing scandals and the popularity of the republican left in the recent Euro-elections have forced him to eat his words and stand down. So, does the Spanish crisis suggest that monarchy is seeing its last days? Does that mean the writing is on the wall for all European royals, with their magnificent uniforms and majestic lifestyle? 

The Spanish case provides arguments both for and against monarchy. When public opinion is particularly polarised, as it was following the end of the Franco regime, monarchs can rise above “mere” politics and “embody” a spirit of national unity. 

It is this apparent transcendence of politics that explains monarchs’ continuing popularity polarized. And also, the Middle East excepted, Europe is the most monarch-infested region in the world, with 10 kingdoms (not counting Vatican City and Andorra). But unlike their absolutist counterparts in the Gulf and Asia, most royal families have survived because they allow voters to avoid the difficult search for a non-controversial but respected public figure. 

Even so, kings and queens undoubtedly have a downside. Symbolic of national unity as they claim to be, their very history—and sometimes the way they behave today – embodies outdated and indefensible privileges and inequalities. At a time when Thomas Piketty and other economists are warning of rising inequality and the increasing power of inherited wealth, it is bizarre that wealthy aristocratic families should still be the symbolic heart of modern democratic states. 

The most successful monarchies strive to abandon or hide their old aristocratic ways. Princes and princesses have day-jobs and ride bicycles, not horses (or helicopters). Even so, these are wealthy families who party with the international 1%, and media intrusiveness makes it increasingly difficult to maintain the right image. 

While Europe’s monarchies will no doubt be smart enough to survive for some time to come, it is the British royals who have most to fear from the Spanish example. 

It is only the Queen who has preserved the monarchy’s reputation with her rather ordinary (if well-heeled) granny style. The danger will come with Charles, who has both an expensive taste of lifestyle. and a pretty hierarchical view of the world. He has failed to understand that monarchies have largely survived because they provide a service – as non-controversial and non-political heads of state. Charles ought to know that as English history shows, it is kings, not republicans, who are the monarchy’s worst enemies. 

 21. According to the first two Paragraphs, King Juan Carlos of Spain

Write an essay of 160-200 words based on the following drawing. In your essay you should 

1) describe the drawing briefly

2) explain its intended meaning, and

3) give your comments

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You are going to host a club reading session. Write an email of about 100 words recommending a book to the club members. You should state reasons for your recommendation. You should write neatly on the ANSWER SHEET. Do not sign your own name at the end of the letter. Use Li Ming instead. Do not write the address. 

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Within the span of a hundred years, in the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, a tide of emigration—one of the great folk wanderings of history—swept from Europe to America. 46) This movement, driven by powerful and diverse motivations, built a nation out of a wilderness and, by its nature, shaped the character and destiny of an uncharted continent. 

47) The United States is the product of two principal forces-the immigration of European peoples with their varied ideas, customs, and national characteristics and the impact of a new country which modified these traits. Of necessity, colonial America was a projection of Europe. Across the Atlantic came successive groups of Englishmen, Frenchmen, Germans, Scots, Irishmen, Dutchmen, Swedes, and many others who attempted to transplant their habits and traditions to the new world. 

48) But, the force of geographic conditions peculiar to America, the interplay of the varied national groups upon one another, and the sheer difficulty of maintaining old-world ways in a raw, new continent caused significant changes. These changes were gradual and at first scarcely visible. But the result was a new social pattern which, although it resembled European society in many ways, had a character that was distinctly American. 

49) The first shiploads of immigrants bound for the territory which is now the United States crossed the Atlantic more than a hundred years after the 15th- and 16th-century explorations of North America. In the meantime, thriving Spanish colonies had been established in Mexico, the West Indies, and South America. These travelers to North America came in small, unmercifully overcrowded craft. During their six- to twelve-week voyage, they subsisted on barely enough food allotted to them. Many of the ship were lost in storms, many passengers died of disease, and infants rarely survived the journey. Sometimes storms blew the vessels far off their course, and often calm brought unbearably long delay. 

“To the anxious travelers the sight of the American shore brought almost inexpressible relief.” said one recorder of events, “The air at twelve leagues’ distance smelt as sweet as a new-blown garden.” The colonists’ first glimpse of the new land was a sight of dense woods. 50) The virgin forest with its richness and variety of trees was a veritable real treasure-house which extended from Maine all the way down to Georgia. Here was abundant fuel and lumber. Here was the raw material of houses and furniture, ships and potash, dyes and naval stores. 

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