Reading 23

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Icebergs are among nature’s most spectacular creations, and yet most people have never seen one. A vague air of mystery envelops them. They come into being somewhere-in faraway, frigid waters, amid thunderous noise and splashing turbulence, which in most cases no one hears or sees. They exist only a short time and then slowly waste away just a unnoticed.

Objects of sheerest beauty, they have been called. Appearing in an endless variety of shapes they may be dazzlingly white, or they may be glassy blue, green. or purple, tinted faintly or in darker hues. They are graceful, stately, inspiring-in calm, sunlit seas.

But they are also called frightening and dangerous, and that they are-in the night, in the fog, and in storms. Even in clear weather one is wise to stay a safe distance away from them. Most of their bulk is hidden below the water, so their underwater parts may extend out far beyond the visible top. Also, they may roll over unexpectedly, churning the waters around them.

Icebergs are parts of glaciers that break off, drift into the water, float about awhile, and finally melt. Icebergs afloat today are made of snowflakes that have fallen over long ages of time. They embody snows that drifted down hundreds, or many thousands, or in some cases maybe a million years ago. The snows fell in polar regions and on cold mountains, where they melted only a little or not at all, and so collected to great depths over the years and centuries.

As each year’s snow accumulation lay on the surface, evaporation and melting caused the snowflakes slowly to lose their feathery points and become tiny grains of ice. When new snow fell on top of the old, it too turned to icy grains. So blankets of snow and ice grains mounted layer upon layer and were of such great thickness that the weight of the upper layers compressed the lower ones. With time and pressure from above, the many small ice grains joined and changed to larger crystals, and eventually the deeper crystals merged into a solid mass of ice.

1. Which of the following is the best title for the passage?

(A) The Melting of Icebergs (B) The Nature and Origin of Icebergs

2. The author states that icebergs are rarely seen because they are

(A) surrounded by fog

(B) hidden beneath the mountains

(D) broken by waves soon after they are formed

3. The passage mentions all of the following colors for icebergs EXCEPT

(A) yellow (B) blue (C) green (D) purple

4. According to the passage, icebergs are dangerous because they

(A) usually melt quickly (B) can turn over very suddenly

5. According to the passage, icebergs originate from a buildup of

(A) turbulent water (B) feathers

6. The formation of an iceberg is most clearly analogous to which of the following activities?

(A) Walking on fluffy new snow, causing it to become more compact and icy

(B) Plowing large areas of earth, leaving the land flat and barren

(D) Blowing snow into one large pile to clear an area

7. In line 23, the expression "from above" refers to

(A) sunlit seas (B) polar regions

8. The attitude of the author toward icebergs is one of

(A) disappointment (B) humor (C) disinterest (D) wonder

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