5441336990

EGZAMIN Z JĘZYKA ANGIELSKIEGO POZIOM B2 CZERWIEC 20XX CZAS 120 MIN

IMIĘ I NAZWISKO_

ROK I KIERUNEK STUDIÓW_

I	READING	40
II	USE OF NGLISH	40
III	WRITING	20
	TOTAL	100

I READING COMPREHENSION

PART ONE

Ex 1. Read the text below. Some of its sentences, A-H, have been removed. Put them in their correct places. There łs one extra sentence you do not need to use.

TULIPMANIA

I. Greed, desire, anguish and devotion all played a part in the development of the tulip from a wild flower of Central Asia and the Caucasus to the worldwide phenomenon it is today. When merchants first bought it to the flower markets of Europę, it caused a sensation. Only the rise of football as a spectator sport could draw people’s interest away from the thousands of intensely competitive tulip growers’ societies that existed in England in the nineteenth century. ( 0 - H )

II. Holland was the setting for perhaps the most mysterious of these events. What might be

called “Tulipmania” engulfed the country in the 1630s and has puzzled historians and economists ever sińce. Before tulipmania took hołd, a bulb sold for 46 guilders. Within a month, the price had risen from 60 guilders to 1,800 guilders. At the height of the fever, one bulb could sell for the equivalent of 15 years’ wages for the average Amsterdam bricklayer. (1 -......)

III. It was partly a matter of timing. The Dutch East India Company had been set up in 1602

and this, combined with AmsterdanTs increasing importance as a port, marked the beginning of an era of great prosperity for the Dutch. Merchants got rich and so did lawyers, doctors, pharmacists and jewellers. ( 2 -.......)

IV. And the flower itself had a uniąue trick that added dangerously to its other attractions.

( 3 -.......) A plain red tulip might emerge the following spring looking completely different with its

petals feathered and flamed in intricate patterns of white and deep red. Though tulip lovers of the time did not know it, these “breaks” were caused by a virus spread by insects. It was not until the 1920s and the invention of the electron microscope that the mystery was solved.

V. ( 4 -.......) Some, taking the advice of contemporary alchemists, laid powdered paint on

their tulip beds, expecting the colours miraculously to affect the flowers. It was no stranger than the alchemists’ own attempts to turn base metal into gold. In fact, it was rather better, for while the alchemists consistently failed, the tulip growers occasionally succeeded. They just did not know why.

VI. Connoisseurs had always rated “broken” flowers morę highly than plain-coloured ones.

For that reason, the broken flowers were the ones that commanded outrageous prices. But the

virus was the joker in the tulip bed. ( 5 -.......) Virus-weakened tulips did not reproduce as ffeely

and vigorously as virus-free bulbs and that, too, increased their value.

VII. Though other European countries experienced similar bouts of tulipmania, the Dutch

soon came to lead the world in tulip cultivation. ( 6 -.......) The Dutchman Carolus Clusius