Unit 61.

 Some villagers were going to celebrate an important wine festival in a few day's time, so they borrowed a huge barrel from the nearest town, put it in the village square, and determined that each of them should empty a bottle of the best wine he had into it, so that there should be plenty at the feast.

 One of the villagers thought he would be very clever. "If I pour a bottle of water in, instead of wine, no one will notice it," he said to himself, "because there will be so much excellent wine in the barrel that the water will be lost in it".

 The night of the feast arrived. Everybody gathered in the village square with their jugs and their glasses for the wine. The tap on the barrel was opened, but what came out was pure water. Everyone in the village had had the same idea.

 Unit 62.

 Can you think of sentence in which the word "and" appears five times, without any words in between? There is one at the end of this story.

 There was once an inn which was called "The horse and Cart". It had the sign outside it which had a picture of a horse and cart on it, but the sign was getting very old, so the owner of the inn decided to have a new one made. He went to a painter and asked him to paint one, and to write "The Horse and Cart" on it in large letters.

 A few days later, he went to see how painter was getting on. He liked the picture of the horse and cart very much, but he did not like the writing at all. He said to the painter, "No, no! There's too much space between HORSE and AND and AND and CART!"

 Unit 63.

 A young man was called up for army service and had to go to be medically examined. The doctor was sitting at the desk when he went in. He said to the man, "take your coat and shirt off, loosen your belt and sit on that chair".

 The young man did so. The doctor looked at him for a moment without getting up from his chair and then said, "All right. Put your clothes on again".

 "But you haven't examined me at all! " The young man said in a trouble voice.

 "It isn't necessary," the doctor said gently. "When I told you to take your coat and shirt off, you hear me all right, so you aren't deaf. You saw the chair I pointed to, so your eyesight's good enough for the army. You managed to take your clothes off and to sit on the chair, so your body must be healthy, and you understood what I told you to do and did it without a mistake, so you must possess enough intelligence for the army".

 Unit 64.

 A man had to go to court, and he asked his lawyer which judge would be hearing his case. His lawyer told him and then said, "Do you know him?"

 The man answered "No, but I wanted to know his name so that I could send him a dozen bottles of good wine".

 The lawyer was terribly shocked. "You can't do that," he said. "You would be breaking the law very seriously, and you would be sure to lose the case".

 Some weeks later the case was heard, and the man won it. As he was leaving the court, he said to his lawyer, "My present to the judge was quite successful, wasn't it?"

 The lawyer was even more shocked than before, and said "What? Did you really send him that wine after what I told you?"

 "Yes, certainly," answered the man. "But I put my opponent's name on the card which I sent with the wine".

 Unit 65.

 A man was telling one of his friends the secret of his contented married life. "My wife makes all the small decisions," he explained, "and I make all the big ones, so we never interfere in each other's business and never get annoyed with each other. We have no complaints and no arguments".

 "That sounds reasonable," answered his friend sympathetically. "And what sort of decisions does your wife make?"

 "Well," answered the man, "she decides what jobs I apply for, what sort of house we live in, what furniture we have, where we go for our holidays, and things like that".

 His friend was surprised "Oh? " He said. "And what do you consider important decisions then?"

 "Well," answered the man. "I decide who should be Prime Minister, whether we should increase our help to poor countries, what we should do about the atom bomb, and things like that".

 Unit 66.

 John was the only son of a wealthy American businessman. Usually he was taken to school by the chauffeur in his father's beautiful car, before the chauffeur took John's father to his office. One evening his father told him that he had to go to the airport early the next day, so he would need the car at the time that John had to go to school. He said that John's mother, who possessed another car, would still be in bed at the time he had to leave the house.

 "Well, how will I get to school if you need your car and Mummy is still in bed?" John asked. His father thought this was a good opportunity to teach him a lesson about how hard life was for the less fortunate people of the world, so he answered, "You'll go in the same way as every other child in the world goes, in a taxi".

 Unit 67.

 At the entrance to a big office in London there was a book which all employees had to sign when they arrived each morning. At nine o'clock, the manager's secretary, who lived in a small flat above the office, had to draw a red line under the last name in the book, and anyone who came after that had to explain why he was late.

 Whenever there was a thick fog in the city, the first person to arrive late usually wrote "Delayed by fog" under the red line in the book, and then everybody else who came after that just put "ditto" underneath.

 But one foggy morning, the first man to arrive late wrote "My wife had a baby early this morning" instead of "Delayed by fog" under the red line in the book. Twenty or thirty people who came after him put "ditto" underneath as usual.

 Unit 68.

 A policeman returned to his police station one evening and reported to the sergeant that he had found an old car with no number plates.

 "Where was it?" Asked the sergeant.

 "In Ecclesiastes Street, beyond the bridge," answered the policeman.

 The sergeant opened the report book and began to write. When he reached the name of the street, he began to spell aloud: "E-c-I". He looked at this for a few seconds, then crossed it out and wrote "E-c-k". Then he became annoyed, decided that he was already too busy with other jobs, and said to the policeman, "Write the report yourself".

 The policeman had a try too, but after a minute, he put his helmet on and began to go out slowly.

 "Where are you going?" The sergeant asked.

 "Back to Ecclesiastes Street," answered the policeman. "I'm going to push the car round the corner into Green Street".

 Unit 69.

 The leader of a band was finding it extremely difficult to prepare for an important performance, because the members of the band were never all present at any one of the rehearsals. Then the last rehearsals before the show came, and again some of the members were not there. At the end of the rehearsals, the leader said to all the members of the band who were present, "I have been making a note of those who have been absent from our various rehearsals. Here it is". He took a piece of paper out of his pocket and looked at it. "I see that the only man who has been hardworking and faithful enough to be present every time is the drummer".

 The drummer went very red, stood up and answered, "Well, I thought it was the only right thing to do, as I won't be able to come to the show tomorrow".

 Unit 70.

 A man was tired of living in his old house in the country and wanted to sell it and buy a better one. He attempted to sell it for a long time, but was not successful, so at last he decided to solve the problem by using an estate agent.

 The agent promptly advertised the house, and a few days later, the owner saw a very attractive photograph of it, with a wonderful description of its gardens, in an expensive magazine.

 After the house owner had read the advertisement through, he hastened to telephone the estate agent and said to him. "I'm sorry, Mr.Jones, but I've decided not to sell my house after all. After reading your advertisement in that magazine, I can see that it's just the kind of house I've wanted to live in all my life".

 Unit 71.

 Jean was a very beautiful young girl, so she was quite used to some men showing their admiration for her, and to others being confused and shy when they saw her.

 One summer, when Jean was travelling abroad, she went into a cafe in a small town, sat down and waited to be served.

 The young waiter was talking to someone at the bar when she came in, and at first he did not pay any attention to her, because he had not looked at her properly. Then he turned round and saw how beautiful she was. His face went bright red, and he hurried over to take her order.

 "I'd like coffee without cream, please," Jean said.

 The waiter hurried out, and came back a few minutes later without the coffee.

 "I'm very sorry," he said, "but we haven't got any cream. Would you like your coffee without milk?"

 Unit 72.

 Carol and Susan were great friends. They were in the same class at school, and they often visited each other's homes at weekends.

 When they were both eight years old, Carol's mother had a baby. Carol was overjoyed to have a little sister and was always talking about her to Susan, who had no brothers or sisters.

 At first Susan was very interested in the new baby, but after some time she began to get rather discontented with Carol's continual talking about it. She also felt a little jealous.

 One morning when the two girls were in the school playground. Carol said to Susan cheerfully, "Do you know, Susan, my baby sister gained nearly two hundred grams in weight this week".

 "That's not very much," answered Susan. "I know a baby that gains five kilograms a day".

 "Oh, that can't be true! " Answered Carol scornfully, "Whose baby is it?"

 "An elephant's" said Susan.

 Unit 73.

 A priest who was walking through a small town saw a blackboard outside the front door of a school. It had been washed and put out to dry in the open air.

 There was a piece of chalk at the foot of the blackboard, so the priest took it and wrote in large letters, "I'm a priest and I pray for you all".

 A lawyer happened to pass next and when he saw what the priest had written, he added under it, "I'm a lawyer and I defend you all".

 Then a doctor came by, took the piece of chalk and wrote on the blackboard, "I'm a doctor and I cure you all".

 Finally ordinary citizen stopped, looked at what the others had written, thought for a few seconds and then added, "I'm an ordinary citizen and I pay for you all".

 Unit 74.

 George was a quiet, serious young man. He had been studying particularly hard one year, and when he passed his examinations, his friend Jim went to give him his congratulations and then had an earnest conversation with him.

 "You've never been to a dance, George" he said. "It's boring always studying and never enjoying oneself. Come out with me this evening".

 Perhaps you're right, Jim," replied George after a moment's hesitation.

 So they went to a dance and had an enjoyable time. But George drank more than he was used to, and by midnight Jim had become worried about him, so he said, "Now we'll walk home in the cool air".

 On their way home, they came to a bridge, and George looked down at the river below attentively. The stars were reflected in its smooth surface.

 "What are those lights down there?" George inquired.

 "They're the stars, George," Jim replied.

 "The stars?" George said. "Well, then, how did I get up here?"

 Unit 75.

 One year Miss Wyatt decided to have a holiday in Italy. She did not speak much Italian, but wherever she went, she was fortunate enough to find people who knew enough English to be able to understand what she wanted, until one day she decided to have lunch in a charming little restaurant in a village in the south of Italy.

 She had seen some nice mushrooms in the market of another village near there and thought they would taste very good, so when the waiter came to take her order for lunch, she inquired whether she could have some mushrooms for her meal, but she had great difficulty in explaining to him, because she did not know the Italian word for mushrooms.

 At last she took out a pencil and drew a picture of a mushrooms. The waiter's face brightened at once, and he hastened out to the kitchen. A minute later he returned, carrying an umbrella.

 Unit 76.

 Tom saw an advertisement in a newspaper for a beautiful, modern bicycle which cost 54.99 pounds, so he went to the shop which had put the advertisement in and asked to see one of their wonderful bicycles.

 The shopkeeper was very happy to show one to Tom, who examined it carefully and then turned to the shopkeeper, saying, "There isn't a lamp on this bicycle, but there was one on the bicycle in your advertisement".

 "Yes, sir," answered the shopkeeper, "but the lamp isn't included in the price of the bicycle. It's an extra".

 "Not included in the price of the bicycle?" Tom said angrily. "But that's not honest if the lamp's in the advertisement, it should have been included in the price you gave here".

 "Well, sir," answered the shopkeeper calmly, "there's also a girl on the bicycle in our advertisement, but we don't supply one of them with the bicycle either".

 Unit 77.

 In the United States, gifts by a company or a person to a charity which is approved by the government, can be used to reduce the company's or the person's tax. (This is, of course, to encourage people to give money to charities). One day the secretary of a world famous charity had a telephone call from a tax officer, who said, "A certain gentleman who says that his name is Howard Vine claims to have given your society 15.000 dollars in gifts last year. I am telephoning to find out whether he did in fact do so".

 "Howard Vine, did you say?" Answered the secretary of the charity cautiously. "Wait a moment please. I'll have a look in our records".

 After half a minute, the tax officer heard the secretary voice again, "Mr.Howard Vine hasn't given us 15.000 dollars yet," the secretary said delightedly, "but he's going to now!"

 Unit 78.

 David was a young man who worked in an office in a big city. His hobby was fishing, but he did not often get a chance to practice it.

 Then one summer he decided to have a holiday in a beautiful place in the mountains where there were a lot of streams. "I ought to be able to have some good fishing there," he said to himself.

 The first morning after he arrived, he walked to the nearest stream with his fishing-rod. He saw an old man standing beside the water, so he asked him whether it was a private stream. The old man answered that it was not, so David then said to him, "Well, then it won't be a crime if I catch some fish here, will it?"

 "Oh, no," answered the old man, "it won't be a crime, but it will certainly a miracle".

 Unit 79.

 A young man had a new girl friend, whom he wanted to impress, so he invited her to go to a world-famous restaurant with him one evening. They dined wonderfully and had numerous drinks, they danced until midnight, and there was a polished musical entertainment. The girl enjoyed the entire evening, and was suitably impressed by everything she saw, including several film stars.

 Then the waiter brought the bill at the end of the evening, and when the young man saw how much he had to pay, he was so shocked by the total that he went as white as a sheet.

 The helpful waiter, who was watching his face, thought he might be going to faint, so he quickly poured out a glass of ice-cold water and emptied it over the young man's head. Then he took the bill back and added to it: "Iced water: 50p".

 Unit 80.

 Jack had gone to the university to study history, but at the end of his first year, his history professor failed him in his examinations, and he was told that he would have to leave the university. However, his father decided that he would go to see the professor to urge him to let Jack continue his studies the following year.

 "He's a good boy," said Jack's father, "and if you let him pass this time, I'm sure he'll improve a lot next year and pass the examinations at the end of it really well".

 "No, no, that's quite impossible! " Replied the professor immediately. "Do you know, last month I asked him when Napoleon had died, and he didn't know!"

 "Please, sir, give him another chance," said Jack's father. "You see, I'm afraid we don't take any newspapers in our house, so none of us even knew that Napoleon was ill".

 Unit 81.

 Mr.Briggs got a job with an insurance company after he left school and went around visiting people in their homes to sell them life insurance.

 One day, after he had been working for the company for about a year, the insurance manager sent for him and said, "Mr.Briggs, I have been looking at your record as a salesman with our company, and there is one thing that surprises me about it. Why have you been selling insurance only to people over 95 years old, and why have you been giving them such generous conditions? You'll ruin our company if you go on like that".

 "Oh, no sir," answered Mr.Briggs at once. "Before I started work, I looked at the figures for deaths in this country during the past ten years, and I can tell you that extremely few people die at the age of 95 or above each year".

 Unit 82.

 For a long time Dr.Jackson had wanted to get a permanent job in a certain big modern hospital, and at last he was successful. He was appointed to the particular position which he wanted, and he and his wife moved to the house which they were now to live in. The next day some beautiful flowers delivered to them, with a note which said, "Deepest sympathy".

 Naturally, Dr.Jackson was annoyed to receive such an extraordinary note, and telephoned the shop which had sent the flowers to find out what the note meant".

 When the owner of the shop heard what had happened, he apologized to Mr.Jackson for having made the mistake.

 "But what really worries me much more" he added, "is that the flowers which ought to have gone to you were sent to a funeral, with a card which said "Congratulations on your new position".

 Unit 83.

 During the second World War, Winston Churchill was the British Prime Minister. One day he had to go to the British Broadcasting Corporation (the BBC) to make an important speech to the nation.

 An hour before the time of this speech, he stopped a taxi in the street and asked the driver to take him to the BBC, but the taxi driver, who did not recognize him, said he could not take him anywhere just then, because he wanted to go back to his home at the other end of London to hear Churchill make a speech on the radio.

 Churchill was so pleased when he heard this answer that he gave the man a pound, which was worth quite a lot in those days.

 "All right, get in," said the driver happily, opening the door of the taxi. "I'll take you, and to hell with Churchill and his speech!"

 Unit 84.

 A poor farmer who had always lived in the country and had never visited a big town won a lot of money, so he decided that he could now afford a holiday in an excellent hotel by the sea.

 When lunch-time came on his first day there, he decided to go and eat in the restaurant of the hotel. The head waiter showed him to his table, took his order and went away. When he looked at the farmer again, he had a surprise! The farmer had tied his table napkin round his neck.

 The head waiter was very annoyed at this and immediately told one of the other waiters in the restaurant to go to the man and inform him, without being in any way insulting, that people did not do such a thing in restaurants of that quality.

 The waiter went to the farmer and said in a friendly voice, "Good morning, sir. Would you like a shave, or a hair-cut?"

 Unit 85.

 A man and his wife had arranged to have a holiday at the seaside. They were waiting at the railway station for their train when the man saw a weighing-machine near the bench on which they were sitting. It was one of those weighing-machines that give cards on which one's fortune is printed as well as one's weight.

 The man decided to weigh himself, so he went to the machine, got on it, put a penny in, and a card came out. The man took it back to his wife, and she read it out to him, because he had not got his glasses.

 On the card was written, "You are a leader of men and have a masterly character. You have greet intelligence and are attractive to women".

 After she had read this out, the man's wife turned the card over, looked at the back for a moment and then remarked, "It's got your weight wrong too".

 Unit 86.

 A man went to see his doctor one day because he was suffering from pains in his stomach. After the doctor had examined him carefully, he said to him, "Well, there's nothing really wrong with you, I'm glad to say. Your only trouble is that you worry too much. Do you know, I had a man with the same trouble as you in here a few weeks ago, and I gave him the same advice as I'm going to give you. He was worried because he couldn't pay his tailor's bills. I told him not to worry his head about the bills any more. He followed my advice, and when he came to see me again two days ago, he told me that he now feels all right again".

 "Yes, I know all about that," answered the patient sadly. "You see, I'm that man's tailor".

 Unit 87.

 Mary wanted to be a nurse when she left school, but in the meantime, she joined the Red Cross and had some limited training.

 She was taught that, in case of an accident, and they were plentiful in her town, she should give first aid at once and then send for a doctor.

 One day, there was an accident in a busy street, and when Mary arrived soon after she saw a man bending over a woman who had been accidentally knocked down by a car and was lying motionless in the street.

 Mary ran up pushed the man away, informed the crowd that she was a Red Cross nurse and began to help the wounded woman.

 After a few minutes the man who had been bending over the woman when Mary arrived touched her on the shoulder and said, "When you reach the part about sending for a doctor, don't worry. I'm here already".

 Unit 88.

 A tourist was standing outside a very big church in Germany when a wedding party got out of some car and went into the church. Everybody was very well dressed, and there were a lot of photographers, so the tourist thought, "The people getting married must be famous". He turned to a man who was standing beside him and said, "What is the name of the man who is getting married?"

 The man answered, "Ich spreche kein Englisch".

 The tourist thanked him and went into the church. As he was coming out of another door, a coffin was carried out. There had been a funeral service in one of the side chapels of the church.

 The tourist turned to one of the people in the church and said, "Whose funeral was that?"

 The man answered, "Ich spreche kein Englisch".

 "Well," said the tourist, "his marriage didn't last long".

 Unit 89.

 A priest had to take services in several churches every Sunday, and one of them was in the centre of a big city where there were lots of offices, but very few people lived, so hardly anyone ever went to this church on a Sunday. The priest used to go there in a taxi, and one Sunday he arrived as usual and told the taxi driver to wait while he read the service. When he entered the church, he found that there was only one man there, so he inquired whether he would be willing to have a shortened service.

 "No," replied the man firmly and without any hesitation. "I'd like to have the full service, without omitting anything".

 When the priest said the last prayer and left, he discovered that the man in the church had been his taxi driver, whose meter had been adding up the pence throughout the service.

 Unit 90.

 The soldiers had just moved to the desert, and as they had never been in such a place before, they had a lot to learn.

 As there were no trees or buildings in the desert, it was of course, very hard to hide their trucks from enemy planes. The soldiers were therefore given training in camouflage, which means ways of covering something so that the enemy cannot see where it is. They were shown how to paint their trucks in irregular patterns with pale green, yellow, and brown paints, and then to cover them with nets to which they had tied small pieces of cloth.

 The driver who had the largest truck went to a lot of trouble to camouflage it. He spent several hours painting it, preparing a net and searching for some heavy rocks with which to hold the net down. When it was all finished, he looked proudly at his work and then went off to have his lunch.

 But when he came back to the truck after he had had his meal, he was surprised and worried to see that his camouflage work was completely spoilt by the truck's shadow, which was growing longer and longer as the afternoon advanced. He stood looking at it, not knowing what to do about it.

 Soon as officer arrived and he too saw the shadow, of course.

 "Well," he shouted to the poor driver, "what are you going to do about it? If an enemy plane comes over, the pilot will at once know that there is a truck here".

 "I know, sir," answered the soldier.

 "Well, don't just stand there doing nothing," said the officer.

 "What shall I do, sir?" Asked the poor driver.

 "Get your spade and throw some sand over the shadow, of course!" Answered the officer.