双语+MP3|美国学生世界地理38 战争和童话故事

     Though Italian is the language of music, the people of Germany are quite as musical as the Italians. But their music is very different from the music of the Italians. Some of their music is warlike, big and loud, and yet some of it is gentle and sweet, and the most famous cradle songs and Christmas carols have been written by Germans. "Silent Night, Holy Night" is one. Musical plays are called operas. Some of the greatest operas in the World have been composed by Germans.
     Cradle songs and Christmas carols don't seem to go well with fighting. But the Germans, besides being very musical, have also been very warlike. You have all heard of the two terrible World Wars, World War I and World War II. Most of the countries of the World took part in these two wars. In each war Germany fought almost all the other countries in the World and, even with almost all the rest of the World against her, she nearly won both times.
     After World War II the countries that had beaten Germany divided Germany up to keep her from starting any more wars. Russia took Eastern Germany. The United States, Great Britain, and France ruled Western Germany. So there came to be two Germanies, West Germany and East Germany.


     Which do you like better, fairy-tales or true stories? Some of the World's best fairy-tales have been made in Germany. Stories, poems, songs, and operas have been written about fairy people and real people who once lived on the hills and in the caves by the side of a river in Germany called the Rhine. The Rhine starts from a glacier in the Swiss Alps and runs north along the west side of Germany and through Holland.
     On both sides of the Rhine are steep hills and rocks and on top of these hills are castles built many years ago. The men who built these castles were called robber barons, and they built their castles on these hills so that they could rob and would be safe from their enemies. The poor people, who lived down in the valleys, had to give part of the things they raised to the barons; if they did not do so, the barons would swoop down on them with their men and take what they wanted and destroy the people's homes. The people knew it was useless to attack the barons because of their strong castles. Most of these castles are now in ruins, because it is too hard to get to them and to keep them in repair, and no longer can any one treat the poor people the way the barons did.
     Cologne is a kind of strong perfume. It is named for a city on the Rhine called Cologne. Cologne means colony, for it was once a colony of Rome. The house in which I live took seven months to build, but there is a Cathedral in Cologne that took seven hundred years to build!-the longest time of any building in the World.


     Cologne is a city famous for its Cathedral but the most famous German city is Berlin Before World War II Berlin was one of the finest and cleanest cities in the world. It had broad tree-lined avenues, great handsome stone buildings, parks and statues. It was also the capital of Germany. But by the time World War II was over, much of Berlin was a wreck. Many of its finest buildings were in ruins, destroyed by bombs dropped from airplanes during the war. Berlin is in Eastern Germany, the part of Germany ruled by the Russians after the War, but the United States, Great Britain, and France as well as Russia govern Berlin. The Russians had fought on our side during World War II, but after the War was over they became very unfriendly to the United States and Great Britain. They even said that the countries ruling Western Germany could not use the railroad or auto roads to Berlin. The people of Berlin had to be fed, so the United States and Great Britain flew tons and tons of food and coal into the city by airplanes day after day for a year and a half. Finally the Russians realized they could not keep out the Americans and British and opened the railroad again. This carrying of supplies to Berlin was called the Berlin Airlift because the supplies were lifted through the air from Western Germany to Berlin.
     Sticking up off the map of Germany like a thumb is a little country called Denmark. On one side of it is the North Sea; on the other side is another sea called the Baltic. Germany fronts on the North Sea and on the Baltic Sea too, but this little thumb of land does not belong to Germany. The Germans had to go all around this country in order to get from the cities on the North Sea to the cities on the Baltic Sea, so they cut off the thumb by digging a canal across the bottom of it. It is called the Kiel Canal.