美國(guó)-The United States
The United States
The United States covers a large part of the North American continent. Its neighbours are Canada to the north, and Mexico to the south.
When this land first became a nation, after winning its independence from Engand, it had thirteen states. Each of the states was represented of the American flag by a star. All these states were in the eastern part of the continent. As the nation grew toward the west, new states were added and new states appeared on the flag. For a long time, there were 48 states. In 1959, however, two more stars were added to the flag, representing the new states of Alaska and Hawaii.
Indians were the first inhabitants (居民) of the land which is now the United States. There are still many thousands of the descendants (后代) of these original inhabitants living in all parts of the country. Sometimes it is said that the Indians are "the only real Americans."
Most Americans, however, are descendants of people who came from all over the world to find a new life in a new land. Those who came first and in greatest numbers to make their homes on the eastern coast of North America were mostly from England. It is for that reason that the language of the United States is English and that its culture and customs are more like those of England than of any other country in the world.
[點(diǎn)評(píng)]
作者用簡(jiǎn)單明了的語(yǔ)言告訴了我們美國(guó)及美國(guó)人的由來(lái)，使我們對(duì)美國(guó)有了初步的了解。
[參考譯文]
美國(guó)
美國(guó)占去北美大陸很大一部分土地。它北鄰加拿大，南接墨西哥。
這片土地剛從英國(guó)獨(dú)立出來(lái)，成為一個(gè)國(guó)家的時(shí)候，只有十三個(gè)州，每個(gè)州在美國(guó)國(guó)旗上由一顆星來(lái)代表。這些州都在東部。當(dāng)這個(gè)國(guó)家不斷向西擴(kuò)大，就增加了新的州，同時(shí)它們也出現(xiàn)在國(guó)旗上。很長(zhǎng)一段時(shí)間，美國(guó)有48個(gè)州，可是，到1959年，國(guó)旗上又多了兩顆星，分別代表阿拉斯加和夏威夷。
印地安人是如今叫做美國(guó)的這塊土地上的最初居民。現(xiàn)在在全國(guó)各地仍然居住著許多這些原始居民的后裔。有時(shí)人們說(shuō)印安人才是“真正的美國(guó)人”。
不過(guò)，大部分美國(guó)人是來(lái)自世界各地要在這個(gè)新世界里對(duì)找新生活的人的后代。那些最早大批來(lái)到北美東海岸建立家園的人大部來(lái)自英格蘭，也是由于這個(gè)原因，美國(guó)的國(guó)語(yǔ)為英語(yǔ)，而它的文化習(xí)俗也與英國(guó)的更為相像。