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The country of a king is called a kingdom.If one man rules over several countries, he is called an emperor and the countries an empire.A country with a president is called a republic.Our country is a republic.The king or the president and the others who rule with him are called the government.The government makes the rules, but it also does two things that no one else is allowed to do.The government makes the money of the country and the postage-stamps.The money of one country is not good in another country and neither are the postage-stamps.And neither is the language of one country good in another— usually.
一個國王的國家叫做王國。如果一個人統(tǒng)治好幾個國家，他就叫做帝王，這些國家就叫做帝國。一個總統(tǒng)領導的國家叫做共和國。美國就是一個共和國。國王或者總統(tǒng)以及和他一起統(tǒng) 治國家的人叫做政府。政府制定規(guī)章制度，政府還做兩件別人 不能做的事情。政府制造國家的貨幣和郵票。一個國家的貨幣在另一國家并不能通用，郵票也是一樣。同樣的，一個國家的語言在另一國家里通常也不能通用。
The people on the World speak many different languages.Even in the same country many different languages are spoken.There are over 3,000 different languages in all—3,000，just think of that! You probably speak only one of these, and couldn't talk to any one nor understand any one who spoke any other language than your own.In the United States almost every one speaks English, which, strange to say, is the language of another country—England.But on a continent like Europe you could hardly go a day's journey without hearing a different language on the street in the shops, at the hotel.
世界上的人說很多種不同的語言。即使在同一個國家里也有 許多不同的語言。世界上總共有三千多種不同的語言，想想吧，三千多種！你也許只會說其中一種語言，不會說，也聽不懂其他語言。在美國，幾乎每個人都說英語；說起來有點奇怪，這也是另外一個國家—英國的語言。但在歐洲大陸上， 上街走一天，在商店里、旅館里，你總是能聽到不同的語言。 我
I happened to be born in the United States, and as I heard everybody around me speaking English I learned to speak English too.But I might have been born in Asia, a yellow boy, and learned to speak Chinese, or I might have been born in Africa, a black boy, and learned to speak a language I don't even know the name of.I know a man who speaks a dozen different languages, and I know of a man who speaks 100！ You can understand how wonderful this is when it usually takes years to learn to speak one other language besides your own.Letters of most of these languages are like ours, like the letters on this page—they are called Roman, because a people called Romans first used them long ago.But letters of Chinese and Japanese and some other faraway languages are different.
碰巧出生在美國，由于聽到周圍的人都說英語，我也就學會了說英語。但是我也有可能出生在亞洲，是個黃色人種的小男孩，學會說漢語；我還有可能出生在非洲，是個黑色人種的 小男孩，于是學會說一種我也叫不上名字的語言。我認識一個人，他會說12種不同的語言，我還聽說過一個人，他會說100種 語言！通常要學會另一種和你的母語不同的語言要花上幾年的時間，所以你可以想象到他們有多了不起。大多數(shù)語言的字母和我們的差不多，就像這本書上的字母一樣，這種字母叫做羅馬字，因為是由叫羅馬人的一個民族在很久以前最先使用的。 但是漢語和日語以及其他更遠地方的語言有著不一樣的字母。
