Pre-reading

Question: Why didn’t Robinson eat the corn?

Intensive Reading

I had my first corn at the end of December. It wasn’t a lot of corn. I didn’t want to eat the corn. I decided to keep all the seeds. My goal was to put the seeds in the ground again and have more corn later.

12月底我拥有了我的第一株玉米。玉米不多。我不想吃掉玉米。我决定保留所有的种子。我的目标是把这些种子再次种到地里，以后就可以收获更多玉米。

I thought, “I will need some pots for the seeds. I will look for clay around the island.”

我想，“我需要一个罐子来装这些种子。我要在岛上寻找黏土。”

I found some clay. I tried to make a pot. I had no success at the beginning. People in England made beautiful pots. But I didn’t know the whole process well enough to be able to make pots.

我找到了一些黏土。我试图做一个罐子。一开始我没有成功。英格兰的人会做很漂亮的罐子。但我对于整个制作过程了解得不够清楚，所以做不出罐子。

However, I tried again and again. It was a long process but after two months of experimenting and trying I made two large pots. I put the pots into round baskets. I put dry grass between the baskets and the pots. The dry grass and the baskets protected the pots very well.

但是，我尝试了一遍又一遍。这是一个漫长的过程，但是经过两个月的实验和尝试，我做出了两个大罐子。我把罐子放进圆形的篮子里。我在篮子和罐子之间垫了一些干草。干草和篮子可以很好地保护罐子。

I continued to make small pots. Their quality improved. I also made long but not very high pots. I put sea water in these pots. When the water was gone, I had salt.

我继续做了一些小罐子。它们的质量有所提高。我还做了一个不是特别高的长形罐子。我在罐子里放了一些海水。水蒸发了之后，我就有了盐。

Notes:

1. goal: 目标。“达到目标”可以说achieve a goal，“设立目标”可以说set a goal。

2. pot: 锅，罐子，瓶子，容器。

3. clay: 黏土，陶土。

4. experiment: 实验，尝试，也可以作名词。

Exercise:

How did Robinson protect the pots?