The history of the modern world is a
record of highly varied activity, of incessant change, and of astonishing
achievement. The lives of men have, during the last few centuries, increasingly
diversified, their powers have greatly multiplied, their powers have greatly
multiplied, their horizon been enormously enlarged. New interests have arisen
in rich profusion to absorb attention and to provoke exertion. New aspirations
and new emotions have come to move the soul of men. Amid all the bewildering phenomena,
interest, in particular, has stood out in clear and growing pre-eminence, has expressed
itself in a multitude of ways and with an emphasis more and more pronounced,
namely, the determination of the race to gain a larger measure of freedom than
it has ever known before, freedom in the life of the intellect and spirit,
freedom in the realm of government and law, freedom in the sphere of economic
and social relationship. A passion that has prevailed so widely, that has transformed
the world so greatly, and is still transforming it, is one that surely merits
study and abundantly rewards it, its operations constitute the very pith and
marrow of modem history.
Not that this passion was unknown to
the long ages that proceeded the modern periods. The ancient Hebrews, the
ancient Greeks and Roman blazed the was leaving behind them a precious heritage
of accomplishments and suggestions and the men who were responsible for the
Renaissance of the fifteenth century and the Reformation of the sixteen century
contributed their imperishable part to this slow and difficult emancipation of
the human race. But it is in modern times the pace and vigour, the scope and
sweep of this liberal movement have so increased unquestionably as to dominate
the age, particularly the last three centuries that have registered great
triumphs of spirit.
In what period of the history of the
world have the lives of men become increasingly diversified?
Chocolate – there’s nothing quite like it, is there?
Chocolate is simply delicious. What is chocolate? Where does it come from?
Christopher Columbus was probably the first to take cacao
beans from the New World to Europe in around 1502. But the history of chocolate
goes back at least 4,000 years! The Aztecs, who lived in America, through that
their bitter cacao drink was a divine gift from heaven. In fact, the scientist
Carolus Linnaeus named the plant Theobroma, which means “food of the gods”
The Spanish explorer Hernando Cortex went to America in
1519. He visited the Mexican emperor Montezuma. He saw that Montezuma drank
cacao mixed with vanilla and spices. Cortez took some cacao home as a gift to the
Spanish King Charles. In Spain, people began to drink Cortez’s chocolate in
drink with chili peppers. However, the natural taste of cacao was too bitter
for most people. To sweeten the drink, Europeans added sugar to the cacao
drink. As a sweet drink, it became more popular. By the 17th
century, rich people in Europe were drinking it.
Later, people started using chocolate in pastries, like pies and cakes. In 1828, Dutch chocolate
makers started using a new process for removing the fat from cacao beans, and
getting to the center of the cacao bean. The Dutch chocolate maker Conrad J.
Van Houten made a machine that pressed the fat from the bean. The resulting powder
mixed better with water than cacao did. Now, some call van Houten’s chocolate “Dutch
chocolate.”
It was easy to mix Dutuch chocolate powder with sugar. So
other chocolate makers started trying new recipes that used powdered chocolate. People started
mixing sweetened chocolate with cocoa butter to make solid chocolate bars. In
1849, an English chocolate maker made the first chocolate bar. In the 19th
century, the Swiss started making milk chocolate by mixing powdered milk with
sweetened chocolate. Milk chocolate has not changed much since this process was
invented.
Today, two countries – Brazil and Ivory Coast – account for
almost half the world’s chocolate. The United States imports most of the
chocolate in the world, but the Swiss eat the most chocolate per person. The
most chocolate eaten today is sweet milk chocolate, but people also eat white
chocolate and dark chocolate.
Cocoa and dark chocolate are believed to help prevent heart
attacks, or help keep from happening. They are supposed to be good for the
circulatory system. On the other hand, the high fat content of chocolate can
cause weight gain, which is not good for people’s health. Other health claims
for chocolate have not been proven, but some research shows that chocolate
could be good for the brain.
Chocolate is a popular holiday gift. A popular Valentine’s
Day gift is a box of chocolate candies with a card and flowers. Chocolate is
sometimes given for Christmas and birthdays. Chocolate eggs are sometimes given
at Easter.
Chocolate is toxic to some animals. An ingredient in chocolate
is poisonous to dogs, cats, parrots, small rodents, and some livestock. Their
bodies cannot process some if the chemicals found in chocolate. Therefore, they
should never be fed chocolate.
Pastries are
In the early 1920's,
settlers came to Alaska looking for gold. They traveled by boat to the coastal
towns of Seward and Knik, and from there by land into the gold fields. The
trail they used to travel inland is known today as the lditarod Trail, one of the
National Historic Trails designated by the congress of the United States. The
Iditarod Trail quickly became a major thoroughfare in Alaska, as the mail and
supplies were carried across this trail. People also used it to get from place
to place, including the priests, ministers, and judges who had to travel
between villages down this trail was via god sled.
Once the gold rush ended, many gold-seekers
went back to where they had come from, and suddenly there was much less travel
on the lditarod Trail. The introduction of the airplane in the late 1920's
meant dog teams were mode of transportation, of course airplane carrying the
mail and supplies, there was less need for land travel in general. The final
blow to the use of the dog teams was the appearance of snowmoniles.
By the mid 1960's most Alasknas didn't even
know the lditarod Trail existed, or that dos teens had played a crucial role in
Alaska's early settlements. Dorothy G.Page, a self-made historian, recognized
how few people knew about the former use of sled dogs as working animals and
about the Iditarod Trail's role in Alaska's colorful history. To she came up
with the idea to have a god sled race over the Iditarod Trail. She presented
her idea to an enthusiastic musher, as dog sled drivers are known, named Joe
Redington, Sr. Soon the pages and the Redintons were working together to
promote the idea of the Iditarod race.
Many people worked to make
the first Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race a reality in 1967. The Aurora Dog
Mushers Club, along with men from the Adult Camp in Sutton, helped clear years
of overgrowth from the first nine miles of the Iditarod Trail. To raise
interest in the race, a $25,000 purse was offered, with Joe Redington donating
one acre of his land to help raise the funds. The short race, approximately 27
miles long, was put on a second time in 1969.
After these first two
successful races, the goal was to lengthen the race a little further to the
ghost town of Iditarod by 1973. However in 1972, the U.S. Army reopened the
trail as a winter exercise, and so in 1973, the decision was made to take the
race all the way to the city of Nome-over 1,000 miles. There were who believed
it could bot be done and that it wad crazy to send a bunch out into vast,
uninhabited Alaskan wilderness. But the race went! 22 mushers finished that
year, and to date over 400 people have completed it.
As used in paragraph 2,
which is the best definition for ‘mode’
