THE FLAG AND THE NATIONAL EMBLEMS OF GREAT BRITAIN

4. THE FLAG AND THE NATIONAL EMBLEMS OF GREAT BRITAIN

1)    The flag of the United Kingdom is often called the Union Flag, or the Union Jack.

2)    It consists of several flags.

3)    In 1603 Scotland was joined to England and Wales.

4)    The Scottish Flag, St.Andrew’s Cross (the patron saint of Scotland0, blue with a white cross from corner to corner, was joined to the English flag, St.George’s Cross (the patron saint of England), white with a red upright cross.

5)    Later, in 1801, the Irish Flag of St.Patrick’s Cross (the patron of Ireland) was added, white with a red cross from corner to corner.

6)    As for the national emblems of Great Britain they are very unusual and surprising.

7)    Everybody knows about the War of the Roses (1455-1485), which was led between the two contending Houses for the English throne.

8)    The emblem of one of them, the Lancastrians, was the red rose, and the emblem of the Yorkists was the white rose.

9)    Since the end of this war the red rose has been the national emblem of England.

10)  The people of Scotland chose the thistle as their national emblem.

11)  They say that it saved their land from foreign invaders many years ago.

12)  This happened so.

13)  During a surprise night attack by the invaders the Scottish soldiers were awakened by the shouts of one of the invaders, whose bare feet stepped on the thorns of the thistle.

14)  The alarm was given and soon the Scots won victory over the enemy, and the thistle became their national emblem.

15)  The little shamrock is the national emblem of the Irish.

16)  It is worn in memory of St. Patrick, Irelands patron saint.

17)  A legend says that St. Patrick used a small green shamrock when he was preaching the doctrine of the Trinity to the pagan Irish.

18)  There is a legend according to which St. David (the patron saint of Wales) lived for several years on bread and wild leeks.

19)  So Welshmen all over the world celebrate St. David’s Day by putting leers onto their clothes.

20)  They consider the leek their national emblem.

21)  By the way the daffodil is also associated with St. David’s Day, it flowers on that day.  

5. MICHAEL FARADAY

1)    Could you imagine your life without television, radio, telephones, without electricity?

2)    “Of course not!” – this is the answer.

3)    The discovery of how electricity could be generated was one of the great scientific events of history.

4)    It was made by Michael Faraday.

5)    Michael Faraday was born in 1791 in London in a poor family.

6)    His father, a blacksmi th, couldn't find work for a long time, and so when Michael was 14 years old he was sent to work.

7)    He found work in a bookshop.

8)    There he learnt how to bind books and read as much as he could.

9)    He was especially fond of books about science.

10)  Once a customer at the bookshop gave him a ticket to a lecture by Humphrey Davy, England's greatest scientist of that time.

11)  After some time Michael got a job of an assistant in a laboratory of Davy.

12)  He got interested in the strange new power, electricity, which had been discovered by that time.

13)  Michael Faraday spent long weeks and months studying this strange force.

14)  At last he tried to move a magnet between coils of wires.

15)  He discovered that electricity passed from the magnet to the wires, and could become a strong electric current.

16)  This is the method which is used in every electric generator throughout the world.

17)  This was the beginning of all great machines that make our electricity today.

 

6. ROBERT BURNS

1)    Robert Burns is the national poet of Scotland.

2)    Burns’s poetry is loved and enjoyed by all his countrymen.

3)    Burns was born in Alloway, on the 25^th of January, 1759.

4)    His father was a small farmer.

5)    He was a hard-working man and wanted to give his family the education he could.

6)    Thanks to his father Robert got a good knowledge of English, he made a rapid progress in reading and writing, he read and tried to understand Shakespeere, Milton and other writers of the seventeenth-eighteenth centuries.

7)    Robert’s father also taught his children arithmetic and other subjects.

8)    And at the same time young Robert worked hard on his family farm.

9)    When he was 14 he composed his first poem “Handsome Nell”.

10)  In 1784 his father died and the family had to move to another farm.

11)  While working on this farm Burns composed some of his best known poems.

12)  Robert Burns was not successful as a farmer.

13)  He wanted to emigrate to Jamaica and to leave behind something by which his country would remember him.

14)  So he composed his most brilliant poems.

15)  He published his poems, they were a success.

16)  That’s why he made up his mind to go to Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland.

17)  He travelled much across his native country which he so dearly loved.

18)  He admired the beautiful landscapes and lochs of the Highlands.

19)  He visited some historic places which made a great impression on him.

20)  All this influenced his literary work and resulted in many fine poems.

21)  But Robert Burns had the serious heart dies, from which he died on the 21^st of July, 1796, at the age of 37.

22)  His poems he song and described joys, sorrows and life of the common people.

23)  People loved Burns for the generosity and kindness of his nature, for his patriotism and truthfulness.

 

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