解析：选C　段落大意题。根据第三段的内容可知，本段主要介绍了不是所有的羊都适合用于羊毛编织，故人们选择了合适的品种饲养。故选C。

　　26．What are Babylonia and the Romans mentioned to prove?

　　A．The wisdom of ancient people.

　　B．The aggression of ancient nations.

　　C．The link between their rise and wool.

　　D．The greatness of well­organized ancient society.

　　解析：选C　推理判断题。根据倒数第二段中的"Great empires were built on the backs of sheep and their wool"可知，一些实力强大的帝国是建立在羊背和羊毛上的，紧接着就列举了巴比伦王国和罗马人的例子，故可判断出，作者提到巴比伦王国和罗马人是为了说明他们的崛起和羊毛之间是有联系的。

　　27．What does the underlined part in the last paragraph mean?

　　A．They lost their advantage of something.

　　B．They won and got rid of the shame of failure.

　　C．They did something harmful to their opponent.

　　D．They were taking pains to catch up with others.

　　解析：选B　句意理解题。根据最后一段的第一句"The Chinese held onto the secret of silk for thousands of years before Europeans even got an idea about how to put two threads together"可知，中国人在掌握了如何制作丝绸的秘诀数千年之后，欧洲人才知道如何把两根蚕丝缠绕在一起变为一根。结合上文中提到西方国家在羊毛利用方面的领先情况可以推断出，画线部分意思应为他们似乎扳回一局，即羊毛纺织让欧洲人得以"一雪前耻"。revenge意为"报仇，复仇，雪耻"。

　　C

　　(2018·河北省鄂西北联考)Up until now, it has been believed big cats like the leopard (豹) originated in parts of Africa. However, an ancient skull unearthed recently indicates that big cats originated in central Asia - not Africa as widely thought, paleontologists (古生物学家) reported on Wednesday.

　　Dated at between 4.1 and 5.95 million years old, the fossil is the oldest remains ever found of a pantherine felid, as big cats are called. The previous felid record holder - tooth fragments (碎片) found in Tanzania - is estimated to be around 3.8 million years old.

The evolution of big cats has been heatedly discussed, and the issue is complicated by a