Can you see that there's a ship in-side the bottle? How do you think it got there?

你看到瓶子里有一只船吗？猜猜看，它是怎样放进去的？

Why would anyone put a ship in a bot-tle - it must be very difficult and take a long time!

为什么要把船放到瓶子里去呢？这肯定非常艰难，而且要花费很长的时间！

The ship in the bottle in the picture is a very small version （式样，模型） of an old sailing ship （帆船） .

照片中瓶子里的船是一艘古老帆船的迷你模型。

Sailors hundreds of years a-go used to make miniature （微小的） versions of the ships they sailed in on long voyages （航海） and then put them into bottles.

几百年前的海员在漫长的航海岁月里，常常把他们的船做成小模型，然后把它放到瓶子里去。

It's really hard to make a model of a ship that's so tiny but they had lots of time to spare while sailing to far away places like Africa , America and the Far East .

把一条船做成这么小的模型，确实很困难。但是船要驶向非洲、美洲和远东那么遥远的地方，他们有的是时间。

Putting a ship into a bottle is not as dif-ficult as you might think.

把船装进瓶子里并不像你想象得那么艰难。

The ship is made so that the masts （桅杆） are collapsible( 可折叠的 ) and tiny holes are made in them where strings are at-tached.

在制作船模的时候，把船的桅杆做成可以折放的，而且在上面钻了小孔，可以穿绳子。

The ship is then slid into the bottle using a delicate （灵巧的） hand and some tweezers （镊子） to get it into position.

然后，用灵巧的双手把船慢慢地塞进瓶子里，再用镊子把它的位置固定好。

Then the strings are pulled so the masts stand up!

接着，拉动绳子，桅杆就竖起来了。

Finally the strings are cut and there you have your ship in a bottle!