Basically, what we see in this cartoon is a woman pushing six floors of baby cradles on an urban street against the background of two skyscrapers. The piled-up cradles interestingly echo the huge buildings with tens of floors: the cradles are occupied by babies while we can imagine those buildings are filled with crowds of adults.

We can deduce from this picture that the artist is trying to attract our attention to the present exploding world population. The striking point is that while the population growth is almost out of control, the space for humans to live is increasingly circumscribed. As a result, owning a house, which was very ordinary centuries ago, becomes a luxury nowadays because only wealthy people can afford the rocketing price of land. In contrast, common households have to cram into small apartments inside large buildings that are alignned close to each other.

The simple picture is a wake-up call for the whole human race. While we strive for better living standards, the overgrowing population tend offsets our efforts by demanding more living space and resources. Hence, mankind should cooperate worldwide to control population by effective measures, in order to secure the prosperity of our future on this planet.

我们在这幅漫画中看到一个女人推着有六层婴儿摇篮的推车在一条城市的大街上走着，背景是两座摩天大楼。有趣的是，叠起来的摇篮与那些有着几十层楼的大厦相呼应，摇篮里面躺着许多婴儿，而同时我们可以想象大楼里面挤满了成年人。

我们可以从画中推论作画者的意图在于使人们更加关注目前世界人口的爆炸性增长。其中令人注意的一点是，随着人口增长的失控，人类的生存空间也更加受到了限制。因此，虽然拥有一座房子在几个世纪以前是非常普遍的现象，但是现在由于地价昂贵，价格飞涨的房子变成了有钱人才买得起的奢侈品。相反，普通家庭挤进大楼的小套公寓中，这些大楼也都是一幢紧挨着另一幢。

这幅简单的图画给人类敲响了警钟。虽然我们努力地提高生活水平，但是过度增长的人口对于空间和资源的需求却抵消了我们的努力。因此，人类应该进行全球范围内的合作，通过有效的措施来控制人口，从而保证我们在这个星球上的美好未来。

词汇及词组：

cradle: n. 摇篮

skyscraper: n. 摩天大楼 

piled-up: adj. 叠起来的 

explode: v. 爆炸

circumscribe: v. 限制 

luxury: n. 奢侈品 

rocket: v. 飞速上升 

household: n. 家庭

cram: v. 把...装满, 使充塞 

living standard: 生活水平 

offset: v. 抵消

prosperity: n. 繁荣 

planet: n. 行星

句型：

Basically, what we see in this cartoon is…

We can deduce from this picture that the artist is trying to attract our attention to…