Which of the following is nearly opposite in meaning to the phrase ‘against the grain’ as given in the passage?
Directions: Read the following passage carefully and answer the question that follows. Certain words/phrases have been printed in bold to help you locate them while answering the question.
There was once a poor farmer who went to the money-lender's house and asked him the secret of becoming rich. The money-lender piously told the farmer that riches came from God and he should ask him.
The simple farmer set out to find God. On his way, he found a poor man sitting under a tree. The poor man asked him about his journey and the farmer told him that he was going to find God! The poor man smiled and said, "I am God! What do you want of me?" The farmer told him the whole story, and God, taking pity on him, gave him a conch shell, and showed him how to blow it in a particular way, saying, “Just remember, whatever you wish for, you have only to blow the conch this way, and your wish will be fulfilled. Only have a care of that money-lender, for even magic is not proof against his wiles!"
The farmer went back to his village, rejoicing. The money-lender noticed his high spirits at once and went over to the farmer's house, and congratulated him on his good fortune . The farmer told him the whole story—everything except the secret of blowing the conch.
Nevertheless, the money-lender was determined to have the conch by hook or by crook, and waited for a favorable opportunity and stole the conch.
He tried blowing the conch in every conceivable way but had to give it up as a bad job. So, he went back to the farmer, and said, "I've got your conch, but it is of no use to either of us. Everything is at a stand-still unless we make a bargain. I will give you back your conch, and never interfere with your using it, on one condition, which is this, whatever you get from it, I am to get double."
The farmer refused the bargain but the wily money-lender persuaded him; "You will have your share! What does it matter to you if I am rich or poor?" So, though it went sorely against the grain to be of any benefit to a money-lender, the farmer was forced to yield and the knowledge of this fact so preyed upon the farmer's mind day and night, that he had no satisfaction out of anything.
There came a very dry season, - so dry that the farmer's crops withered for want of rain. Then he blew his conch, and wished for a well to water them, but the money-lender got two! This was too much for him to stand; and he brooded over it, till at last a bright idea came into his head. He seized the conch, blew it loudly, and cried out, "Oh, God! I wish to be blind of one eye!" And so he was, in a twinkling. But the money-lender became completely blind. He fell into his new well and drowned.