Which sentence in the passage is used to mean, “Socialism has come to an end”?

Directions: Read the given passage carefully and choose the best answer to the question out of the four alternatives.

To a large degree, India embraced a system of socialism at the time it became Independent from the British. This system still continues today. Currently we find government-run or state-run companies and other organizations. Despite this, throughout the world, socialism has proven to be unsuccessful and has come to an end in many countries which have adopted it. While free market economies are certainly not problem-free, it is acknowledged that things are not equal. This inequality is certain, but rather than trying to remove it, working against it is more successful. In the recent past, the average yearly income for an Indian citizen has been steadily improving since 1980. This is a good sign for India and its economy.

What does the passage suggest the U.S. should do?

Directions: Read the given passage carefully and choose the best answer to the question out of the four alternatives.

The British exercised power over their American colonies until the Revolutionary War in 1776. After or at independence, both the United States and India fought wars of succession, classified as civil or international wars depending upon which side won. The Civil War in the US in 1861 resulted in victory for the Union forces of the north and defeat for the Confederate forces of the south but it also resulted in a ½ million or more deaths. The partition of British Indian Empire in 1947 resulted in the separation of Pakistan in the west from India in the east but it also resulted in a ½ - 1 ½ million deaths and 12-14 million refugees as Hindus fled from Pakistan and as many Muslims fled from India. “The exchange of populations between the two new states took on the characteristics of what is today called ‘ethnic cleansing’”.
Britain was not involved in the Indian conflict as it was in the American Revolution 171 years earlier. Perhaps that is why India is a member of the British Commonwealth of Nations whereas the US is not. Indeed, the present Secretary-General is Kamalesh Sharma, an Indian diplomat. Fifty-four sovereign states are currently members of this voluntary association. And the US should at long last consider joining the club given its “special relationship” with the UK.

When the writer says the separation of Pakistan in the west from India, the writer means

Directions: Read the given passage carefully and choose the best answer to the question out of the four alternatives.

The British exercised power over their American colonies until the Revolutionary War in 1776. After or at independence, both the United States and India fought wars of succession, classified as civil or international wars depending upon which side won. The Civil War in the US in 1861 resulted in victory for the Union forces of the north and defeat for the Confederate forces of the south but it also resulted in a ½ million or more deaths. The partition of British Indian Empire in 1947 resulted in the separation of Pakistan in the west from India in the east but it also resulted in a ½ - 1 ½ million deaths and 12-14 million refugees as Hindus fled from Pakistan and as many Muslims fled from India. “The exchange of populations between the two new states took on the characteristics of what is today called ‘ethnic cleansing’”.
Britain was not involved in the Indian conflict as it was in the American Revolution 171 years earlier. Perhaps that is why India is a member of the British Commonwealth of Nations whereas the US is not. Indeed, the present Secretary-General is Kamalesh Sharma, an Indian diplomat. Fifty-four sovereign states are currently members of this voluntary association. And the US should at long last consider joining the club given its “special relationship” with the UK.

What important events took place in 1861 and 1947?

Directions: Read the given passage carefully and choose the best answer to the question out of the four alternatives.

The British exercised power over their American colonies until the Revolutionary War in 1776. After or at independence, both the United States and India fought wars of succession, classified as civil or international wars depending upon which side won. The Civil War in the US in 1861 resulted in victory for the Union forces of the north and defeat for the Confederate forces of the south but it also resulted in a ½ million or more deaths. The partition of British Indian Empire in 1947 resulted in the separation of Pakistan in the west from India in the east but it also resulted in a ½ - 1 ½ million deaths and 12-14 million refugees as Hindus fled from Pakistan and as many Muslims fled from India. “The exchange of populations between the two new states took on the characteristics of what is today called ‘ethnic cleansing’”.
Britain was not involved in the Indian conflict as it was in the American Revolution 171 years earlier. Perhaps that is why India is a member of the British Commonwealth of Nations whereas the US is not. Indeed, the present Secretary-General is Kamalesh Sharma, an Indian diplomat. Fifty-four sovereign states are currently members of this voluntary association. And the US should at long last consider joining the club given its “special relationship” with the UK.

The author of Passage 1 qualifies his judgment of the prairie by

Directions: The passage below is followed by a question based on its content. Answer the question on the basis of what is stated or implied in the passage.

These passages present two perspectives of the prairie, the grasslands that covered much of the central plains of the United States during the nineteenth century.

Passage 1

We came upon the Prairie at sunset. It would be difficult to say why, or how – though it was possibly from having heard and read so much about it – but the effect on me was disappointment. Towards the setting sun, there lay stretched out before my view a vast expanse of level ground, unbroken (save by one thin line of trees, which scarcely amounted to a scratch upon the great blank) until it met the glowing sky, wherein it seemed to dip, mingling with its rich colors and mellowing in its distant blue. There it lay, a tranquil sea or lake without water, if such a simile be admissible, with the day going down upon it: a few birds wheeling here and there, solitude and silence reigning paramount around, but the grass was not yet high; there were bare–black patches on the ground and the wild flowers that the eye could see were poor and scanty. Great as the picture was, its very flatness and extent, which left nothing to the imagination, tamed it down and cramped its interest. I felt little of that sense of freedom and exhilaration that the open landscape of a Scottish moor, or even the rolling hills of our English downlands, inspires. It was lonely and wild, but oppressive in its barren monotony. I felt that in traversing the Prairies, I could never abandon myself to the scene, forgetful of all else, as I should instinctively were heather moorland beneath my feet. On the Prairie I should often glance towards the distant and frequently receding line of the horizon, and wish it gained and passed. It is not a scene to be forgotten, but it is scarcely one, I think (at all events, as I saw it), to remember with much pleasure or to covet the looking–on again, in after years.

Passage 2

In herding the cattle on horseback, we children came to know all the open prairie round about and found it very beautiful. On the uplands, a short, light–green grass grew, intermixed with various resinous weeds, while in the lowland grazing grounds luxuriant patches of blue joint, wild oats, and other tall forage plants waved in the wind. Along the streams, cattails and tiger lilies nodded above thick mats of wide–bladed marsh grass.
Almost without realizing it, I came to know the character of every weed, every flower, every living thing big enough to be seen from the back of a horse. Nothing could be more generous, more joyous, than these natural meadows in summer. The flash and ripple and glimmer of the tall sunflowers, the chirp and gurgle of red–winged blackbirds swaying on the willow, the meadow larks piping from grassy bogs, the peep of the prairie chick and the wailing call of plover on the flowery green slopes of the uplands made it all an ecstatic world to me. It was a wide world with a big, big sky that gave alluring hints of the still more glorious unknown wilderness beyond.
Sometimes we wandered away to the meadows along the creek, gathering bouquets of pinks, sweet williams, tiger lilies, and lady's slippers. The sun flamed across the splendid serial waves of the grasses and the perfumes of a hundred spicy plants rose in the shimmering midday air. At such times the mere joy of living filled our hearts with wordless satisfaction.
On a long ridge to the north and west, the soil, too wet and cold to cultivate easily, remained for several years. Scattered over these clay lands stood small wooded groves that we called "tow–heads." They stood out like islands in the waving seas of grasses. Against these dark green masses, breakers of blue joint radiantly rolled. To the east ran the river; plum trees and crab apples bloomed along its banks. In June, immense crops of wild strawberries appeared in the natural meadows. Their delicious odor rose to us as we rode our way, tempting us to dismount.
On the bare upland ridges lay huge antlers, bleached and bare, in countless numbers, telling of the herds of elk and bison that had once fed in these vast savannas. On sunny April days, the mother fox lay out with her young on southward sloping swells. Often we met a prairie wolf, finding in it the spirit of the wilderness. To us it seemed that just over the next long swell toward the sunset the shaggy brown bison still fed in myriads, and in our hearts was a longing to ride away into the "sunset regions" of our pioneer songs.

One aspect of Passage 2 that might make it difficult to appreciate it is the author's apparent assumption that readers will

Directions: The passage below is followed by a question based on its content. Answer the question on the basis of what is stated or implied in the passage.

These passages present two perspectives of the prairie, the grasslands that covered much of the central plains of the United States during the nineteenth century.

Passage 1

We came upon the Prairie at sunset. It would be difficult to say why, or how – though it was possibly from having heard and read so much about it – but the effect on me was disappointment. Towards the setting sun, there lay stretched out before my view a vast expanse of level ground, unbroken (save by one thin line of trees, which scarcely amounted to a scratch upon the great blank) until it met the glowing sky, wherein it seemed to dip, mingling with its rich colors and mellowing in its distant blue. There it lay, a tranquil sea or lake without water, if such a simile be admissible, with the day going down upon it: a few birds wheeling here and there, solitude and silence reigning paramount around, but the grass was not yet high; there were bare–black patches on the ground and the wild flowers that the eye could see were poor and scanty. Great as the picture was, its very flatness and extent, which left nothing to the imagination, tamed it down and cramped its interest. I felt little of that sense of freedom and exhilaration that the open landscape of a Scottish moor, or even the rolling hills of our English downlands, inspires. It was lonely and wild, but oppressive in its barren monotony. I felt that in traversing the Prairies, I could never abandon myself to the scene, forgetful of all else, as I should instinctively were heather moorland beneath my feet. On the Prairie I should often glance towards the distant and frequently receding line of the horizon, and wish it gained and passed. It is not a scene to be forgotten, but it is scarcely one, I think (at all events, as I saw it), to remember with much pleasure or to covet the looking–on again, in after years.

Passage 2

In herding the cattle on horseback, we children came to know all the open prairie round about and found it very beautiful. On the uplands, a short, light–green grass grew, intermixed with various resinous weeds, while in the lowland grazing grounds luxuriant patches of blue joint, wild oats, and other tall forage plants waved in the wind. Along the streams, cattails and tiger lilies nodded above thick mats of wide–bladed marsh grass.
Almost without realizing it, I came to know the character of every weed, every flower, every living thing big enough to be seen from the back of a horse. Nothing could be more generous, more joyous, than these natural meadows in summer. The flash and ripple and glimmer of the tall sunflowers, the chirp and gurgle of red–winged blackbirds swaying on the willow, the meadow larks piping from grassy bogs, the peep of the prairie chick and the wailing call of plover on the flowery green slopes of the uplands made it all an ecstatic world to me. It was a wide world with a big, big sky that gave alluring hints of the still more glorious unknown wilderness beyond.
Sometimes we wandered away to the meadows along the creek, gathering bouquets of pinks, sweet williams, tiger lilies, and lady's slippers. The sun flamed across the splendid serial waves of the grasses and the perfumes of a hundred spicy plants rose in the shimmering midday air. At such times the mere joy of living filled our hearts with wordless satisfaction.
On a long ridge to the north and west, the soil, too wet and cold to cultivate easily, remained for several years. Scattered over these clay lands stood small wooded groves that we called "tow–heads." They stood out like islands in the waving seas of grasses. Against these dark green masses, breakers of blue joint radiantly rolled. To the east ran the river; plum trees and crab apples bloomed along its banks. In June, immense crops of wild strawberries appeared in the natural meadows. Their delicious odor rose to us as we rode our way, tempting us to dismount.
On the bare upland ridges lay huge antlers, bleached and bare, in countless numbers, telling of the herds of elk and bison that had once fed in these vast savannas. On sunny April days, the mother fox lay out with her young on southward sloping swells. Often we met a prairie wolf, finding in it the spirit of the wilderness. To us it seemed that just over the next long swell toward the sunset the shaggy brown bison still fed in myriads, and in our hearts was a longing to ride away into the "sunset regions" of our pioneer songs.

In Passage 1, the reference to 'eyestrain' conveys a sense of

Directions: The passage below is followed by a question based on its content. Answer the question on the basis of what is stated or implied in the passage.

Passage 1

Talk to those people who first saw films when they were silent, and they will tell you the experience was magical. The silent films had extraordinary powers to draw members of an audience into the story, and an equally potent capacity to make their imaginations work. It required the audience to become engaged – to supply voices and sound effects. The audience was the final, creative contributor to the process of making a film.
The finest films of the silent era depended on two elements that we can seldom provide today – a large and receptive audience and a well–orchestrated score. For the audience, the fusion of picture and live music added up to more than the sum of the respective parts.
The one word that sums up the attitude of the silent filmmakers is enthusiasm, conveyed most strongly before formulas took shape and when there was more room for experimentation. This enthusiastic uncertainty often resulted in such accidental discoveries as new camera or editing techniques. Some films experimented with players; the 1916 film Regeneration, for example, by using real gangsters and streetwalkers, provided startling local color. Other films, particularly those of Thomas Ince, provided tragic endings as often as films by other companies supplied happy ones.
Unfortunately, the vast majority of silent films survive today in inferior prints that no longer reflect the care that the original technicians put into them. The modern versions of silent films may appear jerky and flickery, but the vast picture palaces did not attract four to six thousand people a night by giving them eyestrain. A silent film depended on its visuals; as soon as you degrade those, you lose elements that go far beyond the image on the surface. The acting in silent movies was often very subtle, very restrained, despite legends to the contrary.

Passage 2

Mime opens up a new world to the beholder, but it does so insidiously, not by purposely injecting points of interest in the manner of a tour guide. Audiences are not unlike visitors to a foreign land who discover that the modes, manners, and thoughts of its inhabitants are not meaningless oddities, but are sensible in context.
I remember once when an audience seemed perplexed at what I was doing. At first, I tried to gain a more immediate response by using slight exaggerations, I soon realized that these actions had nothing to do with the audience's understanding of the character. What I had believed to be a failure of the audience to respond in the manner, I expected was, in fact, only their concentration on: what I was doing; they were enjoying a gradual awakening – a slow transference of their understanding from their own time and place to one that appeared so unexpectedly before their eyes. This was evidenced by their growing response to succeeding numbers. Mime is an elusive art, as its expression is entirely dependent on the ability of the performer to image a character and to re–create that character for such performance. As a mime, I am a physical medium, the instrument upon which the figures of my imagination play their dance of life. The individuals in my audience also have responsibilities – they must be alert collaborators. They cannot sit back, mindlessly complacent, and wait to have their emotions titillated by mesmeric musical sounds or visual rhythms or acrobatic feats, or by words that tell them what to think. Mime is an art that, paradoxically, appeals both to those who respond instinctively to entertainment and to those whose appreciation is more analytical and complex. Between these extremes lie those audiences conditioned to resist any collaboration with what is played before them, and these the mime must seduce despite themselves. There is only one way to attack those reluctant minds – take them unaware! They will be delighted at an unexpected pleasure.

What additional information could reduce the apparent similarity between these two art forms?

Directions: The passage below is followed by a question based on its content. Answer the question on the basis of what is stated or implied in the passage.

Passage 1

Talk to those people who first saw films when they were silent, and they will tell you the experience was magical. The silent films had extraordinary powers to draw members of an audience into the story, and an equally potent capacity to make their imaginations work. It required the audience to become engaged – to supply voices and sound effects. The audience was the final, creative contributor to the process of making a film.
The finest films of the silent era depended on two elements that we can seldom provide today – a large and receptive audience and a well–orchestrated score. For the audience, the fusion of picture and live music added up to more than the sum of the respective parts.
The one word that sums up the attitude of the silent filmmakers is enthusiasm, conveyed most strongly before formulas took shape and when there was more room for experimentation. This enthusiastic uncertainty often resulted in such accidental discoveries as new camera or editing techniques. Some films experimented with players; the 1916 film Regeneration, for example, by using real gangsters and streetwalkers, provided startling local color. Other films, particularly those of Thomas Ince, provided tragic endings as often as films by other companies supplied happy ones.
Unfortunately, the vast majority of silent films survive today in inferior prints that no longer reflect the care that the original technicians put into them. The modern versions of silent films may appear jerky and flickery, but the vast picture palaces did not attract four to six thousand people a night by giving them eyestrain. A silent film depended on its visuals; as soon as you degrade those, you lose elements that go far beyond the image on the surface. The acting in silent movies was often very subtle, very restrained, despite legends to the contrary.

Passage 2

Mime opens up a new world to the beholder, but it does so insidiously, not by purposely injecting points of interest in the manner of a tour guide. Audiences are not unlike visitors to a foreign land who discover that the modes, manners, and thoughts of its inhabitants are not meaningless oddities, but are sensible in context.
I remember once when an audience seemed perplexed at what I was doing. At first, I tried to gain a more immediate response by using slight exaggerations, I soon realized that these actions had nothing to do with the audience's understanding of the character. What I had believed to be a failure of the audience to respond in the manner, I expected was, in fact, only their concentration on: what I was doing; they were enjoying a gradual awakening – a slow transference of their understanding from their own time and place to one that appeared so unexpectedly before their eyes. This was evidenced by their growing response to succeeding numbers. Mime is an elusive art, as its expression is entirely dependent on the ability of the performer to image a character and to re–create that character for such performance. As a mime, I am a physical medium, the instrument upon which the figures of my imagination play their dance of life. The individuals in my audience also have responsibilities – they must be alert collaborators. They cannot sit back, mindlessly complacent, and wait to have their emotions titillated by mesmeric musical sounds or visual rhythms or acrobatic feats, or by words that tell them what to think. Mime is an art that, paradoxically, appeals both to those who respond instinctively to entertainment and to those whose appreciation is more analytical and complex. Between these extremes lie those audiences conditioned to resist any collaboration with what is played before them, and these the mime must seduce despite themselves. There is only one way to attack those reluctant minds – take them unaware! They will be delighted at an unexpected pleasure.

The contrast between the two passages reflects primarily the biases of a

Directions: The passage below is followed by a question based on its content. Answer the question on the basis of what is stated or implied in the passage.

These passages present two perspectives of the prairie, the grasslands that covered much of the central plains of the United States during the nineteenth century.

Passage 1

We came upon the Prairie at sunset. It would be difficult to say why, or how – though it was possibly from having heard and read so much about it – but the effect on me was disappointment. Towards the setting sun, there lay stretched out before my view a vast expanse of level ground, unbroken (save by one thin line of trees, which scarcely amounted to a scratch upon the great blank) until it met the glowing sky, wherein it seemed to dip, mingling with its rich colors and mellowing in its distant blue. There it lay, a tranquil sea or lake without water, if such a simile be admissible, with the day going down upon it: a few birds wheeling here and there, solitude and silence reigning paramount around, but the grass was not yet high; there were bare–black patches on the ground and the wild flowers that the eye could see were poor and scanty. Great as the picture was, its very flatness and extent, which left nothing to the imagination, tamed it down and cramped its interest. I felt little of that sense of freedom and exhilaration that the open landscape of a Scottish moor, or even the rolling hills of our English downlands, inspires. It was lonely and wild, but oppressive in its barren monotony. I felt that in traversing the Prairies, I could never abandon myself to the scene, forgetful of all else, as I should instinctively were heather moorland beneath my feet. On the Prairie I should often glance towards the distant and frequently receding line of the horizon, and wish it gained and passed. It is not a scene to be forgotten, but it is scarcely one, I think (at all events, as I saw it), to remember with much pleasure or to covet the looking–on again, in after years.

Passage 2

In herding the cattle on horseback, we children came to know all the open prairie round about and found it very beautiful. On the uplands, a short, light–green grass grew, intermixed with various resinous weeds, while in the lowland grazing grounds luxuriant patches of blue joint, wild oats, and other tall forage plants waved in the wind. Along the streams, cattails and tiger lilies nodded above thick mats of wide–bladed marsh grass.
Almost without realizing it, I came to know the character of every weed, every flower, every living thing big enough to be seen from the back of a horse. Nothing could be more generous, more joyous, than these natural meadows in summer. The flash and ripple and glimmer of the tall sunflowers, the chirp and gurgle of red–winged blackbirds swaying on the willow, the meadow larks piping from grassy bogs, the peep of the prairie chick and the wailing call of plover on the flowery green slopes of the uplands made it all an ecstatic world to me. It was a wide world with a big, big sky that gave alluring hints of the still more glorious unknown wilderness beyond.
Sometimes we wandered away to the meadows along the creek, gathering bouquets of pinks, sweet williams, tiger lilies, and lady's slippers. The sun flamed across the splendid serial waves of the grasses and the perfumes of a hundred spicy plants rose in the shimmering midday air. At such times the mere joy of living filled our hearts with wordless satisfaction.
On a long ridge to the north and west, the soil, too wet and cold to cultivate easily, remained for several years. Scattered over these clay lands stood small wooded groves that we called "tow–heads." They stood out like islands in the waving seas of grasses. Against these dark green masses, breakers of blue joint radiantly rolled. To the east ran the river; plum trees and crab apples bloomed along its banks. In June, immense crops of wild strawberries appeared in the natural meadows. Their delicious odor rose to us as we rode our way, tempting us to dismount.
On the bare upland ridges lay huge antlers, bleached and bare, in countless numbers, telling of the herds of elk and bison that had once fed in these vast savannas. On sunny April days, the mother fox lay out with her young on southward sloping swells. Often we met a prairie wolf, finding in it the spirit of the wilderness. To us it seemed that just over the next long swell toward the sunset the shaggy brown bison still fed in myriads, and in our hearts was a longing to ride away into the "sunset regions" of our pioneer songs.

In creating an impression of the prairie for the reader, the author of Passage 1 makes use of

Directions: The passage below is followed by a question based on its content. Answer the question on the basis of what is stated or implied in the passage.

These passages present two perspectives of the prairie, the grasslands that covered much of the central plains of the United States during the nineteenth century.

Passage 1

We came upon the Prairie at sunset. It would be difficult to say why, or how – though it was possibly from having heard and read so much about it – but the effect on me was disappointment. Towards the setting sun, there lay stretched out before my view a vast expanse of level ground, unbroken (save by one thin line of trees, which scarcely amounted to a scratch upon the great blank) until it met the glowing sky, wherein it seemed to dip, mingling with its rich colors and mellowing in its distant blue. There it lay, a tranquil sea or lake without water, if such a simile be admissible, with the day going down upon it: a few birds wheeling here and there, solitude and silence reigning paramount around, but the grass was not yet high; there were bare–black patches on the ground and the wild flowers that the eye could see were poor and scanty. Great as the picture was, its very flatness and extent, which left nothing to the imagination, tamed it down and cramped its interest. I felt little of that sense of freedom and exhilaration that the open landscape of a Scottish moor, or even the rolling hills of our English downlands, inspires. It was lonely and wild, but oppressive in its barren monotony. I felt that in traversing the Prairies, I could never abandon myself to the scene, forgetful of all else, as I should instinctively were heather moorland beneath my feet. On the Prairie I should often glance towards the distant and frequently receding line of the horizon, and wish it gained and passed. It is not a scene to be forgotten, but it is scarcely one, I think (at all events, as I saw it), to remember with much pleasure or to covet the looking–on again, in after years.

Passage 2

In herding the cattle on horseback, we children came to know all the open prairie round about and found it very beautiful. On the uplands, a short, light–green grass grew, intermixed with various resinous weeds, while in the lowland grazing grounds luxuriant patches of blue joint, wild oats, and other tall forage plants waved in the wind. Along the streams, cattails and tiger lilies nodded above thick mats of wide–bladed marsh grass.
Almost without realizing it, I came to know the character of every weed, every flower, every living thing big enough to be seen from the back of a horse. Nothing could be more generous, more joyous, than these natural meadows in summer. The flash and ripple and glimmer of the tall sunflowers, the chirp and gurgle of red–winged blackbirds swaying on the willow, the meadow larks piping from grassy bogs, the peep of the prairie chick and the wailing call of plover on the flowery green slopes of the uplands made it all an ecstatic world to me. It was a wide world with a big, big sky that gave alluring hints of the still more glorious unknown wilderness beyond.
Sometimes we wandered away to the meadows along the creek, gathering bouquets of pinks, sweet williams, tiger lilies, and lady's slippers. The sun flamed across the splendid serial waves of the grasses and the perfumes of a hundred spicy plants rose in the shimmering midday air. At such times the mere joy of living filled our hearts with wordless satisfaction.
On a long ridge to the north and west, the soil, too wet and cold to cultivate easily, remained for several years. Scattered over these clay lands stood small wooded groves that we called "tow–heads." They stood out like islands in the waving seas of grasses. Against these dark green masses, breakers of blue joint radiantly rolled. To the east ran the river; plum trees and crab apples bloomed along its banks. In June, immense crops of wild strawberries appeared in the natural meadows. Their delicious odor rose to us as we rode our way, tempting us to dismount.
On the bare upland ridges lay huge antlers, bleached and bare, in countless numbers, telling of the herds of elk and bison that had once fed in these vast savannas. On sunny April days, the mother fox lay out with her young on southward sloping swells. Often we met a prairie wolf, finding in it the spirit of the wilderness. To us it seemed that just over the next long swell toward the sunset the shaggy brown bison still fed in myriads, and in our hearts was a longing to ride away into the "sunset regions" of our pioneer songs.

In Passage 2, the author's references to things beyond his direct experience indicate the

Directions: The passage below is followed by a question based on its content. Answer the question on the basis of what is stated or implied in the passage.

These passages present two perspectives of the prairie, the grasslands that covered much of the central plains of the United States during the nineteenth century.

Passage 1

We came upon the Prairie at sunset. It would be difficult to say why, or how – though it was possibly from having heard and read so much about it – but the effect on me was disappointment. Towards the setting sun, there lay stretched out before my view a vast expanse of level ground, unbroken (save by one thin line of trees, which scarcely amounted to a scratch upon the great blank) until it met the glowing sky, wherein it seemed to dip, mingling with its rich colors and mellowing in its distant blue. There it lay, a tranquil sea or lake without water, if such a simile be admissible, with the day going down upon it: a few birds wheeling here and there, solitude and silence reigning paramount around, but the grass was not yet high; there were bare–black patches on the ground and the wild flowers that the eye could see were poor and scanty. Great as the picture was, its very flatness and extent, which left nothing to the imagination, tamed it down and cramped its interest. I felt little of that sense of freedom and exhilaration that the open landscape of a Scottish moor, or even the rolling hills of our English downlands, inspires. It was lonely and wild, but oppressive in its barren monotony. I felt that in traversing the Prairies, I could never abandon myself to the scene, forgetful of all else, as I should instinctively were heather moorland beneath my feet. On the Prairie I should often glance towards the distant and frequently receding line of the horizon, and wish it gained and passed. It is not a scene to be forgotten, but it is scarcely one, I think (at all events, as I saw it), to remember with much pleasure or to covet the looking–on again, in after years.

Passage 2

In herding the cattle on horseback, we children came to know all the open prairie round about and found it very beautiful. On the uplands, a short, light–green grass grew, intermixed with various resinous weeds, while in the lowland grazing grounds luxuriant patches of blue joint, wild oats, and other tall forage plants waved in the wind. Along the streams, cattails and tiger lilies nodded above thick mats of wide–bladed marsh grass.
Almost without realizing it, I came to know the character of every weed, every flower, every living thing big enough to be seen from the back of a horse. Nothing could be more generous, more joyous, than these natural meadows in summer. The flash and ripple and glimmer of the tall sunflowers, the chirp and gurgle of red–winged blackbirds swaying on the willow, the meadow larks piping from grassy bogs, the peep of the prairie chick and the wailing call of plover on the flowery green slopes of the uplands made it all an ecstatic world to me. It was a wide world with a big, big sky that gave alluring hints of the still more glorious unknown wilderness beyond.
Sometimes we wandered away to the meadows along the creek, gathering bouquets of pinks, sweet williams, tiger lilies, and lady's slippers. The sun flamed across the splendid serial waves of the grasses and the perfumes of a hundred spicy plants rose in the shimmering midday air. At such times the mere joy of living filled our hearts with wordless satisfaction.
On a long ridge to the north and west, the soil, too wet and cold to cultivate easily, remained for several years. Scattered over these clay lands stood small wooded groves that we called "tow–heads." They stood out like islands in the waving seas of grasses. Against these dark green masses, breakers of blue joint radiantly rolled. To the east ran the river; plum trees and crab apples bloomed along its banks. In June, immense crops of wild strawberries appeared in the natural meadows. Their delicious odor rose to us as we rode our way, tempting us to dismount.
On the bare upland ridges lay huge antlers, bleached and bare, in countless numbers, telling of the herds of elk and bison that had once fed in these vast savannas. On sunny April days, the mother fox lay out with her young on southward sloping swells. Often we met a prairie wolf, finding in it the spirit of the wilderness. To us it seemed that just over the next long swell toward the sunset the shaggy brown bison still fed in myriads, and in our hearts was a longing to ride away into the "sunset regions" of our pioneer songs.

In the second paragraph of Passage 2, the author most likely describes a specific experience in order to

Directions: The passage below is followed by a question based on its content. Answer the question on the basis of what is stated or implied in the passage.

Passage 1

Talk to those people who first saw films when they were silent, and they will tell you the experience was magical. The silent films had extraordinary powers to draw members of an audience into the story, and an equally potent capacity to make their imaginations work. It required the audience to become engaged – to supply voices and sound effects. The audience was the final, creative contributor to the process of making a film.
The finest films of the silent era depended on two elements that we can seldom provide today – a large and receptive audience and a well–orchestrated score. For the audience, the fusion of picture and live music added up to more than the sum of the respective parts.
The one word that sums up the attitude of the silent filmmakers is enthusiasm, conveyed most strongly before formulas took shape and when there was more room for experimentation. This enthusiastic uncertainty often resulted in such accidental discoveries as new camera or editing techniques. Some films experimented with players; the 1916 film Regeneration, for example, by using real gangsters and streetwalkers, provided startling local color. Other films, particularly those of Thomas Ince, provided tragic endings as often as films by other companies supplied happy ones.
Unfortunately, the vast majority of silent films survive today in inferior prints that no longer reflect the care that the original technicians put into them. The modern versions of silent films may appear jerky and flickery, but the vast picture palaces did not attract four to six thousand people a night by giving them eyestrain. A silent film depended on its visuals; as soon as you degrade those, you lose elements that go far beyond the image on the surface. The acting in silent movies was often very subtle, very restrained, despite legends to the contrary.

Passage 2

Mime opens up a new world to the beholder, but it does so insidiously, not by purposely injecting points of interest in the manner of a tour guide. Audiences are not unlike visitors to a foreign land who discover that the modes, manners, and thoughts of its inhabitants are not meaningless oddities, but are sensible in context.
I remember once when an audience seemed perplexed at what I was doing. At first, I tried to gain a more immediate response by using slight exaggerations, I soon realized that these actions had nothing to do with the audience's understanding of the character. What I had believed to be a failure of the audience to respond in the manner, I expected was, in fact, only their concentration on: what I was doing; they were enjoying a gradual awakening – a slow transference of their understanding from their own time and place to one that appeared so unexpectedly before their eyes. This was evidenced by their growing response to succeeding numbers. Mime is an elusive art, as its expression is entirely dependent on the ability of the performer to image a character and to re–create that character for such performance. As a mime, I am a physical medium, the instrument upon which the figures of my imagination play their dance of life. The individuals in my audience also have responsibilities – they must be alert collaborators. They cannot sit back, mindlessly complacent, and wait to have their emotions titillated by mesmeric musical sounds or visual rhythms or acrobatic feats, or by words that tell them what to think. Mime is an art that, paradoxically, appeals both to those who respond instinctively to entertainment and to those whose appreciation is more analytical and complex. Between these extremes lie those audiences conditioned to resist any collaboration with what is played before them, and these the mime must seduce despite themselves. There is only one way to attack those reluctant minds – take them unaware! They will be delighted at an unexpected pleasure.

In Passage 2, last paragraph, the author's description of techniques used in the types of mime performances is

Directions: The passage below is followed by a question based on its content. Answer the question on the basis of what is stated or implied in the passage.

Passage 1

Talk to those people who first saw films when they were silent, and they will tell you the experience was magical. The silent films had extraordinary powers to draw members of an audience into the story, and an equally potent capacity to make their imaginations work. It required the audience to become engaged – to supply voices and sound effects. The audience was the final, creative contributor to the process of making a film.
The finest films of the silent era depended on two elements that we can seldom provide today – a large and receptive audience and a well–orchestrated score. For the audience, the fusion of picture and live music added up to more than the sum of the respective parts.
The one word that sums up the attitude of the silent filmmakers is enthusiasm, conveyed most strongly before formulas took shape and when there was more room for experimentation. This enthusiastic uncertainty often resulted in such accidental discoveries as new camera or editing techniques. Some films experimented with players; the 1916 film Regeneration, for example, by using real gangsters and streetwalkers, provided startling local color. Other films, particularly those of Thomas Ince, provided tragic endings as often as films by other companies supplied happy ones.
Unfortunately, the vast majority of silent films survive today in inferior prints that no longer reflect the care that the original technicians put into them. The modern versions of silent films may appear jerky and flickery, but the vast picture palaces did not attract four to six thousand people a night by giving them eyestrain. A silent film depended on its visuals; as soon as you degrade those, you lose elements that go far beyond the image on the surface. The acting in silent movies was often very subtle, very restrained, despite legends to the contrary.

Passage 2

Mime opens up a new world to the beholder, but it does so insidiously, not by purposely injecting points of interest in the manner of a tour guide. Audiences are not unlike visitors to a foreign land who discover that the modes, manners, and thoughts of its inhabitants are not meaningless oddities, but are sensible in context.
I remember once when an audience seemed perplexed at what I was doing. At first, I tried to gain a more immediate response by using slight exaggerations, I soon realized that these actions had nothing to do with the audience's understanding of the character. What I had believed to be a failure of the audience to respond in the manner, I expected was, in fact, only their concentration on: what I was doing; they were enjoying a gradual awakening – a slow transference of their understanding from their own time and place to one that appeared so unexpectedly before their eyes. This was evidenced by their growing response to succeeding numbers. Mime is an elusive art, as its expression is entirely dependent on the ability of the performer to image a character and to re–create that character for such performance. As a mime, I am a physical medium, the instrument upon which the figures of my imagination play their dance of life. The individuals in my audience also have responsibilities – they must be alert collaborators. They cannot sit back, mindlessly complacent, and wait to have their emotions titillated by mesmeric musical sounds or visual rhythms or acrobatic feats, or by words that tell them what to think. Mime is an art that, paradoxically, appeals both to those who respond instinctively to entertainment and to those whose appreciation is more analytical and complex. Between these extremes lie those audiences conditioned to resist any collaboration with what is played before them, and these the mime must seduce despite themselves. There is only one way to attack those reluctant minds – take them unaware! They will be delighted at an unexpected pleasure.

In the passage 1, 'Regeneration' and the films of Thomas Ince are presented as examples of

Directions: The passage below is followed by a question based on its content. Answer the question on the basis of what is stated or implied in the passage.

Passage 1

Talk to those people who first saw films when they were silent, and they will tell you the experience was magical. The silent films had extraordinary powers to draw members of an audience into the story, and an equally potent capacity to make their imaginations work. It required the audience to become engaged – to supply voices and sound effects. The audience was the final, creative contributor to the process of making a film.
The finest films of the silent era depended on two elements that we can seldom provide today – a large and receptive audience and a well–orchestrated score. For the audience, the fusion of picture and live music added up to more than the sum of the respective parts.
The one word that sums up the attitude of the silent filmmakers is enthusiasm, conveyed most strongly before formulas took shape and when there was more room for experimentation. This enthusiastic uncertainty often resulted in such accidental discoveries as new camera or editing techniques. Some films experimented with players; the 1916 film Regeneration, for example, by using real gangsters and streetwalkers, provided startling local color. Other films, particularly those of Thomas Ince, provided tragic endings as often as films by other companies supplied happy ones.
Unfortunately, the vast majority of silent films survive today in inferior prints that no longer reflect the care that the original technicians put into them. The modern versions of silent films may appear jerky and flickery, but the vast picture palaces did not attract four to six thousand people a night by giving them eyestrain. A silent film depended on its visuals; as soon as you degrade those, you lose elements that go far beyond the image on the surface. The acting in silent movies was often very subtle, very restrained, despite legends to the contrary.

Passage 2

Mime opens up a new world to the beholder, but it does so insidiously, not by purposely injecting points of interest in the manner of a tour guide. Audiences are not unlike visitors to a foreign land who discover that the modes, manners, and thoughts of its inhabitants are not meaningless oddities, but are sensible in context.
I remember once when an audience seemed perplexed at what I was doing. At first, I tried to gain a more immediate response by using slight exaggerations, I soon realized that these actions had nothing to do with the audience's understanding of the character. What I had believed to be a failure of the audience to respond in the manner, I expected was, in fact, only their concentration on: what I was doing; they were enjoying a gradual awakening – a slow transference of their understanding from their own time and place to one that appeared so unexpectedly before their eyes. This was evidenced by their growing response to succeeding numbers. Mime is an elusive art, as its expression is entirely dependent on the ability of the performer to image a character and to re–create that character for such performance. As a mime, I am a physical medium, the instrument upon which the figures of my imagination play their dance of life. The individuals in my audience also have responsibilities – they must be alert collaborators. They cannot sit back, mindlessly complacent, and wait to have their emotions titillated by mesmeric musical sounds or visual rhythms or acrobatic feats, or by words that tell them what to think. Mime is an art that, paradoxically, appeals both to those who respond instinctively to entertainment and to those whose appreciation is more analytical and complex. Between these extremes lie those audiences conditioned to resist any collaboration with what is played before them, and these the mime must seduce despite themselves. There is only one way to attack those reluctant minds – take them unaware! They will be delighted at an unexpected pleasure.

The incident described in the second paragraph of Passage 2 shows the author of this passage to be similar to the silent filmmakers of Passage 1 in the way she

Directions: The passage below is followed by a question based on its content. Answer the question on the basis of what is stated or implied in the passage.

Passage 1

Talk to those people who first saw films when they were silent, and they will tell you the experience was magical. The silent films had extraordinary powers to draw members of an audience into the story, and an equally potent capacity to make their imaginations work. It required the audience to become engaged – to supply voices and sound effects. The audience was the final, creative contributor to the process of making a film.
The finest films of the silent era depended on two elements that we can seldom provide today – a large and receptive audience and a well–orchestrated score. For the audience, the fusion of picture and live music added up to more than the sum of the respective parts.
The one word that sums up the attitude of the silent filmmakers is enthusiasm, conveyed most strongly before formulas took shape and when there was more room for experimentation. This enthusiastic uncertainty often resulted in such accidental discoveries as new camera or editing techniques. Some films experimented with players; the 1916 film Regeneration, for example, by using real gangsters and streetwalkers, provided startling local color. Other films, particularly those of Thomas Ince, provided tragic endings as often as films by other companies supplied happy ones.
Unfortunately, the vast majority of silent films survive today in inferior prints that no longer reflect the care that the original technicians put into them. The modern versions of silent films may appear jerky and flickery, but the vast picture palaces did not attract four to six thousand people a night by giving them eyestrain. A silent film depended on its visuals; as soon as you degrade those, you lose elements that go far beyond the image on the surface. The acting in silent movies was often very subtle, very restrained, despite legends to the contrary.

Passage 2

Mime opens up a new world to the beholder, but it does so insidiously, not by purposely injecting points of interest in the manner of a tour guide. Audiences are not unlike visitors to a foreign land who discover that the modes, manners, and thoughts of its inhabitants are not meaningless oddities, but are sensible in context.
I remember once when an audience seemed perplexed at what I was doing. At first, I tried to gain a more immediate response by using slight exaggerations, I soon realized that these actions had nothing to do with the audience's understanding of the character. What I had believed to be a failure of the audience to respond in the manner, I expected was, in fact, only their concentration on: what I was doing; they were enjoying a gradual awakening – a slow transference of their understanding from their own time and place to one that appeared so unexpectedly before their eyes. This was evidenced by their growing response to succeeding numbers. Mime is an elusive art, as its expression is entirely dependent on the ability of the performer to image a character and to re–create that character for such performance. As a mime, I am a physical medium, the instrument upon which the figures of my imagination play their dance of life. The individuals in my audience also have responsibilities – they must be alert collaborators. They cannot sit back, mindlessly complacent, and wait to have their emotions titillated by mesmeric musical sounds or visual rhythms or acrobatic feats, or by words that tell them what to think. Mime is an art that, paradoxically, appeals both to those who respond instinctively to entertainment and to those whose appreciation is more analytical and complex. Between these extremes lie those audiences conditioned to resist any collaboration with what is played before them, and these the mime must seduce despite themselves. There is only one way to attack those reluctant minds – take them unaware! They will be delighted at an unexpected pleasure.