Reading Comprehension

The Pundit struggled for six months so that

Directions: Read the following passage and answer the question.

Ordinarily, nothing upset the equilibrium of the Pundit. But the loss of the necklace, which his wife had borrowed from a neighbour, and the fact that he had to replace it worried him. He spent all his time in devising ways and means to repay the debt. Six months later, he gave his wife a gold necklace. It was exactly what she had yearned for. “There is no need to repay it’, she said. The Pundit was surprised. She explained, ‘the necklace was not stolen. That was the only way I could think of making you get me one’.

According to the author’s mother, the best way to apologise is

Directions: Read the following passage and answer the question.

I consider myself something of an authority on apologies, because a quick temper has provided me with plenty of opportunities to make them. In one of my earliest memories, my mother is telling me, “Don’t look at the ground when you say, ‘I’m sorry’. Hold your head up and look the person in the eye, so he’ll know you mean it”.
My mother thus conveyed the first principle of successful apology: it must be direct. You must never pretend to be doing something else. You do not leaf through a sheaf of correspondence,  while apologising to a subordinate after blaming her for a mistake that turned out to be your fault. You do not apologise to a hostess, whose guest of honour you insulted, by sending flowers the next day, without mentioning your bad behaviour.

The phrase ‘leaf through a book’, means to

Directions: Read the following passage and answer the question.

I consider myself something of an authority on apologies, because a quick temper has provided me with plenty of opportunities to make them. In one of my earliest memories, my mother is telling me, “Don’t look at the ground when you say, ‘I’m sorry’. Hold your head up and look the person in the eye, so he’ll know you mean it”.
My mother thus conveyed the first principle of successful apology: it must be direct. You must never pretend to be doing something else. You do not leaf through a sheaf of correspondence,  while apologising to a subordinate after blaming her for a mistake that turned out to be your fault. You do not apologise to a hostess, whose guest of honour you insulted, by sending flowers the next day, without mentioning your bad behaviour.

Picasso went to school only when

Directions: Read the passage and answer the question.

Pablo Picasso showed his truly exceptional talent from a very young age. His first word was lapis (Spanish for pencil) and he learnt to draw, before he could talk. He was the only son in the family and he was good looking, so he was thoroughly spoilt. He hated school and often refused to go unless his doting parents allowed him to take one of his father’s pet pigeons with him.
Apart from pigeons, his great love was art, and when in 1891 his father, who was an amateur artist, got a job as a drawing teacher at a college, Pablo went with him to the college. He often watched his father paint and sometimes was allowed to help. One evening his father was painting a picture of their pigeons when he had to leave the room. He returned to find that Pablo had completed the picture, and it was so amazingly beautiful and lifelike, that that he gave his son his own palette and brushes and never painted again. Pablo was just 13.

The author considers himself to be an authority on apologies because

Directions: Read the following passage and answer the question.

I consider myself something of an authority on apologies, because a quick temper has provided me with plenty of opportunities to make them. In one of my earliest memories, my mother is telling me, “Don’t look at the ground when you say, ‘I’m sorry’. Hold your head up and look the person in the eye, so he’ll know you mean it”.
My mother thus conveyed the first principle of successful apology: it must be direct. You must never pretend to be doing something else. You do not leaf through a sheaf of correspondence,  while apologising to a subordinate after blaming her for a mistake that turned out to be your fault. You do not apologise to a hostess, whose guest of honour you insulted, by sending flowers the next day, without mentioning your bad behaviour.

Pablo’s father gave up painting because he

Directions: Read the passage and answer the question.

Pablo Picasso showed his truly exceptional talent from a very young age. His first word was lapis (Spanish for pencil) and he learnt to draw, before he could talk. He was the only son in the family and he was good looking, so he was thoroughly spoilt. He hated school and often refused to go unless his doting parents allowed him to take one of his father’s pet pigeons with him.
Apart from pigeons, his great love was art, and when in 1891 his father, who was an amateur artist, got a job as a drawing teacher at a college, Pablo went with him to the college. He often watched his father paint and sometimes was allowed to help. One evening his father was painting a picture of their pigeons when he had to leave the room. He returned to find that Pablo had completed the picture, and it was so amazingly beautiful and lifelike, that that he gave his son his own palette and brushes and never painted again. Pablo was just 13.

The international nature of their vocabulary, helps drug addicts to

Directions: Read the following passage and answer the question.

Drug addicts in some countries form small groups, the customs of which may be unknown to outsiders. They often speak a language that is so full of expression and words created by themselves, that their speech has become unintelligible to those who are not living, or in some way associated, with them. It is amazing to find that, to understand some of today’s so-called pop music, one requires some acquaintance with the peculiar language, of those enslaved to drugs. A great part of the vocabulary is international with a preponderance of American terms or, corruptions of these. This makes it easy for those in search of drugs in a country, not their own, to communicate with those that have some to dispose.

The locality where the author lived, was

Directions: Read the following passage and answer the question.

Our home stood behind the railroad tracks. Its skimpy yard was paved with black cinders. The only touch of green we could see was far away, beyond the track, over where the white folks lived. However, cinders were fine weapons. All you had to do was crouch behind the brick pillars of a house with your hands full of gritty ammunition. And the first woolly black head you saw from behind another row of pillars was your target. It was fun.
One day the gang to which I belonged, found itself engaged in a war with the white boys who lived beyond the tracks. As usual, we laid down our cinder barrage thinking this would wipe the white boys out. But they replied with a steady bombardment of broken bottles. We retreated. During the retreat, a broken milk bottle caught me behind the ear,  opening a deep gash. The sight of blood pouring over my face completely demoralised our ranks. My fellow combatants left me standing paralyzed in the centre of the yard and scurried for their houses. A kind neighbour saw me and rushed me to a doctor.

The author used the cinders for

Directions: Read the following passage and answer the question.

Our home stood behind the railroad tracks. Its skimpy yard was paved with black cinders. The only touch of green we could see was far away, beyond the track, over where the white folks lived. However, cinders were fine weapons. All you had to do was crouch behind the brick pillars of a house with your hands full of gritty ammunition. And the first woolly black head you saw from behind another row of pillars was your target. It was fun.
One day the gang to which I belonged, found itself engaged in a war with the white boys who lived beyond the tracks. As usual, we laid down our cinder barrage thinking this would wipe the white boys out. But they replied with a steady bombardment of broken bottles. We retreated. During the retreat, a broken milk bottle caught me behind the ear,  opening a deep gash. The sight of blood pouring over my face completely demoralised our ranks. My fellow combatants left me standing paralyzed in the centre of the yard and scurried for their houses. A kind neighbour saw me and rushed me to a doctor.

The successful way of apology is that it

Directions: Read the following passage and answer the question.

I consider myself something of an authority on apologies, because a quick temper has provided me with plenty of opportunities to make them. In one of my earliest memories, my mother is telling me, “Don’t look at the ground when you say, ‘I’m sorry’. Hold your head up and look the person in the eye, so he’ll know you mean it”.
My mother thus conveyed the first principle of successful apology: it must be direct. You must never pretend to be doing something else. You do not leaf through a sheaf of correspondence,  while apologising to a subordinate after blaming her for a mistake that turned out to be your fault. You do not apologise to a hostess, whose guest of honour you insulted, by sending flowers the next day, without mentioning your bad behaviour.

What worried the Pundit most was that

Directions: Read the following passage and answer the question.

Ordinarily, nothing upset the equilibrium of the Pundit. But the loss of the necklace, which his wife had borrowed from a neighbour, and the fact that he had to replace it worried him. He spent all his time in devising ways and means to repay the debt. Six months later, he gave his wife a gold necklace. It was exactly what she had yearned for. “There is no need to repay it’, she said. The Pundit was surprised. She explained, ‘the necklace was not stolen. That was the only way I could think of making you get me one’.

Australia’s national symbol is

Directions: Read the passage and answer the question that follows.

The dog fence in Australia has been erected to keep out hostile invaders, in this case hordes of yellow dogs called dingoes. The empire it preserves is that of wool growers. Yet the fence casts a much broader ecological shadow. For the early explorers, a kangaroo or a wallaby sighting marked a noteworthy event. Now try not to see one. Without a native predator there is no check on the marsupial population. The kangaroos are now cursed more than the dingoes. They have become rivals of sheep, competing for water and grass. The State Governments now cull more than three million kangaroos a year to keep Australia’s natural symbol from over running the pastoral lands.

The ‘fence’ is meant to keep the

Directions: Read the passage and answer the question that follows.

The dog fence in Australia has been erected to keep out hostile invaders, in this case hordes of yellow dogs called dingoes. The empire it preserves is that of wool growers. Yet the fence casts a much broader ecological shadow. For the early explorers, a kangaroo or a wallaby sighting marked a noteworthy event. Now try not to see one. Without a native predator there is no check on the marsupial population. The kangaroos are now cursed more than the dingoes. They have become rivals of sheep, competing for water and grass. The State Governments now cull more than three million kangaroos a year to keep Australia’s natural symbol from over running the pastoral lands.

Which one of the following statements is correct?

Directions: Read the passage and answer the question that follows.

Not all nocturnal animals have good eyesight. Many of them concentrate on the other senses for finding their way about and for finding food. The sense of touch is very developed in many nocturnal animals, whether they have good eyes or not. The large hairs or whiskers on the faces of cats and mice are sense organs and the animals react rapidly if these whiskers are touched. The sense of smell is also very important for nocturnal animals such as hedgehogs and field mice. The moist night air holds scent much better than dry air does.

The cat’s whiskers are organs associated with the sense of

Directions: Read the passage and answer the question that follows.

Not all nocturnal animals have good eyesight. Many of them concentrate on the other senses for finding their way about and for finding food. The sense of touch is very developed in many nocturnal animals, whether they have good eyes or not. The large hairs or whiskers on the faces of cats and mice are sense organs and the animals react rapidly if these whiskers are touched. The sense of smell is also very important for nocturnal animals such as hedgehogs and field mice. The moist night air holds scent much better than dry air does.