Read the following passage carefully and answer the questions on it.
Miss Williamson announced in class one day that she wanted one of us to live with her to help her with her domestic work after school. There was a rush to volunteer which took her completely by surprise. When she recovered and had quietened our excited shouting, there was a moment during which none of us dared breathe, as she scanned the eager faces. What made her choose me i had never found out, but i had noticed before that she was partial to me. “All right Karimu,” she said. “You can come, but first run along and get your father’s consent”
My parents were only too glad to have one mouth fewer to feed and my brothers and sisters to see the back of one who inevitably, had begun to assume an air of superiority in talking to them. Miss Williamson’s bungalow was a stone’s throw from school. That very evening saw me installed on a mat in a corner of her back veranda. I was unable to sleep, excited at the thought of the good fortune that had come my way. To be within earshot of Miss Williamson’s English all day, to have access to her books, to nurse the possibility, overwhelming even in thought, of going with her frequently of Rofunkti – all these visions kept my eyes wide open and my brain racing until very late that night. With my “lapa” pulled right over my head and happy beyond all description in my heart, I smiled myself to sleep.
I learnt a very great deal in Miss Williamson’s bungalow. Apart from improving my English, I learnt about the world outside and began to sense that were barriers much higher and much less easily gauged than those of mere language and colour, between my own people and those from whom she sprang. The smiling teacher in the daytime often became the brooding restless, ill-tempered spinster in the evening. Her bungalow was shared by another lady, a doctor, also a Scot, who traveled to and fro between the villages on a bicycle. I noticed that when not at their work or talking about it, these women showed no signs of being happy. As I grew up with them, i found myself wondering what had made them leave their country and come to live among a people whose ways were totally different from theirs.
(a) Why was Miss Williamson completely surprised?
(b) Why was Karimu’s family happy to see him go to stay at the bungalow?
(C) State the overwhelming thought that kept Karimu awake.
(d) What did Karimu find difficult to understand about the two ladies?
(e) Mention the identical trait in these two ladies behaviour.
(f) “What made her choose me. .”
(i) What grammatical name is given to this expression as it is used in the passage? ;
(ii) What is its function?
(g) “I smiled myself to sleep.”What is the meaning of this expression?
(h) For each of the following words, find another word or phrase which means the same and which can replace it as it is used in the passage: (i) scanned; (ii) inevitably; (iii) nurse; (iv) vision; (v)gauged; (vi) brooding.
Explanation
(a) Because many pupils were eager/volunteered to stay with her.
(b) i) His parents would be saved the problem of feeding him. (ii) His brothers and sisters did not like his ways /attitude towards them.
(c) The thought of accompanying Miss Williamson to Rofunkti
(d) (He could not understand ) why they left their own country to live among a people whose ways were different from theirs.
(e) Thes h owe cir when they were not at work or talking about their work.
(f) (i) Noun Clause. (ii) Object of the verb have never found out (g) I smiled until I fell asleep/slept off. Or it means that the writer smiled until he slept. (h) 0) scanned — searched, examined, studied, scrutinized. (ii) inevitably — undoubtedly, certainly, naturally, surely. (iii) nurse — nurture, cherish, anticipate. (iv) visions — fancies, dreams, thoughts, hopes, imaginations, prospects (v) gauged — determined, measured, estimated, assessed. (vi) brooding depressed, unhappy, sad, melancholic, despondent, downcast,