मराठी

What is the story The Banyan Tree about? Narrate the incident in brief.

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प्रश्न

What is the story The Banyan Tree about? Narrate the incident in brief.

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उत्तर

 The Banyan Tree is about a deadly fight between a mongoose and a snake. The outcome of such a fight is the death of the cobra. The mongoose is faster in movement than his opponent. The writer witnessed such a fight, sitting on a branch of a banyan tree. He enjoyed the fight. Both the mongoose and the cobra were experienced fighters. They could strike with speed. A myna and a crow also arrived to feed on the dead crew. The crow had hard luck. He was bitten and he fell dead. The cobra got tired in the fight and the mongoose dragged it into the bushes.

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पाठ 10: The Banyan Tree - Extra Question

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एनसीईआरटी English - Honeysuckle Class 6
पाठ 10 The Banyan Tree
Extra Question | Q 8

संबंधित प्रश्‍न

Think about the Text

Discuss in pairs and answer the question below in a short paragraph (30 − 40 words).

“The sound was familiar one.” What sound did the doctor hear? What did he think it
was? How many times did he hear it? (Find the places in the text.) When and why did the
sounds stop?


Thinking about the Poem

The poet finds the snake beautiful. Find the words he uses to convey its beauty.


How does he narrate the story of the tusker? Does it appear to be plausible?


For whom does the prince send the sapphires and why?


What actions of the schoolmates change the author’s understanding of life and people, and comfort him emotionally? How does his loneliness vanish and how does he start participating in life?


The Mystery of Bermuda Triangle. 

The potential of nature, of discovered and undiscovered elements in our world, persuades us to probe into some of her mysteries and what they may tell us. Prepare yourself then for a true odyssey of the Earth around us. 

Air France Plane Misalng Near Bermuda Triangle 
June 1, 2009 An Air France plane is missing. The Agence France-Presse reported that an Air France Airbus A330-200 wide-body jet carrying 216 passengers and 12 crew members disappeared from the radar screens on Monday somewhere off Brazil's Atlantic coast. 
Flight AF 447 out of Rio de Janeiro was headed for Paris. According to the Mirror, Air France reported that the plane had radioed in, that they were going through turbulence. They also reported that a message, signalling electrical circuit malfunction, was received before it disappeared. 
A search for the missing plane was conducted by the Brazilian Air Force. The French were also involved in the search. 
Another well known case of 1962 vividly brings home the need for careful behind -the-scenes probing. Once again, it involved an aircraft. 

The date was January 8, 1962. A huge 4 engine KB50 aerial tanker was enroute from the east coast to Lajes in the Azores. The captain, Major Bob Tawney, reported in at the expected time. All was normal, routine. But he, his crew and the big tanker, never made it to the Azores. Apparently, the last word from the flight had been the usual routine report, which had placed them a few hundred miles off the East Coast. 
FLASH! the media broadcasted, fed by a sincere Coast Guard, that a large oil slick was sighted 300 miles off Norfolk, Virginia, in the plane's proposed route. The mystery could be breaking ... 
But that was the only clue ever found. Although never proved, it was from the plane, publicly the suspicions were obvious: the tanker and its qualified crew met a horrid and sudden death by crashing headlong into the sea. 
However, the report, which was finished months later, confirmed no such thing. Tawney had been clearly overheard by a Navy transport hours after his last message. This placed him north of Bermuda, hundreds of miles past the spot of the oil slick. There is no evidence, therefore, that the plane and its crew ever met any known fate. 

                   The Sea of Lost Ships 

The ships below represent samples of the many vessels that have mysterioualy vanished in the Bermuda Triangle . 

Many US warships are listed missing by the US Navy between 1780 and 1824 , including the general Gates , Hornet , Insurgent , Pickering , wasp , wildcat and Expervier .

The Rosalle was built in 1838 of 222 tons of wood . In 1840 , she was found deserted but in ship shape near the Bahamas .

Ellen Austin's Encounter disappeared in 1881 in the Triangle

Bermuda Triangle Theories 
The Bermuda triangle is a stretch over the Atlantic Ocean, measuring less than a thousand miles on any one side. The name 'Bermuda Triangle' remained a colloquial expression throughout the 1950s. By the early 1960s, it acquired the name 'The Devil's Triangle.' Bordered by Florida, Bermuda, and Puerto Rico, the location became famous on account of the strange disappearance of ships, as well as aircrafts in the area. A number of supernatural explanations have been put forward with regard to the mysterious disappearances. 
However, many probable logical explanations for the missing vessels include hurricanes, earthquakes, as well as magnetic fields, which render navigation devices worthless. However, most people do not like to accept such boring explanations and instead opt for more interesting options like alien abduction, giant squids, or getting sucked into another dimension. 

Supernatural theories 

Death Rays from Atlantis. 
Rays from the magic crystals, left from the time of Atlantis, deep down in the sea are responsible for the strange sinking of ships. However, several underwater expeditions have revealed places under the ocean that look man-made, but no such crystals have been found. In fact no real proof that Atlantis existed, has been ever found. 
Sea monsters. 
The presence of sea monsters was the most widely believed explanation especially in the earlier times, when their existence was believed to be true. 

Presence of a time warp. 

People claim to be lost in the time warp while going through the region. 

Alien abductions. 
The Bermuda Triangle is a collecting station from where aliens take our people, ships, planes and other objects back to their planet to study. 

Scientific Explanations 
Magnetic Compass 
According to the scientists in the US Navy, this area is one of the only two in the world, where a magnetic compass points to true north rather than magnetic north. This probably caused some navigators to go off course, which is very dangerous because many of the islands in 'The Triangle' have large areas of shallow water where vessels can run aground. They can also sink a long way down as some of the ocean's deepest trenches, from 19 ,000 to over 27 ,000 feet below sea level, are found here. 

Unpredictable weather 
Since the island is situated in the Atlantic Ocean, the weather is influenced by several factors and can change instantly. That means that at one moment the weather is stable, and at another it becomes extremely turbulent accompanied by strong currents of wind along with the hurricanes. 
Formation of methane in the sea. 
Methane can lower the density of water, leading to the sinking of ships. Similarly, methane can cut out an aircraft engine leading to crashes. 
Bermuda Triangle Survivors 
These witnesses constitute a long list of pilots, sailors and fishermen. 

1. It is interesting to note that Christopher Columbus was one such witness. He wrote in his memoir on how his compass acted strangely while sailing through the Bermuda Triangle. He along with another shipmate witnessed a glowing globe of light that seemed to hover over the sea. 
2. It is said that when clouds or fog enter the Bermuda Triangle, strange things start happening. Such a phenomenon has been witnessed with the Philadelphia Experiment in which the USS Eldridge vanished and reappeared later miles away, with some of the crew men warped into the hull of the ship. 
3. In 1901, Anne Moberly and Eleanor Jourdain stepped into a mist and claimed to arrive at a time period before the French Revolution. It is said, that the mist and the ominous clouds might be the key to time travel or entering into other dimensions. 
4. Even a great pilot like Charles Lindbergh witnessed unusual events while flying in the reaches of the Bermuda Triangle. It is said that when he was making a nonstop flight from Havana to St. Louis, his magnetic compass started rotating. His Earthinductor-compass needle jumped back and forth erratically. This has now all been revealed in his autobiography. 

5. Another eyewitness account is that of Bruce Gernon, who flew his plane, a BonanzaA36, into the Bermuda Triangle and encountered a non-threatening mile and a half long cloud. As he neared, the cloud seemed to come alive. It became huge and engulfed his plane. However, a tunnel opened up in the cloud and he went through this tunnel. It had cloud trails swirling around his plane. He also reported that while going into this tunnel, he experienced zero gravity and the only thing that kept him in the cockpit was his seatbelt. 
Whatever be the actual reason, there is an involvement of more than one fact.or behind the disappearances of ships and aircrafts in the Bermuda triangle region. 
The Bermuda triangle continues to evoke a lot of interest. Most people like to read about it. In fact., in the last few decades, island of Bermuda has emerged as a major tourist destination as well; mainly, due to its close proximity with the Bermuda Triangle. 


It was a summer evening,
Old Kaspar's work was done,
And he before his cottage door
Was sitting in the sun,
And by him sported on the green
His little grandchild Wilhelmine.
She saw her brother Peterkin
Roll something large and round,
Which he beside the rivulet
In playing there had found;
He came to ask what he had found,
That was so large, and smooth, and round.

Read the lines given above and answer the question that follow.

Explain with reference to context.


So please, oh please, we beg, we pray,
Go throw your TV set away,
And in its place you can install
A lovely bookshelf on the wall.
Then fill the shelves with lots of books,
Ignoring all the dirty looks,
The Screams and yells,the bites and kicks,
And children hitting you with sticks-
Fear not, because we promise you
That, in about a week ot two
Of having nothing else to do,
They'll now begin to feel the need
Of having something to read.
And once they start - oh boy, oh boy!
You watch the slowly growing joy
That fills their hearts. They'll grow so keen 
They'll wonder what they'd ever seen
In that ridiculous machine,
That nauseating, foul, unclean,
Repulsive television screen!
And later, each and every kid
Will love you more for what you did.

Read the lines given above and answer the question given below.

What does Dahl ask the parents to do?


Which is considered as the greatest Olympic prize? Why?


“Do the scientists really know? Will it happen today, will it ?”
“Look, look; see for yourself !”The children pressed to each other like so many  roses, so many weeds, intermixed, peering out for a look at the hidden sun. It rained. It had been raining for seven years; thousands upon thousands of days compounded and filled from one end to the other with rain, with the drum and gush of water, with the sweet crystal fall of showers and the concussion of storms so heavy they were tidal waves come over the islands. A thousand forests had been crushed under the rain and grown up a thousand times to be crushed again. And this was the way life was forever on the planet Venus, and this was the schoolroom of the children of the rocket men and women who had come to a raining world to set up civilization and live out their lives.

Read the extract given below and answer the question that follow.

What is supposed to happen on this particular day?


I could hear the squeaking that heralded the evening arrival of the bats. I listened to the noises of the approaching night. Every day my hearing grew sharper. I was learning to filter out whatever I did not need to listen to, and giving no sign that I could hear everything that went on in the house.

I could not sleep. The air was heavy and still, the moon hidden behind thick banks of cloud. Lord Otori was sound asleep. I did not want to leave the house I'd come to love so much, but I seemed to be bringing nothing but trouble to it. Perhaps it would be better for everyone if I just vanished in the night.    [5]

 
Now I heard the hiss of hot water as the bath was prepared, the clatter of dishes from the kitchen, the sliding sigh of the cook's knife, a dog barking two streets away, and the sounds of feet on the wooden bridges on the canals. I knew the sounds of the house, day and night, in the sunshine and under the rain. This evening I realized I was always listening for something more. I was waiting too. For what?        [10]


I began to wonder if I could get out of the house without setting the dogs barking and arousing the guards. I started consciously listening to the dogs. Usually, I heard them bark on and off throughout the night, but I'd learned to distinguish their barks and to ignore them. I set my ears for them but heard nothing. Then I started listening for the guards: the sound of a foot on stone or a whispered conversation. Nothing. Sounds that should have been there been missing from the night's familiar web.        [20]


Now I was wide-awake, straining my ears to hear. There came the slightest of sounds, hardly more than a tremor, between the window and the ground.    


For a moment I thought it was the earth-shaking, as it so often did. Another tiny tremble followed, then another. Someone was climbing up the side of the house        [25]


My first instinct was to yell out, but cunning took over. I rose from the mattress and crept silently to Lord Otori's side. I knelt beside him and whispered in his ear, "Lord Otori, someone is, outside."      [30]


He woke instantly and then reached for the sword and knife that lay beside him. I gestured to the window. The faint tremor came again.


Lord Otori passed the knife to me and stepped to the wall. I moved to the other side of the window. We waited for the assassin to climb in.


Step by step he came up the wall, stealthy and unhurried as if he had all the time in the world. We waited for him with the same patience.    [35]

He paused on the sill to take out the knife he planned to use on us and then stepped inside. Lord Otori took him in a stranglehold. The intruder wriggled backwards. I leaped at him, and the three of us fell into the garden like a flurry of fighting cats.  [40]


The man fell first, across the stream, striking his head on a boulder. Lord Otori landed on his feet. My fall was broken by one of the shrubs. The intruder groaned, tried to rise, but slipped back into the water.


"Get a light," Lord Otori said.


I ran to the house, took a light that still burned in one of the candle stands and carried it back to the garden.    [45]


The assassin had died without regaining consciousness. It turned out he had a poison pellet in his mouth and had crushed it as he tell. He was dressed in black, with no marking on his clothes. I held the light over him. There was nothing to tell us who he was.    [50]

 

(i) Given below are four words and phrases. Find the words which have a similar meaning in the passage:
(1) Coming near 
( 2 ) Disappeared suddenly
(3) Awakening from sleep
(4) Moved slowly and gradually 

(ii) For each of the words given below, write a sentence of at least ten words using the same word unchanged in form, but with a different  meaning from that which it carries in the passage:
(1) Bats ( line 1 )
( 2 ) Sign ( line 4 )
( 3 ) Banks (  line 6 )
( 4 )  Back ( line 43 )


 When Mabel Dancy later requests De Levis to withdraw the charge, how does he respond? What declaration does Dancy wish De Levis to sign? 


Complete the following sentence by adding the appropriate part of the sentence given below.

Someone else suggested that the king should have a timetable ____________________. 


How did Mr Gessler described his brother?


What do you know about worker ants?


What is an oasis? How is it useful for desert plants?


How did Algu and Jumman treat each other?


Why did the daimio reward the farmer, but punish his neighbour for the same act?


Does Nishad agree with Maya about Mr Nath? How does he feel about him?


Analyse the comparison between death and sleep in the poem, Death Be Not Proud. How does this metaphor contribute to the overall message of the sonnet? Write your answer in about 200-250 words.


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