READING COMPREHENSION
The following passage is taken from the book The Englishwoman in America by
Isabella Lucy Bird, published in 1856, and tells of the author’s experiences during a
visit to America.
Read the passage carefully and then answer all the questions that follow:
EXTRACT 1: AMERICA
We packed ourselves into the stage again with great difficulty, and how the forty-
eight limbs fared was shown by the painful sensations experienced for several
succeeding days. All the passengers, however, were in a perfectly good humour;
and amused each other during the eleven hours spent in this painful way. At an
average speed of six miles an hour we travelled over roads of various descriptions,
plank, corduroy, and sand; up long heavy hills, and through swamps swarming
with mosquitoes.
Everyone was heard of corduroy roads, but how few have experienced their
miseries! They are generally used for traversing swampy ground and are formed of
small pine-trees deprived of their branches, which are laid across the track
alongside each other. The wear and tear of travelling soon separates these,
leaving gaps between; and when, added to this, one trunk rots away, and
another sinks down into the swamp, and another tilts up, you may imagine such a
jolting as only leather springs could bear. On the very worst roads, filled with deep
holes, or covered with small granite boulders, the stage only swings on the straps.
Ordinary springs, besides dislocating the joints of the passengers, would be
wrenched, and broken after a few miles travelling.
Even as we were, faces sometimes came into rather close proximity to each other
and to the side railings, and heads sustained very unpleasant collisions. The
amiable man who was so disappointed with the American climate suffered very
much from the journey. He said he had thought a French diligence [a type of
coach] the climax of discomfort, but a ‘stage was misery, oh torture!’ Each time
that we had rather a worse jolt than usual the poor man groaned, which always
drew forth a chorus of laughter, to which he submitted most good-humouredly.
Occasionally he would ask the time, when someone would point maliciously to his
watch, remarking, ‘Twelve hours more’, or ‘Fifteen hours more’, when he would
look up with an expression of despair. The bridges wore a very un-English feature.
Over the small streams or brooks they consisted of three pines covered with
planks, without any parapet – with sometimes a plank out, and sometimes a hole
in the middle. Over large streams they were wooden erections of a most peculiar
kind, with high parapets; their insecurity being evidenced by the notice, ‘Walk
your horses, according to law’, - a notice generally disregarded by our
coachman, as he trotted his horses over the shaking and rattling fabric.
In Nova Scotia the animals seemed to be more carefully lodged than the people.
Wherever we changed horses, we drove into a lofty shed, opening into a large
stable with a boarded floor scrupulously clean, generally containing twenty
horses. The rigour of the climate in winter necessitates such careful provision for the
support of animal life. The coachman went into the stable and chose his team,
which was brought out, and then a scene of kicking, biting, and screaming
ensued, ended by the most furious kickers being put to the wheel; and after a
certain amount of talking, and settling the mail-bags, the ponderous vehicle
moved off again, the leaders always rearing for the first few yards.
For sixty miles we were passing through woods, the trees sometimes burned and
charred for several miles, and the ground all blackened round them. We saw very
few clearings, and those there were consisted merely of a few acres of land,
separated from the forest by rude ‘snake-fences’. Stumps of trees blackened by
fire stood up among the oat-crops; but though they look extremely untidy, they
are an unavoidable evil for two or three years, till the large roots decay.
Isabella Lucy Bird
1. Explain what is meant by the following words and phrases as used in the
passage:
a. traversing:
_________________________________________________________________
b. close proximity:
_________________________________________________________________
c. scrupulously clean:
_________________________________________________________________
d. ponderous:
_________________________________________________________________
2. How many people do you think were travelling in the coach? What are your
reasons for saying so?
___________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________
3. Using your own words, explain as fully as you can the features of corduroy
roads and what the writer thought about travelling on them.
___________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________
4. What does the writer tell you about the suspension of the coach on which she
was travelling?
___________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________
5. From paragraph 3 what do you learn about the bridges on the route and
what did the writer find surprising about the way the coach was driven over
them?
___________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________
6. What reason does the writer give for the way in which horses were lodged in
Nova Scotia?
___________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________
7. What would appear to be the main criterion used by the coachman when
choosing a new team of horses?
___________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________
8. What was the reason for the ground being ‘blackened’ (paragraph 5)?
___________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________