English Exercise 004

COMPREHENSION PASSAGE

Read the following passage carefully and answer the questions on it.

Bitrus, a middle-aged man, was speeding along the hot tarmac one afternoon, oblivious of the countryside. By his side, reading a magazine was his first son, a twenty-year old university computer science student. On the man’s mind was the contract he was pursuing in the capital city. It was worth several million dollars. Although he had handled bigger contracts before, Bitrus was preoccupied with this new challenge, his mind far away from the road before him.

His son was also buried in the magazine he was reading. So neither saw the goat crossing the road early enough. Like automation, Bitrus jammed on the brakes.

In a flash, there was a skid and a somersault. The villagers worked for almost an hour on the huge Mercedes before rescuing the two.

There, in the casualty ward, the duo lay on the stretchers. Bitrus was soon in a fairly stable, but anybody would know that the son needed prompt specialist medical attention. The doctor was sent for, a surgeon who regularly handled such cases. Soon enough, the doctor came.

The nurses heaved a sigh of relief. But then.. “Oh no, I can’t handle this case.

He’s my son!” Everyone was shocked. One of the nurses pleaded. “But doctor, you must do something otherwise,... “No, he’s my son. I’ll have to transfer this case.” And so tearfully, more agitated than anybody around, the doctor hurried away to call a colleague.

Here was Bitrus, with multiple injuries, but not in danger. In the adjoining room washis son, still comatose. How then could a doctor come in and say, “This is my son”?

Wasn’t Bitrus the father after all? Most people would reason that the doctor was

truly the secret biological father. Others, reasoning hard, would conclude that the doctor was Bitrus’s father and thus was right in describing him as his son. But for how long would people continue to think that all doctors must be male? Couldn’t the doctor have simply been Mrs. Bitrus?

Questions

(a)(i) What was the remote cause of the accident?

(ii) What was the immediate cause?

(b) What does the passage suggest

about doctors’ attitude to the cases they

handle?

(c) Describe the conditions of Mr. Bitrus

and his son at the hospital.

(d) What assumption about doctors does

the passage illustrate?

(e) ‘His son was also buried in the

magazine he was reading.’

(i) What type of figurative expression is this?

(ii) What is its meaning as it is used

in the sentence?

(f) ‘...that the doctor was truly the secret

biological father.’

(i) What grammatical name is given

to this expression?

(ii) What is its function as it is used

in the sentence?

(g) For each of the following, find a word

or phrase that means the same and can

replace it as it is used in the passage:

(i)                          oblivious

(ii) prompt

(iii)regularly

(iv) pleaded

(v) agitated

(vi) adjoining