Read the passage below and then answer all the questions which follow.

An Elephant Rescues her Calf

1. One of the most intelligent acts I ever witnessed an elephant perform took placeon an evening when the Upper Taungdwin River was in full spate. I was listening andhoping to hear the boom and roar of timber coming from upstream. Directly belowmy camp the banks of the river were steep and rocky and four to five s high.About fifty-.meters away on the other side, the bank was made up of ledges of shale 5strata. Although it was already nearly dusk, by watching these ledges being successsively submerged, I was trying to judge how fast the water was rising.

2. I was suddenly alarmed on hearing an elephant roaring as though frightened, and,looking down, I saw three or four men rushing up and down on the opposite bankin a state of great excitement. I realized at once that something was wrong, and 10ran down to the edge of the near bank and from there saw Ma Shwe (Miss Gold)with her three-month-old calf, trapped in the fast-rising torrent. She herself was stillin her depth, as the water was about two meters deep. But there was a life-and-death struggle going on. Her calf was screaming with terror and was afloat like acork. Ma Shwe was as near to the far bank as she could get, holding her body against 15the raging and increasing torrent, and keeping the calf pressed against her massivebody. Every now and then the swirling water would sweep the calf away; then, withterrific strength, she would encircle it with her trunk and pull it upstream to restagainst her body again.

3. There was a sudden rise in the water, as if a half-metre bore had come down, and 20the calf was washed clean over the mother's hindquarters and was gone. She turnedto chase it, like an otter after a fish, but she had travelled about fifty metersdownstream and, plunging and sometimes afloat, had crossed to my side of the river,before she had caught up with it and got it back. For what seemed like minutes,she pinned the calf with her head and trunk against the rocky bank. Then, with a 25really gigantic effort, she picked it up in her trunk and reared up until she was halfstanding on her hind legs so as to be able to place it on a narrow shelf of rock,one and a half meters above the flood level.

4. Having accomplished this, she fell back into the raging torrent, and she herself wentaway like a cork. She well knew that she would now have a fight to save her own 30life, as, less than three hundred meters below where she had stowed her calf insafety, (here was a gorge. If she were carried down, it would be certain death . Iknew, as well as she did, that there was one spot between her and the gorge whereshe could get up the bank, but it was on the other side from where she had puther calf. By that time, my chief interest was in the calf. It stood, tucked up, shivering 35and terrified on a ledge: just wide enough to hold its feet. Its little, fat, protrudingbelly was tightly pressed against the bank.

5. While 1 was peering over at it from about two and a half metres above, wonderingwhat I could do next, I heard the grandest sounds of a mother's love I can remember.Ma Shwe had crossed the river and got up the bank, and was making her way back 40as fast as she could, calling the whole time -.a defiant roar, but to her calf it wasmusic. The two little ears, little maps of India, were cocked forward, listening tothe only sound that mattered, the call of her mother.

6. Any wild schemes which had raced through my head of recovering the calf by ropesdisappeared as fast as I had formed them, when 1 saw Ma Shwe emerge from the 45jungle and appear on the opposite bank. When she saw her calf, she stopped roaringand began rumbling, a never-to-be-forgotten sound, not unlike that made by a veryhigh-powered car when accelerating. It is the sound of pleasure, like a cat's purring,and delighted she must have been to see her calf still in the same spot, where shehad put her half an hour before. 50

7. As darkness fell, the muffled boom of floating logs hitting against each other camefrom upstream. A torrential rain was falling, and the river still separated the motherand her calf. I decided I could do nothing but wait and see what happened. Twicebefore turning in for the night I went down to the bank and picked out the calfwith my torch, but this seemed to disturb it, so I went away 55

8. It was just as well I did, because at dawn Ma Shwe and her calf were together bothon the far bank. The spates had subsided to a mere 30 centimetres of dirty-colouredwater. No one in the camp had seen Ma Shwe recover her calf, but she must havelifted it down from the ledge in the same way as she had put it there.

Section:2Reading for Meaning

From Paragraph 1

5. How do you know that it was the rainy season?

6. What work do you think the men and elephants were doing in the camp?[2]

7. Pick out two consecutive words, which indicate the water was steadily rising.

From Paragraph 28. What were the feelings of the elephant and the men?

9. Pick out one word. which emphasises the fast flow of the water,

10. "She was still in her depth ..." Explain in your own words the position of the elephant.[I]

11 What was the "life and death struggle"? Answer in your own words. [2]

From paragraph 3

12. Pick out the word, which emphasises that tremendous force was needed. [I]13. What did the elephant do? Answer in your own words.

[2]From Paragraph 4

14. "She herself went away like a cork How does this comparison emphasise the force[2]15. Why would it be certain death?

[I]|From Paragraph 5

16.Pickout the words that are paradoxical.[2]

From Paragraph 6

17. To what does the writer liken the sound she made? .

From Paragraph 718. How did the elephant finally rescue her calf?[I]

From the whole of Passage 2

19. Choose five of the following words. For each of them give one word or short phras(of not more than seven words) which has the same meaning that the word has ithe passage.

1. strata (paragraph I, line 6)

2. massive (paragraph 2, line 16) ______

3. upstream (paragraph 2, line 18) _______________

4. protruding (paragraph 4, line 36) _____________________

5. schemes (paragraph 6, line 44) ___________

6. emerge (paragraph 6, line 45) _____

7. muffled (paragraph 7, line 51)

8. subsided (paragraph 8, line 57) ______

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