Workspace▸ Reading▸ Test 43
← Back to Reading
Reading · Drill 43

Reading practice 43

10 questions ~9 min recommended
⏱ 00:00
Score
—

Rebecca stood and gazed out across the fields, into the unending horizon.

A warm breeze caressed the fields, causing the ears of the wheat to bend homeward, looking for all the world like they were listening to a conversation none but they could hear. The ears bent and bobbed as the breeze eddied about them. She stood, inhaling the fresh and savory scent of the almost-ripe wheat, mixed with the rich scent of the earth. Someone had plowed nearby: the newly uncovered earth always smelled more alive. She could hear bees—there was a hive somewhere not far away—and birds and men, all faintly but as much a part of the image in her mind as was the wheat itself. And underneath everything else, that slight tang in the air that said it would rain soon. Not even a tang, really—almost a feeling but somehow a smell, too.

The evening, just as dusk was falling, was always the best time to visit the fields alone. Earlier in the day there were too many people, and too many chores to do to justify standing silently in the middle of the field. Later it was too still, too quiet. It felt as if the field itself had gone to sleep; not an unpleasant feeling, really, but not the feeling of being embraced by a living, breathing entity that she had wanted today. That she liked best of all.1

Of course, the earth hadn't always been a friend to the people that cultivated it. Any farmer knows that there will be good years and bad years, and that sometimes one bad year will follow another and then another, to the point where you wonder if a good year will ever come again. Growing up far away from the soil that had held her people for generations, Rebecca had known all of that. Known how the land had turned on her parents and driven them far from the only home they knew, seeking work on a stranger's land, doing unfamiliar work. Still, she had felt the draw. Even as a child, she had known that someday, she would return.2 It was in her blood, really. Her great-grandparents had claimed the land as their own, poured their blood, sweat, and tears into it, and turned it from a wild tract of prairie into3 productive fields of wheat and corn. Her grandparents had inherited the fields, and her parents in their turn had as well. They would have gone to Rebecca next, had her parents been able to hold on to what was theirs. Even when they had left, they had claimed the land as their own and had sworn that they'd return to it someday. Both her mother and father had been prevented from returning home, but now Rebecca was here in their place, trying to reclaim her family's heritage.

4She stood still, thinking about the past and the present, breathing in the heat and the life that surrounded her. The land might not always be kind, but it is always good.5 She flinched a little bit as a bee landed on her cheek, inspecting this large thing that didn't seem to be a part of the field. She let it explore her face, knowing it would move on once it had ascertained that she was no flower. The feel of the bee's feet tramping across her nose made her want to sneeze but she held her breath, not wanting to frighten it into stinging her.

When the bee ventured on in pursuit of more profitable discoveries, she opened her eyes and gazed out across her fields. They were hers, in truth if not in writing,6 and would one day be hers in every sense. For a moment, her stomach began to clench as her mind turned unwillingly but naturally to the realities of what lay ahead.7 The loans, the mortgage payments, the possibility of a bad crop ruining all her plans. Firmly, she pushed those thoughts aside. She had acknowledged them before and would acknowledge them again, when she sat before her ledger or reviewed the accounts. This moment was for enjoying the sheer bounty of life, not for fears and numbers. Without the former, she could never face the latter. It was for the warm reality of the growing, breathing crops that she was determined to deal with the men from the bank, to go without new things, and work until her back ached every day, only to get up and do the same the next morning, before the sun was up.8

She breathed deeply, trying to take in the strength and life that surrounded her, trying to store it inside herself. This was her people's land;9 she knew that in her bones. Whatever else might happen, that would not change.10

1. Which of the following statements best expresses Rebecca's feelings during her visit to the fields, as expressed in lines 1–42 ?

2. The word that in line 28 most directly refers to:

3. The main purpose of the information in lines 30–42 is to explain why Rebecca believes that the land is:

4. In the first four paragraphs (lines 1–42), the narrator describes all of the following aspects of Rebecca's surroundings EXCEPT the:

5. The passage can best be described as a fictional depiction of a woman's impression of the land that:

6. The narrator's statement in lines 62–63 ("Without the former, she could never face the latter) most directly refers back to Rebecca's:

7. One of the main purposes of the last two paragraphs (lines 52–71) is for the narrator to describe Rebecca's attitude towards the land in a way that:

8. The point of view from which the passage is told can best be described as that of a narrator who:

9. As it is used in line 34, the word wild most nearly means:

10. When Rebecca realized that "a bee landed on her cheek" (line 46), her first response is to:

← Prev test Next test →
Jump to