Soft bodied animals like caterpillars often fall a prey to voracious hunters like birds or reptiles. Despite having no means to 'actively' defend themselves, with weapons like claws or jaws, they have nevertheless, evolved other equally effective deterrents. A particular species of the caterpillar lives at an altitude over 2,500 metres in the Himalayas. It uses prominent colour to inform would be predators of its inedibility. In the event that an inexperienced or adventurous bird did eat the caterpillar, it would probably vomit it soon after, and subsequently desist from attacking similar species in future. Though this would do the unfortunate victim no good, the species benefits. A rare example of the martyr among animals.
Experienced birds do not attack the Himalayan caterpillars because they are
Answer: C
Correct answer: Inedible
The passage says the caterpillar's prominent colour informs would-be predators of its inedibility, and that a bird which does eat one vomits it and afterwards avoids similar species. Experience teaches the bird that the caterpillar cannot be eaten, not that it is dangerous or diseased.
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The Himalayan caterpillar uses prominent colours to
Answer: A
Correct answer: warn the predator
The passage says it uses prominent colour to inform would-be predators of its inedibility. The colour carries a message rather than doing anything physical, which is why attack and defend both overstate it; and it is not merely revealing itself but telling the bird something.
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Caterpillars cannot defend themselves because
Answer: D
Correct answer: have no claws or jaws
The passage says they have no means to actively defend themselves, with weapons like claws or jaws. The absence is anatomical, which is why the options about passivity, laziness or acquiring weapons all import a choice the passage does not describe.
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In the context of this passage, a martyr is one who dies
Answer: D
Correct answer: To save others
The passage says the bird that eats one caterpillar afterwards avoids the whole species: though this would do the unfortunate victim no good, the species benefits. The individual dies and the others are spared, which is exactly what makes the word martyr apt here.
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Today perhaps your only association with the word 'polio' is the Sabin Oral Vaccine that protects children from the disease. Fifty five years ago this was not so. The dreaded disease, which mainly affects the brain and spinal cord, causing stiffening and weakening of muscles, crippling and paralysis - which is Why I am in a wheelchair today. If somebody had predicted, when I was born, that this would happen to me, no one would have believed it. I was the seventh child in a family of four pairs of brothers and sisters, with a huge 23-year gap between the first and last. I was so fair and brown haired that I looked more like a foreigner than a Dawood Bohri. I was also considered to be the healthiest of the brood.
In his childhood, the narrator was
Answer: B
Correct answer: Very healthy
The passage says he was also considered to be the healthiest of the brood, which is the irony the paragraph is built on: the child least likely to be crippled was the one polio took. Height and build are never mentioned.
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In this passage, the word 'brood' refers to
Answer: C
Correct answer: Children in the family
Brood means the children of one family taken together, and the sentence in which it appears is comparing the narrator with his brothers and sisters. The passage is not discussing polio victims or children in general at that point.
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The narrator was the seventh child in a family of
Answer: A
Correct answer: 8 Children
The passage says he was the seventh child in a family of four pairs of brothers and sisters. Four pairs is eight children, with a twenty-three year gap between the eldest and the youngest.
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In this passage, the narrator is a patient of
Answer: A
Correct answer: Polio
The passage names the disease outright and traces its effects - stiffening and weakening of muscles, crippling and paralysis - before adding which is why I am in a wheelchair today. Paralysis is a symptom of the polio, not a separate condition.
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In his childhood, the narrator looked "more like a foreigner than a Dawood Bohri" This was because he was
Answer: D
Correct answer: Fair and brown haired
The passage gives the reason in the same sentence: I was so fair and brown haired that I looked more like a foreigner than a Dawood Bohri. His health and build are mentioned in the next sentence and for a different purpose.
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Piccadilly Circus was full of loneliness. It seethes and echoes with it. To live near it, looking down on it, is a discomforting exercise. You can't feel the pulse of London here, though people expect to. To Londoners it is a maddening obstruction between one place and another, and few voluntarily linger there. The only locals are those who live off the lingerers; the lingerers are primarily sightseers, with a fair sprinkling of people hoping to draw attention to themselves - both typically from the provinces. They have come to see the heart of London and expect to see spectacle, glamour and vice.
Piccadilly circus is
Answer: C
Correct answer: a centrally located area in London
The passage treats it as a place people pass through, live near and look down on - a maddening obstruction between one place and another for Londoners, and the place visitors go to see the heart of London. It is a junction in the city, not a company, a building or a ruin.
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