Extract Based Questions: Poem - On the Grasshopper and Cricket | English Class 8 PDF Download

Q1: Read the extract given below and answer the following questions.
The poetry of earth is ceasing never:
On a lone winter evening when the frost
Has wrought a silence, from the stone there shrills
The cricket’s song, in warmth increasing ever,
And seems to one in drowsiness half lost;
The grasshopper’s among some grassy hills.

(i) What is ‘ceasing never’?
Ans: The poetry of earth is never ceasing.

(ii) Who takes up the job of providing rhythm during winters?
Ans: Cricket takes up the job by providing rhythm in extreme cold weather.

(iii) From where do the cricket sing?
Ans: The crickets hide under the stone and sing in its shrill voice.

(iv) What is the impact of cricket and grasshopper music?
Ans: Crickets and grasshoppers make sounds that soothe the listener even its extreme weathers. The listeners are recovered from their drowsy sleep to listen to the endless fountain of relief with music of the nature.

Q2: Read the extract given below and answer the following questions.
The poetry of earth is never dead:
When all the birds are faint with the hot sun,
And hide in cooling trees, a voice will run
From hedge to hedge about the new-mown mead,
That is the grasshopper’s
he takes the lead In summer luxury
he has never done With his delights, for when tired out with fun
He rests at ease beneath some pleasant weed.

(i) What is an ongoing process in nature?
Ans: Poetry, rhythm in nature is an unending process giving life to surroundings.

(ii) Where do birds go when heat of the sun rise?
Ans: As the heat of the Sun rise, the birds hide in branches to find a cool place for themselves.

(iii) How has the continuity of music maintained?
Ans: During the extreme heat when birds stop singing, voice of grasshopper delights with its music.

(iv) Name the figure of speech in the above stanza.
Ans: Metaphor – Poetry of earth.

(v) Describe the beauty of the poem.
Ans: The poem is a 14 line Petrarchan sonnet with a rhyming scheme of abba – abba – cdecde.