Short Question Answer: On the Grasshopper and Cricket | English Honeydew Class 8 PDF Download

Q1: Where do birds take rest on a hot summer day?
Ans: The birds take rest under shady trees to secure themselves from the scorching heat of the sun.

Q2: Discuss with your partner the following definition of a poem. A poem is made of words arranged in a beautiful order. These words, when read aloud with feeling, have music and meaning of their own.
Ans: A poem is supposedly an artistic piece that contains speech as well as a song and is usually rhythmical and metaphorical. These beautifully arranged words add to the essence of the poem. Poems are supposed to be read aloud to feel the intense passion and emotion with which they have been composed. The rhyming words in a poem put various ideas and imaginations of the poet in sync. According to the Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary, a poem can be defined as a piece of writing in which the words are chosen for their sound and the images they suggest, not just for their obvious meanings. The words are arranged in separate lines, usually with a repeated rhythm, and often the lines rhyme at the end.

Q3: In which season do crickets sing?
Ans: Crickets sing in winter. When it is very cold and quiet, the winter silence is broken by a shrill sound.

Q4: 'The poetry of earth' is not made of words. What is it made of, as suggested in the poem?
Ans: 'The poetry of earth' is not made of words, but it is made of the songs of a grasshopper and the cricket, thus it is made by the music sung by these insects.

Q5: What is the main theme of the poem?
Ans: The main theme of the poem is that poetry and music in nature do not perish.

Q6: How long does the poetry of the earth live?
Ans: The poetry of the earth lives forever. It never dies.

Q7: Where do grasshoppers take rest when they are tired?
Ans: When grasshoppers become tired, they rest beneath some pleasant weeds.

Q8: 'The poetry of earth continues round the year through a cycle of two seasons'. Mention each with its representative voice.
Ans: The grasshopper takes the lead in summer. He is never done with his delight. On a long winter evening when the forest is silent, the cricket sings with its shrill voice from the stone.

Q9: Read the following extract and answer the questions that follow:
"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 grasshoppers among some grassy hills."

(i) When does the frost wrought a silence?
Ans: The frost wrought a silence during winters.

(ii) What does the cricket’s song do?
Ans: The cricket’s song shrills out.

(iii) What does the cricket’s song seem like?
Ans: The cricket’s song seems to be lost in half drowsiness.

Q10: Read the following extract and answer the questions that follow:
"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."

(i) How long does the poetry of the earth live?
Ans: The poetry of the earth lives forever. It never dies.

(ii) Where do the birds hide during the hot sun?
Ans: The birds hide in the cooling trees.

(iii) Where will the voice run?
Ans: The voice will run from hedge to hedge.