Practice Paper 1

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1. Q1

   Old Mrs Hay has sent the Burnell children a doll's house. The children are allowed to invite schoolmates to see it — but not the Kelveys, two poor sisters (Lil and little Else) whom everyone looks down on.

   The doll's house stood open for all to see: drawing-room and dining-room, the kitchen and two bedrooms. But what Kezia liked better than anything, what she liked frightfully, was the lamp. It stood in the middle of the dining-room table, an exquisite little amber lamp with a white globe. It was even filled ready for lighting, though of course you could not light it. The father and mother dolls, who sprawled very stiff as though they had fainted in the drawing-room, and their two little children asleep upstairs, were really too big for the doll's house. They didn't look as if they belonged. But the lamp was perfect. It seemed to smile at Kezia, to say, 'I live here.' The lamp was real.

   The Burnell children were allowed to ask the other girls at school, two at a time, to come and look. But not the Kelveys. They were the daughters of a hardworking little washerwoman, and it was whispered that their father was in prison; they were shunned by everybody. Even the teacher had a special voice for them. So the Kelveys were not allowed to see the doll's house; the line had to be drawn somewhere. It was drawn at the Kelveys.

   One afternoon Kezia was swinging on the gate when she saw the little Kelveys coming along the road. She got down. She had made up her mind; and though her heart beat, she called out, 'Hullo. You can come and see our doll's house if you want to.' 'Your ma told our ma you wasn't to speak to us,' said Lil. 'Oh well,' said Kezia. 'It doesn't matter. You can come and see it all the same. Come on.'

   They had just reached the doll's house when the back door opened, and out came Aunt Beryl. 'How dare you ask the little Kelveys into the courtyard!' she said, in a cold, furious voice. 'You know as well as I do you're not allowed to talk to them. Run away at once. And don't come back.' She stepped into the yard and shooed them out as if they were chickens.

   Presently the Kelveys were far enough away to sit down and rest on a big red drain-pipe by the side of the road. Lil's cheeks were still burning. But little Else, who had not said a word since they left the courtyard, seemed to have forgotten it all. She smiled her rare smile. 'I seen the little lamp,' she said softly.

   • ¹ shunned: avoided, deliberately kept away from

   From 'The Doll's House' by Katherine Mansfield (1922)

   The passage says the dolls 'didn't look as if they belonged', but of the little lamp that it 'seemed to smile' and 'was real'. What is suggested by setting the lamp against the dolls in this way?

   1. AThe dolls were broken and the lamp was not.
   2. BThe plain little lamp feels alive; the dolls do not.
   3. CKezia preferred small toys to large ones.
   4. DThe lamp was simply better made than the stiff dolls were.
2. Q2

   For thousands of years, sailors have feared the darkness of the open sea. A single hidden rock or sandbank could tear open a wooden hull and send a ship to the bottom within minutes. For the families waiting at home, a storm at sea could mean they never saw their fathers and brothers again. ____ (23) The earliest solution was simple: people lit bonfires on hilltops near dangerous shores.

   The most famous lighthouse of the ancient world stood on the island of Pharos, near the Egyptian city of Alexandria. Built more than two thousand years ago, it towered over the harbour like a giant stone finger. A fire burned at its top every night, and polished metal mirrors threw the light far out to sea. ____ (24) Yet even this wonder could not last forever. A series of earthquakes shook the tower, and after many centuries it crumbled into the sea.

   For hundreds of years after the fall of Rome, few new lighthouses were built, and many of the old ones fell into ruin. ____ (25) These busy new routes demanded better guidance than a smoky bonfire could give.

   The greatest change came in the early nineteenth century, when a French scientist named Augustin Fresnel designed a new kind of lens. ____ (26) Instead, a lighthouse fitted with a Fresnel lens could be seen from more than thirty kilometres away. Its rings of glass gathered the scattered rays and bent them into a single powerful beam. Fishermen and merchants alike blessed the bright new light that reached them far out on the water.

   For over a century, every lighthouse needed a keeper who lived beside the light. The keeper's job was lonely but vital: he had to trim the wicks, polish the lenses, and wind the clockwork that turned the lamp. ____ (27) If the light failed even for a moment, ships might be dashed against the rocks.

   Today, almost every lighthouse in the world works on its own. ____ (28) Even so, these towers still stand watch along dangerous coasts, flashing their patient warning to any ship that passes in the night.

   Which sentence best fits gap 26?

   1. AElectric lamps and computers have replaced the keepers, who have now retired from their lonely posts.
   2. BEarlier lights had wasted most of their glow, scattering it uselessly into the sky.
   3. CSailors could see its glow from many kilometres away, and travellers counted it among the wonders of the world.
   4. DBecause of this danger, coastal peoples searched for a way to warn ships away from the shallows.
   5. ESome old lighthouses have now been turned into small museums or unusual holiday cottages.
   6. FAbove all, he could never let the flame go out, no matter how fierce the storm.
   7. GSlowly, though, sea trade recovered, and ships crowded the coasts of Europe once more.
3. Q3

   Which writer, once helped through their own nervousness, would like to be there for a shy young relative facing the same ordeal?

   1. AExtract A
   2. BExtract B
   3. CExtract C
   4. DExtract D