GCE O Level Paper 1 Reading Comprehension Exercises

The Mine

For Xuma the day was strange. There was the rumbling noise, shouting, explosions and the trembling of the earth. And always the shouting foreman driving the men on to work. And over all those were the bitter, hard eyes of the supervisor who had told him to push the truck when he did not know how.

The looks in the eyes of the men were like that of sheep. Sheep which did not know where to run when dogs chased them. It was frightening. He had seen that look before when he was at home on the farms. When a lorry came the men jumped out of the road and ran here and there like sheep. Over all this the foreman was like a shepherd with a spear. And the supervisor sat with folded arms.

Xuma pushed the loaded truck up the incline. The path on which they had to walk was narrow. It snaked up in endless convolutions. It was difficult to balance well. The supervisor shouted, “Hurry up!” The foreman took up the shout. And one little truck after another, loaded with fine wet white sand, was pushed up the incline to where a new mine-dump was being born. A truck load would go and another would come from the bowels of the earth. And another. And yet another. So it went on all day long. On and on and on and on.

Beads of sweat stood on their foreheads and the muscles on their arms hardened with pain as they fought the pile of fine wet sand. And for all their sweating, hard breathing, redness of their eyes and the emptiness of their stare, there would be nothing to show. This mocking of a man by the sand that was always wet and warm and the hard eyes of the supervisor who told them to hurry up made Xuma go mad with frustration.

However fast as they moved the sand, the pile did not grow. It made him feel desperate and anxious. He worked feverishly. But it was the same. The same all the time. no change.

Xuma could hear only the startling and terrifying noises around. And the whistles blowing. And these things beat against his brain till his eyes reddened like the eyes of the other men. When the whistle blew for them to stop for food, one of the men who had been filling the trucks called Xuma. He said his name was Nana and that they would eat together. Everywhere men found places for themselves and ate their food. Xuma wiped his brow and leaned against the corrugated wall of the smoky shack. To the left was a mine-dump, big and overpowering. To the right of it they had been dumping sand all morning without seeing anything for it. Nana followed his eyes. “It takes a long time,” Nana said.

“Yes, the pile stays the same. This brings fear. But tomorrow you think, well, there will be nothing to look for and you do not look much. The fear is less then. Then all the fear goes. It is so,” said Nana.
“But the eyes of the men…..”, Xuma protested.
“The eyes of the men?”
“Yes, I watched them. They are like the eyes of sheep.”
Nana looked at Xuma and smiled. A smile that softened his face and made gentle creases around his mouth.
“Are we not all sheep that talk,” Nana said.

For a spell they ate in silence. When they had finished Nana stretched himself full-length on the ground and closed his eyes. One by one the other men did it too, till all were stretched full-length on the ground.
“Do it too,” Nana said, “It gives your body rest.”
Xuma obeyed.
“Better, eh?”
“Yes.”
“Now make your body go soft all over.”

Somewhere a man began to hum softly. Others joined in. a low soft monotonous hum it was. Xuma joined in. It made him feel easier. He could feel the stiffness leaving his body. The aching of his back became less. He closed his eyes. The noise and hissings and explosions seemed subdued by the humming. Xuma looked at the sky. It was blue up there. And at home in the country it would be green now and there would be cattle on the hillside. His eyes suddenly felt wet. With the back of his hand he rubbed them vigorously. There was no noise to be heard from anywhere now. Nana was snoring loudly. He stole a sideways look at Nana. He looked big and strong, with ripped muscles in his arm. Xuma thought to himself what a strong man like Nana could do if he was not moving wet sand all his life. Perhaps he could do much better things, he thought.

Xuma slowly drifted off to sleep. He woke up when Nana shook him. Xuma was relaxant to get back to work, but the foreman’s commands could not be disobeyed. He dragged himself to the place where they were digging up the sand, and slowly began filling up another truck. He felt a little invigorated by the sleep and rest. Yet, the futility of the exercise was not lost on him. All around him, workers worked like bees, not stopping to talk to anyone. Xuma fell into the rhythm, and sure enough, got lost in the constant flow of work. By evening, he was soaked with sweat, and sore all over. But he felt that, even though the sand pile had not grown, he had put in a fair amount of work. He was satisfied with his performance. Nana, for one, told him that for a newcomer, he had worked very well.