English language test
English language test
Passage 1
Write a precis of the following passage in about one-third of its length. Suggest a suitable title also:
Unemployment arises from a variety of causes. One which is always securing and of the effects of which we have had a recent example is the disorganization of industry resulting from a long war; this is a serious problem admitting of no easy solution at the best of times. Again these are the unemployment which follows a marked diminution in the quality of any raw products, such as cotton: fewer hands are required in the mills and factories. We may call this cause bad harvest. Similar, but more serious in the effect of changes in the industry due to the invention of machinery which does more work and requires fewer workers. And yet another serious cause is a strike or a lockout; and this is the more to be deplored because such a stoppage sometimes is due to a very trivial matter, perhaps the fact that men are working half an hour longer than the regulation of their union permits.
In the above passage we have a striking example to illustrate how, sometimes, the leading ideas in a passage are buried in a fog of words. There are plenty of repetitions and illustrations. All that may be safely omitted have italicised. Ultimately a summary of this passage will read as follows:
Causes of Unemployment
Precis: Four leading causes of unemployment are the disorganization of the industry by war, the falling off in the supply of raw materials, the invention of labour-saving machinery and the dislocation due to industrial disputes.
Passage 2
Write precis of the following passage:
I always find it a little difficult to know what to say, because of the Press. like a great steam-engine is a little sensitive in relation to itself. If the Press were not sensitive it would not have the sympathy of the public-it could not speak the voice of the nation. Those who would speak to journalists have only one safe course: they must adhere to certain principles.They must assert the potentiality of the Press, they must assert in the strongest language possible that the Brtish Press is the best and cleanest in the world. To all those four principles. I give my conscientious adherence. I believe in the power of the Press. I believe in the potentiality of the Press even more. I believe even more in the responsibility of the Press, and I believe most of all that the British Press is the best and cleanest in the world. But I am not quite sure that covers the whole ground. There are two other things to be observed. One is (and it is a new one) the enormous monopoly which is now exercised by the Press. The great daily newspapers have such a monopoly, owing to the enormous cost of founding new ones, which is obvious to you all. I do not know what the cost is, but I have heard it put at from a half to three-quarters of a million, and even then with different chances of success. Owing to the monopoly which is possessed and exercised by the principal daily newspapers of this country. Their responsibility is greater than that of the newspaper of forty or fifty years ago.
Secondly, I would point out the great development of the Press. As far as I have been able to trace the origin of the Press, it dates from the threat of the Spanish Armada in 1588. It was then a mere flysheet, but it showed what was necessary or interesting to the people of this country. Now everyday journalists produce, not a newspaper, but a library, a huge production of information a and knowledge upon every kind of subject.
Heading: The Power and Responsibility of the Press
Precis: Speaking of the Press the Earl of Rosebery remarked that Press was sensitive, so public men must speak of the power, potentiality and responsibility of the Press and assert emphatically that the British Press was the best. The speaker himself believed in all these things. But he would like to make two other points. Firstly, as the great newspapers enjoyed a kind monopoly-it being extremely difficult to start a newspaper-their responsibility was great. Secondly, there had been a great development of the Press since early days, a modern newspaper being almost a library of knowledge and information.