‘I marvel at the varied wonders of fate. In the days of killing and looting, when it seemed that every house in the city was emptied even of its dust, my house escaped the looters’ grasping hands. Yet I swear even so that nothing but clothes to wear and bedding to sleep upon was left to me. The answer to this riddle and the key to this false seeming truth is this: that at the time when the black rebels seized the city, my wife, without telling me gathered her jewels and valuables and sent them secretly to the house of Kale Saheb. There they were stored in the cellar, and the door of the cellar blocked up with clay and smoothed over. When the British solders took the city and were given leave to loot and kill, my wife revealed this secret to me. Now there was nothing to be done to go there and bring them back was impossible. I said nothing and comforted myself with the thought that we were destined to lose these things and that it was well that they had not been taken from our own home.
(a) (i) Whose house was not looted by the looters?
(ii) What do you mean by the “looters?”
(iii) Where did Ghalib’s wife send her jewels and valuables?
(iv) Where in Kale Saheb’s house were those jewels and valuables stored?
(v) Who seized the city?
(b) Match the words in column A with their meanings in column B:
| A |
B |
| 1. Marvel |
1. Disclose |
| 2. Riddle |
2. A feeling of not suffering or worrying so much |
| 3. Cellar |
3. Feel surprised |
| 4. Reveal |
4. An underground room |
| 5. Comfort |
5. A statement not easily understood |
