THE BEST RECRUITING AGENTS (Intermediate Level - Reading Test)

THE BEST RECRUITING AGENTS (Intermediate Level - Reading Test)

In 1849 a servant girl wrote home to her brother from Port Adelaide, South Australia: "I have accepted a situation at £20 per annum, so you can tell the servants in your neighbourhood not to stay in England for such wages as from £4 to £8 a year, but come here." Letters such as these, which were circulated from the kitchen to kitchen and from attic to attic in English homes, were the best recruiting agents for the colonies, which were then so desperately in need of young women to serve the pioneers who were trying to create a new life for themselves in their chosen countries. Other girls read about the much better prospects overseas in newspapers and magazines, which also published advertisements giving details of free or assisted passages.

EXERCISE 1: Find words or phrases in the passage which mean the same as:

COLUMN A                                                                                              COLUMN B

a) job (in the passage, as a servant)

b) for each year

c) money paid for work - especially unskilled work

(plural)

d) move from place to place, or person to person

in a particular group; pass round

e) room at the top of a house in the space

immediately below the roof

f) the finding of new workers

g) very greatly; seriously

h) one of the first people to go to a new country to

work or settle

i) chance of success, especially in work [plural)

j) abroad; in a foreign country across the sea

k) without payment; costing nothing

I) provided with or given help with raising money

for something

m) journey by ship from one place to another

EXERCISE 2: Choose the correct answer according to the passage.

1. Those women who went to the colonies as servants

A) were all recruited through agents back in England

B) missed their families greatly

C) played the most important role in attracting others

D) found themselves being moved from kitchen to kitchen

E) had the pioneering spirit necessary for starting new lives

2. Getting to the colonies from England for the servants

A) could cost as little as £4

B) was essential if they wanted to escape life in English attics

C) was only possible if an agent had recruited them

D) did not pose any financial problem

E) required a written invitation from someone already there

3. It is stated in the passage that

A) no men could get jobs as servants in Australia

B) servants were in great demand for the pioneers establishing new lives

C) English homes were short of servants as so many went overseas

D) the pioneers who went to the colonies were all men

E) emigration from England to Australia started in 1849

EXERCISE 3: Complete the sentences by selecting words from Column B in EXERCISE 1.

1. A person with good qualifications is bound to have brighter ___________ than

someone without.

2. The local shops are giving away sets of kitchen knives ____________ with every

purchase over £50.

3. The news ______________ so quickly round the office that by the end of the day,

everyone had heard it.

4. Many of the ____________ had no information as to what difficulties they would face

once they arrived in their new land.

5. She ____________ wanted a bicycle, and begged her parents day and night for one.

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