NCERT Solutions for Class 10 English Footprints Without Feet Chapter 4 A Question of Trust

NCERT Solutions for Class 10 English Footprints Without Feet Chapter 4 A Question of Trust are part of NCERT Solutions for Class 10 English. Here we have given NCERT Solutions for Class 10 English Footprints Without Feet Chapter 4 A Question of Trust.

NCERT Solutions for Class 10 English Footprints Without Feet Chapter 4 A Question of Trust

TEXTUAL EXERCISES

Read and Find Out (Pages 20 & 22)

Question 1.
What does Horace Danby like to collect?
Answer:
Horace Danby likes to collect books. He loves rare, expensive books.

Question 2.
Why does he steal every year?
Answer:
He robbed every year. He robbed money which could last for one whole year. So he didn’t need to rob again and again.

He was a typical thief because he stole only once a year. He stole to buy rare and expensive books only.

Question 3.
Who is speaking to Horace Danby ?
Answer:
It is the voice of the lady in the house. Horace thinks that she is the mistress of the house. But she is a thief like him who passes as the landlady.

Question 4.
Who is the real culprit in the story ? (V. Imp.)
Answer:
The real culprit is the lady thief. She poses before Horace Danby as the landlady of the Grange. Danby has entered the house to steal. But before him that lady thief is already there.

Think About It (Page 25)

Question 1.
Did you begin to suspect, before the end of the story, that the lady was not the person Horace Danby took her to be ? If so, at what point did you realise this, and how ?
Answer:
Well, in the beginning the lady appeared on the scene. I did not suspect her. But when she said “I have always liked the wrong kind of people”, I suspected her. Then she said that if Horace did ‘something’ for her, she would let him go.

Question 2.
What are the subtle ways in which the lady manages to deceive Horace Danby into thinking she is the lady of the house ? Why doesn’t Horace suspect that something is wrong ? (V. Imp.)
Answer:
First, the lady speaks with confidence to deceive Horace. She has firmness in her voice. She smiles at him while talking. There is sharpness also in her voice as she continues talking. She then threatens him with the idea of‘prison’. In this way she impresses him to be the landlady.

Question 3.
“Horace Danby was good and respectable—but not completely honest”. Why do you think this description is apt for Horace ? Why can’t he be categorised as a typical thief ?
Answer:
This description fits well on Horace Danby. Horace enjoys a good reputation as ‘a good, honest citizen’. Then he steals only once a year. He covers his stealing under his profession of making locks. He also loves reading books. So due to these reasons he can’t be categorised as a typical thief.

Question 4.
Horace Danby was a meticulous planner but still he faltered. Where did he go wrong and why ? (V. Imp.)
Answer:
He was rightly a meticulous planner. He planned carefully each year just before stealing. But he faltered. He didn’t see into the lady’s sweet, clever and crafty talks. It may be because he had been in the house as a thief. And he had been apprehended red-handed. His ” fear of prison blunted his mind to see through the lady’s tricks. Then he was a thief.

Talk About It

Question 1.
Do you think Horace Danby was unfairly punished, or that he deserved what he got ?
Answer:
I think Horace Danby was unfairly punished in that theft. He was a thief, no doubt. But he was not a full-fledged thief. It is in the sense of the material benefit out of the theft. However, all the material evidence was against it. In the eyes of the law he was a thief. So he was punished. But in the spirit of justice, there was something important. It was : it did not make him a thief.

Question 2.
Do Intentions justify actions ? Would you, like Horace Danby, do something wrong if you thought your ends justified the means ? Do you think that there . are situations in which it is excusable to act less than honestly ?
Answer:
It is not correct to say that intentions justify actions. In the case of Horace Danby his intentions were to get free. If the lady of the house had been true to her verdict, he was safe. His intentions to open the safe did not justify his actions. He was proved wrong in them. It was because his actions took him to jail. However, there was nothing to justify that.

I, like Horace Danby, would not do anything wrong if my ends justified the means. In fact, we must see that wrong is wrong. Then we must analyse our actions and their results.

It is also a fact that there are situations in life. In them, it is excusable to act less than honestly. Life has such facets. Man gets involved without any fault of him.

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