ENGLISH A Legend of Northland
A LEGEND OF NORTHLAND
Date- 18/8/21
Topics covered- Recitation and explanation of poem.
New words
1.hearth
2.harness
3.provoke
4.scrap
5.scanty
6.scarlet
Comprehension
Questions
(a) How is Northland
described in the poem?
Northland is described as a land
somewhere in the northern most
area of the earth. It is
a cold country where people move on sledges drawn by reindeers. People wear heavy fur clothes.
(b) Why does the poet say that the hours of the day are few?
In the poem, the poet talks about a place named Northland. In Northland, the nights
are longer and
the days are
shorter. As a result there
are very few
hours in a day.
(c)How do children of Northland appear
in winters? Why?
The children of Northland appeared in winter
like bear-cubs. They
appear so due to the
thick fur coats that they wear during
the winter to keep themselves warm.
(d) Why does the poet tell the tale through the poem?
The poet doesn’t believe
the story is true yet he tells the story for teaching
his readers a lesson on greed.
(e) How did the people in Northland move around when it snowed?
The people in Northland moved around
in sledges pulled by reindeer.
(f) Where did St. Peter live and what did he do?
St. Peter lived in the world
below (earth) and travelled around
the earth preaching.
(d) Why did Saint Peter ask the woman for a single cake?
Saint Peter
asked the lady for a single cake
because he was hungry and she was making
cakes and baking them
on the hearth,
when he reached
her cottage.
(e) What did the woman do when St. Peter asked
her for one cake? Why didn’t the woman
give away the cake?
The woman
made a very
little cake and
as it was baking, she
thought it was too large to
give away to a stranger, so she kept it with her.
(f)
Why did the little
woman make a second cake?
The little
woman kneaded a second cake because she
felt that the
first one that
she had made for Saint Peter
was large in size to give away.
Being a greedy
and miserly woman, she didn’t want to part
with a big cake for
a stranger.
(g) How did the woman make the third cake?
The little
woman was very
careful while kneading the third cake.
The first two
that she had baked were large in size. So; she took a tiny scrap of dough and rolled
it as flat and slender as a wafer.
(h) Why did the
old woman refuse
to part with the third
cake as well?
The little
woman had been
extremely careful while
kneading the third
cake in order
to make it the smallest size
she could. Yet,
she refused to give that
cake to Saint
Peter because she was
miserly and greedy.
She felt that
her cakes seem
small when she
ate them but seemed too large to give away.
(i) What angered St. Peter?
St. Peter
was hungry and tired. He had asked
the little woman
only a single cake from her store of cakes.
Three times the woman made
a cake for St. Peter
but did not give it to
him. Such a selfish and greedy behaviour by the woman
angered the saint.
(j)
Why did St. Peter
curse the woman?
What was St. Peter’s curse
upon the woman?
St. Peter
told the little
woman that she
was very selfish
to live in human form,
have both food
and water and fire for warmth. He cursed her to be a bird
where she will have to build her
own shelter and
get food by boring continuously in the hard
dry wood.
(k) One should always
be able to share with
others as God has been
so kind to give us so
much Discuss it in the context of the poem.
St. Peter
was hungry and tired for he had been walking
round the earth,
preaching. The saint came
to the cottage of a little woman
who was making
cakes. The woman
in the poem has been shown as a highly stingy,
miserly, greedy and mean by nature.
When the saint asked her for a cake, she made a very little
cake two times.
When, she took out cakes from
the hearth, they
appeared to be large in size so she did not give
them to Saint Peter.
The third
time she tried
to bake a wafer thin
cake. She could
not even give
him that wafer thin slice. This angered St. Peter and he cursed
her to be a woodpecker. According to him she did not deserve to be in human form,
to have food,
shelter and fire for warmth.
Read
the following extracts
and answer the questions that
follow in one or two
lines.
(a) He came to the door of a cottage
In travelling round the earth
Where a little woman
was making cakes And baking them on the hearth
i. Who does ‘he’refer to in the first line?
‘He’ refers
to Saint Peter.
ii.
What request did ‘he’ make to the woman?
Why?
‘He’
requested the woman to give him a cake.
iii.
What did the woman
give Saint Peter?
The woman did not
give Saint Peter
any cake. She tried three
times to bake
the smallest cake
that she could
but did not part even
with that.
iv. Give the meaning of ‘hearth’
floor of a
fireplace
(b)
Then
Saint Peter grew angry For he was hungry and faint ‘ And
surely such a woman
Was enough to
provoke a saint
i.
Why was Saint Peter about to faint?
Saint Peter
was about to faint as he had been travelling round the world
preaching and fasting and it was almost the end of day.
ii.
How did the woman
provoke Saint Peter?
The woman provoked Saint
Peter by not giving him even the
small cakes that she had baked for him after
trying three times
to make the smallest cake
that she could.
iii.
How did Saint Peter react?
Saint Peter
was angry and told her that she did not deserve to be in the human
form, where she had
food, shelter and
the warmth of fire. He cursed her and turned
her into a woodpecker.
iv. Give the antonym of the word ‘provoke’.
pacify
Answers to Text book questions
Thinking about the Poem
I. 1. Which country or countries do you think ‚the
Northland‛ refers to?
The Northland‛ could refer to any extremely cold country in the Earth's
north polar region, such
as Greenland, the
northern regions of Russia, Canada,
Norway etc.
2. What did Saint Peter ask the old lady for?
What was the lady’s reaction?
Saint Peter asked the old lady for one of her baked cakes
to satisfy his hunger. The lady
tried to bake
a small cake for the saint.
3. How did he punish her?
He punished
the lady by changing her into a woodpecker that
built ‚as birds
do‛ and gathered scanty
food by boring
in the ‚hard,
dry wood‛ all day long.
4. How does the woodpecker get her food?
The woodpecker gets her
food by boring holes into trees.
5.
Do you
think that the
old lady would
have been so ungenerous if she had
known who Saint Peter really
was? What would she have done then?
No, the old lady
would not have
been so ungenerous if she had known who Saint Peter really was. Instead, she would have
tried to please
him with her cakes for
the fulfilment of her greedy desires.
6. Is this a true story?
Which part of this poem
do you feel is the
most important?
No, this
not a true story; it is a legend. I feel that the point
in the story
where the old lady
is changed into a woodpecker is the most important. This is because
the punishment meted
out to the lady teaches
us the value of generosity and charity.
7. What is a legend? Why is this poem called
a legend?
A 'legend' is a popular
story from the
past which is believed by many but one cannot prove whether it is true or not. It usually contains
a message or a moral.
The poet himself says
that he doesn't
believe this tale
to be true. This poem
is called a 'legend'
because it preaches generosity towards fellow beings.
8. Write the story
of ‘A Legend of the Northland’ in about ten sentences.
Once Saint
Peter stopped by an old lady's cottage
because he was
feeling hungry and weak
after the day's fasting. The lady was baking cakes on the hearth. The saint asked her
for a cake from her store of cakes. The
selfish lady tried
to bake small
cakes but each time they seemed
too big for her to give away.
Finally, she baked
one that was as
thin as a wafer.
Unable to part
with it too,
she put it on a shelf and did not give any cake
to the Saint. Saint Peter
was very angry
with her behaviour and said she
was too selfish to live as a human
and have food,
shelter and a fire to keep her
warm. He punished her by changing
her into a woodpecker that would have to build a nest to
live in, bore for food
in the trunks
of trees. Her clothes were
burned and she was left
with her
scarlet cap on her head
as she flew
out through the
chimney. Even today
she
still lives in the woods and is seen by all the country
school boys.
II. 1. 1. Let’s look
at the words
at the end of the
second and fourth
lines, viz., ‘snows’ and ‘clothes’, true’ and ‘you’, ‘below’
and ‘know’. We find that
‘snows’ rhymes with ‘clothes’, ‘true’
rhymes with ‘you’
and ‘below’ rhymes
with ‘know’.
The rhyming words are: 'Few' and 'through' 'Earth'
and 'hearth' 'Done'
and 'one' 'Lay' and 'away' 'One' and 'done' 'Flat'
and 'that' Myself
and 'shelf' 'Faint'
and 'saint' 'Form' and 'warm' 'Food' and
'wood' 'Word' and 'bird' 'Same'
and 'flame' 'Wood'
and 'food.