After this incident I went to Nainital, and returned after nearly a month. I had _____ (21) taken _____ (22) my clothes when I saw Gangu standing _____ (23) a new baby. He was _____ (24) with joy. Even Nanda _____ (25) not have _____ (26) such joy _____ (27) getting Krishna. His face had the same _____ (28) that _____ (29) on the face of a _____ (30) man after a full meal. that _____ on the face of a
- (a)comes
- (b)appears
- (c)rises
- (d)shows
Correct — B, appears. 'Appear on the face' is the pairing English uses when an expression becomes visible, so the relative clause reads 'the same glow that appears on the face of a starved man after a full meal.'
- (a)comes — 'Come' in this sense needs 'over' or 'into' — a look comes over a man's face, a light comes into his eyes — and 'comes on the face' is not English.
- (c)rises — 'Rise' goes with upward movement and takes 'to' rather than 'on'; colour rises to the cheeks, but a glow does not rise on a face.
- (d)shows — 'Show' in this use normally has a feeling as its subject and the person as the owner of the face, as in 'his relief showed on his face', whereas the subject here is the visible glow itself, which appears rather than shows.
The verb has to join a visible expression to the phrase 'on the face', and the fixed pairing for that is 'appear on'.
The whole part is a relative clause whose antecedent is 'the same glow', so the verb must be one that a glow can perform. Testing each option against the preposition printed after the blank settles the item quickly, because three of the four verbs would need a different preposition.
- A smile, a frown, a look or a glow appears on a face.
- A look comes over a face, and a light comes into the eyes.
- Colour rises to the cheeks, not on them.
- Reading each option on its own instead of testing it against the preposition that follows.
Asked as a cloze blank where the preposition after the blank decides which verb can stand in it.
The tired traveller ________ on in the hope of finding some resting place.
- (a) strolled
- (b) scurried
- (c) paraded
- (d) plodded
Answer(d) plodded
Same skill — four verbs of broadly similar sense, and the words around the blank decide which one English actually uses. There 'tired' and 'in the hope of finding some resting place' pick out 'plodded'; here 'on the face' picks out 'appears'.
- practice — not a real PYQ
Choose the word that best fills the blank — A puzzled look ____ on his face as he read the letter a second time.
- (a)rose
- (b)appeared
- (c)came
- (d)raised
Answer(b) appeared — an expression appears on a face; 'came' would need 'over'.
- practice — not a real PYQ
Choose the word that best fills the blank — A shadow of doubt ____ over her face for a moment and was gone.
- (a)appeared
- (b)rose
- (c)passed
- (d)showed
Answer(c) passed — with 'over the face' English uses 'pass'.