How the Camel Got his Hump Summary | Class 8 | Questions Answers

How the Camel Got his Hump Summary Class 8| Questions Answers, NCERT Solutions

How the Camel Got his Hump Summary

How the Camel Got his Hump Summary : This chapter revolves around a camel that would not work. He was lazy, but he lived in the middle of the Howling Desert. All the other animals worked for people, but this lazy camel never did anything at all. One day, the old camels told him to work too, or else they would eat him up. He did not want to work. He would eat sticks, prickles and thorns and say ‘humph’ whenever someone asked him to work.

One morning, a horse with a saddle on his back went to the camel. The horse asked the camel to join them and do some work, but the lazy animal said ‘Humph!’. A little later, the dog came and the same thing happened. Then an ox came and asked him to work too, but again

Soon, a man called his horse, ox and dog. He asked them about their work and the camel. They told him that the camel didn’t do any work. After hearing their complaints of the lazy camel, the man gave some of his work to each animal so they can have a share in it. This made all three animals angry and they decided to hold a meeting on an edge of a desert where a djinn came. All the three animals complained to the Djinn about the camel. The horse said that he is very lazy and would only say “humph!” when asked. But the Djinn said he would fix him.

The Djinn found the camel in the desert. The camel was sitting by a pond and he was looking at his reflection in the water. The djinn wanted to make him work, but he told him to ‘humph’. Just as he said that, the djinn punished him and made a big hump on his back. He was very proud of his looks before but now he had a strange-looking hump on his back. He saw himself in the water again and realized it’s because of himself that this happened.

A Djinn asked the camel to work, but the latter said that he couldn’t work. He had a hump on his back. The Djinn told him that if he didn’t work for three days, then for those three days he could not drink or eat anything. Then the camel started working like other animals with his hump.

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NCERT Solutions of How The Camel Got His Hump

Comprehension Check (Page 3)

Question 1: What tasks, do you think, were assigned to the dog and the ox?

Answer: Different animals were assigned different tasks. The dog was assigned to fetch and carry sticks because he had a stick in his mouth. The ox was assigned to plough the field because there was a yoke on its neck.

Question 2: Why did the camel live in the middle of the desert?

Answer: The camel was the laziest animal. It did not want to work and help man. That’s why the camel lived in the middle of a howling desert. The camel ate sticks, thorns and prickles and whenever anybody came to speak to him, he just said “Humph!” and nothing more.

Question 3: What made the dog, the horse and the ox very angry?

Answer: The dog, the horse and the ox were very angry because man gave them work to do for the camel too. The three of them had to work twice as hard because the camel was lazy.

Question 4: How did the Djinn know the horse was complaining against the camel?

Answer: While the other animals were doing work that belonged to the camel, the horse complained to the Djinn who was in charge of All Deserts. He told him that an animal with a long neck and long legs had not done any work since last week. Hearing this, the Djinn instantly understood that he was talking about the lazy camel for not helping them with work.

Comprehension Check (Page 5)

Question 1: The camel was looking at this own reflection in the pool. What does it suggest to you about the camel?

Answer: The camel was looking at his own reflection in the pool while he was swimming. He thought that he looked good and had a nice back. The camel may have thought that he was the most handsome animal around.

Question 2: The camel said, “Humph” repeatedly. How did it affect him?

Answer: The Djinn was trying to remind the camel about his work. But the lazy animal avoided it because of his idleness. The camel said “Humph” over and over again in a bored tone, which annoyed the Djinn. Then, the camel’s back got bigger for saying “Humph”, and not doing what he was told to do.

Question 3: What, according to the Djinn, was the use of the “humph”?

Answer: The Djinn said that if the camel was not able to work for three days, he would be able to do so for three days without food with the help of his hump. His hump would store food and give him energy.

Question 4: “…he has never yet learnt to behave”. In the light of this, what is the writer’s opinion about the camel?

Answer: According to the author, camel is lazy. He likes sitting still and doing nothing. Every day he would eat bushes, thorns, and sharp objects. But then he got a hump on his back. That was when the Djinn asked for him to go out into the desert with the other three animals – horse, ox, and dog – to help them work. The camel missed three days of work because he was too lazy to do it all on his own! The Djinn told him that his hump could be used as storage space so that he would not need food anymore for energy because of it. It would help him to stop the work that he is doing now, and keep living in the desert.

Exercise (Page 6)

Discuss the following topics in groups.

Question 1: Can this story be factually true?

Answer: No, this story is fictional.

Question 2: What, according to you, is the story about? Consider the following:

1. How the world began.
2. Why everyone should do his/her share of work seriously.
3. How animals are important to humans.
4. How the camel got his hump.

Answer:

(iv) How the camel got his hump.

Question 3: What did you do over the weekend? Were you generally active or idle? Please check your back before starting to discuss or answer the question.

Answer: The last weekend I woke up early and exercised. After that, I helped my mother with some work at home. Later, I played badminton with my sister. Overall, it was an active weekend because of these things!

Question 4: There are broadly two categories of workers – those who prefer to do today what they can do tomorrow, and those who prefer to do tomorrow what they can do today. Where do you belong?

Answer: I am in the first group of workers. We prefer to do what we can today, instead of putting it off until tomorrow. This means that we take care of our work right away and do not wait for a later date.

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