Class 10 English · Original EZT practice
Two Stories about Flying - His First Flight and Black Aeroplane (Class 10 English, First Flight, Chapter 3)
Two Stories about Flying is Chapter 3 of Class 10 First Flight in the Reprint 2026-27 printing (pp. 32-47), pairing Liam O'Flaherty's His First Flight with Frederick Forsyth's Black Aeroplane. A young seagull, certain 'his wings would never support him', starves on his ledge until hunger drives him at the fish in his mother's beak - and into the air. Then a pilot flying an old Dakota over France takes a storm risk for breakfast in England, loses compass and radio, and follows a strange black aeroplane down to safety. This page retells both flights with fresh practice questions. (Note: this is original practice, not a textbook exercise key.)
6 original worked examples, 6 fresh self-check questions and 4 mixed questions, with explained answers. These are not copied textbook exercises, an official chapter index or a full answer key. No affiliation with NCERT is claimed.
Official sources for topic and edition context, checked 26 October 2026:
1. About the authors
The chapter's contents page credits two authors: Liam O' Flaherty for His First Flight and Frederick Forsyth for Black Aeroplane. The textbook's Before You Read section frames both pieces - 'A young seagull is afraid to fly. How does he conquer his fear?' and 'A pilot is lost in storm clouds. Does he arrive safe? Who helps him?' - but carries no biographical notes, so this page stays with what the chapter itself shows.
2. The stories at a glance
The ledge: 'His two brothers and his sister had already flown away the day before. He had been afraid to fly with them.' The fear: 'The great expanse of sea stretched down beneath, and it was such a long way down - miles down.' The family: parents circled his older brother's first herring 'raising a proud cackle' while the whole family spent the morning 'taunting him with his cowardice'. The trap: his mother halts with fish 'almost within reach of his beak' - and 'maddened by hunger, he dived at the fish'. The first flight: 'a monstrous terror seized him and his heart stood still' - then 'He was not falling headlong now. He was soaring gradually downwards and outwards. He was no longer afraid.' The sea: 'He dropped his legs to stand on the green sea. His legs sank into it.' The easy flight: 'I was flying my old Dakota aeroplane over France back to England' - 'I'll be in time for breakfast.' The storm: 'They looked like black mountains standing in front of me across the sky.' The dead cockpit: 'the compass was turning round and round and round. It was dead.' - 'I had no radio, no compass, and I could not see where I was.' The guide: a plane with no lights on its wings, the pilot waving him to follow - 'I was very happy to go behind the strange aeroplane like an obedient child.' The answer that answers nothing: 'No other aeroplanes were flying tonight. Yours was the only one I could see on the radar.'
3. Key details and what they signal
Hunger as teacher: the mother does not push him; she holds the fish just out of reach until the plunge is his own move - the lesson is staged, not forced. Twenty-four hours of isolation: 'Since then nobody had come near him' - the family withdraws attention before it withdraws food. The risk named: 'I ought to go back to Paris' - but he wanted to get home; 'I wanted that breakfast' - the narrator knows the odds and chooses anyway. Instruments dying in sequence: compass spinning, then 'The other instruments were suddenly dead, too', then the radio - each loss narrows the flight to eyes and hope. Fuel as countdown: only 'five or ten minutes more' of fuel in the old Dakota's last tank when the descent begins. The runway reveal: 'Suddenly I came out of the clouds and saw two long straight lines of lights in front of me. It was a runway!'
4. Theme
Fear beaten by need: the seagull's terror of falling is real, but hunger and his mother's staged patience move him past it - courage arrives as action, not as a feeling first. Trusting the unseen helper: the pilot follows a plane that radar says never existed; the story holds the mystery open - 'Who was the pilot on the strange black aeroplane, flying in the storm, without lights?' Two kinds of first flight: one creature driven by nature's design, one human saved mid-mistake; both land changed. Risk and its price: 'I'll take the risk' - the storm punishes the choice before the stranger repays it.
Choose, solve, check, then try a fresh question.
Before calculating, read the method prompt and name the condition that makes it useful. Write your own attempt. Open the steps only when you need them, and use the check to catch a wrong sign, unit or interpretation. Finish with the fresh question before reading its answer.
Start on the ledge
Choose the method: Family first, fear later.
EZT practice question
What had the seagull's brothers and sister done the day before the story opens?
Show the worked solution
- The family: 'His two brothers and his sister had already flown away the day before.'
- The gap: 'He had been afraid to fly with them.'
- The result: he is alone on the ledge while his family flies, calls and fishes around him.
Answer: They had flown away from the ledge the day before - he alone stayed back, because 'He had been afraid to fly with them.'
Check: The day before, the flown siblings, the stayed-back brother.
Watch for this: Do not say the siblings refused to teach him - they flew, called and later taunted him; what held him on the ledge was his own fear, not their neglect.
Now try it yourself
How does the family respond to his staying behind?
Check your answer
His parents circle his brother's first catch 'raising a proud cackle', and the whole family spends the morning 'taunting him with his cowardice' - then leaves him alone for a full day.
Praise for the flyer and taunts for the afraid one raise the pressure before the hunger does.
Read the mother's trap
Choose the method: Fish close, ledge far.
EZT practice question
How does the mother get the seagull off the ledge without touching him?
Show the worked solution
- The bait: she picks up a piece of fish and flies across to him.
- The halt: she stops 'almost within reach of his beak' and waits, wings motionless.
- The plunge: 'maddened by hunger, he dived at the fish' - and falls off the ledge into open air.
Answer: She flies across with a piece of fish and halts 'almost within reach of his beak', so that hunger makes him dive at it - the dive carries him off the ledge and his wings open on their own.
Check: The fish, the halted distance, the hunger-driven dive.
Watch for this: Do not credit a push or a lesson in technique - the mother never touches him; she stages the distance so that his own hunger does the teaching.
Now try it yourself
Why is hunger the right teacher here?
Check your answer
Fear argued him out of flying for a day, but hunger overruled fear in a single moment - 'maddened by hunger, he dived at the fish' - and once in the air, instinct took over.
The story lets need, not courage-talk, defeat the fear.
Land on the sea
Choose the method: Legs down, sea soft.
EZT practice question
What happens the first time the seagull tries to stand on the sea?
Show the worked solution
- The attempt: 'He dropped his legs to stand on the green sea.'
- The surprise: 'His legs sank into it' - the sea is not ground.
- The scare: he screamed with fright and tried to rise, but he was tired and weak with hunger - he floated, belly touching the water.
Answer: 'He dropped his legs to stand on the green sea. His legs sank into it' - he screamed with fright, too tired and weak with hunger to rise, and floated on the water.
Check: The dropped legs, the sinking, the floating wait.
Watch for this: Do not read the sinking as failure - the flight is already won; the sea landing is the last small lesson of the first day, not a crash.
Now try it yourself
How does the family close the first flight?
Check your answer
They fly around him screaming praise, their beaks offering him scraps of dog-fish as he floats - the outcast of the morning is fed and celebrated by evening.
The reward scene confirms the ledge life is over.
Board the Dakota
Choose the method: Night sky, breakfast plan.
EZT practice question
What is the narrator flying, and where is he headed when the story opens?
Show the worked solution
- The plane: 'I was flying my old Dakota aeroplane over France back to England.'
- The hour: one thirty in the morning, a moonlit, star-filled sky.
- The mood: he dreams of holiday with his family and thinks, 'I'll be in time for breakfast.'
Answer: He is flying 'my old Dakota aeroplane over France back to England' at one thirty in the morning, dreaming of his holiday and his family - 'I'll be in time for breakfast.'
Check: The Dakota, France to England, one thirty in the morning, the breakfast plan.
Watch for this: Do not miss that the storm is a chosen risk, not bad luck - he sees the clouds, knows 'I ought to go back to Paris', and says 'I'll take the risk' because he wants that breakfast.
Now try it yourself
Why does the narrator fly into the clouds instead of turning back?
Check your answer
Paris is only 150 kilometres behind him, but home and breakfast pull harder - 'I wanted that breakfast' - so he takes the risk and flies the old Dakota straight into the storm.
The story names the motive before the storm does its work.
Count the dead instruments
Choose the method: Compass, instruments, radio.
EZT practice question
Name the three things the storm takes from the narrator one after another.
Show the worked solution
- First the compass: it is 'turning round and round and round. It was dead.'
- Then the rest: 'The other instruments were suddenly dead, too.'
- Last the radio: 'I tried the radio. The radio was dead too.'
Answer: The compass first - 'turning round and round and round. It was dead' - then the other instruments ('The other instruments were suddenly dead, too'), and finally the radio: 'The radio was dead too.'
Check: Compass, instruments, radio - in that order.
Watch for this: Do not merge the losses into one failure - the story kills them one at a time, and each death narrows the flight further to eyes and hope.
Now try it yourself
What is left to the pilot after the radio dies?
Check your answer
Nothing but sight and luck: 'I had no radio, no compass, and I could not see where I was' - which is exactly when the strange black aeroplane appears.
Total instrument failure is the doorway for the mystery.
Hear the control centre
Choose the method: Landed, then puzzled.
EZT practice question
What does the woman in the control centre tell the narrator after he lands?
Show the worked solution
- The landing: he follows the black aeroplane down through the storm and lands, with fuel for 'five or ten minutes more'.
- The question: he asks where the other pilot is, wanting to thank him.
- The answer: 'No other aeroplanes were flying tonight. Yours was the only one I could see on the radar.'
Answer: She tells him, 'No other aeroplanes were flying tonight. Yours was the only one I could see on the radar' - the guide plane that led him out of the storm was never on anyone's screen.
Check: The thanks he wants to give, the empty radar, the unanswered question.
Watch for this: Do not treat the line as a riddle the chapter later solves - it is the ending itself: 'Who was the pilot on the strange black aeroplane, flying in the storm, without lights?' stays open.
Now try it yourself
Why is the control-centre answer the right ending for this story?
Check your answer
It converts a rescue into a mystery at the last line: the narrator is safe on the runway, but the one fact he is sure of - another plane was there - is contradicted by the only official record.
The story ends on gratitude with nowhere to go.
Try a mixed set
Choose a method or explanation before opening each answer.
1. How does the mother force the first flight?
Show answer and reason
She halts with fish 'almost within reach of his beak' until hunger makes him dive.
The lesson is staged, not forced.
2. The seagull's first sea landing?
Show answer and reason
'He dropped his legs to stand on the green sea. His legs sank into it.'
The sea is not ground - the day's last small lesson.
3. Order of the cockpit failures?
Show answer and reason
Compass dead, then the other instruments, then the radio.
Each loss narrows the flight to eyes and hope.
4. The control centre's answer?
Show answer and reason
'No other aeroplanes were flying tonight. Yours was the only one I could see on the radar.'
The rescue stays a mystery.
Try it yourself
Work these on paper before checking any notes. Answers are deliberately not shown here.
- In two sentences, explain how hunger succeeds where the family's taunts failed in His First Flight.
- Trace the three instrument failures in Black Aeroplane and show how each one increases the narrator's helplessness.
- Explain in your own words why the chapter pairs a bird's instinctive first flight with a human pilot's storm flight.
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Questions about this practice page
- Who wrote Two Stories about Flying in Class 10 First Flight?
- The chapter pairs two authors on the contents page: Liam O' Flaherty wrote His First Flight, the seagull story, and Frederick Forsyth wrote Black Aeroplane, the storm story. The textbook carries no biographical notes for either.
- What happens in His First Flight?
- A young seagull too afraid to fly is left alone on his ledge for a day; when his mother hovers with fish just out of reach, hunger makes him dive at it, his wings open on their own, and he soars with his family over the sea.
- What happens in Black Aeroplane?
- Flying his Dakota from France to England at night, the narrator heads straight into storm clouds; with compass, instruments and radio dead, a mysterious black aeroplane with no lights guides him down to a runway - and the control centre says no other plane was in the sky.
- Is Two Stories about Flying in the 2026-27 syllabus?
- Yes - it appears as 'Stories About Flying' in the CBSE Class 10 English (Language and Literature) curriculum for 2026-27, and it is Chapter 3 of First Flight in the Reprint 2026-27 printing (pp. 32-47). Check your own copy, as printings can differ.
- What is the mystery at the end of Black Aeroplane?
- The narrator wants to thank the pilot who led him out of the storm, but the woman in the control centre tells him his was the only plane on the radar - the chapter closes on the unanswered question of who, or what, flew ahead of him.