Fair active tolerant warm late attractive

Of all my relatives, I like my Aunt Emily the best. She’s my mother’s youngest sister. She has never married, and she lives alone in a small village near Bath. She’s in her (1)fifties, but she’s still quite young in spirit. She has a (2)complexion, thick brown hair which she wears in a bun, and dark brown eyes. She has a kind face, and when you meet her, the first thing you notice is her lovely, (3)smile. Her face is a little wrinkled now, but I think she is still rather (4). She is the sort of person you can always go to if you have a problem.

She likes reading and gardening, and she goes for long walks over the hills with her dog, Buster. She’s a very (5)person. Either she’s making something, or mending something, or doing something to help others. She does the shopping for some of the old people in the village. She’s extremely generous, but not very (6)with people who don’t agree with her. I hope that I am as happy and contented as she is when I’m her age.

19 Go through the text again and underline like this:

a the parts which describe her physical appearance

b the parts which describe her character

c the parts which describe her habits

20 Find the following words in the text: quite, a little, rather, very, extremely. How do they change the meaning of the adjectives which follow them?

21 She’s ‘not very tolerant’. This is a nice way of saying she is ‘intolerant’. Sometimes we try to be polite by not using a negative adjective. We can say not very + the opposite adjective.

Use a tactful way to describe someone who is:

a rude d ugly

b boring e cruel

c mean f stupid