Select the option that expresses the given sentence in direct speech.
The commander ordered the soldiers to march ahead and not to think of their enemy’s large numbers.
Show answer & explanation
Correct answer: C
Explanation
The correct answer is Option 3 i.e. The commander said to the soldiers, “March ahead. Do not think of your enemy’s large numbers".
The given sentence is in indirect speech, to convert this sentence into direct speech we need to follow the following points:
-
'That' will be omitted and Inverted commas will be used.
- If the sentence entails indirect commands, requests, advice, i.e. the sentence is imperative, the reporting verb will be changed to 'said' in the direct speech.
- Next, the third-person pronoun 'their' will be changed into the second person pronoun 'your'.
- The to-infinitive i.e. 'to think' is changed into the base form of the verb i.e. 'think'.
- Also, in the reported speech "not" is changed into "do not".
After following these steps, we got the direct speech as: The commander said to the soldiers, “March ahead. Do not think of your enemy’s large numbers".
Hence, the correct answer is Option 3 i.e. The commander said to the soldiers, “March ahead. Do not think of your enemy’s large numbers".