Question

As soon as he sneezed,the crowd outside the grocery shop disappeared.
Begin with : Hardly

Answer 1

The sentence beginning with 'hardly' is:

Hardly had he sneezed, when the crowd outside the grocery shop disappeared.

• When two events occur one after the other, we can express it using:

1. No sooner...than

2. Hardly....when

3. As soon as

• The first event is written first, followed by the second one.

• The same sentence can be expressed using 'No sooner...than':

No sooner had he sneezed than the crowd outside the grocery shop disappeared.

Answer 2

Here is the correct answer along with explanation:

Hardly had he sneezed than the crowd outside the grocery shop disappeared.

or

Hardly had he sneezed when the crowd outside the grocery shop disappeared.

Explanation

Hardly is an adverb that is used in various ways. We can also use scarcely or barely in place of hardly to say that one thing happens immediately after another: We had hardly/scarcely/barely driven a few meters, when the tyre went flat. In formal, written English, especially in a literary style, these words can be placed at the beginning of the sentence as shown in the following example: Hardly/Scarcely had we driven a few meters, when the tyre went flat.