Category: Writing

lease read the following question and then after answer the questions, please.
Excerpt from
The Awakening
by Kate Chopin
Victor, with hammer and nails and scraps of scantling, was patching a corner of one of the galleries. Mariequita sat near by, dangling her legs, watching him work, and handing him nails from the tool-box. The sun was beating down upon them. The girl had covered her head with her apron folded into a square pad. They had been talking for an hour or more. She was never tired of hearing Victor describe the dinner at Mrs. Pontellier’s. He exaggerated every detail, making it appear a veritable Lucullean feast. The flowers were in tubs, he said. The champagne was quaffed from huge golden goblets. Venus rising from the foam could have presented no more entrancing a spectacle than Mrs. Pontellier, blazing with beauty and diamonds at the head of the board, while the other women were all of them youthful houris, possessed of incomparable charms. She got it into her head that Victor was in love with Mrs. Pontellier, and he gave her evasive answers, framed so as to confirm her belief. She grew sullen and cried a little, threatening to go off and leave him to his fine ladies. There were a dozen men crazy about her at the Cheniere; and since it was the fashion to be in love with married people, why, she could run away any time she liked to New Orleans with Celina’s husband.
Celina’s husband was a fool, a coward, and a pig, and to prove it to her, Victor intended to hammer his head into a jelly the next time he encountered him. This assurance was very consoling to Mariequita. She dried her eyes, and grew cheerful at the prospect.
They were still talking of the dinner and the allurements of city life when Mrs. Pontellier herself slipped around the corner of the house. The two youngsters stayed dumb with amazement before what they considered to be an apparition. But it was really she in flesh and blood, looking tired and a little travel-stained.
“I walked up from the wharf,” she said, “and heard the hammering. I supposed it was you, mending the porch. It’s a good thing. I was always tripping over those loose planks last summer. How dreary and deserted everything looks!”
It took Victor some little time to comprehend that she had come in Beaudelet’s lugger, that she had come alone, and for no purpose but to rest.
“There’s nothing fixed up yet, you see. I’ll give you my room; it’s the only place.”
“Any corner will do,” she assured him.
“And if you can stand Philomel’s cooking,” he went on, “though I might try to get her mother while you are here. Do you think she would come?” turning to Mariequita.
Mariequita thought that perhaps Philomel’s mother might come for a few days, and money enough.
Beholding Mrs. Pontellier make her appearance, the girl had at once suspected a lovers’ rendezvous. But Victor’s astonishment was so genuine, and Mrs. Pontellier’s indifference so apparent, that the disturbing notion did not lodge long in her brain. She contemplated with the greatest interest this woman who gave the most sumptuous dinners in America, and who had all the men in New Orleans at her feet.
“What time will you have dinner?” asked Edna. “I’m very hungry; but don’t get anything extra.”
“I’ll have it ready in little or no time,” he said, bustling and packing away his tools. “You may go to my room to brush up and rest yourself. Mariequita will show you.”
“Thank you,” said Edna. “But, do you know, I have a notion to go down to the beach and take a good wash and even a little swim, before dinner?”
“The water is too cold!” they both exclaimed. “Don’t think of it.”
“Well, I might go down and try—dip my toes in. Why, it seems to me the sun is hot enough to have warmed the very depths of the ocean. Could you get me a couple of towels? I’d better go right away, so as to be back in time. It would be a little too chilly if I waited till this afternoon.”
Mariequita ran over to Victor’s room, and returned with some towels, which she gave to Edna.
“I hope you have fish for dinner,” said Edna, as she started to walk away; “but don’t do anything extra if you haven’t.”
“Run and find Philomel’s mother,” Victor instructed the girl. “I’ll go to the kitchen and see what I can do. By Gimminy! Women have no consideration! She might have sent me word.”
Edna walked on down to the beach rather mechanically, not noticing anything special except that the sun was hot. She was not dwelling upon any particular train of thought. She had done all the thinking which was necessary after Robert went away, when she lay awake upon the sofa till morning.
She had said over and over to herself: “To-day it is Arobin; to-morrow it will be some one else. It makes no difference to me, it doesn’t matter about Leonce Pontellier—but Raoul and Etienne!” She understood now clearly what she had meant long ago when she said to Adele Ratignolle that she would give up the unessential, but she would never sacrifice herself for her children.
Despondency had come upon her there in the wakeful night, and had never lifted. There was no one thing in the world that she desired. There was no human being whom she wanted near her except Robert; and she even realized that the day would come when he, too, and the thought of him would melt out of her existence, leaving her alone. The children appeared before her like antagonists who had overcome her; who had overpowered and sought to drag her into the soul’s slavery for the rest of her days. But she knew a way to elude them. She was not thinking of these things when she walked down to the beach.
The water of the Gulf stretched out before her, gleaming with the million lights of the sun. The voice of the sea is seductive, never ceasing, whispering, clamoring, murmuring, inviting the soul to wander in abysses of solitude. All along the white beach, up and down, there was no living thing in sight. A bird with a broken wing was beating the air above, reeling, fluttering, circling disabled down, down to the water.
Edna had found her old bathing suit still hanging, faded, upon its accustomed peg.
She put it on, leaving her clothing in the bath-house. But

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Read the story first and answer this question:
A. Evaluate the character of the father of Leon and Baldo, expressing in the evaluation your own opinion as to whether he is acting more as concerned father, or whether he is simply a domineering one.
B. Explain briefly the new insight that Baldo gains from his initial exposure to his brother’s wife, Maria.
HOW MY BROTHER LEON BROUGHT HOME A WIFE Manuel E. Arguilia She stepped down from the carratela of Ca Celin with a quick, delicate grace. She was lovely. She was tall. She looked up to my brother with a smile, and her forehead was on a level with his mouth. “You are Baldo,” she said and placed her hand lightly on my shoulder. Her nails were long, but they were not painted. She was fragrant like a morning when papayas are in bloom. And a small dimple appeared momentarily high up on her right cheek. “And this is Labang of whom I have heard so much.” She held the wrist of one hand with the other and looked at Labang, and Labang never stopped chewing his cud. He swallowed and brought up to his mouth more cud and the sound of his insides was like a drum. I laid a hand on Labang’s massive neck and said: “You may scratch his forehead now.” She hesitated and saw that her eyes were on the long curving horns. But she was game and touched Labang’s forehead with her long fingers, and Labang never even stopped chewing his cud except that his big eyes half closed. And by and by, she was scratching his forehead very daintily. My brother Leon put down the two trunks on the grassy side of the road. He paid Ca Celin twice the usual fare from the station to the edge of Nagrebcan. Then he was standing beside us, and she turned him eagerly. I watched Ca Celin, where he stood in front of his horse, and he ran his fingers through his forelock and could not keep his eyes away from her. “Maria–,” my brother Leon said. He did not say Maring. He did not say Mayang. I knew then that he had always called her Maria, and that to us all she would be Maria: and in my mind I said– “Maria”– and it was a beautiful name. “Yes, Noel.” Now where did she get that name? I pondered the matter quietly to myself, thinking father might not like it. But it was only the name my brother Leon said backwards and it sounded much better that way. “There is Nagrebcan, Maria,” my brother Leon said, gesturing widely toward the west. She moved close to him and slipped her arm through his. After a while she said quietly, “You love Nagrebcan, don’t you, Noel?” Ca Celin drove away hi-yi—ying to his horse loudly. At the bend of the camino real where the big duhat tree grows, he rattled the handle of his braided rattan whip against the spokes of the wheel. We stood alone on the roadside. The sun was in our eyes, it was dipping into the bright sea. The sky was wide and deep and very blue above us, but along the sawtooth rim of the Katayaghan hills to the southwest flamed huge masses of clouds. Before us the fields swam in a golden haze through which floated big purple and red and yellow bubbles when I looked at the sinking sun. Labang’s white coat, which I had washed and brushed that morning with a coconut husk, glistened like beaten cotton under the lamplight and his horns appeared tipped with fire. He faced the sun and from his mouth came a call so loud and vibrant that the earth seemed to tremble underfoot. And far away in the middle of the fields a cow lowed softly in answer.
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“Hitch him to the cart, Baldo,” my brother said, laughing. and she laughed with him a bit uncertainly, and I saw that he had put his arm around her shoulders. “Why does he make that sound?” she asked. “I have yet to hear another bull call like Labang. In all the world there is no other bull like him.” She was smiling at him, and I stopped in the act of tying the sinta across Labang’s neck to the opposite end of the yoke, because her teeth were very white, her eyes were so full of laughter, and there was the small dimple high up on her right cheek. “If you continue to talk about him like that, either I shall fall in love with him or become greatly jealous.” My brother laughed and she laughed and they looked at each other and it seemed to me there was a world of laughter between them and in them. I climbed into the cart over the wheel and Labang would have bolted for he was always like that, but I kept a firm hold on his rope. He was restless and would not stand still, so that my brother Leon had to say “Labang” several times. When he was quiet again, my brother Leon lifted the trunks into the cart, placing the smaller one on top. She looked down once at her high heeled shoes, then she gave her left hand to my brother Leon, placed a foot on the hub of the wheel, and in one breath she had swung up into the cart. Oh, the fragrance of her! But Labang was fairly dancing with impatience and it was all I could do to keep him from running away. “Give me the rope, Baldo,” my brother Leon said. “Maria, sit down on the hay and hold on to anything.” Then he put a foot on the left shaft and that instant Labang leaped forward. My brother Leon laughed as he drew himself up to the top side of the cart and made the slack of the rope hiss above the back of Labang. The wind whistled against my cheeks and the rattling of the wheels on the pebbly road echoed in my ears. She sat up straight on the bottom of the cart, legs bent together to one side, her skirts spread over them so that only the toes and heels of her shoes were visible. Her eyes were on my brother Leon’s back; I saw the wind on her hair. When Labang slowed down, my brother Leon handed me the rope, I knelt on the straw inside the cart and pulled on the rope until Labang was merely shuffling along, then I made him turn around. “What is it you have forgotten now, Baldo?” my brother Leon said. I did not say anything but tickled with my fingers the nimp of Labang; and away we went—back to where I had unhitched and waited for them. The sun had sunk and down from the wooded sides of the Katayaghan hills shadows were stealing into the fields. High up overhead the sky burned with many slow fires. When I sent Labang down the deep cut that would bring us to the dry bed of the Waig which could be used as a path to our place during the dry season, my brother Leon laid a hand on my shoulder and said sternly, “Who told you to drive through the fields tonight?” His hand was heavy on my shoulder, but I did not look at him nor utter a word until we were on the rocky bottom of the Waig. “Baldo, you fool, answer me before I lay the rope of Labang on you. Why do you follow the Waig instead of the camino real?” His fingers bit into my shoulder. “Father, he told me to follow the Waig tonight, Manong.” Swiftly his hand fell away from my shoulder and he reached for the rope of Labang. Then my brother Leon laughed, and he sat back, and laughing still, he said: “And I suppose Father also told you to hitch Labang to the cart and meet us with him instead of with Castano and the calesa.”
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Without waiting for me to answer, he turned to her and said. “Maria, why do you think Father should do that, now?” He laughed and added, “Have you ever

In “How to Find Joy in Your Sisyphean Existence,” Arthur Brooks argues that following the philosophy of Albert Camus by embracing the absurdity of life can lead to happiness. Pair “On the Doctrine of the Feeling of Power” with “How to Find Joy in Your Sisyphean Existence” and compare the texts’ points of view on human nature. What are Nietzche’s central arguments about human nature according to “On the Doctrine of the Feeling of Power”? What are Camus’ central arguments about human nature according to “How to Find Joy in Your Sisyphean Existence”? What do you see as the strengths and weaknesses of these two philosophies? Which of these philosophies aligns best with your own view of human nature and why?

The Crucible Act 2 Film Analysis
John Proctor tells his wife Elizabeth her “justice would freeze beer.” What does he mean by this example of hyperbole? Who is acting most reasonable in this scene—John or Elizabeth? Explain.
While George Jacobs is mentioned in the play, his trial is not shown. How does his trial affect your interpretation of the film? What does it show about the characters/courts? Explain.
The scene where Abby and John meet in the woods was originally included in the original play, but ultimately deleted by Arthur Miller. What is the purpose of this scene? Why do you think Miller deleted it from the play?
What role does theocracy play in the plot thus far? Remember, a theocracy is a government ruled by God, meaning all reverends are divinely guided by God and rule in the name of Him. Which characters demonstrate the effects of theocracy? Explain.

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Artists during the Renaissance, concerned with making optically convincing representations through perspective and chiaroscuro, welcomed this as an improved “drawing tool.” A Film B camera obscura C Pictorialism D Daguerreotype
Question 6 2 Points What are the Lumiere brothers known for? A Spearheading the New Wave film movement B Originating the concept of the auteur in filmmaking C Inventing the first workable film projector D Producing the first science fiction film
Question 7 2 Points What is the act of suppressing words or pictures that some people may find offensive, indecent, or dangerous, which caused Dorothea Lange’s work to be labeled “Impounded”?

Pride and Prejudice Unit Test
Darcy helps to enable Wickham and Lydia to marry because __________.
?      he hopes to convince Jane to marry Bingley
?      he seeks the approval of Mr. Collins
?      he believes his silence about Wickham led to the elopement
?      he is sorry for the way he has misjudged the Bennets
2.Mr. Collins believes he should get married because __________.
?      he is in love with Elizabeth Bennet
?      Lady Catherine tells him to marry for social reasons
?      he wants to be in the same family as Mr. Darcy
?      he will gain wealth through his marriage
3.Early in the novel, Elizabeth bases her ideas about Darcy and Wickham on her __________.
?      intelligence
?      fear
?      prejudice
?      rationality
4.What word best describes Mr. Darcy at the end of the novel?
?      humbled
?      silent
?      disengaged
?      powerful
5.When Elizabeth hears from Darcy’s housekeeper that she has “never had a cross word from him,” Elizabeth realizes that __________.
?      she would have predicted this about Mr. Darcy
?      she has never given Mr. Darcy a fair chance
?      Mr. Darcy has never understood her
?      the housekeeper is not telling the truth
6.Mrs. Bennet can best be described as __________.
?      uncontrolled
?      submissive
?      sacrificial
?      discerning
7.In what way are Elizabeth’s and Darcy’s inner conflicts in the novel similar?
?      Both are shy about stating their own opinions in public.
?      Both must fight the hasty, mistaken judgments they have made.
?      Both take pride in their family’s social positions.
?      Neither enjoys dancing or other social engagements.
8.Unlike Elizabeth, Charlotte Lucas views marriage in terms that can be described as __________.
?      practical
?      irrational
?      romantic
?      uninterested
9.What does Mr. Darcy reveal in his letter to Elizabeth?
?      He was wrong in his judgments of Wickham.
?      He hopes to marry Lady Catherine de Bourgh’s daughter.
?      He did not realize that Jane really liked Mr. Bingley.
?      He wants to invite Elizabeth to visit Pemberley.
10.How do Lady Catherine’s demands that Elizabeth not marry Darcy affect Elizabeth?
?      She realizes that Lady Catherine will get what she wants.
?      She is furious that Darcy has sent Lady Catherine.
?      She is hopeful that Darcy still loves her.
?      She is confused about her feelings for Darcy.
11.Mr. Bennet is relieved that Elizabeth has rejected Mr. Collins because Mr. Bennet __________.
?      enjoys upsetting his wife
?      hopes that Jane will be the first to marry
?      recognizes Mr. Collins to be a foolish man
?      does not want Elizabeth to leave home
12.Mr. Wickham tries to get Miss Darcy to marry him because __________.
?      he wants access to her money
?      he wants to make Lydia jealous
?      he knows Mr. Darcy will change his mind
?      he is in love with her
13.By the end of
Pride and Prejudice
, Elizabeth Bennet has learned __________.
?      to question her own judgment
?      to ignore her own emotions
?      that Mr. Darcy did not have any prejudice
?      that love is more important than intelligence
14.When Mr. Darcy is writing a letter early in the novel, Miss Bingley gives him constant attention, commenting “on his handwriting, or on the evenness of his lines, or on the length of his letter….”
Why does Austen include these details?
?      She is comparing Miss Bingley and Mrs. Hurst.
?      She is showing how rude Mr. Darcy is in response.
?      She wants readers to know the importance of letters at the time.
?      She is making fun of Miss Bingley for her false interest.
15.Unlike Mr. and Mrs. Bennet, both of the Gardiners are __________.
?      prideful and prejudiced
?      confused, but agreeable
?      sensible and intelligent
?      fickle and unreserved

sign this sentence in ASL: I have an older sister who is 32 and a younger brother who is 12. question: do I sign use ranking order or I sign the word older and younger?

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Summary Write a summary of “Home Away from Home. ” Remember that a summary is a concise,
complete, objective overview of a text. It should contain neither opinion nor analysis.

Help me with these questions
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19:39 FIRST READ: Comprehension Identify the choice that best answers the question 27. In her essay “Shakespeare’s Sister,” what prompts Virginia Shakespeare’s sister? a. a bishop’s statement b. something she reads in a play c. an invitation to a speaking engagement d. her admiration for the works of Shakespeare
Part In “Shakespeare’s Sister,” what does Woolf suggest was the main reason a Shakespeare’s day could never have written plays like Shakespeare’s? a. lack of experience b. financial hardship c. lack of ambition d. social strictures
Which of these adjectives best describe the imaginary character of Judith Shakespeare in “Shakespeare’s Sister”? Choose one option. a. loyal b. talented c. obedient d. kindhearted e. adventurous
Given the details in “Shakespeare’s Sister,” identify the statement that most accurately reflects the situation of women in the Tingland of Shakespeare’s day. a. Most women received an excellent classical education. b. Many women were allowed to choose their husbands. c. Few women could fulfill their artistic ambitions. d. No woman would be permitted to rule the nation.
FIRST READ: Concept Vocabulary Identify the choice that best answers the question. 31. Which of these qualities would a dancer most need to display in order to be described as a gifted ballerina? a. honesty and integrity b. skill and grace in her art c. a ruthless drive for success d. a strong need to be admired
32. If a man has a taste for opera, how does he most likely feel about it? a. He finds it greatly appealing and enjoyable. b. He likes it but does not understand it very well. c. He believes that it shows elegance and refinement. d. He sampled it once and decided that once was enough.
Which of these people most clearly displays a fancy for words? a. someone who is nervous about speaking in public b. someone who frequently works on crossword puzzles c. someone who never says what he or she really means d. someone who enjoys the finer things in life
CLOSE READ: Analyze the Text Identify the choice that best answers the question. The following question has two parts. Answer Part A first, and then Part B. 34. Part A Consider the account presented in “Shakespeare’s Sister.” How would well-to-do parents in Shakespeare’s day most likely have treated a daughter’s literary ambitions? a. They would have encouraged those ambitions. b. They would have tried to stop those ambitions. c. They would have boasted about those ambitions. d. They would have been amused by those ambitions.
35. Part B Which quotation from “Shakespeare’s Sister” best supports the answer to Part A? a. She was as adventurous, as imaginative, as agog to see the world as he was. b. She picked up a book now and then, one of her brother’s perhaps, and read a few pages. c. But then her parents came in and told her to mend the stockings or mind the stew and not moon about with books and papers. d. Indeed, more likely than not she was the apple of her father’s eye.
The following question has two parts. Answer Part A first, and then Part B. 36. Part A In the scenario that Virginia Woolf presents in “Shakespeare’s Sister,” what is the main reason that Judith Shakespeare sets off for London? a. She wants to avoid an arranged marriage. b. She hopes to join her famous brother. c. She is driven by her creative genius. d. She is angry at her father.
37. Part B Which quotation from “Shakespeare’s Sister” best supports the answer to Part A? a. Very soon he got work in the theater, became a successful actor, and lived at the hub of the universe, meeting everybody, knowing everybody, clearly practicing his art on the boards, exercising his wits in the streets. b. She cried out that marriage was hateful to her. c. For that she was severely beaten by her father. d. The force of her own gift alone drove her to it.
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Edmund Burke FIRST READ: Comprehension Identify the choice that best answers the question. 19. What was Edmund Burke’s most likely purpose for writing “What We Mean When We Say the People”? a. to explain why individuals band together in groups b. to defend his opinion of nations and their governments c. to express his views about the sources of legitimate power d. to persuade his readers that individuals are controlled by natural law
According to “What We Mean When We Say the People,” why do people accept the idea of majority rule? a. They have become so accustomed to it that they think of it as natural. b. They have determined that it is the best way to avoid hostilities. c. They think it is the fairest way to make laws and keep order. d. They think that it protects their freedom and rights.
According to “What We Mean When We Say the People,” what happens if a group of people seen as one body (as Burke words it, a “corporation”) consents to exist? a. It is quickly replaced by another. b. Its former members become mere individuals. c. All of the actions it has taken become meaningless. d. The contract that once unified it has now meaning.
In “What We Mean When We Say the People,” which of the following is a key part of Burke’s critique of majority rule? a. He argues that majority rule lends to disbanding corporations and so threatens the social order. b. He argues that majority rule is only right or wrong in a given social order and so cannot be used to justify revolution. c. He argues that majority rule gives the people too much power and so undermines any government that allows it. d. He argues that majority rule is practical only in certain political situations.
In “What We Mean When We Say the People,” which of the following is a key part of Burke’s defense of an aristocracy? a. He argues that the people will drive a society that lacks

HERMANN THE IRASCIBLE
It was in the second decade of the Twentieth Century, after the Great Plague1 had devastated England, that Hermann the Irascible,2 nicknamed also the Wise, sat on the British throne. The Mortal Sickness had swept away the entire Royal Family, unto the third and fourth generations, and thus it came to pass that Hermann the Fourteenth of Saxe-Drachsen-Wachtelstein, who had stood thirtieth in the order of succession, found himself one day ruler of the British dominions within and beyond the seas. He was one of the unexpected things that happen in politics, and he happened with great thoroughness. In many ways he was the most progressive3 monarch4 who had sat on an important throne; before people knew where they were, they were somewhere else. Even his Ministers, progressive though they were by tradition, found it difficult to keep pace with his legislative5 suggestions. “As a matter of fact,” admitted the Prime Minister, “we are hampered6 by these votes-for-women creatures; they disturb our meetings throughout the country, and they try to turn Downing Street into a sort of political picnic-ground.” “They must be dealt with,” said Hermann. “Dealt with,” said the Prime Minister; “exactly, just so; but how?”
“I will draft you a Bill,” said the King, sitting down at his type-writing machine, “enacting that women shall vote at all future elections. Shall vote, you observe; or, to put it plainer, must. Voting will remain optional, as before, for male electors; but every woman between the ages of twenty-one and seventy will be obliged to vote, not only at elections for Parliament, county councils, district boards, parishcouncils, and municipalities, but for coroners, school inspectors, churchwardens, curators of museums, sanitary authorities, police-court interpreters, swimming-bath instructors, contractors, choir-masters, market superintendents, art-school teachers, cathedral vergers, and other local functionaries whose names I will add as they occur to me. All these offices will become elective, and failure to vote at any election falling within her area of residence will involve the female elector in a penalty of 10 pounds.7 Absence, unsupported by an adequate medical certificate, will not be accepted as an excuse. Pass this Bill through the two Houses of Parliament and bring it to me for signature the day after tomorrow.” *** From the very outset the Compulsory Female Franchise8 produced little or no elation9 even in circles which had been loudest in demanding the vote. The bulk of the women of the country had been indifferent or hostile to the franchise agitation, and the most fanatical Suffragettes10 began to wonder what they had found so attractive in the prospect of putting ballot-papers into a box. In the country districts, the task of carrying out the provisions of the new Act was irksome enough; in the towns and cities it became an incubus.11 There seemed no end to the elections. Laundresses and seamstresses had to hurry away from their work to vote, often for a candidate whose name they hadn’t heard before, and whom they selected at haphazard; female clerks and waitresses got up extra early to get their voting done before starting off to their places of business. Society women found their arrangements impeded and upset by the continual necessity for attending the polling stations, and week-end parties and summer holidays became gradually a masculine luxury. As for Cairo and the Riviera, they were possible only for genuine invalids or people of enormous wealth, for the accumulation of 10 pound fines during a prolonged absence was a contingency that even ordinarily wealthy folk could hardly afford to risk. It was not wonderful that the female disfranchisement agitation became a formidable movement. The No-Votes-for-Women League numbered its feminine adherents by the million; its colours, citron and old Dutch-madder, were flaunted everywhere, and its battle hymn, “We Don’t Want to Vote,” became a popular refrain. As the Government showed no signs of being impressed by peaceful persuasion, more violent methods came into vogue. Meetings were disturbed, Ministers were mobbed, policemen were bitten, and ordinary prison fare rejected, and on the eve of the anniversary of Trafalgar women bound themselves in tiers up the entire length of the Nelson column so that its customary floral decoration had to be abandoned. Still the Government obstinately12 adhered to its conviction that women ought to have the vote.
Then, as a last resort, some woman wit hit upon an expedient which it was strange that no one had thought of before. The Great Weep was organized. Relays of women, ten thousand at a time, wept continuously in the public places of the Metropolis. They wept in railway stations, in tubes and omnibuses, in the National Gallery, at the Army and Navy Stores, in St. James’s Park, at ballad concerts, at Prince’s and in the Burlington Arcade. The hitherto unbroken success of the brilliant farcical comedy “Henry’s Rabbit” was imperilled13 by the presence of drearily weeping women in stalls and circle and gallery, and one of the brightest divorce cases that had been tried for many years was robbed of much of its sparkle by the lachrymose14 behaviour of a section of the audience. *** “What are we to do?” asked the Prime Minister, whose cook had wept into all the breakfast dishes and whose nursemaid had gone out, crying quietly and miserably, to take the children for a walk in the Park. “There is a time for everything,” said the King; “there is a time to yield. Pass a measure through the two Houses depriving women of the right to vote, and bring it to me for the Royal assent the day after tomorrow.” As the Minister withdrew, Hermann the Irascible, who was also nicknamed the Wise, gave a profound chuckle. “There are more ways of killing a cat than by choking it with cream,” he quoted, “but I’m not sure,” he added “that it’s not the best way.”
What does the phrase “There are more ways of killing a cat than by chocking it with cream” mean as used in paragraph 12, and how does it relate to the story’s meaning?
How does the irony used in the story contribute to the reader’s understanding of the author’s point of view?
A. Hermann tries to give the women what they want but they refuse; this irony adds to the author’s criticism of the women’s suffrage movement as unorganized and lacking conviction.
B. A small minority of suffragettes make the vast majority of women miserable; this supports the author’s criticism of elitist progressive movements that hurt the public.
C. When the women get more power than men, they realize they want less power than men; this supports the author’s belief in the superiority of male power.
D. Hermann claims to be a progressive but prevents progressive change to suit his agenda; this irony supports the author’s criticism of hypocritical leaders.