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This test consists of 15 multiple choice questions and 5 short answer questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What do Ndotsheni’s children lack which is causing them to die in greater than average numbers?
(a) Clean water.
(b) Malaria medicine.
(c) Milk.
(d) Vitamin C.

2. What is the name of the agricultural demonstrator Jarvis hires for Ndotsheni?
(a) Cromwell.
(b) Washington.
(c) Lincoln.
(d) Napoleon.

3. How many black miners die during their short-lived strike?
(a) None.
(b) Three.
(c) One hundred.
(d) Twenty.

4. Which of the following is NOT a reason Absalom gives for having a revolver at all?
(a) Because he was told Johannesburg was a dangerous city.
(b) Because he thought he needed it for self-defense.
(c) Because he had grown up having and using guns.
(d) Because he thought it would frighten people off.

5. What word does Kumalo use to describe a quality about Arthur to James?
(a) A “brightness.”
(b) A “lightness.”
(c) A “shine.”
(d) A “sunniness.”

6. Who does Absalom claim planned the time and place for the house break?
(a) Johannes Pafuri.
(b) Absalom himself.
(c) Matthew Kumalo.
(d) Richard Mpiring.

7. What other weapon was carried by one of the two accomplices?
(a) A second revolver.
(b) An iron bar.
(c) A knife.
(d) A bat.

8. Kumalo gets a packet of mail all at once. Which character does NOT send him a letter?
(a) Absalom.
(b) Gertrude.
(c) Msimangu.
(d) Mr. Carmichael.

9. What is Absalom’s wife’s response to her new home?
(a) She weeps with happiness.
(b) She is completely indifferent.
(c) She is fearful of the natural world.
(d) She sulks and is unresponsive.

10. What does James have a hard time looking at each day upon entering Arthur’s house?
(a) An unfinished letter Arthur had started to his father.
(b) The bloodstain on the floor where Arthur died.
(c) A cigar left half-smoked in an ashtray on Arthur’s desk.
(d) A portrait of Arthur hanging in the parlor.

11. How do the Jarvises travel to Johannesburg?
(a) By train.
(b) By plane.
(c) By bus.
(d) By private car.

12. Complete the following statement Kumalo makes when Arthur Jarvis’ son announces he will soon leave Natal: “When you go, something _______ will go out of Ndotsheni.”
(a) Important.
(b) Bright.
(c) Joyful.
(d) Harmonious.

13. Before the murderer is caught, who is suspected of the crime of killing Arthur?
(a) Someone who was once an employee of Arthur’s.
(b) Someone who committed the murder in a random act of gang violence.
(c) Someone on the orders of Dubula and John Kumalo.
(d) A racist white who dislikes Arthur’s agitation for black rights.

14. Whose death devastates the villagers of Ndotsheni?
(a) Gertrude.
(b) Jarvis’ wife.
(c) The tribe’s chief.
(d) Kumalo’s wife.

15. What name does Absalom ask his father to name his child if it is boy?
(a) Michael.
(b) Paul.
(c) Arthur.
(d) Peter.

Short Answer Questions

1. What vocation does Gertrude think she would like to try?

2. Who has disappeared on the morning Kumalo is set to return to Ndotsheni?

3. From which province do both Kumalo and Jarvis come?

4. What is the name of the Jarvis farm?

5. What natural phenomenon is afflicting Umzimkulu valley when Kumalo returns home?

(see the answer keys)

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