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This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What caused the bell-ringing automaton to kill Bannadonna?
(a) An unrepaired defect.
(b) A manufacturing error.
(c) A design flaw.
(d) Jealousy.

2. What loss of John Gentian's is noticed most on May thirtieth?
(a) His empty sleeve.
(b) His missing ear.
(c) His limp.
(d) His blinded eye.

3. How does the narrator of "The Piazza" travel to the spot in the mountains that he wants to see?
(a) In a carriage.
(b) On horseback.
(c) In a yawl.
(d) On foot.

4. What had Hautboy lost in order to succeed?
(a) Guilt.
(b) Glory.
(c) Conscience.
(d) Fear.

5. What does the narrator's wife think of his apprehension about the apple-tree table?
(a) She thinks he is drunk.
(b) She thinks he is trying to frighten her.
(c) She thinks he is crazy.
(d) She thinks he is making it up.

Short Answer Questions

1. How does the lightning rod salesman feel about thunderstorms?

2. How does Captain Delano evaluate Benito Cereno's condition when he first meets him?

3. What is unusual about the strange ship's figurehead?

4. What habit of the bachelors in the Temple does the narrator wish to introduce in his own country?

5. What does the narrator decide to give the apple-tree table when he first discovers it?

Short Essay Questions

1. Why does the owner of the paper factory in "The Tartarus of Maids" tell the narrator that all of his workers are called "girls"?

2. According to the deposition in "Benito Cereno," what would have happened to Captain Delano if he had suspected a mutiny aboard the San Dominick?

3. What is Captain Delano's intention in boarding Benito Cereno's ship?

4. What does Melville say is the difference between boarding a strange ship and entering a strange house?

5. What does the narrator claim shows Jack Gentian's natural gentility?

6. What is the figurehead on the San Dominick?

7. What does the chimney in "I and My Chimney" provide for the narrator on the second landing?

8. Why did the Spanish naval board of inquiry at first reject parts of Benito Cereno's deposition?

9. What is unusual about the bug that emerges from the apple-tree table in the story of that name?

10. In "The Lightning Rod Man," why does the narrator pretend to mistake the salesman for the god Jupiter Tonans?

(see the answer keys)

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