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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. The story opens with the word "prithee" (332). What does this word mean in this context?
(a) Keep this information secret.
(b) Please, I am begging you.
(c) Listen carefully.
(d) I disapprove of this.

2. Miss Coulson has a "lorgnette" (334). What is a lorgnette?
(a) A round, flat case designed to hold medications or tobacco.
(b) Glasses that have a handle instead of ear-pieces.
(c) A high-necked, long-sleeved sweater.
(d) A piece of jewelry used to hold a scarf or shawl closed.

3. What is implied about Miss Coulson when she looks at the flowers "with the eye of a botanist" (334)?
(a) She is thinking of cutting them down.
(b) She is curious.
(c) She is logical and unemotional.
(d) She is very intelligent.

4. When Mr. Coulson asks for his "aconite," what is he asking for (333)?
(a) A hot breakfast cereal, like porridge or gruel.
(b) A religious text that provides commentary on the Bible.
(c) An herbal medicine used to treat pain and inflammation.
(d) A wooden cane with a carved top.

5. Why does Mrs. Widdup go into Mr. Coulson's room in the afternoon on the second day of the story?
(a) She needs to tell him that everyone else has left the house.
(b) She is concerned that he is all by himself.
(c) She wants him to finish what he was going to say on the day before.
(d) She hears him ring for help.

Short Answer Questions

1. What illness does Mr. Coulson suffer from?

2. Why does Miss Coulson ask when Mrs. Widdup's vacation begins?

3. Whom does the narrator refer to as "the venerable and scarcely suspecting victim of May" (334)?

4. Who is Miss Van Meeker Constantia Coulson?

5. How old is Mrs. Widdup?

Short Essay Questions

1. What is the thematic significance of the olfactory image of the city in springtime?

2. In the passage where Miss Coulson stares out the window, the reader is told "The chirp of the sparrows gave her a pain. She mocked at May" (334). To what earlier passage is this a reference, and what is the significance of the reference?

3. Explain the titular allusion and the allusion to "the poet" in the first sentence of the story.

4. What happens overnight that changes Mrs. Widdup and Mr. Coulson's fate?

5. How does O. Henry use dry humor to reveal the narrator's opinion about Mrs. Widdup in the narrative intrusion on page 333?

6. When Mr. Coulson finally confesses his feelings to Mrs. Widdup, what drawback to himself does he acknowledge, and what advantage does he say balances this drawback out?

7. What is the significance of the sound of the overturned chair after Mr. Coulson confesses his feelings to Mrs. Widdup?

8. What rhetorical purposes does O. Henry accomplish with his introduction of Mr. Coulson through a list of things that he "has," like gout, money, and a daughter?

9. How does O. Henry characterize the month of May?

10. How do words like "yaller" and "lawsy" in Mrs. Widdup's dialogue characterize her?

(see the answer keys)

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