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Question
How does the writer create humour in this story?
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Solution
The story is full of humour. Mrs. Packletide arranges for the shooting. The funniest part is that a weak tiger is arranged and cheaper goats are left to lure him. Mrs Packletide is not a good shooter, but a platform is constructed in a tree, and she sits there with a rifle, a thumb-nail pack of patience cards. The funniest part is as soon as the tiger caught sight of the goat it lay flat on the earth, seemingly less from a desire to take advantage of and attack its prey.
The rifle is shot with a loud bang and the great beast springs to one side and then rolls over dead. Miss Mebbin makes fun of Mrs. Packletide by bringing out the fact that the wrong animal had been killed. The bullet had hit the goat, but the tiger had a heart failure because of the loud noise of the rifle. The villagers shouted happily, for they were only anxious for their thousand rupees and gladly connived at the fiction that she had shot the tiger. Mrs. Packletide faced the cameras happily and her pictured fame reached the pages of Texas Weekly Snapshot.
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RELATED QUESTIONS
Why do people hunt? Complete the web chart giving various reasons for the
same:
Answer the following question in your own words :
What made her decide to give a party in Loona Bimberton's honour? What did she
intend to give Loona on her birthday?
Who was Miss Mebbin? Was she really devoted to Mrs. Packletide? How did she behave during the tiger shooting?
Mrs. Packletide was a good shot. Discuss.
What comment did Miss Mebbin make after Mrs Packletide fired the shot? Why
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Answer the following question in your own words:
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“The incidental expenses are so heavy,” she confides to inquiring friends. Who is the speaker? What is she referring to here?
Do you think the writer is trying to make fun of the main characters in the story i.e. Mrs. Packletide, Miss Mebbin and Loona Bimberton? Pick out instances from the story that point to this fact.
A person who is vain is full of self importance and can only think of himself/herself and can go to great lengths to prove his/her superiority. Do you think Mrs Packletide is vain? Give reasons in support of your answer.
Choose extracts from the story that illustrate the character of the people listed in
the table given below. There are some words given to help you. You may add
words of your own. One has been done as an example:
vain jealous competitive shrewd manipulative stingy materialistic spiteful
| Character | Extract from the story | What this tells us about the character |
|
Mrs. Packletide |
(i) The compelling motive for her sudden deviation towards the footsteps of Nimrod was the fact that Loona Bimberton had recently been carried eleven miles in an aeroplane by an Algerian aviator, and talked of nothing else; only a personally procured tiger-skin and a heavy harvest of Press photographs could successfully counter that sort of thing | Competitive |
| (ii) Mrs. Packletide had offered a thousand rupees for the opportunity of shooting a tiger without over-much risk or exertion, |
||
| (iii) Mrs. Packletide faced the cameras with a light heart, and her pictured fame reached from the pages of the Texas Weekly Snapshot to the illustrated Monday supplement of the Novoe Vremya. |
||
| Louisa Mebbin | (i) "If it's an old tiger I think you ought to get it cheaper. A thousand rupees is a lot of money." | |
| (ii) Louisa Mebbin adopted a protective elder-sister attitude towards money in general, irrespective of nationality or denomination |
||
| (iii) "How amused every one would be if they knew what really happened," said Louisa Mebbin a few days after the ball. |
||
| (iv) Louisa Mebbin's pretty week-end cottage, christened by her "Les Fauves," and gay in summer-time with its garden borders of tiger-lilies, is the wonder and admiration of her friends |
||
| Loona Bimberton | (i) As for Loona Bimberton, she refused to look at an illustrated paper for weeks, and her letter of thanks for the gift of a tiger-claw brooch was a model of repressed emotions |
|
| (ii) There are limits beyond which repressed emotions become dangerous. |
Rewrite the one in ordinary prose so that the meaning is retained.
Mrs. Packletide had already arranged in her mind the lunch she would give at her
house on Curzon Street, ostensibly in Loona Bimberton's honour, with a tiger-skin
rug occupying most of the foreground and all of the conversation.
……………………………………………………
Rewrite the one in ordinary prose so that the meaning is retained.
Mothers carrying their babies home through the jungle after the day's work in the
fields hushed their singing lest they might curtail the restful sleep of the venerable
herd-robber.
………………………………………………………………………
Rewrite the one in ordinary prose so that the meaning is retained.
Evidently the wrong animal had been hit, and the beast of prey had succumbed to
heart-failure, caused by the sudden report of the rifle, accelerated by senile decay.
………………………………………………………………………………………
In groups of four, construct the dialogues and enact the following situations
from the story:
1. Mrs. Packletide and the headman of the village/other villagers discussing the
details of the tiger shooting
2. Miss Mebbin blackmailing Mrs Packletide into gifting her a cottage
3. Loona Bimberton and a lady-friend discussing Mrs Packletide's hunting success
The Maasai tribe in Africa hunt lions because
The hunting of lionesses is discouraged because
The Maasai use three parts of the lion. They are
