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Question
Mrs. Packletide was a good shot. Discuss.
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Solution
Mrs. Packletide shot at the tiger. The tawny beast sprang to one side and rolled over dead. Miss Mebbin drew attention that the goat had been killed by the bullet, while there was no trace of a bullet wound on the tiger’s body. The wrong animal had been killed and the tiger died due to heart failure caused by the sudden sound of the rifle.
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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 :
Why did Mrs. Packletide wish to kill a tiger ?
Answer the following question in your own words :
How was the tiger shooting arranged? What kind of a tiger was chosen for the
purpose?
What comment did Miss Mebbin make after Mrs Packletide fired the shot? Why
did Miss Mebbin make this comment? How did Mrs Packletide react to this
comment?
Answer the following question in your own words:
How did the villagers react to the tiger’s death?
Did Mrs. Packletide achieve her heart’s desire? Give reasons for your answer.
“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 tiger shooting organized by the villagers was a serious affair?
Give reasons for your answer.
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.
How does the writer create humour in this story?
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.
Louisa Mebbin adopted a protective elder-sister attitude towards money in
general, irrespective of nationality or denomination.
…………………………………………………………………………………………
Rewrite the one in ordinary prose so that the meaning is retained.
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.
………………………………………………………………………………………
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 hunting of lionesses is discouraged because
The Maasai warriors chase a lion with rattle bells to
Answer the following question:
Why does the author say that Louisa Mebbin had a "protective elder sister" attitude towards money?
