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Question
Years later Mrs. Packletide writes her autobiography. As Mrs. Packletide, write
about the tiger episode with the help of the clues given below.
| jealous of the applause Loona was getting-thought of tiger hunt--all arranged-- Louisa Mebbin accompanied; turned out to be a blackmailer-huge price to pay to outdo a rival |
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Solution
When I think about my life, I realise that many of my biggest wins came from competing with other people. I finally decided to go on my own hunt because of the ridiculous praise that Loona Bimberton was getting. She kept bragging about having shot tigers. It was impossible for me to stand by and let her pride go unchallenged. I carefully set everything up, making sure it was ready for a performance better than hers.
I made the mistake of hiring Louisa Mebbin to go with me, which turned out to be my biggest mistake. I thought she would just be a background figure, but it turned out she was a sneaky blackmailer who was always watching my reputation and waiting for a chance to take advantage of any mistake I made. The hunt itself was strange, and it ended only by accident, but everyone chose to praise my shooting. When I think about it now, I see that the whole thing was a huge, pointless gamble. Yes, I beat my competitor, but it cost me a lot more than the thousand rupees I paid the villagers. It was a high price to pay for vanity, and it taught me how expensive it is to maintain a reputation based on nothing but a lie.
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RELATED QUESTIONS
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?
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.
Do you think the tiger shooting organized by the villagers was a serious affair?
Give reasons for your answer.
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.
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.
It was Mrs. Packletide's pleasure and intention that she should shoot a tiger.
....................................................................................
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.
………………………………………………………………………………………
The Maasai tribe in Africa hunt lions because
Solo hunting has been banned because
The Maasai warriors chase a lion with rattle bells to
The Maasai use three parts of the lion. They are
Answer the following question:
Why does the author say that Louisa Mebbin had a "protective elder sister" attitude towards money?
