Tom Sawyer – Part Forty

Before you read the text, read the following comprehension questions.

1. What was Tom doing with the medicine instead of taking it?

2. Who is Peter, and what is Peter’s relationship to Aunt Polly?

3. Why was Peter behaving so strangely?

4. How did Aunt Polly know that Tom had given the cat pain-killer?

5. Why did Tom say that he felt sorry for the cat?

Now read the text and answer the questions.

Tom felt that it was time to wake up. He thought over various plans to change his mood and finally decided to pretend to be fond of pain-killer.

He asked for it so often that he became a nuisance, and his aunt finally told him to help himself and stop bothering her.

If it had been Sid, she would have trusted him, but since it was Tom, she watched the bottle carefully. She saw that the medicine was disappearing, but it did not occur to her that the boy was mending the health of a crack in the sitting-room floor with it.

One day Tom was in the act of treating the crack when his aunt's yellow cat came along, purring and begging for a taste of the medicine. Tom said,

"Don't ask for it unless you want it, Peter."

But Peter signified that he did want it.

"You’d better be sure."

Peter was sure.

"Now you've asked for it, and I'll give it to you, because there isn’t anything bad about me. But if you don't like it, you mustn't blame anybody but yourself."

Peter was agreeable. So, Tom opened his mouth and poured down the pain-killer. Peter jumped a couple of metres in the air, and then made a loud noise and ran around and round the room, banging against furniture, breaking flower-pots, and making a total mess.

Next, he rose up on his back legs and walked around crying with happiness.

Then he ran around the house again spreading chaos and destruction.

Aunt Polly entered in time to see him jump high in the air, cry with joy and jump through the open window, taking the rest of the flower-pots with him.

The old lady was surprised and looked over her glasses. Tom lay on the floor, laughing uncontrollably.

"Tom, what’s wrong with the cat?"

"I don't know, aunt," said the boy.

"I’ve never seen anything like it. What made him behave like that?"

"I don't know, Aunt Polly. Cats always behave like that when they're having a good time."

"Oh, they do, do they?"

There was something in her voice that made Tom nervous.Diccionario online

"Yes ma’am. That is, I believe they do."

"You do?"

"Yes ma'am."

The old lady was bending down, Tom watching, with interest emphasized by anxiety. He noticed too late. The handle of the teaspoon was visible under the bed. Aunt Polly picked it up.

Tom looked down at the floor. Aunt Polly raised him by the usual handle - his ear - and hit him on the head.

"Why did you want to give that poor cat medicine?"

"I felt sorry for him because he doesn’t have an aunt."
"Doesn’t have an aunt! You idiot. What has that got to do with it?"

"A lot, because if he had an aunt, she'd treat him the same way and give him that horrible medicine exactly as if he was a human!"

Aunt Polly suddenly felt guilty. This was putting the thing in a new light. What was cruelty to a cat might be cruelty to a boy, too.

She began to soften. She felt sorry. Her eyes watered a little, and she put her hand on Tom's head and said gently,

"I did it for the best, Tom. And, Tom, it did do you good."

Tom looked up into her face and tried to be serious.

"I know you did it for the best, aunty, and so was I with Peter. It did Peter good, too. I’ve never seen him so happy!"

... to be continued!

* The text has been adapted from the Adventures of Tom Sawyer
by Mark Twain


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*Consulta un PDF con la información y resumen de 100 libros en inglés
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Tom Sawyer – Part Forty-one

Before you read the text, read the following comprehension questions.
 

1. What was unusual about the way Tom had been attending school?

2. Who did Tom ask for information about Becky?

3. Why did Tom hate the owners of pretty dresses?

4. Which expression is used in the text to describe Tom’s excitement at seeing Becky?

5. Why was Tom behaving so strangely?
   

Now read the text and answer the questions.
 
Tom got to school early. It was noticed that this strange thing had been occurring every day lately. Also, he hung about the school gate instead of playing with his friends. He was sick, he said, and he looked it.

He tried to seem to be looking everywhere but he was really looking down the road. Suddenly, Jeff Thatcher appeared, and Tom's face lit up. He Looked for a moment, and then turned away sadly.

When Jeff arrived, Tom spoke to him and tried to find out information about Becky, but the silly boy didn’t say anything.

Tom watched and watched, hoping whenever a pretty dress came in sight that it might be her. Then hating the owner of it as soon as he saw she was not the right one.

At last dresses stopped appearing, and he dropped hopelessly into sadness. He entered the empty schoolhouse and sat down to suffer. Then one more dress passed through the gate, and Tom's heart missed a beat.

The next minute he was outside, and behaving like an Indian; shouting, laughing, chasing boys, jumping over the fence at risk of personal injury, standing on his head, rolling about and doing all the heroic things he could think of, and all the time paying attention to see if Becky Thatcher was noticing. But she seemed to be unconscious of it all; she never looked. Could it be possible that she was not aware that he was there?

He moved closer to where she was. He made loud noises, took a boy's cap, threw it to the roof of the schoolhouse, ran through a group of boys, pushing them in every direction, and fell on the ground under Becky's nose, almost knocking her over. She turned, with her nose in the air, and he heard her say: "Ooofff! some people think they're very clever, always showing off!"

Tom's cheeks turned red. He picked himself up and walked away, sad and emotionally destroyed.

... to be continued!

* The text has been adapted from the Adventures of Tom SawyerDiccionario online
by Mark Twain


  Download the original book for free
 

*Consulta un PDF con la información y resumen de 100 libros en inglés
que puedes descargar en 1 único archivo.

 

  Haz click para comprobar las soluciones

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