2025 December English I Benchmark- ECR

Read the selection and choose the best answer to each question.

Mr. Roger Mifflin lives in a horse-drawn wagon, or van, that he has named Parnassus. He travels the countryside selling books, but he is ready to settle down now and hopes to sell the van and all its contents to Andrew McGill. He stops by the McGill property to speak to Andrew, but Helen, Andrew’s sister, talks to Mr. Mifflin first.

from Parnassus on Wheels

by Christopher Morley

1 I must admit that Mr. Roger Mifflin had fixed up his van mighty comfortably inside. The body of the wagon was built out on each side over the wheels, which gave it an unwieldy appearance but made extra room for the bookshelves. This left an inside space about five feet wide and nine long. On one side he had a little oil stove, a flap table, and a cozy-looking bunk above which was built a kind of chest of drawers—to hold clothes and such things, I suppose; on the other side more bookshelves, a small table, and a little wicker easy chair. Every possible inch of space seemed to be made useful in some way, for a shelf or a hook or a hanging cupboard or something. Above the stove was a neat little row of pots and dishes and cooking usefuls.1 The raised skylight made it just possible to stand upright in the center aisle of the van; and a little sliding window opened onto the driver’s seat in front. Altogether it was a very neat affair. The windows in front and back were curtained and a pot of geraniums stood on a diminutive shelf. I was amused to see a sandy Irish terrier curled up on a bright Mexican blanket in the bunk.

2 “Miss McGill,” he said, “I couldn’t sell Parnassus for less than four hundred. I’ve put twice that much into her, one time and another. She’s built clean and solid all through, and there’s everything a man would need from blankets to bouillon cubes. The whole thing’s yours for $400—including dog, cook stove, and everything—jib, boom, and spanker. There’s a tent in a sling underneath, and an ice box (he pulled up a little trapdoor under the bunk) and a tank of coal oil and what all. She’s as good as a yacht; but I’m tired of her. If you’re so afraid of your brother taking a fancy to her, why don’t you buy her yourself and go off on a lark? Make him stay home and mind the farm! . . . Tell you what I’ll do. I’ll start you on the road myself, come with you the first day and show you how it’s worked. You could have the time of your life in this thing, and give yourself a fine vacation. It would give your brother a good surprise, too. Why not?”

3 I don’t know whether it was the neatness of his absurd little van, or the madness of the whole proposition, or just the desire to have an adventure of my own and play a trick on Andrew, but anyway, some extraordinary impulse seized me and I roared with laughter.

4 “Right!” I said. “I’ll do it.”

5 I, Helen McGill, in the thirty-ninth year of my age!

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6 “Well,” I thought, “if I’m in for an adventure I may as well be spry about it.

Andrew’ll be home by half-past twelve and if I’m going to give him the slip I’d better get a start. I suppose he’ll think I’m crazy! He’ll follow me, I guess. Well, he just shan’t catch me, that’s all!” A kind of anger came over me to think that I’d been living on that farm for nearly fifteen years—yes, sir, ever since I was twenty-five—and hardly ever been away except for that trip to Boston once a year to go shopping with cousin Edie.

I’m a homekeeping soul, I guess, and I love my kitchen and my preserve cupboard and my linen closet as well as grandmother ever did, but something in that blue October air and that crazy little red-bearded man just tickled me.

7 “Look here, Mr. Parnassus,” I said, “I guess I’m an old fool but I just believe I’ll do that. You hitch up your horse and van and I’ll go pack some clothes and write you a check. It’ll do Andrew all the good in the world to have me skip. I’ll get a chance to read a few books, too. It’ll be as good as going to college!” And I untied my apron and ran for the house. The little man stood leaning against a corner of the van as if he were stupefied. I dare say he was.

8 I ran into the house through the front door, and it struck me as comical to see a copy of one of Andrew’s magazines lying on the living-room table with “The Revolt of Womanhood” printed across it in red letters. “Here goes for the revolt of Helen McGill,” I thought. I sat down at Andrew’s desk, pushed aside a pad of notes he had been jotting down about “the magic of autumn,” and scrawled a few lines:

9 DEAR ANDREW,

Don’t be thinking I’m crazy. I’ve gone off for an adventure. It just came over me that you’ve had all the adventures while I’ve been at home baking bread. Don’t worry. I’m going off for a little while—a month, maybe—to see some of this happiness and hayseed of yours. It’s what the magazines call the revolt of womanhood. Warm underwear in the cedar chest in the spare room when you need it. With love, HELEN.