EST I – Literacy Test II – October 2021

The following edited passage is an excerpt from The Legend of Sleepy Hollow by Washington Irving, introducing the history of Sleepy Hollow.

            In the bosom of one of those spacious coves which indent the eastern shore of the Hudson, at that

broad expansion of the river denominated by the ancient

5          Dutch navigators the Tappan Zee, and where they always prudently shortened sail and implored

the protection of God when they crossed, there lies a small market town or rural port, which by

10        some is called Greensburgh, but which is more generally and properly known by the name of

Tarry Town. This name was given, we are told, in former days, by the good housewives of the

adjacent

15        country, from the inveterate propensity of their husbands to linger about the village inn on market

days. Be that as it may, I do not vouch for the fact, but merely advert to it, for the sake of being

20        precise and authentic. Not far from this village, perhaps about two miles, there is a little valley or

rather lap of land among high hills, which is one of the quietest places in the whole world. A

25        small brook glides through it, with just murmur enough to lull one to repose; and the occasional

whistle of a quail or tapping of a woodpecker is almost the only sound that ever breaks in upon

the

30        uniform tranquillity.

            I recollect that, when a stripling, my first exploit in squirrel-shooting was in a grove of tall

walnut-trees that shades one side of the valley. I had wandered

35         into it at noontime, when all

nature is peculiarly quiet, and was startled by the roar of my own gun, as it broke the Sunday

stillness around and was prolonged and reverberated by the angry

40        echoes. If ever I should wish for a retreat whither I might steal from the world and its distractions,

and dream quietly away the remnant of a troubled

            life, I know of none more promising

45        than this little valley.

  From the listless repose of the place, and the peculiar character of its inhabitants, who are

descendants of the original Dutch settlers, this sequestered

50        glen has long been known by the name of SLEEPY HOLLOW, and its rustic lads are called the

Sleepy Hollow Boys throughout all the neighboring country. A drowsy, dreamy influence seems

to

55        hang over the land, and to pervade the very atmosphere. Some say that the place was bewitched

by a High German doctor, during the early days of the settlement; others, that an old Indian

60        chief, the wizard of his tribe, held his powwows there before the country was discovered by

Master Hendrick Hudson. Certain it is, the place still continues under the sway of some witching

power,

65        that holds a spell over the minds of the good people, causing them to walk in a continual reverie.

They are given to all kinds of marvellous beliefs, are subject to trances and visions, and

frequently

70        see strange sights, and hear music and voices in the air. The whole neighborhood abounds with

local tales, haunted spots, and twilight superstitions; stars shoot and meteors

75        glare oftener across the valley than in any other part of the country, and the nightmare, with her

whole ninefold, seems to make it the favorite scene of her gambols.

80        The dominant spirit, however, that haunts this enchanted region, and seems to be commander-in-

chief of all the powers of the air, is the apparition of a figure on horseback, without a head. It

85        is said by some to be the ghost of a Hessian trooper, whose head had been carried away by a

cannon-ball, in some nameless battle during the Revolutionary War, and who is ever and

90        anon seen by the country folk hurrying along in the gloom of night, as if on the

wings of the wind. His haunts are not confined to the valley, but extend at times to the adjacent

roads, and

95         especially to the vicinity of a graveyard at no great distance. Indeed, certain of the most authentic

historians of those parts, who have been careful in collecting and collating the floating

100       facts concerning this spectre, allege that the body of the trooper having been buried in the

graveyard, the ghost rides forth to the scene of battle in nightly quest of his head, and that the

rushing

105       speed with which he sometimes passes along the Hollow, like a midnight blast, is owing to his

being belated, and in a hurry to get back to the graveyard before daybreak.

The following edited passage is taken from The Story of Geographical Discovery by Joseph Jacobs on the discovery of Australia.

            If one looks at the west coast of Australia one is struck by the large number of Dutch names which are jotted down the coast. There is Hoog Island, Diemen’s

5          Bay, Houtman’s Abrolhos, De Wit land, and the Archipelago of Nuyts, besides Dirk Hartog’s Island and Cape Leeuwin. To the extreme north we find the Gulf of Carpentaria, and to the extreme south the

10        island which used to be called Van Diemen’s Land. It is not altogether to be wondered at that almost to the middle of this century the land we now call Australia was tolerably well known as

15        New Holland. If the Dutch had struck the more fertile eastern shores of the Australian continent, it might have been called with reason New Holland to the present day; but there is scarcely any long

20        coast-line of the world so inhospitable and so little promising as that of Western Australia, and one can easily understand how the Dutch, though they explored it, did not care to take possession of it.

25        But though the Dutch were the first to explore any considerable stretch of Australian coast, they were by no means the first to sight it. As early as 1542, a Spanish expedition under Luis Lopez de

30        Villalobos, was dispatched to follow up the discoveries of Magellan in the Pacific Ocean within the Spanish sphere of influence. He discovered several of the islands of Polynesia, and attempted to

35        seize the Philippines, but his fleet had to return to New Spain. One of the ships coasted along an island to which was given the name of New Guinea, and was thought to be part of the great unknown

40        southern land which Ptolemy had imagined to exist in the south of the        Indian Ocean, and to be connected in some way with Tierra del Fuego.

            Curiosity was thus aroused, and in 1606

45        Pedro de Quiros was dispatched on a voyage to the South Seas with three ships. He discovered the New Hebrides, and believed it formed part of the southern continent, and he therefore

50        named it Australia del Espiritu Santo, and hastened home to obtain the viceroyalty of this new possession. One of his ships got separated from him, and the commander, Luys Vaz de Torres, sailed

55        farther to the south-west, and thereby learned that the New Australia was not a      continent but an island. He proceeded farther till he came to New Guinea, which he coasted along the south coast, and

60        seeing land to the south of him, he thus passed through the straits since named after him, and was probably the first

            European to see the continent of Australia. In the very same year (1606)

65        the Dutch yacht named the Duyfken is said to have coasted along the south and west coasts of New Guinea nearly a thousand miles, till they reached Cape Keerweer, or “turn again.” This was

70        probably the north-west coast of Australia. In the first thirty years of the seventeenth century the Dutch followed the west coast of Australia with as much

75        industry as the Portuguese had done with the west coast of Africa, leaving up to the

80        present day signs of their explorations in the names of islands, bays, and capes.

Dirk Hartog, in the Endraaght, discovered that Land which is named after his ship, and the cape and roadstead

85        named after himself, in 1616. Jan Edels left his name upon the western coast in 1619; while, three years later, a ship named the Lioness or Leeuwin reached the most western point of the continent,

90        to which its name is still attached. Five years later, in 1627, De Nuyts coasted round the south coast of Australia; while in the same year a Dutch commander named Carpenter discovered and gave his name to the immense indentation still known as the Gulf of Carpentaria. 

But still more important discoveries were made in 1642 by an expedition sent out

95        from Batavia under Abel Janssen Tasman to investigate the real extent of the southern land. After the voyages of the Leeuwin and De Nuyts it was seen that the southern coast of the new land

100        trended to the east, instead of working round to the west, as would have been the case if Ptolemy’s views had been correct. Tasman’s problem was to discover whether it was connected with the great

105        southern land assumed to lie to the south of South America. Tasman first sailed from Mauritius, and then directing his course to the south-east, going much more south than Cape Leeuwin, at last

110       reached land in latitude 43.30° and longitude 163.50°. This he called Van Diemen’s Land, after the name of the Governor-General of Batavia, and it was assumed that this joined on to the land

115       already discovered by De Nuyts.

            The first passage is from Birds of the Rockies by Leander Sylvester discussing           the humming bird. Passage 2, taken from

The Nests and Eggs of Indian Birds by Allan O. Hume, discusses the Punjab raven birds.

            Passage 1

5          Where do you suppose I got my first glimpse of the mite in feathers called the broad-tailed humming-bird? It was in a green bower in the Rocky Mountains in plain sight of the towering summit of Pike’s Peak, which seemed almost to be

            standing guard over the place. Two brawling mountain brooks met here, and, joining their forces, went with increased

10        speed and gurgle down the glades and gorges. As they sped through this ravine, they slightly overflowed their banks, making a boggy area of about an acre as green as green could be; and here amid

15        the grass and bushes a number of birds found a pleasant summer home, among them the dainty hummer.

            From the snow-drifts, still to be seen in the sheltered gorges of Pike’s Peak, the

20        breezes would frequently blow down into the nook with a freshness with no danger of intoxication; and it was no wonder that the white-crowned sparrows, Lincoln’s sparrows, the robins and wrens, and

25        several other species, found in this spot a pleasant place to live. One of the narrow valleys led directly up to the base of the massive cone of the Peak, its stream fed by the snow-fields shining in the sun.

30        Going around by the valley of Seven Lakes, I had walked down from the summit, but nowhere had I seen the tiny hummer until I reached the green nook just described. Still, he sometimes

35        ascends to an elevation of eleven thousand feet above the level of the sea.

            Our feathered dot is gorgeous with his metallic green upper parts, bordered on the tail with purplish black, his white or

40        grayish under parts, and his gorget of purple which gleams in bright, varying tints in the sun. He closely resembles our common ruby-throated humming-bird, whose gorget is intense crimson instead

45        of purple, and who does not venture into the Rocky Mountain region, but dwells exclusively in the eastern part of North America. It is a little strange that the eastern part of our country attracts only

50        one species of the large hummer family, while the western portion, including the Rocky Mountain region, can boast of at least seventeen different kinds as summer residents or visitors.

55        My attention was first directed to the broad-tailed hummer by seeing him darting about in the air with the swiftness of an arrow, sipping honey from the flower cups, and then flying to the twigs

60        of a dead tree that stood in the marsh. There he sat, turning his head this way and that, and watching me with his keen little eyes. It was plain he did not trust me, and therefore resented my presence.

65        Though an unwelcome guest, I prolonged my call for several hours, during which I made many heroic but vain attempts to find his nest.

            But what was the meaning of a sharp,

70        insect-like buzzing that fell at intervals on my ear? Presently I succeeded in tracing the sound to the hummer, which utters it whenever he darts from his perch and back again, especially if there is a

75        spectator or a rival near at hand, for whom he seems in this way to express his contempt. It is a vocal sound, or, at least, it comes from his throat, and is much louder and sharper than the susurrus

80        produced by the rapid movement of his         wings. This I ascertain by hearing both the sounds at the same time.

            Passage 2

            The Punjab Raven breeds throughout the Punjab (except perhaps in the Dehra

85        Ghazee Khan District), in Bhawulpoor, Bikaneer, and the northern portions of Jeypoor and Jodhpoor, extending rarely as far south as Sambhur. To Sindh it is merely a seasonal visitant, and I could not

90        learn that they breed there, nor have I ever known of one breeding anywhere east of the Jumna. Even in the Delhi Division of the Punjab they breed sparingly, and one must go further north

95        and west to find many nests.

The breeding-season lasts from early in December to quite the end of March; but this varies a little according to season and locality, though the majority of birds

100      always, I think, lay in January.

The nest is generally placed in single trees of no great size, standing in fields or open jungle. The thorny Acacias are often selected, but I have seen them on Sisoo

105      and other trees.

The nest, placed in a stout fork as a rule, is a large, strong, compact, stick structure, very like a Rook’s nest at home, and like these is used year after year,

110      whether by the same birds or others of the same species I cannot say. Of course they never breed in company: I never found two of their nests within 100 yards of each other, and, as a rule, they will not be

115      found within a quarter of a mile of each other.

Five is, I think, the regular complement of eggs; very often I have only found four fully incubated eggs, and on two or three

120      occasions six have, I know, been taken in one nest, though I never myself met with so many.

The following edited passage is taken from Music and Life by Thomas Whitney Surette on beauty and truth.

I have already stated that the other arts have for their ideal that fusing of subject and expression which in music is complete, and I have further stated that

5 the purpose or object of music is to present emotion ordered and guided by the mind and illumined by the imagination. In this latter respect all the arts are alike. It is in the very nature of

10 their being that they seek to find the heart of the great secret. The purpose of painting and sculpture is not to present objects as objects, but to set them forth in such harmonious perfection of line and

15 color and rhythm as will reveal their deepest significance. The greatest examples of the plastic arts cannot be understood through sense-perception of objects. Rembrandt is a greater painter

20 than Bougereau, not only because he has superior technique, but because he has deeper insight. This is why the “subject” in painting is comparatively unimportant.

It is the same with literature. In “Jane

25 Eyre” the “subject” is more tangible and vivid than in “Villette,” but the latter is the finer book, because the technical skill is greater, the insight deeper. “There are no good subjects or bad subjects,” says

30 Hugo; “there are only good poets and bad poets.” Any subject is interesting when a master-mind presents it in full significance. A custom-house is a prosaic thing, and a custom-house that has neither

35 exports nor imports, but only a few sleepy old pensioners dozing in the sun, might be thought a dull subject for a writer; but Hawthorne’s imagination and subtlety of literary expression clothe it

40 with both beauty and significance. Even the noblest and most tragic deeds find their best justification in a sublime harmony of beauty.

Deeds, monuments, cities, and

45 civilizations fade into nothingness, but a

few words, or a strain of music turned by an artist, will live on forever. The battle of Gettysburg will become merely a paragraph of history, the causes for which

50 it was fought will be as nothing, but the words spoken by Lincoln will be preserved for all time, not because they were wise, but because they were wise and beautiful.

55 There is no escape from this condition. An occasional great writer has railed at beauty, only to prove finally that his own permanence depended on it. Carlyle, for example, was more caustic than usual

60 when he discussed poetry. His comment on Browning’s “The Ring and the Book” ran thus: “A wonderful book, one of the most wonderful ever written. I re-read it all through—all made out of an ‘Old

65 Bailey’ story that might have been told in ten lines, and only wants forgetting.” Yet the best part of “Sartor Resartus” is its beauty, and there are in “The French Revolution” many passages of quite

70 perfect poetic imagery and characterization without which it would lose much of its value. What we call “Carlyle” is no longer a man; nor is it a philosophy, or a history; it is nothing but

75 a style, a manner of saying things—an individual, characteristic, and strange blend of hard and soft, of high and low, of rugged and tender, all struggling with a conscience. So we say that beauty is the

80 lodestone by which all life is tested.

No game can be perfectly played unless the physical motions are timed in beauty; no machine will act save in perfect synthesis; no character is strong until it

85 attains a harmony within itself. Beauty is the matrix in which life shall be finally moulded.

All forms of artistic expression, then, require that we shall see the object not as

90 fact but as art. If it is fact—that is, merely an isolated object or event—it remains insignificant until some artist catches it up into the wider realm in which it

belongs and sets it forth in some form of

95    beauty. If we accept this conception of all the arts as seeking the inner sense of things, as portraying life in its essence rather than in its outward  manifestations, we shall be able to understand the 

100    peculiar power of music.

The following edited passage is taken from The Brain and the Voice in Speech and Song by F.W. Mott on the diaphragm and its attachments.

In speech, and more especially in singing, there is an art of breathing. Ordinary inspiration and expiration necessary for the oxygenation of the

5   blood is performed automatically and unconsciously. But in singing the respiratory apparatus is used like the bellows of a musical instrument, and it is controlled and directed by the will;

10   the art of breathing properly is fundamental for the proper production of the singing voice and the speaking voice of the orator. It is necessary always to maintain in the lungs, which

15 act as the bellows, a sufficient reserve of air to finish a phrase; therefore when the opportunity arises it is desirable to take in as much air as possible through the nostrils, and without any apparent

20   effort; the expenditure of the air in the lungs must be controlled and regulated by the power of the will in such a manner as to produce efficiency in loudness with economy of expenditure.

25   The bellows consist of the lungs enclosed in the movable thorax. The latter may be likened to a cage; it is formed by the spine behind and the ribs, which are attached by cartilages to the

30   breastbone (sternum) in front. The ribs and cartilages form a series of hoops which increase in length from above downwards; moreover, they slope obliquely downwards and inwards. The

35 ribs are jointed behind to the vertebrae in such a way that muscles attached to them can, by shortening, elevate them; the effect is that the longer ribs are raised, and pushing forward the

40   breastbone and cartilages, the thoracic cage enlarges from before back; but being elastic, the hoops will give a little and cause some expansion from side to side; moreover, when the ribs are raised,

45   each one is rotated on its axis in such a way that the lower border tends towards eversion; the total effect of this rotation is a lateral expansion of the whole thorax.

50 Between the ribs and the cartilages the space is filled by the intercostal muscles, the action of which, in conjunction with other muscles, is to elevate the ribs. It is, however,

55   unnecessary to enter into anatomical details, and describe all those muscles which elevate and rotate the ribs, and thereby cause enlargement of the thorax in its antero-posterior and lateral

60   diameters. There is, however, one muscle which forms the floor of the thoracic cage called the diaphragm that requires more than a passing notice, inasmuch as it is the most effective

65   agent in the expansion of the chest. It consists of a central tendinous portion, above which lies the heart, contained in its bag or pericardium; on either side attached to the central tendon on the one

70 hand and to the spine behind, to the last rib laterally, and to the cartilages of the lowest six ribs anteriorly, is a sheet of muscle fibres which form on either side of the chest a dome-like partition

75   between the lungs and the abdominal cavity. The phrenic nerve arises from the spinal cord in the upper cervical region and descends through the neck and chest to the diaphragm; it is

80 therefore a special nerve of respiration. There are two—one on each side supplying the two sheets of muscle fibres. When innervation currents flow down these nerves the two muscular

85   halves of the diaphragm contract, and the floor of the chest on either side descends; thus the vertical diameter increases. Now the elastic lungs are covered with a smooth pleura which is

90 reflected from them on to the inner side of the wall of the thorax, leaving no space between; consequently when the chest expands in all three directions the elastic lungs expand correspondingly.

95   But when either voluntarily or automatically the nerve currents that cause contraction of the muscles of expansion cease, the elastic structures of the lungs and thorax, including the           

100   muscles, recoil, the diaphragm ascends, and the ribs by the force of gravity tend to fall into the position of rest. During expansion of the chest a negative pressure is established in the air             

105   passages and air flows into them from without. In contraction of the chest there is a positive pressure in the air passages, and air is expelled; in normal quiet breathing an ebb and flow of air takes

110   place rhythmically and subconsciously; thus in the ordinary speaking of conversation we do not require to exercise any voluntary effort in controlling the breathing, but the orator

115   and more especially the singer uses his knowledge and experience in the voluntary control of his breath, and he is thus enabled to use his vocal instrument in the most effective manner.