Mathew ascended three flights of stairs--passed half-way down a long arched gallery--and knocked at
another old-fashioned oak door. This time the signal was answered. A low, clear, sweet voice, inside the
room, inquired who was waiting without? In a few hasty words Mathew told his errand. Before he had
done speaking the door was quietly and quickly opened, and Sarah Leeson confronted him on the
threshold, with her candle in her hand.
Not tall, not handsome, not in her first youth--shy and irresolute in manner--simple in dress to the utmost
limits of plainness--the lady's-maid, in spite of all these disadvantages, was a woman whom it was
impossible to look at without a feeling of curiosity, if not of interest. Few men, at first sight of her, could
have resisted the desire to find out who she was; few would have been satisfied with receiving for answer,
She is Mrs. Treverton's maid; few would have refrained from the attempt to extract some secret
information for themselves from her face and manner; and none, not even the most patient and practiced
of observers, could have succeeded in discovering more than that she must have passed through the
ordeal of some great suffering at some former period of her life. Much in her manner, and more in her face,
said plainly and sadly: I am the wreck of something that you might once have liked to see; a wreck that
can never be repaired--that must drift on through life unnoticed, unguided, unpitied--drift till the fatal shore
is touched, and the waves of Time have swallowed up these broken relics of me forever.
This was the story that was told in Sarah Leeson's face--this, and no more. No two men interpreting that
story for themselves, would probably have agreed on the nature of the suffering which this woman had
undergone. It was hard to say, at the outset, whether the past pain that had set its ineffaceable mark on
her had been pain of the body or pain of the mind. But whatever the nature of the affliction she had
suffered, the traces it had left were deeply and strikingly visible in every part of her face.
Her cheeks had lost their roundness and their natural color; her lips, singularly flexible in movement and
delicate in form, had faded to an unhealthy paleness; her eyes, large and black and overshadowed by
unusually thick lashes, had contracted an anxious startled look, which never left them and which piteously
expressed the painful acuteness of her sensibility, the inherent timidity of her disposition. So far, the
marks which sorrow or sickness had set on her were the marks common to most victims of mental or
physical suffering. The one extraordinary personal deterioration which she had undergone consisted in
the unnatural change that had passed over the color of her hair.
It was as thick and soft, it grew as gracefully, as the hair of a young girl; but it was as gray as the hair of an
old woman. It seemed to contradict, in the most startling manner, every personal assertion of youth that
still existed in her face. With all its haggardness and paleness, no one could have looked at it and
supposed for a moment that it was the face of an elderly woman. Wan as they might be, there was not a
wrinkle in her cheeks. Her eyes, viewed apart from their prevailing expression of uneasiness and timidity,
still preserved that bright, clear moisture which is never seen in the eyes of the old. The skin about her
temples was as delicately smooth as the skin of a child. These and other physical signs which never
mislead, showed that she was still, as to years, in the very prime of her life. Sickly and sorrow-stricken as
she was, she looked, from the eyes downward, a woman who had barely reached thirty years of age.
From the eyes upward, the effect of her abundant gray hair, seen in connection with her face, was not
simply incongruous--it was absolutely startling; so startling as to make it no paradox to say that she would
have looked most natural, most like herself if her hair had been dyed. In her case, Art would have seemed
to be the truth, because Nature looked like falsehood. What shock had stricken her hair, in the very
maturity of its luxuriance, with the hue of an unnatural old age? Was it a serious illness, or a dreadful grief
that had turned her gray in the prime of her womanhood? That question had often been agitated among
her fellow-servants, who were all struck by the peculiarities of her personal appearance, and rendered a
little suspicious of her, as well, by an inveterate habit that she had of talking to herself. Inquire as they
might, however, their curiosity was always baffled. Nothing more could be discovered than that Sarah
Leeson was, in the common phrase, touchy on the subject of her gray hair and her habit of talking to
herself, and that Sarah Leeson's mistress had long since forbidden every one, from her husband
downward, to ruffle her maid's tranquility by inquisitive questions.
What was the overall purpose of this excerpt?

• A. to establish the unique relationship Sarah had with the other servants
• B. to present her individual relation to her mistress
• C. to explain that Sarah was a privileged maid
• D. to describe the setting of the house and those living there
• E. to give a detailed account of the character of Sarah

Amelia Earhart's hope of being the first woman to fly around the globe was __ when she disappeared in
the middle of her __ journey.

• A. postponed . . famous
• B. controversial . . hazardous
• C. fulfilled . . historic
• D. realized . . triumphant
• E. thwarted . . ill-fated

With her speech, the politician attempted to __________ the fears of the __________ citizens.

• A. ignore. .alarmed
• B. exploit. .serene
• C. quell. .disaffected
• D. assuage. .concerned
• E. intensify. .disingenuous

(1) An incredible hot-air balloon exhibition happened on September 5, 1862.
(2) It was given by Glaisher and Coxwell, two Englishmen.
(3) There was no compressed oxygen for them to breathe in those days.
(4) They got so high that they couldn't use their limbs.
(5) Coxwell had to open the descending valve with his teeth.
(6) Before Glaisher passed out, he recorded an elevation of twenty-nine thousand feet.
(7) Many believe they got eight thousand feet higher before they began to descend, making their ascent
the highest in the nineteenth century.
(8) Now the largest balloon to go up in the nineteenth century was "The Giant."
(9) The balloon held 215,000 cubic feet of air and was 74 feet wide.
(10) It could carry four and a half tons of cargo.
(11) Its flight began in Paris, in 1853, with fifteen passengers.
(12) All of whom returned safely.
(13) The successful trip received a great deal of national and international press because many thought
the hot-air balloon would become a form of common transportation.
Which of the following offers the best combination of sentences 1 and 2? An incredible hot-air balloon
exhibition happened on September 5, 1862. It was given by Glaisher and Coxwell, two Englishmen.

• A. Glaisher and Coxwell, two Englishmen, gave an incredible hot-air balloon exhibition, happening on
  September 5, 1862.
• B. An incredibly hot-air balloon exhibition happened on September 5, 1862, given by Glaisher and
  Coxwell, two Englishmen.
• C. Two Englishmen, Glaisher and Coxwell, gave an incredible hot-air balloon exhibition on September 5,
  1 862.
• D. An incredible hot-air balloon exhibition was given September 5, 1862 by Glaisher and Coxwell, two
  Englishmen.
• E. Given by Glaisher and Coxwell, two Englishmen, an incredible hot-air balloon exhibition happened on
  September 5, 1862.