The ruined man who became rich again through a dream
an adaptation of a story from 1,001 arabian nights

once there lived in the city of chongqing a very wealthy man who lost all his belongings and his treasures and became very poor. he was so poor that he could only earn his living by laboring day and night. one night, extremely late, he lay down to rest. he was exhausted, dejected, and sick at heart. he fell into a deep sleep and dreamt that a wise old soul came to him and said, "your fortune is in the city of beijing; go there and seek it."

the next day, he set out for beijing. he arrived there deep into the night and he lay down to sleep for a bit in a hostel. presently, as fate would have it, a company of thieves entered the hostel. they made their way into the house that adjoined the hostel. soon, the people of the house, aroused by the noise, awoke and cried out, "thieves, thieves! " an alarm was raised and the chief of the police came to their aid with his officers. the robbers made off; but the police entered the hostel and found the man from chongqing asleep there. they cast him into prison, where they kept him for three days. the chief of police sent for him and said, "where did you come from? "

"from chongqing," whispered the man.

"and what brought you to beijing? " asked the chief.

"i saw in a dream an old soul who said to me, 'thy fortune is at beijing; go there at once to find it.' but, when i came here, the fortune that i was promised proved to be an arrest and a jail stay."

the chief of the police laughed until he showed his white, wide, broad teeth. he said to the man from chongqing, "o man of little wit! three times have i seen an old soul in a dream who said to me, 'there is a fashionable house in chongqing, with a fountain in the front garden. under the fountain there is buried treasure— a great sum of money. go there and take it.' of course i did not go. you, on the other hand, you of little wit, have journeyed from place to place, on the faith of a dream, which was but an illusion of sleep."

then the chief of police gave the man from chongqing money, saying, "this is to you get back to your native land."

now, the house that the chief described was the man's very own house in chongqing! when he traveled home, he immediately dug underneath the fountain in his garden and discovered a great treasure! he received an abundant fortune in his own yard!

the author describes the man and his situation in the first paragraph, or the introduction, of the story. why is this information important for the reader to know?
the author wants to introduce us to the character and events that will cause the conflict.
the author wants the reader to know his opinion.
the author wants to tell the theme by what the character does.
this is the climax of the story, so we know what happened to the character.

by: nita twenty thousand leagues under the sea some time ago, i decided to read twenty thousand leagues under the sea, by jules verne. i figured that because it was so well known it must be an extremely interesting book. in addition, it was science fiction, the one area that i was always interested. my assumption was only partially correct, for i only was to a degree interested in the piece of writing. when jules verne was writing this book, he must have been reading some incredibly dull science book the day before, for that was what the book was written as.  

the style of writing was utterly against my tastes, and though the plot was moderately interesting, the style of writing really ruined it. often, the author will trail off describing some marine animal for pages at a time. two entire chapters were almost entirely this! however, the setting and characters of the story seemed to be well thought out. nevertheless, 20,000 leagues under the sea was an extremely tedious volume. when the story was introduced, jules verne described m. aronnax, the main character, whose love for marine biology was more important than anything else to him did.  

this immediately led to the international crisis about a bizarre aquatic creature, which immediately dragged m. aronnax into the action. due to his expertise on the matter, the public expected pierre to be the one to solve this mystery. m. aronnax, under all this pressure, concluded that the animal was to be called the narwhale. at first, the matter was taken lightly, and only expert scientists were involved. however, when this animal began to become a threat to all ships in the water, the military took the issue into its own hands.  

it promptly fitted a frigate, the abraham lincoln, to destroy the beast, and invited pierre to join them, for his science capabilities. for many months they searched, but could not find this narwhale anywhere. when they found it, it attacked the ship, disabling it, and sending m. aronnax, ned land (a harpooner) and conseil (servant of pierre) overboard. soon, the three were guests in the narwhale, now known to be a ship, the nautilus, commanded by captain nemo. during the stay aboard the nautilus, pierre conseil and ned encounter and discover many wonderful and interesting facts from the sea. often, they would accompany the captain in an under water expedition.  

several of these excursions were to hunt, and others were simply to explore a submarine region. one of the times when the purpose was just to investigate an underwater region, captain nemo and m. aronnax explored the lost city of atlantis. on a separate occasion, pierre found that there was a supply of coal underwater that the nautilus used as a source of fuel. in addition to underwater excursions, the nautilus itself was on a round the world journey, which accounted for the most exiting time of the book. this was when captain nemo was attempting to access the south pole.  

that meant passing the great ice barrier, and surviving with very little air. during this rather long voyage, the submarine gets wedged between two icebergs, and is almost crushed! to add to this, the inhabitants of the nautilus almost die of suffocation from the lack of air. finally, at the end of the book, the three friends narrowly escape that nautilus.  

this all occurs during the maelstrom, which is a deadly storm, which makes the escape so daring. at the end, the three friends end up in a fisherman's shack, not knowing how they arrived, for they were knocked unconscious. that is how the events in the story twenty thousand leagues under the sea took place. the main character in this book was an extremely well recognized marine biologist named m. pierre aronnax. m. aronnax is one who gets the most benefit throughout the course of the book. pierre was always curious, which often got in the way of following his instincts and good judgment.  

also, he sometimes talked to himself! in addition, his faithful servant, conseil, follows his master during all of his adventures. conseil never really said much, and the role he played was one of a calm and humble person. another character of importance was ned land, the most well known harpooner of all his time. this man proved himself to be very useful when the threesome attempt to escape the nautilus. on the other hand, ned land was always quick tempered, and free willed.  

these qualities almost got many people killed many times during the book. the next most important character and perhaps the most outlandish one of all was captain nemo. note that this was not his real name, however, the actual name was never given in the book. captain nemo was forever strict and secretive to everyone. he never showed any emotion on his face, and never showed any bodily expressions in any way except when he was in extreme anguish. the setting that the story took place in was quite interesting.  

explanation:

the correct answer is d. in john paston's letter written friday, 14, 1476, he expresses his fear that he may have to go to war.

indeed, although the black death was ravaging europe, the pastons were relatively safe from it due to their social status as they were part of the landed gentry. it is clear that the vast majority of the victims of the pandemic were the poor. the reason why he is weary of having to go to war is because at the particular time england was also devastated by the war of the roses and paston, being a courtesan was inevitably involved.