Preview
Copywork
About This Passage
These sentences sit at the heart of Poe's portrait of the rookery as a tiny civilization. Watch how the measured, clause-by-clause syntax — the male absent, the female on duty, the eggs never uncovered — mirrors the birds' own discipline, and how the final sentence reveals why such order is needed: the colony is riddled with theft. Copying it trains the long balanced sentence and shows how a writer lets the rhythm of the prose enact the very vigilance it describes.
While the male is absent at sea in search of food, the female remains on duty, and it is only upon the return of her partner that she ventures abroad. The eggs are never left uncovered at all—while on...
Full copywork activity with handwriting lines available in the complete study guide.
Discussion Questions
Narration Prompt
Retell the chapter's movement: how the Jane Guy takes in Peters and the narrator and they recover as she runs south, how she survives a violent squall off the Cape of Good Hope, how she reaches barren Kerguelen, or Desolation Island, and how the narrator turns from survivor to naturalist, cataloguing the royal penguins and the strangely ordered towns the penguins and albatrosses build. Pause where the chapter's mood shifts most sharply and account for the change.
Discussion Questions
- Recovered aboard the Jane Guy, the narrator reflects that 'the incidents are remembered, but not the feelings,' a 'partial oblivion' he ties to any sudden swing 'from sorrow to joy.' What might Poe be exploring about the mind here? Use details from the chapter to make your reading stronger.
- On Kerguelen Land the narrator dwells on how the royal penguins, walking 'erect, with a stately carriage,' could 'deceive the spectator... in the gloom of the evening.' Why might a survivor of shipwreck be so drawn to a creature that blurs the line between animal and human? Use details from the chapter.
+ 3 more questions in the complete study guide
Vocabulary Builder
Item 1
The lack of basic necessities; suffering from want.
Item 2
The state of being forgotten, or of forgetting.
Item 3
Smooth, polished courtesy of manner.
+ 5 more vocabulary words in the complete study guide
Critical Thinking
+ 6 more questions in the complete study guide
Get the complete study guide — free
Sign up and get your first book with every chapter included. Copywork, discussion questions, vocabulary, and critical thinking.
Sign up free