A Tiger By Morning

“I HAVE one house [continued Mr Haw] which is only just finished. Your brother has not seen it yet, but I think it is the best of them all. It represents an Indian jungle, and is hot enough in all conscience.”

“I shall so look forward to seeing it,” cried Laura, clasping her hands. “It has been one of the dreams of my life to see India. I have read so much of it, the temples, the forests, the great rivers, and the tigers. Why, you would hardly believe it, but I have never seen a tiger except in a picture.”

“That can easily be set right,” said Raffles Haw, with his quiet smile. “Would you care to see one?”

“Oh, immensely.”

“I will have one sent down. Let me see, it is nearly twelve o’clock. I can get a wire to Liverpool by one. There is a man there who deals in such things. I should think he would be due to-morrow morning.”

From ‘The Doings of Raffles Haw’, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.
Questions for Critics

1. What is the author aiming to achieve in writing this?

2. Note any words, devices or turns of phrase that strike you. How do they help the author communicate his ideas more effectively?

3. What impression does this passage make on you? How might you put that impression into words?

Based on The English Critic (1939) by NL Clay, drawing on The New Criticism: A Lecture Delivered at Columbia University, March 9, 1910, by J. E. Spingarn, Professor of Comparative Literature in Columbia University, USA.

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