Name ______Date ______
A Tale of Two Cities
Book II, Chapters 22, “The Sea Still Rises”
Chapter 23, “The Fire Rises”
Chapter 24, “Drawn to the Loadstone Rock
Chapter 22, The Sea Still Rises
I. Summary and Notes
A week after the fall of the Bastille, the revolutionaries learn that Foulon, a hated official who they thought was dead, is alive and has been captured. Apparently Foulon, who had said that starving people could eat grass, faked his death in order to escape the revolutionaries. Upon learning that Foulon is being held at the Hotel de Ville, Madame Defarge leads a mob to the hotel. With the help of the Defarges, The Vengeance (Madame Defarge's assistant), and Jacques Three, the mob seizes Foulon, stuffs his mouth with grass, and then hangs him from a lamp post. After he dies, they behead him and put his head on a pike. The crowd then captures Foulon's son-in-law, who has ridden into Paris under heavy guard. The mob kills him and places his head and heart on pikes. The men and women of the mob return to their homes that night, still hungry but happy and hopeful for the future.
In describing Foulon, Dickens is sympathetic. Foulon is an elderly "wretched old sinner" who continues "entreating and beseeching for mercy" as the crowd drags him through the streets.
The mob, however, has no mind to understand mercy. Dickens depicts the process of people being transformed by the mob, stressing the change taking place in the women, who he believes should be the moral center of society. He describes the women as "a sight to chill the boldest" as they "lashed into blind frenzy, whirled about, striking and tearing at their own friends until they dropped into a passionate swoon."
Madame Defarge is especially disturbing, for she is the one woman who seems to keep her sense of self. As she plays a game of cat and mouse with Foulon, she watches him "silently and composedly" as he begs for mercy. Her behavior here demonstrates her heartlessness and potential for cruelty, preparing us for her ruthlessness in Book III.
II. Questions
1. What is the date now?
2. Why does Defarge hate Foulon?
3. How is Foulon's punishment yet another example of poetic justice?
(Poetic justice is a literary device in which virtue is ultimately rewarded or vice punished, often in modern literature by an ironic twist of fate intimately related to the character's own conduct.)
4. When Defarge says to his wife "At last it has come," why does she not totally
agree?
5. Why does Madame Defarge no longer wear a rose in her hair?
6. Who is Madame Defarge’s friend and fellow revolutionary?
7. How is Foulon’s fate appropriate?
6.How is the drum personified at the end of the chapter?
Chapter 23, Fire Rises
I. Notes
One July day, a stranger approaches the road-mender and asks for directions to the Evrémonde chateau. That night, four figures set fire to the chateau and the villagers watch it burn, making no effort to put it out despite the pleas of servants from the chateau. Excited by the destruction of the chateau, the villagers threaten Gabelle, the local tax collector, who hides on his roof while the villagers pound on his door.
The rebellion begun in Paris is spreading to the countryside. Although Dickens despises mob violence, he recognizes that the abuses of the upper classes brought the country to the point of revolution, saying "Monseigneur as a class had, somehow or other, brought things to this." Dickens also continues his depiction of the revolution as a force of nature when he describes the four members of the Jacquerie who set fire to the chateau as "East, West, North, and South."
II. Terms
1. wore a red cap now, in place of his blue one- French revolutionaries wore red caps.
2. sacristan- a person responsible for the ceremonial equipment in a church.
3. tocsin- an alarm bell.
III. Questions
1. What was the significance of the blaze the stranger made in his pipe?
2. Whom do the four fierce figures come to represent in this chapter?
3. Why can the rider solicit no aid from any quarter? Note that Gabelle miraculously escapes.
4.What color cap does the mender of roads wear? How might this be symbolic?
5.What does the stranger (“wayfarer”) want to find?
6. How high are the flames? How might this be symbolic? (think back to Gaspard)
7.What do the townspeople do when asked to help put out the fire? What do they do instead?
8. What do the soldiers and officers at the prison do when asked to help put out the fire? What do they say in response? What does this mean for the Revolution?
9. What is the symbolism of the fire? What happens to the stone faces?
10. Who are the “four fierce figures”? Where do they go after they leave the town? What is the symbolism?
Chapter 24, Drawn to the Loadstone Rock
I. Notes
Three more years have passed, and the French Revolution has succeeded in removing the royalty and aristocracy from power. France is still unsettled, however, and many members of the French upper classes who have fled to England use Tellson's as an information hub. One afternoon at Tellson's, Darnay and Mr. Lorry discuss Mr. Lorry's impending trip to France, where he will manage Tellson's Paris office and try to salvage some property and papers for Tellson customers. Amidst the activity in the bank, Stryver loudly commiserates with French nobles. When a letter for the Marquis St. Evrémonde surfaces, several Frenchmen and Stryver make disparaging comments about the current Marquis St. Evrémonde, unaware that they are speaking of Darnay. Darnay offers to deliver the letter to the Marquis. When Darnay reads the letter, he is troubled to find it is from Gabelle, who has been imprisoned for acting as Darnay's steward. Feeling guilty about Gabelle's imprisonment and about leaving some matters unfinished, Darnay resolves to go to France. Idealistically, he even imagines that he might be able to calm some of the revolutionary fervor. Consequently, he writes letters explaining the situation to Lucie and Doctor Manette and then departs for France alone. Although Darnay's secret departure from England for France where revolutionaries regularly imprison and kill aristocrats may seem foolish, he is acting in accordance with his nature. Darnay embodies justice and duty, and although he is devoted to his family, his sense of responsibility forbids him to turn his back on Gabelle or on his country. Additionally, Darnay remains unaware of some of the dangers, such as Madame Defarge's register, awaiting him. Because he has renounced his property and name, he thinks of himself as a common man. He does not realize, however, that the revolutionaries in France still view him as the Marquis St. Evrémonde, an aristocrat who deserves to die.
II. Notes
1. Sardanapalus's luxury- Sardanapalus (also known as Assurbanipal) was an Assyrian king renowned for his lavish lifestyle.
2. Prison of the Abbaye- a prison in Paris that held many aristocrats during the French Revolution.
3. the Loadstone Rock- a rock containing loadstone (or lodestone), a naturally magnetic mineral.
III. Questions
1. What is the chronological setting?
2. Why is Lorry going to Paris?
3. Why does Charles offer to go in his place?
4. How does Dickens use the letter to the Marquis de Evremonde to generate
suspense?
5. Why does Gabelle request Charles to return to France?
6. The Loadstone Rock was a mythical rock that magnetically drew ships to it so
that they would crash -- what for Charles is the Loadstone Rock?
7. Why was Tellson's Bank, London, the natural gathering place of emigrates?
8. Should Darnay have kept his real name and identity secret from his wife, and not
told her of his trip?
9. Why is it ironic that Gabelle is being held in the Abbaye?
10. Why does Darnay unwisely feel that it is safe for him to return to assist Gabelle?
11. Why does he feel he must help him?
12.How is “Monseigneur” here used as a catch-all name? What does it mean that “Monseigneur by this time was scattered far and wide”?
13. Where do “Monseigneur” and his colleagues spend time in London? Why?
14. Where does Charles Darnay want to travel to? Why does Lorry persuade him not to go? Why can Lorry go himself? What is the purpose of the trip?
15.When Charles receives a letter addressed to him with the Evrémonde name, how does he claim it without revealing his identity? What does “Monseigneur” have to say about the Evrémonde name?
16.What does the letter request of Charles? What does he decide to do? What do you think of his decision?