The Cremation of Sam McGee quiz

Questions and answers

1. 1

   Question 1. Which kind of poem best describes "The Cremation of Sam McGee"?

   • Lyric poem
   • Correct answer: Narrative ballad
   • Sonnet
   • Epic poem
   • Free verse elegy

   A narrative ballad tells a story in rhyme with a strong, songlike beat, and it often repeats a stanza like a refrain. This poem tells the whole tale of Sam's promise and cremation, and its opening stanza returns at the end. Its impossible ending also gives it the flavor of a tall tale.

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2. 2

   Question 2. Which sentence best summarizes "The Cremation of Sam McGee"?

   • Two partners strike gold on the Dawson trail, but one of them freezes to death before he can spend his share of the fortune
   • A lost miner wanders the Arctic alone until a strange steamboat called the "Alice May" rescues him and carries him home
   • Correct answer: A man keeps his promise to cremate his frozen partner in a boat's boiler, then finds him inside, warm at last and smiling
   • A prospector from Tennessee builds a cabin at Lake Lebarge and learns to love the long winters of the far North

   Sam McGee dies on the trail after making the narrator swear to cremate his remains. The narrator hauls the body to Lake Lebarge, burns it in the boiler of a derelict boat, and opens the door to find Sam sitting calmly in the fire, saying it is the first time he has been warm since he left Tennessee.

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3. 3

   Question 3. Why does Sam ask the narrator to cremate his remains?

   • Correct answer: He dreads being buried in the icy ground more than death
   • He wants his ashes carried back home to his family in Tennessee
   • He hopes a fire will keep wolves away from his body
   • He believes a cremation will bring him good luck

   Sam explains, "Yet 'tain't being dead—it's my awful dread of the icy grave that pains." He has been cold the whole time he has lived in the North, and he cannot bear the thought of lying in frozen ground forever. So he asks the narrator to "swear that, foul or fair, you'll cremate my last remains."

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4. 4

   Question 4. In the line "Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge," what does "marge" mean?

   • A thick layer of ice on a lake
   • A small cabin used by miners
   • A narrow trail through the hills
   • Correct answer: The edge or shore of a body of water

   "Marge" is an old poetic word for the edge or shore of a body of water, related to the word margin. Service uses it because it rhymes with "Lebarge," creating one of the poem's famous internal rhymes.

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5. 5

   Question 5. "Now Sam McGee was from Tennessee, where the cotton blooms and blows." Which device makes this line so catchy?

   • Alliteration, because several words start with the same sound
   • Correct answer: Internal rhyme, because two words rhyme inside the same line
   • A simile, because it compares Sam to his home in the South
   • Onomatopoeia, because the words imitate a real sound

   "McGee" and "Tennessee" rhyme in the middle of the line, before the end rhyme "blows" matches "knows" in the next line. Service uses this internal rhyme in nearly every line, as in "The Northern Lights have seen queer sights," which gives the poem its quick, songlike beat.

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6. 6

   Question 6. What is the name of the derelict boat jammed in the ice at Lake Lebarge?

   • The Yukon Belle
   • The Dawson Queen
   • Correct answer: The Alice May
   • The Northern Star

   The narrator "saw in a trice" that it was called the "Alice May." He tears up planks from its cabin floor and lights its boiler fire to make a crematorium.

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7. 7

   Question 7. "Now a promise made is a debt unpaid, and the trail has its own stern code." What does this line reveal about why the narrator keeps going?

   • A reward waits for anyone who brings a body back to town
   • The law says every death on the trail must be reported
   • He fears that Sam's ghost will haunt him if he gives up
   • Correct answer: On the trail, a promise is a debt that must be repaid

   The narrator says he "loathed the thing" he was hauling, yet he keeps his word. In the harsh North, men depended on each other, and breaking a promise to a dying partner was unthinkable. This loyalty is the poem's central theme.

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8. 8

   Question 8. "And I'd often sing to the hateful thing, and it hearkened with a grin." Which device is at work here?

   • Correct answer: The corpse seems to listen and grin, which is personification
   • The narrator compares his singing to the howling wind, a simile
   • The dogs repeat the tune, which is an example of a refrain
   • The body grows lighter each day, which is dramatic irony

   A frozen corpse cannot listen or grin, but the narrator describes it that way. Giving human actions to something that is not alive is personification. Earlier, the lashed-down body even "seemed to say" that he must keep his promise, which makes the load feel eerie and alive.

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9. 9

   Question 9. At the end, Sam "wore a smile you could see a mile." What device is this?

   • Metaphor, because the smile is called a lamp in the dark
   • Understatement, because Sam hides how happy he really is
   • Correct answer: Hyperbole, because it wildly exaggerates the size of the smile
   • Alliteration, because the line repeats the same first sound

   Hyperbole is deliberate exaggeration. No one can see a smile a mile away, but the image tells us how completely happy Sam is in the fire. Exaggeration like this is a trademark of the tall tale, and the whole ending, with a man sitting calmly in a furnace, is hyperbole on a grand scale.

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10. 10

    Question 10. The poem begins and ends with the same stanza. What does repeating it at the end accomplish?

    • It changes the ending so that Sam never dies at all
    • Correct answer: It frames the tale, which now proves the opening's claim
    • It introduces a second narrator who doubts the whole story
    • It reveals that the whole trip was only a bad dream

    The opening stanza promises that the Arctic has "secret tales" that "would make your blood run cold" and that "the queerest" sight was the night "I cremated Sam McGee." When the same stanza returns as a refrain, the reader has just heard that strange tale, so the frame closes the story like a campfire yarn told from start to finish.

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11. 11

    Question 11. Why is the ending of the poem considered dark humor?

    • It is tragic, because Sam's death finally teaches the narrator to fear the cold
    • It is a mystery, because the narrator never learns who lit the boiler fire
    • It is a warning, because the narrator decides to leave the North for good
    • Correct answer: It is darkly funny, because the fire meant to burn Sam finally warms him up

    The reader expects a grim cremation, but Sam sits "cool and calm, in the heart of the furnace roar" and asks the narrator to close the door so he will not let in the cold. The situational irony turns a gruesome scene into a punchline: "Since I left Plumtree, down in Tennessee, it's the first time I've been warm."

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12. 12

    Question 12. In his final line, Sam names the place in Tennessee he left. What is it called?

    • Correct answer: Plumtree
    • Dawson
    • Lebarge
    • Memphis

    Sam says, "Since I left Plumtree, down in Tennessee, it's the first time I've been warm." Dawson and Lebarge are places in the North, and Memphis never appears in the poem.

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13. 13

    Question 13. Which of these events actually happened in the story?

    • Sam McGee came to the North from Tennessee.

      Happened

      The poem says, "Now Sam McGee was from Tennessee, where the cotton blooms and blows."

    • Sam loved the cold and never complained about it.

      Didn't happen

      Sam "was always cold," and on the trail he was "the only one to whimper."

    • Sam calls the narrator "Cap."

      Happened

      Sam turns to him and says, "Cap," before asking for his last request.

    • The narrator buried Sam in the snow beside the trail.

      Didn't happen

      He kept the body "lashed to the sleigh" for days until he could cremate it, as he had sworn.

    • The narrator's food began to run low on the journey.

      Happened

      He kept going "though the dogs were spent and the grub was getting low."

    • The narrator burned the planks of an old cabin on shore.

      Didn't happen

      He tore planks "from the cabin floor" of the boat, the "Alice May," and lit its boiler fire.

    • The narrator walked away because he did not like hearing the sizzle.

      Happened

      "Then I made a hike, for I didn't like to hear him sizzle so."

    • Sam asked the narrator to leave the furnace door open.

      Didn't happen

      Sam said, "Please close that door," because he feared the narrator would let in the cold.

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