Question

in the excerpt from the novel the country of pointed firs, the unnamed narrator—a female writer—receives a visit from a retired sea - captain.
adapted from captain littlepage by sarah orne jewett
“i am an old man, as you can see,” said captain littlepage, “and i have been a shipmaster the greater part of my life. you may not think it, but i am above eighty years of age.”
“you must have left the sea many years ago,” i said.
“i should have been serviceable at least five or six years more,” he answered.
now we were approaching dangerous ground, but i asked to hear more with all the deference i really felt.
“i had a valuable cargo of general merchandise from the london docks to fort churchill, a station of the old company on hudson’s bay,” said the captain earnestly. “we were delayed in loading, and baffled by head - winds and a heavy tumbling sea all the way north. then the fog kept us off the coast, and when i made port at last, it was too late to delay in those northern waters with such a vessel and such a crew as i had. they cared for nothing, and idled me into a fit of sickness, but my first mate was a good, excellent man, so we made what speed we could to get clear of hudson’s bay. i mean it to be my last voyage in her, and so it proved. she had been an excellent vessel in her day. of the crew aboard her i can’t say so much.”
“then you were wrecked?” i asked.
“i went down by any fault of mine,” said the captain gloomily.
“it was a hard life at sea in those days, i am sure,” i said.
“it was a dog’s life,” said the poor old gentleman, “but it made men of those who followed it. i see a change for the worse even in our own town here, full of loafers now. i view it that a community narrows down and grows dreadful ignorant when it is shut up to its own affairs, and gets no knowledge of the outside world except from a cheap, unprincipled newspaper. in the old days, a good part of the best men here knew a hundred ports of something of the way folks lived in them. shipping’s a terrible loss to this part of new england from a social point of view, ma’am.”
“it accounts for the change in a great many things,—the sad disappearance of sea - captains,—doesn’t it?”
“a shipmaster was apt to get the habit of reading,” said my companion. “a captain is not expected to be familiar with his crew, and for the company’s sake in dull days and nights he turns to his book. most of us old shipmasters came to know most everything.
3
select the correct answer
how does the underlined paragraph reinforce a central idea in the passage?
a. the paragraph foreshadows that a flood is about to interrupt the conversation.
b. the narrator provides background information about wind and tides.
c. the narrator thinks she can hear the tide turning, which mirrors the times changing.
d. the paragraph represents a flash - back to a time when shipping brought culture to the region.
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Explanation:

Analyze each option in the context of the passage. Option A has no indication of a flood in the text. Option B - while there may be some nautical - related talk, it's not the main reinforcement of a central idea. Option C - the idea of the tide turning mirroring the times changing can be related to the captain's reminiscences about the past and the changes in the community. Option D - there is no evidence of a flash - back about shipping bringing culture.

Answer:

C. The narrator thinks she can hear the tide turning, which mirrors the times changing