Hang A Thousand Trees With Ribbons--Part 4

Hang A Thousand Trees With Ribbons~~~Ann Rinaldi
I read from page 126-161, or from chapter 16 to chapter 20.

Chapter 16:  Phillis meets an African American painter.  The stamp act was going on.  They find out that Prince is part of the Sons of Liberty.  A crowd comes by the Wheatley's house.

Chapter 17:  A year later, Phillis wrote her very first poem!  Yeah!!!  Phillis didn't like her hair the way it was, so Nathaniel took her to get it cut.  While they were gone, Mary had gone snooping around in Phillis' stuff.  She had discovered her poetry and had it in her hand when they came home.  That caused a bit of an issue, but in the end, it turned out good that Mary had discovered it.

Chapter 18:  The last couple sentences of my summary of chapter 17 blends in with chapter 18.  So some of it happened then, but it made sense to put it in with chapter 17.  In chapter 18, the Wheatley's were "praising" her writing.  They were shocked when they found out it was hers.

Chapter 19:  In chapter 19, it sort of skips ahead a year in her life.  It talks about how she did not really make any poems during the next year.  On Pope's Day, there was a crowd outside of the Wheatley's house.  This is what inspired her to write her next poem.  She wrote it about the ruckus that the Harvard boys were making on the street below.

Chapter 20:  This chapter startes off by stating that she had lost her cowrie shell.  That shell was very important to her because her mother gave it to her on the slave ship.  Phillis searches for it for about 10 minutes, but can not find it.  She is called down for supper.  Mrs. Wheatley was having a party, and Phillis was to recite her poetry afterwards.  They have conversation at the table.  A slave trader comes up to Phillis afterwards, and asks for a private recitation.  Phillis doesn't want to, but in the end, she does it for him.  Mostly, she does it because Nathaniel tells her that his parents were thinking about getting her poetry published, and that meant begin able recite on demand.  She does it because it would be good practice.


Questions:  I didn't know what a bunch of the words meant this week.  The first one was seditious.  The word seditious means troulemaking.  It got that answer from the dictionary on my desktop.  Another word was pernicious.  Pernicious means destructive, or hurtful.  I found this answer on my desktop dictionary.  I didn't know what jest meant, or what Braintree means.  Jest means to fool around.  I also found that out on my desktop dictionary.  I found out from Wikipedia that Braintree was a document or a letter that was written in protest of the stamp act.  On Wikipedia it said that a bier was a type of stick or coffin.  Syllabub was a traditional English dessert.  Found my answer on Wikipedia.  Vellum is a type of paper.  Found on Wikipedia.  Wikipedia also said that potpourri was a type of dried fruit.  Tapestry is a type of art.  Found my answer on Wikipedia.

Prediction:  I predict that Prince will get in trouble for being part of the Sons of Liberty.

Connection:  My connection this week is to the Revolutionary War.  In the Revolutionary War, there were others who were in the Sons of Liberty just like Prince was.  Some of them got caught, and some of them didn't

Key Question:  The theme in this book was that a black person can be just as good as a white person.  They can do things just as well.  Phillis became the first African American to publish her poetry.