McGuffey's Fifth Eclectic Reader, Revised Edition · Lesson XXIX · Part 4: Lost Lucy, the Town Pump and the bobolink

35. The Town Pump, by Hawthorne

Goal: Your child enjoys Hawthorne's talking pump, explains what it is arguing for, and notices personification.

⏱ About 40 minutes · 7 steps

Open it at the Internet Archive ↗

You'll need

  • The book, open to this lesson
  • A notebook and pencil

What's in the book

A humorous speech by the town pump of a New England town, which boasts of its many public offices and urges all to drink cold water instead of liquor. A note about Nathaniel Hawthorne opens it; a long list of definitions ends it.

The lesson, step by step

  1. Words and meanings

    Read some definitions:

    Municipality, a division of a country or of a city.

    Unadulterated, pure, unmixed.

    Potations, drinkings.

    Rubicund, inclining to redness.

    Slaked, quenched.

  2. About the author

    The book says Nathaniel Hawthorne was born in Salem, Massachusetts, graduated from Bowdoin College in 1825, wrote "Twice-Told Tales" and "The Scarlet Letter," and was U.S. consul at Liverpool. It says he was modest and avoided publicity, and that as a prose writer he has no superior among American authors.

  3. Read aloud

    Your child reads the pump's speech like a proud town official calling to a crowd.

    Noon, by the north clock! Noon, by the east!

    Here it is, gentlemen! Here is the good liquor! Walk up, walk up, gentlemen, walk up, walk up!

  4. Talk about it

    SayWhat town offices does the pump claim to hold? Why is that funny?

    SayWhat "good liquor" is the pump selling?

    Say"An ox is your true toper." A toper is a heavy drinker. What is the joke?

    SayHawthorne gives a pump a voice. What is that called? (Personification.) Why does it work here?

  5. Tell it back

    Your child tells, in the pump's own voice, what it does for the town.

  6. Copywork

    Copy:

    Dry work this speechifying, especially to all unpracticed orators.

  7. Write (optional)

    Write a short speech by some other object in your house, boasting of all it does.

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