A Bird of Bagdad Flashcards
by O. Henry — tap or click to flip
Flashcard Review
Flashcards: A Bird of Bagdad
What does Quigg do every night after closing his restaurant at 9 PM?
He sets out into the city streets in search of romance, adventure, and people in distress he can help, modeling himself after the Caliph Harun Al Rashid.
What does Quigg carry in his pockets on his nightly excursions?
An assortment of cards good at his restaurant for various amounts of food, ranging from a bowl of soup to full meal tickets for a week.
What is the young man doing when Quigg first encounters him?
He is throwing silver coins into the street at a corner of Broadway, causing a crowd to scramble for the money and blocking traffic.
What challenge does old Hildebrant pose to Simmons and Bill Watson?
He gives them a riddle to solve by the next morning: "What kind of a hen lays the longest?" Whoever answers correctly gets to attend his daughter Laura's birthday party.
What is Bill Watson's incorrect answer to Hildebrant's riddle?
Bill guesses "the one that lives the longest," which Hildebrant rejects as wrong.
How does Simmons discover the correct answer to the riddle?
He finds the card Quigg gave him in his pocket, which reads "Good for one roast chicken to bearer." This inspires the answer: "A dead one."
What are the stakes of the riddle for Simmons and Bill Watson?
The winner gets to attend Laura's birthday party, which effectively means winning her hand in marriage, since Hildebrant wants her to marry someone who will carry on his harness business.
Who is Margrave August Michael von Paulsen Quigg?
A restaurant owner on Fourth Avenue whose mother descended from a Margravine of Saxony and whose father was a Tammany politician. By day he runs his restaurant; by night he roams the city helping strangers.
How is Laura Hildebrant described in the story?
She is about nineteen years old, with hair the color of straw matting and black, shiny eyes. Simmons compares her to the blonde figure on the Rhine palisades who enchants passersby.
What kind of person is old Hildebrant?
He is a German saddle and harness maker on Grant Street who constantly tells bad jokes and riddles. He likes both Simmons and Bill Watson and wants his daughter to marry one of them.
What is Simmons's situation at the start of the story?
He works at Hildebrant's saddle and harness shop for $18 a week, is in love with Laura Hildebrant, and is despondent because he cannot solve the riddle that will win him an invitation to her party.
What historical figure does Quigg model himself after?
Harun Al Rashid, the Caliph of Bagdad from The Arabian Nights, who disguised himself and walked among his people to discover and relieve their distress.
How does the story illustrate the theme of fate and serendipity?
Quigg's food charity card, given as a routine kindness, accidentally provides the answer to a riddle that determines Simmons's romantic future. An act of generosity solves a problem it was never intended to address.
How does O. Henry explore the theme of appearance versus reality in this story?
Quigg appears to fail in his Caliph role because he cannot solve the riddle, yet his simple gift of a meal card succeeds where his wisdom could not. The real help comes not from grand gestures but from humble charity.
What does the story suggest about generosity and its unexpected consequences?
It shows that acts of kindness can have unforeseen, far-reaching effects. Quigg's routine charity card, meant to provide a meal, instead provides the answer to a riddle and wins Simmons a wife.
How does the story comment on urban life in New York City?
It portrays the city as a place of strange encounters and hidden stories, where a restaurant owner can become a wandering philanthropist and a chance meeting on Broadway can change a young man's life.
What is the central irony of the story's resolution?
Quigg believes he has failed because he cannot solve the riddle intellectually, yet his habitual act of giving away a food card inadvertently provides the exact answer Simmons needs.
How does O. Henry use the frame narrative technique in this story?
The story frames modern New York as a parallel to ancient Bagdad, with Quigg cast as a latter-day Caliph Harun Al Rashid. The Arabian Nights motif structures the entire tale of Quigg's nightly wanderings.
What role does the extended description of Fourth Avenue play in the story?
It serves as atmospheric world-building that establishes the decaying, ghostly setting of Quigg's restaurant neighborhood, contrasting the mundane reality of New York with the exotic romance Quigg seeks.
How does O. Henry use the riddle as a plot device?
The riddle ("What kind of a hen lays the longest?") drives the entire plot, creates suspense, and enables the surprise ending where the answer ("a dead one") comes from an unrelated source.
What does the title "Margrave" signify in the story?
A Margrave is a German hereditary nobleman, equivalent to a marquis. Quigg inherited the title through his mother's Saxon lineage, and it adds a layer of mock-aristocratic grandeur to his nightly wanderings.
What does "spiflicated" mean as Simmons uses it?
It is slang for being drunk or intoxicated. Simmons uses it to explain his irrational behavior of throwing money in the street, saying he was spiflicated on account of Laura.
What does "largesse" mean in the context of the coin-throwing scene?
Largesse means generous giving of money or gifts. The crowd scrambles after the "falling largesse" as Simmons throws silver coins into the street.
Who says "Pinched by a painless dentist. Take me away, flatty, and give me gas" and what does it reveal?
Simmons says this when Quigg first takes his arm. It reveals his despondent, reckless state of mind -- he assumes he is being arrested and does not care, using flippant slang to mask his despair.
What does Quigg mean when he says "I seek for romance and adventure in city streets--not in ruined castles or in crumbling palaces"?
He is explaining his philosophy that the real marvels and stories worth discovering are found among ordinary people in a great city, not in exotic or ancient settings.
What is the significance of the card reading "Good for one roast chicken to bearer"?
This simple charity card becomes the key to the entire plot. The word "chicken" triggers Simmons to think of "a dead one" as the answer to the hen riddle, connecting Quigg's generosity to Simmons's romantic fate.