These are original Marlbridge practice questions, not past exam questions. All passages were written by Marlbridge for practice. The marks in the rubrics are a suggested Marlbridge rubric, not an official scoring guideline. Questions 1 to 4 use the weighing-house passage (Bartholomew Lisle, his granddaughter Nell and the self-weighing machine) from Topic 4.6; its key phrases are quoted where needed. Answer every question before opening its answer.
Question 1 (multiple choice · foundation)
A student’s claim is: “Bartholomew’s quiet manner gives his work authority.” Which piece of evidence is most relevant?
- (A) “he stood among them in his brown apron”
- (B) “the new harbour company would install a machine”
- (C) “saying nothing, turning the brass weight a quarter-turn until the beam sat level”
- (D) “the shop was silent except for the slow tick of the beam”
Answer and explanation
Answer: (C). “Saying nothing” and the careful turn directly show a quiet manner exercised as authority.
- (A) shows only what he wears.
- (B) concerns the machine, not his manner.
- (D) describes the shop’s silence, which supports setting more than his manner.
Question 2 (multiple choice · core)
A student supports the claim “Bartholomew’s idea of exactness includes being answerable” with one quotation: “I am exact.” Which is the best judgment?
- (A) It is sufficient, because he says the word “exact”.
- (B) It is insufficient on its own, because it does not yet show answerability; the line “sorry when it is wrong” is needed as well.
- (C) It is irrelevant, because he is not speaking.
- (D) It is sufficient because it is short.
Answer and explanation
Answer: (B). “I am exact” shows his claim but not his definition; the phrase about being “sorry” carries the idea of answerability.
- (A) A word’s presence does not prove the claim.
- (C) He is speaking; the line is in direct speech.
- (D) Length does not decide sufficiency.
Question 3 (multiple choice · core)
“He lifted the pan to the light, found nothing to correct, and set it down as gently as a sleeping child.” What is the most precise purpose of the phrase “as gently as a sleeping child” in an argument about his care?
- (A) To exemplify his typical customers
- (B) To qualify his claim of exactness
- (C) To amplify the tenderness of his care
- (D) To clarify the passage’s setting
Answer and explanation
Answer: (C). The simile intensifies the idea of gentle care.
- (A) Children are not the customers.
- (B) It does not limit or complicate exactness.
- (D) It is not describing the setting.
Question 4 (multiple choice · core)
Which sentence uses a transition most effectively to show contrast between the two ideas?
- (A) “Bartholomew values precision, and Nell values speed.”
- (B) “Nell promises exactness; however, Bartholomew values answerability, which a machine cannot offer.”
- (C) “Nell promises exactness. Bartholomew. Answerability.”
- (D) “Nell promises exactness, so Bartholomew promises exactness.”
Answer and explanation
Answer: (B). “However” signals contrast and the second clause explains what he values instead.
- (A) The conjunction “and” adds, rather than contrasts, and “precision” and “speed” do not match the passage.
- (C) Fragmented; no relationships are shown.
- (D) “So” implies a cause that does not exist.
Question 5 (multiple choice · stretch)
A student paragraph includes: “The writer uses a simile. This shows his skill.” What is the most useful revision?
- (A) Add another sentence that says “The simile is good.”
- (B) Quote the exact simile, say what it suggests, and link that to the claim.
- (C) Delete the simile.
- (D) Replace “simile” with “image”.
Answer and explanation
Answer: (B). Naming a device is not evidence; the words, an explanation and a link to the claim are.
- (A) Praise is not commentary.
- (C) Removing evidence leaves the claim unsupported.
- (D) Renaming the device does not add support.
Question 6 (short answer · core)
The claim is: “The passage presents Bartholomew’s work as a ritual of care.” Choose two pieces of evidence from the weighing-house passage (quote the shortest accurate phrases) and state the purpose of each. (4 points)
Answer and explanation
Sample response. (1) “polishing the pan of the great scale with the hem of his apron” illustrates routine care: he tends the instrument as a personal duty. (2) “set it down as gently as a sleeping child” amplifies that care into tenderness. Together they move from routine to affection.
Suggested Marlbridge rubric (4 points).
| Point | Awarded for |
|---|---|
| 1 | First phrase is accurate and relevant |
| 2 | Purpose of the first stated precisely (illustrate, amplify and so on) |
| 3 | Second phrase is accurate and relevant |
| 4 | Purpose of the second stated, and the two linked |
Other relevant phrases are acceptable, such as “lifted the pan to the light”.
Question 7 (short answer · core)
Revise this paragraph so that it is coherent and uses evidence strategically. Keep it under 100 words.
The porter walks the corridor. There are keys. The doors are locked. He stops at the window. The writer says it’s only part of the day that belonged to him. This shows he is lonely.
(The source passage is the night-porter passage printed under Question 8.)
Answer and explanation
Sample response (written by Marlbridge). The porter’s nightly walk is a duty that has lost its purpose but not its meaning for him. He carries “a ring of keys he never used” along corridors where every door is already locked, so his task persists as a ritual without function. Yet at the window he lingers “for exactly as long as it took the cathedral clock to strike the quarter”, the one stretch of the day he can call his own. The routine is therefore both empty and precious.
Suggested Marlbridge rubric (4 points).
| Point | Awarded for |
|---|---|
| 1 | A topic sentence that makes a claim |
| 2 | Two accurate short quotations built into sentences |
| 3 | Transitions and linked ideas (“yet”, “therefore”) |
| 4 | Commentary that explains rather than names (“ritual without function”) |
An answer that claims “lonely” can still earn points if it supports that claim with evidence and commentary.
Question 8 (essay · stretch)
Read this passage written by Marlbridge.
Every night at eleven the porter of the Grand Imperial Hotel walked the length of the third-floor corridor with a ring of keys he never used. The doors were all locked by then; the guests asleep, or pretending. He walked slowly in the carpeted hush, and at the far end, where the corridor met a tall window over the dark square, he stopped and looked out for exactly as long as it took the cathedral clock to strike the quarter.
There was nobody to report this to. The hotel had changed hands twice since he had been given the keys, and no one had told him to stop, so he went on. It was, he sometimes thought, the only part of the day that belonged to him, though it was also the only part he had been paid to do without being watched.
Write a complete essay (about 40 minutes) analysing how the writer uses details and structure to present the porter’s relationship to his work.
Answer and explanation
Sample high-quality response (written by Marlbridge).
The passage presents the porter’s nightly walk as a ritual that has outlived its purpose and yet become the one place where he holds a private dignity, suggesting that meaning in work can survive after its usefulness has gone.
The first paragraph builds the walk as a duty without a function. He carries “a ring of keys he never used”, and “the doors were all locked by then”, so the rounds protect nothing. The “carpeted hush” and the slow pace make the corridor a space where nothing is asked of him. Even the guests, “asleep, or pretending”, seem remote from his task. The details establish a role performed faithfully while its reason has disappeared, and the reader senses a man guarding a mechanism that no longer turns.
The same paragraph, however, gives the ritual a shape that a purposeless routine would lack. He stops at the window “for exactly as long as it took the cathedral clock to strike the quarter”, a measure that is as precise as a task. The exactness suggests that he has made the pause his own duty, so that what the hotel no longer requires he continues to require of himself.
The second paragraph turns on this idea by showing that nobody notices. “There was nobody to report this to” and “no one had told him to stop” leave him in a gap between instruction and permission, and the repeated negatives make the hotel’s indifference as steady as his routine. Yet the final sentence complicates this: the walk is “the only part of the day that belonged to him”, and also “the only part he had been paid to do without being watched”. The paradox joins ownership and employment, implying that his dignity comes precisely from the absence of an audience. His work has become a private act of faith in his own role.
The passage, then, moves from emptiness to possession. Details of locked doors and unused keys establish futility, the timed pause shows self-imposed discipline, and the final paradox shows that the unwatched duty is what he owns.
Suggested Marlbridge rubric (6 points, modelled on the three strands of the exam essay).
| Strand | Points | Awarded for |
|---|---|---|
| Thesis | 1 | A defensible interpretation that answers the prompt (not a summary or a list of devices) |
| Evidence and commentary | 4 | Accurate evidence for each claim (1); commentary explaining how the evidence supports each claim (1); a line of reasoning that builds across paragraphs (1); commentary that links claims back to the thesis (1) |
| Sophistication | 1 | A complication, tension or paradox handled within the argument (here, the final paradox) |
For self-assessment, do not award a point for evidence that is named but not quoted, or for commentary that only repeats the claim.
How did you do?
Count your correct multiple-choice answers (out of 5) and your rubric points (out of 14). If you missed questions 1 to 5, reread “Evidence: relevant, sufficient and strategic” in the study guide. If your written scores were low, redo Question 7 with a topic sentence first and a transition in every second sentence. Then try the checklist.