Could you help me answer these questions using William Cullen Bryant's poem, "The Prairies?" Thank you so much! I've attached a link to the poem. The poem text is widely available online if you just google the title/author

Question

Here are the questions I am struggling with. I have tried my best to answer the ones I know but I am confused.

1. The words undulations (7), swell (8), and billows (9) are part of what analogy? How does the comparison work?

2. What question does the speaker ask of the southern winds?

3. Who, according to the speaker, is responsible for “this glorious work” (24)?

4. Why do “the great heavens seem to stoop down” (32) toward the prairies—figuratively and literally?

5. Why does the speaker fear his horse’s footsteps are “sacrilegious” (38)?

6. What answer does the speaker get from the “mighty mounds” (42)?

7. How, according to the speaker, does the “populous race” (46) compare with the Greeks?

8. Who caused the “mound-builders [to] vanish[ ] from the earth” (60)?

9. Why did the “solitary fugitive” (75) come out of hiding?

10. What action(s) manifest the “better nature” (79) of the “rude conquerors” (80)?

11. What action seems to belie the speaker’s claim that the fugitive “ne’er forgot,—the wife/Of his first love” (83-4)?

12. Explain the following statement, and, in particular, the phrase quickening breath:
		…Thus arise
		Races of living things, glorious in strength,
		And perish, as the quickening breath of God
		Fills them, or is withdrawn. (86-89)

13. What three types of beings have left the prairie for lands to the west?

14. Why is the “bee,/A more adventurous colonist than man” (109-110)?

15. Who are the “advancing multitude” (116)? What attributes does the speaker ascribe to them?

16. What is the “dream” (123) the wind “breaks” (123)?

17. What attitude does Bryant convey toward wilderness? toward solitude?

Writeacher · Answer

You're expecting someone to read this long poem and then do your work for you?? You post what YOU THINK, and someone here may be able to help. http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-prairies/