16Hit1600
Information and IdeasVery hardInference from a mill's ledger in a famine year

Information and Ideas practice question

The mill's ledger shows that it bought no wheat in 1816 yet sold the same quantity of flour as in other years. In 1816 the harvest across the region failed. The mill's owner was also the district's largest landowner. A historian could reasonably infer that ____

Which choice most logically completes the text?

  1. A. the mill ground wheat from the owner's own estates or stores that year, so it needed to buy none.Correct
  2. B. the mill closed in 1816.
  3. C. the ledger for 1816 is a forgery.
  4. D. the mill sold flour it had made in earlier years.

Answer: A. the mill ground wheat from the owner's own estates or stores that year, so it needed to buy none.

No purchases, full sales, a landowner.

Why the other answers are wrong

B. the mill closed in 1816.
It sold its usual quantity.
C. the ledger for 1816 is a forgery.
Nothing suggests forgery.
D. the mill sold flour it had made in earlier years.
Flour does not keep for years.

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