We know that the actor missed some direction telling him to enter the scene, so we need to pick out an answer choice that means something like "signal." While "summons" might seem like the correct answer, "cue" fits the context of the sentence better; while "summons" means "an authoritative or urgent call to someone to be present or to do something" or "an order to appear before a judge or magistrate, or the writ containing it," "cue" means "a thing said or done that serves as a signal to an actor or other performer to enter or to begin their speech or performance." Because "cue" best fits the theatrical context of the sentence, "cue" is the correct answer.

We can infer from the sentence's context that we need to pick out a word that means something like "a short trip," because the biology class went to the local zoo but was back in time for lunch. All of the answer choices refer to different kinds of trips except for "itinerary," which means "a planned route or journey" or "a travel document recording these," so it is not the correct answer. "Odyssey" refers to a very long journey, so it cannot be the correct answer either, and neither can "vacation," because we can infer that the trip took place as a field trip during school hours. While "errand" refers to a short trip, it specifically means "a short journey undertaken in order to deliver or collect something, often on someone else's behalf"; that wouldn't fit the sentence's meaning, so "errand" cannot be the correct answer. "Excursion," a noun that means "a short journey or trip, especially one engaged in as a leisure activity," is the best answer choice for the sentence's context, so it is the correct answer.

The barbarians clearly are being said to have driven out the people who originally dwelled in the caves. We do not know anything about the identity of these people. All that can be said is that they lived in the caves. While this is very limited, it is expressed by the word "inhabitant," meaning one who lives in a given area. The word is related to "habitat," which means living space, and a number of other related words.

The key word is "shrewdness," which means the quality of having very good judgment. When someone has "savvy," he or she is very shrewd, particularly in business or politics. For instance, we often speak of a "savvy businessman" who knows just how to maneuver his company to make a great deal of profit at just the right times. The idea of this sentence is that, in order to become a senator, someone needs to have an a likeable personality in addition to political shrewdness—that is, political "savvy."

The key phrase in this sentence is "because of the persecutions he faced." Many people judge Galileo in light of this. When someone is persecuted and killed because of his or her beliefs, that person is called a "martyr." The word comes from the Greek for "witness." A martyr "witnesses" (bears testimony to) a truth that he or she believes. The sentence does not state that Galileo was killed for his investigations. However, it does qualify the blank by stating that many believe him to be "a kind of"—that is "sort of" a martyr.

The context of the sentence suggests that Bryan moved from his mansion to a much smaller house because he lost all of his money. So, to solve this sentence completion problem, you have to figure out which of these answer choices means a small house. The correct answer is "hovel," as a hovel is the name we give to a small, run-down house or shack. To further help you, "maxim" and "adage" are synonyms of one another and both words mean a common saying, and "incentive" means motivation or reason for doing something.

The best clues for the sentence are "reading habits" and the fact that the sentence is speaking about the general difficulty and length of the texts read by the citizens. The sense is that we are considering the overall reading habits of the citizens, trying to find out their general reading abilities. In its stricter sense, "literacy" is the ability to read (as well as to write). It comes from the Latin for "letter" (as in alphabetic letters), the same root that is found in words like "literal" and "literate." In less formal English, it used to be said that someone "had his letters," meaning that the person was able to read and write. Often, we use the word "literacy" to indicate general reading competence. Note, also, that the word can be used in a broader sense to indicate abilities in any topic—for instance, "computer literacy."

If you know the word "hypochondriac," this sentence is very easy. When someone is called this, he or she is being said to be overly worried about being sick, often imagining that he or she is sick when in fact he or she is not. A "malady" is a sickness, so it is fair to say that a hypochondriac believes that he or she is experiencing a malady of some sort or other—even if this is not really the case.

The two most tempting wrong answers likely are "probe" and "dissect," which would perhaps be done by the police in order to get the needed bone samples. However, these descriptions are not normally used to describe these kinds of processes in such cases (though they might be options if you had no other fitting words). Certainly, they do not wish to "incinerate" (burn) or "cremate" (burn to ashes) the body. If anything, they need to recover it from wherever it is. Given the options and the sentence, it is safe to assume that it has been buried for at least ten years. To "exhume" something is to remove it from the ground, often meaning to remove a body from its burial place. The word literally means "out of (ex-) the ground (-hume)." The "-hume" portion is related to "humble" which has the sense of being "lowly" (not arrogant or "haughty"). Metaphorically speaking, being "near the ground" is rather "lowly."

We can infer that because the shoppers were "running between stores in a frenzy to find good deals," they must have been hurrying around the mall. So, we need to pick out a verb to describe the shoppers' movements that means something like "hurried." "Strolled" cannot be the correct answer, then, because while strolled describes a kind of movement, "strolled" means "walked in a leisurely way," and the shoppers are not "walking in a leisurely way" because they are "running between stores in a frenzy to find good deals." "Bustled," however, means "moved or went in a busy or hurried way," and because it is the answer choice that best conveys the shoppers' hurry, "bustled" is the correct answer.