What is Lexington and Concord and why was it important?

Lexington and Concord were two small towns not far to the northwest of Boston at the time of the Revolutionary War.  There were small battles in each of these towns on April 19, 1775.  These battles were important because they were the first battles of what we now know as the Revolutionary War.

In 1775, the British Army leaders in Boston had heard that the Patriots were storing weapons and gunpowder in Concord.  They had also heard that some Patriot leaders were in Lexington.  They decided to make a foray out to capture the leaders and the gunpowder.  At this time, tensions were clearly high between the British and the colonists, but no military fighting had yet occurred.  When the British Army went to Lexington and Concord, this changed.  Battles were fought at the two towns and the British were harried by American militia members as they returned to Boston.  This fighting is important because it is generally seen as the beginning of the Revolutionary War.

When does Fortunato realize that Montresor plans to harm him?

Fortunato does not realize that Montresor plans to harm him until he has had a little time to sober up. It would appear that he begins to realize the terrible situation he is in at the following point in the story.

I had scarcely laid the first tier of the masonry when I discovered that the intoxication of Fortunato had in a great measure worn off. The earliest indication I had of this was a low moaning cry from the depth of the recess. It was not the cry of a drunken man.

Fortunato has to go over a whole series of incidents in his mind. He met Montresor up on the street. Montresor said he had a pipe of Amontillado he needed to have an expert sample. They came back to Montresor's palazzo together, down the stairs, along some passages--and now he is chained to the granite wall of a narrow niche, and Montresor, whom he thought was his friend, is starting to build a wall. The "low moaning cry" must represent Fortunato's realization that he has been tricked. Montresor has been deceiving him for years and has made a fool of him.

There was then a long and obstinate silence. 

Fortunato, now fully sober, must be feeling the chains, the padlock, and the bolts holding the chains to the rock wall. He is hoping to find a weak spot of some sort. But he wouldn't want to break free as long as Montresor was still there. Montresor might kill him. He is thinking of waiting until Montresor finishes the wall and then breaking the chain or the padlock. The mortar in the wall would still be damp, and he could knock out enough stones to get free of the niche. He is doing everything in silence because he doesn't want Montresor to guess what he is up to..

I laid the second tier, and the third, and the fourth; and then I heard the furious vibrations of the chain.

Fortunato has failed to find any weak place in the chains or padlock. Now he is desperate and starts struggling. It is futile.

A succession of loud and shrill screams, bursting suddenly from the throat of the chained form, seemed to thrust me violently back.

Fortunato is panicked. But he finds out that screaming for help is useless when Montresor starts screaming along with him. They are deep underground. Nobody could possibly hear them.

“Ha! ha! ha!—he! he! he!—a very good joke, indeed—an excellent jest. We will have many a rich laugh about it at the palazzo—he! he! he!—over our wine—he! he! he!”

As a last resort, Fortunato pretends that he believes this is all a practical joke. He is giving Montresor an excuse for changing his mind about killing him. He knows that Montresor might have some misgivings about having been seen with him just before he disappeared. He thinks he can make Montresor believe that he was expected at home that night and people would be out searching for him if he failed to appear. So he tries to plant some fears in Montresor's mind.

“He! he! he!—he! he! he!—yes, the Amontillado. But is it not getting late? Will not they be awaiting us at the palazzo, the Lady Fortunato and the rest? Let us be gone.”

He says "awaiting us" to suggest that many people had observed them together and assumed they were on their way to Fortunato's palazzo. Montresor had previously established that Fortunato was not expected anywhere. He had twice pretended he thought Fortunato had an "engagement," and the second time he had suggested this, Fortunato had said: “I have no engagement;—come.”

So the first indication that Fortunato realizes Montresor is his enemy, not his friend, and that his enemy has him in his power and intends to kill him, is when he utters that "low moaning cry from the depth of the recess." Fortunato never really believes this is a practical joke. He tries desperately to escape and uses psychology as a last resort, but in the end he is left to die. Montresor concludes his narrative with these words:

Against the new masonry I re-erected the old rampart of bones. For the half of a century no mortal has disturbed them. In pace requiescat!

How do Aboriginal residential schools contribute to ethnic discrimination?

Residential School systems contributed to the ethnic discrimination of aboriginal peoples by design. The primary factor was that the schools removed aboriginal children from the influence of their parents and aboriginal communities. In the isolated environment of the school these children could then be forcibly assimilated into the practices of the dominant culture. As the aboriginal cultural practices were viewed as being inferior, this process was viewed as being for the education and benefit of the children.

The schools themselves benefited from very little funding and generally failed to provide the students with a meaningful education. Children were taught skills to prepare them for a life as menial workers and servants, helping to entrench aboriginal peoples as inferior and subservient to members of the dominant culture.

Abuse at such residential schools was common. Emotional and psychological abuse was a prime means by which the aboriginal culture was struck from the children, and physical and sexual abuse was also frequently suffered by the children. The result of this was to ensure that while the children lost their native culture, they did not make the mistake of thinking they were becoming full members of the oppressive culture. They were not to be afforded the full consideration that those born into the dominant culture could rely upon.

All of these factors worked together to ensure that aboriginal children remained distinct from members of the colonizing society, leaving them prime targets for future discriminatory practices as they left the school and attempted to interface with the communities into which they had been forced.

How do the 9th and 10th limit the power of government

I assume that you are asking about the 9th and 10th Amendments to the Constitution of the United States and I have edited your question to reflect this.

The 9th Amendment says that

The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

This means that we should not assume that the people do not have a right because that right is not listed in the Constitution.  In other words, it limits the power of government because it says that we should assume that the people have more rights rather than fewer rights.  This means that there are more restrictions on what the government can do to the people.  The more we restrict what the government can do, the more we limit its power.

The 10th Amendment says that

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

This amendment limits the power of the national government more than it limits the power of the government in general.  This amendment was created because people worried that the national government would have too much power and the states would have too little.  The amendment means that powers belong to the states unless the Constitution explicitly says that they do not.  This reduces the power of the national government and increases the power of the states.

Explain why the narrator seems pleased to meet Fortunato in The Cask of Amotillado.

The narrator, Montresor, is extremely pleased to meet Fortunato in the street because, tonight, he plans to exact his revenge on Fortunato for "The thousand injuries" he had done Montresor.  Montresor has come up with a plan and ensured that none of his servants will be home to witness his crime; all that remains is to find Fortunato and lure him into the trap Montresor has set.

This trap relies on Fortunato's one "weak point," his pride, especially the pride he feels in his taste and discernment as a connoisseur of wine.  Montresor, when he sees his nemesis, tells him that he has purchased a pipe (126 gallons) of Amontillado (a dry Spanish sherry) and that he was "silly enough to pay the full Amontillado price without consulting [Fortunato] in the matter."  In other words, he appeals to Fortunato's pride, thus increasing the likelihood that Fortunato will want to help him.  

Montresor goes on to flatter him even more, saying that he will seek out another local wine expert to confirm his purchase because "some fools will have it that his taste is a match for [Fortunato's]."  By calling those people "fools," Montresor implies that he knows that Fortunato's taste is better than this other man's, but by suggesting that he will ask for his assistance any way, Montresor guarantees that Fortunato will want to come in order to prove that his taste is, in fact, better.

Casually "bumping into" Fortunato in the street is the first step to exacting the revenge Montresor has so long desired.

Why were characters from the past brought before Ebenezer Scrooge in A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens?

In A Christmas Carol, author Charles Dickens writes about miserly old Ebenezer Scrooge, who says, "Bah humbug," whenever Christmas is mentioned. To save Scrooge's miserable life, his deceased partner, Jacob Marley, visits Scrooge with a warning and a message that he will soon be visited by three spirits. The first spirit is the Ghost of Christmas Past, who takes Scrooge on a journey of his personal past. Scrooge sees people and events from his past, and they remind him of what once was. He sees himself as a boy--a boy filled with imagination. He sees his sister, Fan, who he had loved so dearly. He sees his former mentor, Fezziwig, who had taught him much and treated him so well. He sees Belle, the girl he loved and would have married if money had not become such an obsession. All of this was done to help Scrooge realize how wonderful and satisfying life could be. The people he loved were generous and kind-hearted. All of the money in the world could not bring happiness the way trusting, loving relationships do. Scrooge needed to see himself through the eyes of the past in order to change, and this is done effectively with the first Ghost.

Why do the Jewish people, in Night by Elie Wiesel, obey those who are obviously intent on destroying them?

Many people today wonder why the Jewish people and others who were taken to concentration camps during the Holocaust did not revolt or fight the Nazis. The truth is that some did (look up Warsaw, for example), but most people just could not fathom what was happening. In Night by Elie Wiesel, we see this up close. Moshe the Beadle is taken away and nearly killed but is able to make his way back to Elie's town of Sighet. When he warns the other people there about what is happening, nobody believes him. Such horrors just could not register with the people. In Germany, when Hitler first came to power, he made all of the Jews register with the government. They did it because their government told them to do it, and they had no reason to believe their registration would be used against them. The events of the Holocaust were unprecedented. Another reason had to do with the Jewish faith. The Jewish people believed God would protect them. Some Jews kept that faith throughout the horrors they endured, while others, like Elie Wiesel, completely gave up on God.

"Why, but why should I bless Him? In every fiber I rebelled. Because He had had thousands of children burned in His pits? Because He kept six crematories working night and day, on Sundays and feast days? Because in His great might He had created Auschwitz, Birkenau, Buna, and so many factories of death?" (Wiesel 64)

Elie, like so many others, wished he had done something differently--wished his father had done something differently, but they just did not know what was coming.