Read the selection below from gulliver’s travels by jonathan swift and answer the question that follows.
there is indeed another custom, which i cannot altogether approve of: when the king has a mind to put any of his nobles to death in a gentle indulgent manner, he commands to have the floor strewn with a certain brown powder of a deadly composition, which being licked up, infallibly kills him in twenty-four hours.
which statement explains the irony in the passage best?
using brown powder to kill someone makes the situation seem like a joke.
creating a messy floor in order to execute someone is unusual.
describing an execution as “gentle” and “indulgent” does not match the violence of executing someone.
nobles and kings take much longer than twenty-four hours to die, especially when brown powder is involved.