ROGER MALVIN'S BURIAL. (Riverside Literature Series, No. 145.)

Why is the first paragraph needed?

Why could the incident in the first paragraph on p. 50 not be omitted? Do you find it later?

How many chapters could you divide the story into? What is the basis of division?

Why did not Hawthorne tell the result of the shot at once?

A plot is usually made by introducing more than one cause, by hiding one of the causes, or by holding back an effect. Which in this story?

Is there a change of movement between the beginning and the end of the story? Look at the last two pages carefully. How has the author expressed the intensity of the situation?

Does the story end when it is finished?

THE WEDDING KNELL. (Riverside Literature Series, No. 145.)

Of the three common ways of giving uncertainty to a plot, which has been used?

Do you call this plot more complicated than those of the other tales studied?

Why does the author say, at the top of p. 72, "necessary preface"? Could it not be omitted? If not, what principle of narrative construction would be violated by its omission?

Why has he introduced the last paragraph on p. 74 reaching over to p. 75?

THE AMBITIOUS GUEST. (Riverside Literature Series, No. 40.)

In what order are the elements of the story introduced?

Pick out phrases which prepare you for the catastrophe.

Can you detect any difference in the movement of the different parts of the story? What aids its expression?

THE GOLD-BUG. (Riverside Literature Series, No. 120.)

Would you have been satisfied if the story had stopped when the treasure was discovered? What more do you want to know?

What, then, is the main incident? Was the main incident the last to occur in order of time? Why did Poe delay telling it until the end?

Do you see how relating the story in the first person helped him to throw the main incident last? Why could he not tell it before?

Does Poe tell any other stories in the first person?

In what person are "Treasure Island" and "Kidnapped" told? Are they interesting?

If a friend is telling you a story, do you care more for it if it is about a third party or about himself? Why?

What, then, is the advantage of making an actor the narrator? What are some of the disadvantages?

Do you think this plot as good as those of Hawthorne's stories?

Why was it necessary to have "a day of remarkable chilliness" (p. 3), and a Newfoundland dog rushing into the room (p. 6)?

What principle would it violate to omit these little matters? (Text-book, p. 24.)

What of the rapidity of movement when they are digging? How has rapidity been gained?

What form of wit does Poe attempt? Does he succeed?

Do you think the conversation is natural? If not, what is the matter with it?

Are negroes usually profane? Does Jupiter's general character lead you to expect profanity from him? Is anything gained by his oaths? Is anything sacrificed? In this story is profanity artistic? (To know what is meant by "artistic," read the last line of "L'Envoi" on p. 253 of the text-book.)

THE VISION OF SIR LAUNFAL. (Riverside Literature Series, No. 30.)

What is the purpose of the first stanza?

What connection in thought is there between the second, third, and fourth stanzas? What have these stanzas to do with the story? If they have nothing to do with it, what principle of structure do they violate? Would Lowell be likely to do this?

What is the use of the description beginning "And what is so rare as a day in June"?

Would the story be complete without the preludes? Would the teaching be understood without them?

Are time and place definitely stated in the poem? Why should they be, or not be?

Why does so much time elapse between Part I. and Part II. of the story?

In what lines do you find the main incident?

In the first prelude is Lowell describing a landscape of New England or Old England? Where is the story laid? What comment have you to make upon these facts?

Pick out the figures. Are they useful?

Can you find passages of exposition and description in this narrative? Why do you call it narration?

What is Lowell's criticism upon himself? (See "Fable for Critics.")

A CHRISTMAS CAROL. (Riverside Literature Series, No. 57.)

Is the opening such as to catch the attention?

What is the essential idea in the description of Scrooge? Do all details enforce this idea? Do you know Scrooge?

In what paragraph does Dickens tell where the story occurs?

Find places on p. 19 and p. 96 where Dickens has used "in" or "into."

What advantage to the story is the appearance in Scrooge's office of his nephew and the two gentlemen? Do they come into the story again?

Are the details in the description of the apparition on p. 41 in the order in which they would be noted? Which is the most important detail? Where is it in the description?

Is the description of Mrs. Fezziwig on p. 52 successful?

What helps express rapidity of movement in the paragraph at the bottom of p. 53? (See also paragraph on p. 85.)

Examining the words used by Dickens and Hawthorne, which are longer? Which are most effectual? Are you sure? Rewrite one of Hawthorne's paragraphs with a Dickens vocabulary. What is the result?

What word is the topic of the last paragraph on p. 73?

Recast the first sentence of the last paragraph on p. 77.

Does Dickens use slang? (Do not consider conversation in the answer to this question.)

What is the main incident? Is there one of the minor incidents that could be omitted?

Which one could you most easily spare?

What is the need of the last chapter?

MARMION. (Rolfe's Student's Series, Vol. 2.)

How do you know the time of "Marmion"?

Do you see any reason why stanza vi. of Canto I. would better precede stanza v.?

Where is the first mention of De Wilton? the first intimation of Clara de Clare? of Constance?

What form of discourse in stanza vii. of Canto II.?

What part in the development of the narrative does Fitz-Eustace's song make?

Does the tale related by the host break the unity of the whole? Is it "another story"? What value has it?

Why does Scott not tell of Marmion's encounter with the Elfin Knight in Canto III.? Where is it told? Why there?

Why is Canto II. put after Canto I.? Did the events related in II. occur after those related in I.?

How many of the descriptions of persons in "Marmion" begin with the face? How many times are they of the face only?

Try to write the incident related in stanzas xix., xx., xxi., and xxii. of Canto III. in fewer words than Scott has done it without sacrificing any detail.

Are you satisfied with the description of King James in stanza viii. Canto V.? Do you see him?

Write an outline of the plot of "Marmion" in two hundred words.

Why is the story of Lady Clare reserved until Canto V.?

What cantos contain the main incident?

Were all that precedes omitted, would "The Battle" be as interesting?

Do you think the plot good? Is it complicated?

What of the number of figures used in the last canto compared with those used in any other canto? Do you find more in narrative or descriptive passages? Why?

Read stanza viii. Canto III. Can you describe a voice without using comparison?

Do the introductions to the several cantos form any part of the story? Would they be just as good anywhere else? Would the story be better with them, or without them? What principle of structure do they violate?

EXERCISES.

The subjects for composition given below are not intended as a course to be followed, but only to suggest a plan for the work. The individual topics for essays may not be the best for all cases. Long lists of topics can be found in rhetorics. Bare subjects, however, are usually unsuggestive. They should be adapted to the class. Put the subjects in such shape that there is something to get hold of. Give the pupils a fair start.

1-4. In order to place before the pupils good models for constructing stories, read one like "A Piece of String" in "An Odd Number," by Maupassant. Stories for this purpose should not be long. Talk the story over with the pupils, bringing out clearly the main incident and the several episodes which contribute to it. Have them notice how characters, time, and place are introduced; and how each succeeding event is possible and natural. Then have it rewritten. This will fix the idea of plan. For this purpose some of Miss Wilkins's stories are excellent; Kenneth Grahame's "The Golden Age," and Miss Jewett's short stories are good material. Some of the short stories in current magazines serve well.

5, 6. Read the first of a story and its close,—enough to indicate the main incident and the setting of the story. Have the pupils write it complete.

7. Read the close of a story. The pupils will then write the whole.

8. Read the opening of a story. Have the pupils complete it.

9. Finish "The Circus-Man's Story" (Text-book, p. 297.)

10. My First Algebra Lesson. Remember that in composition a good story is worth more than a true one. The basis may be a fact. Do not hesitate to fix it up.

11. A delivery horse runs away. No persons are in the wagon. Tell about it.

12. Write about a runaway in which you and your little sister are injured. (I have found it very helpful to use the same subject, but having the relation of the narrator to the incident very different. It serves to bring out a whole new vocabulary in order to express the difference in the feelings of the narrator.)

13. Write the story suggested to your mind by these words: Digging in the sand I found a board much worn by the waves, on which were cut, in characters scarcely traceable, these words: "Dec.——18 9, N. J."

14. A humorous incident in a street car, in which the joke was on the other fellow.

15. Another in which the joke was on me. The same incident may be used with good effect. The choice of new words to express the difference of feelings makes an excellent exercise.

16. Tell the story that Doreas related to her neighbors about her husband's escape and her father's death.

17. To bring out the fact that the language must be varied to suit the character of the reader or listener, tell a fairy story to a sleepy five-year old so that he will not go to sleep. Do not hesitate at exaggerations. Only remember it must be consistent.

18. Have "The Gentle Boy" tell one of the incidents in which he was cruelly treated. This may well be an incident of your own life adapted to its purpose.

19, 20. Jim was a mean boy. Meanness seemed to be in his blood. He was all mean. His hair was mean; his freckles were mean; his big, chapped hands were mean. And he was always mean. He was mean to his pets; he was meaner to small boys; and he was as mean as he dared to be to his equals in size.

Write one incident to show Jim's meanness.

Write another to show how Jim met his match, and learned a lesson.

21. Work up the following into a story. It all occurs in one day at the present time. Place, your own city. Characters, a poor sewing girl, her little sick brother, and a wealthy society lady. Incidents: a conversation between brother and sister about some fruit; a conversation between the sewing girl and the lady about money due for sewing; stealing apples; arrest; appearance of the lady. Title: Who was the Criminal?

22. A story of a modern Sir Launfal.

23. The most thrilling moment of my life.

24. Tell the whole story suggested by the stanza of "A Nightingale in the Study," by Lowell, which begins, "Cloaked shapes, a twanging of guitars."

25. Write a story which teaches a lesson. Remember that the lesson is in the story, not at its end.

In the work at this time but little attention can be given to the teaching of paragraphs and sentences. The pupil should learn what a paragraph is, and should have his composition properly divided into paragraphs. But the form and massing of paragraphs cannot be taken up at this time. The same may be said of sentences. He should have no sentences broken in two by periods; nor should he have two sentences forced into one. Grammatical errors should be severely criticised. However, the present work is to get the pupils started; and they cannot get started if there is a teacher holding them back by discouraging criticisms. Mark all mistakes of whatever kind; but put the stress upon the whole composition: its unity, its coherence, its mass, and its movement. Everything cannot be done at once; many distressing faults will have to be passed over until later.

* * * * *

CHAPTER IV

DESCRIPTION

Difficulties of Language for making Pictures.

Description has been defined as the form of literature which presents a picture by means of language. In the preceding chapter, it has been pointed out that the sequence of language is perfectly adapted to detail the sequence of action in a narrative. For the purpose of constructing a picture, the means has serious drawbacks. The picture has to be presented in pieces; and the difficulties are much as would be experienced if "dissected maps and animals" used for children's amusement were to be put together in the head. It would not be easy to arrange the map of the United States from blocks, each containing a small part of it, taken one at a time from a box. Yet this closely resembles the method language forces us to adopt in constructing a picture. Each phrase is like one of the blocks, and introduces a new element into the picture; from these phrases the reader must reconstruct the whole. This means not alone that he shall remember them all, but there is a more serious trouble: he must often rearrange them. For example, a description by Ruskin begins, "Nine years old." Either a boy or a girl, the reader thinks, as it may be in his own home. In the case of this reader it is a boy, rather tall of his age, with brown hair and dark eyes. But the next phrase reads, "Neither tall nor short for her age." Now the reader knows it is a girl of common stature. Later on he learns that her eyes are "deep blue;" her lips "perfectly lovely in profile;" and so on through the details of the whole sketch. Many times in the course of the description the reader makes up a new picture; he is continually reconstructing. Any one who will observe his own mind while reading a new description can prove that the picture is arranged and rearranged many times. This is due to the means by which it is presented. Language presents only a phrase at a time,—a fragment, not a whole,—and so fails in the instantaneous presentation of a complete picture.

Painting and Sculpture.

The painter or sculptor who upon canvas or in stone flashes the whole composition before us at the same instant of time, has great advantages over the worker in words. In these methods there is needed no reconstruction of previous images, no piecing together of a number of fragments. Without any danger of mistakes which will have to be corrected later, the spectator can take in the whole picture at once,—every relation, every color, every difference in values.

It is because pictures are the surest and quickest means of representing objects to the mind that books, especially text-books, and magazines are so profusely illustrated. No magazine can claim popularity to-day that does not use illustrations where possible; no text-book in science or history sells unless it contains pictures. And this is because all persons accurately and quickly get the idea from a picture.

Advantages of Language.

Whatever be the disadvantages of language, there are some advantages. Who could paint this from Hawthorne?

"Soon the smoke ascended among the trees, impregnated with savory incense, not heavy, dull, and surfeiting, like the steam of cookery indoors, but sprightly and piquant. The smell of our feast was akin to the woodland odors with which it mingled." ("Mosses from an Old Manse.")

Or this from Lowell?—

"Under the yaller-pines I house, When sunshine makes 'em all sweet-scented, An' hear among their furry boughs The baskin' west wind purr contented, While 'way o'erhead, ez sweet an' low Ez distant bells thet ring for meetin', The wedged wil' geese their bugles blow, Further an' further South retreatin'."[4]

Or cut this from marble?—

"O mother Ida, many-fountained Ida, Dear mother Ida, hearken ere I die. For now the noonday quiet holds the hill; The grasshopper is silent in the grass; The lizard, with his shadow on the stone, Rests like a shadow, and the winds are dead. The purple flower droops; the golden bee Is lily-cradled; I alone awake. My eyes are full of tears, my heart of love, My heart is breaking, and my eyes are dim, And I am all aweary of my life."[5]

The painter cannot put sounds upon a canvas, nor can the sculptor carve from marble an odor or a taste. We use the other senses in determining qualities of objects; and words which describe effects produced by other senses beside sight are valuable in description. As Lowell says, "we may shut our eyes, but we cannot help knowing" a large number of beautiful things. Moreover, language suggests hidden ideas that the representative arts cannot so well do. The following from a "Song" by Lowell has in it suggestions which the picture could not present.

"Violet! sweet violet! Thine eyes are full of tears; Are they wet Even yet With the thought of other years? Or with gladness are they full, For the night so beautiful, And longing for those far-off spheres?

"Thy little heart, that hath with love Grown colored like the sky above, On which thou lookest ever,— Can it know All the woe Of hope for what returneth never, All the sorrow and the longing To these hearts of ours belonging?"

Enumeration and Suggestion

Description, like narration, has two large divisions: one simply to give information or instruction; the other to present a vivid picture. One is representative or enumerative; the other, suggestive. One may be illustrated by guide-books; the other by the descriptions of Stevenson or Ruskin. And in the most artistic fashion the two have been made to supplement each other in the following picture of "bright and beautiful Athens" by Cardinal Newman. From the first, to the sentence beginning "But what he would not think of," there is simply an enumeration of features which a commercial agent might see; the rest is what the artistic soul of the lover of beauty saw there. One is enumeration; the other a gloriously suggestive picture.

"A confined triangle, perhaps fifty miles its greatest length, and thirty its greatest breadth; two elevated rocky barriers, meeting at an angle; three prominent mountains, commanding the plain,—Parnes, Pentelicus, and Hymettus; an unsatisfactory soil; some streams, not always full;—such is about the report which the agent of a London company would have made of Attica. He would report that the climate was mild; the hills were limestone; there was plenty of good marble; more pasture land than at first survey might have been expected, sufficient, certainly, for sheep and goats; fisheries productive; silver mines once, but long since worked out; figs fair; oil first-rate; olives in profusion. But what he would not think of noting down was that that olive-tree was so choice in nature and so noble in shape that it excited a religious veneration; and that it took so kindly to the light soil as to expand into woods upon the open plain, and to climb up and fringe the hills. He would not think of writing word to his employers, how that clear air, of which I have spoken, brought out, yet blended and subdued, the colors on the marble, till they had a softness and harmony, for all their richness, which in a picture looks exaggerated, yet is after all within the truth. He would not tell how that same delicate and brilliant atmosphere freshened up the pale olive, till the olive forgot its monotony, and its cheek glowed like the arbutus or beech of the Umbrian hills. He would say nothing of the thyme and the thousand fragrant herbs which carpeted Hymettus; he would hear nothing of the hum of its bees; nor take account of the rare flavor of its honey, since Gaza and Minorca were sufficient for the English demand. He would look over the Aegean from the height he had ascended; he would follow with his eyes the chain of islands, which, starting from the Sunian headland, seemed to offer the fabled divinities of Attica, when they would visit their Ionian cousins, a sort of viaduct thereto across the sea; but that fancy would not occur to him, nor any admiration of the dark violet billows with their white edges down below; nor of those graceful, fan-like jets of silver upon the rocks, which slowly rise aloft like water spirits from the deep, then shiver, and break, and spread, and shroud themselves, and disappear in a soft mist of foam; nor of the gentle, incessant heaving and panting of the whole liquid plain; nor of the long waves, keeping steady time, like a line of soldiery as they resound upon the hollow shore,—he would not deign to notice the restless living element at all except to bless his stars that he was not upon it. Nor the distinct details, nor the refined coloring, nor the graceful outline and roseate golden hue of the jutting crags, nor the bold shadows cast from Otus or Laurium by the declining sun;—our agent of a mercantile firm would not value these matters even at a low figure. Rather, we must turn for the sympathy we seek to yon pilgrim student, come from a semi-barbarous land to that small corner of the earth, as to a shrine, where he might take his fill of gazing on those emblems and coruscations of invisible unoriginate perfection. It was the stranger from a remote province, from Britain or from Mauritania, who in a scene so different from that of his chilly, woody swamps, or of his fiery, choking sands, learned at once what a real University must be, by coming to understand the sort of country which was its suitable home."[6]

Enumerative Description.

Enumerative description has one point of great difference from suggestive description. In the former everything is told; in the latter the description is as fortunate in what it omits as in what it includes. Were an architect to give specifications for the building of a house, every detail would have to be included; but after all the pages of careful enumeration the reader would know less of how it looked than after these few words from Irving. "A large, rickety wooden building stood in its place, with great gaping windows, some of them broken and mended with old hats and petticoats, and over the door was painted 'The Union Hotel, by Jonathan Doolittle.'" So the manual training student uses five hundred words to describe in detail a box which would be thrown off with but a few words in a piece of literature. In enumerative description, one element is of as much importance as another; no special feature is made primary by the omission or subdual of other qualities. It has value in giving exact details of objects, as if for their construction, and in including an object in a class.

Suggestive Description.

Suggestive description, description the aim of which is not information, but the reproduction of a picture, is the kind most employed in literature. To present a picture, not all the details should be given. The mind cannot carry them all, and, much worse, it cannot arrange them. Nor is there any need for a detailed enumeration. A room has walls, floor, and ceiling; a man naturally has ears, arms, and feet. These things may be taken for granted. It is not what is common to a class that describes; it is what is individual, what takes one object out of a class.

Value of Observation.

This leads to the suggestion that good description depends largely on accurate observation. A selection frequently quoted, but none the less valuable because often seen, is in point here. It is the last word on the value of observation.

"Talent is long patience. It is a question of regarding whatever one desires to express long enough and with attention close enough to discover a side which no one has seen and which has been expressed by nobody. In everything there is something of the unexplored, because we are accustomed to use our eyes only with the thought of what has already been said concerning the thing we see. The smallest thing has in it a grain of the unknown. Discover it. In order to describe a fire that flames or a tree in the plain, we must remain face to face with that fire or that tree until for us they no longer resemble any other tree or any other fire. This is the way to become original.

"Having, moreover, impressed upon me the fact that there are not in the whole world two grains of sand, two insects, two hands, or two noses absolutely alike, he forced me to describe a being or an object in such a manner as to individualize it clearly, to distinguish it from all other objects of the same kind. 'When you pass,' he said to me, 'a grocer seated in his doorway, a concierge smoking his pipe, a row of cabs, show me this grocer and this concierge, their attitude, all their physical appearance; suggest by the skill of your image all their moral nature, so that I shall not confound them with any other grocer or any other concierge; make me see, by a single word, wherein a cab-horse differs from the fifty others that follow or precede him.'... Whatever may be the thing which one wishes to say, there is but one word for expressing it; only one verb to animate it, but one adjective to qualify it. It is essential to search for this verb, for this adjective, until they are discovered, and never to be satisfied with anything else."[7]

The Point of View.

With the closest observation, an author gets into his own mind what he wishes to present to another; but with this essential step taken, he is only ready to begin the work of communication. For the successful communication of a picture there are some considerations of value. And first is the point of view. It has much the same relation to description as the main incident has to narration. In large measure it determines what to exclude and what to include. When a writer has assumed his point of view, he must stay there, and tell not a thing more than he can see from there. It would hardly be possible for a man, telling only so much as he saw while gazing from Eiffel Tower into the streets below, to say that the people looked like Lilliputians and that their hands were dirty. To one lying on the bank of a stream, it does not look like "a silver thread running through the landscape." Things do not look the same when they are near as when at a distance. This fact has been acted upon more by the modern school of painting than ever before in art. Verboeckhoven painted sheep in a marvelous way. The drawing is perfect, giving the animal to the life. Still, no matter how far away the artist was standing, there are the same marvelously painted tufts of wool, showing almost the individual fibres. Tufts of wool were on the sheep, and made of fibres; but no artist at twenty rods could see them. The new school gives only what actually can be seen. Its first law is that each "shall draw the thing as he sees it for the God of Things as They Are." Make no additions to what you can actually see because, as a result of experience, you know that there are some things not yet mentioned in your description; the hands may be dirty, but the man on the tower cannot see the dirt. Neither make an addition simply because it sounds well; the "silver thread through the landscape" is beautiful, but, unfortunately, it is not always true.

Not only does distance cut out details from a picture; the fact that man sees in a straight line and not around a corner eliminates some features. In describing a house, remember that as you stand across the street from it, the back porch cannot be seen, neither can the shrubbery in the back yard. A writer would not be justified in speaking of a man's necktie, if the man he was describing were walking in front of him. In enumerative description the inside of a box may be told of; a man may be turned around, as it were; but to present a picture, only one side can be described, just as it would be shown in a photograph. Any addition to what can actually be known from the point of view assumed by the author is a fault and a source of confusion. Choose your point of view; stay there; and tell only what is seen from that point.

Moving Point of View.

It has been said that the point of view should not be changed. This requires one modification. It may be changed, if the reader is kept informed of the changes. If a person wished to describe an interior, he would be unable to see the whole from any one point of view. As he passed from room to room he should inform his reader of his change of position. Then the description, though a unit, is a combination of several descriptions; just as the house is one, though made of dining-room, sitting-rooms, bedrooms, and attic. This kind of description is very common in books of travel, in which the author tells what he sees in passing. The thing to be remembered in writing this kind of description is to inform the reader where the author is when he writes the different parts of the description,—to give the points of view.

The Point of View should be stated.

The point of view, whether fixed or moving, should be made clear. Either it should be definitely stated, or it should be suggested by some phrase in the description. In the many examples which are quoted in this chapter, it would be well to see what it is that gives the point of view. The picture gains in distinctness when the point of view is known. The following sentences are from "The Old Manse;" there is no mistake here. The reader knows every move the author makes. It opens with:—

"Between two tall gateposts of rough-hewn stone (the gate itself having fallen from its hinges at some unknown epoch) we beheld the gray front of the old parsonage terminating the vista of an avenue of black ash-trees."

From the street the reader is taken to "the rear of the house," where there was "the most delightful little nook of a study that ever offered its snug seclusion to a scholar." Through its window the clergyman saw the opening of the "deadly struggle between two nations." He heard the rattle of musketry, and

"there needed but a gentle wind to sweep the battle smoke around this quiet house. Perhaps the reader, whom I cannot help considering as my guest in the Old Manse and entitled to all courtesy in the way of sight-showing,—perhaps he will choose to take a nearer view of the memorable spot. We stand now on the river's brink."... "Here we are, at the point where the river was crossed by the old bridge."... "The Old Manse! We had almost forgotten it, but will return thither through the orchard."... "What with the river, the battle-field, the orchard, and the garden, the reader begins to despair of finding his way back into the Old Manse. But in agreeable weather it is the truest hospitality to keep him out-of-doors. I never grew quite acquainted with my habitation till a long spell of sulky rain had confined me beneath its roof. There could not be a more sombre aspect of external nature than as then seen from the windows of my study."

And so Hawthorne continues through this long and beautiful description of "The Old Manse;" every change in the point of view is noted.

Mental Point of View.

Closely connected with the physical point of view is the mood or purpose of the writer; this might be called the mental point of view. Not everything should be told which the author could know from his position, but only those things which at the time serve his purpose. In the description already quoted from Newman, the mercantile gentleman notes a large number of features which are the commercial advantages of Attica; of these but three are worthy of mention by "yon pilgrim student" in giving his impression of Athens as "a shrine where he might take his fill of gazing on those emblems and coruscations of invisible unoriginate perfection." The others—the soil, the streams, the climate, the limestone, the fisheries, and the silver mines—do not serve his purpose. Hawthorne in the long description already mentioned has retained those features which suggest quiet and peace. Such a profusion of "quiet," "half asleep," "peaceful," "unruffled," "unexcitable" words and phrases never "loitered" through forty pages of "dreamy" and "whispering" description.

In the following bit from "Lear," where Edgar tells his blinded father how high the cliff is, only those details are included which measure distance.

"How fearful And dizzy 'tis to cast one's eyes so low! The crows and choughs that wing the midway air Show scarce so gross as beetles; half way down Hangs one that gathers samphire,—dreadful trade! Methinks he seems no bigger than his head: The fishermen, that walk upon the beach, Appear like mice; and yond tall anchoring bark, Diminished to her cock; her cock, a buoy Almost too small for sight: the murmuring surge, That on th' unnumbered idle pebbles chafes, Cannot be heard so high.—I'll look no more, Lest my brain turn, and the deficient sight Topple down headlong."

The following is from Kipling's "The Light that Failed:"—

"What do you think of a big, red, dead city built of red sandstone, with green aloes growing between the stones, lying out neglected on honey-colored sands? There are forty dead kings there, Maisie, each in a gorgeous tomb finer than all the others. You look at the palaces and streets and shops and tanks, and think that men must live there, till you find a wee gray squirrel rubbing its nose all alone in the marketplace, and a jeweled peacock struts out of a carved doorway and spreads its tail against a marble screen as fine pierced as point-lace. Then a monkey—a little black monkey—walks through the main square to get a drink from a tank forty feet deep. He slides down the creepers to the water's edge, and a friend holds him by the tail, in case he should fall in.

"Is all that true?

"I have been there and seen. Then evening comes and the lights change till it's just as though you stood in the heart of a king-opal. A little before sundown, as punctually as clockwork, a big bristly wild boar, with all his family following, trots through the city gate, churning the foam on his tusks. You climb on the shoulder of a big black stone god, and watch that pig choose himself a palace for the night and stump in wagging his tail. Then the night-wind gets up, and the sands move, and you hear the desert outside the city singing, 'Now I lay me down to sleep,' and everything is dark till the moon rises."

Note how every detail introduced serves to make the city dead. Dead kings, a wee gray squirrel, a little black monkey, a bristly wild boar, the night wind, and the desert singing,—these could not be seen or heard in a live city with street cars; but all serve to emphasize the fact that here is "a big, red, dead city."

At the risk of over-emphasizing this point that the purpose of the author, the mental point of view of the writer, the feeling which the object gives him and which he wishes to convey to the reader, the central thought in the description, is primary, and an element that cannot be overlooked in successful description, I give another example. This point really cannot be over-emphasized: a writer cannot be too careful in selecting materials. Careless grouping of incongruous matters cannot make a picture. Nor does the artistic author leave the reader in doubt as to the purpose of the description; its central thought is usually suggested in the first sentence. In the quotations from Shakespeare and Kipling, the opening sentences are the germ of what follows. Each detail seems to grow out of this sentence, and serves to emphasize it. In the following by Stevenson, the paragraphs spring from the opening sentence; they explain it, they elaborate it, and they accent it.

"Night is a dead monotonous period under a roof; but in the open world it passes lightly, with its stars and dews and perfumes, and the hours are marked by changes in the face of Nature. What seems a kind of temporal death to people choked between walls and curtains is only a light and living slumber to the man who sleeps afield. All night long he can hear Nature breathing deeply and freely; even as she takes her rest she turns and smiles; and there is one stirring hour unknown to those who dwell in houses, when a wakeful influence goes abroad over the sleeping hemisphere, and all the outdoor world are on their feet. It is then that the first cock crows, not this time to announce the dawn, but like a cheerful watchman speeding the course of the night. Cattle awake on the meadows; sheep break their fast on the dewy hillsides, and change to a new lair among the ferns; and houseless men, who have lain down with the fowls, open their dim eyes and behold the beauty of the night.

"At what inaudible summons, at what gentle touch of Nature, are all these sleepers thus recalled in the same hour to life? Do the stars rain down an influence, or do we share some thrill of mother earth below our resting bodies? Even shepherds and old country-folk, who are the deepest read in these arcana, have not a guess as to the means or purpose of this nightly resurrection. Towards two in the morning they declare the thing takes place; and neither know nor inquire further. And at least it is a pleasant incident. We are disturbed in our slumber only, like the luxurious Montaigne, 'that we may the better and more sensibly enjoy it.' We have a moment to look upon the stars. And there is a special pleasure for some minds in the reflection that we share the impulse with all outdoor creatures in our neighborhood, that we have escaped out of the Bastille of civilization, and are become, for the time being, a more kindly animal and a sheep of Nature's flock." ("Travels with a Donkey.")

Length of Descriptions.

There is one more step in the exclusion of details. This considers neither the point of view nor the purpose of the writer, but it is what is due the reader. Stevenson says in one of his essays that a description which lasts longer than two minutes is never attempted in conversation. The listener cannot hold the details enumerated. The clearest statement regarding this comes from Jules Lemaitre in a criticism upon some descriptions by Emile Zola which the critic says are praised by persons who have never read them. He says:—

"It has been one of the greatest literary blunders of the time to suppose that an enumeration of parts is a picture, to think that forever placing details side by side, however picturesque they may be, is able in the end to make a picture, to give us any conception of the vast spectacles in the physical universe. In reality, a written description arranges its parts in our mind only when the impression of the first features of which it is formed are remembered sufficiently, so that we can easily join the first to those which complete and end it. In short, a piece of description is ineffective if we cannot hold in mind all its details at one time. It is necessary that all the details coexist in our memory just as the parts of a painting coexist under our eye. This becomes next to impossible if the description of one definite object last over fifteen minutes of reading. The longer it is, the more obscure it becomes. The individual features fade away in proportion to the number which are presented; and for this reason one might say that we cannot see the forest for the trees. Every description which is over fifty lines ceases to be clear to a mind of ordinary vigor. After that there is only a succession of fragmentary pictures which fatigues and overwhelms the reader."[8]

These, then, are the principles that guide in the choice of materials for a description. First, the point of view, whether fixed or movable, should be made clear to the reader; it should be retained throughout the description, or the change should be announced. By regard for it the writer will be guided to the exclusion of matters that could not be observed, and to the inclusion of such details as can be seen and are essential. Second, the writer will keep out matters that do not contribute to his purpose, and will select only those details which assist in producing the desired impression. Third, the limitations of the reader's powers advise a writer to be brief: five hundred words should be the outside; two hundred are enough for most writers. These principles will give to the whole that unity of materials and of structure which is the first requisite of an effective description.

The next matter for consideration is the arrangement of the materials. The arrangement depends on the principles that guided in narration, Mass and Coherence.

Arrangement of Details in Description.

After we have looked at any object long enough to be able to write about it, one feature comes to assume an importance that sets it far above all others. To a writer who has looked long at a man, he may shrink to a cringing piece of weakness, or he may grow to a strong, self-centred power whose presence alone inspires serenest trust. Hawthorne, standing in St. Peter's, saw only the gorgeous coloring; proportions, immensity, and sacredness were as nothing to the harmonious brilliancy of this expanded "jewel casket."[9] Stevenson, thinking of the beast of burden best suited to carry his great sleeping sack, discarded the horse, for, as he says, "she is a fine lady among animals."[10] The description of a horse which follows this statement emphasizes the fact that a horse is not intended for carrying burdens. From the germinal impression of a description, all the details grow; to this primary impression they all contribute. In the case of buildings, or other things material, this impression is generally one of form, sometimes of the height of the object; if striking, it may be color. The strongest impression of persons is a quality of character which shows itself either in the face or in the pose of a man. An example of each may be found in the following paragraphs from "David Copperfield:"—

"At length we stopped before a very old house bulging out over the road; a house with long, low lattice-windows bulging out still farther, and beams with carved heads on the ends bulging out too, so that I fancied the whole house was leaning forward, trying to see who was passing on the narrow pavement below. It was quite spotless in its cleanliness. The old-fashioned brass knocker on the low-arched door, ornamented with carved garlands of fruits and flowers, twinkled like a star; the two stone steps descending to the door were as white as if they had been covered with fair linen; and all the angles and corners, and carvings and mouldings, and quaint little panes of glass, and quainter little windows, though as old as the hills, were as pure as any snow that ever fell upon the hills.

"When the pony-chaise stopped at the door, and my eyes were intent upon the house, I saw a cadaverous face appear at a small window on the ground floor (in a little round tower that formed one side of the house), and quickly disappear. The low arched door then opened, and the face came out. It was quite as cadaverous as it had looked in the window, though in the grain of it there was that tinge of red which is sometimes to be observed in the skins of red-haired people. It belonged to a red-haired person—a youth of fifteen, as I take it now, but looking much older whose hair was cropped as close as the closest stubble; who had hardly any eyebrows, and no eyelashes, and eyes of a red-brown; so unsheltered and unshaded that I remember wondering how he went to sleep. He was high-shouldered and bony; dressed in decent black, with a white wisp of a neck cloth; buttoned up to the throat; and had a long, lank, skeleton hand, which particularly attracted my attention, as he stood at the pony's head, rubbing his chin with it, and looking up at us in the chaise."

Hawthorne thus begins his description of "The House of the Seven Gables:"—

"Maule's Lane, or Pyncheon Street, as it were now more decorous to call it, was thronged, at the appointed hour, as with a congregation on its way to church. All, as they approached, looked upward at the imposing edifice, which was henceforth to assume its rank among the habitations of mankind."

And in the same volume his description of "The Pyncheon of To-day" begins:—

"As the child went down the steps, a gentleman ascended them, and made his entrance into the shop. It was the portly, and, had it possessed the advantage of a little more height, would have been the stately figure of a man, considerably in the decline of life, dressed in a black suit of some thin stuff, resembling broadcloth as closely as possible."

If the description be long, and the object will lend itself to such a treatment, a definite, tangible, easily understood shape or form should be suggested at once. Notice Newman's first sentence describing Attica: "A confined triangle, perhaps fifty miles its greatest length, and thirty its greatest breadth." Like this is the beginning of the description of the battle of Waterloo by Victor Hugo.

"Those who would get a clear idea of the battle of Waterloo have only to lay down upon the ground in their mind a capital letter A. The left stroke of the A is the road to Nivelles, the right stroke is the road from Genappe, the cross of the A is the sunken road from Ohain to Braine l'Alleud. The top of the A is Mont Saint Jean, Wellington is there; the left-hand lower point is Hougomont, Reille is there with Jerome Bonaparte; the right-hand lower point is La Belle Alliance, Napoleon is there. A little below the point where the cross of the A meets and cuts the right stroke, is La Haie Sainte. At the middle of this cross is the precise point where the final battle word was spoken. There the lion is placed, the involuntary symbol of the supreme heroism of the Imperial Guard. The triangle contained at the top of the A, between the two strokes and the cross, is the plateau of Mont Saint Jean. The struggle for this plateau was the whole of the battle."[11]

In "The Vision of Sir Launfal" Lowell opens his beautiful description with the words, "And what is so rare as a day in June?" From this general and comprehensive sentence follow all the details which make a June day perfect.

Hawthorne, after telling how he happened to write of him, begins his long description of "The Old Apple Dealer" with the following paragraph:—

"He is a small man, with gray hair and gray stubble beard, and is invariably clad in a shabby surtout of snuff color, closely buttoned, and half concealing a pair of gray pantaloons; the whole dress, though clean and entire, being evidently flimsy with much wear. His face, thin, withered, furrowed, and with features which even age has failed to render impressive, has a frost-bitten aspect. It is a moral frost which no physical warmth or comfortableness could counteract. The summer sunshine may fling its white heat upon him, or the good fire of the depot room may make him the focus of its blaze on a winter's day; but all in vain; for still the old man looks as if he were in a frosty atmosphere, with scarcely warmth enough to keep life in the region about his heart. It is a patient, long-suffering, quiet, hopeless, shivering aspect. He is not desperate,—that, though its etymology implies no more, would be too positive an expression,—but merely devoid of hope. As all his past life, probably, offers no spots of brightness to his memory, so he takes his present poverty and discomfort as entirely a matter of course; he thinks it the definition of existence, so far as himself is concerned, to be poor, cold, and uncomfortable. It may be added, that time has not thrown dignity as a mantle over the old man's figure: there is nothing venerable about him: you pity him without a scruple."

So this old apple dealer shivers all through this description of nine pages to the last sentences:—

"God be praised, were it only for your sake, that the present shapes of human existence are not cast in iron nor hewn in everlasting adamant, but moulded of the vapors that vanish away while the essence flits upward to the Infinite. There is a spiritual essence in this gray and lean old shape that shall flit upward too. Yes; doubtless there is a region where the lifelong shiver will pass away from his being, and that quiet sigh, which it has taken him so many years to breathe, will be brought to a close for good and all."

The prominent characteristic may be the feeling aroused by the object. It may be horror, as in a description of a haunted house or a murderer; it may be love, as in the picture of an old home or a sainted mother. The emotion occasioned is often mentioned or suggested at once, and the details are afterward given which have called forth the feeling. Poe uses this in the first paragraph of "The House of Usher."

"During the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless day in the autumn of the year, when the clouds hung oppressively low in the heavens, I had been passing alone, on horseback, through a singularly dreary tract of country, and at length found myself, as the shades of evening drew on, within view of the melancholy House of Usher. I know not how it was—but, with the first glimpse of the building, a sense of insufferable gloom pervaded my spirit. I say insufferable; for the feeling was unrelieved by any of that half-pleasurable, because poetic, sentiment with which the mind usually receives even the sternest natural images of the desolate or terrible. I looked upon the scene before me—upon the mere house, and the simple landscape features of the domain—upon the bleak walls—upon the vacant, eye-like windows—upon a few rank sedges—and upon a few white trunks of decayed trees—with an utter depression of soul which I can compare to no earthly sensation more properly than to the after-dream of a reveler upon opium—the bitter lapse into every-day life—the hideous dropping off of the veil. There was an iciness, a sinking, a sickening of the heart—an unredeemed dreariness of thought which no goading of the imagination could torture into aught of the sublime.... It was, possible, I reflected, that a mere different arrangement of the particulars of the scene, of the details of the picture, would be sufficient to modify, or perhaps to annihilate, its capacity for sorrowful impression; and, acting upon this idea, I reined my horse to the precipitous brink of a black and lurid tarn that lay in unruffled lustre by the dwelling, and gazed down—but with a shudder even more thrilling than before—upon the remodeled and inverted images of the gray sedge, and the ghastly tree-stems, and the vacant and eye-like windows."

And one may see from looking back at the illustrations given that the dominant impression which gives the character to the whole description, this leading quality which is the essence of the whole, usually stands at the very beginning, and to it all the succeeding details cling.

The End of a Description.

The end of a description is equally as important as the opening. In most descriptions, whether short or long, the most important detail, the detail that emphasizes most the general feeling of the whole, stands at the end. If the description be short, the necessity of a comprehensive opening statement is not imperative,—indeed, it may be made so formal and ostentatious when compared with the rest of the description as to be ridiculous; yet even in the short description some important detail should close it. In a long description the repetition of the opening statement in a new form sometimes stands at the end. If the description be of movement or change, the end will be the climax of the movement, the result of the change.

In the examples already given there are illustrations of the methods of closing. In each case, there is an important detail or an artistic repetition of the general impression. Many examples of short characterization can be found in all narratives. In Irving's description of Ichabod Crane, the next to the last sentence gives the significant detail, and the last gives another general impression. It reads:—

"The cognomen of Crane was not inapplicable to his person. He was tall, but exceedingly lank, with narrow shoulders, long arms and legs, hands that dangled a mile out of his sleeves, feet that might have served for shovels, and his whole frame most loosely hung together. His head was small, and flat at top, with huge ears, large green glassy eyes, and a long snipe nose, so that it looked like a weather-cock perched upon his spindle neck to tell which way the wind blew." ("The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.")

So far this is but an amplification of his likeness to a crane; certainly "a long snipe nose" "upon his spindle neck" is the most important detail. Next the author gives another general impression:—

"To see him striding along the profile of a hill on a windy day, with his clothes bagging and fluttering about him, one might have mistaken him for the genius of famine descending upon the earth, or some scarecrow eloped from a cornfield."

The following is from "The House of Usher:"—

"Shaking off from my spirit what must have been a dream, I scanned more narrowly the real aspect of the building. Its principal feature seemed to be that of an excessive antiquity. The discoloration of ages had been great. Minute fungi overspread the whole exterior, hanging in a fine tangled web-work from the eaves. Yet all this was apart from any extraordinary dilapidation. No portion of the masonry had fallen, and there appeared to be a wild inconsistency between its still perfect adaptation of parts and the crumbling condition of the individual stones. In this there was much that reminded me of the specious totality of old woodwork which has rotted for long years in some neglected vault with no disturbance from the breath of the external air. Beyond this indication of extensive decay, however, the fabric gave little token of instability. Perhaps the eye of a scrutinizing observer might have discovered a barely perceptible fissure, which, extending from the roof of the building in front, made its way down the wall in a zigzag direction, until it became lost in the sullen waters of the tarn."

In this every detail emphasizes the "excessive antiquity" of the house; and on reading the story there is no question of the importance of the "barely perceptible fissure." Thereby hangs the tale.

The two following are descriptions of dawn, of change; they have marked climaxes. The first is by Edward Everett, the second by Stevenson. The similarity in choice of words and in the feelings of the men is remarkable.

"Such was the glorious spectacle as I entered the train. As we proceeded, the timid approach of twilight became more perceptible; the intense blue of the sky began to soften; the smaller stars, like little children, went first to rest; the sister-beams of the Pleiades soon melted together; but the bright constellations of the west and north remained unchanged. Steadily the wondrous transfiguration went on. Hands of angels, hidden from mortal eyes, shifted the scenery of the heavens; the glories of night dissolved into the glories of dawn. The blue sky now turned more softly gray; the great watch-stars shut up their holy eyes; the east began to kindle. Faint streaks of purple soon blushed along the sky; the whole celestial concave was filled with the inflowing tides of the morning light, which came pouring down from above in one great ocean of radiance, till at length, as we reached the Blue Hills, a flash of purple blazed out from above the horizon, and turned the dewy teardrops of flower and leaf into rubies and diamonds. In a few seconds, the everlasting gates of morning were thrown wide open, and the lord of day, arrayed in glories too severe for the gaze of man, began his state." ("The Uses of Astronomy.")

"At last she began to be aware of a wonderful revolution, compared to which the fire of Mittwalden Palace was but a crack and flash of a percussion cap. The countenance with which the pines regarded her began insensibly to change; the grass, too, short as it was, and the whole winding staircase of the brook's course, began to wear a solemn freshness of appearance. And this slow transfiguration reached her heart, and played upon it, and transpierced it with a serious thrill. She looked all about; the whole face of nature looked back, brimful of meaning, finger on lip, leaking its glad secret. She looked up. Heaven was almost emptied of stars. Such as still lingered shone with a changed and waning brightness, and began to faint in their stations. And the color of the sky itself was most wonderful; for the rich blue of the night had now melted and softened and brightened; and there had succeeded a hue that has no name, and that is never seen but as the herald of the morning. 'Oh!' she cried, joy catching at her voice, 'Oh! it is the dawn!'

"In a breath she passed over the brook, and looped up her skirts and fairly ran in the dim alleys. As she ran, her ears were aware of many pipings, more beautiful than music; in the small, dish-shaped houses in the fork of giant arms, where they had lain all night, lover by lover, warmly pressed, the bright-eyed, big-hearted singers began to awaken for the day. Her heart melted and flowed forth to them in kindness. And they, from their small and high perches in the clerestories of the wood cathedral, peered down sidelong at the ragged Princess as she flitted below them on the carpet of the moss and tassel.

"Soon she had struggled to a certain hilltop, and saw far before her the silent inflooding of the day. Out of the East it welled and whitened; the darkness trembled into light; and the stars were extinguished like the street-lamps of a human city. The whiteness brightened into silver; the silver warmed into gold, and the gold kindled into pure and living fire; and the face of the East was barred with elemental scarlet. The day drew its first long breath, steady and chill; and for leagues around the woods sighed and shivered. And then, at one bound the sun had floated up; and her startled eyes received day's first arrow, and quailed under the buffet. On every side, the shadows leaped from their ambush and fell prone. The day was come, plain and garish; and up the steep and solitary eastern heaven, the sun, victorious over his competitors, continued slowly and royally to mount." ("Prince Otto.")

Proportion.

One thing further should be said regarding Mass. Not everything can stand first or last; some important details must be placed in the midst of a description. These particulars will not be of equal importance. The more important details may be given their proportionate emphasis by relatively increasing the length of their treatment. If one detail is more important than another, it requires more to be said about it; unimportant matters should be passed over with a word. Proportion in the length of treatment is a guide to the relative importance of the matters introduced into a description.

In the description of "The House of Usher," position emphasizes the barely perceptible fissure. Proportion singles out the crumbling condition of the individual stones and makes this detail more emphatic than either the discoloration or the fungi. And in Newman's description, the olive-tree, the brilliant atmosphere, the thyme, the bees, all add to the charms of bright and beautiful Athens; but most of all the Aegean, with its chain of islands, its dark violet billows, its jets of silver, the heaving and panting of its long waves,—the restless living element fascinates and enraptures "yon pilgrim student." Position and proportion are the means of emphasis in a paragraph of description.

Arrangement must be natural.

Having settled the massing of the description, the next matter for consideration is the arrangement. In order that the parts of a description may be coherent, hold together, they should be arranged in the order in which they would naturally be perceived. What strikes the eye of the beholder as most important, often the general characteristic of the whole, should be mentioned first; and the details should follow as they are seen. In a building, the usual way of observing and describing is from foundation to turret stone. A landscape may be described by beginning with what is near and extending the view; this is common. Sometimes the very opposite plan is pursued; or one may begin on either hand and advance toward the other. Of a person near by, the face is the first thing observed; for it is there that his character can be best discovered. Afterward details of clothing follow as they would naturally be noticed. If a person be at a distance his pose and carriage would be about all that could be seen; as he approaches, the other details would be mentioned as they came into view. To arrange details in the order in which they are naturally observed will result in an association in the description of the details that are contiguous in the objects. Jumping about in a description is a source of confusion. How entirely it may ruin a paragraph can be estimated by the effect upon this single sentence, "He was tall, with feet that might have served for shovels, narrow shoulders, hands that dangled a mile out of his sleeves, long arms and legs, and his whole frame most loosely hung together." This rearrangement makes but a disjointed and feeble impression; and the reason is entirely that an order in which no person ever observed a man has been substituted for the commonest order,—from head to foot. Arrange details so that the parts which are contiguous shall be associated in the description, and proceed in the order in which the details are naturally observed.

The following is by Irving; he is describing the stage-coachman:—

"He has commonly a broad, full face, curiously mottled with red, as if the blood had been forced by hard feeding into every vessel of the skin; he is swelled into jolly dimensions by frequent potations of malt liquors, and his bulk is still further increased by a multiplicity of coats, in which he is buried like a cauliflower, the upper one reaching to his heels. He wears a broad-brimmed, low-crowned hat; a huge roll of colored handkerchief about his neck, knowingly knotted and tucked in at the bosom; and has in summer time a large bouquet of flowers in his buttonhole, the present, most probably, of some enamored country lass. His waistcoat is commonly of some bright color, striped, and his small-clothes extend far below the knees, to meet a pair of jockey boots which reach about half way up his legs."[12]

Use Familiar Images.

When the materials have been selected and arranged, the hardest part of the work has been done. It now remains to express in language the picture. A few suggestions regarding the kind of language will be helpful. The writer must always bear in mind the fact that in constructing a mental picture each reader does it from the images he already possesses. "Quaint arabesques" is without meaning to many persons; and until the word has been looked up in the dictionary, and the picture seen there, the beautiful line of "Sir Launfal" suggests no image whatever. So when Stevenson speaks of the birds in the "clerestories of the wood cathedral," the image is not distinct in the mind of a young American. Supposing a pupil in California were asked to describe an orange to an Esquimau. He might say that it is a spheroid about the size of an apple, and the color of one of Lorraine's sunsets. This would be absolutely worthless to a child of the frigid zone. Had he been told that an orange was about the size of a snowball, much the color of the flame of a candle, that the peeling came off like the skin from a seal, and that the inside was good to eat, he would have known more of this fruit. The images which lie in our minds and from which we construct new pictures are much like the blocks that a child-builder rearranges in many different forms; but the blocks do not change. From them he may build a castle or a mill; yet the only difference is a difference in arrangement. So it is with the pictures we build up in imagination: our castle in Spain we have never seen, but the individual elements which we associate to lift up this happy dwelling-place are the things we know and have seen. A reader creates nothing new; all he does is to rearrange in his own mind the images already familiar. Only so may he pass from the known to the unknown.

The fact that we construct pictures of what we read from those images already in our minds warns the writer against using materials which those for whom he writes could not understand. It compels him to select definite images, and it urges him to use the common and the concrete. It frequently drives him to use comparisons.

Use of Comparisons.

To represent the extremely bare and unornamented appearance of a building, one might write, "It looked like a great barn," or "It was a great barn." In either case the image would be definite, common, and concrete. In both cases there is a comparison. In the first, where the comparison is expressed, there is a simile; in the second, where the comparison is only implied, there is a metaphor. These two figures of speech are very common in description, and it is because they are of great value. One other is sometimes used,—personification, which ascribes to inanimate things the attributes of life which are the property of animate nature. What could be happier than this by Stevenson: "All night long he can hear Nature breathing deeply and freely; even as she takes her rest she turns and smiles"? or this, "A faint sound, more like a moving coolness than a stream of air"? And at the end of the chapter which describes his "night under the pines," he speaks of the "tapestries" and "the inimitable ceiling" and "the view which I command from the windows." In this one chapter are personification, simile, metaphor,—all comparisons, and doing what could hardly be done without them. Common, distinct, concrete images are surest.

Choice of Words. Adjectives and Nouns.

To body forth these common, distinct, concrete images calls for a discriminating choice of words; for in the choice of words lies a large part of the vividness of description. If the thing described be unknown to the reader, it requires the right word to place it before him; if it be common, still must the right word be found to set it apart from the thousand other objects of the same class. The words that may justly be called describing words are adjectives and nouns; and of these the adjective is the first descriptive word. The rule that a writer should never use two adjectives where one will do, and that he should not use one if a noun can be found that completely expresses the thought, is a good one to follow. One certain stroke of the crayon is worth a hundred lines, each approaching the right one. One word, the only one, will tell the truth more vividly than ten that approach its expression. For it must be remembered that a description must be done quickly; every word that is used and does nothing is not only a waste of time, but is actually in the way. In a description every word must count. It may be a comparison, an epithet, personification, or what not, but whatever method is adopted, the right word must do it quickly.

How much depends on the nice choice of words may be seen by a study of the selections already quoted; and especially by a careful reading of those by Stevenson and Everett. To show the use of adjectives and nouns in description, the following from Kipling is a good illustration. Toomai had just reached the elephants' "ball-room" when he saw—

"white-tusked wild males, with fallen leaves and nuts and twigs lying in the wrinkles of their necks and the folds of their ears; fat, slow-footed she-elephants, with restless pinky-black calves only three or four feet high, running under their stomachs; young elephants with their tusks just beginning to show, and very proud of them; lanky, scraggy, old-maid elephants, with their hollow, anxious faces, and trunks like rough bark; savage old bull-elephants, scarred from shoulder to flank with great weals and cuts of by-gone fights, and the caked dirt of their solitary mud bath dropping from their shoulders; and there was one with a broken tusk and the marks of the full-stroke, the terrible drawing scrape of a tiger's claw on his side."[13]

One third of the words in this paragraph are descriptive nouns and adjectives, none of which the reader wishes to change.

Use of Verbs.

Verbs also have a great value in description. In the paragraph picturing the dawn, Stevenson has not neglected the verbs. "Welled," "whitened," "trembled," "brightened," "warmed," "kindled," and so on through the paragraph. Try to change them, and it is apparent that something is lost by any substitution. Kaa, the python, "pours himself along the ground." If he is angry, "Baloo and Bagheera could see the big swallowing-muscles on either side of Kaa's throat ripple and bulge."

Yet in the choice of words, one may search for the bizarre and unusual rather than for the truly picturesque. Stevenson at times seems to have lapsed. When he says that Modestine would feel a switch "more tenderly than my cane;" that he "must instantly maltreat this uncomplaining animal," meaning constantly; and at another place that he "had to labor so consistently with" his stick that the sweat ran into his eyes, there is a suspicion of a desire for the sensational rather than the direct truth. On the other hand, the beginner finds himself using words that have lost, their meaning through indiscriminate usage. "Awful good," "awful pretty," and "awful sweet" mean something less than good, pretty, and sweet. "Lovely," "dear," "splendid," "unique," and a large number of good words have been much dulled by the ignorant use of babblers. Superlatives and all words denoting comparison should be used with stinginess. One cannot afford to part with this kind of coin frequently; the cheaper coins should be used, else he will find an empty purse when need arises. Thackeray has this: "Her voice was the sweetest, low song." How much better this, Her voice was a sweet, low song. All the world is shut out from this, while in the former he challenges the world by the comparison. Shakespeare was wiser when he made Lear say,—

"Her voice was ever soft, Gentle, and low,—an excellent thing in woman."

Avoid words which have lost their meaning by indiscriminate use; shun the sensational and the bizarre; use superlatives with economy; but in all you do, whether in unadorned or figurative language, choose the word that is quick and sure and vivid—the one word that exactly suggests the picture.

SUGGESTIVE QUESTIONS AND EXERCISES

QUESTIONS.

THE OLD MANSE. (Riverside Literature Series, No. 69.)

Are there narrative portions in "The Old Manse"? paragraphs of exposition?

Do you term the whole narration, description, or exposition? Why?

Frame a sentence which you think would be an adequate topic sentence for the whole piece.

What phrase in the first paragraph allows the author to begin the second with the words, "Nor, in truth, had the Old Manse," etc.? Where in the second paragraph is found the words which are the source of "my design," mentioned in the third? How does the author pass from the fourth paragraph to the fifth? In the same way note the connections between the succeeding paragraphs. They are most skillfully dovetailed together. Now make a list of the phrases in the first fifteen pages which introduce paragraphs, telling from what in the preceding paragraph each new paragraph springs. Do you think that such a felicitous result just happened? or did Hawthorne plan it?

Does Hawthorne generally introduce his descriptions by giving the feeling aroused by the object described, a method very common with Poe?

In the paragraph beginning at the bottom of p. 18, what do you think of the selection of material? What have guided in the inclusion and exclusion of details?

Write a paragraph upon this topic: There could not be a more joyous aspect of external nature than as seen from the windows of my study just after the passing of a cooling shower. Be careful to select things that have been made happy, and to use adjectives and nouns that are full of joy.

Make a list of the words used to describe "The Old Apple Dealer."

Has this description Unity?

What relation to the whole has the first sentence of paragraph three? the last?

Do you think there is a grammatical error in the third sentence of this paragraph?

By contrasts to what has Hawthorne brought out better the character of the Apple Dealer? When can contrasts help?

AN INDIAN-SUMMER REVERIE, AND OTHER POEMS. (Riverside Literature Series, No. 30.)

In this poem what purpose is served by the first two stanzas?

Where in the landscape does the author begin? Which way does he progress?

Quote stanzas in which other senses than sight are called upon.

Make a list of the figures of speech. How many similes? metaphors? examples of personification? Which seems most effective? Which instance of its use do you prefer? Has Lowell used too many figures?

Read "The Oak," "The Dandelion," and "Al Fresco."

Are they description or exposition? Do they bear out Lowell's estimate of himself?

THE SKETCH-BOOK. (Riverside Literature Series, Nos. 51, 52.)

Why has Irving given four pages to the description of Sleepy Hollow before he introduces Ichabod Crane?

Why, then, seven pages to Ichabod before the story begins?

What gives the peculiar interest to this tale?

In the "Legend of Sleepy Hollow" how many paragraphs of description close with an important detail?

In how many with a general characterization?

In all the descriptions of buildings by Irving that you have read, what are the first things mentioned,—size, shape, color, or what? Make a list, so as to be sure.

Does Irving use many comparisons? Are the likenesses to common things? Select the ten you think best. Are there more in narrative or descriptive passages? What do you gather from this fact?

In "Christmas Day," on p. 51 (R. L. S., No. 52), does Irving proceed from far to near in the landscape? Is this common? Find another example.

How has Irving emphasized the littleness of the minister described on p. 56 (R. L. S., No. 52)?

THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER. (Riverside Literature Series, No. 119.)

Is the arrangement of the details in the last two lines of the first paragraph stronger than the arrangement of the same details on p. 63? Why, or why not?

In the description of the hall, pp. 67 and 68, do the details produce the effect upon you which they did upon Poe?

Find a description in this piece which closes with an important detail.

Is Usher described at all when Poe says, "I gazed upon him with a feeling half of pity, half of awe"? Do the details enumerated arouse such feelings in you? Would the feeling have been called forth if it had not been suggested by Poe? Is there, then, any advantage in this method of opening a description?

What good was done by describing Usher as Poe knew him in youth?

Why is the parenthetical clause on p. 72 necessary?

On p. 80, should Poe write "previously to its final interment"?

What do you think of the length of the sentence quoted on p. 85?

Does Poe use description to accent the mood of the narrative, or to make concrete the places and persons?

Why is "The Haunted Palace" introduced into the story?

Is this story as good as "The Gold-Bug"?

SILAS MARNER. (Riverside Literature Series, No. 83.)

Why is not the early history of Silas Marner related first in the story?

By what steps has the author approached the definite time?

From the fragments about his appearance, do you get a clear idea of how Marner looks?

Do you approve this method of scattering the description along through the story? Write a description of Marner on the night he was going to the tavern.

Could not the quarrel between Godfrey and Dunsey been omitted?

Describe the interior of Marner's cottage.

Why should Sally Oates and her dropsy be admitted to the story?

Do you know as well how George Eliot's characters look as how they think and feel?

What do you think of the last sentence of Chapter IV.? Why does not Chapter V. go on with Dunsey's story? Why is Chapter VI. introduced at all? What of its close?

What figure in the last sentence of Chapter X.?

Would you prefer to know how tall Eppie was, what kind of clothes she wore, etc., to the knowledge you gain of her on p. 178?

Suppose that Dunsey came home the night he staked Wildfire, recite the conversation between him and Godfrey.

Have Dolly Winthrop, Priscilla Lammeter, and Mr. Macey talk over "The New Minister."

Write on "What I see in George Eliot's Face."

THE DESERTED VILLAGE. (Riverside Literature Series, No. 68.)

Is this piece description or exposition?

In the first stanza where is the topic sentence?

The author has made two groups of charms. Would it be as well to change them about? Give your reasons.

Where has he used the ear instead of the eye to suggest his picture? Is it clear?

What method is adopted in lines 125-128? See also lines 237-250.

Can you unite the paragraphs on p. 25? Why do you think so?

Could you suggest a new arrangement of details in lines 341-362 that would be as good as the present? What are the last four lines for?

EXERCISES.

Enumerative Description may well employ a few lessons. In it accuracy of detail must be studied, and every detail must be introduced.

1. The Teacher's Desk.

2. Write a letter to a carpenter giving details for the construction of a small bookcase.

3. By telling how you made it, describe a camp, a kite, a dress, or a cake. Narration may be employed for the purpose of description. A good example may be found in "Robinson Crusoe" in the chapter describing his home after the shipwreck.

4. Describe an unfurnished room. Shape, size, position, and number of windows, the fireplace, etc., should be definite. Be sure to give the point of view. To say "On my right hand," "In front of me," or any similar phrases means nothing unless the reader knows where you are.

In these exercises the pupil will doubtless employ the paragraph of particulars. This is the most common in description. Other forms are valuable.

5. Using a paragraph telling what it was not, finish this: I followed the great singer to her home. Imagine my surprise in finding that the house in which this lady lived was not a home of luxury and splendor,—not even a home of comfort. Go on with the details of a home of luxury which were not there. Finish with what you did see. This is really a description of two houses set in artistic contrast to heighten the effect. Remember you are outside.

6. By the use of comparison finish this: The home of my poor little friend was but little better than a barn. Choose only such details as emphasize the barn-like appearance of the home. There is but one room. Remember where you are standing; and keep in mind the effect you wish to produce.

7. Using a moving point of view, describe an interior. Do not have too many rooms.

8. Furnish the room described in number four to suit your taste. Tell how it looks. Remember that a few things give character to a room.

9. Describe your childhood's home as it would look to you after years of absence.

10. Using a paragraph of the obverse, describe the appearance of the house from which you were driven by the cruelty of a drunken father.

11. Describe a single tree standing alone in a field. It will be well for the teacher to read to the class some descriptions of trees,—Lowell's "Birch" and "Oak," "Under the Willows," and some stanzas from "An Indian Summer Reverie." Holmes has some good paragraphs on trees in "The Autocrat." Any good tree descriptions will help pupils to do it better than they can without suggestion. They should describe their own tree, however.

12. Describe some single flower growing wild. Read Lowell's "Dandelion," "Violet, Sweet Violet," Wordsworth's "Daisy," "The Daffodils," "The Small Celandine," and Burns's "Daisy." These do not so much describe as they arouse a feeling of love for the flowers which will show itself in the composition.

13. Describe a view of a lake. If possible, have your point of view above the lake and use the paragraph of comparison.

14. Describe a landscape from a single point of view. Read Curtis's "My Castles in Spain" from "Prue and I," many descriptions in "An Inland Voyage" by Stevenson, and "Bay Street" by Bliss Carman in "The Atlantic Monthly."

15. Describe your first view of a small cluster of houses or a small town.

16. Approach the town, describing its principal features. Keep the reader informed as to where you are.

17. Describe a dog of your own.

18. Describe a dog of your neighbor's. Before the description is undertaken read "Our Dogs" and "Rab" by Dr. Brown; "A Dog of Flanders" by Ouida. Scott has some noble fellows in his novels.

19. Describe a flock of chickens. There are good descriptions of chickens in "The House of the Seven Gables" and in "Sketches" by Dickens.

20. Describe the burning of your own home. Be careful not to narrate.

21. Describe a stranger you met on the street to-day. It is easier to describe a person if you and the person you describe move toward each other. Remember that you begin the description at a distance. Details should be mentioned as they actually come into view.

22. Describe your father in his favorite corner at home.

23. Describe a person you do not like, by telling what he is not.

24. Describe a person you admire, but are not acquainted with, using the paragraph of comparisons.

25. Describe a picture.

It would be well to have at the end of this year four or five stories written, in which description plays a part. Its principal use is to give the setting to the story, to give concreteness to the characters, and to accent the mood of the story.

Most passages of description are short. Rarely will any pupil write over three hundred words. One hundred are often better. The short composition gives an opportunity for the study of accuracy of expression. What details to include; in what order to arrange them that they produce the best effect, both of vividness and naturalness; and the influence of the point of view and the purpose of the author on the unity of description should be kept constantly present in the exercises. Careful attention should be paid to choice of words, for on right words depends in a large degree the vividness of a description. Right words in well-massed paragraphs of vivid description should be the object this term.

* * * * *

CHAPTER V

EXPOSITION

So far we have studied discourse which deals with things,—things active, doing something, considered under the head of narration; and things at rest, and pictured, considered in description. Now we come to exposition, which deals with ideas either separately or in combinations. Instead of Mr. Smith's horse, exposition treats of the general term, horse. "The Great Stone Face" may have taught a lesson by its story, but the discussion of the value of lofty ideals is a subject for exposition.

General Terms Difficult.

That general terms and propositions are harder to get hold of than concrete facts is readily apparent in the first reading of an author like Emerson. To a young person it means little. Yet when he puts in the place of the general terms some specific examples, and so verifies the statements, the general propositions have a mine of meaning, and "the sense of the author is as broad as the world." This stanza from Lowell is but little suggestive to young readers:—

"Such earnest natures are the fiery pith, The compact nucleus, round which systems grow! Mass after mass becomes inspired therewith, And whirls impregnate with the central glow."[14]

Yet when Columbus and Luther and Garrison are mentioned as illustrations of the meaning, it becomes world-wide in its application. Still in order to get at the thought, there is first the need of the specific and the concrete; afterward we pass to the general and the abstract.

As abstract ideas are harder to get hold of than concrete facts, so exposition has difficulties greater than those found in narration and description. It is not so hard to tell what belongs in a story; the events are all distinct. Nor is it so difficult to know what to include in a description; one can look and see. In exposition this is not so. In most minds ideas do not have distinct limits; the edges rather are indistinct. It is hard to tell where the idea stops. In writing of "The Uses of Coal," it is easy to wander over an indistinct boundary and to take a survey of "The Origin of Coal." Not only may one include what unquestionably should be excluded, but there is no definite guide to the arrangement of the materials, such as was found in narration. There a sequence of time was an almost infallible rule; here the writer must search carefully how to arrange hazy ideas in some effective form. As discourse comes to deal more with general ideas, the difficulties of writing increase; and the difficulties are not due to any new principles of structure which must be introduced. When one says that the material should be selected according to the familiar law of Unity, he has given the guiding principle. Yet the real difficulty is still before an author: it is to decide what stamp to put upon such elusive matter as ideas. They cannot be kept long enough in the twilight of consciousness to analyze them; and often ideas that have been marked "accepted" have, upon reexamination, to be "rejected." To examine ideas—the material used in this form of discourse—so thoroughly that they may be accurately, definitely known in their backward relation and their bearing upon what follows, this is the seat of the difficulty in exposition.

Exposition may conveniently be classified into exposition of a term, or definition; and exposition of a proposition, which is generally suggested by the term exposition.

Definition.

Definition of a word means giving its limits or boundaries. Of man it might be said that it is a living animal, having a strong bony skeleton; that this skeleton consists of a trunk from which extend four limbs, called arms and legs, and is surmounted by a bony cavity, called a skull; that the skeleton protects the vital organs, and is itself covered by a muscular tissue which moves the bones and gives a rounded beauty to their ugliness; that man has a highly developed nervous system, the centre of which is the brain placed in the skull. So a person might go on for pages, enumerating the attributes which, taken together, make up the general idea of man.