CHAPTER III.

SITUATION-TYPES I. AND II.

24. The Situation Elaborated. The next step we shall take in the study of narration is to become acquainted with a more elaborate form of the situa tion than that which we have been studying—one that involves more details in regard to the four elements, and serves to introduce narrative in dialogue.

The exercises that follow on this new type are similar to those we have already had upon the situation; that is, they furnish drill in the principle of variety in sentence structure, order of the situation elements, and choice of words.

25. Model for Situation-type I. A situationtype is a situation that may be used as a model or pattern in our composition. Type I. aims at teaching us how to handle the situation elements with a little more precision than the previous exercise on that motive required. Ruskin, in explaining how painful too much liberty of choice sometimes is to our minds, tells us that a child who will shudder if left alone in an open plain, will be happy playing in a walled garden. This new situation-type which we are about to study is like the garden wall in that it will narrow our liberty in the use of the four w's. It will, however, make the writing of the situation. paragraph easier because more definite than it has hitherto been.

"The sun was shining bright and clear after squalls, and the straits showed violet, green, red, and bronze lines, melting and intermingling each changing second. Jules McCartney, the best blacksmith on the island, stood at the door of his cottage, noting this change in the weather. He was keeping melancholy holiday in his best clothes. His neighbor, Simon Griggs, paused at the gate in passing. He was evidently in distress."

ANALYSIS OF THE MODEL

I. The time element (here day time) may be told in an indirect way-"The sun was shining bright and clear after squalls."

CAUTION.-In giving the time element avoid trite expressions such as "The last rays of the sun."

2. The place element may be given both indirectly-"straits," and directly-" island," "cottage door."

3. The characters we shall designate as A and B, A being the one first mentioned in any situation.

4.

a. In writing a situation on this model, the student should mention the name of each character, unless one of them is a stranger whose name we are to learn in the narrative which follows. "Jules McCartney,” “Simon Griggs."

b. A is to be described by an appositive, a phrase, or a clause, which will tell his occupation or other relation to society-" The best blacksmith on the island."

C. B is to be described by an appositive, a phrase, or a clause, which will tell the relation of B to A-"His neighbor." Use "a stranger," or "a traveler," or some other general characterization, if B is unknown to A.

d. A and B are each to be located-"door of his cottage," "gate."

e. B is to be placed at some distance from A.

f. The reason why each is in a particular place is given-A is "noting the change in the weather." B paused “in passing" and "was evidently in distress."

g. In addition to ƒ (i. e., the reason why each is in a particular place), A and B may each be represented in action. In the above situation, Simon Griggs might have been represented as coming down the street shouting.

In telling a story in the form of a series of three situations,

the appositive should be dropped in the second and third situations. Students will see the need of this dogmatic statement when they attempt to write such a theme.

There should be no change of place or time in this kind of situation. It should be like a picture taken with a snap shot. The situation is spoiled by a change of scene or time, as a picture is by a movement of the person who is being photographed.

Exercise

Write an original situation, using Type I. as a model, and correct it in accordance with the directions given below:

I.

DIRECTIONS

[To be used by the pupil in revising his theme.]

Avoid using the language of the model.

2. Make the place significant; that is, place a farmer in his fields, a lawyer in his office.

3.

Do not connect the names of the characters.

If students are allowed to do this, they do it constantly, and so make their situations monotonous.

4. Do not speak invariably of A as watching or waiting for B.

This direction is given for the same reason as 3; that is, to keep the situations from becoming stereotyped.

5. Set off the appositive by commas.

6. Do not let the appositive, phrase, or clause modifying A or B, tell the whole point of the story.

7. Do not use an appositive with a possessive in the situation.

CAUTION. Do not allow directions to hamper you while you are writing. Use them only in revising work.

Otherwise you will be in the same state of mind

as the centipede whose bewilderment is described in the following:

"The centipede was happy quite

Until the toad for fun,

Said, 'Pray, which leg goes after which?'
Which worked her soul to such a pitch
She lay distracted in the ditch,
Considering how to run."

After you have kept the above directions in mind for some time in revising your exercises, you will begin to obey them without effort in your first writing of a paragraph or theme.

26. Examples of Situation-type I. for Analysis. The following paragraphs should be examined for illustrations of points 1-3 given in the analysis of Situation-type I. (§ 25):

I.

Towards the hour of supper on Friday, the twentysixth of the month of December, a little shepherd lad came into Nazareth, crying bitterly.

Some peasants, who were drinking ale in the Blue Lion, opened the shutters to look into the village orchard, and saw the child running over the snow. They recognized him as the son of Korneliz, and called from the window: "What is the matter? It's time you were abed!"

But sobbing still and shaking with terror, the boy cried that the Spaniards had come, that they had set fire to the farm, had hanged his mother among the nut trees, and bound his nine little sisters to the trunk of a big tree.

— MAURICE MAETERLINCK, The Massacre of the Innocents.

SUGGESTIONS.-I.

Find the references to place. Notice that the name of the town is given first; then that of the inn; then a particular part of the inn is mentioned.

2.

3.

How many times is A spoken of? What is the name? The reasons why A and B are in their respective places are told. Who gives each reason? What are the reasons?

4. The actions of A and B are told. What is the action of each? 5. Although a third set of people are mentioned here, the mother and sisters and the Spaniards, they are not characters of the situation, for they are not in Nazareth at the time the boy appears before the Blue Lion.

II.

When it rains in Amsterdam, it pours; and when the thunder takes a hand in the performance things are pretty lively; this is what my friend Balthazer Van der Lys was saying to himself one summer night as he ran along the Amstel on his way home to escape the storm. On reaching the Orphelinat Straat he rushed under the awning of a shop to seek refuge from the rain; in his hurry he did not take time to look where he was going, and the next moment he found himself fairly in the arms of another man. The person thus disturbed was seated at the time in an arm-chair; this person was no other than our mutual friend, Cornelius Pump, who was undoubtedly one of the most noted savants of the age.

-Victorien SARDOU, Jettatura and Other Stories.

III.

Mrs. Rutger de Peyster sat in her steamer chair idly watching the people marching back and forth on the deck. A gleam of interest flickered an instant in her eyes as her nephew, young Oswald, gave her a good morning and asked if he might take advantage of Colonel de Peyster's absence to sit in his chair for a while.

IV.

It was a summer evening;

Old Kaspar's work was done,
And he before his cottage door
Was sitting in the sun;

And by him sported on the green
His little grandchild Wilhelmine.

– ROBERT SOUTHEY, The Battle of Blenheim.

SUGGESTION.-Analyze also the situations in sections 2 and 9 and determine which of them belong to Type I.

In the next section we shall give attention to the importance of variety in this kind of situation.