Little white Lily Smells very sweet, Rain at her feet. "Thanks to the sunshine, Thanks to the rain, Little white Lily Is happy again." GEORGE MACDONALD. SUBJECTS FOR STORY. In this exercise your entire work, even the plot, is to be original. You have neither a poem nor an outline of topics given to assist you. Select from the following subjects. Miss Frog's Party. The Bee and the Flower. The Church Mouse. Playing School. Flying Kites. The Violet and the Rosebush. The Turtle-dove and the Bluejay. Pussy's Education. The Musical Education of the Frog Children. Complaint of the Town Pump. A Looking-glass's Opinion of the World. 7 CHAPTER IV. PRINCIPLES OF EXPRESSION. PRINCIPLE XVI.— Interrogation and Exclamation. Commonly a sentence used declaratively has a different meaning from the same sentence used interrogatively. Dr. Jones went to Boston, has a very different meaning from, Did Dr. Jones go to Boston? In the interrogative sentence, the questioner does not know whether or not Dr. Jones went to Boston, and wishes to learn. But the question is not always for the purpose of obtaining information. If you ask, Does God pervert justice? the question is not put for the sake of an answer. know what would be the answer. It is merely an emphatic way of saying God does not pervert justice. There are many such cases, when the interrogation is merely an emphatic way of making a statement. You Compare the following interrogative sentences with the same expressed declaratively; and see how much more emphatic the interrogative forms are: 1. Who can declare the mighty acts of the Lord? 2. He that planted the ear, shall He not hear? 3. Can a mother forget her child? 1. No one can declare the mighty acts of the Lord. 2. He that planted the ear must surely be able to hear. 3. A mother cannot possibly forget her child. UNIV. OF Compare also the exclamatory with the declarative form in the following examples, and see how much more vigorous the exclamatory form is: 1. What a wild charge they made! 2. How many goodly creatures are there here! 3. O how I love thy law! 1. They made a wild charge. 2. There are here many goodly creatures. 3. I love thy law. Notice also that in these forms the emphasis is often increased by omission of words: as Mercy upon us! is more forcible than May they have mercy upon us! Monstrous! monstrous! is more forcible than It is monstrous! it is monstrous! PRINCIPLE.-Where an emphatic expression of a thought is desired, prefer the exclamatory or interrogative form to the declarative. The use of these forms for emphasis must not, however, be too frequent, but merely the exception to the general use of the declarative. Exercise 63.-Change from the interrogative to the declarative form. Note how much is lost in energy. 1. When can their glory fade? 2. Some pretty good men were boys once. Were you never a boy, Mr. Superintendent? 3. Are the girls all angels? Do they never do anything wrong? Do girls never make any noise in school? Do girls never need to be scolded? 4. O these women! these women! Could that girl have been playing off any of her coquettish tricks? Was her encouragement of the poor pedagogue all a mere sham to secure the conquest of his rival? Heaven only knows, not I! 5. And for what is all this apparatus of bustle and terror? Is it because anything substantial is expected? No. The stir and bustle itself is the end proposed. 6. And where is he to exert his talents? At home, to be sure, for where else can he obtain a profitable credit for their exertion? 7. Has the gentleman done? Has he completely done? He was unparliamentary from the beginning to the end of his speech. There was scarce a word he uttered that was not a violation of the privileges of the House. But I did not call him to order,- why? because the limited talents of some men render it impossible for them to be severe without being unparliamentary. 8. Who made you glorious as the gates of Heaven Exercise 64.- Change from the exclamatory to the declarative. Show how the sentence is rendered exclamatory. Note the loss of energy in the change from the emotional to the matter-of-fact form. V 1. How sweet the moonlight sleeps upon this bank! 2. A horse! a horse! my kingdom for a horse! 3. I have well bethought me of my duties. O, how extensive they are! what a fair and goodly inheritance! 4. For, lo! the hills around, gay in their early green, give silent thanks. 5. O, pleasantly the harvest-moon looked on them through the great elm boughs! 6. How poor, how rich, how abject, how august, A worm! a god! - I tremble at myself, 9. A boom!- the Lighthouse gun! (How its echo rolls and rolls!) Off the shoals! Exercise 65.-Change from the declarative to the interrogative. Note the gain in energy. 2. Thou hast not 1. The Judge of all the earth will do right. given the horse strength; thou hast not clothed his neck with thunder. 3. The leviathan will not make many supplications unto thee; he will not speak soft words unto thee; thou canst not take him as a servant forever; thou canst not play with him as with a bird. 4. We will not submit, and consent that we ourselves shall be ground to powder, and our country and its rights trodden down in the dust. 5. The traces of her early cares, her sufferings, and fatigues, were all gone. V 6. The hardest task in the world is to think. 7. Cut off from all hope of royal clemency, you are nothing, you can be nothing, but outlaws. 8. These roarers (the waves) care nothing for the name of king. 9. You cannot put your hand in the fire without being burned. Exercise 66.- Change from the declarative to the exclamatory. Note the gain in energy. 1. They lash us with their tongues. 2. The scenes of my childhood are dear to my heart.3. Their melody foretells a world of merriment. 4. The fears which such a situation must inspire are boundless. 5. Sighs have been wafted after that ship; prayers have been offered up at the deserted fireside of home. 6. And the star which they saw in the east, went before them till it came and stood over where the young child was. 7. These are noble institutions; this is a comprehensive policy; this is a wise equalization of every political advantage. 8. Our hearts were beating when we saw the army of the League drawn out in long array. 9. Mar cried to them to put their lances down. 10. There never was such a knight in friendship or in war as our sovereign lord, King Henry of Navarre. 11. He commanded them to fix bayonets and charge. 12. King |