quaintance; the happiest looking; the most interesting looking. 15. Describe some bit of natural scenery, emphasizing a dominant feature: (a) A bend in the river. (b) A leafy nook. (c) The swimming hole. (d) A cataract. (e) The seashore. (f) The wooded vale. (g) A meadow. (h) The place where you found pussy-willows. 16. Write a description, the aim of which is to convey an impression of one of the following: (a) fear; (b) happiness; (c) weariness; (d) dejection; (e) confusion and disorder. 17. Write a letter to a friend in which you aim to give an impression of (a) the town in which you live, or (b) the place where you spend your vacations. 18. Describe the picture of cheer and comfort that the interior of a farmhouse presents to a wanderer who has lost his way on a cold winter night. 19. Write a description, the purpose of which is to convey an impression that you yourself have experienced. 20. (a) Turn to the specimens of description in this chapter (pp. 240–267) and find out the particular point of interest in each. (b) Make a list of suggestive and picture words taken from the same descriptions. 21. Describe for a city boy one of the following: (a) A country store in the evening. (b) A village character. (c) The arrival of the mail. (d) The most prominent man of the country town. 22. Write a description of two brothers, using comparison and contrast. 23. Write a description in which you suggest sound and odors as well as the things seen. 24. Read the following and point out the expressions which indicate the arrangement and placing of details: It was a vast enclosure, lighted on either side by great windows of colored glass, the roof supported by thin iron pillars elaborately decorated. To the left were bulletin blackboards, and beyond these, in the northwest angle of the floor, a great railed-in space where the Western Union Telegraph was installed. To the right, on the other side of the room, a row of tables, laden with neatly arranged paper bags half full of samples of grains, stretched along the east wall from the doorway of the public room at one end to the telephone room at the other. The center of the floor was occupied by the pits. To the left and to the front of Landry the provision pit, to the right the corn pit, while farther on at the north extremity of the floor, and nearly under the visitors' gallery, much larger than the other two, and flanked by the wicket of the official recorder, was the wheat pit itself. Directly opposite the visitors' gallery, high upon the south wall, a great dial was affixed, and on the dial a marking hand that indicated the current price of wheat, fluctuating with the changes made in the Pit. Just now it stood at ninety-three and three-eighths, the closing quotation of the preceding day. FRANK NORRIS: The Pit. 25. Write a descriptive paragraph on one or more of (f) My favorite retreat. weather, in a fog. (h) An old-fashioned equipage. (i) The haunted house. (j) An old garret. (k) The sounds of the woods on a July morning. 26. Describe the picture the following expressions sug gest to you: (a) The smell of pitch and tar. (b) Broad stream. (c) Towering trees. (d) Floating leaves and silvery blossoms. (e) Roar of the metropolis. (f) Tasselling corn rustling its broad leaves. (g) The sun-steeped air with a perfume that calls all the wild bees. (h) Parched fields and dwindling streams. (i) Heap of bright red leaves. (j) Rich brown earth. (k) Nipping winds and early frosts. (2) The smell of spring was in the air. (m) Foaming and thundering on the steep beach. 27. Examine the pictures on pages 167 and 267. Try to determine from the pictures the character of the persons. Write the descriptions. CHAPTER VI EXPOSITION 310. Importance of Exposition. Of all the forms of discourse, exposition, or explanation as it is frequently called, is perhaps the most common and most familiar. You are making use of exposition whenever you answer the questions how or why; whenever you direct a stranger on his way, tell how you solved a problem or how to play a game; and whenever you recite a lesson explaining the subjectmatter in question. Textbooks, sermons, editorials, and essays are all examples of this form of discourse, and prove how important it is. It enters into all lives regardless of occupations. The manufacturer must be able to give the explanations necessary to the production of his wares; the merchant must set forth the merits of his goods; the physician is called upon to make clear the causes of the disordered condition. 311. Purpose of Exposition. The purpose of exposition is to give information, to make clear to another the meaning of that which you are discussing. It appeals to the understanding. Often while describing or narrating, you are stopped short by your listener with an exclamation, "But I do not understand." It may be a word, a technical term, |