DESCRIPTION
=61. Observation.=--The first recommendation given in beginning any
new form of composition is always to arrange what you wish to say in
a logical and orderly manner, by means of an outline, either mental
or written. In description, however, the first thing to do is to
observe the subject of your composition, carefully, completely, and
accurately.
You will be surprised to see how very carelessly you observe, as a
rule, even things with which you are very familiar.
Try, offhand, without further examination, to write a
description of a piece of money (copper, nickel, silver, gold,
or paper), giving the dimensions and the color, and stating
what some of the printing on it is; and try in the same way to
describe the face of a watch, telling the size and length of
the hands, how they run, and what the printing is; to give an
accurate and detailed account of the appearance of the front
of your school building or church, your next door neighbor's
house, the mechanism of a lamp, the exact disposition of the
furniture in your parlor at home, a cornstalk (size of leaves,
shape, how they are set on the stalk, where the ears grow, how
many wrappings of husk inclose them, etc.), a violet, a silk hat
(height, width, shape, lining, width of brim, etc.), a cat's
forefeet (number of toes, sheath for the nail, how they curve
in, why they do not penetrate the cushioned foot in walking,
etc.), a common fly, a robin redbreast, the arrangement of
panels in the front door of your house, an English sparrow, a
postage stamp. Tell how a cow lies down; a horse; a dog.
By such experiments you will find that you are hampered not by
difficulty in expressing what you know, but by the great gaps
in your knowledge of even such very familiar objects. You will
discover that you have never really looked at them, although you
may have seemed to do so every day since you can remember.
Some people seem to have opened more eyes than others, they see with
such force and distinctness; their vision penetrates the tangle
and obscurity where that of others fails like a spent or impotent
bullet. How many eyes did Gilbert White open? How many did Henry
Thoreau? How many did Audubon? How many does the hunter, matching
his sight against the keen and alert senses of a deer or a moose or
a fox or a wolf. Not outward eyes but inward. We open another eye
whenever we see beyond the first general features or outlines of
things--whenever we grasp the special details and characteristic
markings that this mask covers. Science confers new powers of
vision. Wherever you have learned to discriminate the birds, or the
plants, or the geological features of a country, it is as if new
and keener eyes were added.... We think we have looked at a thing
sharply until we are asked for its specific features. I thought
I knew exactly the form of the leaf of the tulip tree, until one
day a lady asked me to draw the outlines of one.... The habit of
observation is the habit of clear and decisive gazing; not by a
first, casual glance, but by a steady, deliberate aim of the eye
are the rare and characteristic things discovered. You must look
intently and hold your eye firmly to the spot, to see more than do
the rank and file of mankind.--JOHN BURROUGHS: _Locusts and Wild
Honey_.
Description by means of writing is often compared to the work of
an artist, since the aim of both artist and writer is to present a
visual image of their subject. But the writer of a description is
more like a Japanese artist than one of his own race. The artists
of Japan look long and fixedly at an object or scene or person, and
then produce the picture from memory. In general, it is not often
easy to write your description while you are actually in presence
of the thing you wish to picture, so that after quick, keen, and
accurate observation you should try to cultivate a retentive memory
for details. Try cultivating both of these qualities by some of the
following class exercises.
=Exercise 102.=--1. Look for one minute by the clock at your
teacher's desk, and then without another glance see who can
describe it with the most accuracy and completeness. 2. Turn
to the title-page of this book, look at it for a moment, and
then try to reproduce it. 3. Examine your own shoe for a moment
and see how clearly you can describe it. 4. The stove or steam
radiator in your room. 5. What you see from the window nearest
you after a moment's gaze. 6. Just how the inside of your desk
looks now--exact place of books, pencils, note books, etc. 7.
Just how the pupil next you is dressed, with as many details as
a two-minute gaze will show you. 8. The exact arrangement of
maps, pictures, reports, plants, etc., about the wall of your
class room.
As you go about your house or school, in the streets, or in the
woods, try this exercise, either in competition with a companion,
or simply for your own satisfaction. In passing a shop window, see
how many of the objects displayed you can remember, or in passing a
brook, try to observe rapidly but accurately the exact nature of the
banks at the place you crossed. See how definitely you can impress
on your mind the appearance of any house you pass, or of a vehicle
which passes you. After a moment's steady look at your mother's
work-basket see how completely you can describe it,--or the dining
table set for dinner, or the front hall, with wraps and rubbers
in it, or the parlor with several people in it, or the minister
preaching in church. You will be surprised to find how much you have
overlooked before, even in scenes which have been constantly before
you. You will see that Mr. Burroughs does not exaggerate when he
says that when we observe carefully and accurately, it is as though
we had opened a new pair of eyes, "not outward but inward."
=62. General Scientific Description.=--Notice the difference between
these two descriptions:--
1. Gentiàna crinita, Froel. Fringed Gentian. Leaves lanceolate or
broader, with rounded or heart-shaped base; flowers solitary on
long peduncles terminating the stem or simple branches; calyx with
4 unequal lobes; corolla sky blue, showy, 2' long, funnel form, the
4 wedge-obovate lobes with margins cut into a long and delicate
fringe. N. Eng., W. and S.--LEAVITT'S _Outlines of Botany_.
2. Thou blossom bright with autumn dew,
And colored with the heaven's own blue,
That openest when the quiet light
Succeeds the keen and frosty night.
Thou comest not when violets lean
O'er wandering brooks and springs unseen,
Or columbines, in purple dressed,
Nod o'er the ground-bird's hidden nest.
Thou waitest late and com'st alone,
When woods are bare and birds are flown,
And frosts and shortening days portend
The aged year is near his end.
Then doth thy sweet and quiet eye
Look through its fringes to the sky,
Blue--blue--as if that sky let fall
A flower from its cerulean wall.
I would that thus, when I shall see
The hour of death draw near to me,
Hope, blossoming within my heart,
May look to heaven as I depart.
--BRYANT: _To the Fringed Gentian._
You will see at once how extremely varied different forms of
description may be when you reflect that these two extracts are both
descriptions of the same thing. The prose extract presents a plain
and accurate account of facts. The poetry aims to give a description
of the object which will interest, please, and move the reader,
and which will bring a picture vividly before his eyes. Between
two examples contrasting so completely as these, there lies a long
series of gradations from one variety of description to another.
There are, however, two main divisions of this form of writing:
the plain statement, whose only purpose is to present a picture
of the object described and to interest the reader in doing so;
and scientific description, which bears about the same relation to
literary description as a business letter to a friendly one. They
both present facts, but in one case for the sake of the facts and in
the other in order to interest the reader.
When analyzed, scientific description is found to be simply a list
of all the facts about a given subject. These facts, however, must
not be gathered together and thrown into a paragraph without order.
In the plainest sort of description there must be a regular plan.
Begin by stating definitely what it is you are about to treat, or
give a definition of it as it stands in its broad relations to
other things, so that your reader may have a general notion of your
subject. This is called the introduction, and should vary in length
and explicitness according to the familiarity of your theme. If you
are about to describe the common house fly, a simple statement to
that effect is enough; but if you are beginning a description of a
rare dragon fly, you will need not only to give the name, but where
it is found, its general relation to other families of flies more
familiar, and perhaps to tell how you happened to see it, where it
may be observed, etc. In general, however, the introduction should
always be brief and very much to the point, since it is a common
fault for inexperienced writers to delay too long over the beginning.
After this, take up, one by one, in the order of their importance,
the main qualities of your subject. For this purpose you should
have brief outlines prepared, so that you will not state small and
non-essential details before essentials.
The following description of the group of birds known as warblers
will aid you as a model:--
When you begin to study the warblers, you will probably conclude
that you know nothing about birds and can never learn. But if
you begin by recognizing their common traits, and study a few
of the easiest and those that nest in your locality, you will
be less discouraged; and when the flocks come back at the next
migrations, you will be able to master the oddities of a large
number.
Most of them are very small--much less than half the size of
a robin--and are not only short, but slender. Active as the
chickadee or kinglet, they flit about the trees and undergrowth
after insects, without charity for the observer who is trying to
make out their markings. Unlike the waxwing, whose quiet ways
are matched by its subdued tints, the warblers are dashed with
all the glories of the rainbow, a flock of them looking as if a
painter's palette had been thrown at them.
Why they should be called warblers is a puzzle, as a large
percentage of them have not as much song as a chippy, nothing
but a thin chatter, or a shrill piping trill. If you wish a
negative conception of them, think of the coloring and habits
of the cuckoo. No contrast could be more complete. The best
places to look for them during migration are in young trees,
orchards, and sunny slopes. I find them in old orchards, swamps,
the raspberry patch, and the edge of the woods.--FLORENCE A.
MERRIAM: _Birds through an Opera Glass._
Study this description, and you will discover the plan on which
it is built. First comes the introduction, giving general
directions for recognizing the subject. Then the most noticeable
characteristics are stated, the size and shape. Habits of great
activity are next mentioned, and a general notion of coloring
is given. The song of the warblers is then taken up, and the
description is summed up in a sentence by contrasting them with the
cuckoo. The statement of where they are found could well have been
placed at the beginning, directly after the introduction.
=Exercise 103.=--Using this as a model, describe any variety
of bird or animal with which you are familiar, such as English
sparrows, hens, parrots, ducks, dogs, cats, horses, goats,
rabbits, squirrels, pigeons, geese, sheep.
=Exercise 104.=--Describe tomatoes, peaches, apricots,
grapes, potatoes, carrots, watermelons, rice, blackberries,
huckleberries, corn, wheat, oats, rye. Use the following as a
model:--
The apple is one of the most widely cultivated, and best known
and appreciated of fruits belonging to temperate climates.
In its wild state it is known as the crabapple, and is found
generally distributed through Europe and Western Asia. The apple
tree, as cultivated, is a moderate-sized tree with spreading
branches, ovate, acutely serrated or crenated leaves, and
flowers in corymbs. It is successfully cultivated in higher
latitudes than any other fruit tree, growing up to 65° N.; but,
notwithstanding this, its blossoms are more susceptible of
injury from frost than the flowers of the peach or apricot. It
comes into flower much later than these trees, and so avoids
the night frost, which would be fatal to its fruit bearing. The
apples which are grown in northern regions are, however, small,
hard, and crabbed, the best fruit being produced in hot summer
climates, such as Canada and the United States."--_Encyclopædia
Britannica._
Try sometimes to make these descriptions so complete that your
classmates can recognize what you are describing without knowing
your subject beforehand. An almost infinite list of subjects
suitable for scientific description could be given, but enough
titles have been suggested to show you that you have only to look
about you to find themes for the exercise.
=63. Specific Scientific Description.=--Compare with the treatment
of the warblers in general this description of one particular
variety of that species, by the same author, a little later in the
same book.
The Blackburnian is one of the handsomest and most easily
recognized of the warblers. His throat is a rich orange or
flame color, so brilliant that it is enough in itself to
distinguish him from any of the others. His back is black with
yellow markings. His crown is black, but has an orange spot in
the center, and the rest of his head, except near his eye, is
the same flaming orange as his throat. His wings have white
patches, and his breast is whitish tinged with yellow. His
sides are streaked with black. The female and young are duller,
the black of their backs being mingled with olive; while their
throats are yellow instead of orange.
In this case, the author, having stated the general characteristics
and habits of the family of warblers, needs only to describe
minutely the appearance of one variety.
=Exercise 105.=--Take up in this way a special variety of
the general topics you described in the last exercise: Buff
Cochin hens; parrots from Central America; Royal Pekin ducks;
Newfoundland or St. Bernard dogs, terriers, bull dogs, or
greyhounds; Shetland ponies, race horses, or heavy draught
horses; white rabbits or Belgian hares; gray squirrels,
chipmunks, red squirrels or flying squirrels; pouter pigeons or
homing pigeons.
=64. Technical Terms.=--In describing some objects you will find
that careful and accurate observation and logical arrangement of
your information are not enough. You will discover that you do
not know the names for all the various parts of your subject. In
attempting to write a complete description of even as well known
an object as a flower or fruit, you will probably need to consult
a dictionary or a scientific work, to learn the botanical names.
Minute scientific description is, therefore, an excellent exercise
for enlarging your vocabulary, for giving you control over more
words. In using very technical terms, which may be as unfamiliar
to your reader as they were to you before you made a study of your
subject, add a brief explanation of the meaning.
=Exercise 106.=--Give a plain, scientific description of one or
more of the illustrations given in your dictionary, remembering
to start from some point and to proceed regularly from there
in your description. For instance, in describing a ship under
sail, begin at the water line and go up to the top of the masts,
or else in the opposite direction; but do not begin at the
stern, jump to the bow, and then back again to the masts. Do not
attempt to explain the different qualities, the workings, or
the interior parts of these objects. You will have this to do
in exposition. Simply describe as accurately as possible their
aspect, on the model of the description of the Blackburnian
warbler.
=Exercise 107.=--Describe scientifically and specifically,
using correct botanical terms, an individual example of one
of the list of topics given you for general treatment on page
162, taking up (1) the general habit of growth, (2) usual
location, (3) usual dimensions of whole plant, (4) body of the
plant, (5) leaves, (6) flowers, (7) fruit and seeds, (8) any
general remarks as to its usefulness in the world, etc. In
addition, treat similarly the sunflower, seaweed, pansies, the
peanut vine, the hazel nut, witch-hazel, the forget-me-not, the
golden-rod, the willow, the sumac.
=65. Literary Description.=--An example of literary description,
very far removed from the scientific variety, is the following
extract:--
We had a remarkable sunset one day last November. I was walking
in a meadow, the source of a small brook, when the sun at last,
just before setting after a cold gray day, reached a clear
stratum in the horizon; and the softest, brightest morning
sunlight fell on the dry grass, and on the stems of the trees
in the opposite horizon, and on the leaves of the scrub oaks on
the hillside, while our shadows stretched long over the meadows
eastward as if we were only motes in its beams. It was such a
light as we could not have imagined a moment before, and the air
also was so warm and serene that nothing was wanting to make a
paradise of that meadow. When we reflected that this was not a
solitary phenomenon, never to happen again, but that it would
happen forever and ever an infinite number of evenings, and
cheer and reassure the latest child that walked then, it was
more glorious still.--H. D. THOREAU: _Excursions._
The real point of difference between such a description and the
account of the Blackburnian warbler is that the aim in the one
case is to present facts and in the other to present a picture.
Observation, however accurate, and order, however logical, are not
enough for this sort of description. You must interest and please,
or you have failed of your purpose. You must observe keenly and
arrange your material carefully, but you must do more than this. You
must remember all the time that you are trying to make a picture,
and in many regards you need to follow the same rule as the artist
does in painting.
For instance, he establishes himself in one place and draws the
object, scene, or person as it looks to him from there. You would
laugh at a painter who, in drawing a solid oak door, put in a person
standing on the other side of it, but one of the first things to
remember in making your written picture is not to put in details
which you could not see from the point where you have placed
yourself to make your sketch. In describing the view from a high
hill, you must not write, "The woods back of our house looked like
a green carpet and the house like the tiniest sort of a child's
plaything. The sun shining in the windows of the front parlor made
the room look as though it were smiling." The last sentence may be
perfectly true, and in an account of the front parlor would be a
good piece of description, but since you could not possibly see that
detail from the top of a distant hill, it is absurd to use it.
More even than this, you must learn to remove too much detail from
your descriptions. Not only should you refrain from using anything
you cannot see from the point where you have placed yourself, but
you should not use all the things you can see. In the exercises on
scientific description you have been observing, as completely as you
possibly could, a given subject, and putting into your composition
all the facts you could see or learn about. In literary description
the process is quite different. You must train yourself to leave
out a great many details, and to select those you use with great
care for their value in aiding you to give your reader a lifelike
picture. In describing a house scientifically, it is of just as
much value to say that there are eight windows on the north side as
that it stands on a high hill, for what you wish to do is to convey
all the information you can about the house. But in a literary
description you should not mention the windows at all, unless there
is something unusual about them, and you should pick out for mention
only the features that make that house different from other houses;
so that one of the first things you would say is some presentation
of the fact that it is on a hill.
At length we stopped before a very old house bulging out over
the road; a house with long low lattice-windows bulging out
still further, 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 fruit 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 moldings, 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 from the hills.--CHARLES DICKENS: _David
Copperfield._
In this sketch of a house nothing is mentioned that could not be
seen both from the position of a person who has just stepped in
front of it and in the time which would naturally elapse between
his ringing the doorbell and the arrival of some one to answer it.
Notice also that a general impression of the whole house is given in
the first sentence. Just as an artist making a sketch draws first
a general rough outline of the whole object, "blocking in" (as it
is called) the proportions and general aspect before going on to
details; so a good beginning for a description is some general
summing up of the first impression made upon you by the scene,
or of the impression you desire to make upon your reader. This
corresponds to the topic sentence of a paragraph.
=Exercise 108.=--Write a description from a fixed point, and as
if after only a few moments' look, of the general impression
made upon the observer by any of the following subjects, trying
to catch some characteristic trait or quality, which you can
state in one metaphor or comparison, as the predominating
effect. For instance:--
1. I fancied that the whole house was leaning forward, trying to
see who was passing on the narrow pavement below.
2. The deep projection of the second story gave the house such a
meditative look that you could not pass it without the idea that
it had secrets to keep, and an eventful history to moralize upon.
3. The nest looks as if it barely touched the twigs from which
it hung; but when you examine it, you may find that the gray
fibers have woven the wood in so securely that the nest would
have to be torn in pieces before it could be loosened from the
twigs.
Make your descriptions brief and try to convey vividly the first
impression.
The front of your school building, your home, an old barn, the
handsomest house in your neighborhood, a country church, the
kitchen of your home, your own room, a hen house with the hens
just going to roost, a dovecot, any public monument you may
know, the inside of a public library, the post office, a drug
store, a carpenter's shop, a blacksmith's, an iron foundry,
a milliner's shop, a beehive, a crow's nest, an ant-hill, a
spider's web, an aquarium, a farmhouse, a tall office building,
an ocean steamer, a sailboat, any curious house you may have
seen.
One good exercise for forcing yourself to express quickly the aspect
of a given object at a given time is to try to describe something in
very rapid motion, of which you can get only a momentary glimpse.
For instance:--
1. The squirrel would shoot up the tree, making only a brown streak
from the bottom to the top.
2. Away across the endless dead level of the prairie a black speck
appears against the sky, and it is plain that it moves. Well, I
should think so! In a second or two it becomes a horse and rider,
rising and falling, rising and falling, sweeping toward us nearer
and nearer, growing more and more distinct, more and more sharply
defined, nearer and still nearer, and the flutter of the hoofs comes
faintly to the ear. Another instant, a whoop and hurrah from all
of us, a wave of the rider's hand, but no reply, and man and horse
burst past our excited faces, and go winging away like a belated
fragment of a storm!
=Exercise 109.=--1. Try to give a brief, vivid impression of an
express train passing at full speed, an automobile, a steamer,
a race horse, a man running, a dog chasing a cat. 2. Describe
how you are impressed by the passage through a short tunnel of a
train you are on, by a village you pass on an express, by a bit
of forest your train darts through.
=66. Description of People.=--Read these two passages, the second
of which is a description by the historian Motley of Thackeray, the
great English novelist.
1. Mr. Creakle's face was fiery, and his eyes were small and
deep in his head. He had thick veins in his forehead, a little
nose, and a large chin. He was bald on the top of his head,
and had some thin, wet-looking hair that was just turning
gray, brushed across each temple, so that the two sides
interlaced on his forehead. But the circumstance about him which
most impressed me was that he had no voice, but spoke in a
whisper.--CHARLES DICKENS: _David Copperfield._
2. He has the appearance of a colossal infant, smooth, white,
shiny, ringlety hair,--flaxen alas! with advancing years, a
roundish face, with a little dab of a nose, upon which it is a
perpetual wonder how he keeps his spectacles, a sweet but rather
piping voice with something of a childish treble about it, and a
very tall, slightly stooping figure.
In writing this sort of quick sketch, notice what impresses you
first about your subject, that is, what is the most characteristic
feature. In Dickens's description of the house, it was the fact
that the whole building seemed to be leaning forward; in Motley's
picture of Thackeray, it was the fact that the great novelist looked
curiously like a little child; in Dickens's Mr. Creakle, it was the
fact that the school-teacher had no voice.
=Exercise 110.=--I. Write in the same way as in the preceding
lesson a picture, in a paragraph or two, suggested by any of
the following subjects, trying to catch the most characteristic
points, such as would impress you after a moment's observation,
and to state them vividly and briefly, so that the description
may be recognizable.
The iceman; the policeman; the washerwoman; the janitor; a
street-car conductor; a postman; an organ grinder; a newsboy;
a farmer; a classmate; a messenger boy; a butcher; any one of
unusual appearance who has passed you in the street, or whom you
have seen in the cars.
II. Or, give in the same brief, picturesque manner the
impression made by a first sight of your dog as differing from
other dogs of the same breed, trying to express the way in which
his character shows itself through his appearance--kind and
slow, or nervous and active, or affectionate and playful, etc.;
of any dog you have seen who has a marked individuality; of your
cat, canary, or any of your pets.
In describing a person you will find very often that you are
most impressed by the eyes, and that they give the characteristic
expression to the face. These following extracts, taken from one
novel, the work of a skillful writer, show how much attention is
paid to the eyes of the persons described:--
1. She was tall and pale, thin and a little awkward; her hair
was fair and perfectly straight; her eyes were dark and they had
the singularity of seeming at once dull and restless.
2. The second young lady was also thin and pale; but she was
older than the other; she was shorter; she had dark, smooth
hair. Her eyes, unlike the other's, were quick and bright; but
they were not at all restless.
3. This latter personage was a man of rather less than the usual
stature and the usual weight, with a quick, observant, agreeable
dark eye.
4. She was a fair, plump person, of medium stature, with a round
face, a small mouth, a delicate complexion, a bunch of light
brown curls at the back of her head, and a peculiarly open,
surprised-looking eye.
=Exercise 111.=--I. Look at a portrait or bust of Julius Cæsar
and see if you think his appearance as a young man was well
described by the historian Froude in the following extract:--
A tall, slight, handsome youth, with dark piercing eyes, a
sallow complexion, large nose, lips full, features refined and
intellectual, neck sinewy and thick, beyond what might have been
expected from the generally slender figure.
II. Write a paragraph or two describing the personal appearance
of any noted man or woman with whose portrait you are familiar.
Try to reproduce the most striking traits, describing them as if
you were speaking of a living person.
(a) Sir Walter Scott, George Eliot, Hawthorne, Longfellow, James
Russell Lowell, Whittier, Bryant, Dickens, Tennyson, Louisa M.
Alcott.
(b) George Washington, Daniel Webster, Abraham Lincoln, General
Grant, Alexander Hamilton, Bismarck, Napoleon, Julius Cæsar,
Queen Victoria, Queen Wilhelmina.
III. Think over some of the fictitious characters given
below; try to imagine how they would look, and write a brief
description as of a living person. Do not begin writing until
you have a complete picture in your mind.
Cinderella and her two wicked sisters, Robin Hood, Ali Baba,
Robinson Crusoe, Sindbad the Sailor, Uncle Remus, The Sleeping
Beauty, Shylock, King Lear, St. George, Santa Claus, Bluebeard,
Ruth, Samuel, David and Goliath.
=67. Longer Description.=--You are now ready to try descriptions
on a little larger scale. Be careful, however, to bear in mind the
following hints:--
1. Plan your whole description before you write any part of it, and
see that you are following some natural order, such as from left to
right, or right to left, from the top down, from the bottom up, from
head to foot, etc. In describing a landscape, for instance, from a
fixed point, after the introduction (usually only a single sentence)
you begin with what is nearest to you--the foreground--and proceed
to more distant points of the scene. Or you begin with what is far
away--the background--and come closer and closer, finishing with the
things immediately about you.
2. Use no details which will not add to the vividness and force of
your picture. In describing a library, for instance, you can very
well leave out any mention of the number of chairs there are in the
room, or of the fact that the front door is of oak, since those
details might be true of any large public room. But you must not
fail to notice and to remark on the stillness of the place,--people
walking about very quietly and talking in whispers, standing close
to each other,--for that is one of the things which distinguishes a
library from other places. So, in writing of both a handsome street
and an alleyway, you would be telling the truth if you said that
they were both paved and had a gutter on each side, but you would
not be making a picture, as you would if you spoke of battered ash
barrels and hungry cats in the alley, and of beautiful lawns and
pretty romping children in the handsome street. In observing the
scene you wish to describe, you should notice everything, looking at
a sight long familiar to you with the steady gaze you had to give
in order to see what is really on a postage stamp or a dollar bill.
You will find that you have looked at the view from your window with
the same careless, vacant, absent gaze, lacking real attention, and
that you need to fix your mind on observing a landscape or a scene,
before you take in a great many details that are essential. But when
you come to writing, you should think of each detail before you use
it, to see if it brings the picture out more clearly.
3. Use some device for expressing the relation between the different
parts of your picture. This is usually done by employing complex
sentences made up by means of connecting links, such as _near
which_, _above which_, _around which_, etc., and by using such
phrases as _farther off_, _nearer by_, _close at hand_, _far away_,
_in the distance_, _high up_, _directly below_, _on the other side_,
_beyond_, etc.
=Exercise 112.=--Describe such of the following as your teacher
may indicate:--
1. What I see from my window at home, at school. 2. View from
the highest place to which I ever climbed. 3. View from the top
of our house. 4. The most beautiful view I ever saw. 5. How
our street looks from our front steps. 6. Across the meadow.
7. How my room looks from the door. 8. The views in the park
I like best. 9. View along a country road. 10. Trees along a
village street. 11. View along a street in a large city. 12. The
inside of our church from where I sit. 13. My class room from
my seat. 14. Our kitchen. 15. The inside of a barn. 16. What I
can see from the door of a barn. 17. An alleyway in a city. 18.
View along the most beautiful street I know. 19. View from the
back of a river or lake. 20. Imaginary description of the view
I should like best to be able to see from my window. 21. How
my room would look if I could have it exactly as I wished. 22.
The prettiest parlor I ever saw. 23. How the inside of a public
library looks from the door. 24. A view in the woods in the
winter. 25. An orchard in bloom. 26. Beside the brook. 27. In
the market. 28. Scene in a department store; in a hospital; in
a restaurant. 29. A soda-water fountain. 30. A sand pile where
children have been playing "keep-house." 31. Any scene at a
county fair.
=68. Description of Conditions.=--Read the following description:--
A cornfield in July is a hot place. The soil is hot and dry;
the wind comes across the lazily murmuring leaves laden with
a warm, sickening smell drawn from the rapidly growing,
broad-flung banners of the corn. The sun, nearly vertical,
drops a flood of dazzling light and heat upon the field, over
which the cool shadows run, only to make the heat seem the more
intense.--HAMLIN GARLAND: _Main-traveled Roads._
The first sentence of this paragraph states the fact that the
author wished to convey to you. All the rest is added to make the
conditions seem vivid to you, to make you feel the heat, smell
the rank odor of the corn, and hear the murmur of the leaves. You
will notice that this is different from the description in the last
lesson, where you have been trying to tell merely how a scene or
object looked to you, to make a picture such as an artist might
paint. Here you are made to notice odors, motion, noises, and
heat,--things that a painter would find it difficult to suggest in
any picture.
Think how different would be the effect of intense cold on a street
in a big city or in the heart of the forest, and you will see that
in the effect of given conditions on all kinds of objects you have
one of the best methods of portraying a scene.
For instance, in both the country and the city the rapid approach
of a thundershower is preceded by black clouds and a high wind. The
difference lies in what effect these things have. In the country,
the wind tosses the trees wildly about, roars among the branches,
scatters the dry leaves in volleys. In the city the arrival of a
storm is heralded by a flapping of awnings, little whirlwinds of
dust, crowds of people hurrying to shelter or looking up at the sky,
and a hasty removal indoors of everything that would be spoiled by
the rain.
=Exercise 113.=--In treating such of the following subjects
as your teacher may indicate, try to notice odor, noise, and
movement as well as form, color, and position:--
1. A very cold day in a city street, in a barnyard full of
animals, in our class room, on the playground, in the woods,
beside a river or brook, on a street car, in a railway train,
at the station. 2. A very rainy day in our garden, in summer,
in spring, in autumn, inside a barn, in an attic, in a henyard,
in a crowded business street, on a boat, at the door of a
department store, or church, or theater, at a country fair, at
a picnic. 3. A snowstorm in the country, in the city. 4. Muddy
walking on a country road, in a plowed field, in a city street,
on the playground, at the door of our school. 5. A hot night
on our piazza, indoors, in a public square, in the woods, in
a theater, in a flower garden, in the street in front of our
house, at a pleasure resort. 6. A high wind in the country,
in the city, in summer, in autumn, in winter, on the harbor
or river, at sea, in a tall tower, an attic (this mainly for
sounds), in a pasture full of horses, in a group of pine trees,
in a cornfield, in a city park, in a city court on wash day.
=Exercise 114.=--As a class exercise, try writing on some one
subject and comparing the results. See who has been able to
produce the clearest impression and why his description is
successful. The subjects should be only those of which the whole
class has an equal knowledge, _e.g._ description of some public
person who has addressed the school; of the walk to school on a
snowy, rainy, or hot day, of the playground at recess time, of
the aspect of the halls directly after school is dismissed, of
the schoolroom, of any incident which all the pupils saw, a fire
in the neighborhood, etc.
=69. Description by Contrast.=--Another excellent device in
description is contrast. For instance, if you wish to describe the
effect made by a day in the woods when rain has frozen in falling
and has coated everything with ice, you might begin by making
a brief picture of such a day in the city,--every one slipping
uncomfortably, horses straining painfully to keep their footing, the
wheels of street cars revolving uselessly on an ice-coated track;
and then suddenly transfer your description to the woods, where
the trees are as though made of glass, every little twig a prism
to reflect light, and where the bits of ice falling from the trees
tinkle like broken glass on the frozen snow.
=Exercise 115.=--Describe, by contrasting with each other:--
1. A heavy draught horse and a race horse. 2. A canoe and a
raft. 3. A Newfoundland dog and a pug dog. 4. Your class room
when every one is busy and quietly studying, when every one is
just going away, and when it is deserted after school hours.
5. The kitchen of your house on different occasions,--washing,
ironing, just before dinner, just after a candy pull, after the
work is all done, on a Sunday afternoon. 6. A theater full of
people and bright with lights, afterward darkened and deserted
except for cleaning women. 7. Our garden at different times of
year,--in spring, when planting is being done; when I am weeding
it on a hot day in summer; when everything is ripe in autumn; in
winter, snow-covered. 8. A grocer's shop in early morning with
a sleepy boy sweeping out, and later when full of customers and
clerks. 9. An apple tree in blossom; in autumn with ripe fruit;
in winter. 10. A brook or river frozen over with skaters on it,
and in midsummer with swimmers, etc. 11. The route I generally
take to and from school,--in the morning (other pupils going to
school; business men going to their offices; butcher's carts
and grocery and ice wagons); in the afternoon (nurses out with
babies, ladies calling, children at play, etc.). 12. A public
square in its ordinary aspect, and on the Fourth of July, or
Decoration Day, or Election Night. 13. A department store full
of shoppers just before Christmas, and early in the morning on a
hot summer day, with only the clerks and a few customers. 14. A
railway station, quiet and deserted, with only a few travelers
waiting silently, and when an important train arrives, bringing
a crowd of passengers.
=70. Description of Events.=--In the extract given below there is a
certain amount of definite information conveyed, in addition to the
pictures presented.
Slowly and mournfully they carried his embalmed body in a
procession of great state to Paris, and thence to Rouen, where
his queen was, from whom the sad intelligence of his death was
concealed until he had been dead some days. Thence, lying on a
bed of crimson and gold, with a golden crown upon his head and
a golden ball and scepter lying in the nerveless hands, they
carried him to Calais, with such a great retinue as seemed to
dye the road black. The King of Scotland acted as chief mourner,
all the Royal Household followed; the knights wore black armor
and black plumes of feathers, crowds of men bore torches, making
the night as light as day; and the widowed Princess followed
last of all. At Calais there was a fleet of ships to bring the
funeral host to Dover; and so, by way of London Bridge, where
the service for the dead was chanted as it passed along, they
brought the body to Westminster Abbey, and there buried it with
great respect.--CHARLES DICKENS: _A Child's History of England._
An account of almost any happening, custom, or festival must be told
in this way, with an eye both to stating facts clearly and at the
same time to making them seem lifelike.
This sort of exercise is harder than anything you have yet tried,
for you must be at once complete and full in your account and yet
must continue to go on in the sort of picture making you have
been practicing. In a way, this is almost a return to some of the
exercises in narrative which you have had, since a description of
several happenings in order of time is really a narrative. At any
rate, in trying this sort of description you are like a person who
has been learning to play the piano, first with the right hand and
then with the left, and finally with both together in a simple but
complete melody. You are to keep in mind that you have two aims in
view: to be as full as is necessary to give an accurate idea of the
facts, and to attempt to present a picture.
=Exercise 116=.--Describe accurately, as though for a newspaper
or magazine, but trying to reproduce some of the essential
characters of the event:--
A fire drill in your school; how you celebrate Fourth of July,
Thanksgiving, Hallowe'en, New Year's Day; laying the corner
stone of a new building; the procession of the veterans on
Decoration Day; a political parade or meeting; a wedding;
a funeral; the parade of the Fire Department; a play or
entertainment given by your school.
=71. Picture Making of Scenes of Action.=--Here, instead of
describing something stationary, like a house or landscape, the
writer has taken one moment of a scene of action, and has attempted
to make, as it were, a snapshot photograph of it.
To-day the large side doors were thrown open toward the sun to
admit a beautiful light to the immediate spot of the shearers'
operations, which was the wood threshing floor in the center,
formed of thick oak, black with age. Here the shearers knelt,
the sun slanting in on their bleached shirts, tanned arms, and
the polished shears they flourished, causing them to bristle
with a thousand rays strong enough to blind a weak-eyed man.
Beneath them a captive sheep lay panting, increasing the
rapidity of its pants as misgiving merged in terror, till it
quivered like the hot landscape outside.--THOMAS HARDY: _Far
from the Madding Crowd._
All the painters of historical pictures try in the same way to
paint one moment of a well-known incident, and they select some
significant moment; that is, one where the action tells something of
the story involved.
=Exercise 117.=--I. Imagine that you are about to paint a
picture of any one of the following scenes, and describe what
comes into your mind when you think of the incident. Do not tell
the story--simply describe the scene at a given moment.
1. Columbus sighting land. 2. Columbus landing. 3. The burial of
De Soto. 4. Pocohontas saving the life of John Smith. 5. Penn
making a treaty with the Indians. 6. A scene in the attack on
Braddock by Indian skirmishers. 7. An night attack by Indians on
a colonial settlement. 8. The discovery of Major André. 9. King
Alfred and the cakes. 10. The rain of manna on the Children of
Israel.
II. Try in the following subjects to make a picture which would
serve as illustration to a story. See if you can make the
picture recognizable, so that your classmates can tell what the
story is from the one scene from it which you present them.
1. Horatius at the bridge. 2. The Sleeping Beauty. 3. William
Tell and the apple. 4. Cinderella trying on the slipper. 5.
Ivanhoe and Rebecca during the progress of the battle which
Rebecca is describing. 6. Ulysses, returned to Ithaca, is
recognized by his old dog Argus. 7. Uncle Remus telling stories
to the little boy. 8. Barbara Frietchie. 9. Robinson Crusoe and
the footprints.
Here is a description, by Parkman, of the robbing of a train of pack
horses carrying valuable goods.
Advancing deeper among the mountains, they began to descend the
valley at the foot of Sidling Hill. The laden horses plodded
knee-deep in snow. The mountains towered above the wayfarers in
gray desolation, and the leafless forest howled dreary music to
the wind of March.
Suddenly, from behind snow-beplastered trunks and shaggy
bushes of evergreen, uncouth apparitions started into view.
Wild visages protruded, grotesquely horrible with vermilion
and ocher, white lead and soot; stalwart limbs appeared,
encased in buckskin; and rusty rifles thrust out their long
muzzles. In front and flank and all around them white puffs of
smoke and sharp reports assailed the bewildered senses of the
travelers.--FRANCIS PARKMAN: _The Conspiracy of Pontiac._
With this description you are again almost back to narration. The
extract presents two pictures, and in so doing, relates a story.
This way of telling a story by a succession of pictures is a
favorite one with comic illustrators, but it is also used very often
in writing, although in a real narration explanatory matter is added
between the scenes.
=Exercise 118.=--The following topics are given as subjects for
description only, and you are to try to give as vivid a picture
of the two scenes as you can, letting the story tell itself by
inference.
1. Boys skating at top speed along a river with a pack of wolves
in the distance. A camp of wood choppers beside the river, a
fire burning, the boys fallen exhausted, and men starting up
with guns in their hands.
2. People on a raft waving coats and handkerchiefs wildly. On
board a big ocean steamer, with passengers gathered around the
group of rescued castaways.
3. A Christmas tree inside a richly furnished room with
well-dressed children gathered around it. Outside in the snow a
group of poor children looking in at the window.
4. A boy with a swollen jaw in the dentist's chair. A group of
smaller children to whom the boy proudly holds up a tooth.
5. A hen calling wildly to her chickens and trying to cover them
with her wings, and a farmer running up with a gun. The farmer
has his gun in one hand, and with the other holds up a big
hen-hawk for a group of people to see.
6. A street with everybody running in one direction, pointing
ahead. A house on fire with firemen climbing up on ladders.
7. A family assembled at the dinner table in the evening quietly
talking together. A man taps on the window pane outside; every
one starts up in surprise and great pleasure, as if he were a
relative returned from travels.
8. A group of women gathered at the end of a pier on a stormy
night, straining their eyes anxiously out to sea. A fisherman
returning up the beach, at early dawn, with a net full of fish
on his back. In the background a small house with children
running out to meet him.
=72. Travel.=--It is hard to draw a definite line between
descriptive writing and narrative writing, since description is very
often needed to make a narration interesting, and sometimes to make
it complete. There is one kind of composition where the two methods
of writing are needed in almost equal quantities, and that is in
stories of travel. In writing an account of a journey, you have a
distinct story to tell, since you are narrating a series of events
that took place one after the other; but without description of what
you saw the account is scarcely worth writing at all. Your aim is
to give your reader a clear idea of the course of your journey, and
you can only do this by a combination of narration and description,
by telling what happened and then by trying to make a picture of
the event. So that there are two main things to remember in writing
of travel: first, to make your journey clear and intelligible by
following the time-order in your narration, and by recollecting
all the important stages of the trip; and, second, to select for
description the most interesting incidents or places which you saw,
and to write of them as vividly and picturesquely as possible.
The roads were gay early next morning when we started, for it
was market day, and the country people were flocking into town,
some driving their pigs, some riding donkeys with calfskin
saddles adorned with little red tassels; the women wearing
high-crowned hats with bright handkerchiefs tied on underneath,
and bright cotton shawls; the men with brown-and-white-striped
blankets gracefully thrown over the shoulder, and in their
hands long, brass-tipped staves. Most of the women had large
gold earrings, and some of them, in addition, gold chains and
crosses and filigree heart-shaped pendants. We met presently a
troop of fishwomen running at full speed to catch the market,
their baskets balanced on their heads. Their earrings were
hoop-shaped, and their skirts short and tucked up, and they
had embroidered purses hanging at the side. The fishermen we
overtook a little later, going back toward the sea with their
nets. All had time to touch their caps and say "Good day," for
civility to strangers is the rule in Portugal. Here and there
were children minding goats under the shade of the olives. No
idlers, no beggars were to be seen. At noon we came to Alcobaça,
and walked through the town to the great abbey church of the
Cistercians. The market was going on outside it. Gayly dressed
women presided over heaps of maize and oranges and eggs. Strings
of donkeys were tied up by the wall. A scarlet-robed acolyte
walked amongst the people collecting alms. A broad flight of
steps led up to the great door. Inside all is very simple and
grand--a vaulted roof, rows of slender columns, no pictures or
tawdry decorations to be seen. Now and then, not very often,
a woman would come in from the busy market place and kneel to
say a silent prayer.... We visited the convent where Beckford
had lived, and saw its great tiled kitchen and its beautiful
cloisters, and then went back to the inn to lunch, where we
enjoyed above all a liberal dish of green peas--green still in
our memories.
We drove on through pleasant fields and vineyards, catching
sight now and then of the distant sea, and, suddenly coming to
an open space through the trees, we saw before us the great
memorial church of Batalha, the Battle Abbey of Portugal, its
pinnacles and the delicate lace work of its roof standing out
against the clear blue sky. It stands quite alone, except for
the handful of red-tiled houses that form the village, and from
its roof you look down, not on the smoke and turmoil of human
habitations, but on green fields and slopes and olive trees;
and under its walls no troops of beggars, or pleasure seekers,
or chattering merchants disturb the stillness. One only I saw
there, sitting near the door under the shade of a bright-colored
umbrella, a heap of pottery at her feet for sale, and a donkey
tied up close by; but her child had fallen asleep in her arms,
and she did not move or speak. Inside, also, all was quiet,
and we could enjoy its beauty--the long aisles, the endless
columns, the exquisite cloisters, where the fantastic and varied
stone traceries contrast with the quaint formal garden with
its box-edged beds, in which are set roses, and peonies, and
columbines.... We learned that the church was founded in 1387
by the great King Joao soon after the fighting of the decisive
victory which it commemorates, and that there is a doubt as
to the architect employed, whether he was an Irishman named
Hackett, or another. I am all for the Irishman, but hope he was
not also responsible for the idea of laying the foundations
in this hollow, where the water lies when the winter floods
begin. We tried to find out, through Antonio, how high the water
actually rises, but he would only wave his hands deferentially
and say, as though he had been one of Canute's courtiers, "As
high as you please, sir." That night we slept at Leiria. The
inn is over a stable, and one room looks out on a piggery and
another on a fowl yard.
We said farewell to our mules, and took the train again at
Pombal, interesting chiefly from its association with the
great eighteenth-century statesman of the same name. We look
out from the railway carriage on level meadows, purple with
vipers' bugloss, bordering the Mondego, and then across a bend
of the river where it is broadest we see Coimbra, the Oxford of
Portugal, an ancient and beautiful city, beautifully set on a
hillside. Bare-headed, black-robed students fill the streets,
and swarm in and out of the doors of the university. The streets
are steep and narrow, and here and there are unexpected gardens
and blossoming Judas trees.--LADY GREGORY: _Through Portugal._
=Exercise 119.=--Write, either in letter form or as a
composition, an account of any journey you have taken. It is
better to select a small part of a trip, and describe that
quite completely, than to try to cover a long journey. A day's
excursion, if it is interesting, is enough as a rule for one
exercise, although this is by no means an invariable rule.
The following subjects are given as suitable for travel
compositions, or as suggesting others:--
1. Our trip to the county fair. 2. The journey I took the
first time I saw the ocean. 3. How we go away for the summer:
packing up, leaving the house, the journey with pet animals,
etc., arrival. 4. A trip that should have been very short, but
was made long by an accident. 5. How we go fishing, hunting,
studying birds. 6. The trip to the greatest natural curiosity I
ever saw; a cave; hanging cliff; waterfall, etc.
=73. Descriptions of an Hour.=--When you write an account of a
journey, you are telling all the interesting events that occurred in
your life on a certain day or days, or in a certain number of hours.
Now you do not need to travel to have interesting things happen to
you, and a lively and picturesque account of your doings for an
afternoon or a morning may be extremely readable, although perhaps
you did not stir from one room. You will be quite surprised to see
how many things you do, or any one else does, in a short space of
time.
The following passage from _David Copperfield_ is an account of how
an underdone leg of mutton was made palatable after it had come to
the table. No subject could be simpler, and yet it is treated in so
lively a way that it is very entertaining.
There was a gridiron in the pantry, on which my morning
rasher of bacon was cooked. We had it in, in a twinkling, and
immediately applied ourselves to carrying Mr. Micawber's idea
into effect. The division of labor to which he had referred
was this: Traddles cut the mutton into slices; Mr. Micawber
(who could do anything of this sort to perfection) covered them
with pepper, mustard, salt, and cayenne; I put them on the
gridiron, turned them with a fork, and took them off, under Mr.
Micawber's direction; and Mrs. Micawber heated, and continually
stirred, some mushroom ketchup in a little saucepan. When we had
slices enough to begin upon, we fell to, with our sleeves still
tucked up at the wrists, more slices sputtering and blazing on
the fire, and our attention divided between the mutton on our
plates, and the mutton then preparing.
What with the novelty of this cookery, the excellence of it,
the bustle of it, the frequent starting up to look after it,
the frequent sitting down to dispose of it as the crisp slices
came off the gridiron hot and hot, the being so busy, so flushed
with the fire, so amused, and in the midst of such a tempting
noise and savor, we reduced the leg of mutton to the bone. My
own appetite came back miraculously. I am ashamed to record it,
but I really believe I forgot Dora for a little while. Traddles
laughed heartily almost the whole time, as he ate and worked.
Indeed we all did, all at once; and I dare say there never was a
greater success.
We were at the height of our enjoyment, and were all busily
engaged, in our several departments, endeavoring to bring the
last batch of slices to a state of perfection that should crown
the feast, when I was aware of a strange presence in the room,
and my eyes encountered those of the staid Littimer, standing
hat in hand before me.--CHARLES DICKENS: _David Copperfield._
=Exercise 120.=--I. Take a piece of paper and try to note down
everything a baby of six or eight months does for a half an
hour when he is wide awake and active. Or take similar notes of
all that a two-year-old child does in an hour's play; or watch
a kitten amuse itself, and try to write an account of it that
will give your reader some idea of the gay frolics of the little
animal. If you can find a colony of ants, their movements will
give you good material for this sort of composition; or a pair
of birds building a nest, or a crowd of little children playing.
II. In the same way, write on any of the following subjects:--
1. The story of a convalescent's afternoon. 2. The story of one
day in house-cleaning time. 3. What we do on Sunday afternoon.
4. The first day at school after a vacation. 5. Our school
picnic. 6. Two hours spent at a junction, waiting for a delayed
train--how we amused ourselves. 7. The first time I ever rode
horseback or tried to sail a boat. 8. The cook's last fifteen
minutes before dinner is served. 9. An hour in a department
store. 10. A visit to a flour mill, blacksmith shop, large
bakery, candy factory, or any manufactory. 11. An afternoon
spent just as I should like it best. 12. What a country boy
does to amuse himself in two leisure hours; a city boy. 13. The
hardest hour's work I ever did. 14. The hour on a farm spent in
feeding the animals. 15. How we hurried to catch the morning
train. 16. The half hour when I tried to amuse the baby.