§ 25. When the final syllable of a radical is accented, and ends in a consonant preceded by a single vowel, if a suffix is to be added which begins with a vowel, the final consonant of the radical must be doubled.

Monosyllables are included in this rule; for, having only one syllable, the accent must, of course, fall upon it.

The final consonant is doubled after a vowel preceded by qu, as if it were a single vowel preceded by a consonant.

The letters and k are never doubled in English.

The word gas does not double its final s in the plural, gases.

The final consonant of a radical, when not preceded by a single vowel, or when the accent is not on the last syllable, remains single when a suffix is added.

§ 26. When a radical ends with silent e, and a suffix is to be added which begins with e or i, then the final e of the radical is dropped in the derivative.

When the final e of the radical is preceded by o, e, or y, it is retained in the derivative before the suffix ing.

The final e is also retained in the participles singeing (from singe), tingeing (from tinge), and swingeing (from swinge), to distinguish them from the corresponding participles of the verbs sing, ting, and swing.

§ 27. When the final letter of a radical is y, preceded by a consonant, and a suffix is to be added beginning with e, then the y is to be changed into i in the derivative.

§ 28. When the final letter of a radical is y, preceded

by a vowel, the y is retained before any suffix that may

Layed, payed, and stayed are generally contracted into laid, paid,

and staid; and said is always used for sayed.

When the suffix ing is to be added to a radical ending in ie, this termination must be changed into y in the derivative.

§ 29. When the suffixes ed and est are both to be added to a radical, they are contracted into edst.

Ordain

EXAMPLES.

ordainedst

Laugh

laughedst

PART SECOND.

DIVISION OF THE SUBJECT-INVENTION.

CHAPTER III.

ELICITATION OF THOUGHT BY QUESTIONS.

§ 30. The Art of Composition is the combination of the two subordinate arts,―the Art of Invention and the Art of Expression.

§ 31. Invention is that art by which thoughts are produced and arranged in a natural and impressive order.

§ 32. Expression is the art by which thought is communicated in an accurate and pleasing manner.

These subordinate arts, though so distinguishable in the results at which they aim, and in the training exercises which they require, must, nevertheless, be studied in connection with each other; as no proficiency can be acquired in the one without corresponding attainments in the other.

For the manner in which the subsequent contents of this Manual are to be used, so as to secure the proper combination of Invention and Expression, see the Directions to the Teacher on page 11.

The most successful method of teaching young persons to put their thoughts on paper is the following. When they are ready to write, announce some easy, familiar subject, and proceed to ask questions upon it, calling for such replies as you know they can give. After a dozen or more of such questions have been proposed and answered, require them to write down as much of the substance of their answers as they can recollect, but avoid any approach to the question-andanswer form of expression.

If the teacher prefer it, he can write the questions all out on the blackboard, and keep them before the pupils while they are writing. But while this course may be pursued with mere beginners, it is advisable that the pupils should early be trained to recollect the thoughts which the questions may have suggested, and to produce them according to their natural associations, and independent of their connection with the questions.

The following composition, actually produced in this way by a little girl of ten years of age, is a fair specimen of the exercises here required.

MY DOG.

1. Did you ever have a dog?
2. What kind of a dog was he?
3. What was his color?

4. What was his name?

5. Why was he so named?

6. Was he playful?

7. Was he an intelligent dog?

8. How did he usually employ himself?

9. Did he ever go away from home? 10.

What became of him?

COMPOSITION.

I once had a dog. He was a very little dog when I got him, but grew as he advanced in age. My brother brought him to me from Lexington. He was nearly all black, with a white stripe down his nose, and with brown tips to his paws. His name was Rip Van Winkle. He was named after that Rip Van Winkle who slept twenty years. I named him so because he slept so much. He was very playful and intelligent, as well as very active. He usually passed his time carrying people's shoes away. When you woke up in the morning you were sure to miss your shoes, and after a while you would find one on the staircase, or some other place in the house, and the other in the yard. He frequently went to make visits to his neighbors and friends, even after I had forbidden him to do so. He was punished for this, because disobedience is always punished. One day he started to market without my permission, and stopped to see some of his friends. suppose they enticed him off, for he has never

been heard of since.

CHAPTER IV.

REPRODUCTION.

TO THE TEACHER.-The exercises prescribed in the foregoing section are not meant to be continuous, but performed at intervals as the class advances in those parts of the Manual devoted to Expression. After some facility in them has been acquired, they should give place to the form of exercise styled Reproduction.

This differs from the former, not only in the mode of eliciting thought, but also in the additional particular that the information is communicated by the teacher previous to writing. To do this, the teacher should prepare himself, and then deliver to the pupils a short, plain lecture on some interesting subject, on a level with their capacity. On no account should the lecture exceed fifteen or twenty minutes: less than that would be sufficient for young pupils. At its close, allow a few minutes for the asking of questions on points which may not have been fully apprehended. Then let silence be commanded, and require each pupil to reproduce so much of the substance of the lecture as he may recollect. These productions should be subjected to all the revisions and corrections recommended in the "General Directions to the Teacher."

The following is a specimen of the kind of lecture proper to be delivered for such a purpose. But be careful to avoid the mere reading of any piece to be reproduced by the pupils. Prepare your mind as thoroughly as you please, but deliver the lecture in a natural, conversational style, speaking very deliberately, and using all the aids that gestures, intonations, and looks can impart, to make the remarks impressive. Let this exercise be repeated at intervals of a week or two, as the class progresses through the parts devoted to Diction.

SPECIMEN OF LECTURE DELIVERED FOR REPRODUCTION.

LIFE IN SEEDS.-A dry seed looks as if it were dead. But there is life in it, shut up as in a prison house. It is very quiet as long as it is shut up. But once let it out, and it does wonderful things.

An apple-seed, with its stout brown covering, is a very little thing. It does not look as if any thing could ever come from it. But if it gets into the ground, the moisture softens and swells it, the covering bursts, and an apple-tree comes from that little seed. And you know that the Bible tells us that a tree, large enough for the fowls of the air to rest on, comes from the little mustard-seed.

The life in the dry seed is asleep. Put it into moist ground, and this life wakes up. This sleep of seeds sometimes lasts a great while. Commonly we keep them only from one year to another. And it is wonderful to think that the life can sleep through all the winter months and yet not die, but be ready at the call of Spring, when the sun warms the ground a little, to set in motion all the particles of the seed, and cause it to put on a new form, and change itself into a new being, as it were.