PART II CHAPTER IV THE PARAGRAPH SECTION XIII The Paragraph Explained Up to this point we have been considering the whole composition in the complete development or treatment of a subject, as, for example, in a story, a narrative, a description, or some other form of composition. We must now learn something about the elements of which the whole composition is composed. If you examine a theme or composition of some length, you will find that it is made up of short divisions or paragraphs, which are composed of sentences, and these in turn of words. Hence paragraphs, sentences, and words are the rhetorical elements into which every composition may be resolved. As the paragraph is the largest division of the composition, we shall consider it first. The Paragraph Defined. As soon as a person begins to collect and put together his ideas upon a subject, he will find that he has one or more distinct notions or thoughts around which these ideas naturally group themselves. For example, if he wishes to write about coal, such questions as where it is found, how it is obtained, what are its uses, will be suggested to him, and his ideas will group themselves about these different topics. The sentences which he writes upon each topic form a paragraph. paragraph is a group of sentences relating to a single topic. A Paragraph Divisions. The division of a composition into paragraph groups is indicated upon the page by indenting or beginning the first line of each a little farther to the right of the margin than the other lines. This division of a composition into paragraphs is a great convenience to the reader, as it enables him to see at a glance into what paragraph groups the writer arranged his ideas. Unless the paragraph divisions are carefully made, each containing a distinct point with all the ideas relating to it, the reader may not get the writer's meaning except by much effort. You see, then, how important it is that you give particular attention to the proper grouping of your ideas. Exercises 1. Read the following selection carefully, to determine the topic of each paragraph, and to see how the writer has grouped his ideas upon each topic in a separate paragraph. A NEW ENGLAND SNOW-STORM On such a day I recall the great snow-storm on the northern New England hills, which lasted for a week with no cessation, with no sunrise or sunset, and no observation at noon, and the sky all the while dark with the driving snow, and the whole world full of the noise of the rioting Boreal forces, until the roads were obliterated, the fences covered, and the snow was piled solidly above the first-story window of the farmhouse on one side, and drifted before the front door so high that egress could only be had by tunneling the bank. After such a battle and siege when the wind fell and the sun struggled out again, the pallid world lay subdued and tranquil, and the scattered dwellings were not unlike wrecks stranded by the tempest and half buried in sand. when the blue sky again bent over all, when the wide expanse of snow sparkled like diamond fields and the chimney signal smoke could be seen, how beautiful was the picture! Then began the stir abroad, and the efforts to open up communications through roads or fields or whatever paths could be broken, and the way to the meeting-house first of all. Then from every house and hamlet the men turned out with shovels, with the patient lumbering oxen yoked to the sleds, to the roads, driving into the deepest drifts, shoveling and shouting as if the severe labor were a holiday frolic, the courage and hilarity rising with the difficulties encountered; and relief parties, meeting at length in the midst of the wide, white desolation, hailed each other as chance explorers in a new land, and made the whole country side ring with the noise of their congratulations. - WARNER. 2. Read" The Robin," page 7, and write the topic of each paragraph. 3. Read any ten consecutive paragraphs in the history which you are studying, write their subjects, and notice how each logically follows, or is the natural outgrowth of the one preceding it. 4. Turn to the selection on page 42, and as you read each paragraph name its subject in a few words, adding such items as you think necessary to give a brief outline of it. Using these notes as a guide, write the story from memory. The Narrative Paragraph. — In narrating an incident or giving an account of some occurrence, the paragraph topics will naturally be what happened first, what happened next, and so on. Notice how the incidents are grouped together in the following selection. What happened in the school-room forms the material for one paragraph, what happened after school was dismissed furnishes material for another. All was now bustle and hubbub in the late quiet schoolroom. The scholars were hurried through their lessons without stopping at trifles. Those who were nimble skipped over half with impunity, and those who were tardy had a smart application now and then in the rear, to quicken their speed or to help them over a tall word. Books were flung aside without being put away on the shelves; inkstands were overturned, benches thrown down, and the whole school was turned loose an hour before the usual time,―bursting forth like a legion of young imps, yelping and racketing about the green in joy at their early emancipation. The gallant Ichabod now spent an extra half-hour at his toilet, brushing and furnishing up his best-and indeed only-suit of rusty black, and arranging his locks by a bit of broken looking-glass that hung up in the schoolhouse. That he might make his appearance before his mistress in the true style of a cavalier, he borrowed a horse from the farmer with whom he was domiciliated, a choleric old Dutchman of the name of Hans Van Ripper; and, thus gallantly mounted, issued forth like a knight-errant in quest of adventures. - IRVING. When the action is rapid, incidents may be given one after another as they happen without making time the basis of separation into paragraphs; but when there is any decided break or change in the course of the event, this should be indicated by a new paragraph. In the following account of the conflict between the knight and the Saracen, the incidents are given in the rapid succession with which they followed one after the other, a break or change in their order being indicated by a new paragraph. THE KNIGHT AND THE SARACEN As the Saracen approached at full speed, he seemed to expect the knight of the Leopard should put his horse to the gallop to meet him. But the Christian, knowing well the customs of Eastern warriors, did not seem to tire his horse without good reason. Instead of doing as the Arab expected, the crusader made a dead halt. When the Saracen had approached to within twice the length of his lance, he wheeled his horse to the left and rode twice around the Christian. Without quitting his ground, the knight turned his horse, keeping his front constantly to the enemy, so that he could not attack him at any unguarded point. The Saracen, wheeling his horse, retreated to the distance of a hundred yards. A second time, like a hawk attacking a heron, he renewed the charge, and a second time retreated without coming to a close fight. A third time he approached in the same manner, when the knight, growing tired of this kind of warfare, suddenly seized the battle-ax which hung at his saddlebow, and with a strong hand and unerring aim he hurled it against the head of the enemy. The Saracen became aware of the crusader's intention just in time to interpose his light buckler between the ax and his head; but the blow forced the buckler down upon his turban, and the Saracen was beaten from his horse. DESCRIPTIVE PARAGRAPH - SCOTT. In a description the sentences that describe each prominent object or feature usually form a paragraph. For instance, in a long description of a landscape each prominent feature, such as a mountain range, a forest, a lake, or a river, may be described in a separate paragraph, but in shorter descriptions what can be seen at one time or from one point usually forms material for a paragraph. In the following the writer makes what he sees as he looks to one side of him the subject of the first paragraph, and what he sees when looking down the river the subject of the other paragraph: On the left of the spectator lay the ruined wall, broken in many places, and in some, overhanging the narrow beach below in rude and heavy masses. Huge knots of seaweed hung upon the jagged and pointed stones, trembling in every breath of the wind, and the green ivy clung mournfully round the dark and ruined battlements. Behind it rose the ancient castle, its towers roofless, and its |