1. The plumbers had occasion to make me several visits. 2. Sometimes they would find, upon arrival, that they had forgotten some indispensable tool; and one would go back to the shop, a mile and a half, after it; and his comrade would await his return with the most exemplary patience, and sit down and talk—always by the hour. 3. I do not know but it is a habit to have something wanted at the shop. 4. They seemed to me very good workmen, and always willing to stop, and talk about the job or anything else, when I went near them. 5. Nor had they any of that impetuous hurry that is said to be the bane of our American civilization. 6. To their credit be it said that I never observed anything of it in them. 7. They can afford to wait. 8. Two of them will sometimes wait nearly half a day, while a comrade goes for a tool. 9. They are patient and philosophical. 10. It is a great pleasure to meet such men. 11. One only wishes there was some work he could do for them by the hour.
+The Uses of Words and Groups of Words+.—How can you make the last part of 1 express more directly the cause of becoming disabled? Would you use a semicolon to separate the sentences thus joined, or would you use a comma? Give a reason for the comma after days, Find in 2 an adverb phrase that expresses purpose. Use an equivalent adjective in place of a couple of. Explain the use of there in 3. What adjective may be used in place of good in a good deal? What long complex phrase modifies deal? Put what after the preposition about and find a group of words that takes the place of a noun. Find in this group a subject and a predicate. Find in 4 an objective complement. Find a compound infinitive phrase and tell what it modifies. Notice that the dash helps to show the break made by repeating talk. When 5 is divided into two sentences, what word is dropped? This, then, must be the word that connected the two sentences. Notice that the two main parts of 5 are separated by a semicolon. This enables the writer to show that the two main divisions of 5 are more widely separated in meaning than are the parts of the second division where the comma is used. Give the three leading predicate verbs in 5 and their complements. If they had been made by the job is joined like an adverb to what verb? What is the predicate of this modifying group?
The infinitive phrase in 1, paragraph 2, modifies what? Is me, or visits, the object complement of make? Put what after would find in 2 and get the object complement. Can you make a sentence of this group? What are its principal parts? Does the writer make an unexpected turn after talk? How is this shown to the eye? Put what after do know in 3 and find the object complement. Can you make a sentence of this object complement? What phrase can you put in place of the pronoun it without changing the sense? By using the word it, a better arrangement can be made. What group of words in 5 is used like an adjective to modify hurry? Change the pronoun that to hurry and make a separate sentence of this group. What word, then, must have made an adjective of this sentence and joined it to hurry? What is the object complement of can afford in 7? Supply a preposition after will wait in 8, and then find two groups of words that tell the time of waiting. Find a subject and a predicate in the second group. What explains it in 10? Find the object complement of wishes in 11. What is the subject of was? The office of there? After work supply the pronoun that and tell the office of the group it introduces. What is the object complement of could do? What connects this group to work?
+The Grouping of Sentences into Paragraphs+.—There are two distinct sets of sentences in this selection—distinct because developing two distinct sub-topics. Accordingly, there are two paragraphs. Let us take for the general topic The Visits of the Plumbers. Let us see whether all the sentences of the first paragraph will not come under the sub-topic First Visit, and those of the second under the sub-topic Subsequent Visits. The sentences of each paragraph should be closely related to one another and to the sub-topic. They should stand in their proper order. Do the paragraphs above stand such tests? If they do, they possess the prime quality of +Unity+.
+The Author's Style+.—This selection we may call +Narrative+, though there are descriptive touches in it. It is a story of what? Is the story clearly told throughout? If not, where is it obscure? Is it made interesting and entertaining? Is Mr. Warner here giving us a bit of his own experience? Or do you think he is drawing upon his imagination? Would you call the style plain, or does it abound with metaphors, similes, or other figures of speech? Are the sentences generally long, or generally short? What are the faults or foibles of these real or fancied plumbers? Does the author speak of them in a genial and lenient way? or is he hostile, and does he hold up their foibles to scorn and derision? Does he make us laugh with, or does he make us laugh at, the plumbers? If the former, the style is humorous; if the latter, the style is satirical or sarcastic. Would you call Mr. Warner's quality of style +Humor+? or that +form of wit+ known as +Satire+? Is our author's use of it delicate and refined? or is it gross and coarse? Does it stop short of making its object grotesque, or not? Can you name any writers whose humor or satire is coarse?
SUGGESTIONS FOB COMPOSITION WORK.
TO THE TEACHER.—See suggestions, pages 159, 160.
Exercises on the Composition of the Sentence and the Paragraph.
FROM BEECHER'S "LECTURES TO YOUNG MEN."
1. Indolence inclines a man to rely upon others and not upon himself, to eat their bread and not his own. 2. His carelessness is somebody's loss; his neglect is somebody's downfall. 3. If he borrows, the article remains borrowed; if he begs and gets, it is as the letting out of waters—no one knows where it will stop. 4. He spoils your work, disappoints your expectations, exhausts your patience, eats up your substance, abuses your confidence, and hangs a dead weight upon all your plans; and the very best thing an honest man can do with a lazy man is to get rid of him.