ies
only twelve inches.

V. Notes and Queries

1. Observe the structure:
Par. 1. General Description.
Par. 2. Statistics.
Par. 3. Offensive Power.
Par. 4. Defensive Arrangements.

2. Could the same structure be used for the description of a
freight boat, a passenger steamer, a ferryboat, a schooner, a
sloop, a brig, a brigantine, a tugboat, a launch, a locomotive,
a railway carriage, an airship, or an automobile?

3. What changes, if any, would you suggest?

4. Explain the terms "displacement," "draft," "normal," "knots,"
"pounds," "turrets."

5. Explain the metaphor in "belt." Is it a good one?

VI. Gathering Material

Do not get your material from reading; get it from observation. Don't
steal it; earn it. Catch your fish; don't buy a string of dead ones at
the fish-market, and then lie about the way you obtained them. Few of us
can be original, but we can all be honest and industrious.

VII. Organization

Before you write, make a plan. It is as necessary in composition as in
building. If the nature of your subject or the kind and quantity of your
material render it desirable to deviate from the model, do not hesitate
to do so. As a rule, however, it will be best to follow its plan rather
closely. At all events, work from some plan. Don't get the idea that you
can dash off a finished exposition in a few minutes.

VIII. Writing

Exposition above everything else should be clear. Say what you mean and
mean what you say.

IX. Criticism

The written expositions of house plans may be tested by having the
pupils exchange papers, and asking the recipients to draw the plans from
the compositions.

X. Suggested Reading

Rudyard Kipling's _The Ship that Found Herself_.

XI. Memorize

CHARITY

Then gently scan your brother man,
Still gentler sister woman;
Though they may gang a kennin' wrang,
To step aside is human.
One point must still be greatly dark,
The moving why they do it,
And just as lamely can ye mark
How far perhaps they rue it.

Who made the heart 'tis he alone
Decidedly can try us;
He knows each chord--its various tone,
Each spring--its various bias.
Then at the balance let's be mute;
We never can adjust it;
What's done we partly may compute,
But know not what's resisted.
ROBERT BURNS.

CHAPTER XV

THE EXPOSITION OF IDE