ut this detail also
has been overlooked in the Deerslayer tale.

5. They require that when the personages of a tale deal in conversation,
the talk shall sound like human talk, and be talk such as human beings
would be likely to talk in the given circumstances, and have a
discoverable meaning, also a discoverable purpose, and a show of
relevancy, and remain in the neighborhood of the subject in hand, and be
interesting to the reader, and help out the tale, and stop when the
people cannot think of anything more to say. But this requirement has
been ignored from the beginning of the Deerslayer tale to the end of it.

6. They require that when the author describes the character of a
personage in his tale, the conduct and conversation of that personage
shall justify said description. But this law gets little or no attention
in the Deerslayer tale, as Natty Bumppo's case will amply prove.

7. They require that when a personage talks like an illustrated,
gilt-edged, tree-calf, hand-tooled, seven-dollar Friendship's Offering
in the beginning of a paragraph, he shall not talk like a negro minstrel
in the end of it. But this rule is flung down and danced upon in the
Deerslayer tale.

8. They require that crass stupidities shall not be played upon the
reader as "the craft of the woodsman, the delicate art of the forest," by
either the author or the people in the tale. But this rule is
persistently violated in the Deerslayer tale.

9. They require that the personages of a tale shall confine themselves
to possibilities and let miracles alone; or, if they venture a miracle,
the author must so plausibly set it forth as to make it look possible and
reasonable. But these rules are not respected in the Deerslayer tale.

10. They require that the author shall make the reader feel a deep
interest in the personages of his tale and in their fate; and that he
shall make the reader love the good people in the tale and hate the bad
ones. But the reader of the Deerslayer tale dislikes the good people in
it, is indifferent to the others, and wishes they would all get drowned
together.

11. They require that the characters in a tale shall be so clearly
defined that the reader can tell beforehand what each will do in a given
emergency. But in the Deerslayer tale this rule is vacated.

In addition to these large rules there are some little ones. These
require that the author shall:

12. Say what he is proposing to say, not