verly arranged conversation all circumstances before the time of
the opening that are necessary to the development of the plot are
introduced. The audience receives these minor yet essential details
with no impatience, since they explain in part a situation already
interesting. The time order may be broken in order to introduce at the
beginning of the story some interesting situation which will
immediately engage the reader's attention.

In arranging the materials of a story, the main considerations are
Mass and Coherence. Mass demands important matters at the beginning
and at the end of a story. Coherence demands that events closely
related shall stand close together: that an effect shall immediately
follow its cause. Beginning with some interesting situation that will
also introduce the principal characters, the time, and the setting,
the story follows in the main the order of time, and concludes with
the main incident.

An Outline.

One practical suggestion will assist in arranging the parts of a
story. Use an outline. It will guard against the omission of any
detail that may afterward be found necessary, and against the
necessity of offering the apology, inexcusable in prepared work, of
"forgetting to say;" it will help the writer to see the best
arrangement of the parts, to know that causes have preceded effects.
The outline in narration should not be too much in detail, nor should
it be followed if, as the story progresses, new light comes and the
writer sees a better way to proceed. The writer should be above the
outline, not its slave; but the outline is a most valuable servant of
the writer.

Movement.

_Movement is an essential quality of narrative;_ a story must advance.
This does not mean that the story shall always go at the same rate,
though it does mean that it shall always go. If a story always had the
rapidity and intensity of a climax, it would be intolerable. Music
that is all rushing climaxes is unbearable; a picture must not be a
glare of high lights. The quiet passages in music, the grays and low
tones in the background of the picture, the slow chapters in a story,
are as necessary as their opposites; indeed, climaxes are dependent on
contrasts in order to be climaxes.

Rapidity.

The question of movement resolves itself into these two: how is
rapidity of movement obtained, and how can the writer delay the
movement. Rapidity is gained by the omission of all unnecessary
details, and