of view chosen by the writer. He will not include
details that cannot be seen from that position even though he knows that
they exist.

Notice that the following descriptions include only that which can be seen
from the place indicated in the italicized phrases:--

_Forward from the bridge_ he beheld a landscape of wide valleys and
irregular heights, with groves and lakes and fanciful houses linked
together by white paths and shining streams. The valleys were spread
below, that the river might be poured upon them for refreshment in day of
drought, and they were as green carpets figured with beds and fields of
flowers and flecked with flocks of sheep white as balls of snow; and the
voices of shepherds following the flocks were heard afar. As if to tell
him of the pious inscription of all he beheld, the altars out under the
open sky seemed countless, each with a white-gowned figure attending it,
while processions in white went slowly hither and thither between them;
and the smoke of the altars half risen hung collected in pale clouds over
the devoted places.

Wallace: _Ben-Hur_.
(Copyright, 1880. Harper and Bros.)

The house stood unusually near the river, facing eastward, and standing
four-square, with an immense veranda about its sides, and a flight of
steps in front, spreading broadly downward, as we open our arms to a
child. _From the veranda_ nine miles of river were seen; and in their
compass near at hand, the shady garden full of rare and beautiful flowers;
farther away broad fields of cane and rice, and the distant quarters of
the slaves, and on the horizon everywhere a dark belt of cypress forest.

--Cable: _Old Creole Days_.

+122. Selection of Details Affected by Point of View.+--A skillful writer
will not ask his reader to perform impossible feats. We cannot see the
leaves upon a tree a mile away, and so should not describe them. The finer
effects and more minute details should be included only when our chosen
point of view brings us near enough to appreciate them. In the selection
below, Stevenson tells only as much about Swanston cottage as can be seen
at a distance of six miles.

So saying she carried me around the battlements _towards the opposite or
southern side of the fortress and indeed to a bastion_ almost immediately
overlooking the place of our projected flight. Thence we had a view of
some foreshortened suburbs at our feet, and beyond of a green, open, and
irregular country rising t