ant countries.

7. There are unquestionably increasing opportunities for an honorable and
useful career in the civil service of the United States.

(Have you used any method besides that of repetition? Does your paragraph
really explain the proposition?)

+165. Exposition by Use of Examples.+--Exposition treats of general
subjects, and the topic statement of a paragraph is, therefore, a general
statement. In order to understand what such a general statement means, the
reader may need to think of a concrete case. The writer may develop his
paragraph by furnishing concrete cases. (See Section 44.) In many cases no
further explanation is necessary.

The following paragraph illustrates this method of explanation:--

The lower portions of stream valleys which have sunk below sea level are
called _drowned valleys_. The lower St. Lawrence is perhaps the greatest
example of a drowned valley in the world, but many other rivers are in the
same condition. The old channel of the Hudson River may be traced upon the
sea bottom about 125 miles beyond its present mouth, and its valley is
drowned as far up as Troy, 150 miles. The sea extends up the Delaware
River to Trenton, and Chesapeake Bay with its many arms is the drowned
valleys of the Susquehanna and its former tributaries. Many of the most
famous harbors in the world, as San Francisco Bay, Puget Sound, the
estuaries of the Thames and the Mersey, and the Scottish firths, are
drowned valleys.

--Dryer: _Lessons in Physical Geography_.

+Theme XCII.+--_Develop one of the following topic statements into an
expository paragraph by use of examples:_--

1. Weather depends to a great extent upon winds.

2. Progress in civilization has been materially aided by the use of nails.

3. Habit is formed by the repetition of the same act.

4. Men become criminals by a gradual process.

5. Men's lives are affected by small things.

6. Defeat often proves to be real success.

(Have you made your meaning clear? Does your example really illustrate the
topic statement? Can you think of other illustrations?)

+166. Exposition by Comparison or Contrast.+--We can frequently make our
explanations clear by comparing the subject under discussion with
something that is already familiar to the reader. In such a case we shall
need to show in what respect the subject we are explaining is similar to
or differs from that with which it is compared. (Section 48.) Though
customary it i