riting, however, aims to give pleasure
or to arouse our emotions. It calls out something in the reader even more
strongly than it sets forth something in the writer. This suggestiveness
in writing will be considered later, but for the present it will be well
for you to bear in mind that most language has for its purpose the exact
expression of a definite idea. Much of the failure in school work arises
from the careless substitution of one image for another, and from the
formation of incomplete and inaccurate images.

EXERCISES

_A._ Make a list of the words in the following selections whose meanings
you need to look up in order to make the images exact and complete. Do not
attempt to memorize the language of the definition, but to form a correct
image.

1. The sun stared brazenly down on a gray farmhouse, on ranges of
whitewashed outbuildings, and on a goodly array of dark-thatched ricks.

2. In his shabby frieze jacket and mud-laden brogans, he was scarcely an
attractive object.

3. In a sunlit corner of an old coquina fort they came suddenly face to
face with a familiar figure.

4. Somewhat back from the village street
Stands the old-fashioned country seat.
Across its antique portico
Tall poplar trees their shadows throw,
And from its station in the hall
An ancient timepiece says to all:
"Forever--never!
Never--forever!"

--Longfellow: _The Old Clock on the Stairs_.

5. There was a room which bore the appearance of a vault. Four spandrels
from the corners ran up to join a sharp cup-shaped roof. The architecture
was rough, but very strong. It was evidently part of a great building.

6. The officer proceeded, without affecting to hear the words which
escaped the sentinel in his surprise; nor did he again pause, until he had
reached the low strand, and in a somewhat dangerous vicinity to the
western water bastion of the fort.

7. She stood on the top step under the _porte-cochere_, on the extreme
edge, so that the toes of her small slippers extended a little over it.
She bent forward, and then tipped back on the high, exiguous heels again.

8. Before the caryatides of the fireplace, under the ancestral portraits, a
valet moves noiselessly about, arranging the glistening silver service on
the long table and putting in order the fruits, sweets, and ices.

9. No sooner is the heavy gate of the portal passed than one sees from
afar among the leafage the court of honor,