as were the faults of Hastings, it was happy for our country that at that conjuncture, the most terrible through which she has ever passed, he was the ruler of her Indian dominions.—MACAULAY: Warren Hastings.

The above is no digression (§ 28), but a brilliant summary of indispensable information. It also exemplifies the principle that the order of cause and effect is even more important than the order of time.

SPECIAL VARIETIES OF NARRATIVE FORM.

26. Reverting Narration.-Ever since the days of the Greeks and Romans there has been a disposition, notably among writers of epic poetry, to narrate certain earlier portions of the story after the main action has been carried on a while. The story goes back, reverts, to the real beginning, or at least to an earlier stage. Thus, in the Odyssey, the hero, Odysseus, having been shipwrecked on the coast of Phæacia and hospitably entertained there by the king, Alcinoüs (books v.-viii.), narrates to Alcinous his previous adventures among the Cicones and Lotos-eaters, with Polyphemus, Æolus, Antiphates, Circe, his descent to the nether world, his escape from the Sirens, etc. (books ix.-xii.). Similarly, in the Æneid, Æneas, having been shipwrecked and received by Dido, queen of Carthage (book i.), narrates to her his adventures during the seven years from the fall of Troy to the present moment (books ii. and iii.). In Mr. Gilfil's Love-Story the first chapter represents him as dead, and gives a sketch of him in the latter period of his life. His early life and his relations with Tina are begun in chapter ii. The first two chapters of Daniel Deronda introduce the heroine, Gwendolen, at Leubronn, a German watering-place. All the rest of book i. (chs. iii.-x.) and part of book ii. (chs. xi.-xv.) narrate Gwendolen's previous life in England and bring the reader back to Leubronn. In Irving's story of The Widow and her Son (Sketch-Book) we first have the account of the burial

of George Somers, and afterwards the story of his misfortunes and death. See also Hawthorne, § 17.

A remarkable specimen of reverting narrative is Grant Allen's Recalled to Life. The opening scene depicts the heroine standing over the body of a murdered man, her father. Her mind is perfectly sound, but she has lost all memory. She cannot recollect how she came to be there, who fired the pistol-in short, any event of her previous life. The rest of the story relates her efforts to recover her memory and reconstruct her past life piece by piece. The narrative is autobiographic in form.

The present remarks are not offered as an adequate treatment of this mode of writing, but only as a hint to the reader to discover additional instances for himself.

27. Overlapping Narration.-In long and complex narratives the personages arrange themselves in groups. Each group has its own peculiar interests and leads its own life, while they all move forward to a common goal, i. e., they co-operate in carrying on the fortunes of the hero. They act upon him, he acts upon them. It is in this linking together of groups that the story-teller has abundant opportunity of displaying his art. He should make it effective without letting it become obtrusive. To discuss the various devices by which groups may be linked would not be feasible in a book like the present. The problem is too complicated, and pertains rather to the study of literary methods. Yet the reader can and should appreciate, in a measure at least, the grouping in Dickens, Scott, George Eliot, and other authors commonly read. A good deal can be accomplished by writing down the name of every person as soon as he or she appears, then, when the list is complete, sorting the persons into their natural groups, and finally determining which persons in every two groups constitute the link.

By overlapping narration is meant briefly this. The narrator tells his story piecemeal, i. e., recounts the sayings

E

and doings (the action) first of one group, then of a second group (perhaps in a different place), then of a third, and so on. If now the action of the second group, let us say, has been in part simultaneous with that of the first group, the action overlaps. An example or two will make this clear. Chapter xxii. (book i.) of The Old Curiosity Shop ends with Barbara shelling peas and Kit watching her. Then follow fifteen chapters narrating the doings of Dick Swiveller, Quilp, Little Nell, Mrs. Jarley, etc. Chapter xxxviii. then opens:

Kit, . . . while the matters treated of in the last fifteen chapters were yet in progress, was, as the reader may suppose, gradually familiarizing himself more and more with Mr. and Mrs. Garland, Mr. Abel, the pony, and Barbara, and gradually coming to consider them one and all as his particular private friends, etc.

The story of Nell, after being carried through chapters xlii.-xlvi., breaks off, leaving her in the church-yard. Chapters xlvii.-li. give the story of Kit's mother, Quilp, and the Brass family. Chapter lii. then takes us back to Nell. It is really introduced by the concluding sentence of chapter li.:

Leaving him [Quilp] to visions in which, perhaps, the quiet figures in the old church porch were not without their share, be it our task to rejoin them as they sat and watched.

This linking of the two groups by means of the dwarf's dreams is an ingenious device. There are several more instances of overlapping narration in The Old Curiosity Shop. In fact, the whole plot deserves careful study from this point of view.

In The House of the Seven Gables there is also an instance of overlapping narration, thus indicated:

Judge Pyncheon, while his two relatives have fled away with such ill-considered haste, still sits in the old parlor, keeping house, as the familiar phrase is, in the absence of its ordinary occupants. To him, and to the venerable House of the Seven Gables, does our story now betake itself, like an owl bewildered in the daylight and hastening back to his hollow tree.-HAWTHORNE: Seven Gables, ch. xviii.

The battle of Beal' an Duine in The Lady of the Lake (canto vi. st. 16-21), if we consider it merely chronologically, might be classified as overlapping. But if we consider it as something apart from and independent of the main narrative (it is not an essential part), we may classify it rather as an Episode (§ 29).

Few writers are as painstaking as Dickens and Hawthorne in indicating the chronology of their narratives. Scott and Thackeray not infrequently leave the reader in uncertainty. But the most careless writer in this respect is George Eliot. She rarely, if ever, informs us explicitly when the narrative passes from one group to another and when it overlaps. Her Middlemarch and Daniel Deronda are so loosely put together, in this respect, that the reader who wishes to master these stories thoroughly must construct a diary, as it were, of the action.

It is quite possible to compose a long, complex narrative without overlapping, e. g., David Copperfield. The explanation is simple: the story is told in strict autobiographic form. David tells only what happened to himself from time to time, and each group appears on the scene only in so far as he is for the time a member of it.

28. Digression.-In a loose, general way, digression may be defined to be wandering from the subject. But there are two kinds of digression, which should be carefully distinguished.

In the one kind the writer violates the unity of the paragraph (4) by introducing matter which is connected with the general subject, but which should be treated by itself in a separate paragraph. Thus, the account of Sir Roger's death, written by his butler, Edward Biscuit:

Upon his coming home, the first complaint he made was, that he had lost his roast-beef stomach, not being able to touch a sirloin, which was served up according to custom; and you know he used to take great delight in it. From that time forward he grew worse and worse, but still kept a good heart to the last. Indeed, we were once in great hope

of his recovery, upon a kind message that was sent him from the widow lady whom he had made love to the forty last years of his life; but this only proved a lightning before death. He has bequeathed to this lady, as a token of his love, a great pearl necklace, and a couple of silver bracelets set with jewels, which belonged to my good old lady his mother; he has bequeathed the fine white gelding, that he used to ride a hunting upon, to his chaplain, because he thought he would be kind to him, and has left you all his books. He has, moreover, bequeathed to the chaplain a very pretty tenement with good lands about it. It being a very cold day when he made his will, he left for mourning, to every man in the parish, a great frieze coat, and to every woman a black riding-hood. It was a most moving sight to see him take leave of his poor servants, commending us all for our fidelity, whilst we were not able to speak a word for weeping. As we most of us are grown grayheaded in our dear master's service, he has left us pensions and legacies, which we may live very comfortably upon, the remaining part of our days. He has bequeathed a great deal more in charity, which is not yet come to my knowledge, and it is peremptorily said in the parish that he has left money to build a steeple to the church; for he was heard to say some time ago, that if he lived two years longer, Coverley church should have a steeple to it. The chaplain tells everybody that he made a very good end, and never speaks of him without tears. He was buried, according to his own directions, among the family of the Coverleys, on the left hand of his father, Sir Arthur. The coffin was carried by six of his tenants, and the pall held up by six of the quorum ; the whole parish followed the corpse with heavy hearts, and in their mourning suits, the men in frieze, and the women in riding-hoods.— ADDISON (Spectator, 517): Death of Sir Roger.

The grotesqueness of the above is produced by the intermixture of incidents of the death-scene with will-making, bequests, and other business. A skilful narrator would have reserved the business for a separate paragraph. But the Spectator is intentionally burlesquing the rambling manner of an uneducated servant. In like manner, Shylock's raving over his daughter and his ducats (Merchant of Venice, ii. 8) is intended by the dramatist to give to Shylock's really intense grief a strong touch of the ridicu lous, in the eyes of Salarino and Solanio at least.

In the other kind, Digression proper, the writer intro