The hoarse sea moans bodeful, swinging low and heavy against these whinstone bays; - the sea and the tempests are abroad, all else asleep but we, — and there is One that rides on the wings of the wind. . .

And now is the hour when the attack should be, and no Lambert is yet here, he is ordering the line far to the right yet; and Oliver occasionally, in Hodgson's hearing, is impatient for him. The Scots, too, on this wing, are awake; thinking to surprise us; there is their trumpet sounding, we heard it once; and Lambert, who was to lead the attack, is not here. The Lord General is impatient; behold Lambert at last! The trumpets peal, shattering with fierce clangor Night's silence; the cannons awaken all along the Line: "The Lord of Hosts!" "The Lord of Hosts!" On, my brave ones; on!

The dispute "on this right wing was hot and stiff, for three-quarters of an hour." Plenty of fire, from field-pieces, snaphances, matchlocks, entertains the Scotch main-battle across the Brock; poor stiffened men roused from the corn-shocks with their matches all out! But here on the right, their horse," with lances in the front rank," charge desperately; drive us back across the hollow of the Rivulet;

-back a little; but the Lord gives us courage, and we storm home again, horse and foot, upon them, with a shock like tornado tempests; break them, beat them, drive them all adrift. "Some fled towards Copperspath, but most across their own foot." Their own poor foot, whose matches were hardly well alight yet! Poor men, it was a terrible awakening for them: field-pieces and charge of foot across the Brocksburn; and now here is their own horse in mad panic trampling them to death. Above three-thousand killed upon the place: "I never saw such a charge of foot and horse," says one; nor did I. . Oliver was still near to Yorkshire Hodgson when the shock succeeded; Hodg

son heard him say, "They run! I profess they run!" And over St. Abb's Head and the German Ocean just then burst the first gleam of the level Sun upon us, "and I heard Nol say, in the words of the Psalmist, 'Let God arise, let His enemies be scattered.'

CARLYLE: Oliver Cromwell, vol. i, p. 465.

B. Continue one of Stevenson's beginnings (p. 256) until you have (1) introduced an obstacle; (2) produced a struggle; (3) reached a climax. Or begin a new story and carry it through these three stages. The following may suggest a story:

1. A poor tenement district in New York. -Children play on roofs. A mother, going away to work all day, tethers her four-year-old to one of the chimneys, at end of long clothesline. Firemen in engine-house across street startled to see a child dangling high in mid-air at end of a line. Attempted rescue. Longest ladders barely reach. At last tallest fireman at top of longest ladder manages to get within reach. Suddenly child slips out of rope and (horror of crowd below) disappears utterly. - Widow Murphy on fireescape at third floor later discovers a four-year-old playing on a mattress that she had put out on fire-escape to air.

2. Two boys living in an abandoned mining district are walking along a slope when one suddenly sinks through the surface. Other tries to rescue him and also falls in. After long exploring, they finally come out in the vegetablecellar of a house half a mile away.

3. A young girl in a large city is compelled by a drunken mother to beg on the street. — Girl's conscience revolts at the lies she must tell day after day. Some of her experiences. Hits upon a plan for honest self-support.— A queer professionrepairer of rag dolls. - Final success, and reform of the mother.

4. Two boys in a big city high school have exactly the same name, though not related-one a fine student; other careless, rich, and a failure. At end of term, each takes home the other's report card. - How the matter was straight

ened out.

The End.

87. A narrative may close in several different ways. The chief actor, after struggle with the obstacle, may succeed in overcoming it and go on his way rejoicing. In that case we have a cheerful conclusion. Or he may struggle with it and be overcome by it and die. In that case we have a painful conclusion. Sometimes it appears in the course of the story that the chief character is himself responsible for the obstacle. With his own hand, however unwittingly, he put it there. He dug the pit into which he himself falls. The trap he set for some one else catches him. Some slight defect in his character, or the indulgence of some whim, turns out to be an obstacle to the fulfilment of his dearest hopes. Then, if the end is the death or ruin of the hero, we have what is called a tragic ending.

In a well-constructed plot there is but one main line of incidents. Along this track the action presses right forward to its goal, the climax. Minor incidents there may be in abundance, but upon examination they will be found to be so used as to contribute in some way to the forward movement of the main action. The incidents of this action are closely bound together. Each one, after the first, grows naturally out of the incident that precedes it, and each one except the last grows naturally into the incident that follows it. The

test of a good plot was stated by Aristotle in the following words, and no one since his time has improved upon it: "The plot," says Aristotle, "being a representation of action, must be the representation of one complete action, and the parts of the action must be so arranged that if any be transposed or removed, the whole will be broken up and disturbed; for what proves nothing by its insertion or omission is no part of the whole.”

88.

Assignments on the Plot.

A. Examine the conclusions of the several narratives quoted in the preceding pages of this chapter. Is the conclusion in each case expected? What is its nature?

B. Analyze the following narratives, pointing out (1) the elements of the story, that is, the opposing forces, and the setting; (2) the nature of the obstacle; (3) the character of the beginning; (4) the means of exciting suspense; (5) the point of highest interest; (6) the nature of the conclusion. Then taking it up sentence by sentence, show how each part of the narrative contributes to the development of the plot. See whether any of the sentences can be taken out or transposed without disturbing the unity and sequence of the whole.

1. On topping some rising ground we again sighted antelope. 2. The hood was then slipped from the chetah's head. 3. He saw the animals at once; his body quivered all over with excitement, the tail straightened, and the hackles on his shoulders stood erect, while his eyes gleamed, and he strained at the cord, which was held short. 4. In a second it was unfastened, there was a yellow streak in the air, and the chetah was crouching low some yards away. 5. In this position, and taking advantage of a certain unevenness of the ground which gave him cover, he stealthily crept forward toward a buck that was feeding some distance

away from the others. 6. Suddenly this antelope saw or scented his enemy, for he was off like the wind. 7. He was, however, too late; the chetah had been too quick for him. 8. All that was to be seen was a flash, as the supreme rush was made. 9. This movement of the chetah is said to be, for the time it lasts, the quickest thing in the animal world, far surpassing the speed of a race-horse. 10. Certainly it surprised all of us, who were intently watching the details of the scene being enacted in our view. 11. The pace was so marvellously great that the chetah actually sprang past the buck, although by this time the terrified animal was fairly stretched out at panic speed. 12. This overshooting the mark by the chetah had the effect of driving the antelope, which swerved off immediately from his line, into running round in a circle, with the chetah on the outside. 13. The tongas were then galloped up, and the excitement of the occupants can scarcely be described. 14. In my eagerness to see the finish, I jumped off and took to running, but the hunt was soon over, for before I could get quite up, the chetah got close to the buck, and with a spring at his haunches, brought him to the ground. 15. The leopard then suddenly released his hold, and sprang at his victim's throat, throwing his prey over on its back, where it was held when we arrived on the spot. Century, 47:574.

2. The first interest was attracted toward the combat of Niger with Sporus; for this species of contest, from the fatal result which usually attended it, and from the great science it required in either antagonist, was always peculiarly inviting to the spectators.

They stood at a considerable distance from each other. The singular helmet which Sporus wore (the visor of which was down) concealed his face; but the features of Niger attracted a fearful and universal interest from their com