38. ORPHEUS WITH HIS LUTE From King Henry the Eighth. Act III. Scene I. Everything that heard him play, Hung their heads, and then lay by. Fall asleep or hearing die. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE. In the play, when the Queen says to her attendant, "My soul grows sad with troubles. Sing and disperse 'em, if thou canst,' the maiden weaves the old story into the song, which she sings to the accompaniment of her own lute. STANZA I. Orpheus made how many things bow themselves? Made them-how? When? Lines 4-6. Plants and flowers sprung to his music as (if) sun and showers had made there (where the music was heard, or where he played) a lasting Spring. Sprung, took on newness of life. STANZA 2. Billows hung their heads. Could one imagine more exquisite praise than that the water would cease in its falling to listen? Could it be true? Why does the extravagant praise not offend you? Such art (that) killing care (care that kills) and grief of heart fall asleep or listening die. Art, power through skill. Compare lines 5 and 6 with the Queen's words. The semicolon in stanza 1 and the first period in stanza 2 indicate two main divisions to each stanza. SUGGESTIVE QUESTIONS FOR WRITTEN REVIEW 1. Indicate by dashes of separation your grouping for Nos. 4, 5, 6, 8, and 16. 2. When a sentence appears to be a single group but is too long to read comfortably as such, how, generally, may we best divide it? 3. Why is the following grouping incorrect? That dances on the sea. (No. 11.) Not a habitation along the route -- was spared. nor an inhabitant 4. (No. 18.) What incorrect grouping would momentarily tell an untruth? (No. 22.) Which action is opposed to honorable treatment? 5. Quote an illustration in which the grammatical groups and the expression groups coincide. One in which they differ. 6. Indicate your preferred phrasing for No. 34 by parallel lines (||). If the importance of a word causes unusual pause, you may indicate it by a single line (\). 7. (No. 35.) What does Mr. Paley mean by suitableness to their several natures, vulgar observation, disposition of the feathers, constitute a vestment? 8. (No. 36.) To what " Everlasting Memorial" does the title refer? 9. Quote the sentence or paragraph that seems to you the finest in Chapter II. CHAPTER III STUDIES IN CONNECTIVES Grammar teaches us that coördinate conjunctions connect words, phrases, and clauses of equal rank; in reading, we find that the connected words, phrases, and clauses are of equal thought value. 66 Conjunctions are signboards," and each has a message of its own. For instance: And connects words, phrases, and clauses of equal thought value, and therefore tells us that the part to follow is equally important with the part that has gone before. (See illustration No. 1.) Or connects parts of equal thought value, but we may know that between them there is always a choice. (See No. 15.) But bespeaks the presence of a second part; and it tells us that the second will be opposed, in some way, to the first. (No. 23.) For signals that it is followed by an explanation or reason for what precedes, or if the form is inverted, for what follows; and so on through the list of wellknown words, whose meanings the Dictionary will unfold. A preposition is a connective having an object that it connects with some other part of the sentence. PEDAGOGICAL INTRODUCTION Faulty reading of words, phrases, and clauses connected by and is one of the most common errors in school reading. What teacher has not wrestled with the tendency of pupils to place undue emphasis on connectives, particularly coördinate conjunctions and prepositions that express naturally inferred relationships? It is one of the most noticeable errors in the reading of poetry, and invariably present in " singsong. Undue emphasis, however, is not the real fault; it is only the outward manifestation of careless and incorrect thinking. 66 In the sentence, The United States has a large home and foreign trade in wheat," pupils will read, home-and-foreign, as though the two words stood for one kind of trade, just as they would say by and by, meaning presently, regardless of the fact that the ideas conveyed by home and foreign may be as far apart as the width of the ocean. Or, they may read, home and foreign trade, as though home bore the same relation to the thought as trade, and that trade was modified by foreign only. To correct this half-thoughtless, half-mechanical sort of reading, pupils should be led one step beyond the recognition and appreciation of individual words or groups of words. They should learn the functions of certain words and know the conditions that confront them when such words appear on the printed page. The presence of and, for instance, means the presence of two words, two phrases, or two clauses of equal importance. The and is but the pin that fastens the parts together. When the pupil realizes this, and that, as a rule, the meaning of the sentence is in the other words, when he grasps the full significance of those other words, correct expression will take care of itself. He reasons: And is a connective. What does it connect? He holds the first portion in mind until he finds the second; performs a quick mental appraisal of the two and expresses each as complete. Or, too, connects, but it allows a choice. I will sell you the farm land on the hillside or the town lot. To choose we must compare. To compare we must see the ideas side by side. Therefore the reader must hold the first idea in mind, even as he expresses the second, and present both to his hearers in such a way that they can grasp the relative values. But connects two parts, but the second part is, in some way, opposed to the first, or is an exception to it. Knowing this, even the sight reader is prepared for the character of the second portion, -- however long |