artistic the expression of his thought; will set forth his usual method (comparison and figure, specific word and epithet, allusion, etc.) of developing his thought or calling up images in the mind of the reader; and will treat of all such matters of style as reveal the author's habit of mind. The student will attain one of the most satisfying results of the study of literature if he can come to know his author as an acquaintance and friend can enumerate the qualities of his mind and heart, as well as those of his art, and feel the influence of his personality.

5. However thorough and conscientious may be the formal study of a work of art, it yet leaves something to be desired an intimate and spiritual appreciation, without which the best of formal work is vain and empty. The formal study should help to prepare the mind and heart for such appreciation by concentrating the attention on the beauty of the conception and of its expression; but sympathy is not a necessary or direct result of even good formal study. Every intelligent being is more or less susceptible to the influence of beauty, and this natural susceptibility may be cultivated. The means of cultivation comes to most persons through the influence of some personality. A text-book is, perforce, too impersonal to furnish the atmosphere necessary for the most complete and profitable study of any work of art. It is the teacher's province to create this atmosphere in the classroom. The text-book relieves the teacher of careful and troubled attention to many details and formal matters, that he may give himself more freely to this better part. Love of and enthusiasm for beauty are contagious; they are transmitted, indeed, rather by contagion than by direct instruction. The ability to bring an inspiring atmosphere into the class-room is a sine qua non for a teacher of art. A mechanical

instructor teaches nothing really worth while in literature, and no text-book can do for his class what his personality should be able to do.

6. It is recommended that the students be encouraged to look up critical estimates of a classic after it has been studied carefully, never before. They will thus learn to be independent in work and in judgment.

7. There are many good and inexpensive annotated editions of some of the works discussed in this volume (e. g., Emerson's Essays and Poe's Tales), and the compiler of these STUDIES has not thought it worth while to explain allusions and references found in these pieces of literature. The necessary notes will naturally be in the hands of the students. In all cases where the author of this book has, in her own experience, found it difficult to obtain texts satisfactorily annotated, she has furnished here notes and explanations necessary for a complete study of detail.

8. In this volume reference is made, unless otherwise stated, to lines of poetry and to paragraphs of prose. The STUDIES are grouped for convenience under the authors of the selections studied, and the authors are placed chiefly in chronological order. Unless, however, the STUDIES are used in connection with the history of American literature or to bring out the distinctive style of the various writers, it may be found more desirable to use them in connection with the Rhetorical Introduction until the subjects of Meter and Melody and Harmony have been discussed (see exercises for practice after these topics in the Introduction), and after the discussion of Figures of Speech to take up the easier before the more difficult poems and stories, combining with them the remaining sections of the Introduction. For example, Lanier's Tampa Robins should precede the more

difficult poems of earlier writers, if nothing is to be considered but the study of the poem itself.

9. Other groupings of material and innumerable other exercises will readily occur to the teacher. For example, various works of the same kind may be studied together. The ballads of Longfellow, Lowell, and Whittier may be compared with each other and with the Early English ballads; variations in style may be observed, and in some cases reasons for such variations can be discovered. Again, comparisons of authors on certain points of style may profitably be made. Which depend most on epithets for effects? Which on figures of speech? Which authors have the broadest interests, and how do they show it? Which are most influenced by Nature? Which by books and scholarship? How do they show such influence in choice of subjects, in source of figures, in abundance of allusions, by imitation? What mental qualities do all these peculiarities of style reveal? For purposes of comparison, poems may be grouped according to subjects, e. g., poems addressed to flowers by several writers may be studied together to show how in various ways to various persons

the meanest flower that blows can give Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears.

- WORDSWORTH.

Another exceedingly profitable exercise may be used for training the frequently neglected ear to catch an author's meaning and method. After listening to a first reading by the teacher of, say, Emerson's Each and All, the class should be able to state clearly in a single sentence the central thought of the poem; and on hearing it a second time, the teacher having directed them to listen now for the poet's method,

they should be able to discover that the theme is developed by example, and to say which example is evidently the most important one in the poet's mind - perhaps even the raison d'être of the entire poem.

10. Little attempt is here made to define formally the rhetorical terms explained and used. The writer has found that beginners do better to acquire familiarity with and usage of technical terms rather through example and practice than through formal definitions, which belong to later, more philosophical study. It is believed, however, that the less formal explanations of this volume are in accord with the discussions to be found in the most scholarly of advanced books on literary forms and criticism, and that this volume will serve, therefore, for those students who go on to a college course, as an introduction to more advanced work. Neither do these discussions pretend to be exhaustive, or to settle vexed questions. They are intended merely to make the young student more sensitive to the form and content of works of literature, in order that he may read with greater profit and pleasure. The suggestions for supplementary reading are intended to furnish a background for the selections more carefully studied. In the study of the history of American literature, the class should have access also to some book (like Stedman's Anthology) containing selections from minor poets, and of course to the Stedman and Hutchinson Library of American Literature. The various bibliographies are not intended to be complete, but to name some books that have been found particularly useful to young people.