ance and assistance of the pupil, are framed in such a way as to give full scope to his ingenuity, and to leave his mode of expression free and unshackled. Such exercises have been too frequently reduced to a mere demand upon the memory. Based, as they often are, upon the principle of placing disjointed quotations in clumsy juxtaposition, they are calculated, as it has been well observed, to operate rather as a groove to confine the ideas of the pupil than as a track to direct him. The List of Books at the end, it is conceived, may be serviceable to such pupils as may feel at a loss to select books for themselves. The Author has always encouraged a course of Private Reading in his Composition Classes; and, as it is unnecessary here to enlarge upon its general advantages, he will only mention the method he has taken to render it subservient to the purposes of tuition. An opportunity is occasionally seized of calling out one or two of the pupils, and questioning them separately, in an easy style, upon the subject of their reading. A conversation being thus opened up, much useful information may be elicited, a general spirit of curiosity awakened in the class, and many inspired with a desire to read who would never have been induced to do so without some such stimulus. With respect to the number of the exercises in the various Sections, the Author has adjusted them to such limits as he thought most consistent with the great object of the work-the speedy progress of the Pupil in the Art of Composition. |