IN

ENGLISH COMPOSITION.

BY R. G. PARKER, A. M.
PRINCIPAL OF THE FRANKLIN GRAMMAR SCHOOL, BOSTON.

"Ordo et modus omnia breviora reddunt."

New Stereotype Edition

REVISED, ENLARGED AND IMPROVED, FROM THE FIFTY-FIFTH EDITION.

BOSTON:

PUBLISHED BY ROBERT S. DAVIS.
NEW YORK: PRATT, WOODFORD, & Co., AND HUNTINGTON & SAVAGE.
PHILADELPHIA: THOMAS, COWPERTHWAIT, & Co.

And sold by the trade generally.

The School Committee of Boston have authorized the introduction of this work into the Public Schools of the City.

GREENLEAF'S SERIES OF ARITHMETICS.

1. MENTAL ARITHMETIC, upon the Inductive Plan, designed for beginners. By Benjamin Greenleaf, A. M., Principal of Bradford (Mass.) Teachers' Seminary.

2. INTRODUCTION TO THE NATIONAL ARITHMETIC, designed for Common Schools. Fifteenth improved stereotype edition.

3. THE NATIONAL ARITHMETIC, for advanced scholars in Common Schools and Academies. Twenty-fifth improved stereotype edition. 360 pages, full bound.

COMPLETE KEYS TO THE INTRODUCTION AND NATIONAL ARITHMETICS, containing Solutions and Explanations, for Teachers only. (In separate volumes.)

*** The attention of Teachers and Superintendents of Schools generally is respectfully invited to this popular system of Arithmetic, which is well adapted to all classes of students. The whole or a part of this series has been recommended and adopted by the superintending school committees of the principal towns throughout New England, and is also used in the best public and private schools in various sections of the United States.

GREENLEAF'S NATIONAL ARITHMETIC is now extensively used as a text book in many distinguished seminaries of learning, including the following: - The several STATE NORMAL SCHOOLS in Massachusetts, under the direction of the State Board of Education; the NORMAL SCHOOLS in New York City; Rutger's Female Institute, New York; Brooklyn (N. Y.) Female Academy; Abbott Female Academy, and Phillips Academy, Andover; Chauncey Hall School, Boston; Bradford Female Seminary; Phillips Academy, Exeter; Young Ladies' Institute, Pittsfield; Worcester County High School, Worcester; together with the best schools in Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Richmond, Charleston, Savannah, Mobile, New Orleans, and other cities; and wherever the work has been introduced, it is still used with great suc cess, which is deemed a sufficient recommendation.

CLASS BOOK OF PROSE AND POETRY;

from the best English and American Authors; designed as Exercises in Parsing, for Academies and Common Schools. Compiled by T. Rickard, A. M. and H. Orcutt, A. M. (Teachers.) *** A cheap work like the above, (comprised in a small volume,) has long been needed.

THE CLASSICAL READER:

A Selection of Lessons in Prose and Verse, from the most esteemed English and American writers. Intended for the use of the higher classes in public and private seminaries. By Rev. F. W. P. Greenwood, D. D. and George B. Emerson, A. M., of Boston. Tenth edition, stereotyped. With an engraved frontispiece.

SMITH'S CLASS BOOK OF ANATOMY:

Explanatory of the first principles of Human Organization as the basis of Physical Education; with numerous Illustrations, a full Glossary, or Explanation of Technical Terms, and Practical Questions at the bottom of the page. Designed for Schools and Families. Tenth stereotype edition, revised and enlarged.

A GRAMMAR OF THE GREEK LANGUAGE.

By Benjamin Franklin Fisk. Twenty-sixth improved stereotype edition. Fisk's Greek Grammar is used in Harvard University, and in many other distinguished collegiate and academic institutions in various parts of the United States.

FISK'S GREEK EXERCISES. [NEW EDITION.]

Greek Exercises: containing the substance of the Greek Syntax, illustrated by passages from the best Greek authors, to be written out from the words given in their simplest form. By Benjamin Franklin Fisk. Consuetudo et exercitatio facilitatem maxime parit.'-Quintil. Adapted to the author's Greek Grammar.' Sixteenth improved stereotype edition. ***Fisk's Greek Exercises' are well adapted to illustrate the rules of the Grammar, and constitute a very useful accompaniment thereto.

LEVERETT'S CÆSAR'S COMMENTARIES.

Cail Julii Cæsaris Commentarii de Bello Gallico ad Codices Parisinos recensiti, a N. L. Achaintre and N. E. Lemaire. Accesserunt Notula Anglica, atque Index Historicus et Geographicus. Curavit F. P. Leverett, A. M.

FOLSOM'S CICERO'S ORATIONS.

M. T. Ciceronis Orationes Quædam Selectæ, Notis Illustratæ. [By Charles Folsom, A. M.;
In Usum Academiæ Exoniensis. Editio stereotypa, Tabulis Analyticis instructa.
ALGER'S MURRAY'S ENGLISH GRAMMAR, AND EXERCISES.
ALGER'S MURRAY'S READER, AND INTRODUCTION.
Published by ROBERT S. DAVIS, School-Book Publisher, BOSTON,
and sold by all the principal Booksellers throughout the United States.

Also constantly for sale, (in addition to his own publications,) a complete assortment of School Books and Stationery, which are offered to Booksellers, School Committees, and Teachers, on very liberal terms.

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1846, by R. S. DAVIS, in the Clerk's
Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts.

PREFACE.

Two great obstacles beset the pupil in his first attempts at composition. The first is the difficulty of obtaining ideas, (or learning to think;) the second is that of expressing them properly when obtained. In this volume, the author has endeavored to afford some assistance to the pupil in overcoming both these difficulties. It is not unfrequently the case that the scholar is discouraged in the very onset, and the teacher, from the want of a regular and progressive system, finds his labors unsuccessful, and his requisitions met with reluctance, if not with opposition. The simplicity of the plan here proposed, requires no labored explanation. The first exercise or lesson, consists in giving the pupil a word, or a number of words, and instead of asking for a definition of them, requiring him to use them in a sentence or idea of his own.* From this simple exercise he is led onward through a series of Lessons in easy and regular progression, from the simplest principles to the most difficult practice. After the principle of each lesson is stated, (and, when necessary, explained,) a "MODEL" is presented, which is designed to show the pupil how the exercise is to be performed. The EXAMPLES FOR PRACTICE furnish him with the materials with which he is expected to perform his exercise. The teacher will find no difficulty in supplying the deficiency, if the EXAMPLES are not sufficiently numerous in some cases, or in omitting what may be superfluous in others. If, on the first inspection, any of the Lessons appear too difficult, the author respectfully requests the tests of trial and experience before they are condemned. They have been performed, and the Models of some of those apparently the most difficult, were written by pupils in the school of which he has the charge.

* The pupil may be permitted to write simply or familiarly at first; but the teacher should in all cases require that the sentence be the unassisted production of the pupil himself. Although a decided preference is expressed for a written exercise, yet several of the early lessons may be read from the book, at the discretion of the teacher. For some suggestions on the mechanical execution of written exercises, and the mode of correcting them, the teacher is referred to the close of the volume.