Composition-Rhetoric | Page 7

over all
the important railroads in the country. His duties took him to
Springfield, the state capital, and as he generally went by the Chicago,
Alton & St. Louis road, the conductors on that line knew him so well
that they never asked to see his pass.
"One day I received a telegram summoning me to meet one of the
officers of my company at Aurora the next morning. I had only a short
time to catch my train to Chicago, and in my haste left my passbook
behind. I did not find this out until I reached Chicago, and was about to

take the last train for Aurora that night. Then I saw that the conductor, a
man brought over from the Iowa division, was a stranger, and the fact
that I would need my pass reminded me that I did not have it.
"I told the conductor the situation, but he said he could not carry me on
my mere representation that I had a pass.
"Why, man," said I, "I am an officer of the company, going to Aurora
on company business, and this is the last train that will get me there in
time. You must take me."
"He was polite, but firm. He said he was a new man on this division,
and could not afford to make any mistakes.
"When I saw that he was determined, I rushed off to the telegraph
office; but it was too late to catch anybody authorized to issue passes,
so I settled it in my mind that I must go by carriage, and the prospect of
an all-night ride over bad roads through the dark was anything but
inviting. Indeed, it was so forbidding that I resolved to make one more
appeal to the conductor.
"You simply must take me to Aurora!" I said, with intense earnestness.
"I can't do it," he answered. "But I believe you are what you represent
yourself to be, and I will lend you the money personally. It is only one
dollar and twelve cents."
"Well, sir, you could have knocked me down with the flat side of a
palm-leaf fan. I had more than two thousand dollars in currency in my
pocket, but it had never for an instant occurred to me that I could pay
my fare and ride on that train. I showed the conductor a wad of money
that made his eyes stick out.
"I thought it was funny," said he, "that a man in your position couldn't
raise one dollar and twelve cents. It was that that made me believe you
were playing a trick to see if I would violate the rule."
"The simple truth was, I had ridden everywhere on passes so many
years, that it did not occur to me that I could ride in any other way."
+Oral Composition III.+[Footnote: Oral compositions should be
continued throughout the course. A few minutes may be profitably used
once or twice each week in having each member of the class stand
before the class and relate briefly some incident which he has witnessed
since the last meeting of the class. Exercises like those on page 53 also
will furnish opportunities for oral work.]--_Relate to the class some
personal incident suggested by one of the following subjects_:--

1. A day with my cousin. 2. Caught in the act. 3. A joke on me. 4. My
peculiar mistake. 5. My experience on a farm. 6. My experience in a
strange Sunday school. 7. What I saw when I was coming to school.
(In preparation for this exercise, consider the point of your story. What
must you tell first in order to enable the hearers to understand the point?
Can you say anything that will make them want to know what the point
is without really telling them? Can you lead up to it without too long a
delay? Can you stop when the point has been made?)
+8. Theme Writing and Correcting.+--Any written exercise, whether
long or short, is called a theme throughout this book. Just as one learns
to skate by skating, so one learns to write by writing; therefore many
themes will be required. Since the clear expression of thought is one of
the essential characteristics of every theme, theme correction should be
primarily directed to improvement in clearness. The teacher will need
to assist in this correction, but the really valuable part is that which you
do for yourself. After you leave school you will need to decide for
yourself what is right and what is best, and it is essential that you now
learn how to make such decisions.
To aid you in acquiring a habit of self-correction, questions or
suggestions follow the directions for writing each theme. In Theme I
you are to express clearly to