ELEMENTS OF NARRATIVE. A. PLOT. 1. Samuel Johnson. Born 1709. Died 1784. FROM A Journey to the Western Islands. [The following selection, entitled Grissipol in Col, is an illustration of the chronicle or enumerative method of narration. There is little unity of aim, and no attempt at proportion and climax. Examples of such writing abound in newspapers, letters, talk; and excellent specimens are furnished in such books of travel as Mandeville and in such histories as the Chronicles of the Old Testament.] THE house of Grissipol stands by a brook very clear and quick; which is, I suppose, one of the most copious streams in the island. This place was the scene of an action, much celebrated in the traditional his5 tory of Col, but which probably no two relators will tell alike. Some time, in the obscure ages, Macneil of Barra married the lady Maclean, who had the isle of Col for her jointure. Whether Macneil detained Col, when Io the widow was dead, or whether she lived so long as to make her heirs impatient, is perhaps not now known. The younger son, called John Gerves, or John the Giant, a man of great strength, who was then. in Ireland, either for safety or for education, dreamed of recovering his inheritance; and getting some ad- 5 venturers together, which in those unsettled times was not hard to do, invaded Col. He was driven away, but was not discouraged, and collecting new followers, in three years came again with fifty men. On his way he stopped at Artorinish in Morvern, where his 10 uncle was prisoner to Macleod, and was then with his enemies in a tent. Maclean took with him only one servant, whom he ordered to stay at the outside, and where he should see the tent pressed outwards, to strike with his dirk; it being the intention of Maclean, 15 as any man provoked him, to lay hands upon him, and push him back. He entered the tent alone, with his Lochaber axe in his hand, and struck so much terror into the whole assembly, that they dismissed his uncle. When he landed at Col, he saw the sentinel, who 20 kept watch towards the sea, running off to Grissipol, to give Macneil, who was there with a hundred and twenty men, an account of the invasion. He told Macgill, one of his followers, that if he intercepted that dangerous intelligence, by catching the courier, 25 he would give him certain lands in Mull. Upon this promise Macgill pursued the messenger, and either killed or stopped him; and his posterity, till very lately, held the lands in Mull. The alarm being thus prevented, he came unex-30 pectedly upon Macneil. Chiefs were in those days never wholly unprovided for an enemy. A fight en sued, in which one of their followers is said to have given an extraordinary proof of activity, by bounding backwards over the pool of Grissipol. Macneil being killed, and many of his clan destroyed, Maclean took 5 possession of the island, which the Macneils attempted to conquer by another invasion, but were defeated and repulsed. Macneil, in his turn, invaded the estate of the Macleans, took the castle of Brecacig, and conquered the Io isle of Barra, which he held for seven years, and then restored it to the heirs. 2. Thomas Babington Macaulay. Born 1800. Died 1859. FROM the ESSAY on Lord Clive. [The second sentence in the foregoing passage states the objective point of the narrative, but it states at the same time the dubiousness of the story, and there is no such emphasis as would give the narrative unity. Such unity is obtained in the following passage, in which the opening sentence distinctly states the objective point and forecasts the horror to ensue.] Then was committed that great crime, memorable for its singular atrocity, memorable for the tremendous retribution by which it was followed. The English 15 captives were left at the mercy of the guards, and the guards determined to secure them for the night in the prison of the garrison, a chamber known by the fearful name of the Black Hole. Even for a single European malefactor, that dungeon would, in such a cli20 mate, have been too close and narrow. The space was only twenty feet square. The air-holes were |