small and obstructed. It was the summer solstice, the season when the fierce heat of Bengal can scarcely be rendered tolerable to natives of England by lofty halls and by the constant waving of fans. The number of prisoners was one hundred and forty-six. When 5 they were ordered to enter the cell, they imagined that the soldiers were joking; and, being in high spirits on account of the promise of the Nabob to spare their lives, they laughed and jeered at the absurdity of the notion. They soon discovered their mistake. They 10 expostulated; they entreated; but in vain. The guards threatened to cut down all who hesitated. The captives were driven into the cell at the point of the sword, and the door was instantly shut and locked upon them. 15 Nothing in history or fiction, not even the story which Ugolino told in the sea of everlasting ice,' after he had wiped his bloody lips on the scalp of his murderer, approaches the horrors which were recounted by the few survivors of that night. They cried 20 for mercy. They strove to burst the doors. Holwell who, even in that extremity, retained some presence of mind, offered large bribes to the gaolers. But the answer was that nothing could be done without the Nabob's orders, that the Nabob was asleep, and that 25 he would be angry if anybody woke him. Then the prisoners went mad with despair. They trampled each other down, fought for places at the windows, fought for the pittance of water with which the cruel mercy of the murderers mocked their agonies, raved, 30 prayed, blasphemed, implored the guards to fire among Dante, Inferno, xxxiii. 1 them. The gaolers in the mean time held lights to the bars, and shouted with laughter at the frantic struggles of their victims. At length the tumult died away in low gaspings and moanings. The day broke. 5 The Nabob had slept off his debauch, and permitted the door to be opened. But it was some time before the soldiers could make a lane for the survivors, by piling up on each side the heaps of corpses on which the burning climate had already begun to do its loathIO Some work. When at length a passage was made, twenty-three ghastly figures, such as their own mothers would not have known, staggered one by one out of the charnel-house. A pit was instantly dug. The dead bodies, a hundred and twenty-three in number, 15 were flung into it promiscuously and covered up. FROM A Journal of a Voyage to Lisbon. [Inasmuch as the holding up of an objective point at the beginning of a narrative may cause looseness of structure, the skillful narrator, like Macaulay, generally stops after he has given enough facts vividly to establish, so to speak, his opening proposition. The danger of anticlimax is often counteracted by hiding the objective point until the end; and such structure is well illustrated in the following short passage, where the details are evidently selected in preparation for the final sentence. It is to be added that such reserving of the objective point is characteristic of novels famous for intricacy of plot, as Fielding's Tom Jones and Wilkie Collins's The Moonstone, and such construction is often the life of the short story, as in Mr. Rudyard Kipling's In the Pride of His Youth, and in the excellent short stories of M. Alphonse Daudet and of de Maupassant.] MONDAY, July 1. This day Mr. Welch took his leave of me after dinner, as did a young lady of her sister, who was proceeding with my wife to Lisbon. They both set out together in a post-chaise for London. Soon after their departure, our cabin, where my wife and I were sitting together, was visited by two ruffians, whose appearance greatly corresponded with that of the sheriff's, or rather the knight marshal's bailiffs. One of these, especially, who seemed to 10 affect a more than ordinary degree of rudeness and insolence, came in without any kind of ceremony, with a broad gold lace on his hat, which was cocked with much military fierceness on his head. An inkhorn at his button-hole, and some papers in his hand, 15 sufficiently assured me what he was, and I asked him if he and his companion were not custom-house officers; he answered with sufficient dignity, that they were, as an information which he seemed to conclude would strike the hearer with awe, and suppress all 20 further inquiry; but, on the contrary I proceeded to ask of what rank he was in the Custom-house, and receiving an answer from his companion, as I remember, that the gentleman was a riding surveyor, I replied that he might be a riding surveyor, but could 25 be no gentleman, for that none who had any title to that denomination would break into the presence of a lady, without any apology, or even moving his hat. He then took his covering from his head, and laid it on the table, saying, he asked pardon, and blamed 30 the mate, who should, he said, have informed him if any persons of distinction were below. I told him, he 5 might guess by our appearance (which, perhaps, was rather more than could be said with the strictest adherence to truth) that he was before a gentleman and lady, which should teach him to be very civil in 5 his behaviour, though we should not happen to be of that number whom the world calls people of fashion and distinction. However, I said, that as he seemed sensible of his error, and had asked pardon, the lady would permit him to put his hat on again, if he chose Io it. This he refused with some degree of surliness, and failed not to convince me that, if I should condescend to become more gentle, he would soon grow more rude. 4. Rudyard Kipling. FROM Cupid's Arrows.1 [Besides the foregoing methods of handling plot, the story may be developed by suggestion. The details may be chosen at such a moment as to suggest much that has been left unsaid; indeed, in that dramatic little poem, The Twa Corbies,2 in Browning's My Last Duchess, and in the ending of Dickens's A Tale of Two Cities, much more is left to the reader's imagination than is given him in fact. Such a method, though very dramatic, is often somewhat foreign to plain, straightforward narrative. The following extract, however, is very direct, and illustrates in addition the power that comes from the skillful choice of events to suggest the side-play of character. The ending, of course, suggests a complete episode.] 1 From Plain Tales from the Hills. Printed with the consent of the author, and through the courtesy of the publishers, Messrs. Macmillan & Co., 2 P. 88 of Mr. Palgrave's Golden Treasury. Edition of 1888, 3 Cited by Genung, Rhetoric, p. 368, LATE in the season, when he judged that the time was ripe, Barr-Saggott developed a plan which did great credit to his administrative powers. He arranged an archery-tournament for ladies with a most sumptuous diamond-studded bracelet as prize. 5 He drew up his terms skilfully, and everyone saw that the bracelet was a gift to Miss Beighton; the acceptance carrying with it the hand and heart of Commissioner Barr-Saggott. The terms were a St. Leonard's Round-thirty-six shots at sixty yards-under the 10 rules of the Simla Toxophilite Society. All Simla was invited. There were beautifully arranged tea-tables under the deodars at Annandale, where the Grand Stand is now; and, alone in all its glory, winking in the sun, sat the diamond bracelet in 15 a blue velvet case. Miss Beighton was anxiousalmost too anxious-to compete. On the appointed afternoon all Simla rode down to Annandale to witness the judgment of Paris turned upside down. Kitty rode with young Cubbon, and it was easy to see that 20 the boy was troubled in his mind. He must be held innocent for everything that followed. Kitty was pale and nervous, and looked long at the bracelet. Barr-Saggott was gorgeously dressed, even more nervous than Kitty, and more hideous than ever. Mrs. Beighton smiled condescendingly, as befitted the mother of a potential Commissioneress, and the shooting began; all the world standing a semicircle as the ladies came out one after the other. 25 Nothing is so tedious as an archery competition. 30 They shot, and they shot, and they kept on shooting, till the sun left the valley, and the little breezes got |