Short Stories and Selections for Use in the Secondary Schools by Emilie Kip Baker
page 47 of 239 (19%)
page 47 of 239 (19%)
![]() | ![]() |
|
day. Yet sometimes now they all knew something about him; they would go
on talking. You see, they all rather petted and spoiled him. Next, if Guido did not hear them conversing, the fern said he must touch a little piece of grass and put it against his cheek, or a leaf, and kiss it, and say, "Leaf, leaf, tell them I am here." Now, while he was lying down, and the tip of the rushes touched his foot, he remembered this, so he moved the rush with his foot and said, "Rush, rush, tell them I am here." Immediately there came a little wind, and the wheat swung to and fro, the oak-leaves rustled, the rushes bowed, and the shadows slipped forwards and back again. Then it was still. --RICHARD JEFFERIES (adapted). [Footnote: Whore do you imagine this scene is laid? What things in the text suggest this? Do you get a single picture, or a rapid succession of pictures? Which is the author really giving you: nature as it is, or as it seems to the boy? Has any of it ever seemed so to you? Note the appeal to sight, hearing, and touch; note the use of color. Does the author show a love for, and knowledge of, nature? Select the passages in which the sympathy between the boy and all nature is dwelt on.] THE TABOO There is a marked similarity, almost an identity, between the religious |
|