A Boy's VIOLIN

III. David.

IV. The Impressario.

V. Outside the Museum.

VI. Bliss.

VII. Misery.

VIII. Afterwards.

If we examine into the eight episodes that constitute this little story, we shall find the germ of the whole in one brief paragraph:

As time passed on it became evident that some grave occurrence indeed had befallen him. Thenceforth, and during the five remaining years of his life, he was never quite the same. For months his faculties, long used to being soothed at midnight by the music of the flute, were like children put to bed hungry and refused to be quieted, so that sleep came to him only after hours of waiting and tossing, and his health suffered in consequence. And then in all things he lived like one who was watching himself closely as a person not to be trusted.

Unity of atmosphere the story certainly possesses, and that atmosphere is pathos, — the pathos of tragedy arising from misunderstanding. Everything is shaped to the exposition of this one idea: the simplicity, the gentleness, the thorough lovableness of the one principal actor; the wistfulness, the helplessness, the appealing isolation of the other. The eccentricities of the parson, the selfishness of Tom, the humor of Widow Spurlock and of Arsena Furnace in fact all the details of the action - blend into one consistent note of pathos. No jarring incongruity mars the general effect. A consistent point of view is maintained throughout.

Emphasis, or effective massing, in Flute and Violin re

solves itself into the question of so arranging the details of the story as to hold the attention of the reader. In this case surprise is not the source of emotional arousement. Effectiveness does not demand any sudden revelation of concealed mystery, any clever unraveling of complicated details. Rather, the reader's interest centres in the pathetic appeal arising from the accumulated evils that fall to the fate of the little cripple through the seeming thoughtlessness of the loving parson. In view of these conditions, the author has chosen a very simple and natural mode of massing his story. At the outset he presents a brief introduction in two chapters. This accomplishes two ends: it arouses interest in the kindly personality of the Reverend James Moore, and it implies that in the current of his simple life there has been an eddy. The device in a small way serves the purpose of presenting an initial mystery that must be solved. Then follows the story with its six episodes. These, despite their somewhat complicated ordering, to be noted later under the coherence of the story, carry the narrative step by step to its culmination in the tragedy of David's death, followed by the brief conclusion dealing with the saddened later days of James Moore.

And thus being ever the more loved and revered as he grew ever the more lovable and saint-like, he passed onward to the close. But not until the end came did he once stretch forth a hand to touch his flute; and it was only in imagination then that he grasped it, to sound the final roll-call of his wandering faculties, and to blow a last good-night to his tired spirit.

Thus the story reaches a mild climax, and the massing is, in general, that of a chronological succession with increasing emotional force.

The study of coherence in Flute and Violin brings us

to the manner of coupling the coherent details of the story: that is, to an analysis of its plot-structure. Taking it up episode by episode, we note the following facts:

Episode I covers in a general way the years from 1792, when the Reverend James Moore first came to Lexington, to 1814, the close of his life. Here we have a bird'seye view of the parson's simple life with the closing suggestion that it contained an event of unusual interest, -the bond coupling the episode with what follows.

Such having been the parson's fixed habit as long as any one had known him, it is hard to believe that five years before his death he abruptly ceased to play his flute and never touched it again. But from this point the narrative becomes so mysterious that it were better to have the testimony of witnesses.

In episode II we have an enlargement of what was indicated in this introduction, but expressed in vague terms, forming a conclusion to what has preceded, but indicating something to follow and thus leading the way to the story proper. The concluding words of the episode serve to couple it with what follows and to introduce the main action contained in episode III:

If any one should feel interested in having this whole mystery cleared up, he may read the following tale of a boy's violin.

In the third episode the main action centres about David on the day of the great lottery, Friday, August 31, 1809, about ten o'clock in the morning. During the episode the action reverts by three years to the time when David's father had died, and again by one year to the day when Mr. Leuba had promised to bestow on David the discarded violin. But these back-casts of the

action are wholly subordinate, and do not detract from the time-setting of the main episode.

The episode following, the fourth, brings the reader to a scene two hours later on this same Friday morning, again with two slight reversions to incidents occurring between this and the preceding occurrence, David's visit home and the announcement of the drawing in the lottery. By the introduction of these two minor details the coherence becomes almost continuous, and the story is brought to the fifth episode.

This takes up the narrative and continues it through the afternoon and twilight of the same day.

The sixth takes the reader through the following day, Saturday, September 1, by four distinct and separate episodes of the second order (p. 28) as follows: (a) early in the day, at the church; (b) at dinner with the Leubas and their merry company; (c) in the afternoon, at the Museum; and (d) later, at home, where the parson executes the mystic manœuvres noted by observing eyes across the way, as described in the second episode of the story.

The next episode is introduced by a brief transitional paragraph:

A sad day it had been meantime for the poor lad.

The entire episode reverts from the point at which the preceding scene closed, Saturday afternoon, back to the morning of the same day, and concerns itself with the experiences of David, as the preceding has done with the parson. The fortunes of the little cripple follow in order: (a) in the morning, at home and at the Museum; (b) in the afternoon, at the Museum, at the parson's door (as already narrated in episode 11) and again at the Museum; (c) about nightfall, at the end of the town,

at Leuba's store, and finally at home. This simultaneous ordering of vi and VII presents an example of the device referred to on page 56 and holds the action stationary for the time being.

Episode VIII resumes the story on Sunday morning, September 2, follows it through the morning and afternoon with David and through the evening at Mr. Moore's, and again reverts to David at the hour of the boy's death early on Monday morning. It then takes a leap to September 9, the Sunday following, and closes with a brief retrospect of the parson's remaining years (already quoted on page 61), a good example of the "concluding paragraph."

The story thus affords illustration of how the element of time, with slight modifications, secures the coherence of an "orderly recital." First a general survey of the action to its culmination, and then a reversion to the beginning, followed by a detailed recital of the successive events in their chronological order. The smooth and natural issuance of one episode from another, the close relation of each detail to what precedes and to what follows, shows further the close association between coherence and unity of action. With greater complication of incident and with more intricacy of massing so as to secure added interest would come the development of plot characteristic of the detective story or of the novel. Flute and Violin, however, with its general adherence to the actual sequence of time, is constructed after the method of veritable history.