THE RHETORICAL MANUAL, OR SOUTHERN FIFTH READER: EMBRACING COPIOUS AND ELEGANT EXTRACTS BOTH IN PROSE AND POETRY. WITH A TREATISE ON RHETORICAL FIGURES, AND THE PRINCIPLES OF ELOCUTION. BY D. BARTON ROSS, A. M., N. G., EX-SUPERINTENDENT OF PUBLIC SCHOOLS. NEW ORLEANS, LA.: PUBLISHED BY J. B. STEEL, 60 CAMP STREET. 1854. N. B. For ONE DOLLAR, postpaid to either of the above-named Publishers, a copy of this EducT 758, 54.745 HARVARD COLLEGE LIBRARY 29. 1857. June Gift of Henry 5. Lenny of Boston. Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1853, by D. BARTON Ross, In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the STEREOTYPED AT THE BOSTON STEREOTYPE FOUNDRY. 56524 15.04 PREFACE. WE state, upon the recent authority of a very distinguished southern review, that no attempt has ever been hitherto made to prepare and publish a school book south of Mason and Dixon's line a fact of which we had not before been apprised. And though it may be ours to pioneer the way for those who may be induced to follow, yet we can scarcely entertain a doubt but that we shall be sustained in this attempt to prepare and publish the work which we are now offering to the friends of southern education. We do not solicit patronage for our book simply because it happens to be an item of southern enterprise, although this might, under the circumstances, be urged as a reason, - but because we confidently believe that, upon a careful examination, it will be found to sustain a character quite equal, if not greatly superior, to any similar work which has preceded it. It contains, moreover, a much greater amount of matter than any other work intended for the same class of students. It is believed that there now exists in the public mind of the south a rapidly-increasing disposition to patronize home schools, and to encourage home enterprise, at least to a much greater extent than formerly. We are not about to preach a crusade against the north, for the purpose of exciting a greater amount of sectional feeling at the south; but we think it must be confessed, that we have lavished our patronage somewhat too freely upon northern schools, school books, and northern enterprise generally, without always receiving adequate returns; while the same interests, among ourselves, have consequently been neglected in nearly a corresponding ratio. Such a state of things is by no means compatible with that real independence which it should be the pride of every citizen to sustain and cherish. But we are happy to believe that the signs of the times clearly indicate the dawning of a more auspicious day upon (3) our beautiful " sunny south." The sky is even now beaming with its auroral light, which, like the ruddy harbinger of the morning, is the certain presage of the full coming of the glorious day at last. Part First of the following pages contains a treatise on Rhetorical Figures, which, we think, can never be learned with so small an amount of special study as in connection with reading exercises, almost every page of which contains some striking figure of rhetoric, which this treatise will enable the reader at once to recognize. It is believed that no other reading book embraces this very important department. Superadded to this, are the necessary remarks upon Voice, Slides, Waves, Emphasis, &c., with a most interesting and important collection of examples under the head of Expression and Transition. We have thus developed, in Part First, all the principles of Elocution necessary to a natural, correct, and effective style of reading; the whole being prepared and arranged with a view to its being employed for reading purposes, the same as Part Second. Part Second is made up of the most select and appropriate specimens of prose and poetry, which, we think, for utility and variety, is not surpassed. A rhetorical notation has been purposely discarded, in the belief that it would be much more injurious than beneficial. While professors of elocution themselves differ so widely in their style of reading and declamation, and as no two of them would probably give to any piece of composition the same rhetorical notation, we very much prefer to confide in the judgment of the teacher, who, we presume, would not choose to be put in leading strings when he is already able to walk. Having briefly set forth some of the reasons upon which our expectations are based, together with the plan and characteristics of the work in hand, we, with all due deference, submit it to the enlightened judgment and discrimination of those for whom it is designed. ST. FRANCISVILLE, LA. D. B. R. |