4.  In the following passages, make such changes and omissions as are necessary to unify the tone: 

How I loved to stroll, on those long Indian summer afternoons, into the quiet meadows where the mild-breathed kine were grazing!  An old cow that switches her tail at flies and puts her foot in the bucket when you milk her, I absolutely loathe.  How I loved to hear the birds sing, to listen to the fall of ripe autumnal apples!

It wasn’t the girl yclept Sally.  This girl was not so vivacious as Sally, but she had a mug on her that was a lot less ugly to look at.  Gee, when she stood there in front of me with those mute, ineffable, sympathetic eyes of hers, I was ready to throw a duck-fit.

  Old Grimes is dead, that dear old soul;
  We’ll never see him more;
  He wore a great long overcoat,
  All buttoned down before.

I.  Abstract vs.  Concrete Terms; General vs.  Specific Terms

Abstract terms convey ideas; concrete terms call up pictures.  If we say “Honesty is the best policy,” we speak abstractly.  Nobody can see or hear or touch the thing honesty or the thing policy; the apprehension of them must be purely intellectual.  But if we say “The rat began to gnaw the rope,” we speak concretely. Rat, gnaw, and rope are tangible, perceptible things; the words bring to us visions of particular objects and actions.

Now when we engage in explanations and discussions of principles, theories, broad social topics, and the like—­when we expound, moralize, or philosophize,—­our subject matter is general.  We approach our readers or hearers on the thinking, the rational side of their natures.  Our phraseology is therefore normally abstract.  But when, on the other hand, we narrate an event or depict an appearance, our subject matter is specific.  We approach our readers or hearers on the sensory or emotional side of their natures.  Our phraseology is therefore normally concrete.

You should be able to express yourself according to either method.  You should be able to choose the words best suited to make people understand; also to choose the words best suited to make people realize vividly and feel.  Now to some extent you will adopt the right method by intuition.  But if you do not reinforce your intuition with a careful study of words, you will vacillate from one method to the other and strike crude discords of phrasing.  Of course if you switch methods intelligently and of purpose, that is quite another matter.  An abstract discussion may be enlivened by a concrete illustration.  A concrete narrative or portrayal may be given weight and rationalized by generalization.  Moreover many things lie on the borderland between the two domains and may properly be attached to either.  Thus the abstraction is legitimate when you say or write:  “A man wishes to acquire the comforts and luxuries, as well as the necessaries, of life.”  The concreteness is likewise legitimate when you say or write:  “John Smith wishes to earn cake as well as bread and butter.”