I. THE NEWSPAPER 1 II. NEWS ITEMS 9 III. BIOGRAPHICAL NOTICES 15 IV. REPORTING ACCIDENTS 19 V. CONSTRUCTIVE NEWSPAPER WRITING 23 VI. HUMOROUS ITEMS 29 VII. THE USE OF CONTRAST 33 VIII. THRILLERS 38 IX. BOOK REVIEWS 45 X. REPORTING GAMES 52 XI. REPORTING SPEECHES 63 XII. DRAMATIC NOTICES 71 XIII. INTERVIEWS 77 XIV. THE EXPOSITION OF MECHANICS 84 XV. THE EXPOSITION OF IDEAS 90 XVI. EDITORIALS--CONSTRUCTIVE 97 XVII. EDITORIALS--DESTRUCTIVE 102 XVIII. ADVERTISEMENTS 108 XIX. ADVERTISEMENTS (_continued_) 114 XX. ADVERTISEMENTS (_concluded_) 118 "Whoever wishes to attain an English style, familiar but not coarse, and elegant but not ostentatious, must give his days and nights to the volumes of Addison." SAMUEL JOHNSON. _Life of Addison._ "Children learn to speak by watching the lips and catching the words of those who know how already; and poets learn in the same way from their elders." JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. _Essay on Chaucer._ "Grammars of rhetoric and grammars of logic are among the most useless furniture of a shelf. Give a boy Robinson Crusoe. That is worth all the grammars of rhetoric and logic in the world.... Who ever reasoned better for having been taught the difference between a syllogism and an enthymeme? Who ever composed with greater spirit and elegance because he could define an oxymoron or an aposiopesis?" THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY. _Trevelyan's Life of Lord Macaulay._ Chapter VI. PRACTICAL ENGLISH COMPOSITION BOOK II CHAPTER I THE NEWSPAPER "Truth is the highest thing that man may keep." CHAUCER. I. Introduction