48    RHETORICAL  PRINCIPLES  OF  NARRATION

Here  the  writer  has  begun  with  a  bird's-eye  view  of
the  complete  transaction,  and  has  followed  it  up  by  pre-
senting the  constituent  details  in  their  due  order.  This
method  of  securing  coherence  by  placing  at  the  very
beginning  an  epitome  of  the  entire  action  serves  the
same  purpose  as  do  the  headlines  in  a  telegraphic  col-
umn. It  gives  the  hasty  reader  an  opportunity  of  test-
ing the  contents  of  the  paragraph  in  question,  that  he
may  continue  or  stray  elsewhere  as  his  taste  dictates.
Of  course,  it  is  apparent  that  in  this  method  of  ordering
the  details  there  must  be  a  momentary  break  in  the  co-
herence of  the  narrative  at  the  point  where  the  writer
completes  the  epitome  and  passes  on  to  the  individual
elements  of  the  account  in  their  chronological  order.  But,
the  entire  transaction  in  miniature  before  him,  the  chasm
is  not  a  wide  one,  and  the  effect  of  coherence  is  not  lost.
This  device  is  better  adapted  to  the  item  than  to  longer
narrative  forms,  because  in  these  the  question  of  sus-
pense and  the  various  devices  for  sustaining  the  reader's
interest  become  increasingly  important,  and  to  begin
by  presenting  the  issue  would  be  fatal.  If  one  will  try
to  imagine  Aldrich's  Marjorie  Daw  or  Maupassant's
Necklace  so  rearranged  that  the  substance  of  the  closing
paragraph  is  summed  up  at  the  outset,  he  will  at  once
appreciate  the  futility  of  this  method  in  a  long  narra-
tive where  the  interest  is  to  be  sustained.
