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POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



Table V. 



Goethe : ' Criticism and Description.' 



as the basis. These will approximately coincide with the invariable 

 curves for the two kinds of composition in question. 



Throughout our work we have used the word-curve as the basis of 

 comparison. But the mere fact of divergence of such curves for dif- 

 erent forms of composition could have been much more readily estab- 



Fig. 15. Five 1,000 Word-corves from 

 Dryden's 'Sir Martin Mar-all.' (See 

 Table IV. 



Fig. 16. Five 1,000 Word-curves from 

 Dryden's 'Essay on Satire.' (See Table 

 IV.) 



lished by an inspection of the average word-lengths of various works. 

 It will pay to compare carefully the numbers given in the last columns 

 of our tables. None of the averages per thousand in Goethe's prose 

 dramas exceeds 4.8 letters per word; in none of his other works ex- 

 amined do the averages fall below 5.4. The limits of the average word- 

 lengths for the two forms of composition are thus seen to be not only 



