On the Sentence-Length in EnglisJi Prose. 5 



averages. In the first hundred sentences the sum of words 

 is 4062, but rises in the second to 4803, and falls in the third, 

 fourth, and fifth respectively to 3735, 3163, and 2905 ; as- 

 cends again in the three remaining hundreds, 3402, 3386, and 

 3834. Twenty-five sentences remain, which contribute 121 5 

 words. Sum total of the words in the Persouns Tale, 30,505 ; 

 average of words per sentence, 36|4f.^ Complete average for 

 ChaUcer, 40i¥(rV 



We next take up Sir Thomas More's History of Richard 

 III. Here the sense of sentence-form is of the feeblest. 

 Probably not less than forty per cent of the clauses had to be 

 rearranged. Instances of adverb-clauses standing alone as 

 complete sentences are especially frequent. Final average 

 of 24,882 words in 472 ^ sentences, 52,^-|f words. 



A partial examination of Lyly's Euphues resulted in nearly 

 the same average as that of More, namely, 52.22 words, and 

 his sentences stand almost in equal need of repairs. Next 

 in Roger Ascham we meet with the first real promise of a 

 coming English prose-style. His writings clearly enough 

 reveal that in him the sense of sentence-form is fairly awake. 

 A test-examination of the Toxophilus discovers an average as 

 low as 42. But in Sidney's Defense of Poesy we go back- 

 ward. Here a like preliminary examination yields 50.65 

 words. In Joseph Hall's Specialties, and Hard Measure 

 (written between 1640 and 1650) an average as high as 58.61 

 is obtained. This nearly equals a result computed from 

 Fabian (60.30), whose works were written before 15 12. 



In Richard Hooker we find signs of a general advance in 

 the art of writing English prose. The style of the Ecclesias- 

 tical Polity of course is heavy from the nature of the subject ; 

 but the sentence-average in the First Book is only 44. Hooker 



1 This disparity in sentence-length, it is believed, is unparalleled elsewhere in 

 the literature. All other writers yet examined respectively accord in different 

 compositions after a few hundred sentences. One is driven to conclude there 

 may have been closer adherence to the original in the latter Tale. 



2 Those portions of the History not written originally by More in English, but 

 translated from his similar work in Latin, were of course left out of the compu- 

 tation. 



12^ 



