[Footnote 33: A book of synonyms and antonyms is in preparation for this series,

"The Writer's Library."]

 

[Footnote 34: _Composition and Rhetoric_, J.M. Hart.]

 

CHAPTER XXVIII

 

MEMORY TRAINING

 

Lulled in the countless chambers of the brain, Our thoughts are linked by many a

hidden chain; Awake but one, and lo! what myriads rise! Each stamps its image as

the other flies!

 

* * * * *

 

Hail, memory, hail! in thy exhaustless mine From age to age unnumber'd treasures

shine! Thought and her shadowy brood thy call obey, And Place and Time are

subject to thy sway!

 

--SAMUEL ROGERS, _Pleasures of Memory_.

 

Many an orator, like Thackeray, has made the best part of his speech to

himself--on the way home from the lecture hall. Presence of mind--it remained

for Mark Twain to observe--is greatly promoted by absence of body. A hole in the

memory is no less a common complaint than a distressing one.