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§ 5. A cumuleme (cumulative supra-sentential construction) is 
formed by two or more independent sentences making up a topical 
syntactic unity. The first of the sentences in a cumuleme is its 
"leading" sentence, the succeeding sentences are "sequential". 
The cumuleme is delimited in the text by a finalising intonation 
contour (cumuleme-contour) with a prolonged pause 

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(cumuleme-pause); the relative duration of this pause equals two 
and a half moras ("mora" — the conventional duration of a short 
syllable), as different from the sentence-pause equalling only two 
moras. 
The cumuleme, like a sentence, is a universal unit of language in so 
far as it is used in all the functional varieties of speech. For in-
stance, the following cumuleme is part of the author's speech of a 
work of fiction: 
The boy winced at this. It made him feel hot and uncomfortable all 
over. He knew well how careful he ought to be, and yet, do what 
he could, from time to time his forgetfulness of the part betrayed 
him into unreserve (S. Butler). 
Compare a cumuleme in a typical newspaper article: 
We have come a long way since then, of course. Unemployment 
insurance is an accepted fact. Only the most die-hard reactionaries, 
of the Goldwater type, dare to come out against it (from Canadian 
Press). 
Here is a sample cumuleme of scientific-technical report prose: 
To some engineers who apply to themselves the word "practical" 
as denoting the possession of a major virtue, applied research is 
classed with pure research as something highbrow they can do 
without. To some business men, applied research is something to 
have somewhere in the organisation to demonstrate modernity and 
enlightenment. And people engaged in applied research are usually 
so satisfied in the belief that what they are doing is of interest and 
value that they are not particularly concerned about the niceties of 
definition (from a technical journal). 
Poetical text is formed by cumulemes, too: 
She is not fair to outward view, | As many maidens be; | Her love-
liness I never knew | Until she smiled on me. |Oh, then I saw her 
eye was bright, | A well of love, a spring of light (H. Coleridge). 
But the most important factor showing the inalienable and univer-
sal status of the cumuleme in language is the indispensable use of 
cumulemes in colloquial speech (which is reflected in plays, as 
well as in conversational passages in works of various types of fic-
tion). 

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The basic semantic types of cumulemes are "factual" (narrative and 
descriptive), "modal" (reasoning, perceptive, etc.), and mixed. Here 
is an example of a narrative cumuleme: 
Three years later, when Jane was an Army driver, she was sent one 
night to pick up a party of officers who had been testing defences 
on the cliff. She found the place where the road ran between a cleft 
almost to the beach, switched off her engine and waited, hunched 
in her great-coat, half asleep, in the cold black silence. She waited 
for an hour and woke in a fright to a furious voice coming out of 
the night (M. Dickens). 
Compare this with modal cumulemes of various topical standings: 
She has not gone? I thought she gave a second performance at two? 
(S. Maugham) (A reasoning cumuleme of perceptional variety) 
Are you kidding? Don't underrate your influence, Mr. O'Keefe. 
Dodo's in. Besides, I've lined up Sandra Straughan to work with 
her (A. Hailey). (A remonstrative cumuleme) 
Don't worry. There will be a certain amount of unpleasantness but I 
will have some photographs taken that will be very useful at the 
inquest. There's the testimony of the gunbearers and the driver too. 
You're perfectly all right (E. Hemingway). (A reasoning cumuleme 
expressing reassurance) Etc.