A text-book of applied English grammar

Front matter

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Preface

The study of English in the upper grades should and does include something of many subjects : handwriting, spelling, pronunciation, oral reading, elementary composition, literature, grammar. The amount of time required in any year to produce definite results in all these subjects would be very great. The time now given in even the best schools is wholly inadequate, programmes being crowded and classes large. Most phases of the subject now have to be slighted, and some, like the training of the speaking voice, are practically ignored.

But large classes are at present an unavoidable circumstance of democracy. We must be grateful that nearly everybody's child gets to school, and must obtain the best results we can by correlation and a wise economy of minutes. Under such conditions, what phases of grammar should be assured attention? Certainly there must be some systematic view of elementary grammar ; the subject is too difficult to be taught incidentally amid miscellaneous

VI PEE FACE

language lessons. But what should be emphasized? and what should stand first in the order of presentation?

Elementary correctness in oral usage should be the first result aimed at in teaching grammar to children. At all events, it is the result most difficult to produce. The teacher of a large class cannot easily diagnose the habitual faults of each individual, or easily cure those diagnosed. She can patiently correct sporadic aintfs and wa'nfs, but the habits usually persist. It is sometimes said that school cannot counteract a bad linguistic environment ; but it is a mistake for any teacher, however discouraged, to say that. School, with all its opportunities for fixing attention and insuring vivid impressions, can work miracles in a child's usage. But miracles are not wrought " incidentally " ; there must be organized and prolonged drill, of a sort which to-day is called old-fashioned. Nor need there be a fear that learning to say isn't will be less educative than distinguishing "object complements" from " objective complements."

Next in importance to elementary oral correctness we may place a working knowledge of what a sentence is. This knowledge is purely grammatical in its nature, but it underlies all work in composition. It is attained by applying the theory of independent and

PREFACE vii

dependent statements to the actual problems of punctuation. The theory is perfectly definite, even arbitrarily so, and has nothing to do with rhetorical theories of unity.

Believing that elementary oral correctness and an elementary sentence-sense should be the first objects of grammar study, the present writer has devoted Part First of his book to a few cardinal principles of conversational English, and to the definition of the sentence. The exercises of this part are very numerous, but often each member of the class should be required to recite the entire exercise — for example, 17, 27, 28, 30, 31, 32, 34, 36, 38, 39, 43, 48, 50, 52, 53, 55, 56, 57, 61. From time to time each student's usage should be tested. His written usage can be discovered from his handling of such tasks as that of section 300. His oral usage can be tested once a week by having him retell some story to the class, or recount some experience of his own. He should not be corrected during his speech, but his mistakes should be silently " set in a note-book, conned, and learned by heart," to be (most gently and kindly) cast into his teeth next day. A small note-book, with a page for each student, can silently be used throughout the hour without embarrassing the speakers. Conversation should be encouraged, and the faults similarly noted.

Vlll PREFACE

In Part Second a more systematic treatment of English grammar is given, with further applications to usage. The elements of the sentence are treated before the inflections.

The book is meant to be used for two years. If anything is omitted, it should be the " Analysis Exercises" of Part Second. A student who omitted only these would know nothing of analysis or parsing, but would have received a good deal of blind practise in the correct use of the vernacular.

In Part First there are but few definitions. The words defined in Part Second are in bold type. Sentences containing such words should usually be committed to memory.

The writer holds with those who believe that a little technical grammar, sympathetically taught, is within the normal powers and interests of grammar school students. Also he thinks it the only permanent cure for bad punctuation. A boy may learn to punctuate by instinct after his written work has been pointed for him over and over again ; but without some clear notion of principal and subordinate clauses he will never be sure of himself.

Yet it is only too easy to overdo the teaching of formal grammar. Subtleties of analysis are not for children. When we reflect that gram-

PREFACE IX

matical terms are but figures of speech, we can only pity the lad who has to apply them as if they were divinely ordained. When we realize that the purpose of every predicate is to modify the hearer's notion of the subject ; that every word but one in a sentence is a modifier, a complement, an adjunct, a limiter, an increases a definer of the subject; that every word is a name as well as something else ; that in many sentences the only important thought lies in some subordinate element ; that personal pronouns may mean more than persons' names, which are often but unimportant propronouns, and that pronouns may stand for verbs, adjectives, adverbs, and sentences ; when we reflect that what we call the parts of speech are the result of at least three disparate methods of classification, and that a strict definition of any is logically impossible, is it any wonder that technical grammar is strong meat for babes ? If the boy thinks about what he studies, he gets mixed up. If he does not think, he parses accurately from memory till a visitor arrives, and then covers himself and his teacher with confusion by calling a verb a noun. One recalls Sweet's story of the assemblage of grammarians who could not agree whether cannon in cannon ball is an adjective or not. Finally, one thinks with grim humor of

X PREFACE

Browning's poetic license in declaring that his grammarian had " settled hotis business." Hotis business will never be settled while articulatespeaking men strive to fathom the miracle of speech — what Newman liked to call "the twofold logos, the thought and the word."

A kindly fortune has lately given the writer the benefit of many discussions of grammar with three friends : Director George N. Carman of the Lewis Institute, Professor W. A. Heidel of Iowa College, and Professor F. W. Shipley of Washington University. Fortune would have been still kinder had it permitted the writer to submit the proofs of his book to the same critics.

Book One CHAP

1. Grammatical Usage Defined

2. Correct Use of Singular and Plural Verbs

3. Correct Forms of the Verb " To Be " .

4. Correct Forms of the Verb " To Have "

5. Correct Forms of Certain Verbs of Action

6. Subject and Object Forms of Personal Pronouns 71

xi

Xll CONTENTS

Book Two the definition of the sentence

CHAP. PAGE

1. General Meanings of the Word " Sentence " . 81

3. Statements that may be written as Sentences . 93

4. -Statements that may not be written as Sen-

tences 116

5. The Sentence as a Union of Subject and Predi-

cate 129

6. Compound Subjects, Predicates, and Sentences . 150

CONTENTS Xlll

Part Second Elements Of The Sentence, And Forms Of Words

PAGE

Introduction 167

CHAP.

1. Verbs 169

3. Verbal Nouns 187

12. Forms of Words 284

XIV

Contents

CHAP.

14. Forms of Pronouns .

16. Forms of Verbs ....

Chapter I Grammatical Usage Defined

7. Grammatical usage is using such " forms of words," and such combinations of them in sentences, as are considered correct by the best writers and speakers.

Johns is a form of John ; leaves, of leaf; him, of he; hegan and begun, of begin; drowned, of drown. Isn't is a correct form of is not; ain't is an incorrect form. He has begun is a correct combination ; he has began is an incorrect combination. Leaves are is a correct combination, leaves is an incorrect.

8. Vulgar usage. All mistakes in grammar (whether incorrect forms or incorrect combinations) are vulgarisms. Vulgar means " pertaining to the crowd." The great mass or crowd of people have, as yet, but little education. No man has a right to despise uneducated persons, for they are often the superiors of educated persons in character, in natural ability, and in force of expression. Uneducated persons say " I hain't done no such thing," merely because they have never learned to say " I've done no such thing," or " I haven't done any such thing." Uneducated persons are usually the last persons in the world to wish their children to employ vulgar expressions.

9. There are other vulgarisms besides mistakes in grammar. A bad pronunciation (as jest for just) is a vulgarism. Slang words are usually vulgarisms, but not often mistakes in grammar.

The following passages contain vulgarisms, but only the italic words are faults in grammar. Point out all expressions which seem to you vulgar.

A. " Oh, Daddy! They're gone. Wh at made you let them go ? Oh, what made you? "

"Wa'al, Mandy sassed me, 'n' I told her 't I guessed we c'd git along without her. This house ain't good 'nough fer her sence she's been to the city ; she wants carpits and picters an' things, so I jes' told her right out plain she might go an' stay if she wanted to, she was gittin' too fine fer us. I vow, I never see sech a sassy girl."

" Oh, Daddy ! You quarrelled with Mandy ? "

" Wa'al, I guess you kin call it that if you want tew ; it wa'rit nothin' else. She's ashamed of her brother ; she

GRAMMATICAL USAGE DEFINED 9

said so right out an' out, and she's ashamed o' me too. I've seen it stickin' out a good while, but I hain't said nothin'. She don't want me to say much when her comp'ny comes. She tole me so once. S'pose I don't talk propei- 'nough to suit her. It's hurt my feelin's terrible, but I've kep' it to myself. Didn't hev nobody to send me to school — when I was a boy — m' father died — had to work — ter take care o' mother an' Dick." A cough grappled with a sob in the old man's throat as he bent to hide the struggle and lay a stick of wood on the dead ashes. — Eleanor C. Reed : "The Battle Invisible."

B. " Beautiful night, ain't it ? " said Granville. i Ellen noticed that Granville said " ain't " instead of

"isn't," according to the fashion of his own family, although he was recently graduated from the High School. . . . She also noted that Granville presently said "wa'n't" instead of "wasn't." "Hot yesterday, ma' n't it ? " said he.

" Yes, it was very warm," replied Ellen. That " wa'n't " seemed to insert a tiny wedge between them. She would have flown at any one who had found fault with her father and mother for saying " wa'n't," but with this young man in her own rank and day it was different. . . . She wanted to reproach him sharply ; to ask him if he had ever been to school. — Mary E. Wilkins : "The Portion of Labor."

C. " It ain't where a man is born or where he was raised that puts him in any class. It's whether he's got anything under his hat. I seen too many of these boys kind o' jump in from the country, and make a lot o' city boys look like rabbits. You see, Mr. Miller, when a guy comes in from the country he figures it out : ' Here, I'm goin' against a tough proposition, and I've got to hump myself to keep up.' He's willin' to learn a few things and do the best he can. If he feels that way, he stands to win out. But if he comes canterin' into town to be a deadgame sport, and set a pace for all the boys, he don't last. It's a small town, but it's too big for any one boy to come in from the country and scare it. Them sporty boys don't last." — George Ade : " Artie."

10. Literary usage. Vulgar usage is the usage of the uneducated masses. At the other extreme is the language of the few who write books. The language of books is called literary usage. But so many people write books nowadays that literary usage varies a great deal. What may be called scholastic usage never permits such shortened forms as cant, dont, doesn't, isn't, aren't. There are subjects so serious and formal in their nature that in treating them it would sound out of place to use can't for cannot, and dont for do not. On the other hand, some of the best books are not scholastic in tone, but sound like the conversational language of educated persons. In conversational literary usage the short forms given above often appear. Conversational literary usage does not admit slang except in rare instances.

The language of books is important to us partly because it teaches us the mechanical forms of written English. It teaches us how to punctuate, capitalize, italicize, paragraph, and spell.

GRAMMATICAL USAGE DEFINED 11

11. Conversational usage. The language used by educated persons in conversation is called conversational usage. It is correct in all essential matters of grammar, but it often admits such contractions as can't^don't, isn't, Tve no, and it sometimes admits fresh and kindly slang. 1

Conversational usage is the proper model for students to follow in their oral use of English. It is very often the proper model for them to follow in their written work. In a formal business letter there is no place for even the best of slang, and none for contracted forms like can't and isn't. But in friendly letters we write in the conversational tone, so that we shall seem to be talking.

12. The chief mistakes in grammar occur through ignorance of the best conversational usage. The actual number of such mistakes is not very large, but each is considered serious. No educated man says aint for isn't, or set for sit, or has went for has gone. If a person is free from such expressions as these, he is at once

1 The instructor will be interested in Professor Thurston Peck's words about slang, in the essay called "The Little Touches. 1 ' A short passage is quoted in the present writer's " Second Manual of Composition. "

recognized as having some education. It is astonishing to see how far a knowledge of a dozen correct forms of expression will carry a man in the opinion of the educated. The person who passes as educated is not he who pronounces words with airs of superiority. The man who passes as educated is the man who never says ain't.

The next few chapters are devoted to a few important matters of conversational usage.

Chapter II Correct Use Of Singular And Plural Verbs

13. Verb defined. A verb is a word which asserts. Usually it asserts an act, as in burns, runs, strikes, but sometimes it merely asserts, as in is, are, were. Sometimes a group of words is used as a verb, for example has burnt, will run, can strike.

14. Subject defined. With every verb, usually before it, goes a word to show who is acting or is spoken of. This word is called the subject of the verb. In " Birds fly " the subject is birds. Sometimes this subject means one person or thing, as bird. It is then called a " singular" subject. Sometimes it means more than one, as birds, in which case it is called a "plural " subject.

15. Singular and plural verbs. Verbs may have different forms, according as their subjects are singular or plural. " One bird flies" but " Two birds fly." The plural subject often ends in s (birds); but the plural verb almost never ends in s. Note the following plural verbs : burn, run, strike, sing, have, are, were, seem, sound.

16. Oral Exercise. Place a subject before each plural verb in the following sentences.

1. sing. 9. seem sweet.

2. burn. 10. run.

3. jump. 11. — do not run.

4. have wings. 12. sound bad.

5. have legs. 13. chatter.

6. have trouble. 14. sulk.

7. are caught. 15. win success.

8. were present.

17. In vulgar usage, people often employ the singular form of the verb wdiere the plural is needed. They say, " The folks has got home," " The chickens is running loose," " The horses draws the wagon," instead of the correct forms, " The folks have got home," " The chickens are running loose," " The horses draw the wagon."

The subject you takes the verbs are and were, even when it means only one person. Every

COBBECT USE OF VEBBS 15

member of the class should repeat rapidly the following :

/ was there, you were there, he was there ; was I there f were you there f ivas he there ?

When the verb comes first, as in " There are two of us," there is great danger of saying There's for There are. Each member of the class should repeat the following aloud :

There's one, there are two, there are several.

18. Oral Exercise. Insert is or are in

the blanks. Harvest apples an early

fruit ; they ripe in summer, and

very welcome. Other kinds of apples

autumn fruits. Some very late ripeners,

and kept all winter. The baldwin a

spicy autumn apple. There few better

apples than the baldwin, but there some

people who do not like baldwins. There

lots 1 of other late apples. The greening

one. The northern spy another. Still

another the pippin. Then there

russets and wine-saps and spitzenburgs. There

1 The expressions There are lots and There 1 s a lot are grammatically correct, but they are not much found in the best conversational usage. They sound too much like "There's a job-lot."

the king apple, which is a favorite with most boys. There a lot which might be

said about apples, but the best thing to do

to read what Thoreau and John Burroughs have said on the subject.

19. Oral Exercise. Insert was or were

in the blanks. We going trout-fishing,

Herbert and I. We passing through a

wood-road. On either side there patches

of swamp. Suddenly a young grouse flew up by the road. We stopped at once, thinking

that there probably others. We not

mistaken. We glanced ahead, and there, about

thirty feet away, a young cock-partridge

entering the road. He walked slowly across the wagon-tracks to the other side, where there

some tall weeds. He passed through

these, and found that there a ditch full

of water. He paused and looked at the ditch,

then at us. We still as two stumps.

Then Mr. Partridge turned about, concluding

that there worse things than men. He

marched calmly across the road again, lifting his ruff a little, and disappeared as he came.

We agreed that there never a prettier

sight.

CORRECT USE OF VERBS 17

20. Insert has or have in the blanks. There

are several deer that been seen on our

island this summer. None 1 been seen

very lately, but about two weeks ago there

were three in our corn patch. There

been one just across on the mainland almost every morning. His tracks are plain to see, and Mr. Ware caught sight of him several times. The Ware children seen him

too, and tell me he is a big buck, that

magnificent antlers. Last year I saw two deer myself. There is a thicket of arbor-vitse trees

by the river, into which people rarely

penetrated. A lot 2 of big trees been cut

down near it. The deer were among these trees. When they saw me, they seemed almost to fly over the fallen trees, and instantly disappeared in the thicket.

21. Singular verb with "either" and " neither." Very often the word either means either one, and very often neither means neither one. This is true in such sentences as " Either is right," "Neither John nor Harry has gone."

1 None may take either has or have. None means no one, but it may be thought of as meaning no tivo, no three, etc.

2 Lot is singular, but lot of trees may be thought of as plural.

Whenever these words are used as subjects, or with singular subjects, they must take a singular verb.

22. Oral Exercise. Use correct forms of the following verbs with the word neither as subject: burn, sleep, rise, sit, jump, think, fear, hope, lack, go.

23. Oral Exercise. Supply correct forms of the verb to be in the blanks. 1. Neither of us

there yesterday. 2. Either man a

good one. 3. Neither likely to succeed.

4. Either one in danger of failing.

5. Neither to blame that time. 6. Either

one general or the other to blame for that

pine so hard as oak. 8. Neither Alger,

artistic a writer as Stevenson. 9. Neither

Greene, Richard Lee, Stark, nor Wayne

so great a general as Washington. 10. Neither

Grant nor Sherman a greater genius than

Robert Lee. 11. Neither Lee nor Sherman so tenacious as Grant. 12. Neither Sherman nor Lincoln so silent as Grant.

13. Neither Grant nor any of his generals

CORRECT USE OF VERBS so great a statesman as Lincoln. 14. Neither Lincoln nor Grant so polished a gentleman as Robert Lee. 15. Neither Grant nor

any one of his generals so tender-hearted

as Lincoln. 16. Neither North nor South — — slow to fight against Spain.

24. When the subject is such an expression as either he or I the question arises whether we shall say is or am. It is best in such cases to avoid the difficulty by so changing the sentence as to use both is and am. We say "Either he is to blame, or I am." In like manner we say " Either you are to blame, or I am," " Either he is to blame or you are."

Chapter III Correct Forms Of The Verb "to Be"

25. Correct equivalents of " ain't." In conversation it is usual to contract many verbs, as in dont for do not, doesn't for does not. Vulgar usage often makes contractions of its own, and one of the worst of these is the negative form ain't, which is made to serve for am not, are not, etc. It is clear that am not cannot be contracted ; for contraction consists in omitting or shortening some vowel (like 0), and if you omit the vowel from am not, the result is amn't, a word too hard to pronounce. But / am not and you are not can be contracted into Tm not, and you re not or you aren't.

26. A very large proportion of boys and girls say ain't . If the study of grammar should teach them anything, it should teach them not to do this, but to use the proper contractions. Every grammar class should be an &nti-ain't club. It

CORRECT FORMS OF VERB " TO BE " 21 should be a club for the promotion of isn't and such forms. But we shall never be wholly rid of this error until boys have courage to say isn't on the play ground. Some boys who are not afraid of a hot ball or a rusty gun are afraid to say isn't, for fear of being thought pretentious. Now some forms of speech would be pretentious in a boy. A lad who always said " Cannot you go ? " would sound like a little prig. But there is nothing priggish in refusing to say ain't. A boy who says isn't can play ball as well, shoot as well, and if necessary fight as well as the boy who is content with the slovenly expression ain't.

27. The correct conversational equivalents of ain't are given below. They should be mastered perfectly, and the student who has learned them should never again say ain't, except in joke. Notice that in many cases there are two correct equivalents of the incorrect expression.

Singular, in statements.

I'm not

you're not or you aren't

he's not or he isn't

Plurals, in statements.

we're not or we aren't you're not or you aren't they're not or they aren't

Singular, in questions. am I not ? aren't you? isn't he?

Plural, in questions.

aren't we ? aren't you ? aren't they ?

22 EXAMPLES OE GRAMMATICAL USAGE

28. Oral Exercise. Give the correct contracted equivalents of ain't before the word going — thus: " I'm not going ; you're not going or you aren't going," etc. ; also the same equivalents before sorry, before hungry, and before complaining.

29. "It is" with "not" and "no." With not, the form it is contracts to it isnt, 'tisn't, or it's not. It is no contracts in like manner to it's no.

30. Oral Exercise. Use It's not before each of the following expressions : too late ; so had as you think ; so far after all ; more than two miles ; every man that can tell the truth ; all that you could wish; as thy mother says, but as thy neighbors say.

31. Oral Exercise. Use 'Tisn't before each of the following : John ; Monday ; time for dinner ; over there.

Each member of the class should repeat : 'Tisn't so; 'tisn't any such thing.

32. Oral Exercise. Use It's no before each of the following : ivonder ; easy task ;

CORRECT FORMS OF VERB "TO BE" 23

small undertaking ; farther than we thought; sign of death tvhen a bird flies in ; fun to pound your finger ; use to cry over spilt milk ; more than right.

33. There's no. The form there's no, contracted from there is no, means the same as there isn't any. The student should form the habit of using one contraction as freely as the other.

34. Oral Exercise. Use There's no before the following: smoke ivithout fire; art that can make a fool wise ; going to heaven in a sedan chair ; sense in grumbling ; reason for whining ; apple like a russet; royal road to learning ; such flatterer as a mans self; lack of funds ; surety of success except in hard ivork ; man but hath enemies ; arguing with an east wind.

35. " Not " with " was " and " were." The forms I was not, you were not, he was not, we were not, they ivere not, may shorten in conversation to I wasn't, you weren't, he wasn't, we weren't, they weren't.

The forms was not I? were not you? was not he? were not we? were not they? may shorten into wasn't I? weren't you? wasn't he? weren't we? weren't they?

36. Oral Exercise. Use the contracted forms of section 35 before the word going and before the word angry.

37. "Were" with "if" and "as if." The

form ivere is usually plural, as in we were going. It would be wrong to say "I were going." But ^Vhen preceded by if or as if the form were is either singular or plural, and can refer to past, present, or future time. " We were here yesterday " states a fact. " If I were you " states a mere supposition. Of course " I " cannot possibly be "you," but we can suppose that "I" were "you."

With if and as if the verb were states a mere supposition, and is either singular or plural.

38. The following forms should be learned :

if I were if I weren't if you were if you weren't if he were if he weren't if we were if we weren't if you were if you weren't if they were if they weren't

39. Oral Exercise. Give the forms of section 38 before the word going ; " If I were

CORRECT FORMS OF VERB "TO BE" 25

going," etc. ; also before you, before a king, and before sure.

40. Written Exercise. Write from dictation the following sentences, numbering them: 1. If it were evening, we should have the lamps lighted. 2. If it weren't so cold, we could go fishing. 3. If it were four o'clock, we should be out of school. 4. If it weren't for hawks, the field mice would ruin the crops. 5. If it were war-time, the boys and women would have to run the farms. 6. If it weren't for fear of being called cowards, few men w T ould be heroes. 7. If it were a bear, it would bite you.

41. Written Exercise. Write from dictation the following sentences: 1. If there were more honest men, the rogues would be punished. 2. If there were no work, there could be no play. 3. If there were as many horses as wishes, the beggars could ride. 4. If there were no trouble, there could be no happiness. 5. If there were a king in this country, there would not be seventy million kings. 6. If there were no darkness, we should not know light when we saw it. 7. If there were a plenty of them, diamonds would be called pebbles.