(i) Thus we find the following words used either as

(ii) Adverbs are sometimes used as nouns, as in the sentences, “I have met him before now." "He is dead since then."

(iii) In the following we find adverbs used as adjectives: “thine

often infirmities; the then king," etc.

(iv) A phrase sometimes does duty as an adverb, as in "from beyond the sea; from over the mountains," etc.

CONJUNCTIONS.

6. A Conjunction is a word that joins sentences together.

(i) The word and, besides joining sentences, possesses the additional power of joining nouns or other words. Thus we say, "John and Jane are a happy pair;" "Two and three are five."

7. Conjunctions are of two kinds: (i) Co-ordinative; and (ii) Subordinative.

(i) Co-ordinative Conjunctions are those which connect co-ordinate sentences and clauses--that is, sentences neither of which is dependent on the other. The following is a list: And, both, but, either—or, neither

-nor.

(ii) Subordinative Conjunctions are those which connect subordinate sentences with the principal sentence to which they are subordinate. The type of a subordinative conjunction is that, which is really the demonstrative pronoun. "I know that he has gone to London" is= "He has gone to London : I know that."

(iii) The following is a list of subordinative conjunctions: After, before; ere, till; while, since; lest; because, as; for; if; unless; though; whether-or; than.

INTERJECTIONS.

1. Interjections are words which have no meaning in themselves, but which give sudden expression to an emotion of the mind. They are no real part of language; they do not enter into the build or organism of a sentence. They have no grammatical relation to any word in a sentence, and are there

fore not, strictly speaking, "parts of speech." Thus we say, Oh! Ah! Alas! and so on; but the sentences we employ would be just as complete-in sense-without them. They are extragrammatical utterances.

(i) The word interjection comes from the Lat. inter, between, and jactus, thrown.

(ii) Sometimes words with a meaning are used as interjections. Thus we say, Welcome! for "You are well come." Good-bye! for God be with you! The interjection "Now then!" consists of two words, each of which has a meaning; but when employed interjectionally, the compound meaning is very different from the meaning of either.

(iii) In written and printed language, interjections are followed by the mark (!) of admiration or exclamation.

WORDS KNOWN BY THEIR FUNCTIONS,
AND NOT BY THEIR INFLEXIONS.

1. The Oldest English.—When our language first came over to this island, in the fifth century, our words possessed a large number of inflexions; and a verb could be known from a noun, and an adjective from either, by the mere look of it. Verbs had one kind of inflexion, nouns another, adjectives a third; and it was almost impossible to confuse them. Thus, in O.E. (or Anglo-Saxon) thunder, the verb, was thunrian—with the ending an; but the noun was thunor, without any ending at all. Then, in course of time, for many and various reasons, the English language began to lose its inflexions; and they dropped off very rapidly between the 11th and the 15th centuries, till, nowadays, we possess very few indeed.

2. Freedom given by absence of Inflexions. In the 16th century, when Shakespeare began to write, there were very few inflexions; the language began to feel greater liberty, greater ease in its movements; and a writer would use the same word sometimes as one part of speech, and sometimes as another. Thus Shakespeare himself uses the conjunction but both as a verb and as a noun, and makes one of his characters say, "But

says,

me no buts!" He employs the adverb askance as a verb, and "From their own misdeeds they askance their eyes." He has the adverb backward with the function of a noun, as in the phrase "The backward and abyss of time." Again, he gives us an adverb doing the work of an adjective, as in the phrases "my often rumination," "a seldom pleasure." In the same way, Shakespeare has the verbs "to glad" and "to mad." Very often he uses an adjective as a noun; and “a fair" is his phrase for "beauty," "a pale" for "a paleness." He carries this power of using one "part of speech" for another to the most extraordinary lengths. He uses happy for to make happy; unfair for to deface; to climate for to live; to bench for to sit; to false for to falsify; to path for to walk; to verse for to speak of in verse; and many others. Perhaps the most remarkable is where he uses tongue for to talk of, and brain for to think of. In 'Cymbeline" he says:—

"'Tis still a dream; or else such stuff as madness

Will tongue, and brain not.

3. Absence of Inflexions.-At the present time, we have lost almost all the inflexions we once had. We have only one for the cases of the noun; none at all for ordinary adjectives (except to mark degrees); a few in the pronoun; and a few in the verb. Hence we can use a word sometimes as one part of speech, and sometimes as another. We can say, "The boys had a good run;" and "The boys run very well." We can say, "The train travelled very fast," where fast is an adverb, modifying travelled; and we can speak of "a fast train." We can use the phrase, “The very man," where very is an adjective marking man; and also the phrase "A very good man," where very is an adverb modifying the adjective good.

4. Function. It follows that, in the present state of our language, when we cannot know to what class a word belongs by its look, we must settle the matter by asking ourselves what is its function. We need not inquire what a word is; but we must ask what it does. And just as a bar of iron may be used as a lever, or as a crowbar, or as a poker, or as a hammer, or as

a weapon, so a word may be an adjective, or a noun, or a verb, -just as it is used.

5. Examples. When we say, "He gave a shilling for the book,” for is a preposition connecting the noun book with the verb gave. But when we say, "Let us assist them, for our case is theirs," the word for joins two sentences together, and is hence a conjunction. In the same way, we can contrast early in the proverb, "The early bird catches the worm," and in the sentence "He rose early." Hard in the sentence "He works hard" is an adverb; in the phrase "A hard stone" it is an adjective. Right is an adverb in the phrase "Right reverend;" but an adjective in the sentence "That is not the right road." Back is an adverb in the sentence "He came back yesterday;" but a noun in the sentence "He fell on his back." Here is an adverb, and where an adverbial conjunction; but in the line

"Thou losest here, a better where to find,"

Shakespeare employs these words as nouns. The, in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, is an adjective; but in such phrases as "The more, the merrier," it is an adverb, modifying merrier and Indeed, some words seem to exercise two functions at

more.

the same time. Thus Tennyson has—

"Slow and sure comes up the golden year,"

where slow and sure may either be adverbs modifying comes, or adjectives marking year; or both. This is also the case with the participle, which is both an adjective and a verb; and with the gerund, which is both a verb and a noun.

6. Function or Form ?-From all this it appears that we are not merely to look at the form of the word, we are not merely to notice and observe; but we must think-we must ask ourselves what the word does, what is its function ? In other words, we must always—when trying to settle the class to which a word belongs-ask ourselves two questions

(i) What other word does it go with? and
(ii) What does it do to that word?

SYNTA X.

INTRODUCTORY.

1. The word Syntax is a Greek word which means arrangement. Syntax, in grammar, is that part of it which treats of the relations of words to each other in a sentence.

2. Syntax is usually divided into two parts, which are called Concord and Government.

(i) Concord means agreement. The chief concords in grammar are those of the Verb with its Subject; the Adjective with its Noun; one Noun with another Noun; the Pronoun with the Noun it stands for; the Relative with its Antecedent.

(ii) Government means the influence that one word has upon another. The chief kinds of Government are those of a Transitive Verb and a Noun; a Preposition and a Noun.

I. SYNTAX OF THE NOUN.

1. THE NOMINATIVE CASE.

RULE I.-The Subject of a sentence is in the Nominative Case.

Thus we say, I write; John writes: and both I and John-the subjects in these two sentences-are in the nominative case.

RULE II.-When one noun is used to explain or describe another, the two nouns are said to be in Apposition; and they are always in the same case.