ETYMOLOGY. CHAPTER II. THE NINE CLASSES OF WORDS-ADVERBS AND ARTICLES. Lesson 6. THE ADVERBS. P. WE are going to talk about "Adverbs." You know that the Latin word ad means to, or added to. I suppose, therefore, that you can easily imagine what is meant by an Adverb. Ion. I suppose it means a word added to a verb. Let me see if I can add any words to a verb. I am running quickly; I am running now; I am running slowly; I am running much; I will run there; I will run everywhere; I will run a little; I will run presently; I will run soon. It is very easy to add words to a verb. is done; others tell you where, or when it is done. P. But I should tell you that some adverbs are added to ADJECTIVES. You may add one to the adjective "better"; thus: much better; a little sweeter, if you please; very nice tea; rather good toast. L. Now, I think I can describe an adverb. A word which is added to a verb to tell us something about it, is called an adverb; adverbs are sometimes added to adjectives. Example-Nicely, well, slowly, rather, very, &c. W. We must not forget that an adverb is another dependent word; it is the servant of the verb, just as the adjective is the servant of the noun. Ion. More-it is the servant of the adjective also; it is the servant of a servant. W. Those words, Ion, are very much like the adjectives, which we add to nouns. Just as adjectives tell you the quality of the nouns, so adverbs tell you something about verbs. P. You may now go through Some tell you how the action 'your parsing exercise. No. 6. PARSING EXERCISE. My eldest brother [can sing] many songs nicely. Your foolish sister will cut her finger presently. Look! she [has hurt] herself very much. Come, little John, dance! you [can dance] famously. No, I will not. Sit down, you silly boy. Columbus discovered America; it then contained many inhabitants. He nearly lost his balance. Parrots talk loudly. Birds warble sweetly. They hop about prettily. Potatoes will be boiled soon. I [am coming] immediately. He [was shot] there, directly. "Not" shows how much John will dance. Lesson 7. THE ARTICLES. P. Did you never notice how strangely the nouns sound if used alone? Listen I saw boy coming down street riding horse. He fell on stones; it was accident. L. You want the words a and the. Before "accident" you would use an; you would 66 an accident." say, ticular remark, because you point out the stone you want. P. And you may thus remember that the article the, because it points out a particular object, is called the Definite Article. The article a, does not point out any particular object; therefore it is called the Indefinite Article. L. Is not an another article? P. No. An is merely the indefinite article a, with n added P. These little words are to it for a certain purpose. called articles; they are placed You know that people often before nouns to show whether speak very quickly, and run they are used in a general or their words together; thus, if we particular way. You know that said "a owl," men would soon anything which is general re-join the two vowels together lates to many things; and that and say "aowl," which would anything particular relates to sound like "yowl." only one thing. Then, if I say, "Bring me a stone," it may mean any stone in our garden; or any stone in our street; or any stone in this world. "Bring me a stone" is a very general remark. But, suppose that I say bring me the stone. How many stones have you to choose from then? W. We can only choose one stone-the stone which you are talking about-that is a par W. And that is not proper. If I were an owl, I should be offended if anybody called me that. "aegg," very nicely-you would P. So, also, you cannot say soon pronounce "a-agg." Thus you see that when a word begins with a vowel, you use the indefinite article with an n added to it to separate the vowels. L. So there are two articlesThe definite article, the; andThe indefinite article a, or an. No. 7. PARSING EXERCISE. The boy gave the girl an apple. A horse is a useful beast. An ass is useful. The man bought a pig. She caught an antelope. Her cousin James killed the great black bull. CAN I another bear to see Preferred and honour'd above me, Then in my heart will Jesus dwell, A JOURNAL OF INSTRUCTION FOR THE FAMILY AND THE SCHOOL. 5th Week. MONDAY. Moral Biography. INDUSTRY. THE MAN WHO MADE CANALS. P. WATT was a useful man, because he improved the steamengine. Just as he improved the means of conveyance by land, so there was another man useful in forming conveyances by water. I need hardly tell you how useful good conveyances are. I mentioned to you once before that in selling goods their value often depends much on the place where they are sold. Supposing the corn in Russia to be too abundant, and that the people cannot use it; then, much of it is valueless. But if that corn be brought to England, the English will pay a good price for it. For this change in its value, the Russians may thank the conveyance which brought it here. W. But then you have to take off the expense of conveying the corn-so much for every bushel, I suppose; thus, you lessen the profit. P. Yes; the more you pay for conveying the corn, the less profit you get on it: so, it is very important to get conveyance as cheaply and as quickly as possible. Ion. I can tell when quick conveyances are useful; when you carry articles that will perish. You told us that a boat-load of mackerel when brought to Billingsgate is sometimes worth £200, but that if the boat should happen not to reach Billingsgate until the next morning, its load would be worth about 20s. W. And, if you send milk to London in the summer-time, and it does not arrive quickly, the conveyance may decrease its value, instead of increasing it. P. Not only quickness, but cheapness in conveyance must also be attended to. There are large forests of timber in Russia. Suppose the trees to be cut down and lopped, and conveyed easily to London, they would be worth many thousands of pounds. But these trees now remain where they are; for, there are no roads, or means of conveyance near them. If they were felled, they must be brought down the mountain-side, and over many rugged places, where horses and carts could not come, for there are no roads. So, the trees remain where they are, of little or no value to man. L. Because, to remove them you would have to give as much labour as the trees would be worth. P. Certainly. Thus, he who can improve conveyances, by making them quicker or cheaper, does good. The cheapest moving powers are those which require no expense to support them, or keep them up. Thus, a ship is a cheaper conveyance than a coach; why? L. Because the ship is moved by the wind, which does not cost anything to feed it, as horses do: it drives the sails before it without charging for its services. W. And it does not die, as the horses do, giving people the expense to buy new ones. P. At the same time, the wind is like many others who give their services for nothing; it cannot always be depended upon. It receives no wages, so it is perfectly free; it comes and goes whenever its fancy may please; and, after helping the ships which are going southward, it suddenly changes and takes an interest in those travelling eastward or westward. So when Watt improved the steam-engine, men changed their servant the wind for water; the water formed steam, and conveyed them over the water. W. But they allow the wind also to help them when it will; for the great steam-packets have sails, so that when they are travelling in the right direction, the steam and wind may work together. though the steam-engine had to be fed with coal instead of corn, its food is cheaper, and it does more work for its food than the horse does. L. But you were going, papa, to tell us of a man who formed means of conveyance by water. P. Ah! so I was. You must know, then, that goods can be conveyed by water from one part of a country to another. W. Yes; on the rivers. P. The rivers, however, like the wind, were not always exactly such as they were wished to be. It was often wished that they would run in a straight line, instead of forming a line like a serpent-a wave line. Ion. That is because rivers cannot flow up hill: in their course they must run in the lowest ground. So, if a river in its course comes to a hill, it must flow round it, instead of keeping straight on. P. And in some parts the distance round such a hill is thirty or fifty miles; while, if the river could only flow over or through the hill, its course might measure only five miles. Thus, as rivers were not found quite convenient, men found a remedy; they cut deep places for the water to flow in-they bored tunnels through the hills, made “cuttings in places which were too high, and embankments in the parts which were too low, so that the water could easily flow in the way that they wished P. True; and when steam-in a straight line. was made to work on the land -to move railway carriagesthen, not only quickness but cheapness was gained; for al L. They must have taken a great deal of trouble. P. Certainly they did: but they knew that if you wish to have everything exactly as you want it, you must not expect to find it ready-made, but must take the pains to make it. These artificial rivers which the men made are called CANALS. L. Oh, yes! We know what canals are! And are you going to tell us of one of the men who made the canals? P. Yes. Once there was a time when the people of England had no canals: they let the old rivers run on in their old roundabout way, and of course the barges and boats had to go in that way too. Good patient people! But they had long heard of canals. They had heard of the mighty canal of China-the Imperial Canal, which is two hundred feet broad, and extends southward from Pekin nine hundred miles. What a canal that is for Chinamen to cut! a hundred and fifty miles long; it was finished in 1681; altogether, twelve thousand men had worked at it during a course of fifteen years; and it had cost twelve hundred thousand pounds. With such an example it was time for the English people to be doing something of the same kind; but they still lived at ease-they let old Time pass on, and the rivers flow on, and they themselves stood still. Fifty years passed away-the year 1731 came; but still there were no English canals. was about 1752, a hundred years ago, when the first modern canal was begun; it was, after some time, made twelve miles long, and was called the Sankey Canal; and although it cost much money, it turned out a profitable speculation. It to A profitable speculation! That set the people a-thinking. Other parties said they would try to make canals. A nobleman, named the Duke of Bridgewater, determined make one. He had some very rich coal-mines in a place called Worsley, about seven miles from Manchester; but these coals were not of great value, because there were no means for conveying them to some place where they might be used. Then, they had heard rumours of the canals of ancient days-how the old Egyptians were said to have cut a canal between the Red Sea and the Mediterranean; how the Greeks and Romans used to cut canals; and that the Romans made one for England, from Peterborough to Lincoln. The gentlemen of England who live at home at ease knew all about their hardworking neighbours the Dutch-The duke's father had, more what multitudes of canals they had cut in their large wateringplace called Holland: they had seen the canals of France, too, especially the great canal of Languedoc, which joins the Mediterranean to the Atlantic; this is sixty feet broad, and is than 120 years ago, in the year 1732, obtained an act of Parliament for making a canal; but he had not done so, because the expense of the work would be so enormous, and because there did not seem to be any man who could perform so difficult |