PART III.
SYNTAX.

“Now then, reader, if you are quite ready, we are—All right! * * * *”

The asterisks are intended to stand for a word used in speaking to horses. Don’t blush, young ladies; there’s not a shadow of harm in it: but as to spelling it, we are as unable to do so as the ostler’s boy was, who was thrashed for his ignorance by his father.

“Where are we now, coachman?”

SYNTAX.

“The third part of Grammar, Sir, wot treats of the agreement and construction of words in a sentence.”

“Does a coachman say wot for which because he has a licence?”

“Can’t say, Ma’am?”

“Drive on, coachman.”

And we must drive on, or boil on, or whatever it is the fashion to call getting on in these times.

A sentence is an aggregate of words forming a complete sense.

Sometimes, however, a sentence is an aggregate of words forming complete nonsense: as,

“They are very civil and attentive to the smallest order, and furnish a house entirely complete, for twenty-seven guineas, all new and well seasoned.”—Advertisement in the Times.

Sentences are of two kinds, simple and compound.

A simple sentence has in it but one subject and one finite verb; that is, a verb to which number and person belong: as, “A joke is a joke.”

A compound sentence consists of two or more simple sentences connected together: as, “A joke is a joke, but a ducking is no joke. Corpulence is the attribute of swine, mayors, and oxen.”

Simple sentences may be divided (if we choose to take the trouble) into the Explicative or explaining; the Interrogative, or asking; the Imperative, or commanding.

An explicative sentence is, in other words, a direct assertion: as, “Sir, you are impertinent.”—Johnson.

An interrogative sentence “merely asks a question:” as, “Are you a policeman? How’s your Inspector?”

“How’s your Inspector?”

An imperative sentence is expressive of command, exhortation, or entreaty: as, “Shoulder arms!” “Turn out your toes!” “Charge bayonets!”

A phrase is two or more words properly put together, making either a sentence or part of a sentence: as, “Good morning!” “Your most obedient!”

Some phrases consist of two or more words improperly put together: these are improper phrases: as, “Now then, old stupid!” “Stand out of the sunshine!”

“What a duck of a man!”

Other phrases consist of words put together by ladies: as, “A duck of a man,” “A love of a shawl,” “so nice,” “quite refreshing,” “sweetly pretty.” “Did you ever?” “No I never!”

Other phrases again consist of French and English words put together by people of quality, because their knowledge of both languages is pretty nearly equal: as, “I am au désespoir,” “mis hors de combat,” “quite ennuyé,” or rather in nine cases out of ten, “ennuyée,”—“I have a great envie” to do so and so. These constitute an important variety of comic English.

Besides the above, there are various phrases which we may call elliptical phrases, consisting principally of the peculiar terms employed in the different trades and professions: as,

“A Milton Lost,” by booksellers.

“A Lady (of the Lake) in sheets,” do.

“One college (pudding) for No. 6,” by waiters.

“To carry off:” as, “See how the old woman in a red cloak carries off the tower,” by painters, &c.

The principal parts of a simple sentence are, the subject, the attribute, and the object.

If you want to know what subjects and objects are, you should go to the Morgue at Paris. But in Grammar—

The subject is the thing chiefly spoken of; the attribute is that which is affirmed or denied of it; and the object is the thing affected by such action.

The nominative denotes the subject, and usually goes before the verb or attribute; and the word or phrase, denoting the object, follows the verb; as, “The flirt torments her lover.” Here, a flirt is the subject; torments, the attribute or thing affirmed; and her lover, the object.

Yes, and a pretty object he is too, sometimes. But then we shall be told that he is not an object—of attachment. Alas! that is the very reason why he is an object—of compassion, or ridicule, according to people’s dispositions.

It may be also said that the flirt herself is a pretty object. All we can say is, that we never saw such a flirt, nor do we believe that we ever shall.

To torment, it seems, is the attribute of the flirt, as it is that of the ——. Well! no matter. Much good may the fellowship do her: that is all!

It strikes us, though, that we are somewhat digressing from our subject, namely Syntax, which,

Principally consists of two parts (which the flirt does not, for she is all body and no soul) Concord and Government.

Concord is the agreement which one word has with another, in gender, number, case or person.

Note.—That a want of agreement between words does not invalidate deeds. We apprehend that such an engagement as the following, properly authenticated, would hold good in law.

Also that a friend of ours, to whom the following bill was sent, could not have refused to discharge it on the score of its incorrect grammar.

1835Mr. ——

Jenery 10To J. Burton.

Government is that power which one part of speech has over another, in directing its mood, tense, or case.

Government is also that power, of which, if the Chartists have their way, we shall soon see very little in this country.

Hurrah!
No taxes!
No army!
No navy!
No parsons!
No lawyers!
No Commons!
No Lords!
No anything!
No nothing!

To produce the agreement and right disposition of words in a sentence, the following rules (and observations?) should be carefully studied.

RULE I.

A verb must agree with its nominative case in number and person: as, “I perceive.” “Thou hast been to Brixton.” “Apes chatter.” “Frenchmen gabble.”

Certain liberties are sometimes taken with this rule: as, “I own I likes good beer.” “You’m a fine fellow, aint yer?” “He’ve been to the Squire’s.” Such modes of speaking are adopted by those who neither know nor care anything about grammatical correctness: but there are other persons who care a great deal about it, but unfortunately do not know what it consists in. Such folks are very fond of saying, “How it rain!” “It fit you very well.” “He say he think it very unbecoming,” “I were gone before you was come,” and so forth, in which forms of speech they perceive a peculiar elegance.

The infinitive mood, or part of a sentence, is sometimes used as the nominative case to the verb: as “to be good is to be happy:” which is as grammatical an assertion as “Toby Good is Toby Happy;” and rather surpasses it in respect of sense. “That two pippins are a pair, is a proposition which no man in his senses will deny.”

“To be a connoisseur in boots,
To hate all rational pursuits,
To make your money fly, as though
Gold would as fast as mushrooms grow;
To haunt the Opera, save whene’er
There’s anything worth hearing there;
To smirk, to smile, to bow, to dance,
To talk of what they eat in France,
To languish, simper, sue, and sigh,
And stuff her head with flattery;
Are means to gain that worthless part
A fashionable lady’s heart.”

Here are examples enough, in all conscience, of infinitive moods serving as nominative cases.

All verbs, save only in the infinitive mood or participle, require a nominative case either expressed or understood: as, “Row with me down the river,” that is “Row thou, or do thou row.” “Come where the aspens quiver,” “come thou, or do thou come.” “Fly not yet;” “fly not thou, or do not thou fly.” “Pass the ruby;” “pass thou, or do thou pass the ruby” (not the Rubicon). “Drink to me only;” “drink thou, or do thou drink only.” “Wake, dearest, wake;” “wake thou, or do thou wake.” “Tell her I love her;” “tell thou, or do thou tell her I love her.” In short, you cannot listen to a hawker of ballads, crying his commodities about the streets, without hearing illustrations of the foregoing rule. “Move on!” the well known mandate of policemen to those who create obstructions, is a very common exemplification of it. The nominative case is easily understood in the latter instance; and the person addressed, if he pretend that it is not, does so at his own peril.

A well known popular song affords an example of the violation of this rule.

“Ven as the Captain comed for to hear on’t,
Wery much applauded vot she’d done.”

The verb applauded has here no nominative case, whereas it ought to have been governed by the pronoun he. “He very much applauded,” &c.

Every nominative case, except when made absolute, or used, like the Latin Vocative, in addressing a person, should belong to some verb, implied if not expressed. A beautiful example of this grammatical maxim, and one, too, that explains itself, is impressed upon the mind very soon after its first introduction to letters: as,

“Who kill’d Cock Robin?
I, said the sparrow,
With my bow and arrow;
I kill’d Cock Robin.”

Of the neglect of this rule also, the ballad lately mentioned presents an instance: as,

“Four-and-twenty brisk young fellows
Clad in jackets, blue array,—
And they took poor Billy Taylor
From his true love all avay.”

The only verb in these four lines is the verb took, which is governed by the pronoun they. The four-and-twenty brisk young fellows, therefore, though undeniably in the nominative, have no verb to belong to: while, at the same time, whatever may be thought of their behaviour to Mr. William Taylor, they are certainly not absolute in point of case.

When a verb comes between two nouns, either of which may be taken as the subject of the affirmation, it may agree with either of them: as, “Two-and-sixpence is half-a-crown.” Due regard, however, should be paid to that noun which is most naturally the subject of the verb: it would be clearly wrong to say, “Ducks and green peas is a delicacy.” “Fleas is a nuisance.”

A nominative case, standing without a personal tense of a verb, and being put before a participle, independently of the rest of the sentence, is called a case absolute: as, “My brethren, to-morrow being Sunday, I shall preach a sermon in Smithfield; after which we shall join in a hymn, and that having been sung, Brother Biggs will address you.”

The objective case is sometimes incorrectly made absolute by showmen and others: as, “Here, gentlemen and ladies, you will see that great warrior Napoleon Bonaparte, standing agin a tree with his hands in his pockets, him taking good care to keep out of harm’s vay. And there, on the extreme right, you will observe the Duky Vellinton a valking about amidst the red-hot cannon balls, him not caring von straw.”

RULE II.

Two or more singular nouns, joined together by a copulative conjunction, expressed or understood, are equivalent to a plural noun, and therefore require verbs, nouns, and pronouns, agreeing with them in the plural number: as, “Veal, wine, and vinegar” (take care how you pronounce these words) “are very good victuals I vow.” “Burke and Hare were nice men.” “A hat without a crown, a tattered coat, threadbare and out at elbows, a pair of breeches which looked like a piece of dirty patchwork diversified by various holes, and of boots which a Jew would hardly have raked from a kennel, at once proclaimed him a man who had seen better days.”

This rule is not always adhered to in discourse quite so closely as a fastidious ear would require it to be: as, “And so, you know, Mary, and I, and Jane was a dusting the chairs, and in comes Missus.”

RULE III.

When the conjunction disjunctive comes between two nouns, the verb, noun, or pronoun, is of the singular number, because it refers to each of such nouns taken separately: as, “A cold in the head, or a sore eye is a great disadvantage to a lover.”

If singular pronouns, or a noun and pronoun of different persons, be disjunctively connected, the verb must agree with the person which stands nearest to it: as “I or thou art.” “Thou or I am.” “I, thou, or he is,” &c. But as this way of writing or speaking is very inelegant, and as saying, “Either I am, or thou art,” and so on, will always render having recourse to it unnecessary, the rule just laid down is almost useless, except inasmuch as it suggests a moral maxim, namely, “Always be on good terms with your next door neighbour.”

It also forcibly reminds us of some beautiful lines by Moore, in which the heart, like a tendril, is said to twine round the “nearest and loveliest thing.” Now the person which is placed nearest the verb is the object of choice; ergo, the most agreeable person—ergo, the loveliest person or thing.

Should a conjunction disjunctive occur between a singular noun or pronoun, and a plural one, the verb agrees with the plural noun or pronoun: as, “Neither a king nor his courtiers are averse to butter:” (particularly when thickly spread). “Darius or the Persians were hostile to Greece.”

RULE IV.

A noun of multitude, that is, one which signifies many, can have a verb or pronoun to agree with it either in the singular or plural number; according to the import of such noun, as conveying unity or plurality of idea: as, “The Parliament is—” we do not choose to say what. “The nation is humbugged.” “The ministry are exceedingly well pensioned.” “The multitude have to pay many taxes.” “The Council are at a loss to know what to do.” “The people is a many-headed monster.”

We do not mean to call the people names. We only quote what all parties say of it when out of office. When they are in, it is—why, we may exhaust the alphabet about it, as Sterne tried to do about Love; but he couldn’t get farther than R.; and therefore, if we break down, it is no matter. So we will e’en try a leap; and as the maxim “audi alteram partem” is a favourite one with all rightly constituted minds, our own inclusive, we will see what can be said on both sides. The people, then, is termed,

And now for a little more Syntax.

RULE V.

Pronouns agree with their antecedents, and with the nouns to which they belong, in gender and number: as, “This is the blow which killed Ned.” “England was once governed by a celebrated King, who was called Rufus the Red, but whose name was by no means so illustrious as that of Alfred.” “His Grace and the Baronet had put on their boots.” “The Countess appeared, and she smiled, but the smile belied her feelings.”

The relative being of the same person with the antecedent, the verb always agrees with it: as, “Thou who learnest Syntax.” “I who enlighten thy mind.”

The relative what (incorrectly pronounced) is sometimes used in a manner which is very exceptionable: as, “The gentleman wot keeps the wine-vaults.” “None but lovers can feel for them wot loves.” We mention this error once more, in order to insure its abandonment.

The objective case of the personal pronouns is by some, for want of better information, employed in the place of these and those: as, “Let them things alone.” “Now then, Jemes, make haste with them chops.” “Give them tables a wipe.” “Oh! Julier, turn them heyes away.” “What’s the use o’ mancipatin’ them niggers?” “Don’t you wish you was one of them lobsters?” “I think them shawls so pretty!” “Look at them sleeves.” The adverb there, is sometimes, with additional impropriety, joined to the pronoun them: as, “Look after them there sheep.”

The objective case of a pronoun in the first person is put after the interjections Oh! and Ah! as, “Oh! dear me,” &c. The second person, however, requires a nominative case: as, “Oh! you good-for-nothing man!” “Ah! thou gay Lothario!”

“Oh! you good-for-nothing man!”

RULE VI.

When there is no nominative case between the relative and the verb, the relative itself is the nominative to the verb: as, “The master who flogged us.” “The rods which were used.”

But when the nominative comes between the relative and the verb, the relative exchanges, as it were, the character of sire for that of son, and becomes the governed instead of the governor; depending for its case on some word in its own member of the sentence: as, “He who is now at the head of affairs, whom the Queen delighteth to honour, whose Pavilion (if the Court had been there) might have been at Brighton, and to whom is intrusted the helm of state—is a Lamb.”

Well, it is to be hoped that he will get on in his boat a little better than a bear; though why that animal is considered so peculiarly at sea when on the water, we cannot tell. Man is the only sailor except the nautilus that we know of. Even the steer is no steersman. The bear, however, is an ill-conditioned, awkward creature, and very likely to upset the boat; while the more gentle lamb, whatever may be the perils of his situation, leaves the rudder alone, remains quietly in his place, and goes with the stream.

RULE VII.

The relative and the verb, when the former is preceded by two nominatives of different persons, may agree in person with either, according to the sense: as, “I am the young gentleman who do the lovers at the Wells;” or, “who does.”

Let this maxim be borne constantly in mind. “A murderer of good characters should always be made an example of.”

RULE VIII.

Every adjective, and every adjective pronoun, relates to a substantive, expressed or implied: as, “Dando was an unprincipled, as well as a voracious man.” “Few quarrel with their bread and butter;” that is, “few persons.” “This is the wonderful eagle of the sun.” That is, “This eagle,” &c.

Adjective pronouns agree in number with their substantives: “This muff, these muffs; that booby, these boobies; another numscull, other numsculls.”

Some people say “Those kind of things,” or, “This four-and-twenty year,” neither of which expressions they have any business to use.

A good deal of speculation has been expended on the word means in connection with an adjective pronoun. Some will have it that we should say, “By this mean;” “By that mean;” “By these means;” “By those means:” others, that we should say, “By this means,” and so on. The practical rule to be observed is, to treat the substantive, means, as a singular noun when it refers to what is singular, and when it relates to that which is plural, as a plural one. The word mean is seldom used in the same sense with means. We have been induced to advert to this question, by the desire of giving the reader a caution respecting the use of this same word, means. It is not uncommon to hear it said in the streets and elsewhere, “Well, and then, you know, Jem was took afore the beak, by means of which he had three months.” “Sall was quite intosticated, by means of which (or vich) she wor fined five bob,” &c. We will not shock the refined grammarian by the multiplication of examples of this kind; suffice it to say, that the phrase “by means of which” is substituted for “in consequence of which,” or, “on which account,” by the lower or illiterate classes.

Adjectives are sometimes improperly used as adverbs: as, “He behaved very bad.” “He insulted me most gross.” “He eat and drank uncommon.” “He wur beat very severe.” “It hailed tremendous,” or, more commonly, “tremenjus.”

RULE IX.

The article a or an agrees with nouns in the singular number only: as, “A fool, an ass, a simpleton, a ninny, a lout—I would not give a farthing for a thousand such.”

The definite article the may agree with nouns in the singular and plural number: as, “The toast, the ladies, the ducks.”

The articles are often properly omitted; when used, they serve to determine or limit the thing spoken of: as, “Variety is charming.” “Familiarity doth breed contempt.” “A stitch in time saves nine.” “The heart that has truly loved never forgets.”

The article a or an is sometimes (we grieve to say it) applied to nouns in the plural number: as, “A wine-vaults.” “An oyster-rooms.” But this misapplication of the article is positively shocking.

RULE X.

One substantive, in the possessive or genitive case, is governed by another, of a different meaning: as, “A fiddle-stick’s end.” “Monkey’s allowance.” “Virtue’s reward.”

Pronouns, as well as nouns, are thus governed by substantives: as, “The woes of a kitten (like those of a Poet) are expressed by its mews.”

RULE XI.

Active verbs govern the objective case: as, “I kissed her.” “She scratched me.” “Virtue rewards her followers.”

For which reason she is like a cook.

Verbs neuter do not govern an objective case. Observe, therefore, that such phrases: as, “She cried a good one,” “He came the old soldier over me,” and so forth, are highly improper in a grammatical point of view, to say nothing of other objections to them.

These verbs, however, are capable of governing words of a meaning similar to their own: as, in the affecting ballad of Giles Scroggins—

“I wont, she cried, and screamed a scream.”

The verb To Be has the same case after it as that which goes before it: as, “It was I,” not “It was me.” “The Grubbs were they who eat so much trifle at our last party;” not “The Grubbses were them.”

RULE XII.

One verb governs another that depends upon it, in the infinitive mood: as, “Cease to smoke pipes.” “Begin to wear collars.” “I advise you to shave.” “I recommend you to go to church.” “I resolved to visit the United States.

“And there I learned to wheel about
And jump Jim Crow.”

In general, the preposition to is used before the latter of two verbs; but sometimes it is more properly omitted: as, “I saw you take it, young fellow; come along with me.” “Let me get hold of you, that’s all!” “Did I hear you speak?” “I’ll let you know!” “You dare not hit me.” “Bid me discourse.” “You need not sing.”

The preposition for is sometimes unnecessarily intruded into a sentence, in addition to the preposition to, before an infinitive mood: as, “How came you for to think, for to go, for to do such a thing?” “Do you want me for to punch your head?”

Adjectives, substantives, and participles, often govern the infinitive mood: as, “Miss Hopkins, I shall be happy to dance the next set with you.” “Oh! Sir, it is impossible to refuse you.” “Have you an inclination to waltz?” “I shall be delighted in endeavouring to do so.”

The infinitive mood is frequently made absolute, that is, independent of the rest of the sentence: as, “To say the truth, I was rather the worse for liquor.” “Not to mince matters, Miss, I love you.” “To begin at the right end.” “To cut a long tale short,” &c.

RULE XIII.

The relation which words and phrases bear to each other in point of time, should always be duly marked: instead of saying, “Last night I intended to have made strong love to her,” we should say, “Last night I intended to make strong love to her;” because, although the intention of making strong love may have been abandoned (on reflection) this morning, and is now, therefore, a thing which is past, yet it is undoubtedly, when last night and the thoughts connected with it are brought back, again present to the mind.

RULE XIV.

Participles have the same power of government with that of the verbs from which they are derived: as, “Oh, what an exquisite singer Rubini is! I am so fond of hearing him.” “Look at that horrid man; I declare he is quizzing us!” “No, he is only taking snuff.” “See, how that thing opposite keeps making eyes.” “Yes, she is ogling Lumley; I should so like to pinch her!” “How fond they all are of wearing mustaches! Don’t you like it?” “Oh, yes! there is no resisting them.” “Heigho! I am dying to have an ice—”

——Young man for a husband, Miss?
For shame, Sir! don’t be rude!

Participles are sometimes used as substantives: as, “The French mouth is adapted to the making of grimaces.” “The cobbler is like the parson; he lives by the mending of soles.” “The tailor reaps a good harvest from the sewing of cloth.” “Did you ever see a shooting of the moon?”

Is this what the witches mean when they sing, in the acting play of Macbeth,

“We fly by night?”

If they “shoot the moon,” they are shooting stars.

There is a mode of using the indefinite article a before a participle, for which there is no occasion, as it does not convert the participle into a substantive, and makes no alteration in the sense of what is said; in this case the article, therefore, is like a wart, a wen, or a knob at the end of the nose, neither useful nor ornamental: as, “Going out a shooting.” “Are you a coming to-morrow?” “I was a thinking about what Jem said.” “Here you are, a going of it, as usual!”

A liberty not unfrequently taken with the English Language, is the substitution of the perfect participle for the imperfect tense, and of the imperfect tense for the perfect participle: as, “He run like mad, with the great dog after him.” “Maria come and told us all about it.” “When I had wrote the Valentine, I sealed it with my thimble.” “He has rose to (be) a common-councilman.” “I was chose Lord Mayor.” “I’ve eat (or a eat) lots of venison in my time.” “I should have spoke if you hadn’t put in your oar.” “You were mistook.” “He sent her an affecting copy of verses, which was wrote with a Perryian pen.”

RULE XV.

Adverbs are generally placed in a sentence before adjectives, after verbs active or neuter, and frequently between the auxiliary and the verb: as, “He came, Sir, and he was most exceedingly drunk; he could hardly stand upon his legs; he made a very lame discourse; he spoke incoherently and ridiculously; and was impatiently heard by the whole assembly.” “He is fashionably dressed.” “She is conspicuously ugly.” “The eye of jealousy is proverbially sharp, and yet it is indisputably green.” “Britons may often be sold, but they will never be slaves.” “The French Marquis was a very charming man; he danced exquisitely and nimbly, and was greatly admired by all the ladies.”

Several adverbs have been coined in America of late; and some of them are very remarkable for a “particular” elegance: as, “I reckon you’re catawampously chawed up.”

In the example just given there is to be found, besides the new adverb, a word which, if not also new to the English student, is rendered so both by its orthography and pronunciation; namely, chawed. This term is no other than “chewed,” modified (as words, like living things, would seem to be), by transportation to a foreign country. “Chawed up” is a very strong expression, and is employed to signify the most complete state of discomfiture and defeat, when a man is as much crushed, mashed, and comminuted, morally speaking, as if he had literally and corporeally undergone the process of mastication. “Catawampously” is a concentration of “hopelessly,” “tremendously,” “thoroughly,” and “irrevocably;” so that “catawampously chawed up,” means, brought as nearly to a state of utter annihilation as anything consistently with the laws of nature can possibly be. For the metaphorical use of the word “chawed,” made by the Americans, three several reasons have been given: 1. Familiarity with the manner in which the alligator disposes of his victims. 2. The cannibalism of the Aborigines. 3. The delicate practice of chewing tobacco. Each of these is supported by numerous arguments, on the consideration of which it would be quite out of the question to enter in this place.

RULE XVI.

Two English negatives (like French lovers) destroy one another,—and become equivalent to an affirmative: as, “The question before the House was not an unimportant one;” that is, “it was an important one.” “His Lordship was free to confess that he did not undertake to say that he would not on some future occasion give a satisfactory answer to the right honourable gentleman.”

Thus, at one and the same time, we teach our readers Syntax and secretiveness.

It is probable that small boys are often unacquainted with this rule; for many of them, while undergoing personal chastisement, exclaim, for the purpose, as it would appear, of causing its duration to be shortened—“Oh pray, Sir, oh pray, Sir, oh pray, Sir! I won’t do so no more!”

RULE XVII.

Prepositions govern the objective case: as, “What did the butcher say of her?” “He said that she would never do for him; that she was too thin for a wife, and he was not fond of a spare rib.”

The delicate ear is much offended by any deviation from this rule: as, in a shocking and vulgar song which it was once our misfortune to hear:—

“There I found the faithless she
Frying sausages for he.”

As also in the conversation of rustics: as, “It’s all one to we.” “Come out of they ’taters!” “He went to the Parson’s with I.” “From he to they an’t more nor dree mile.”

We had occasion, in the Etymology, to remark on a certain misuse of the preposition, of. This, perhaps, is best explained by stating that of, in the instances cited, is made to usurp the government of cases which are already under a rightful jurisdiction: as, “What are you got a eating of?” “He had been a beating of his wife.”

RULE XVIII.

Conjunctions connect similar moods and tenses of verbs, and cases of nouns and pronouns: as, “A coat of arms suspended on a wall is like an executed traitor; it is hanged, drawn, and quartered.” “If you continue thus to drink brandy and water and to smoke cigars, you will be like Boreas the North wind, who takes ‘cold without’ wherever he goes, and always ‘blows a cloud’ when it comes in his way.” “Do you think there is any thing between him and her?” “Yes; he and she are engaged ones.”

Note.—To ask whether there is any thing between two persons of opposite sexes, is one way of inquiring whether they are in love with each other. It is not, however, in our opinion, a very happy phrase, inasmuch as whatever intervenes between a couple of fond hearts, must tend to prevent them from coming together. Pyramus and Thisbe, as Ovid informs us, had more between them than they liked—a conjunction disjunctive in the shape of a wall. And by the bye, now that we are speaking of Pyramus and Thisbe, we may as well expend a word or two on a matter which, though of much interest, has never yet been noticed by the learned. Pyramus and Thisbe, it is well known, used to kiss each other through a hole in the wall which separated them. Now we have always been puzzled to imagine how they managed it. We are told by the Poet that they lived—

“Ubi dicitur altam
Coctilibus muris cinxisse Semiramis urbem”—

that is to say, where Semiramis is said to have surrounded a lofty city—not with cock-tail mice, as Mr. Canning facetiously translated “Coctilibus muris,”—but with brick walls. The wall which separated two adjoining houses must have been at least a brick thick; and although it be possible, “with Love’s light wings” to “o’erperch” an exceedingly high wall, it occurs to us that it would be no easy thing for Love’s long lips, let them be as long as you will, to reach through a moderately thick one. We do not know exactly what was the breadth of an Assyrian brick, but supposing it to have been three inches, an inch and a half of lip would have been required on the part of either lover for a kiss which could barely be sworn by;—a sort of presentation salute;—but for one worth giving or taking, we must allow an additional half inch of mouth to the gentleman. After all, their noses must have been so much in the way, that to make the operation at all feasible, either these features must have been particularly flat, or the aperture a very large one; whereas it is well known to have been merely a chink. Common observation on the part of their respective parents would have detected such a gap, and common prudence would have stopped it up. How, then, are we to reconcile Ovid’s story with truth? Now, remember, reader, what has been said about noses and lips. Our deliberate opinion is that Pyramus and Thisbe were a couple of negroes. We shall be told that it is one utterly irreconcileable with the description of them given in the Metamorphoses. No matter—

“The lunatic, the lover, and the poet,
Are of imagination all compact.”

And considering that the lover—

“Sees Helen’s beauty in a brow of Egypt,”

we do not see why Abyssinian charms should not be transformed by a poet into those of Assyria. And so, having proved (to our own satisfaction at least) that the beautiful Thisbe was a Hottentot Venus, we will resume the consideration of conjunctions.

RULE XIX.

Some conjunctions govern the indicative; some the subjunctive mood. In general, it is right to use the subjunctive, when contingency or doubt is implied: as, “If I were to say that the moon is made of green cheese.” “If I were a wiseacre.” “If I were a Wiltshire-man.” “A lady, unless she be toasted, is never drunk.”

And when she is toasted, those who are drunk are generally the gentlemen.

“The Ladies!”

Those conjunctions which have a positive and absolute signification, require the indicative mood: as, “He who fasts may be compared to a horse: for as the animal eats not a bit, so neither does the man partake of a morsel.” “The rustic is deluded by false hopes, for his daily food is gammon.”

Every philosopher has his weak points, and in the Sylva Sylvarum may be found some gammon of Bacon.

RULE XX.

When a comparison is made between two or more things, the latter noun or pronoun is not governed by the conjunction than or as, but agrees with the verb, or is governed by the verb or preposition, expressed or understood: as, “The French are a lighter people than we,” (that is “than we are,”) “and yet we are not so dark as they,” that is, “as they are.” “I should think that they admire me more than them,” that is, “than they admire them.” “It is a shame, Martha! you were thinking more of that young officer than me,” that is, “of me.”

Sufficient attention is not always paid, in discourse, to this rule. Thus, a schoolboy may be often heard to exclaim, “What did you hit me for, you great fool? you’re bigger than me. Hit some one of your own size!” “Not fling farther than him? just can’t I, that’s all!” “You and I have got more marbles than them.”

RULE XXI.

An ellipsis, or omission of certain words, is frequently allowed, for the sake of avoiding disagreeable repetitions, and of expressing our ideas in few words. Instead of saying “She was a little woman, she was a round woman, and she was an old woman,” we say, making use of the figure Ellipsis, “She was a little, round, and old woman.”

When, however, the omission of words is productive of obscurity, weakens the sentence, or involves a violation of some grammatical principle, the ellipsis must not be used. It is improper to say “Puddings fill who fill them;” we should supply the word those. “A beautiful leg of mutton and turnips” is not good language: those who would deserve what they are talking about ought to say, “A beautiful leg of mutton and fine turnips.”

In common discourse, in which the meaning can be eked out by gestures, signs, and inarticulate sounds variously modified, the ellipsis is much more liberally and more extensively employed than in written composition. “May I have the pleasure of—hum? ha?” may constitute an invitation to take wine. “I shall be quite—a—a—” may serve as an answer in the affirmative. “So then, you see he was—eh!—you see——,” is perhaps an intimation that a man has been hanged. “Well, of all the—I never!” is often tantamount to three times as many words expressive of surprise, approbation, or disapprobation, according to the tone in which it is uttered. “Will you?—ah!—will you?—ah!—ah!—ah!” will do either for “Will you be so impertinent, you scoundrel? will you dare to do so another time?” or, “Will you, dearest, loveliest, most adorable of your sex, will you consent to make me happy; will you be mine? speak! answer, I entreat you! One word from those sweet lips will make me the most fortunate man in existence!”

There is, however, a kind of ellipsis which those who indulge in that style of epistolary writing, wherein sentiments of a tender nature are conveyed, will do well to avoid with the greatest care. The ellipsis alluded to, is that of the first person singular of the personal pronoun, as instanced in the following model of a billet-doux:—