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ENGLISH  ACCIDENCE  AND  SYNTAX 

1 


A  HANDBOOK  OF 
PRESENT-DAY  ENGLISH 


BY 


E,  KRUISINGA 


PART  II 


ENGLISH  ACCIDENCE  AND  SYNTAX 
1 


Our  most  refined  theories,  our  most 
elaborate  descriptions  are  but  crude  and 
barbarous  simplifications  of  a  reality  that 
is,  in  every  smallest  sample,  infinitely 
complex.  Aldous  Huxley. 


FIFTH  EDITION 


P.  NOORDHOFF     -     1931     ^    GRONINGEN 


4^  iT 


First  published  in   ipii.     Second  Edition  in   191  J.      Third  Edition  in   1922. 
Fourth  Edition  (in  three  volumes)  in   ip2j.     Fifth  Edition  in   1931. 


PREFACE  TO  THE  THIRD  EDITION 


When  the  first  edition  of  this  book  was  pubhshed,  I  intended 
to  add  a  volume  treating  of  the  phenomena  in  Modern 
Enghsh  that  may  be  called  idiomatic  rather  than  grammatical. 
It  has  been  found,  however,  that  a  book  on  this  subject,  if 
scientific,  would  result  in  a  series  of  isolated  studies  on  the 
remnants  of  earlier  systems  of  grammar.  What  is  useful  from 
a  practical  point  of  view  may  best  be  treated  by  reference 
to  the  native  language  of  the  student,  as  may  be  seen  from 
such  a  book  as  Kriiger's  Schwierigkeiten,  or  my  own  smaller 
Grammar  and  Idiom. 

The  present  volume  aims  at  giving  a  scientific  description 
of  the  structure  of  Present  English.  For  the  reason  given  in 
the  preface  to  the  preceding  volume,  on  English  Sounds,  no 
historical  treatment  has  been  attempted.  It  seems  to  the 
author  that  students  of  language  have  cause  to  apply  to 
themselves  the  warning  which  Professor  Dicey  addressed  to 
students  of  law  in  the  Preface  to  his  Lectures  on  the  Law  of 
the  Constitution,  when  he  advised  them  "to  consider  whether 
the  habit  of  looking  too  exclusively  at  the  steps  by  which 
the  constitution  has  been  developed  does  not  prevent  students 
from  paying  sufficient  attention  to  the  law  of  the  constitution 
as  it  now  actually  exists." 

Although  the  book  has  remained  substantially  unchanged, 
its  size  has  increased  considerably.  In  the  second  edition  a 
new  chapter,  on  Sentence-Structure,  was  added;  also  some 
excursus,  in  which  related  constructions  were  compared.  This 
method  has  been  applied  more  frequently  in  the  present  edition, 


VI  PREFACE  TO   THE   THIRD   EDITION 

which  is  further  enlarged  by  a  fuller  treatment  of  Prepositions, 
The  chapter  on  Sentence- Structure  has  been  largely  re-written, 
and  nearly  all  the  other  chapters  have  been  considerably 
altered. 

In  deference  to  the  wish  expressed  by  some  reviewers  I  have 
generally  given  the  sources  of  my  quotations.  I  have  not  in- 
variably been  able  to  do  so,  however.  In  most  of  such  cases 
it  is  quite  evident  that  the  sentence  has  been  taken  from  a 
newspaper,  although  the  reference  has  been  lost;  and,  after 
all,  it  is  of  Httle  importance,  for  nobody  will  surely  want  to 
verify  these,  although  no  doubt  it  may  make  a  difference 
whether  a  passage  is  quoted  from  the  Athenaeum  ox  \\\&  Daily 
Mail.  Other  sentences,  especially  those  illustrating  spoken 
English,  have  been  noted  down  as  they  were  heard  from 
English  speakers ;  apart  from  other  objections  it  would  naturally 
be  useless  to  give  the  names  of  the  speakers.  The  conviction 
that  these  quotations  represent  good  English  must  proceed 
from  the  confidence  the  reader  has  in  the  judgment  of  the 
writer,  or  from  his  own  knowledge. 

Even  in  the  quotations  from  printed  sources  the  learner 
must  largely  rely  on  the  writer's  knowledge  of  living  English, 
and  his  ability  to  distinguish  between  what  is  literary  and 
colloquial,  serious  or  jocular,  standard  English  or  vulgar 
English.  I  trust,  however,  that  no  competent  critic  will  find 
any  quotations  that  are  seriously  misinterpreted,  although 
differences  of  opinion  must  naturally  arise  when  it  comes  to 
deciding  whether  a  construction  is  permissible  in  literary 
English  or  is  only  allowed  in  familiar  conversation. 

So  many  students  of  Modern  English  grammar,  both  friends 
and  strangers,  have  shown  their  interest  in  the  work,  sug- 
gesting corrections,  pointing  out  difficulties  that  had  been 
overlooked,  or  supplying  useful  quotations,  that  it  would  be 
impossible  to  mention  them  all  by  name.  But  they  may 
be    assured    that    I    am    grateful    for   their  cooperation.    My 


PREFACE   TO   THE   THIRD   EDITION  VII 

indebtedness  to  Mr.  J.  H.  Schutt,  however,  is  too  great  to 
be  included  in  this  general  acknowledgement.  Soon  after  the 
first  few  sheets  had  been  printed  he  undertook  to  read  the 
proofs,  and  there  is  hardly  a  sheet  but  has  been  improved 
and  added  to  by  his  suggestions. 

Amersfoort,  January   1922.  E.  K, 


PREFACE  TO  THE  FIFTH  EDITION 


The  short  time  that  elapsed  between  the  third  and  fourth 
editions  of  this  work  naturally  prevented  great  changes  in 
1925.  Since  the  third  edition  appeared,  however,  nine  years 
ago,  I  have  become  more  and  more  convinced  that  progress 
in  the  study  of  living  English  requires  a  deliberate  if 
prudent  attempt  to  free  English  syntax  from  views  that 
have  been  introduced  by  a  servile  imitation  of  traditional 
Indo-Germanic  grammar.  Too  many  traces,  no  doubt,  will 
be  found  in  this  book,  but  a  slow  evolution  along  the  line 
indicated  may  produce  more  lasting  progress  than  revolutionary 
changes  to  which  students  have  not  had  time  to  adapt 
their  minds. 

The  arrangement  by  which  the 'parts  of  speech' are  treated 
first  can  easily  be  shown  to  be  illogical  and  arbitrary;  but 
it  has  one  great  advantage :  it  prevents  the  reader  of  the 
chapters  on  word-groups  in  the  part  dealing  with  syntax  in 
the  narrower  sense  of  the  term  from  being  overwhelmed  by 
the  details,  so  that  he  runs  less  risk  of  failing  to  see  the 
wood  for  the  trees.  The  first  two  volumes  may  thus  be 
looked  upon  as  introductory  to  the  third,  and  if  any  one 
should  choose  to  study  the  third  volume  first,  he  may  consider 
the  first  two  its  supplement. 

The  new  edition  does  not  supply  much  new  material;  it 
rather  differs  from  the  fourth  edition  in  the  systematic  attempt 
that  is  now  made  to  interpret  as  well  as  to  describe  the 
constructions  of  living  Standard  English.  For  this  reason 
comparison    with    other    languages,    whether    related    or  not. 


PREFACE  TO   THE   FIFTH   EDITION  IX 

has  been  freely  resorted  to.  As  in  former  editions  no  history 
of  syntax  has  been  attempted:  this  would  require  a  separate 
book,  for  it  would  deal  with  a  different  subject.  The  old  idea 
that  the  history  of  language  is  the  alpha  and  omega  ot 
language-study,  which  has  never  prevailed  in  the  study  of 
syntax  as  it  has  for  a  considerable  time  in  the  study  of 
forms,  and  especially  of  sounds,  may  now  be  considered  to 
be  completely  exploded. 

The  present  book  is  strictly  limited  to  Standard  British 
English;  but  this  type  of  English  is  no  more  uniform  than 
the  standard  language  of  any  other  civilized  community.  It 
has  been  necessary,  consequently,  to  distinguish  various  strata 
in  Standard  English  itself;  the  form  that  has  been  made  the 
centre  of  the  treatment  here  attempted  may  be  called  Common 
English^  as  has  been  done  by  Dr.  Murray  in  the  introduction 
to  the  New  English  Dictionary.  Variations  have  been  noted 
as  spoken  English,  familiar  English,  occasionally  vulgar 
English.  The  peculiarities,  however,  that  distinguish  literary 
usage  from  the  common  Standard  have  seemed  too  important 
to  be  referred  to  occasionally  in  the  midst  of  the  con- 
structions that  are  common  to  all  varieties.  For  this  reason 
the  distinctly  literary  constructions  have  been  reserved  for 
a  special  chapter  at  the  end  of  volume  2.  Occasionally  a 
detail  of  literary  English  has  been  treated  in  the  chapters 
on  common  English,  and  it  need  hardly  be  observed  that 
the  separation  of  the  two  is  sometimes  necessarily  arbitrary. 
For  of  literary  English  it  may  be  said,  with  more  truth  than 
of  the  literary  forms  of  the  standard  language  in  some  European 
communities,  that  it  is  the  natural  growth  of  a  form  of  language 
in  accordance  with  its  peculiar  needs,  without  much  inter- 
ference by  arbitrary  theorists.  The  result  has  been  that 
literary  English  is  a  perfectly  natural  form  of  English,  without 
any  of  the  affectations  that  disfigure  some  other  literary 
languages.  In  the  chapter  on  literary  English  I  have  naturally 


X  PREFACE   TO   THE   FIFTH   EDITION 

been  obliged  to  distinguish  now  and  then  between  the  language 
of  prose  and  that  of  poetry,  and  in  the  latter  between  what 
is  common  in  poetry  and  what  may  truly  be  called  archaic. 

As  to  the  quotations  some  may  think  there  are  too  many. 
Of  course,  the  beginner  will  be  wise  in  studying  one  or  two 
examples  only,  for  fear  of  being  overwhelmed  by  them  i). 
But  the  advanced  reader  who  consults,  rather  than  reads,  this 
book,  will  welcome  the  quotations,  I  hope.  It  will  usually 
be  found  that  the  sentences  quoted,  though  illustrating  the  same 
phenomenon,  differ  in  more  or  less  important  details,  and  as 
the  progress  of  our  knowledge  of  the  structure  of  living 
English  requires  a  number  of  detailed  studies  of  single 
constructions,  as  well  as  of  the  syntax  as  a  whole  of  individual 
persons,  the  quotations  here  offered  may  serve  as  a  starting- 
point  for  such  studies.  The  discovery  of  a  batch  of  old 
notes  has  enabled  me  to  supply  a  number  of  references  that 
I  had  believed  to  be  lost;  the  result  is  that  practically  all 
the  sentences  quoted  can  be  verified,  with  the  exception  of 
a  small  number  that  have  been  collected  from  conversations 
with  educated  speakers. 

In  conclusion  I  have  a  pleasant  duty  to  perform :  to  thank 
the  numerous  students  of  English,  both  in  this  country  and 
abroad,  who  have  contributed  suggestions,  corrections,  and 
additional  quotations.  Among  them  I  can  only  mention  a 
few  by  name :  my  old  friend,  the  phonetician  Eijkman,  who 
contributed  a  great  number  of  quotations  as  well  as  criticism 
in  the  proof  stage  of  the  work ;  Professor  van  der  Gaaf,  who 
wrote  an  article  of  sixteen  pages  in  Englische  Studien,  which 
has  almost  bodily  been  transferred  to  this  book ;  Professor 
Grattan,  who  sent  me  a  long  letter,  really  an  article  in 
manuscript,    with    notes    on   the  fourth  edition  of  the  book; 


1)  For  the  convenience  of  these  readers  less  important  details  have  been 
printed  in  a  shghtly  smaller  type. 


PREFACE   TO   THE   FIFTH   EDITION  XI 

and  finally  the  many  reviewers  who  have  given  more  praise 
to  the  book  than  I  think  it  deserves,  because  I  know  too 
well  how  much  remains  to  be  done.  The  bibliography  contains 
a  list  of  those  books  only  that  have  been  found  directly 
useful  in  the  writing  of  this  work.  A  full  list  of  studies  on 
English  grammar  can  easily  be  found  elsewhere.  One  source 
of  help  remains  to  be  mentioned :  the  students  of  the  School 
voor  Taal-  en  Letterkimde  who  attended  the  lectures  on  the 
Making  of  Modern  English  Syntax  and  the  lessons  on  the 
practical  study  of  living  English.  Their  criticism,  usually  in 
the  form  of  questions,  has  been  of  real  use,  and  their  interest 
in  the  subject  has  been  a  great  encouragement. 

The  Hague,  29  May   193 1.  E.  K. 


CONTENTS 


The  Parts  of  Speech 

Page 

Verbs 3 — 506 

FORMS 3—21 

Endings  of  the  regular  verb:  [id,  -d,  -t; 
iz,  -z,   -s]. 

Irregular  verbs:  verbs  with  two  forms; 
with  three  forms;  invariable  verbs;  anom- 
alous verbs ;  suppletive  systems. 

USE  OF  THE  FORMS 21— 28Q 

The   Verbal    [id]    as    a    Preterite    .     .     .       21 —  29 

The    past   tense :    narrative    past    tense. 
Iterative     past     tense.      The    preterite    of 
modesty.    The  irrealis. 
The    Verbal    [id]   as    a   Participle.     .     .       29 —  55 

The  participle  as  a  verbal  adjective.  The 
participle  in  verbal  groups.  Compound 
Participles.  Adjectives  as  Occasional  Part- 
iciples. Participles  dissociated  from  their 
verbal  system. 
The   Verbal   Ing 55 — 128 

The  Ing  as  a  member  of  a  complete 
verbal  system.  As  a  prepositional  adjunct. 
As  a  plain  adjunct.  As  an  object.  As  a 
free  adjunct.  Prepositional  and  plain  adjuncts 
compared.  Attributive  ing.  Adverb  and 
attributive  ing  compared  with  free  ing.  The 
ing  as  a  subject.  The  ing  as  a  nominal 
predicate. 

The  subject  of  the  ing.  Object  with  ing. 
Subject  with  ing:  Indefinite  case  with  ing; 


CONTENTS  XIII 

Page 

possessive  with  ing;  genitive  with  ing; 
oblique  with  ing;  nominative  with  ing. 
Retrospect. 

The  complex  ing:  the  passive  ing;  the 
perfect  ing;  the  perfect  passive  ing. 

Meaning  of  the  complete  verbal  ing.  " 

Occasional  ings. 

Compound  ings. 
The    Verbal    [iz] 128—138 

As  a  Present  Tense:  the  neutral  present; 
the    iterative    present;    the    actual  present; 
the  present-perfect;  the  future  present;  the 
historical  present. 
The   Plain    Verb    Stem 138—157 

The  Imperative  Stem.  The  Exclamative 
Stem. 

The    Non-predicative   Stem :  with  auxil- 
iaries; object  with  plain  stem. 
The    Verb    Stem    with    /<? 157 — 220 

Exclamative  Stem  with  to. 

The  Stem  with  to  as  an  adjunct.  Adverb 
adjunct.  Attributive  adjunct.  Complement- 
ary adjunct.  Connecting  Words.  In  free 
adjuncts. 

Object  with  Stem:  verbs  of  will;  ana- 
logical extensions:  forbid,  leave,  trust;  verbs 
of  wish;  analogical  extensions:  to  expect, 
to  thank. 

Prepositional  Object  with  Stem.  Various 
Prepositions.  The  Construction  with  for\ 
With  Nouns  and  Adjectives.  With  Verbs. 
Connecting  Words. 

The  /(?r-construction  as  an  independent 
group:  as  a  subject;  as  a  predicate.  Use 
of  for. 

Object  with  Predicative  Stem.  With  verbs 
of  sensation  and  perception.  With  the  verba 
sentiendi  et  declarandi. 

The  Participle  with  Stem  with  to. 


XIV 


CONTENTS 


Page 

The  Stem  with  to  as  a  Subject  and  as 
a  Predicate. 

Aspect 221—237 

Meaning  of  aspect.  Grammatical  distinct- 
ions of  Aspect  in  various  languages.  Char- 
acter of  the  Verb.  Character  and  Aspect 
compared.  Aspect  of  the  ing. 

Verbals    and    Clauses 237 — 289 

The  Plain  Stem  and  the  Stem  with  to     .     .     238 — 248 
Exclamative    use.     Object     with    Stem. 
Coordination    of  Stems.     Time    of  Action. 
Summary. 

The  Plain  Stem  and  the  Ing 248 — 251 

The  Stem  with  to  and  the  Ing 251 — 278 

Stem    with    to    only.     Verbal    ing  only. 
Both  Stem  and  Ing  Used :  As  Adjuncts  to 
Verbs  or  as  Objects;  As  Adjuncts  to  Nouns 
and  Adjectives;  As  Subjects  and  Predicates. 
Verbals  and  Other  Verbal  Words    ....     278 — 282 
Verbals  and  Subordinate  Clauses      ....     283 — 289 
Plain  Stem  and  Subordinate  Clauses.  Stem 
with  to  and  Subordinate  Clauses. 

AUXILIARIES 289—504 

The  term  auxiliaries.  Classification  of 
auxiliaries.  Suspended  to.  Repetition  of 
Auxiliaries:  Confirmative  Questions;  Sym- 
pathetic Questions;  Appended  Statements; 
Confirmative  Statements;  Denials;  Answers 
to  Disjunctive  Questions;  New  Subject. 

To  Be loi—ne 

To  Be  as  a  Verb  of  full  meaning;  To  Be 
in  Verbal  Groups. 

The  Passive.     .     .     .     , 304 — 340 

The  predicative  passive.  The  passive  of 
occurrence  and  of  action.  Verbs  with  one 
plain  object.  Verbs  with  a  prepositional 
object.     Verbs    with    two    objects.     Verbs 


CONTENTS  XV 

Page 

with  a  plain  object  and  a  prepositional 
adjunct.  Verbs  with  an  object  and  a  pre- 
dicative adjunct.  Verbs  with  an  object  and 
ing  or  with  an  object  and  stem  with  to. 
Verbs  with  a  complementary  stem  or  with 
an  object  clause. 

The  non-predicative  passive.  The  parti- 
ciple with  to  be  and  the  simple  stem  with 
to.  The  participle  with  to  be  and  without 
compared. 

The  Double  Passive. 

Use  of  the  Passive. 

Summary. 

The  Progressive 340 — ^6"] 

The  Predicative  Progressive.  The  Non- 
predicative  Progressive.  Special  Meanings 
of  the  Progressive.  Verbs  not  used  in  the 
Progressive.  Progressive  and  Non-pro- 
gressive  Forms  Compared. 

To  Be  To ^^7—n^ 

Type  he  is  to  blame.  Type  we  are  to 
be  dow?i  before  nine. 

To  Have 376—413 

To  have  as  a  verb  of  full  meaning.  To 
have  to.  To  have  in  verbal  groups :  To  have 
with  object  and  plain  stem.  To  have  with 
object  and  ing.  To  have  with  object  and 
participle.  The  Perfect :  resultative,  con- 
tinuative,  iterative,  declaratory.  Past  Per- 
fect. Modal  Preterite  Perfect.  Complex 
perfect  groups.  Non-predicative  Perfect. 
Character  of  the  Group-perfect,  Perfect- 
Present.  Perfect  and  to  have  with  the 
object  and  participle  Compared.  Perfect 
and  Present.  Perfect  and  Preterite.  Past 
Perfect  and  Preterite. 

To  have  and  to  be  in  Verbal  Groups 
Compared. 

Kruisinga,  Handbook  II.  Accidence  and  Syntax.  1.  U 


XVI  CONTENTS 

Page 

To  Do 413—430 

To  Do  as  a  Verb  of  full  meaning.  .Vi- 
carious Do.  Auxiliary  Do:  Emphatic  Do. 
Even  Do.  Weak  Do. 

Uses  of  Auxiliary  Do  Compared.  Vicarious 
and  Auxiliary  Do  Compared.  Do  with 
Auxiliaries:  to  be;  to  have;  have  got;  to  dare 
and  to  need;  to  let;  ought;  used.  Emphatic 
can,  may,  must,  shall,  and  will. 

To  Dare 430—433 

As  a  verb  of  full  meaning.  As  a  member 
of  a  verbal  group. 

To  Need 433—435 

As  a  verb  of  full  meaning.  As  a  member 
of  a  verbal  group. 

To  Let 435—438 

In  mixed  noun-and-verb  groups.  Shifting 
of  word-order.  To  let  as  a  verb  of  full 
meaning.  To  let  as  an  auxiliary  of  ex- 
hortation.    Modal  Use. 

Ought 438—439 

As  a  Present.     As  a  Preterite 

Used 439 — 441 

With  verbs  of  action  and  occurrence. 
With  verbs  of  condition. 

Can    and    Could 441 — 448 

Restriction  to  two  forms  and  its  causes. 
Can  as  a  neutral  present  and  as  an  actual 
present  to  express  ability.  As  a  neutral 
present  to  express  the  effect  of  a  natural 
law.  Could  as  a  past  tense  and  as  a  modal 
preterite  expressing  the  same  meanings. 

Ca7i  denoting  possibility.     Modal  Could. 
Can,  Could,  and   To  Be  Able. 


CONTENTS  ■  XVir 


May    and    Might 448—458 

The  present  may  expressing  permission, 
uncertainty,  possibiUty.  Modal  inip;]Lt;  might 
as  a  past  tense.  May  and  might  in  sub- 
ordinate clauses. 

May  and  Might  Compared  with  Related 
Constructions:  With  to  be  allowed.  With 
perhaps.     With  can. 

Must 458 — 462 

Must    as    a    present    tense.     As    a    past 
tense.     As  a  modal  preterite.     Must  not. 
Must  not  and  May  not. 

ShallandShould 463 — 478 

Shall  with  weak  stress  in  statements  and 
in  questions.  Strong-stressed  shall  in  the 
first  person.  Future  shall',  in  statements; 
in  questions;  in  the  inferential  future. 

Should  expressing  obligation.  In  rhe- 
torical questions.  Shall  in  rhetorical  quest- 
ions in  literary  English.  Should  expressing 
probability,  ^/^i??//^^  expressing  the  speaker's 
will.  Should  in  subordinate  clauses;  with 
main  clauses  expressing  will  or  wish ;  in 
adverb  clauses  of  purpose;  in  relative 
clauses;  in  adverb  clauses  of  time,  con- 
dition and  concession;  in  clauses  expressing 
probability;  in  clauses  expressing  a  per- 
sonal opinion  or  feeling.  Compared  with 
the  construction  without  Should. 
Have,  Must,  Ought,  and  Shall  Compared.  .  478 — 480 
Should  and  Might  in  Subordinate  Clauses     .     480 — 481 

WillandWould      .     .     . 481 — 499 

Will  and  would  expressing  the  will  of 
the  subject,  and  of  the  person  spoken  to. 
Weak-stressed  will  and  would  expressing 
intention.  Modal  Use  of  will  and  would. 
Will  and  would  expressing  repetition.  Fu- 
ture will.    Would  in  hypothetical  statements. 


XVIII  CONTENTS 

Page 

Shall  and  Will  Compared 491 — 499 

Future  shall  2ind  will.  Present  and  Future. 
The   inferential  future.  Should  and    Would. 

Can,    Will,    and    Used 499 — 502 

Retrospect    on    the   Auxiliaries    .     .     .  502 — 504 

SUMMARY 505—506 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 


Grammar 


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strated Pocket  Classics. 

Sichel,  Edith,  The  Life  and  Let- 
ters of  Alfred  Ainger.  1906. 

Sidgwick,  Mrs.,  The  Severins. 
Methuen's    Shilling    Library, 

Sinister  Street,  see  Compton 
Mackenzie. 


Snaith,  J.  C,  The  Principal 
Girl,  Tauchnitz.    19 12. 

Soames,  L.,  Introduction  to  the 
Study  of  Phonetics.   1891. 

Somervell,  D.  C,  A  History 
of  England,  Benn's  Sixpenny 
Series  no.    i. 

Spectator. 

Spence,  Dean,  A  History  of 
the  English  Church,  1901, 
Temple  Primers. 

Standard. 

Stephen,  Leslie,  George  Eliot, 
London.  English  Men  of  Let- 
ters.   1902. 

,    English    Literature    and 

Society  in  the  Eighteenth 
Century.  1910.  Readers'  Li- 
brary. 

,  The  English  Utilitarians, 

1900. 

Stephen  Compton,  see  Pat- 
terson. 

Stevenson,  R.  L.,  Virginibus 
Puerisque. 

,  The  Strange  Case  of  Dr. 

Jekyll  and  Mr.  Hyde,  ed. 
Schutt.  Utrecht.  1923.  (ist 
ed.    1885). 

,  Travels   with  a  Donkey. 

1908. 

Strachey,  Lytton,  Eminent  Vic- 
torians.   1918. 

Stubbs,  W.,  Lectures  on  Early 
English  History,  ed.  A.  Has- 
sall.    1906. 

Sweet,  H.,  Elementarbuch  des 
gesprochenen  Englisch.  3e 
aufl.  Oxford.   1904. 

,     A    Primer    of    Spoken 

English.  Oxford.    1895. 


XXVIII 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 


Sweet,  A  Primer  of  Phonetics. 

Oxford.   1906. 
,  A     History    of    English 

Sounds.  Oxford   1888. 
Swinburne,      A.      C,     Charles 

Dickens.    1913. 
Synge,  M.  B.,  A  Short  History 

of   Social    Life    in  England. 

1918. 
Teacher's  World. 
Teaching      of     English,      The. 

English      Assoc.      Pamphlet 

no.  43.   1918. 
Temple  Thurston,  E.,  The  City 

of  Beautiful  Nonsense.  19 18. 
Times    W.    =    Times    Weekly 

edition. 
Times  Ed.  S.  =  Times,  Educa- 
tional Supplement. 
Times  Lit.  =  Times,   Literary 

Supplement. 
TroUope,  A.,  Barchester  Towers. 

Everyman's  Library. 
,  The  Warden.  Everyman's 

Library. 
,    The   Last   Chronicle    of 

Barset.  Everyman's  Library. 
,      The      Three      Clerks. 

World's  Classics. 
,  Dr.  Thorne.  Everyman's 

Library. 
,     Dr.     Wortle's     School. 

Tauchnitz. 

,  The  Prime  Minister. 

Twain,   Mark,  The  Prince   and 

the  Pauper.  Tauchnitz. 
Vachell,  H.,  Quinneys'.  Tauch- 
nitz.  1914. 
,  The  Pinch  of  Prosperity. 

Wayfarers'  Library. 


Vachell,  H.,  Spragge's  Canyon. 
Colard.  Paris.    191 5. 

,  Brothers.  Tauchnitz.  1906. 

Verney,  F.  P.,  Memoirs  of  the 
Verney  Family.  1892  and 
1894. 

Verrall,  A.  W.,  Lectures  on 
Dryden.  Cambridge.   19 14. 

Vinogradofif,  P.,  Common  Sense 
in  Law.  Home  Univ.  Libr. 
191.. 

Wakeman,  H.  O:,  An  Intro- 
duction to  the  History  of 
the  Church  of  England.  1914. 

Walker,  H.,  Literature  of  the 
Victorian  Era.   1910. 

Wallace,  C.  W.,  The  Evolution 
of  the  English  Drama  up  to 
Shakespeare.    191 2. 

Walpole,  H.,  The  Green  Mirror. 
1918. 

,   Fortitude. 

Ward,    A.  W.,  Dickens.   1909. 

Washington  Irving,  The  Sketch- 
Book.  1902.  Cassell's  Standard 
Library. 

Waugh,  Alec,  The  Loom  of 
Youth.   1917. 

Webb,  S.  and  B.,  English  Local 
Government  from  the  Revo- 
lution to  the  Municipal  Cor- 
poration Act.  Volume.  I.  1906, 

Wells,  H.  G.,  The  First  Men 
in  the  Moon.  Nelson's  Seven- 
penny  Series. 

,     Tono-Bungay.     English 

Review. 

,  The  Country  of  the  Blind 

and  Other  Stories. 

,    The   Wife   of  Sir  Isaac 

Harman.   1914. 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 


XXIX 


Wells,  H.  G.,  Joan  and  Peter. 

1918. 

,  What  is  Coming?    19 16. 

,  The    Dream.    Tauchnitz. 

1924. 
Westlake,  H.  F.,  Westminster. 

1919. 
Westminster    School,    see   Sar- 

geaunt. 
Weyman,    S.,    The  Red  Robe, 
Wharton,     Edith,    The    Flouse 

of   Mirth.    191 2.  Macmillan's 

Sevenpenny  Series. 
Whibley,  C,  Thackeray.  Edin- 
burgh,  1903. 
White,    P.,    Mr.    John   Strood. 

1906. 


Wilcox,  W.  P.,  Wings  of  Desire. 

1912. 
Williams,   Harold,  Modern  En- 
glish Writers.    191 8. 
Wyld,  H.   C,  The  Place  of  the 

Mother    Tongue   in  National 

Education.    1906. 
,  The  Historical  Study  of 

the  Mother  Tongue.    19.., 
,  The  Teaching  of  Reading. 

1908. 
,     A     Short     History     of 

English.    19 14. 
Yeats,  W.  B,,  Collected  Works. 

Stratford.    1908. 
York,  Described  by  G.  Benson. 

Pictured    by    E.    W.   Hasle- 

hust.    1911. 


PHONETIC  SYMBOLS 


ENGLISH  VOWELS  AND  DIPHTHONGS 

i     in 

bit       beat 

u 

in 

fud        food 

ai    MJ  \Naif 

wife 

I     in 

I  nit       knit 
f  haspi     happy 

u 

in 

i gud      good 
(  VEelju    value 

au  in  hau3 
01    in  boi 

house 
hoy 

e  in 

bred      bread 

A 

in 

nAt       nut 

ei    w  neim 

name 

£e  in 

m^t     mat 

D 

in 

hot        hot 

ou  in  roud 

road 

3    in 

bsd       bird 

0 

in 

lo           law 

18    in  hi8(r) 

hear 

a   in 

fam     farm 

I  ent8(;r)  enter 

69    in  ke9(r) 

care 

9 

171 

( 9gou     ago 

ue  in  pu8(r) 

poor 

09    in  dro9(r)  drawer 

VOWELLIKE 

CONSONANTS 

li    in 

sDij     song 

/ 

3 

in 
in 

/eiv         shave 
ple39(r)  pleasure 

J)  in  |)0t 
8  in  Souz 

thought 
those 

CORRIGENDA 


P. 

26, 

1.     I 

fr.  top. 

ch 

ange 

cierk  into  clerk. 

p. 

27, 

1-   13 

„     >,    J 

» 

27  into  29. 

p. 

39, 

1.  21 

„     ,,    J 

,, 

to  pies  into  topics. 

p. 

40, 

note 

, 

,, 

56  into  66. 

p. 

55, 

note, 

1.    I, 

,, 

as  into  tis. 

p. 

59, 

cancel  note. 

p. 

63, 

cancel  last  line. 

p. 

64, 

cancel  11.    i,   2  & 

3- 

p. 

77, 

1.     9 

fr.  bottom. 

1) 

„ 

bach  into  back. 

p. 

79, 

1.    10 

,,         ,,       , 

„ 

neither  . .  nor  into  either . .  or. 

p. 

97, 

1-      3 

,;             ,,          , 

„ 

adjiLitets  into  adjuncts. 

p. 

98, 

note 

I,    1.    2, 

„ 

doubts  into  no  doubt. 

p. 

106, 

1.    14 

fr.  bottom, 

„ 

121  a  into  121  c. 

p. 

133, 

1.     5 

„    top, 

„ 

solu  ion  into  solution. 

p. 

133, 

1.   21 

,,     ,,    J 

" 

leading  clause,  into  leading 
clause;  but  see  164  b. 

p. 

136, 

1.    15 

,,     „    J 

» 

21th  into  21st. 

p. 

138, 

1.     8 

,,     ,,    J 

„ 

states  a  merely  suppositional 
into  contains  a  recapitulation 
of  a. 

p. 

155, 

L     6 

„    bottom. 

„ 

coulnt  into  couldnt. 

p. 

157, 

cancel  11.  4,  5  &  6. 

p. 

196, 

1-    15 

fr.  bottom. 

„ 

were  into  mere. 

p. 

210, 

1.     9 

„    top, 

„ 

e7iwnerated,  to  be  into  enu- 
merated to  be. 

p. 

233, 

1.      I, 

,j 

form  into  forms. 

p. 

247, 

1.     8 

fr,  bottom, 

,, 

some  thing  into  sometJiing. 

p. 

254, 

1-    13 

„    top, 

„ 

361  into  362. 

p. 

268, 

note. 

1.  3, 

„ 

all  into  both. 

p. 

347, 

1.   10 

fr.  top. 

,, 

it  it  into  it  is. 

p. 

177, 

last  1 

ine, 

,, 

foloiving  into  following. 

p. 

404, 

1.     6 

fr.  top. 

,, 

of  child  into  of  a  child. 

p. 

406, 

1.     2 

I,     ,,    , 

,, 

nndifferefit  into   indifferent. 

p. 

415, 

§  60/ 

'.  The  last 

quotation    is    from    the    Academy; 

see 

§  94- 

p. 

418, 

note, 

1.   I, 

after  liim  add  of. 

p. 

451. 

The 

first  quotation 

of  671  is  from  Temple  Thurston, 

TJie  Antas;o7iists . 

p. 

457, 

1.   21 

fr.  top, 

ch 

ange 

648  into  658. 

p. 

496, 

note, 

1.  2, 

„ 

737  b  into  7B8  b. 

p. 

498, 

1.    I, 

„ 

firs  into  first. 

1)  The   notes    are    included    in    the    line-numbering;    the    running    titles 
are  not. 


THE  PARTS  OF  SPEECH 

1 


JiRUiSiNGA,  Handbook  II.  Accidence  and  Syntax.  1. 


VERBS 


FORMS 

1.  An  English  verb  generally  has  one  stem,  used  in 
various  functions,  and  three  forms  with  suffixes  that  are 
more  or  less  clearly  inflectional.     These  suffixes  are: 

(1)  [id,  d,  t];         (2)  [ii]];         (3)  [iz,  z,  s]. 

Two  of  these  suffixes  vary  according  to  the  phonetic 
character  of  the  final  sound  of  the  verb  stem. 

2.  The  first  of  the  suffixes  just  mentioned  is: 

(1)  [id]  when  the  stem  ends  in  [d,  t] : 

[end,  endid;  weit,  weitidl  end,  ended;  wait,  waited. 

(2)  [d]  when  the  stem  ends  in  a  voiced  sound  (not  d) : 
[kol,  kold;  baeg,  baegd;  stei,  steid;  ents,  entod] 
call,  called;  bag,  bagged;  stay,  stayed;  enter,  entered. 

(3)  [t]  when  the  stem  ends  in  a  breathed  sound  (not  /) : 
[stop,  stopt]  stop,  stopped. 

1.  On  the  phonetic  changes  words  undergo  when  final 
[d]  is  added,  see  English  Sounds  on  Glides  (chapters 
2  and  4). 

2,  On  the  loss  of  final  consonants  of  the  stem,  as  in 
[rs3r^t,  ast]  ranked,  asked,  see  English  Sounds,  on  Assim- 
ilation in  familiar  English  (ch.  4). 

3.  Two  groups  of  verbs  traditionally  have  a  form  in  -/ 
although  their    stem    ends  in  a  voiced  consonant.  The  first 


4  VERBS 

group  ends  in  a  vowellike,  the  second  in  -d  preceded  by 
a  vowellike  (including  the  vocalized  r). 

(1)  a.  dwell  dwelt     b.  burn         burnt 

smell  smelt  learn        learnt 

spell  spelt  pen  pent  'to  enclose 

spill  spilt 

spoil  spoilt 

All  these  verbs  are  also  found  with  the  regular  spel- 
lings {burned,  etc.).  In  some  (perhaps  in  all)  cases  the  pro- 
nunciation is  also  regular,  viz.  [-d];  [d]  is  certainly  used 
in  the  case  of  smell,  spell,  spill ;  burn,  learn  and  pen. 

But  these  pronunciations  are  generally  either  pedantic 
attempts  to  follow  the  spelling,  or  they  are  archaic.  Thus 
we  have  [spoild)  spoiled  when  the  verb  is  used  in  its  biblical 
sense  of  to  rob. 

To  pen,  as  a  converted  noun  meaning  'to  write',  is  always 
regular;  see  6.  The  form /^««(?^ 'enclosed'  is  also  pronounced 
[pend],  perhaps  as  a  converted  noun.  When  used  as  an 
adjective  it  is  most  frequently  [pent]. 

She  has  spoilt  her  children ;  she  never  refused  them 
anything. 

The  dress  is  quite  spoilt ;  I  shall  never  be  able  to  get 
the  stain  out. 

But  this  is  a  people  robbed  and  spoiled. 

Isaiah  42,   22. 

Mr.  S.  has  penned  a  biting  satire  on  the  present 
economic  system.  Athenaeum,   1 4/9,   12. 

Shortly  before  sunset  the  gorge  echoed  with  liquid 
tinklings,  and  an  aged  goatherd  appeared  with  his  flock 
of  brown  sheep  and  tawny  goats,  which  with  the  help 
of  a  wild-eyed  boy  he  penned  in  another  big  cave  on 
the  side  opposite. 

Compton  Mackenzie,  Sylvia  and  Michael  p.  302. 

What  bliss  within  this  narrow  den  is  pent. 

Faust  (translated  by  Taylor). 

I  must  have  a  walk,  I  can't  bear  being  pent  up  in  a 
room  all  day. 


FORMS 


5 


With  a  sort  of  pity  for  those  penned  in  the  crowded 
room.  Benson,  Thread  of  Gold  p.  39, 

(2)  a.  [bild]  build    [bilt]  built 


gild 

gilt 

bend 

bent 

blend 

blent  'to  mix' 

lend 

lent 

rend 

rent 

send 

sent 

spend 

spent 

b.  gird 

girt 

Two  of  these,  bend  and  gild^  often  have  a  form  [bendid^ 
gildid]  bended,  gilded,  chiefly  in  figurative  or  poetic  use 
{ofi  his  hended  knee,  gilded  spurs,  also  The  Gilded  Chamber,  i.e. 
the  House  of  Lords).  In  poetry  we  also  find  builded. 

The  regular  form  blended  is  more  usual  than  blent. 

I've  builded  a  throne  for  my  queen.  Gibson. 

Our  teas  are  pure  and  well-blended. 

A  common  persecution  soon  blended  the  nonconformists 
into  one. 

Her  spirit,  that  had  seemed  to  be  caught  up  into  some 
realm  of  ecstasy  where  pain  was  inextricably  blent  with 
joy,  sank  back  into  the  material  bondage. 

It  should  be  considered  that  the  two  forms  of  each  of 
these  verbs  differ  in  more  than  the  final  consonant:  the 
length  of  vowel  and  vowellike  varies  according  to  the 
general  laws  of  quantity  in  English;  see  English  Sounds. 


4.     A  regular  verb  can  also  take  the  suffix  [-ii]]  -ing: 
[kAmn],  sill]]  coming,  seeing, 

1.  Words  in  syllabic  /,  such  as  fiddle,  either  retain  this, 
or  have  non-syllabic  /;  see  English  Sounds. 

2.  Words  written  with  final  -r  always  have  [-sr]  before 
[11^] ;  [entar,  entarii]].  See  2. 


6  VERBS 

5.     The  third  of  the  suffixes  mentioned  in  1  is: 

(1)  [iz]  when  the  stem  ends  in  a  sibilant: 
[hi  wijiz,  reidgiz]  he  wishes,  rages. 

(2)  [z]  when  the  stem  ends  in  a  voiced  sound  (not  a 
sibilant) : 

[hi  kolz,  steiz,  entaz]  he  calls,  stays,  enters. 

(3)  [s]  when  the  stem  ends  in  a  breathed  sound  (not 
a  sibilant) : 

[hi  houps]  he  hopes. 

On   the    phonetic  changes  words  undergo  when  [z]  is 
added,  see  English  Sounds,  on  Glides  (ch.  2  and  4). 

„   .  6.     A  number   of  verbs  take  the  suffixes 

Irregular  Verbs     ,  ,        j  r    i   t.   .  .^      r 

{iz,  z,  sj   and  [ii]J    but  express  the  lunctions 

of  the  suffix  [id,  d,  t]: 

(1)  by  means  of  one  form  with  vowel-change  in  the 
stem,  as  in  bind,  bound. 

(2)  by  means  of  two  forms  with  vowel-change,  each 
with  its  own  syntactic  function  and  distinguished 
as  the  preterite  and  the  participle,  as  in  break, 
broke,  broken,  or  drink,  drank,  drunk.  In  many 
cases  the  participle  has  the  suffix  [-(9)n]. 

(3)  by  using  the  stem,  as  in  set. 

All  the  irregular  verbs  are  traditional  in  living  English 
so  that  they  are  slowly  disappearing.  This  explains  why 
in  many  cases  regular  forms  exist  by  the  side  of  the 
traditional  ones.  Also  why  verbs  converted  from  nouns, 
even  when  the  noun  is  identical  in  form  with  an  irregular 
verb,  take  the  regular  suffix,  as  mpen  (p.  4)  and  shine  (p.  7). 

In  the  lists  of  verbs  in  the  following  sections  compound 
verbs  are  not  mentioned  with  the  exception  of  a  few  com- 
pounds that  differ  so  much  in  meaning  from  the  simple 
verb  that  the  connection  is  broken,  as  in  forget. 


IRREGULAR   VERBS 


7.    The   verbs    with    a  single  vowel-alternation  are  the 
following,  arranged  according  to  their  vowels: 


(1)  [ai] 

[au] 

bind 

bound 

find 

found 

grind 

ground 

wind 

wound 

(2)  [ai]  [D] 
shine  shone 

To   shine  '^to   polish',   as  a  converted  noun,  is  regular 
(see  6) :    You  have  shined  them  beautifully  (viz.  my  boots). 

(3)  [ai]  [d] 
fight  fought 

<4)  [ai]  [a] 

strike  struck 


(5)  [se] 

[a] 

hang 

hung 

To  hang 

'to  execul 

hanged. 

{6)  [I] 

[^] 

sit 

saet 

spit 

spaet 

(7)  [i] 

[a] 

dig  ^ 

dug 

stick 

stuck 

cHng 

clung 

fling 

flung 

sling 

slung 

slink 

slunk 

sting 

stung 

string 

strung 

swing 

swung 

VERBS 


wring  wrung 

win  won 

To  dig  is  also  regular. 

(8)  [i]  [e] 

bleed  bled 

feed  fed 

lead  led 

meet  met 

[rid]  read     [red]  read 

speed  sped 

The  preterite  pled  (from  to  plead'),  found  in  Punch 
(Sept.  24,  1913  p.  371/1),  is  jocular.  Ellinger,  in  his 
review  (Beiblatt  zur  Anglia,  35  p.  372)  quotes  a  passage 
from  The  Literary  Digest  that  shows  that  pled  is  not 
necessarily  jocular,  but  rather  colloquial,  or  vulgar. 


(9)  [ou] 
hold 
behold 
(10)  [u] 
shoot 


[e] 

held 

beheld 

\p\ 
shot 


8.  The  following  verbs  have  distinct  forms  for  the 
preterite  and  the  participle,  each  with  their  own  vowel^ 
so  that  the  verbal  system  contains  three  vowels: 


(1)  [ai] 

[ou] 

[i] 

drive 

drove 

driven 

ride 

rode 

ridden 

(a)rise 

(a)rose 

(a)risen 

smite] 

smote 

smitten 

stride 

strode 

stridden 

strive 

strove 

striven 

thrive 

throve 

thriven 

write 

wrote 

written 

The  preterite  is  also  strided  (see  6),  thrived. 

Note  also  the  ironic  phrase  English  as  she  is  ivrote. 


IRREGULAR   VERBS 


(2)  [ai] 

[u] 

[ou] 

flyi) 

flew 

flown   'to  move  through  the 
air  with  wings' 

(3)  [i]    _ 

[^] 

[A] 

begin 

began 

begun 

drink 

drank 

drunk 

ring 

rang 

rung 

shrink 

shrank 

shrunk 

sing 

sang 

sung 

sink 

sank 

sunk 

spin 

span 

spun 

spring 

sprang 

sprung 

stink 

stank 

stunk 

swim  swam  swum 

All   these   verbs    also   occur  with  [a]  in  the  preterite^ 
e.  g,  drunk,  rung,  etc. 

His  wife  span  for  domestic  uses. 

Dobbs,  Education  p.   17. 

9.  A  larger  number  of  verbs  with  distinct  forms  for 
the  preterite  and  the  participle  have  two  vowels  only,  the 
participle  sharing  its  vowel  either  with  the  preterite  (a), 
or  with  the  stem  {b). 


a.  (1)  [ai] 

[ei] 

[ei] 

He 

lay 

lain 

(2)  [ai] 

[i] 

[i] 

bite 

bit 

bitten 

light 

lit 

lit  'to  illuminate' 

chide 

chid 

chidden  'to  scold' 

hide 

hid 

hidden 

sHde 

slid 

sUdden 

The   participle    bit 

occurs  in  the  phrase  the  biter  bit', 

the    participle 

s    chid. 

hid. 

slid,    are    also  found.  Slid  is 

1)   To  fly  'run  away'  has  fled  for  its  preterite  and   participle;    see  11,  1 


10 


VERBS 


perhaps  more  usual  than  slidden.  Chide  is  also  inflected 
regularly;  the  verb  to  alight  is  usually  regular:  alighted; 
less  often  the  simple  verb,  which  is  probably  sometimes 
looked  on  as  a  converted  noun  (6). 

The  rich  autumn  foliage  was  lighted  by  the  low  sun. 

Shorthouse,  Inglesant  ch.  4,  p.   52. 
One  lamp  was  lighted. 

Hichens^  Ambition  ch.   13  p.   140. 
(The  bird)  rose  again,  and  after  several  evolutions  lit 
in  the  march  away  from  the  water. 

Times  W.   19/1,  17. 


(3)  [e] 

[d] 

[0] 

get 

got 

got 

forget 

forgot 

forgotten 

tread 

trod 

trodden 

(4)  [ei] 

[ou] 

[ou] 

break 

broke 

broken 

(5)    [£3] 

[03] 

[o] 

bear 

bore 

borne 

Note  to  be 

born:  He  ivas  born  in   1875 

forbear 

forbore 

forborne 

swear 

swore 

sworn 

tear 

tore 

torn 

wear 

wore 

worn 

(6)  [i] 

[ou] 

[ou] 

freeze 

froze 

frozen 

heave 

hove 

hove 

(be)speak 

(be)spoke 

(be)spoken 

steal 

stole 

stolen 

weave 

wove 

woven 

Both  heave  and  zveave  also  have  the  regular  form  heaved, 
weaved. 

The  form  hove  is  only  used  in  the  nautical  sense  of  the 
word. 


IRREGULAR   VERBS 


II 


He  heaved  a  deep  sigh. 
The  body  was  hove  overboard. 
The  anchor  was  hove  up  for  good. 
The  ship  hove  in  sight. 

The    ship   was  hove  to  (i.  e.  was  brought  to  a   stand- 
still by  setting  the  sails  so  as  to  counteract  one  another). 

(7)  [u]  [ou]  [ou] 

choose  chose  chosen 


b.  (1)  [ei] 

[u] 

[ei] 

forsake 

forsook 

forsaken 

take 

took 

taken 

Also 

mistake,  overtake. 

(2)  [ei] 

[u] 

[ei] 

slay 

slew 

slain 

(3)  [i] 

[se] 

[i] 

bid 

[bsed]  bade 

bidden 

Also  forbid  forbade  forbidden. 

In  spoken  English  bid  is  only  used  in  the  sense  of  'to 
bid  at  an  auction,  to  bid  for  votes.'  In  these  meanings 
it  is  generally  invariable  (see  15),  but  Kirkpatrick  (//^/z^af- 
hook)  gives  an  example :  He  bade  for  the  picture  at  an 
auction. 

In  literary  English  it  means  'to  order',  with  the  pre- 
terite [baed]  bade,  also  bad,  and  the  participle  bidden', 
the  stem  bid  is  also  found  as  a  participle. 

Custom  bade  him  blow  his  horn. 

The  two  Earls  were  bidden  to  be  diligent. 

The  proposed  expedition  bade  fair  to  be  successful. 

A  haggard  man  bid  them  depart. 

Eden  Phillpotts,  Eng.  Rev.  Oct.   13,  p. 
Charlie  did  as  he  was  bid. 

Trollope,  Three  Clerks  p. 

(4)  [i]  [ei]  [i] 

give  gave  given 

Also  forgive. 


344. 


2.39- 


12 


VERBS 


(5)  [i]  [e]  [i] 

eat  [et]  ate,  eat    eaten 

The  preterites  [eit,  it]  ate,  eat  are  less  usual. 


(6)  [i] 

w 

[i] 

see 

saw 

seen 

(7)  [o] 

[e] 

[o] 

fall 

fell 

fallen 

(8)   [D] 

[u] 

[3] 

draw 

drew 

drawn 

Also  zuithdratv. 

(9)  [ou] 

[u] 

[ou] 

blow 

blew 

blown 

grow 

grew 

grown 

know 

knew 

known 

throw 

threw 

thrown 

(10)  [a] 

[ae] 

[a] 

run 

ran 

run 

(11)  [a] 

[ei] 

[a] 

come 

came 

come 

Also  become. 

10.  Some  verbs  have  forms  for  the  preterite  and  par- 
ticiple partly  with  the  regular  consonantal  suffix,  partly 
with  vowel-change.     We  call  them  mixed. 

The  following  verbs  have  a  vocalic  preterite  and  a  con- 
sonantal participle. 

crow         crew         crowed 
The   verb    to  crow  usually  has  a  preterite  croived  when  it 
means    'to    utter   the    cry    of  a  cock',  but  crew  is  also  used, 
in    literary  English.  With  reference  to  persons  (children),  or 
in  a  figurative  sense  'to  exult  over',  it  is  always  croived. 
The  black-cock  deem'd  it  day,  and  crew. 
The  Cock  crow'd  lustier  late  and  early. 
The  baby  laughed  and  crowed  the  whole  time. 
I  am  not  going  to  be  crowed  over  by  you. 


IRREGULAR   VERBS  I  3 

stave        stove        staved 
The  participle  is  also  stove,  as  a  nautical  term. 

This  ship  was  too  much  damaged;  it  had  to  be  staved 
('broken  up').     See  6  on  converted  nouns. 

The  fore  compartment  is  stove  in  (after  a  collision  of 
two  ships). 

(a)wake         (a)woke         (a)waked 

The  verb  to  wake  also  has  the  participles  waked  and  ivoken. 
There  is  also  a  participle  awoke. 

Mr.  Chamberlain  has  waked  up  the  country.    Pilot. 
In    the   first   place  Mr.   Pollard  considers  that  Mr.  C. 
has  woken  us  up.  Pilot. 

Lately  he  had  always  woken  up  when  she  came  to  bed. 

Sinister  Street  p.  40. 

11.     Some   mixed   verbs   have  forms  with  vowel-change 
and  a  regular  consonantal  ending  at  the  same  time: 

(1)  [ai]  [e] 

fly  fled     'to  run  away' 

In  spoken  English  the  verb  is  not  very  common,  to 
run  away  being  generally  used. 

(2)  [e]  [ou] 
sell  sold 
tell                told 

(3)  [ei]  [e] 

say  [sed]  said 

Note  that  we  have  the  same  vowel  alternation  before 
the  suffix  -z :  [sez]  says. 

The  verb  to  gainsay  has  the  preterite  and  participle 
[igein'seid]  as  well  as  [|gein'sed]  gainsaid.  See  also  23,  6. 

<4)  [i]  [e] 

creep  crept 

keep  kept 

leap  [lept]  leapt,  leaped;      also  [lipt]  leaped, 

sleep  slept       [perhaps  as  a  converted  noun  (6). 


14 


VERBS 


sweep 

swept 

weep 

wept 

(5)    [19] 

[3] 

hear 

heard 

(6)  [u] 

[d] 

shoe 

shod ; 

shod;   also   [Jud]  shoed,  according  to  6 
(converted  nouns). 

12.     The  following  verbs  show  vowel-change  and  irregular 
consonantal  endings. 


(1)  [ai] 

[3] 

buy 

bought 

(2)  [^] 

[0] 

catch 

caught 

(3)  [i] 

l>] 

bring 

brought 

think 

thought 

(4)  [i] 

[el 

deal 

dealt 

dream 

[dremt]  dreamt  or  dreamed 

feel 

felt 

lean 

[lent]  leant  or  leaned 

kneel 

knelt 

leave 

left 

mean 

meant 

There  are 

also  regular  preterites  and  participles  of  </ri?(a!;;z, 

knee/,  and  lean:  [drimd,  nild,  lind]  dreamed,  kneeled,  leaned; 

these  forms 

are  little  used  (see  note  to  3,   i). 

(5)  [i] 

[o] 

seek 

sought 

beseech 

besought 

teach 

taught 

(6)   [u] 

[D] 

[luz]  lose 

[lost]  lost 

IRREGULAR   VERBS  1 5 

13.  Some  verbs  have  a  regular  consonantal  preterite, 
and  a  participle  with  the  ending  -n,  accompanied  by  vowel- 
change  {a)  or  not  [b). 

a.  shear  sheared  shorn 

b.  hew  hewed  hewn 
mow  mowed  mown 
saw  sawed  sawn 

[sou]  sew       [soud]  sewed        [soun]  sewn 
show  showed  shown 

sow  sowed  sown 

[stru]  strew   [strud]  strewed     [strun]  strewn 
In  these  verbs  the  regular  hewed,  mowed,  etc.  are  also  used 
as  participles,  chiefly  (or  exclusively)  in  predicative  use. 

14.  One  verb  has  the  stem  for  the  function  of  the  pre- 
terite and  a  form  with  [-n]  for  the  participle: 

beat        beat        beaten 

The  stem  heat  [bit]  is  occasionally  used  as  a  participle, 
chiefly  in  the  sense  'to  conquer  in  battle',  and  as  an  ordinary 
adjective  in  the  phrase  dead-beat  'utterly  exhausted'. 

Late  in  the  afternoon  they  returned  home,  dead-beat. 
Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.  28  p.  351. 

15.  The  third  group  of  irregular  verbs  contains  such 
as  use  the  stem  in  the  functions  of  the  form  with  [id], 
i.  e.  of  the  preterite  and  participle.  Although  they  take 
the  suffixes  -5  and  -ing  it  is  perhaps  convenient  to  retain 
the  traditional  term:  invariable  verbs. 

All  these  verbs  end  in  -d  and  -t,  and  might  also  be  looked 
upon  as  exceptions  to  the  rules  for  the  consonantal  suffix, 
shed        rid  hit  cut  cast  burst 

shred       let  slit  shut         cost         hurt 

spread     set  split         put  thrust 

On  bid  see  9  b,  3;  forecast,  as  a  converted  noun,  often 
has  -ed\  broadcast  regularly. 


l6  VERBS 

16.  Some  verbs  in  -/  are  occasionally  found  unchanged 
when  used  as  a  preterite  or  participle,  although  they 
generally  take  [id]. 

Thus  are  we  knit  by  more  than  earthly  ties. 

Frankau,  One  of  Us,  p.  4, 
He  bent  forward,  wet  his  fingers,  picked  up  the  coal 
and  threw  it  back  into  the  fire. 

Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  IV  ch.  2,  %  2,  p.  464. 

17.  Two  irregular  verbs  may  be  mentioned  separately : 
make  made 

stand  [stud]  stood 

,        ,  18.     A    number    of   verbs    are   irregular   apart 

Anomalous  .  ,      ^  ,    r       ,  ■  ■, 

„  .  irom  the  forms  used  tor  the  preterite  and  par- 
ticiple. They  have  irregularities  in  the  form  with 
[iz,  z,  s],  or  use  the  stem  instead.  Owing  to  their  syntactic 
functions  many  have  special  strong-stressed  and  weak- 
stressed  forms. 

They  also  have  special  forms  with  the  weak-stressed 
adverb  no^  joined  to  them  directly,  without  the  verb  to  do. 

The  forms  with  the  adverb  [not]  pronounced  fully  are 
used  when  the  auxiliary  is  repeated  and  not  has  a  strong 
stress  to  contradict  a  preceding  statement: 

"I  am  ready."  —   "You  are  not  ready." 
After   a   prolonged   absence,   she  returns,  and  informs 
us    she    was   mistaken:    Mr.    Gadbrooke  is  not  at  home. 

Sweet,  Spoken  English  p.   yS. 

This  applies  equally  to  all  the  verbs  of  this  group. 
See  below,  on  to  do. 

19.     The  anomalous  verbs  consist  of  three  groups: 

(1)  those  that  have  a  complete  verbal  system:  have,  do. 

(2)  those  that  are  exclusively  used  as  verbal  predicates, 
and    have    a    preterite    only    beside    the    stem,    no 


IRREGULAR   VERBS  1/ 

participle    and    no    form    with    the  suffix  [-iz,  z,  s], 
nor  [ii]]:  can,  may,  shall,  will. 
(3)  those  that  have  a  single  predicative  form :  must,  need, 
ought,  used. 

20.  The  verb  to  have  loses  its  final  consonant  before 
the  suffixes  [z,  d];  it  also  has  special  forms  with  not, 
and  in  weak-stressed  use.  In  other  respects  its  forms  are 
regular : 

Stem:  [hsev;  9v,  v]  have 

Stem  with  [z]:     [hsez;  3z,  z,  s]  has 
Negative  forms :  [hsevnt]  have  not 

[haeznt]  has  not 
Preterite:  [haed;  d]  had 

Negative  form :     [hsednt]  had  not 
Ing :  [haevii]]  having 

21.  The  weak  forms  [az,  z,  s;  d]  has,  had  are  only 
used  when  to  have  is  an  enclitic  auxiliary  without  not: 
He  has  told  everything.  He's  got  a  lot  of  money.  I'd  for- 
gotten all  about  it. 

But  [hsez,  hsed],  because  enclitic  words  follow,  in  He 
has  not  told  us;  He  has  a  lot  of  money;  I  had  to  pay 
the  money  back;  and  in  questions:  Has  he  told  everything? 

22.  The  verb  to  do,  like  to  have,  has  a  complete  verbal 
system  but  its  forms  are  quite  irregular. 

Stem:  [du]  do 

Stem  with  [z] :     [dAz]  does 
Negative  forms:  [dount]  do  not,  don't 

[dAznt]  does  not,  doesn't 
Preterite:  [did]  did 

Negative  form:     [didnt]  did  not,  didn't 

Kruisinga,  Handbook  II.  Accidence  ancl  Syntax.  1.  2 


I 8  VERBS 

Part.:  [dAn]  done 

Ing:  [duirj]  doing 

In  familiar  English  also  don't  for  doesn't. 

23.  The  following  verbs  have  no  complete  verbal  system 
but  only  two  forms,  a  stem  and  a  preterite,  or  one 
form  only. 

(1)  can. 

Stem:  [ksen,  kan]  can;  negative:  [\iQX\t\  cannot,  can't. 
Preterite:  [kud,  ksd]  could;  negative:  [kudnt]  could 
not,  couldn't. 

(2)  may. 

Stem :  [mei]  may;  negative :  [memt]  may  not,  mayn't. 
Preterite :  [mait]  might;  negative :  [maitnt]  might 
not,  mightn't. 

(3)  shall. 

Stem:  [Jsel,  Jl]  shall;  negative  [Jant]  shall  not,  shan't. 
Preterite :  [Jud,  Jed]  shovdd:  negative :  [Judnt]  should 
not,  shouldn't. 

(4)  will. 

Stem :  [wil,  1]  will;  negative :  [wount]  will  not,  won't. 
Preterite:  [wud,  wad,  ad]  would;  negative  [wudnt] 
would  not,  wouldn't. 

(5)  must,  ought. 

Must  and  ought  have  one  form  only. 

Note  [mAstnt,  mAsnt ;  otnt]  must  not,  mustn't;  ought 

not,  oughtn't. 

(6)  dare,  need. 

In  spoken  English  dare  and  need,  when  members 
of  a  verbal  group,  have  one  form  only  {he  need 
not  ask).  As  independent  verbs  they  are  regular: 
Let  him  do  it  if  he  dares  ^). 

1)  CompHre  daredn't  and  daren't,  both  [deant];  and  [mAsnt]  mustn't. 


IRREGULAR   VERBS  I 9 

In  combination  with  say  the  verb  forms  a  semi- 
compound,  chiefly  in  the  first  person  of  the  present 
tense :  /  dare  say,  also  written  in  one  word  I  daresay. 
In  reported  speech  we  find  he  dares  say;  he  dared 
say  or  he  dared  to  say. 

Philip  dared  say  it  was  a  little  .  .  . 

Snaith,  Principal  Girl  p.   169. 
He    dared    say   a   good   deal   would   depend    upon  its 
success.  Times  W.  2/1,   14. 

(7)  used. 

[just]  has  the  function  of  a  preterite,  generally  with 
to  and  a  stem  immediately  after  it.  The  negative 
form  is  tisedn't,  often  written  usen't^)  and  generally 
pronounced  [jusnt],  but  also  did  not  use;  as  a  par- 
ticiple used  is  rare. 

Sometimes  he  used  to  tell  us  of  his  expeditions 
through  the  woods  and  fields  round  his  home. 

Sweet,  Spoken  English  p.   50. 

People  did  not  use  to  eat  so  much  meat  as  they  do 
now.  id.  Element,  no.   15   p.  ^^. 

But  Stella  did  not  begin  to  speak,  as  she  was  used, 
of  her  determination  to  have  her  own  way  in  spite  of 
everybody.  Sinister  Street  p.  816. 

24.  Besides  the  verbs  with  irregular  participles,  and 
the  anomalous  verbs,  English  has  a  small  number  of  verbs 
that  do  not  form  a  complete  system  except  by  combining 
different  verbs.  Such  suppletive  systems  are  those  of  to 
go  and  to  be. 

Both  these  verbs  have  forms  with  the  suffixes  [(-i)z] 
and  [-irj],  but  there  are  other  verbs  in  the  functions  of 
the  verbal  [id]. 

25.  The   system    of  to  go   is  completed  by  means  of 


1)  See  note  on  page  18. 


20  VERBS 

the   preterite    of  an    old    verb   to  wend,  now  completely 
forgotten : 

go        went        gone 

The  'verb'  io  be  is  a  combination  of  a  number  of  distinct 
verbs.  It  differs  from  all  other  verbs  in  English  by  having 
special  forms,  diftering  from  the  stem,  for  the  various 
persons  of  the  present  tense,  and  a  double  form  for  the 
preterite,  partly  according  to  person  and  number,  partly 
according  to  its  syntactic  function.  The  present  tense  also 
forms  special  phonetic  combinations  with  the  personal 
pronouns.  Like  the  anomalous  verbs  it  also  forms  special 
groups  with  weak-stressed  not. 

The  forms  may  be  enumerated  as  follows: 

Present:  [sem]  (/)  am 

[a(r)]  [you,  we,  they)  are 
[iz]  {he,  she,  it)  is 

Shortened  forms :  [aim] 

lju3(r),  wi9(r),  '^'ealr)] 
[hiz,  Jiz,  Its] 

Negative  forms:     [aim  not]  /  am  not 

[ant]  {we,  you,  they)  are  not,  aren^t 
[iznt]  {he,  she,  it)  is  not,  isn't 

Note  that  in  the  negative  form  of  the  first  person 
singular  not  has  its  strong  vowel,  whereas  in  all  the  other 
persons  it  is  [nt].  Hence  in  questions  we  also  find  7tot  [not] 
after  /,  whereas  in  all  other  persons  it  is  joined  on  to  the 
verbal  form:  [asm  ai  not]  am  I  not?,  but  [ant  wi]  aren't 
we?,  etc.,  and  [iznt  hi]  isn't  he?,  etc. 

In  natural  spoken  English,  however,  the  form  [ant]  is 
used  in  the  first  person  singular  in  questions:  [aim  rait, 
ant  ai?]  /  am  right,  aren't  I?  "Arent  I  to  see  Sylvia?" 
Michael  asked,  laughing  (Sinister  Street  p.  1088).  —  "  You 
overlook  the  fact,  Betty,  that  you  are  not  in  a  position  to 


IRREGULAR    VERBS  21 

'state  terms'"  ''Aren't  /?"  (Chapin,  New  Morality,  in  Brit. 
PL  p.  557). 

In  very  colloquial  (some  would  say:  vulgar)  English 
the  negative  form  for  all  persons  is  [emt]  ain't.  ^) 

Preterites:  [wdz,  w9z]  was 

[w5(r),  W9(r)]  were  ^} 

Negative  forms:  [woznt]  zuas  not,  wasn't 
[want]  were  not,  zveren't 

Stem:  [bi]  be 

Part:  [bin,  bm]  been 

Ing:  [bill]]  being 

26.  It  would  be  defensible  to  include  other  verbal 
systems  in  the  suppletive  group.  Thus  there  is  Httle  in 
common  between  Jly  and  /led;  between  /ly,  flew  2iV\dflowu^ 
It  would  also  be  reasonable  to  include  such  verbs  as  stand, 
and  can,  may,  shall,  will.  But  stood  and  the  preterites 
to  these  auxiliaries  may  perhaps  more  conveniently  be 
considered  as  elements  of  a  formally  single  verbal  system : 
as  in  the  case  of  7?y,  y^^^  the  initial  consonant  or  consonant- 
group  of  each  pair  is  identical,  and  all  of  them  have  a 
verbal  [id]  (or  a  preterite)  in  -d. 


USE  OF  THE  FORMS 

27.  It  has  been  shown  in  the  preceding  sections  that 
an  English  verb  generally  has  three  forms  besides  the 
stem.  The  uses  of  each  of  these  forms  will  now  be  treated. 


1)  Both  [ant]  and  [eint]  are  to  be  considered  the  result  of  assimilation 
of  are  not,  is  not,  like  [kant]  of  cannot;  the  spelling  aren't  with  an  r  is 
purely  phonetic  here,  the  r  serving  exclusively  to  express  the  character  of 
the  preceding  vowel. 

2)  Instead  of  [w3(r)]  there  is  a  less  common  form  [w3e(r)] ;  see  Montgomery, 
Types  p.  28  f. 


22  VERBS 

Verbal  [id] 

28.  The  verbal  [id]  corresponds  to  a  form  with  vowel- 
change  in  a  number  of  irregular  verbs;  some  of  these  have 
two  forms  corresponding  to  the  verbal  [id]  according  to 
their  syntactic  functions  (7  — 14).  Other  verbs  again  use 
the  stem  in  the  same  functions  as  the  verbal  [id]  of 
regular  verbs  (15  f.). 

The  verbal  [id]  and  the  corresponding  forms  of  irregular 
verbs  serve : 

(1)  as  a  preterite,  when  used  as  the  leading  part  of  the 
predicate. 

(2)  as   a  participle,  when  not  used  as  the  leading  part 
of  the  predicate. 

The  terms  preterite  and  participle  are  traditional  ones; 
they  are  useful  only  as  long  as  they  are  taken  in  the  sense 
defined  above  without  any  regard  to  their  etymological 
origin. 

Preterite 

29.  The  term  preterite  includes  two  entirely  unrelated 
functions  of  the  verbal  [id] : 

(1)  as  a  past  tense;  (2)  as  a  modal  form. 
The  verb  to  he  is  the  only  one  that  distinguishes  the 
two  functions  formally:  as  a  past  tense  and  as  a  preterite 
of  modest}^  was  is  the  exclusive  form  for  the  first  persons 
of  the  singular,  otherwise  were;  as  an  irrealis,  were  can 
be  used  in  all  cases,  but  was  is  an  alternative  form  in  the 
first  and  third  persons  singular,  especially  in  colloquial 
Enghsh. 

n    ,  „  30.     The    verb    is    the    only   part   of  speech 

Past  Tense  ■^    ^     .        .    . 

that  has  a  form  one  of  whose  functions  it  is  to 

express   distinctions  of  time.     Other  parts  of  speech  may 

be  connected  in  thought  with  a  special  time,  e.  g.  nouns 


PAST   TENSE  23 

expressing  an  action;  thus  the  conquest  of  Ireland  may 
refer  to  present,  past,  or  future  time.  Tlie  time  may  be 
specially  mentioned:  Ireland  in  ancient  times;  English 
pronunciation  in  the  i6th  century.  But  nouns  have  no  forms 
to  express  distinctions  of  time. 

The  verbal  [id]  when  used  predicatively  to  express  dis- 
tinctions of  time  is  called  the  past  tense. 

31.  A  past  action,  occurrence,  or  state  is  expressed 
by  the  past  tense  when  the  speaker  considers  the  time 
as  completely  separated  from  the  present :  the  past  tense 
is  narrative  in  this  case  ^). 

On  Wednesday  five  German  seroplanes  were  destroyed, 
and  three  driven  down  damaged.  Three  of  our  machines 
are  missing.  Times  W.  2/2,    17. 

Three  hundred  years  ago  the  Pilgrim  Fathers  sailed  for 
Am.erica  in  the  Mayflower.  Times   Ed.   S.  9/9,  20. 

"But  j)/(?z^r  house  is  not  like  that."  —  "No,  my  house 
is  all  right;  but  it  is  the  only  dry  house  in  the  whole 
country  round.  I  had  it  built  on  purpose." 

Sweet,  Elementarbuch. 

The  Marquis  lived  for  the  best  part  of  the  year  at 
Fane  Abbey ;  occasionally,  say  for  a  week  or  two  in  the 
height  of  the  season,  he  went  up  to  town  and  stayed  at 
his  large  home  in  Park  Lane.  Garvice,  Staunch. 

The  following  official  statement  describing  the  cause 
and  course  of  the  Tsarewitch's  illness  was  issued  late 
to-night.  Times  W. 

In  my  first  chapter  I  dealt  mainly  with  those  political 
institutions  of  the  earliest  times,  institutions  common  to 
our  whole  race,  institutions  which  still  live  and  are 
untouched  among  some  small  primitive  communities  of 
our  race,  out  of  which  the  still  living  Constitution  of 
England  grew.  Freeman,  Growth. 

[In  the  last  sentence  the  preterite  grew  is  used  because 
the  writer  thinks  of  the  process  that  led  to  the  constitution 


1)  On  the  past  tense  of  concord,  see  vol.  3. 


24  VERBS 

as  it  is  now,  not  of  the  result  of  the  process.  That  such 
is  the  explanation  of  the  preterite  is  shown  by  the  sentences 
following  immediately: 

It  is  now  my  business,  as  the  second  part  of  my  subject,^ 
to  trace  the  steps  by  which  that  Constitution  grew  out 
of  a  political  state  with  which  at  first  sight  it  seems  to 
have  so  little  in  common.  My  chief  point  is  that  it  did 
thus,  in  the  strictest  sense,  grow  out  of  that  state.  Our 
English  Constitution  was  never  made,  in  the  sense  in 
which  the  Constitutions  of  many  other  countries  have 
been  made]. 

32.  The  past  tense  when  expressing  something  that 
was  often  repeated  in  the  past,  is  descriptive  rather  than 
narrative.  This  iterative  use  is  not  in  any  formal  way 
distinguished  from  the  narrative  use,  and  it  is  the  situation 
only  that  makes  the  meaning  clear. 

She  spent  the  intervals  of  the  London  season  in  ragged 
schools  and  workhouses.  When  she  zvent  abroad  with 
her  family,  she  used  her  spare  time  so  well  that  there 
was  hardly  a  great  hospital  in  Europe  with  which  she 
was  not  acquainted.         Lytton  Strachey,  Vict.,  p.  119. 

When  Farmer  Oak  smiled,  the  corners  of  his  mouth 
spread  till  they  were  within  an  unimportant  distance  of 
his  ears;  .  .  .  Hardy,  Madding  Crowd,  ch.   i. 

33.  The  narrative  past  tense  is  sometimes  used  ta 
contrast  past  and  present  time. 

"Oh,  you  did  give  me  a  turn,"  she  exclaimed. 

"I  thought  1)  it  was  early  for  the  milkman." 

Mackenzie,  Sylvia  p.  58  f. 

A.  I  am  sorry  Mr.  C.  is  not  in.  —  B.  Oh,  I  only 
called  to  see  how  he  was. 

A.  "Are  you  going  to  L.  to-night?"  —  B.  'Why?'  — 
A.   "Oh,  I  wondered." 


1)  In  'thought'  the  pitch  of  the  voice  rises  suddenly  and  there  is  a  sHght 
pause  after  it;  it  is  then  slightly  lowered  and  rises  to  its  original  pitch  at 
the  end.     The  italics  are  in  the  original  text. 


PRETERITE   OF   MODESTY  2$. 

On  the  following  advertisement  in  the  Times: 

Importafit  Notice.  M.  L.  supplies  all  classes  of  domestic 
servants  with  good  characters 

Punch  30/10,  12  comments: 

We  wondered  wHere  some  of  them  got  their  good  char- 
acters from. 

34.  We  have  another  special  case  of  the  narrative 
past  tense  when  it  is  used  to  express  hesitation  by  making 
the  idea  expressed  more  remote.  Thus  we  say,  I  thought 
he  was  to  lecture  next  week,  when  something  has  occurred 
to  make  us  doubt  the  correctness  of  the  expectation. 

The  past  tense  is  similarly  used  if  a  writer  wishes  to 
dissociate  himself  from  stating  a  fact. 

(Alexander)  captured  the  cities  of  Susa  and  Persepolis  — 
capitals  and  treasure-cities  of  the  Persian  king.  One 
hundred  and  twenty  thousand  talents  were  said  to  have 
been  obtained  from  the  latter  city. 

Goodspeed,  History,  p.  214. 

p   ^   .         35.     The   past    tense    of   remoteness   leads   by 

J      imperceptible    stages    to    the   case   when   the  idea 

„  .         of  past  time  is  completely  absent.  When  we  say: 

/  called   to    ask  you,    if  you  would  join  us,   the 

preterite    would    seem    to    be    more    polite    or  modest;  it 

suggests:    that    was    my    idea  when   I  rang  the  bell,  but 

now   I   am   waiting   to  hear  what  you  wish  to  say.     We 

use    the   preterite    in    a    similar  way  in :  /  wanted  to  ask 

you    if  you   would  give   a  subscription.     The  use  of  this 

preterite   of  modesty    is    commented    on    by    Mr.    Arnold 

Bennett  in  the  following  passage  {Roll-Call,  I  ch.  1  §  3). 

The  young  girl,  opening  the  front  door,  had  said : 
"Do  you  want  to  see  father?"  And  instantly  the  words 
were  out  George  had  realized  that  she  might  have  said : 
"Did'^)    you    want   to   see  father?"....  in  the  idiom  of 


1)  Italics  in  the  original. 


26  VERBS 

the  shop-girl  or  cierk,  and  that  if  she  had  said  ''did'  he 
would  have  been  gravely  disappointed  and  hurt.  But  she 
had  not!  Of  course  she  was  incapable  of  such  a  locu- 
tion, and  it  was  silly  of  him  to  have  thought  otherwise, 
even  momentarily. 

36.  The  preterite  of  modesty  is  frequent  in  subordinate 
clauses  expressing  a  statement,  proposal  or  suggestion. 
The  idea  of  past  time  is  usually  out  of  the  question.  This 
use  is  found : 

(1)  in  object  clauses. 

Then  I  would  suggest  that  you  ceased  trying  to  clean 
your  finger.  Benson,  David  Blaize,  ch.    i. 

"Alan,  why,  are  you  in  love  with  Stella?"  Michael 
challenged. 

"What  made  you  think  I  wasl^'  countered  Alan,  looking 
alarmed  1).  Sinister  Street,  p.  714. 

Suppose  we  went  to  one  ofthe  Non-Conformist  Churches. 
We  can  usually  count  on  a  good  sermon  from  the 
minister  at  Holly  Road. 

Collinson,  Spoken  English,  p.  6^. 

(2)  in  clauses  after  it  is  time,  it  seems. 

It  is  time  we  gave  a  second  thought  to  Puritanism. 

Gissing,  Ryecroft. 
It  is  high  time  that  we  decided  just  what  is  meant  by 
a  word.  Sapir,  Language,  p.  32. 

I've  felt  it  coming,  you  know,  and  it's  time  I  really 
struck  otit  for  myself. 

Walpole,  Fortitude,  II,  ch.  5  p.   196. 
Sidney.    Auntie,    I    know    Mother    won't   want  to  be 
disturbed. 

Miss  Fairfield.    It's  high  time  she  was. 

Dane,  Bill  of  Div.,  in  Brit.  PI.  p.  682. 
The    censorship    is    not    a    branch  of  military  science 
and  study.  It  is  high  time  that  it  was  made  so. 

Times  Weekly  ed.  22/11,   1912  p.  923/3. 

1)  Perhaps  the  form  was  should  be  interpreted  as  a  past  tense  of  concord ; 
see  volume  3. 


IRREALIS  27 

It  seems  as  though  Oxford  and  Cambridge  mig-ki  still 
be  permitted  to  whisper  a  word  in  their  defence,  and 
that  the  universities  of  the  provinces  were  not  the  im- 
pregnable homes  of  an  austere  and  self-denying  erudition. 

Daily  Mail. 

It  follows  from  the  function  of  the  preterite  of  modesty 
that  the  present  tense  is  also  possible. 

It  is  time  that  I  give  you  some  idea  of  my  domestic 
arrangements.  W.  Irving. 

,  ..  37.  The  preterite  is  frequently  used  to  express 
what  is  thought  of  as  contrary  to  fact :  as  an  irrealis. 
This  use  occurs  in  subordinate  clauses  only.  As  has 
been  stated  in  27,  the  difference  between  the  past  tense 
and  this  preterite  is  not  expressed  formally  except  in 
the  verb  to  be:  the  forms  /  were  and  he  were  are  used 
in  the  irrealis  only.  In  colloquial  English  ivas  is  also 
current  in  this  case,  as  the  quotations  below  will  prove. 
But  it  would  not  be  possible  to  substitute  ivere  for  was 
in  the  sentences  illustrating  the  past  tense  or  the  preterite 
of  modesty;  compare  the  preceding  sections. 

38.     The  preterite  is  used  as  an  irreahs: 
(1)  in    adverb    clauses    of   condition,    comparison,    and 
concession,    with  the  conjunctions  ?/,  as  if,  though, 
as  though,  etc. 

He  makes  one  realise  that  if  only  one  htezv  enough 
about  the  subject,  it  would  abound  in  both  beauty  and 
interest.  Benson,  J.  of  Engl.  St.  I,   155. 

"Well,  what  you  are  thinking  is,  whether  it  is  fair 
to    him    to    take    me    up   there  in  case  he  is  drunk..." 

"If  only  it  was  'in  case,'"  I  said.  "You  see?" 

Michael  Arlen,  Green  Hat  ch.   i   §  2. 

I  should  go  and  do  it  now  if  I  were  you.  Strike  while 
the  iron's  hot. 

Dane,  Bill  of  Divorcement,  Brit.  PI.  p. 


28  VERBS 

Thus,    after    ten    years'    approved    service,    a    teacher 
might  feel  assured  of  a  modest  competency  even  though 
she  never  attained  to  headship  of  school  or  department. 
Times  Ed.  S.  26I10,   16  p.   182/2, 

(2)  in   relative    clauses,   with  a  function  similar  to  that 
of  conditional  adverb  clauses. 

For  some  purposes,  at  any  rate,  those  opposite  shores 
are  the  true  frontiers  of  Britain,  and  no  account  of  the 
island  realm  would  be  complete  which  ignored  their 
characteristics. 

Mackinder,  Brit,  and  the  Brit.  Seas  ch.  2.  p.   17. 

"A  peace  which  left  Belgium's  wrongs  unavenged," 
he  adds,  "and  which  did  not  provide  against  their  recur- 
rence, would  not  be  a  real  peace." 

Roosevelt,  quoted  Times  W.  ed.  27/11,   14. 

Nothing  could  be  more  interesting  and  useful  at  the 
present  time  than  a  book  which  succeeded  in  doing  what 
this  book  sets  out  to  do.  Athenaeum,  6/12,   13. 

(3)  in  object  clauses  with  /  ivish  in  the  main  clause  ^). 

I  wish  I  liked  rice-pudding, 

I  wish  I  ivere  a  twin, 

I  wish  some  day  a  real  live  fairy 

Would  just  come  walking  in. 

Rose  Fyleman  in  Kooistra   and  Schutt, 
Reader  II,   12. 

39.  A  careful  examination  of  the  sentences  quoted  in 
38  will  show  that  in  most  of  them  the  preterite  is  used 
to  express  what  is  thought  of  as  contrary  to  fact.  But 
in  the  last  quotation  of  38,  2  succeeded  refers  distinctly 
to  a  future  event  that  is  uncertain,  but  still  possible. 
We  see,  therefore,  that  the  irrealis  may  be  the  means  of 
arriving   at    a   preterite    of  modesty;  the  result  is  similar 


1)  When  the  wisli  concerns  an  action  by  another  person  than  t  he  speaker? 
a  syntactic  group  with  the  preterite  u'ould  is  used,  as  is  illustrated  by  the 
verse  quoted. 


IRREALIS  29 

to  the  preterites  of  35,  but  the  route  by  which  it  has 
been  reached  is  different.  The  same  interpretation  may- 
serve  for  would  in  38,  3. 

40.  It  has  already  been  stated  that  the  interpretation 
of  a  verbal  [id]  as  a  past  tense,  a  preterite  of  modesty, 
or  an  irrealis,  depends  upon  the  situation  only.  But  it 
may  still  be  useful  to  add  the  following  quotations  of  the 
preterite  in  subordinate  clauses  in  the  function  of  a  narrative 
past  tense,  although  in  some  respects  suggesting  a  modal 
function. 

The  rustic  who  zvent  up  to  London  believing  that  its 

streets  were  paved  with  gold  would  give  a  very  different 

account    of   the   wealth    of  the    metropolis  from  that  of 

the    man    who    expected   to    find    no    gold    there  at  all. 

Times  Ed.  S.  20/8,   191 8,  p.  361/4. 

The  following  sentence  is  less  easy  to  interpret: 

.  .  ,  and  authorship  itself  —  which  some  might  say  ivas 
no  such  terrible  disaster  —  would  be  the  last  pursuit  any 
person  would  choose  for   a  livelihood. 

Baker,  Uses  of  Libraries  p.  5   f. 

The  preterite  was  seems  to  be  the  predicate  of  the  relative 
clause,  the  sentence  some  might  say  being  parenthetic. 
But  this  relative  clause  is  continuative,  i.  e.  it  has  the 
function  of  an  independent  sentence. 

Some  preterites,  all  of  them  forms  of  verbs  that  for 
various  reasons  are  classed  as  auxiliaries,  are  exclusively 
used  as  modal  preterites  [might,  should,  would,  and  the 
isolated  form  ought),  or  can  be  so  used  [coidd),  in 
independent  sentences  (see  Auxiliaries).  The  preterite 
was  is  rare  in  this  function. 

Participle 

41.  The  function  of  the  verbal  [id]  when  not  serving 
as    a   preterite    has    been    defined  negatively  in  28.     The 


30  VERBS 

uses  of  the  form  as  a  participle  must  now  be  treated; 
they  can  be  classified  in  two  groups,  the  participle 
being  used: 

(1)  as  a  member  of  a  close  syntactic  group. 

(2)  as  an  independent  element  of  the  sentence,  resembling 
an  adjective,  so  that  it  may  be  called  a  verbal 
adjective  in  this  function. 

The  character  of  the  participle  as  a  member  of  a  verbal 
system  is  generally  quite  evident  in  the  first  case  {In 
another  moment  I  felt  myself  lifted),  especially  in  purely 
verbal  groups  {He  has  bought  some  flowers).  The  verbal 
character  is  less  evident  in  the  second  function  {a  well- 
written  book,  a  typewritten  letter).  It  will  also  be  shown 
that  it  is  not  possible  in  all  cases  to  distinguish  neatly 
between  the  two  functions  mentioned  above  (compare 
He  was  found  very  ill:  found  is  verbal,  with  He  was 
known  to  be  an  honest  man:  known  is  adjectival). 

42.  The  meaning  of  the  participle  is  naturally  clearest 
when  it  is  used  as  an  independent  element  of  the  sentence. 
For  this  reason  it  seems  convenient  to  treat  the  two 
functions  mentioned  in  41  in  reversed  order,  and  to  begin 
with  the  participle  as  a  verbal  adjective. 

„   ,  .        43.     The    participle   when  used  as  an  adjective 

,,.     .       expresses  a  quality  or  state  that  is  thought  of  as 

the   result   of  an   action  or  occurrence  expressed 

by    the    verbal    stem    from   which  the  participle  has  been 

formed  ^).   For  examples  and  a  further  discussion  of  various 


1)  In  the  case  of  irregular  verbs  the  participle  is  not  always  formed 
from  a  verbal  stem  by  means  of  an  inflectional  suffix;  it  may  be  indepen- 
dent of  the  stem  though  evidently  connected  wilh  it,  as  in  begun  and  the 
stem  begin. 


PARTICIPLE  3 1 

shades  of  meaning  expressed  by  the  participle,  the  reader 
is  referred  to  the  sections  that  follow  immediately  on  the 
syntactic  functions  of  the  participle,  because  meaning  and 
syntactic  function  are  inextricably  mingled.  Like  other 
adjectives  the  participle  can  be  used  attributively  and 
predicatively. 

44,  The  quality  or  state  expressed  by  the  participle 
when  used  as  a  verbal  adjective,  whether  attributively  or 
predicatively,  may  be  the  result  of  an  action  affecting  the 
person  or  thing  expressed  by  the  leading  noun  from 
outside  (a),  or  it  may  be  the  result  of  an  action  or 
change  in  the  person  or  thing  not  thought  of  as  caused 
by  outside  influences  (b). 

a.  a  deserted  child,     a  loaded  revolver. 

b.  the  returned  mistress,     a  travelled  person. 

The  verbs  in  a  are  transitive,  those  in  b  are  intransitive. 
It  follows  from  the  definition  of  the  meaning  of  the  par- 
ticiple that  a  verbal  adjective  can  be  formed  from  those 
intransitives  only  that  express  a  change  of  position  or 
state,  what  are  called  the  mutative  intransitives.  Such 
verbs  as  run,  wait,  sit,  sleep,  talk  do  not  form  a  participle 
with  the  function  of  a  verbal  adjective. 

45.  The  attributive  participle  may  express  the  actual 
result  of  an  action  or  occurrence  thought  of  without 
reference  to  a  definite  time  of  the  action  or  to  an  agent. 
In  this  case  the  participle  precedes  its  leading  noun.  It 
occurs  of  practically  all  transitive  verbs  construed  with  a 
plain  object  {a)  or  a  prepositional  object  {b),  as  well  as  of 
a  number  of  mutative  intransitives  {c).  The  participle  can 
also  express  a  possible,  not  an  actual,  result  \,d). 

a.  The    only    sign    that    she  ever  gave  of  disturbance 


32  VERBS 

was  a  little  clucking  noise  that  she  made  in  her  mouth 
like  an  aroused  hen. 

Walpole,  Fortitude  I  ch.  3.  p.  27. 

.  .  .  inquired  the  shepherd,  who  found  some  difficulty 
in  keeping  the  conversation  in  the  desired  channel. 

Hardy,  Madding  Crowd  ch,  8,  p.  6Z. 

So  Sophia,  faced  with  the  shut  door  of  the  bedroom, 
went  down  to  the  parlour  by  the  shorter  route. 

Bennett,  Old  W.  T.  I.  ch.  2  §   i. 

Constance,  alone  in  the  parlour,  stood  expectant  by 
the  set  tea-table.  id.  ib.  II  ch.  6  §  i. 

The  pathetic  parts  of  The  Old  Curiosity  Shop  are  as 
poor  in  understood  and  artistically  re-created  experience 
as   The  Rosary  —  indeed,  I  think  they  are  even  poorer. 

Huxley,  Vulgarity  p.  59. 

b.  Stanley  had  completely  seen  through  the  talked-of 
revival  of  English  agriculture. 

Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.  4. 

Crackenhill    Hall    had    always    been    one  of  the  most 
talked-of  farms  in  the  parish  of  Bruisyard. 

Freeman,  Joseph  ch.  2  p.  6, 

c.  The  returned  mistress  was  point  by  point  resuming 
knowledge  and  control  of  that  complicated  machine  — 
her  household.  Bennett,  Old.  W.  T.  I.  ch.  2  §  2. 

His  mysterious  friend,  the  escaped  desperado  Rob  Roy. 

Camb.  Hist.  Engl.  Lit.   12,   18. 
Dr.    Verdon    will    leave    the    service   of  the  abdicated 
monarch  at  the  end  of  the  cure  at  Vichy.     Daily  Mail. 

The  Western  world  listened  impatiently  before  the 
war  to  the  tittle-tattle  of  a  few  travelled  dreamers. 

The  decayed  officer,  by  degrees,  came  up  alongside 
his  fellow-wayfarer. 

Hardy,  Return  of  the  Native  I  ch.  2. 
Denis   de    Beaulieu    was    not  yet  two-and-twenty,  but 
he    counted    himself  a  grown   man,  and  a  very  accom- 
plished cavalier  into  the  bargain. 

Stevenson,  Sel.  Short  St.  II,  334. 

d.  Such  tracts  were  originally  covered  by  woods   and 


PARTICIPLE  33 

morasses,    into    which    they    had    no    wish   to  break  so 
long  as  more  easily  cleared  ground  was  available  i). 

Oman,  Engl.  Conq.  p.  7. 

46.  The  participle  in  this  construction  may  be  accompanied 
by  an  adverb  expressing  the  time  or  manner  of  the  action 
or  occurrence  leading  up  to  it. 

What  is  there  about  realising  things  —  old,  often  told, 
believed  in  things  —  that  stirs  such  a  deep  content.'' 
Cotes,  Cinderella  ch.   16  p.   182. 
Aulus    Plautius    was    left    in    command   of  the  newly 
acquired  province.  Oman,  Engl.  Conq.  p.  64  f. 

Mr.  Gregory  shows  us  in  a  series  of  fascinating    and 
lightly  written  chapters  the  thinkers  at  work. 

Times  Ed.  S.  4/7,    16. 

47.  It  has  been  stated  that  the  intransitive  participle 
as  a  verbal  adjective  occurs  of  mutative  verbs  only,  and 
of  these  only  of  a  hmited  number.  For  this  reason  some 
further  examples  may  not  be  out  of  place:  a  departed 
guest,  a  withered  flower,  a  retired  business-man,  a  faded 
material,  a  fallen  dictator,  a  vanished  civilization,  absconded 
debtors,  an  eloped  pair,  an  expired  lease;  the  ground 
is  carpeted  with  lately-fallen  needles  of  a  chestnut-red 
(Hudson,  Hampshire  Days  ch.  1  p.  2). 

As  the  compound  intransitives  are  often  mutative  when 
the  simple  verbs  are  not  (see  304  ff.  on  aspect),  we  frequently 
find  such  compound  participles:  a  runaway  horse.  Also 
in  this  quotation: 

She   woke   next   day   fairly  at  ease  in  her  mind,  but 
,  feeling  as  one  does  after  any  near-rnn  escape. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  9  p.  d>B. 

48.  The  distinction  of  transitive  and  intransitive  participles, 
though  possibly  useful,  should  not  be  considered  as  absolute. 


1)  Compare  72  on  the  participial  adjectives  in  -able. 
KnuisiNGA,  Handbook  II.  Accidence  and  Syntax.  1. 


34  VERBS 

The  very  meaning  of  the  participle  makes  the  distinction 
of  far  less  importance  than  in  the  verb  used  as  the  leading 
member  of  the  predicate.  It  is  often  impossible  as  well  as 
meaningless  to  distinguish  between  the  two  classes,  as  in  the 
following  cases. 

Only  she  said  ever  so  often  that  her  adopted  parent  said 
for  Heaven's  sake  stop,  or  he  should  write  the  word  in 
his  letters,      de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  26  p.  281. 

"Mind  your  own  business!"  was  the  j«a//^d/ rejoinder. 
Patterson,  Stephen  Compton,  p.  4. 

Since  the  settlement  of  the  threatened  trouble  with 
the  spinners  Steve  had  done  an  unusual  amount  of  public 
speaking.  ib.   135. 

Even  in  the  participles  from  verbs  that  are  always  consi- 
dered to  be  transitive  some  are  more  distinctly  expressive  of 
an  external  action,  whereas  others  rather  express  the  result 
of  an  occurrence,  like  the  participles  of  intransitive  verbs. 
It  will  be  found  that  in  the  quotations  of  45  the  first  of  each 
section  are  mostly  suggestive  of  the  result  of  an  action, 
and  that  the  later  ones  express  the  result  of  an  occurrence.  See 
also  50  fif.  on  the  verbal  adjectives  following  the  leading  noun. 

49.  A  special  class  of  intransitive  participles  are  those 
connected  with  verbs  such  as  to  confess  which  require  what 
may  be  called  a  predicate  to  complete  their  meaning: /z<?  c^w- 
fessed  that  he  had  murdered  the  victim  or  he  confessed  to 
have  murdered  the  victim,  whence  the  participial  group :  tJie 
confessed  murderer. 

She  took  a  pen  and  began  a  letter  to  a  dear  friend^ 
Lucy  Darleton,  a  promised  bridesmaid.  Meredith. 

The    whole    world    is    wondering    at    our   stupidity  in" 
being   thus    misled  by  a  man  who  is  an  admitted  rebeL 

English  Review  i). 

1)  Poutsma,  Grammar  V,  546.  He  also  illustrates  the  alleged  conspira- 
tors, the  reputed  house  of  the  Virgin  Mary  at  Nazareth,  an  avowed 
admirer,  a  declared  lover,  a  professed  cook. 


PARTICIPLE  35 

50.  The  attributive  participle  must  sometimes  follow 
its  leading  noun,  because  it  is  accompanied  by  adjuncts 
that  cannot  precede  an  adjective.  The  same  applies  to 
most  participles  from  verbal  groups  of  the  type  to  pack 
up,  add  to,  etc.  (see  64  on  groups  with  up).  The  reason 
for  post-position  may  also  be  in  the  meaning  of  the  par- 
ticiple itself:  when  it  distinctly  suggests  the  time  of  the 
action  or  occurrence,  or  the  agent,  post-position  is  neces- 
sary. The  two  cases  are  frequently  found  combined  for 
a  prepositional  "adjunct  may  express  the  agent  (especially 
with  by),  or  the  time  or  manner.  On  wordorder  in  these 
groups,  see  also  vol.  3. 

As  in  the  case  of  pre-position  the  participle  is  most 
frequently  formed  from  a  transitive  verb  [a).  Occasionally 
the  participle  forms  part  of  a  verbal  group  {b).  The  par- 
ticiple may  be  connected  with  its  noun  by  a  conjunction  {c). 

a.  Her  three  years  with  Pitt,  passed  in  the  very  centre 
of  splendid  power,  were  brilliant  and  exciting. 

Lytton  Strachey,  Vict.  p.  282. 

On  the  controversial  points  touched  07i  in  this  volume, 
I  have  sought  to  state  the  pros  and  cons  as  fairly  as 
I  could.  Henderson,  Ballad  p.   VII. 

On  January  23rd  Mr.  Bonar  Law  asked  a  question  of 
the  Speaker  about  the  effect  of  certain  amendments 
given  notice  of  by  the  Government  to  abolish  the  occu- 
pation franchise.  Everyman,  7/2,   13. 

The  white  house,  timbered  with  dark  beams  in  true 
Worcestershire  fashion,  and  added-to  from  time  to  time  .  .  . 
GalsVi^orthy,  Freelands  ch.  4  p.  39. 

He  wished  to  raise  the  class  at  the  expense  of  indi- 
viduals rather  than  individuals  at  the  expense  of  the 
class.  What  was  more,  he  was  ready  at  once  to  be  the 
first  unit  sacrificed.  Hardy,  Native  III  ch.  2  p.  21 1. 

b.  The  shadowy  form  seen  by  Venn  to  part  from 
Wildeve  in  the  porch,  and  quickly  withdraw  into  the 
house,  was  Thomasin's. 

Hardy,  Return  of  the  Native  II  ch.  8. 


S6  VERBS 

c.  However  great  in  actual  practice  the  king's  power 
may  have  been,  there  was  always  a  central  assembly, 
whether  called  Witenagcmot  or  the  Great  Council,  the 
members  of  which  were  never  dependent  for  their  right 
upon  the  mere  personal  will  of  the  sovereign. 

Constitut.  Essays  p.   159. 

51.  When  a  verb  can  be  construed  with  two  objects 
the  participle  is  rarely  found  as  an  attributive  adjunct  to 
the  personal  noun  (the  indirect  object),  and  never  except 
in  post-position,  because  there  is  always  a  retained  object. 

The  labourers,  stripped  of  their  ancient  rights  and 
their  ancient  possessions,  refused  a  minimum  wage  and 
allotments,  were  given  instead  a  universal  system  of 
pauperism.  Hammond,  Village  Labourer  p.   141. 

52.  Post-position  of  intransitive  participles  is  unusual 
except  when  they  are  accompanied  by  prepositional  ad- 
juncts {a)  or  such  as  emphasize  the  verbal  character  of 
the  participle  (^). 

a.  During  the  greater  part  of  the  afternoon  she  had 
been  entrancing  herself  by  imagining  the  fascination 
which  must  attend  a  man  come  direct  from  beautiful 
Paris.  Hardy,  Native  II  ch.  3  p.   140. 

He  was  a  man  of  rank  sprung  from  one  of  the  first 
families  in  Portugal. 

b.  The  trade  unions,  on  the  other  hand,  demand  that 
the  number  of  hours  worked  weekly  shall  be  reduced 
to  44  .  .  . 

Times  Trading  and  Eng.  Suppl.  22/3,   1930  p.  29. 

53.  We  have  seen  that  participles  of  transitive  verbs  may 
express  the  result  of  an  occurrence  as  well  as  an  action. 
This  applies  equally  to  participles  following  their  noun.  Thus 
English   not  only  uses  killed  in  the  case  of  a  man  killed  by 


PARTICIPLE 


17 


a   burglar   but   also   in   men   killed  in   a   skirmish,    or   in  a 
motor  accident '). 

54,  Like  most  other  adjectives,  the  participles  can  also 
be  used  predicatively,  both  as  a  nominal  predicate  (with 
the  verbs  to  stand,  become,  get,  be:  see  vol.  3  on  Sentence- 
Structure)  and  as  a  predicative  adjunct  to  an  object.  In 
both  functions  we  can  observe  the  difference  of  meaning 
that  is  formally  expressed  by  pre-position  and  post-position 
in  the  case  of  attributive  participles,  but  we  shall  also  find 
that  the  predicative  use  leads  by  insensible  stages  to  the 
use  of  the  participle  as  a  member  of  a  purely  verbal  group, 

55.  The  participles  of  transitive  verbs  are  used  as 
nominal  predicates  to  express  the  meaning  defined  in  45  (a)  ; 
they  may  also  suggest  the  time  or  the  agent  (3),  as  illustrated 
in  50  for  the  attributive  participle.  As  these  two  meanings 
of  the  predicative  participle  are  not  formally  distinguished 
it  is  often  vain  to  attempt  a  rigid  classification.  The  par- 
ticiple of  intransitive  verbs  is  not  frequent  in  this  function  (c). 

a.  Then,  when  the  bag  was  packed,  he  sat  on  the  bed, 
swung  his  legs,  and  thought  about  everything. 

Walpole,  Fortitude  I  ch.   lO  §  4  p,   123, 

b.  Now  that  the  cab  is  so  far  from  the  door,  even  if 
she  spoke  to  him,  she  would  not  stand  committed  to 
anything.       de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  3  p.  21. 

He  seemed  to  go  out  of  his  way  to  get  hurt. 

Punch  31/3,   15. 
And   to   a  boy  of  twelve  years  a  beating  is  forgotten 
with    amazing    quickness,    especially    if  it   is  a  week  of 


1)  A  comparison  with  Dutch  is  instructive:  the  transitive  meaning  is 
expressed  by  doodgescholen,  the  intransitive  meaning  in  the  case  of  a  mili- 
tary action  is  rendered  by  gesneuveld,  otherwise  by  omgekomen.  This  is  an 
instructive  example  suggesting  that  a  'complete'  grammar  would  include 
a  complete  dictionary. 


38  VERBS 

holiday  and  there  have  been  other  beatings  not  so  very- 
long  before.  Walpole,  Fortitude  I  ch.  3  p.  26. 

Without  it  lay  many  large  gardens  and  some  open 
meadow-land,  and  part  of  that  meadow  still  remains 
unbidlt  upon.  Athenaeum. 

c.  The  sun  is  set\  let's  go  home. 

The  guests  are  all  gone. 

Suppose   we  take  the  adagio  now  —  if  you're  rested. 
de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.   1 1  p.  99. 

She  was  resolved  that,  cost  what  it  mighty  Charley 
must  be  banished  from  the  Cottage. 

TroUope,  Three  Clerks  p.  349. 

He  is  deeply  read  in  the  writers,  ancient  and  modern, 
who  have  treated  on  the  subject. 

56.  The  participle  of  transitive  verbs  is  found 
in  a  construction  that  is  formally  identical  with  the 
one  that  has  just  been  described  as  a  nominal  pre- 
dicate, without  expressing  the  same  meaning.  The  group 
may  have  the  character  of  a  phenomenon-word,  like  a 
predicative  verb,  so  that  the  participle,  instead  of  denoting 
a  quality  or  state  as  the  result  of  an  action  or  occurrence, 
denotes  the  occurrence  {a)  or  action  (5)  itself.  As  the 
construction  of  the  participle  with  to  be  is  fully  illustrated 
in  the  chapter  on  Auxiliaries,  examples  with  other  verbs 
will  be  chiefly  given  here. 

a.  Your  shoe  has  come  tmdone  and  I  shall  be  finished 
by  the  time  you  have  done  it  up. 

Collinson,  Spoken  English  p.  38. 

The  monastic  system  became  quickly  spread  over  the 
north  and  midlands.  Wakeman,  Introd.  p.  48. 

A  taste  for  Italian  and  classic  literature  became  widely 
diffused  among  the  many  monasteries  which  sprang  up 
during  this  century  among  the  Northern  conquerors. 
Spence,  English  Church,  p.  21. 

It  is,  however,  an  excellent  thing  that  bicycles  should 
be  getting  called  simply  zvheels.      Abercrombie,  p.  9, 


PARTICIPLE  39 

One  of  our  men  got  sent  down  (i.e.  away  from  the 
University  for  good)  ^). 

She'll  try  and  get  some  shrimps,  but  everything  in 
the  way  of  fish  gets  se?it  up  to  London. 

Sweet,  Spoken  Engl.  p.  84. 
It    was    as   an    experiment    to   see  how  much  I  could 
really   recollect    if  I  once  began  to  try,  and  then  I  got 
led  on.  De  Morgan,   Vance,  ch.    10. 

The  last  time  I  got  (was)  caught  in  a  shower,  I  hadn't 
any  mackintosh  on  and  caught  a  very  bad  cold  ^). 

Collinson,  Spoken  English  p.  34. 
That   young   lassie    will    get  described  as  plump  some 
day,  if  she  doesn't  take  care. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.   5   p.  44. 
b.  Papal    claims  became  more  and  more  acquiesced  in 
by  the  nation  and  cojmived  at  by  the  king. 

Wakeman,  Introd.  p.   151- 
Well,  it  was  time  Brown  got  married. 

Collinson,  Sp.  Engl.  p.  66. 

Good  and  readable  as  these  addresses  are,  we  should 

like    to    see    those    which    deal    with   these  larger  topics 

gathered  into  a  single  smaller  volume,  which  at  a  moderate 

•        price    might  become  widely  read  by  the  people  of  both 

countries.  Times  Lit.    16/4,    14  p.    183/2. 

Nolly  believed  all  these  statements,  and  wasn't  hoaxing. 
He  had  been  told  them  by  others,  Big  Beys,  and  passed 
them  on  to  me.         de  Morgan,  Vance  ch.    11   p.    104. 

The  gong  was  given  a  prominent  position  in  the  bare 
hall.  Mackenzie,  Guy  and  Pauline  p.  345. 

57.  The  distinction  of  the  verbal  groups  discussed  into 
such  as  express  an  occurrence  and  such  as  express  an  activity 
is  not  shown  by  formal  means.  The  interpretation  of  the 
quotations  in  the  preceding  section,  therefore,  can  hardly 
be  expected  to  meet  with  unreserved  approval.    Activity 


1)  The  speaker  was  the  'Mr.  Venables'  familiar  to  several  generations  of 
Oxford  students  and  to  readers  of  Sinister  Street. 

2)  The  alternative  got  (was)  is  the  author's. 


40  VERBS 

seems  to  be  suggested  when  the  agent  is  mentioned  (in 
an  adjunct  with  by),  but  it  should  be  remembered  that  an 
adjunct  with  by  may  also  denote  means.  We  necessarily 
seem  to  have  activity  expressed  when  the  verb  is  quahfied 
by  an  adjunct  characterizing  the  action,  as  in  the  following 
cases. 

The  top  was  reached  by  means  of  a  strong  cord. 

The  top  of  the  mountain  was  reached  by  ten  o'clock. 

The  top  was  reached  under  the  greatest  difficulties. 

58.  Verbal  groups  similar  to  those  with  the  transitive 
participles  are  rarely  found  with  intransitive  participles. 
The  use  is  restricted  to  a  very  small  number  of  mutative 
intransitives,  nearly  all  expressing  movement. 

His  parents  were  growji  old.  — 

"Look  to  your  safety",  he  shouted.  "The  lions  are 
got  loose."  — 

The  meadows  are  so  browned  that  only  the  most 
deeply  rooted  plants,  such  as  burnet,  show  any  greenery. 
Even  the  permanent  vetches  are  become  rather  flower- 
crops  than  green  crops.  Daily  Mail. 

See  also  below  on  the  auxiliary  to  have. 

59.  The  participle  as  a  verbal  adjective  can  be  used 
with  verbs  construed  with  an  object  and  a  predicative 
adjunct;   see   the   chapter  on  Sentence-Structure  in  vol.  3. 

I  like  to  have  you  about  the  house  —  you  keep  the 
lodgers  contented  and  the  babies  quiet,  i) 

Walpole  Fortitude  ch.  5  p.  200. 
We  found  him  much  improved. 

Professor  Pearl's  comments  are  nearly  all  worth  atten- 
tive   reading,    especially    on  the  less  known  books.     On 
some  he  thinks  no  comment  needed  —  for  instance,  the 
"Origin  of  Species". 
Times  Lit.  23/6,   1927,  p.  442/3. 

1)  Note  that  contented  is  an  adjective,  not  a  participle  (56  ff.). 


PARTICIPLE  41 

He    told    him  to  put  his  trolley  somewhere  else,  and 
not  leave  it  stood  in  the  orfice  i)  door. 

de  Morgan,  Vance  ch.  i. 

60.  A  formally  identical  group  of  object  and  participle 
is  found  in  many  cases  when  the  participle  does  not 
express  the  meaning  of  a  verbal  adjective,  and  the  noun 
or  pronoun  is  only  an  apparent  object  of  the  preceding 
verb,  and  really  serves  only  as  the  subject  of  the  verbal 
meaning  expressed  by  the  participle.  This  apparent  object 
and  participle  is  used : 

(1)  with  a  few  verbs  expressing  a  perception  (physical 
or  mental) :  to  feel,  hear,  see. 

(2)  with  some  verbs  expressing  a  meaning  that  may  be 
defined,  though  somewhat  vaguely,  as  *to  experience': 
have,  have  known,  find,  leave.  For  to  have,  see  also 
Auxiliaries. 

(3)  with  some  verbs  expressing  'to  cause':  get,  make; 
and  the  verbs  of  will :  to  order ^  command,  etc. 

(4)  with  some  verbs  expressing  liking  or  preference: 
to  wish,  like. 

a.  In  another  moment  I  felt  myself  lifted. 

Van  Neck,  Adv.  Engl.  Prose  p.   126. 
The    beginner    may    well    feel  himself  aggrieved  when 
he     finds     himself    required   to    know    that    the    letters 
'pro  v.v,'  must  be  read  'pro  vinis  venditis',  and  he  may 
even  meet  with  worse  puzzles  than  this. 

Eng.  Hist.  Rev.  vol.  43  (1928)  p.  98. 
He    drew    several    deep    breaths,    having    heard   deep 
breathing  recommended  by  his  wife's  doctor  2). 

Galsworthy,  Cara  an  p.  203  f. 


4)  A  spelling  to  denote  [ofis]  office. 

2)    It    will    be    noticed  that  the  leading  verb  in  most  of  the  examples  is 
used    predicatively,    or,  as  here,  in  a  free  adjunct.     But  other  uses  are  not 


42  VERBS 

She  has  seen  her  brother  pointed  out  unmistakeably  as 
the  tailor-fellow.       Meredith,  Harrington  ch.  14  p.  143. 

I  have  seen  it  stated  that  his  height  was  5  feet 
10  inches.  G.  W.  E.  Russell. 

Rosalind  saw  him  stopped  as  he  walked  through  the 
groups  that  were  lingering  silently  for  a  chance  of  good 
news.  de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  46  p.  413. 

I  witnessed  several  struggles  with  the  &%^,  but  at  last, 
in  spite  of  my  watchfulness,  I  did  not  see  it  ejected  ^). 
W.  H.  Hudson,  Hampshire  Days  ch.   i,  p.   18. 

b.  I've  known  him  taken  for  a  lord. 

Meredith,  Harrington  ch.  22  p.  229. 
As    early    as  the  legislation  of  Athelstan  we  find  the 
sheriff  give^i  a  yet  wider  sphere  of  action. 

Constit,  Essays  p.   129. 
My   position  is  peculiar.    (Yes,  the  tea  was  all  right.) 
I  find  myself  requested  to  be  reasonable  .  . . 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  47  p.   521. 
Jasmine    found    herself   confronted   by    a    very  bright 
pair    of   eyes    and   offered  that  very  plump  white  hand. 
Mackenzie,  Rich  Relatives  ch.  7  p.   192. 
His  victory  left  him  bewildered,  amazed,  but  ambitious 
to  seize  opportunity,  confident  in  his  ability  to  succeed. 
Botsford,  Engl  Soc,   i8th  Cent.  p.  3. 

c.  He  had  always  said  that  the  difficulty,  so  far  as 
the  diplomatist  was  concerned,  was  not  to  tell  the  truth, 
but  to  get  it  believed  when  one  had  told  it. 

Sir  Edward  Grey,  reported  Times   13/3,  '14. 
Curious,  how  things  still  got  themselves  noticed  when 
all  her  faculties  were  centred  in  gazing  at  his  face. 

Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.  29  p.  369. 


impossible;  in  the  following  case  the  attributive  participle  is  the  leading  verb. 

The  garden  was  of  the  grassy,  shady  kind,  often  seen  attached  to  old 
houses  in  provincial  towns.  Eliot,  Clerical  Life  ^Janet  ch.  7). 

1)  This  is  instructive  with  regard  to  the  character  of  the  participle: 
it  must  express  the  occurrence,  for  this  is  contrasted  with  the  state  or 
condition  which  was  the  result,  and  which  the  author  did  observe.  Seel 31 » 


PARTICIPLE  43 

At  every  place  we  went  to,  I  took  care  to  do  something 
that   would  get  us  talked  about  for  the  rest  of  the  day. 
Chesterton,  Innoc.  of  F.  Brown  p.  22f. 

In  that  case,  as  soon  as  ever  there  is  a  vacant  seat, 
he  takes  the  opportunity  to  get  himself  elected. 

Gill,  Government  p.   io8. 
Art    schools  are  making  their  influence  felt  and  their 
possibilities  recognized.  Times  Ed.  S.   5/S;  20. 

They  give  an  impression  of  such  feebleness,  beneath 
the  bluster,  as  a  person  who  shouts  to  make  himself 
obeyed.  Engl.  Rev.  Oct,    1913. 

Winnie  made  it  U7iderstood  that  the  present  engaged 
her  attention.  Pett  Ridge,  Garland  ch.   13   p.   221. 

H.  H.  1)  pp.  122,  123,  makes  Cumbra  slain  by  Sigbert 
because  he  remonstrated  with  him  in  the  name  of  the 
people  for  his  misgovernment. 

Plummer,  Saxon  Chron.  II  p.  44f. 
The     Queen,     displeased     with    the    play,    ordered    it 
stopped.  Wallace,  English  Drama  p.   106. 

d.  Yes,  it  was  an  old  story,  he  said,  and  he  wanted 
it  told  again  by  someone  else. 

Hudson,  Hampshire  Days  ch.   i   p,    14. 
I  don't  know  exactly  what  I  do  want  done. 

Carolyn  Wells,   Vicky  Van  ch.  7  p.    106. 
To-day    is    Vicky's    birthday.    —   She  didn't  want  it 
known,  lest  the  guests  should  bring  gifts. 

ib.  ch.  4  p.  52. 
He  wants  the  Arabs  departed'^). 

Times  Lit.  23/12,  20. 
Mr.  Osborne  wished  a  tree  cut  down. 

Gaskell,  W.  and  D.  I,  ch.  8. 
Salley   dear,   your    mother   does    not  tell  you  because 
she  wishes  the  whole  thing  buried  and  forgotten. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.   16  p.   165. 


1)  i.e.  the  historian  Henry  of  Huntingdon. 

2)  Examples   of   intransitive    participles    (of  the  mutatives  only,  as  in  all 
the  other  constructions  treated)  are  rare. 


44  VERBS 

She  could  not  wish  it  changed. 

Hichens,  Ambition  ch.  9  p.  98. 
And    yet    on    that    evening    he    had  entered  into  his 
great  friendship  with  Mrs.  Mansfield.  He  could  not  wish 
that  annulled.  ib.  ch.   11  p.   I2i. 

Monkley  told  the  Baron  that  he  did  not  wish  anything 
said  about  Sylvester's  father. 

Mackenzie,  Sylvia  p.  6Z. 

P  61.    The  participle   of  transitive  verbs  is  often 

. ,.  used  in  free  adjuncts,  both  as  a  related  (a)  and  as 

an  absolute  participle  (^),  including  the  prepositional 
constructions  {c).  In  both  of  these  constructions  the  participle 
expresses  a  state  or  condition  which  is  considered  as  accom- 
panying the  predicative  verb  rather  than  as  quahfying  a 
noun  (or  pronoun).  It  thus  has  the  meaning  of  the  verbal 
adjectives  without  sharing  their  syntactic  function.  The 
participles  of  the  mutative  intransitives  are  occasionally  used 
in  the  case  under  a. 

a.  Once  see^i  it  can  never  be  forgotten. 

Mair,  Engl.  Lit.  p.  81. 
Left    in    the    positions    which    they  i)    had    originally 
occupied,  the  tribes  might  have  retained  these  institutions 
unaltered  for  centuries. 

Gardiner  and  MuUinger,  Introd.  p.   18. 
For  a  few  dizzy  minutes  they  sat  together  and  jarred. 
Unrestrained  by  Margery's  presence,  Frank  would  have 
been  rude  to  Mrs.  Rowlands,  .  .  . 

C.  D.  Jones,  Everlasting  Search  ch.   i  p.   11. 
But   whether  considered  with  awe,  or  mocked,  or  sum- 
marily dismissed,  the  examiner  is  loved  by  none. 

Times  Ed.  S.   11/7,   18. 
Arrived  2X  the  spot,  the  party  lost  no  time  in  getting 
to  work.  Athenaeum,  7/10,  11. 


1)  Viz.  the  Jutes,  Saxons,  and  Angles. 


PARTICIPLE  45 

And  now,  returned  home  from  a  long  sea-voyage,  he 
was  coming  to  visit  my  mother, 

Mary  Lamb  in  Sel.  Short  Stories  II  p,   i. 

b.  The  reading  ended,  the  Prince  took  the  oath  of 
allegiance,  and  signed  the  declaration. 

Times  W.  22/2,   18. 

Yet,  all  deductions  and  qualifications  admitted,  Words- 
worth's essays  on  his  own  art  are  valuable  and  instructive 
reading.  Magnus,  Primer  of  Wordsworth,  p.   166. 

Morning  traffic  over,  and  the  western  part  of  Kentish 
Town  provided  with  greens  and  fruit,  and  the  midday 
meal  cleared  away,  Mrs.  Enefer  said,  with  relish,  "Now 
then,  what's  the  programme  for  the  day?" 

Pett  Ridge,  Garland. 

The  limitations  of  her  materials  taken  into  account, 
she  has  produced  a  most  interesting  and  always  tactful 
biography. 

The  song  ended,  and  as  we  went  our  way  i),  I  said  — 
"There,  Brum,  what  do  you  think  of  that  ?" 

Davies,  Super-Tramp  ch.  6  p.  40. 
The  light  of  his  faith  quite  put  out,  and  his  affections 
made   desolate,    he    had    clung   with  all  the  force  of  his 
nature  to  his  work  and  his  money. 

Eliot,  Silas  Marner  ch.  5. 
But,  yielded  all  that  obeisance,  they  did  a  good  deal 
for  the  town.  Gaskell,  Wives  I  ch.   i  p.   10. 

Given  a  king,  a  new  order  of  nobility  was  sure  to 
arise  —  nobility  by  service.  Stubbs,  Lect.  p.  8. 

They  enjoy  learning  it,  given  sympathetic  teachers  2). 

Times  Ed.  S.  27/2,   19. 

c.  Even  now,  with  this  conversion  accomplished,  we 
should  be  immensely  strengthened.       Times  W.  2/8,  15. 

The  streets  of  the  town  were  deserted,  clean,  smelling 
of  the  fields,  hay-carts,  and  primroses,  with  the  darkness 
broken  by  dim  lamps  and  a  slender  moon. 

Walpole,  Fortitude  I  ch.   10  §  4  p.   124  f. 


\)  Note  the  coordination  of  the  free  adjunct  and  the  clause. 
2)  Observe  the  wordorder  of  the  last  three  quotations. 


46  VERBS 

With  the  imagination  thus  aroused,  there  came  an 
insistent  and  consistent  demand  for  inteUigent  travel  and 
for  authentic  accounts  of  experiences. 

Botsford,  Engl.  Soc.   i8th  Cent.  p.   17. 

Only  with  the  last  corner  turned,  the  last  step  taken, 
the  explorer  might  find  that  he  was  looking  down  into 
the  gulf  of  a  crater.      Lytton  Strachey,  Vict.  p.  273. 

My  Father  was  often  away  all  night  without  notice 
given,  and  my  Mother  postponed  belief  in  disaster  quite 
contentedly.  Morgan,  Vance  ch.   15. 

But,  after  all  said,  it  was  in  his  dealings  with  children 
that  the  best  and  sweetest  side  of  his  personality  was 
manifested.  Galsworthy,  Caravan  p.    159. 

For  examples  of  verbal  groups  consisting  of  a  parti- 
ciple with  being  and  having,  see  the  sections  on  the 
verbal  ing  (128). 

62.  The  participle  in  a  free  adjunct  may  have  the  un- 
doubted character  of  a  verbal  adjective,  just  as  non-verbal 
adjectives  occur  in  this  construction.  In  the  following  quotation 
the  association  of  meaning  between  stained  and  the  verbal 
stem  is  so  slight  that  it  might  just  as  well  be  taken  for  a 
derivative  from  the  noun. 

He  entered  the  room  in  his  miner's  dress,  his  hand 
and  face  stained  with  dust,  his  hair  matted  and  hanging 
over  his  eyes.  Shorthouse,  Inglesant  ch.   12. 

63.  It  has  been  shown  that  the  participle  in  predicative 
use  and  in  free  adjuncts  is  frequently  a  phenomenon -word 
rather  than  a  verbal  adjective.  But  all  these  constructions 
are  restricted  to  the  transitive  and  the  mutative  intransitive 
verbs.  The  participle  can  also  form  a  purely  verbal  group 
with  the  auxiliary  to  have  to  express  what  is  called  the 
perfect  aspect;  in  this  construction  all  participles  can  be 
used  including  those  of  the  non-mutative  intransitives  such 


PARTICIPLE  47 

as  ruHy  wait,  sit,  sleep,  talk,  kneel.  The  use  of  the  perfect 
is  fully  treated  in  the  sections  on  the  auxiliary  have. 


Compound  Participles 

64,  The  participles,  both  the  distinctly  verbal  ones  and 
the  participial  adjectives  treated  in  6^  ff.,  often  enter  into 
composition,  a  noun  or  adjective  or  adverb  forming  the  first 
element :  a  bed-ridden  patient,  soberly  conducted  people.  These 
compounds  are  used  attributively  and  predicatively  and  naturally 
resemble  the  purely  nominal  compounds  which  are  formed 
in  the  same  way,  such  as  dark-eyed  (see  vol.  3).  The 
compounds  with  the  negative  prefix  un-  are  especially  fre- 
quent; also  a  number  of  participles  from  compound  verbs 
with  iip. 

Many  time-expired  veterans  settled  on  allotments  in 
the  surrounding  country-side. 

Oman,  Engl,  Conq.  p.  62, 

At  the  head  of  the  steps  up  to  the  wide  open-throzvn 
double  doors  stood  the  beaming  group  of  uncle,  aunt 
and  cousins.  E.  Everett  Green,  The  Temptation 

of  Mary  Lister  VI,  p,    loi. 

And  all  the  while  learned  carriage-folk  poured  in^ 
mothers,  daughters,  well-dined  fathers,  young  men  with 
long  hair.  Academy,  25/3  99. 

In  the  corner  a  French  window  opens  on  to  a  snotv- 
bound  garden.      Clemence  Dane,  Bill  of  Divorcement, 

Brit,  PI,  p,  647. 

Thunderstruck  and  horrorstricken,  the  Doctor  shook 
off  the  other's  touch,        Buchanan,  That  Winter  Night. 

The  reason  why  we  find  both  forms  in  the  above  quotation, 
apart  from  rhythm,  is  probably  in  the  first  place  that  repe- 
tition of  the  same  form  would  be  absurd.  But  it  may  also 
be  noted  that  the  participle  in  thunder str tick  is  more  closely 


48  VERBS 

connected  in  meaning  with  the  verbal  stem  (struck  by  thunder) 
than    in    the    case    of  horror-stricken  (stricken  with  horror). 

His  desperate  resolution  in  covering  the  retreat  of  his 
panic-stricken  soldiers.       Cont,  Rev.  Oct.  1930.  p.  499. 
Also  panic-struck. 

Air-strnck  heiress  in  tears.  Miss  Boll  refused  per- 
mission to  fly  Atlantic  in  Miss  Columbia  i). 

Star  headline,  6/9,  1927. 
Wedderburn's  dim-litten  room.  2). 

Sinister  Street  p.  y^'/. 
The  complete  understanding  between  his  mother  and 
father  excited,  too,  his  unstinted  admiration. 

Sidney  Lee,  in  Engl.   19th  Cent.  II  p.  2. 
Somewhat  desolate  and  uncared  for  in  appearance. 

NED. 
Mr.  Utterson's  nerves,  at  this  unlooked-for  termination, 
gave  a  jerk.  Stevenson,  Dr.  Jekyll,  p.  70. 

She  tended  him  through  a  series  of  ?/«/z^^r^-^/ illnesses. 

Thackeray,  Vanity  Fair  ch.  6^. 
It    was    a     pretty    little     house,     in     very    charming 
country  —  in  an  untravelled  corner  of  Normandy,  near 
the  sea.  Sel.  Short  Stories  II  396. 

...  of  later  travels  as  a  little  maiden,  by  diligence  to 
Pau  and  the  then  undiscovered  Pyrenees,  to  Montpellier, 
and  a  Nice  as  yet  unspoiled. 

Galsworthy,  Caravan  p.   165. 
A  short,  clean-shaved  man. 

Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.  22  p.  265. 
His  dark  clean-shaved  face.  ib.  ch.  8  p.  96. 

His  broad  unshaven  face.  ib.  ch.  24  p.  289. 

His  brown  unsJiaven  cheeks.  ib.  ch.  7  p.  74. 

The    difference    of  form    in   the   last  case  is  probably  the 
result  of  the  more  distinctly  verbal  character  of  shaved  when 


1)  In  this  case  struck  is  the  only  form  that  is  possible,  because  stricken 
invariably  refers  to  unfavourable  circumstances. 

2)  This  form  is  quite  exceptional. 


ADJECTIVES   AS   OCCASIONAL   PARTICIPLES  49 

compared    with   unshaven,  which  is  differentiated  in  meaning 
and  expresses:    'without   a   beard    or   moustache'.     Similarly 

zmwasJien  : 

Grimy  hands  and  unwasJien  faces. 

Walpole,  Fort.  I  ch.   i  p.  4, 
A  got-up  woman;  locked-up  capital;  a  made-up  tale; 
fully  paid-up  shares;  a  put-up  job. 


Adjectives  as  Occasional  Participles 

65.  Some  adjectives  are  occasionally  used  as  verbal 
adjectives  although  they  are  not  connected  with  any  living 
verbal  system  at  all  {a)  or  connected  only  by  means  of  an 
ending  that  is  not  a  verbal  suffix  in  English  {b).  The  verbal 
character  may  be  shown  by  the  situation  only,  as  in  the 
cases  under  a,  but  also  by  the  adjuncts  and  by  wordorder, 
as  in  the  adjectives  in  -able  and  occasionally  those  in  -e7it\ 
see  vol.  3  on  wordorder  in  attributive  groups. 

Compare  also   157. 

a.  Augustine's  brother  and  father  were  at  the  front, 
and  Madame's  dead  brother  had  been  a  soldier  in  the 
Crimean  War.  Galsworthy,   Caravan  p.    168. 

But  from  that  time  I  never  ceased  pondering  on  the 
sad  story  of  my  dead  mamma. 

Sel.  Short  St.  II  p.  4. 

.  . .  but  by  some  helpful  participation  in  those  public 
responsibilities  which  his  dead  father  had  shared  with 
the  Queen.  Sidney  Lee,  Engl.   19th  Cent.  II  p.  3. 

The  Bushmen  of  South  Africa  and  the  recently  extinct 
Tasmanians  are  in  some  ways  intermediate  between  the 
two  groups.  Fleure,  Races  of  Mankind  p.   16. 

b.  All  the  people  present. 

When  the  author's  full  name  is  known  these  are 
readily  findable  in  the  General  Catalogue. 

Baker,  Uses  of  Libr.  p.  yS. 
Kruisinga,  Handbook  II.  Accidence  and  Syntax.  1.  4 


50  VERBS 

There  were  days  when  Sophia  seemed  to  possess  it; 
but  there  were  other  days  when  Sophia's  pastry  was 
uneatable  by  any  one  except  Maggie. 

Bennett,  Old  W.  T.  I  ch.  3  §  i  p.  49. 

"My  own  people  generally  call  me  Ted,"  he  answered 
after  the  faintest  hesitation  .... 

"Ted  is  much  preferable",  said  Mrs.  Copleston. 
D.  Wyllarde,  The  Holiday  Husband  ch.  16  p.  209. 


Participles  dissociated  from  their  Verbal  System 

66.  Participles  may  be  evidently  associated  with  a  verbal 
system  in  their  form  but  express  a  meaning  that  the  verbal 
system  does  not  express.  Thus  in  a  beaten  track,  a  stalest 
match,  also  pleased,  distinguished,  vexed,  surprised,  mistaken, 
engaged:  And  as  a  fact  Maggie  had  fallen  in  love.  In  seven- 
teen years  she  had  been  engaged  eleven  times.  (Bennett,  Old,. 
W.  T.  I  ch.  I  §  2).  In  all  these  cases  there  is  not  a  real 
participle  beaten,  stolen,  pleased,  surprised,  engaged  with  the 
meanings  described  above;  but  an  adjective  expressing  a 
condition  or  state  without  reference  to  any  action  or  occur- 
rence. Such  words  are  ordinary  adjectives  used  attributively 
or  predicatively  only,  not  in  verbal  groups  i). 

Now  there  is  no  knowji  explanation  for  this  pheno- 
menon. Arlen,  Green  Hat  ch.  3  §   i  p.  70. 

How  close  was  the  religious  tie  between  the  conti- 
nental and  the  insular  Celts,  we  have  already  seen,  when 
dealing  with  the  vexed  question  of  the  Druids. 

Oman,  Engl.  bef.  Conq.  p.  32, 

Outspoken  Essays  2),  By  W.  R.  Inge. 


1)  For  examples,  see  also  the   sections  on  wordorder  in  attributive  groups 
in  vol.  3. 

2)  Compare  50  on  the  participles  of  such  groups  as  to  speak  out. 


DISSOCIATED   PARTICIPLES  5  I 

.  .  .  rubbing  his  (the  dog's)  shot  side  against  her  shot 
silk  1).  Sweet,  Elem.  no.  ^6. 

To  the  general  English  reader  the  more  interesting 
because  less  hackneyed  portion  of  the  book  will  probably 
be  that  which  describes  the  course  of  education  in  Canada 
and  in  the  United  States.  Athenaeum  21/2,   14. 

The  dissociation  in  meaning  is  frequently  shown  by  formal 
dissociation,  and  by  syntactic  differences. 

67.  Formal  dissociation  is  rare  in  the  apparent  participles 
with  the  regular  suffix  [id,  d,  t] :  [bnid,  dDgid,  k?sid]  learned, 
dogged,  cursed  by  the  side  of  [bnt,  dugd,  k;st]  learned,  dogged, 
cursed  as  genuine  participles : 

At  that  rate  I  shall  be  up  first  after  all.  —  Oh  no, 
you  won't.  I've  only  got  to  do  up  my  collar,  if  I  can 
find  that  blessed  2)  stud  and  put  on  my  coat. 

Collinson,  Spoken  English  p.   ^'^. 

In  the  irregular  verbs  there  are  several  participial  forms 
in  -en  that  are  exclusively  used  as  attributive  adjectives, 
whereas  the  genuine  participle  has  no  ending.  Such  pairs  are 
bounden  —  bound,  drunken  —  drutik,  shrunketi  —  slirunk,  sunken 
—  sunk,  stricken  —  struck.  Other  participial  adjectives  in  -01 
form  pairs  with  consonantal  participles :  carven  —  carved, 
cloven  —  cleft,  graven  —  graved,,  molten  —  melted,  proven  — ■ 
proved,  rotten  —  rotted,  etc. 

Less  often  do  we  find  adjectives  like  roast  by  the  side  of 
the  participle  roasted;  or  sodden,  soddened  by  the  side  of 
the  participle  sod  (found  in  literary  or  archaic  English  only); 
also  swelled  {swelled  head:  conceit)  by  the  side  of  the  parti- 
ciple swollen. 

one's  bounden  duty;  a  carven  image;  a  cloven  hoof; 
a  drunken  man ;  ill-gotten  gains ;  a  graven  image ;  molten 


1)  A  pun  on  the  difference  of  meaning  between  the  participle  {s]iot  side) 
and  the  adjective  {shot  silk).         2)  [blesid]. 


5  2  VERBS 

lead;  roast  meat;  a  rotten  plank;  a  shrunken  frame; 
sodden  fields,  brutes;  a  stricken  deer;  sunken  eyes;  a 
swollen  face,  etc. 

Beneath  the  soddened  soil  life  is  busy  now. 

Riley,  Netherleigh. 

By  the  side  of  the  participles  bespoken,  woven  we  find  the 
attributive  form  without  7i:  a  bespoke  bootmaker,  cream  wove 
paper  (also  zvoven). 

68.  From  the  fact  that  genuine  participles  can  be  used 
as  verbal  adjectives  it  follows  that  we  may  find  both  the 
special  dissociated  participial  forms  and  the  regular  participles 
in  attributive  use.  The  difference  is  often  unimportant,  but 
the  participle  suggests  that  the  state  or  condition  is  con- 
nected with  an  action  or  occurrence,  a  connotation  that  is 
absent  in  the  case  of  the  participial  adjectives;  thus  we  find 
roast  meat  and  roasted  meat  i). 

Her   eyes   looked    terribly   large   for  her  shrunk  face. 

Peard,  Madame  p.  255. 

Among  the  285  refugees  are  the  v/ives  of  two  cap- 
tains of  sunken  vessels.  Times  W.  6/4,   17. 

The  steamship  Yarrowdale  was  captured  and  sent 
away  with  about  four  hundred  of  the  crews  of  other 
sunk  vessels.  ib.   27/1,    17. 

69.  In  some  cases  the  form  without  -en  is  not  only  used 
as  a  participle,  but  also  as  a  predicative  adjective  in  the 
special  sense  of  the  attributive  form  in  -en.  Thus :  the  man 
ivas  drunk,  he  is  bound  to  approve  of  it.  But  some  of  the 
participial  forms  in  -en  are  occasionally  found  predicatively 
with  to  be  or  another  copula  {a) ;  exceptionally  also  to  form 
a  verbal  group  {U).  BeJiolden  is  always  predicative.  All  these 
uses  are  restricted  to  literary  or  would-be  literary  English. 


1)  Also  roasted  meat  e.  g.  in  Gissing,  Pivecroft. 


DISSOCIATED   PARTICIPLES  53 

a.  And  now  he  was  feebly  drunken  with  my  whisky. 

"Wells,  Tono-Bungay  ch.  3. 
All     these     statements    were    historically    untrue,    or 
unproven..  Wakeman,  Introd.  p.    135. 

Was  the  hope  expressed  in  those  phrases  a  dream  ? 
Is  it  already  proven  a  dream  ? 

Wells,  What's  Coming  p.  9. 
Moreover,    the  road  is  so  deeply  sunken  between  two 
steep  banks ....  Benson,  Thread  of  Gold  p.  69. 

The  air  in  Sofia  is  keen  and  bracing;  the  weather 
cold,  with  a  touch  of  sleet.  The  town  is  clean,  well 
laid  out,  well  paven,  with  good  tramways. 

Times  W.   22/1 1,   12. 

b.  It  has  been  proven,  I  take  it,  as  thoroughly  as 
anything  can  be  proven  in  this  world. 

Wells,  Country  p.   162. 
The  art  of  biography  has  sunken  low  in  this  country. 

Sat.  Rev.   16/10,   1897. 

70.  The  adjectival  rather  than  verbal  character  of  parti- 
cipial forms  may  be  shown  syntactically : 

a)  by  the  way  in  which  degree  is  expressed. 
h)  by  the  association  of  meaning  with  a  noun  rather  than 
with  the  formally  identical  verb. 

71.  In  the  case  of  adjectives  (and  adverbs)  degree  is 
expressed  by  very,  so,  and  too;  whereas  verbs,  including 
participles,  take  very  nincJi,  so  much,  and  too  mnch. 

A  good  many  participial  adjectives  take  the  adverbs  of 
degree  peculiar  to  adjectives :  very  pleased,  so  tired,  etc.  {a) ; 
others  take  either,  the  construction  with  much  being  naturally 
preferred  by  writers  trained  in  the  old  tradition,  but  not 
really  contrary  to  the  spoken  language  {b).  The  classification 
is  a  matter  of  the  dictionary  rather  than  of  a  grammar. 
The  adjectival  character  of  a  participial  form  may  also  be 
shown  by  the  place  of  an  adverb  of  degree  in  -ly  {c). 


54  VERBS 

a.  Truth  to  tell,  she  could  not  conceal  her  very 
pleased  surprise  at  the  exceptional  though  severe  good 
taste  which  Steve  had  shown  in  the  whole  affair. 

Patterson,  Compton  p.   220. 
Surely  one  can't  be  too  interested  in  them? 

Galsworthy,  Fraternity  ch.   i  p.   i8. 
She's  refused  to  —  she's  far  too  upset. 

Chapin,  New  Morality,  in  Brit.  PI.  p.  552. 
His  mouth  was  very  set  and  determined. 
He  began  to  be  very  satisfied  with  himself. 

Bennett,  Old  W.  T.  Ill  ch.   i  §  i. 

b.  I  was  very  surprised   —   a  caller  for  Gerald  March ! 

Arlen,  Green  Hat  ch.   i   p.  7, 
I    was    so    much    surprised    at    the    odd  scene  that  I 
asked  one  of  the  officials  what  it  all  meant. 

Benson,  Thread  of  Gold  p.  71. 
At  all  events  father  was  very  gratified. 

Cotes,  Cinderella  ch.   i. 

c.  A  very  little  reflection  and  inquiry  will  suffice  to 
show  how  completely  mistaken  this  view  really  is. 

Lytton  Strachey,  Books  and  Characters  p.   ^^6, 

The  participial  adjectives  cannot  be  classed  with  the  non- 
verbal adjectives.  For  even  those  that  usually  or  invariably 
take  very,  so,  and  too,  and  could  take  the  suffixes  of  com- 
parison as  far  as  their  form  is  concerned,  are  invariably 
compared  by  means  of  more  and  most;  thus  the  mono- 
syllabic staid  and  tired,  whose  association  with  the  verbal 
system  is  extremely  weak  if  not  completely  broken,  compare 
with  more  and  most. 

It  is  naturally  possible  for  a  participial  adjective  to  break 
the  last  link  with  its  verbal  system,  and  to  take  the  suffixes 
of  comparison. 

"Rotten  for  her."  —  "Rottener  for  him." 

Dane,  Bill  of  Div.  in  Brit.  P.  p.  685. 

On  the  other  hand,  a  participle  may  be  completely  dis- 
sociated from  its  verbal  system  because  it  is  the  sole  survivor, 


VERBAL   ING  55 

as    in    the    case    of   afraid,    and    yet    retain   the    traditional 
adverbs  of  degree  instead  of  adopting  the  suffixes. 

He  was  very  much  afraid  of  dogs. 

Sweet,  Spoken  Enghsh  p.  48. 
I  was  more  afraid  than  I  cared  to  show, 

72.  When  a  participle  is  used  as  a  verbal  adjective 
expressing  a  condition  or  state  as  the  result  of  an  action 
or  occurrence  that  is  not  connected  with  a  definite  time  or 
with  an  agent  (45),  its  nominal  character  is  very  prominent. 
In  this  case  it  may  be  doubtful  whether  we  have  indeed  a 
participial  formation,  i.e.  a  form  connected  with  a  verbal 
system,  or  an  adjective,  frequently  one  derived  from  a  noun 
that  is  identical  with  the  verb,  by  means  of  the  same  suffix : 
clad,  always  with  an  adverb  of  manner,  as  in  thinly  clad, 
warmly  clad,  which  is  not  connected  with  to  clothe  to  a 
modern  speaker,  whatever  may  be  its  history ;  also  booted, 
spurred,  etc.  (see  vol.  3).  Experienced  is  to  be  interpreted 
as  a  nominal  rather  than  a  verbal  adjective');  similarly 
stained  in  the  quotation  of  62 ;  a  ruined  building  may  suggest 
a  building  in  ruins  rather  than  a  building  rimied  (by  time 
or  by  man).  The  absence  of  a  formal  distinction  between 
the  two  classes  of  words  naturally  makes  it  impossible  for 
English  speakers  to  be  aware  of  a  strict  classification. 

Verbal  ing 

73.  The  sufTix  -ing,  like  the  suffix  [-id]  as  far  as  it  is 
used  to  form  participles  and  adjectives,  is  of  mixed 
inflectional  and  derivative  character.  The  treatment  of 
the  verbal  ing  will  consequently  follow  the  lines  laid 
down   in  the  chapter  on  the  Participle,  and  we  shall  first 


i)    The"   'historical'    origin    of   the  word  does  not  concern   as  here:  there 
is  such  a  phenomenon  as  re-interpretation. 


56  VERBS 

deal  with  the  verbal  ings  that  are  part  of  a  complete 
verbal  system,  with  regard  to  their  functions  in  the  sentence 
and  the  constructions  to  which  they  give  rise,  as  well  as 
to  the  meaning  expressed  by  them,  reserving  a  full  discus- 
sion of  the  last  till  a  comparison  can  be  made  between 
them  and  other  verbal  forms  (the  stem  and  various  deri- 
vatives). In  the  second  place  the  occasional  ings  and 
the  compounds  with  ing  for  their  second  element  (types 
dressmaking  and  prizefighting)  will  be  treated. 

The  ing  as  a  Member  of  a  Complete   Verbal  System 

74.  Any  verb  that  can  be  considered  as  a  verb  of  the 
usual  type  may  be  said  to  have  a  form  in  -ing,  either 
actually  or  potentially.  This  complete  verbal  ing  is  used 
in  four  functions : 

(1)  as   a   prepositional   adjunct,   including  prepositional 
objects ; 

(2)  as  a  plain  (i.  e.  non-prepositional)  adjunct,  including 
plain  objects; 

(3)  as  the  subject  of  the  sentence; 

(4)  as  a  nominal  predicate  and  as  a  predicative  adjunct. 

„  ...  ,  75.  The  ing  can  be  used  as  a  prepositional 
Prepositional      ,.  ...°  ,  ,    ,  ,  s 

...  adjunct  qualiiymg  a  verb  or  verbal  group  {a). 

In  many  cases  the  ing  has  the  character  of  a 
prepositional  object  {b),  A  strict  classification  is  naturally 
impossible. 

a.  Take  a  piece  of  tracing-paper  and  copy  this  map. 
Or  use  transparent  drawing-paper  and  trace  the  map 
by  laying  your  paper  on  top. 

CoUinson,  Spoken  Engl.  p.   1 8. 
In    the    normal    way,  it  is  past  denying  that  most  of 
us    do    believe    that    our   minds  are  very  different  from 
our  bodies  when  both  are  going  concerns.     Laird  p.  6. 


VERBAL   ING  57 

You  don't  think  I'm  going  to  be  frightened  into 
apologizing   —  do  you? 

Chapin,  New  Morality  in  Brit.  pi.  p.  565. 

Don't  make  a  habit  of  playing  cards  or  of  reading 
the  sporting  columns. 

Dean  Inge,  quoted  Punch,   i/io,  30  p.  365/1. 

b.  I'm  thinking  of  going  for  a  row  on  the  lake. 

Collinson,  Spoken  Eng.  p.   10. 

I  shall  look  forward  to  seeing  her.  ib.  p.  30. 

I  only  want  to  sit  quietly  somewhere  where  I  can 
hear  what  Ivor  is  saying  and  save  him  from  promising 
anything  that  he  can't  perform. 

Chapin,  New  Morality,  Brit.  PL  p.  552. 

If  this  correspondence  were  printed  as  an  Appendix, 
the  Appendix  would  be  longer  than  the  book.  The 
two  together  would  make  the  kind  of  novel  some  people 
aim  at  writing  now.  Baring,  Tinker's  Leave  p.  7. 

76.  The  prepositional  ing  is  frequent  as  an  adjunct 
to  nouns  [a]  and  adjectives  {b).  We  might  distinguish 
prepositional  objects  here  too,  but  the  classification  would 
be  even  more  arbitrary  than  in  the  case  of  adjuncts  to 
verbs.  When  the  ing  can  be  interpreted  as  an  adjunct 
it  frequently  expresses  time  or  place;  in  other  cases  o/is 
the  usual  preposition. 

a.  But  you  and  he  won't  be  there,  so  what's  the 
use  in  making  plans? 

Mackenzie,  Rich  Relatives  ch.  9  p.  240. 

What's  the  use  of  arguing?     I've  made  up  my  mind. 
CI.  Dane,  Bill  of  Div.  in  Brit.  PI.  p.  692. 

(London)  would  strike  us  as  a  city  of  insanitary 
slums,  but  its  inhabitants  were  proud  of  it,  and  not 
least  of  the  wonderful  scheme  for  lighting  the  streets 
on  winter  evenings.     Somervell,  Hist,  of  Engl.  p.  54. 

I  have  got  out  of  the  way  of  smoking  cigarettes. 
Collinson,  Spoken  Engl.  p.  26. 


58  VERBS 

He  is  considerately  sparing  you  the  trouble  of  having 
to  take  a  bath.  Huxley,  Vulgarity  p.  4. 

b.  At  least,  he  might  answer,  —  a  hurried  scribbling, 
showing  how  much  bored  he  was  at  doing  it. 

Enchanted  April,  by  Elizabeth  (T.)  p.   133. 

Peter  was  not  afraid  of  being  alone. 

Walpole,  Fort.  I  ch.   2  p.    15. 

The  most  refined  spirits  need  not  be  ashamed  in 
taking  a  hearty  interest  in  the  rediscovered  mystery  of 
the  actual  world.  Huxley,  Vulgarity,  p.   13. 

Ziska's  sidelong  glance  of  scorn  at  the  prostrate  figure 
was  incapable  of  rousing  the  least  resentment. 

He  is  fond  of  hearing  his  own  voice. 

77.  The  prepositional  ing  is  never  used  to  express  the 
aim  of  the  action  denoted  by  the  leading  word  (see  2o8fif.). 
The  usual  prepositions  in  adjuncts  expressing  aim  are  to  and 
for;  when  these  are  used  in  a  different  meaning  they  are 
construed  with  an  ing,  like  any  other  preposition. 

78.  When  to  is  construed  with  a  verbal  ing  it  often  expresses 
direction,  both  in  the  local  and  in  the  transferred  sense  {a)\ 
the  latter  may  lead  to  other  meanings  {b).  The  ing  may 
sometimes  be  interpreted  rather  as  a  prepositional  object. 

a.  Tibetan  was  therefore  driven  to  translating  the 
great  majority  of  these  Sanskrit  words  into  native 
equivalents.  Sapir,  Language  p.  210. 

So  I  fell  to  wondering  how  many  more  of  those 
present  hailed  him  as  the  author  of  "Dodo"  or  "The 
Challoners".  Everyman,  9/1 1,   12, 

He  made  an  attempt  to  read,  failed,  and  fell  again 
to  thinking.  Galsworthy,  Caravan  p.  3. 

I  look  forward  with  confidence  to  securing  the  agreement 
of  those  two  great  countries.        Times  W.   16/11,   17. 

Here  were  his  mother  and  the  uncle  .  .  .  apparently 
in  the  fairest  way  to  becoming  fast  friends. 

Princess  Priscilla  ch.  8  p.   no. 


VERBAL  ING  59 

But  I  cannot  nerve  myself  to  accepting  such  a  state 
of  things  on  hearsay.  De  Morgan,  Vance  ch.   16. 

Since  Mr.  Belloc  has  taken  to  producing  books  at 
his  present  pace  we  have  sought  in  vain  for  a  return 
to  the  happy  style  of  'The  Path  of  Rome'. 

Athenaeum,   28/12,   12. 
The    tendency    to    finding  matter  for  hero-worship  in 
Mary's  endurance  was  much  stronger  with  Beatrice  than 
with  Miss  Oriel. 

Trollope,  Dr.  Thorne  ch.   26  p.  277. 
Cedric  was  used  to  seeing  it  there. 

Burnett,  Fauntleroy  ch.  2. 
b.     You've    got    your    best    years  ahead  of  you.     Do 
you  think  I  am  going  to  look  on  while  you  devote  them 
to  fetching  hairpins  for  a  fool  of  a  woman. 

Chapin,  New  Morality,  Brit.   PI.  p.   568. 
If   he    could  only  make  up  his  mind  to  not  alighting 
at    Chancery    Lane,    he   would  have  two  whole  minutes 
for  consideration. 

De  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  2  p.  9. 

79.     The    adjuncts    with    for   and  verbal  ing  may  express 
direction  or  tendency,  cause,   or  purpose  i). 

Hunting,  hawking,  and  shooting  were,  however,  his 
chief  delights,  and  there  Huygens,  on  account  of  his 
propensity  for  falling  off  his  horse,  did  not  shine. 

Cont.  Rev.  Oct.   1930  p.  500. 
No    man   who   is   concerned    for  the  future  of  human 
society   can   neglect   the  peasant ;  and  there  is  much  to 
be  said    for  begitming  with  the  peasant. 

Coulton,  Medieval  Village  p.   i. 
Clearly   it   is    idle   to   blame  Dryden  for  not  painting 
the  passions,  since  that  was  not  what  he  was  trying  to  do. 

Times  Lit.   15/7,  29  p.  629. 
He  was  cross  with  me  for  being  so  late. 

Collinson,  Sp.  Engl.  p.   12. 


1)  The  meaning  'in  favour  of  is  illustrated  in  75&. 


6o  VERBS 

I  shan't  blame  people  a  bit  for  cutting  me. 

Chapin,  New  Morality,  Brit.  PI.  p.   538. 

She  was  dressed  for  going  out. 

Princess  Prise.  X  ch.  5   p.  62. 

.  .  .  the  best  and  nicest  place  for  living  at  the  bottom 
(viz.   of  society)  would  be  England.      ib.  ch.    i   p.   17. 

The  fact  that  certain  sounds  are  used  in  a  language 
for  distinguishing  the  meanings  of  words  does  not  enter 
into  the  definition  of  a  phoneme. 

Maitre  Phon.  Oct. — Dec.   1929  p.  44. 

80.  Among  the  prepositional  adjuncts  we  must  include 
the  construction  with  proclitic  a-,  accompanying  verbs  of 
movement  or  to  be.  The  use  is  not  part  of  the  colloquial 
standard,  but  rather  an  occasional  literary  borrowing  from 
dialectal  English,  or  a  reminiscence  of  earlier  English. 

As  the  ninth  century  wore  on,  a  large  part  of  the 
whole  Scandinavian  people  had  been  a-  Viking  to  the 
most  various  parts  of  the  world.     Trevelyan,  Hist.  p.  75. 

A  journalist  may  go  a-picnicking.  A  journalist  may 
go  a- dancing.  But  the  paper  must  not  suffer.  Proofs 
left  unread  by  day  must  be  read  by  night. 

Niven,  Porcelain  Lady  (p.  217). 

During    the     sixteenth,    seventeenth,    and    eighteenth 
centuries,    when    the    modern   states    were  a-building,  it 
was    the    Jews    who   were  most  influential  as  army  con- 
tractors    and     financiers    to    Courts    and    Governments. 
Nation,  July   12,   1913  p.  558/2. 

The  cases  of  in  with  a  verbal  ing  in  the  following  quo- 
tations are  probably  conscious  archaisms.  The  last  may  also 
be  an  attempt  at  a  'correct'  spelling  of  the  prefix  a-. 

The  Palais  Richelieu  was  at  this  time  in  building. 
Stanley  Weyman,  Red  Robe. 

The  two  boys  were  again  in  grappling  with  each 
other.  Pett  Ridge,  Thanks  to  Sanderson. 


VERBAL   ING  6 1 

81.  The  prepositional  ing  is  not  frequent  in  free  adjuncts 
and  is  chiefly  restricted  to  those  with  on,  upon  and 
after  (a),  apart  from  the  'absolute  adjuncts'  expressing 
the  subject  of  the  ing  illustrated  in  115.  Occasionally, 
it  is  found  without  a  subject  being  mentioned  in  the  rest 
of  the  sentence  (the  'unrelated  adjunct'). 

a.  On  asking  for  Miss  Nunn.  she  was  led  to  a  back 
room  on  the  ground  floor,  and  there  waited  for  a  few 
moments.  Gissing,  Odd  Women  ch,  3. 

She  vanished  for  a  minute  or  two,  and  went  in.  Her 
grandfather  was  safely  asleep  in  his  chair.  'Now  then,' 
she  said,  on  returning,  'walk  down  the  garden  a  little 
way,  and  when  I'm  ready  I'll  call  you.' 

Hardy,  Native  II  ch.  4  p.    154. 

I  am  very  pleased  to  meet  you  after  hearing  so  much 
about  you.  CoUinson,  Sp.  Engl.  p.  20. 

b.  But  before  looking  at  the  word  more  closely,  it  is 
to  be  said  that  his  definition  seems  too  loose  in  one 
respect.  Times  Lit.    13/11,  24  p.  717/3. 

82.  Another  use  that  seems  best  treated  here  is  the 
ing  after  the  correlative  conjunctions  as  and  than.  On 
the  close  connection  between  these  conjunctions  and  the 
prepositions,  see  vol.  2. 

He  even  went  so  far  as  talking  about  a  special  license. 

V.  Bridges,  The  Red  Lodge  ch.  7  p.   160. 
(My  watch)  gains,  which  is  better  than  losing  anyhow. 
CoUinson,  Spoken  English  p.   26, 

A  different  case,  with  as  in  a  predicative  adjunct,  is 
quoted  in  113  (reported  as  saying). 

p.  .  83.     The    verbal    ing    as    a  plain   adjunct   may 

...      ,     qualify    verbs;    the    adjunct    often    expresses    the 

manner    {a),     cause    (3),     or     means    {c)     of    the 

action.     The   action  may  be  expressed  by  a  noun  or  an 

adjective  {d).     See  89. 


62  VERBS 

a.  Mr.  Westcott  spent  the  day  doing  business  in  Truro. 

Walpole,  Fortitude  I  ch.  3  p.  28. 
"Are  you  in  your  senses,  Man?"  it  asked;  "we  have 
no  more  time  to  waste  idling  about  here  ..." 

Galsworthy,  Caravan  p.  21. 
The  subject  of  money  is  a  very  complicated  one,  and 
you    are    recommended   to   devote   yourself  to  the  rules 
for   'making'    it   rather   than  to  waste  your  time  under- 
standing it.  Quoted  Athen.   14/9,   12. 

Defoe  spent  his  life  agitating  for  the  new  ideas  intro- 
duced by  the  Revolution. 

Sefton  Delmer,  English  Lit.  p.  96. 
She  had  spent  the  day  pottering  about  her  bed-room. 

Vachell,  Quinneys'  p.  65. 

b.  And  when  I  showed  Uncle  Tom  that  suit-case,  he 
nearly  died  laughing.  J.  Webster,  Just  Patty. 

It  is  no  use  mending  that  boy's  clothes.  He  tears  his 
coat  climbing  trees,  and  wears  out  the  knees  of  his 
trousers  kneeling  on  the  damp  grass. 

Sweet,  Elementarbuch,  p.   1 19. 

c.  He  made  considerable  money  cherry-grozving. 

Vachell,  Spragge  p.   31. 
"It  just  shows,"  he  continued,  "what  these  European 
markets    are,    when    a    fellow    can    make    a    reputation 
cooking  peas''  Mrs.  Wharton,  Mirth,  p.   174. 

d.  Like  his  father,  Huygens  was  a  good  amateur  artist, 
spending  much  of  his  time  making  sketches,  often  for 
the  Prince,  while  the  latter  could  dash  off  in  the  morning 
after  a  night  in  the  saddle  reconnoitring. 

Cont.  Rev.  Oct.   1930  p.  500. 
I  was  engaged  building  my  porch  when  the  man  said 
this.  Baring-Gould,  Old  Country  Life  ch.  p.  46. 

He  was  hard  at  work  ploughing. 

Blackmore,  Lorna  Doone  ch.  69  p.   528. 

84.  When  the  ing  accompanies  a  verb  of  motion 
it  may  express  purpose  {a).  In  many  cases  the  -ing  is 
not    subordinated    in    meaning    to    the    verb   of  motion, 


VERBAL   ING  6^ 

being  in  fact  rather  the  leading  member  of  the  verbal 
group  (b)  Some  cases  of  fo  be  with  a  verbal  -ing  are 
closely  related  to  this  use  {c). 

a.  When  the  war  ended  in  Troy,  with  the  fall  of  the 
city,  Menelaus  went  looking  for  Helen,  with  a  sword  in 
his  hand.  Erskine,  Private  Life  of  Helen 

of  Troy  I  ch.   2  p.    13. 
Then  I  got  in  my  car  and  went  exploring. 

Warwick  Deeping,  Sorrell  &  Son, 
If    trouble    befell   the    Christian   preachers   who    came 
settling  among  them  they  took  it  as  a  proof  of  the  wrath 
of  the  older  gods.  Green,  Short  Hist.  p.   26. 

Prebendal  stalls,  Fanny,  don't  generally  go  begging 
long  among  parish  clergymen. 

TroUope,  Framley  ch.   18  p.   173. 
(They)  went  sailing  and  climbed  up  Beachy  Head  and 
watched  a  cricket  match  in  Devonshire  Park. 

Sinister  Street  p.   162, 
It   was   such    an   extraordinary   thing  to  go  smashing 
a  window  like  that.  Wells,  Harman  ch.  9  §  3. 

b.  He  suddenly  came  staggeri}ig  towards  me. 

Wells,  Country  p.  ZZ. 
Georgiana    came    to    her    garden    window    and    stood 
watching  me.  Allen,  Kentucky  Cardinal  p.   131. 

"Aha!"  cried  old  Hubert,  who  had  entered  unperceived, 
and  stood  looking  over  her  shoulder. 

Buchanan,  That  Winter  Night  ch.   5. 
Sophia  sat  tvaiting  on  the  sofa  in  the  parlour. 

Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  IV  ch.  3  §  5. 
The  doctor's  pony  cart  came  rattling  up  to  the  door. 

Walpole,  Fort.  I  ch.  8  §  4  p.  95. 
There    she   was,    the    little    Old    Lady  in  her  bonnet, 
sitting  smiling  and  bowing.      ib.  II  ch.  4  §  3  p.   190. 

Peter  stood  holding  the  letter  in  his  hand,  looking 
out  on  to  the  black  square  of  sky. 

ib.  Ill  ch.   I  §  3  p.  239. 

c.  That    meant,    then,    that    he    would    arrive    home 


64  VERBS 

about    half-past-ten ;    and    there    would    be  his  aunt  and 
his  grandfather  and  his  father  sitting  up  waiting  for  him. 

ib.  I  ch.   2  p.    15. 
He  was  a  long  time  reaching  Stanhope  Gate. 

Galsworthy,  Man  of  Property  ch.  7  p.  99. 
He  was  two  years  zvriting  this  work. 

id.  Caravan  p.  421. 

The  syntactic  subordination  of  the  verbs  of  motion 
may  be  shown  by  the  stress.  Thus  in  Sweet's  Spoken 
English  we  find  them  marked  :  i.  e.  with  medium  stress 
or  -  i.  e.  weak  stress,  v/hereas  the  ing  is  not  marked, 
i.  e.  has  strong  stress. 

si  rimembs  hau  tSa  sanjain  :keim  strijmiq  in  ouva  -Saet 
ould  desk.  p.  50. 

■fe  moummt  ij  so  ss,  ij  dgamt  daun,  an  -keim  :ranii^ 
ta  mijt  3S.  ib.  p.  54. 

The  word-order  went  spelling  on  also  seems  to  support 
this  interpretation  of  the  above  sentences. 

I  was  too  intent  on  my  employment  to  observe  him, 
and  went  spelling  on. 

Mary  Lamb,  in  Selected  Short  Stories  II  p.  2. 

85.  The  verb  accompanying  the  ing  may  be  a  subor- 
dinate element  of  the  group  with  the  ing.  On  the  verbal 
groups  of  to  be  and  ing  (the  progressive),  see  Auxiharies. 

I  don't  seem  7}taking  tunes  at  all.  I  don't  seem  to 
have  anything  to  make  them  of. 

Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.  3  p.  20. 

I  entered,  I  suppose,  noiselessly,  and  instead  of  taking 
my  machine  at  once,  remained  hovering  for  some  minutes, 
regarding  the  admirable  and  unparalleled  appointment 
of  the  place.  Wells,  Rampole  Island  ch.   i   p.  41. 

After  talking  that  matter  over  we  got  conversing  on 
other  subjects.         Holmes,  Over  the  Tea-Cups  p.   19. 

But  the  creature  backed  away  from  her  hand,  snuffling, 
and    its    cynical,    soft  eyes  with  chestnut  lashes  seemed 


VERBAL   ING  6$ 

^varning    the    girl   that   she  belonged  to  the  breed  that 
might  be  trusted  to  annoy. 

Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.   37. 

All    the   things  I  wanted  seem  falling  into  my  hands. 

Waugh,  Loom  of  Youth  III  ch.  8. 
She'd    no    business   to  go   dragging  iLp  Father  i)  and 
the  divorce  on  Christmas  morning  to  upset  you. 

Clemence  Dane,  A  Bill  of  Divorcement, 
in  Brit.  PL  p.  651. 

86.  When  used  with  verbs  that  can  take  a  noun-object, 
the  verbal  ing  has  the  character  of  an  object  too ;  although 
here  as  elsewhere  a  strict  classification  of  objects  and 
adverb  adjuncts  is  impossible. 

She   loved  giving  people  the  impression  that  she  was 
adventurous.  Hichens,  Ambition  ch.  7  p.   78. 

Constance,    trembling,    took  pains  to  finish  tindressing 
with  dignified  deliberation. 

Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  I  ch.  2  §  3  p.  46. 
It    is    not    surprising    to  hear  that  she  (viz.   Charlotte 
Bronte)  did  not  enjoy  writijig  her  books. 

Times  Lit.   13/4,    16. 
He  minded,  curiously,  leavhig  Peter. 

VValpole,  Fort.  I  ch.  6  p.  6^. 
I  see  you've  got  a  spare  wheel.  —  I  can't  risk  getting 
a  puncture  a  long  way  from  any  repair-shop. 

CoUinson,  Sp.  Engl.  p.  86. 

For  more  examples  see  361  ff.,  where  the  verbal  ing 
and  the  stem  with  to  are  compared. 

87.  The  ing  can  be  used  as  an  object  with  verbs 
construed  with  an  object  and  predicative  adjunct  {d)\  it 
is  less  frequently  found  {h)  in  appended  objects  (with  a 
'provisional'  it). 


1)  i.  e.  to  open  a  conversation  on. 
Kruisinga,  Handbook  II.  Accidence  and  Bxjntax.  1. 


66  VERBS 

a.  Mrs.    Lazarus  was  without  her  orange  because  she 
had  to  wear  mittens  now,  and  that  made  peeling  difficult. 

Walpole,  Fort.  II  ch.   i  p.   154. 

b.  You    must    find    it    rather    dull    living   here    all    by 
yourself.  Sweet,  Element,  p.  80. 

88.  The  relation  between  the  ing  as  an  object  and 
what  seems  to  be  its  leading  verb  may  be  inverted,  as 
in  the  case  of  intransitive  verbs  (84  f.);  this  makes  it 
possible   to   use   the  construction  with  inanimate  subjects. 

Does    it    do    any  good?  — •   Not  now  that  the  ice  has 
stopped  conmig. 

Chapin,  New  Morality,  Brit.  PI.  p.   538  '). 
Look  out  ©f  the  window,  it's  just  started  snowing. 

Collinson  p.   32. 

We  seem  to  have  similar  cases  in  the  following  quota- 
tions, with  help  and  keep,  although  keep  does  not  take 
a  noun-object  in  the  meaning  expressed  here  -). 

Otherwise,    it's    simply  impossible  to  help  liking  him. 

De  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.   16  p.   159. 
The    thought    was    unpleasant,    and  it  kept  recurring^ 
but  it  only  served  to  harden  his  determination. 

Galsworthy,  Caravan  p.  29. 
The   great  problem  of  the  cotton  industry  during  the 
war    has    not    been,    as  in  the  war  industries,  to  satisfy 
an     unlimited    demand    under    difficulties,    but    to    keep 
going  at  all.  Times  Lit.  9/8,    18. 

89.  It  has  already  been  shown  that  the  ing  may  be  an 
adverb  adjunct  qualifying  an  adjective  or  a  noun  expressing 
a  verbal  meaning  (83(/).  The  adjective  is  always  used 
predicatively,    in    other  words  the  ing  qualifies  the  whole 


1)  Compare  ib.  p.   539: 

I    wish   to   goodness   you'd  stop  boasting  about  your  beastly  ice  and  pour 
out  my  tea  lor  me. 

2)  To  help  can  take  a  noun-object:  I  can't  help  the  warts,  they  will  come. 


VERBAL   ING  6/ 

predicate  rather  than  the  adjective  [a).  Sometimes  it 
may  be  doubtful  whether  /o  be  is  to  be  interpreted  as 
a  copula  or  as  a  verb  of  motion  {b);  compare  the  quo- 
tations of  84  c. 

a.  Don't  be  long  unpacking.     Sinister  Street  p.  401. 
Here    he    introduced,    there    he    struck    out ;    this   he 

condensed,     that     he     expanded;     he     was    never    done 
substituting  a  new  word  or  phrase  for  an  old  one, 

Thomson  ed.  Robertson  p.   24. 
She  was  busy  turning  out  papers  from  an  old-fashioned 
bureau.  Wells,   Country  p.  226. 

(Of  this  critic)  it  has  been  wittily  said  that  he  is  too 
busy  writing  about  Portuguese  literature  to  read  it. 
Mod.  Lang.   Rev.   XIV  p.   346. 
Fortunately     for     them    a    victim    had    already    been 
secured,    and    the    brutes    were  too  busy  devouring  him 
to  pay  attention  to  anything  else. 

Patterson,  Tsavo  p.  74. 

b.  When    we    arrived   at  Liverpool,  we  were  not  long 
clearins^  our  decks  of  cattle. 

Davies,  Super-Tramp  ch.   10  p.  '&'^. 

We  have  an  apparently  identical  case  in  this  sentence : 
Anne,  if  I  meet  him  doivn  the  road,  shall  I  tell  him  you  re 
ready  waiting  for  him?  Bennett,  Anna  p.  119;  but  waiting 
is  rather  an  adjunct  to  you,  unless  it  is  interpreted  as  a 
free  adjunct. 

90.  The  ing  as  an  adjunct  to  adjectives  may  have 
the  character  of  an  object,  serving  to  complete  rather  than 
to  qualify  the  meaning  of  the  adjective.  This  is  the  case 
with  ings  accompanying  worth  {a).  Of  a  similar  character 
is  the  ing  with  near  and  like  {b);  but  these  adjectives 
can  also  be  interpreted  as  prepositions. 

a.  It   is   worth    looking  at  some  of  the  characteristics 
of  classicism. 


68  VERBS 

Penguins  are  the  one  thing  in  the  Antarctic  worth 
going-  all  the  way  to  see.  Times  Lit.  2/4,   14. 

Everything  that  Stevenson  wrote  is  worth  reading; 
very  little  that  has  been  written  about  him  is  worth 
even  skimming.  Pilot  26/10,   1901. 

b.  What  he  has  given  us  is  far  nearer  being  a  political 
history  of  England  from   1739.        Times  Lit.   5/2,   20. 

We  had  the  run  of  the  whole  liner.  It's  not  like 
being  a  steerage  passenger. 

CoUinson,  Spoken  Engl.  p.  48. 

I  certainly  do  not  feel  like  looking  up  to  them. 

ib.  p.  74. 

91.  The  plain  ing  is  very  frequent  in  free  adjuncts. 
The  construction  is  fully  treated  in  vol.  3  in  the  chapter 
on  the  Simple  Sentence,  so  that  it  will  suffice  to  give  some 
quotations  with  the  plain  ing  here  (a),  including  some 
connected  by  means  of  a  conjunction  {h). 

a.  She  remained  outwardly  calm,  seldom  leaving  the 
privacy  of  her  own  apartments. 

Buchanan,  That  Winter  Night  ch.  3. 
Far    away    in    Palestine    General    Allenby  has  won  a 
great     victory,    smashing    the    Turkish    line    across    the 
plain  of  Philistia,  and  taking  Gaza. 

Spectator    lo/ii,   17. 

Finding  Blanche  determined,  Father  Andre  presently 
took  his  leave.        Buchanan,  That  Winter  Night  ch.  5. 

Nearing  Joyfields  he  noted  the  Mallorings'  park,  and 
their  long  Georgian  house. 

Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.  7  p.  71. 

b.  One  is  lifted  as  it  were  into  a  serener  air  when 
pondering  over  them.  Times  Lit,    19/10,    16. 

All  changes  of  habit  among  birds  are  peculiarly  inte- 
resting, as  giving  us  a  brief  glimpse  in  our  own  lifetime 
of  age-long  processes  of  accommodation,     ib.   "jI^,   19. 

He  paused  as  if  expecting  her  to  answer. 

Buchanan,  That  Winter  Night  ch.  2. 


VERBAL   ING  69 

„         ...      ,       .       92.     In   many   cases  the  ing  as  an  adverb 
Prepositional  and     ,.  ,     ,  ,.     ^ 

_,  .     ...      ^       adjunct,  whether  to  a  predicative  adiective  or 
Plain  Adjuncts        ■'         ,  ,  .     .  ■, 

to  a  verb,  can  be  connected  with  a  preposition 

as  well  as  added  without  any  connecting  word.  The  following 

quotations  illustrate  the  prepositional  use  with  words  that  have 

been  shown  to  take  the  plain  adjunct  in  the  preceding  sections. 

All  wore  black  braided  jackets,  maroon  skirts,  hats 
with  plush  decorations,  and  smart  boots.  It  was  near 
to  being  a  uniform.  Pett  Ridge,  Mord  Em'ly. 

One  woman  was  kept  busy  in  supplying  him  with 
material.  Bennett,  Anna  ch.  8  p.   125. 

When  he  ceased  from  speaking  he  again  put  his  elbows 
on  his  knees. 

Trollope,  Last  Chron.  ch.  66  (vol.  II  p.  239). 

But  I've  done  with  expecting  any  course  of  stead}^ 
reading  from  Emma.  J.  Austen,  Emma  p.  35. 

He  kissed  her  cheek,  and  departed  in  great  misery, 
which  was  several  hours  in  lessening  itself  to  a  controllable 
level.  Hardy,  Return  of  the  Native  III  ch.  6. 

I  lost  no  time  in  availing  myself  of  the  privilege  which 
he  proposed.  Hole,  Mem.  p.  90, 

We  spend  our  time  in  searching  for  something  that  is 
not  there.         G.  Murray,  Eng.  Lit.  and  the  Classics  p.  7. 

93.  There  is  generally  no  difference  of  meaning  attached 
to  the  use  or  absence  of  the  preposition  in  these  adverb 
adjuncts.  The  syntactic  difference  may^  however,  entail  a 
difference  of  meaning :  the  preposition  makes  the  nature  of 
the  adverbial  relation  clear,  and  this  is  the  reason  why  it  is 
sometimes  indispensable. 

Some  made  themselves  busy  with  matches,  and  in 
selecting  the  driest  tufts  of  furze,  others  in  loosening  the 
bramble  bonds  which  held  the  faggots  together. 

Hardy,  Native  I  ch.   3  p.   16. 

The  omission  of  tn  would  cause  the  ings  to  assume  the 
character    of  free  adjuncts;  this  explains,  too,  why  it  would 


70  VERBS 

entail  the  omission  of  mid.  In  that  case  the  distributive 
character  would  disappear,  the  free  adjuncts  expressing  sub- 
ordination to  the  predicate;  in  other  words,  there  would  be 
one  group  of  people  instead  of  the  three  groups  characterized 
by  their  occupations  in  our  text. 

Similarly  the  use  of  in  seems  necessary  in  the  second 
quotation  of  92,  for  when  busy  is  used  with  a  non-prepositional 
adjunct  it  is  apt  to  become  subordinate  to  the  ing;  and  that 
would  be  entirely  out  of  place  here. 

We  can  also  make  out  a  difference  between  to  be  and  a 
word  expressing  time  {to  be  long,  to  be  a  long  time)  construed 
with  the  plain  ing  or  with  the  prepositional  adjunct  with  zVz. 
The  plain  ing  denotes  the  period  occupied  by  the  action 
referred  to;  its  aspect  is  consequently  durative  {a).  The 
prepositional  ing  emphasizes  the  final  outcome  of  the  period, 
so  that  it  is  equivalent  to  'It  was  not  long  before  such  and 
such  a  thing  happened';  its  aspect  may  be  called  terminative  {6). 
Of  course  it  happens  not  infrequently  that  the  two  meanings 
cannot  be  distinguished  {c). 

a.   "How  far  is  it?" 

"Perhaps  a  quarter  of  a  mile." 

"Well,  we  have  been  just  one  hour  and  three  quarters 
doing  it."  Cotes,   Cinderella  ch.    13  p.   153. 

He  had  been  an  unusually  long  time  coming  over 
the  pass.  Adelphi,  June  1925. 

I  shan't  be  long  putting  my  things  on. 

CoUinson,  Spoken  Engl.  p.   "^Z. 

h.  Dickens's  Christmas  books  were  so  enormously 
popular  that  imitations  were  not  long  in  making  their 
appearance.  Times  Lit.  20/12,   1923. 

c.  Swithin  was  long  in  deciding  to  go  forth  next  day. 

Galsworthy,  Caravan  p.  29. 

He  was  not  long  in  imagining  the  truth. 

Eliot,  Mill  VI  ch.   13  (Poutsma  V,   372). 

The  reason  for  the  distinction  is  not  difficult  to  understand : 


VERBAL   ING  /I 

the  plain  ing  forms  a  closer  group  with  long,  a  long  time, 
etc.  and  is  apt  to  become  the  leading  element  of  it,  reducing 
the  other  element  to  an  adverb  adjunct  expressing  length  of 
time.  This  shifting  is  impossible  in  the  prepositional  adjunct 
with  in. 

It  has  been  shown  (90)  that  near  when  taking  a  plain 
ing  has  the  character  of  a  preposition.  This  explains  why 
the  prepositional  ing  must  be  used  when  near  retains  its 
independent  meaning,  as  in  the  following  sentence. 

Five    years    have    passed    since  that  meeting,  and  we 
seem  no  nearer  to  possessing  a  National  Theatre. 

Engl.   Rev.  July   1913. 

94.  From  the  quotations  in  81  and  91  we  learn  that 
both  the  plain  and  the  prepositional  ing  occur  in  free 
adjuncts.  In  this  case  the  preposition  has  an  independent 
meaning  which  produces  the  difference  between  the  two 
constructions.  The  plain  ing  expresses  attendant  circum- 
stances, which  is  the  natural  result  of  the  inherent  meaning 
of  the  ing  as  shown  in  many  other  constructions.  The  use 
of  without  does  not  change  the  meaning  except  in  making 
it  negative.  When  on  {upoji)  and  after  are  used  they  do 
not,  naturally,  change  the  meaning  of  the  ing  itself  which 
expresses  attendant  circumstances  here  as  well  as  in  the 
other  construction.  But  the  prepositions  express  the  com- 
pletion of  the  action  or  occurrence  referred  to,  so  that  it  is 
the  effect  of  the  action  or  occurrence  after  its  completion  that 
accompanies  the  action  or  occurrence  expressed  by  the 
predicative  verb;  the  two  actions  or  occurrences  are  distinctly 
referred  to  as  succeeding  each  other  with  an  interval  by  the 
use  of  after. 

The  plain  ing,  on  the  other  hand,  is  the  only  construction 
possible  when  it  is  followed  by  a  clause  with  as  (a),  less 
frequently  w/ten  (d),  with  repetition  of  the  subject  and  to  do 


72  VERBS 

as    an    auxiliary    of    substitution.     See    further  volume  3  on 
Free  Adjuncts. 

a.  We  hope  this  novel  dealing  as  it  does  with  much 
that  is  ignoble  in  politics  and  politicians  will  continue  .... 

Athenaeum  3/10,    14. 
In     connection    with    this    church,    one    of    the    most 
beautifully    situated  in  England,  standing,  as  it  does,  in 
a    lovely    fold    of    the    sheep-cropped    downs    over    the 
Bristol  Channel ....  Academy,   5/8,    1905. 

The  report  of  1822,  helping  as  it  did  to  give  direction 
to  the  energies  of  the  Commissioners,  led  directly  to 
the  chief  and  most  enduring  work  of  his  life. 

Times  Lit.  22/5,   19. 
The    fourth    volume,    covering    as    it    does    the    usual 
allowance    of    five    plays,  now  brings  the  number  up  to 
twenty,  out  of  the  entire  fifty-two. 

Athen.    14/12,    12. 

b.  Late  again,  my  dear;  surely  going  to  bed  when 
you  do,  you  migJit  get  up  a  little  earlier  1). 

Olive  Schreiner,  Undine  ch.   i   p.  20. 

95.  One  of  the  most  important  functions  of  the  plain 
ing  is  its  attributive  use.  In  this  case  it  serves  as  a 
verbal  adjective  so  that  it  can  be  compared  with  the 
verbal  [id]  as  far  as  this  is  used  in  the  same  function. 
Like  the  participle  (45  ff.),  the  attributive  plain  ing  can 
both  precede  {a)  and  follow  ib)  the  noun  which  it  qualifies, 
with  similar  results  as  to  the  shade  of  meaning  expressed; 
on  this  subject  the  chapter  on  wordorder  in  attributive 
groups  in  vol.  3  may  be  consulted. 

a.  The  bomb  was,  that  evening,  the  dominant  note  of 
the  occasion.  Through  the  illuminated  streets,  the  slowly 
surs:inp:  crowds  —  inhuman  in  their  abandon  to  the  mono- 


\)  Italics  for  you  and  might  in  the  original. 


VERBAL   ING  'J'^ 

tonous  ebb  and  flow  as  of  a  sweepmg  river  —  the  cries 
and  laughter  and  shouting  of  songs,  that  note  was 
above  all.  Walpole,  Fort.  II  ch.  5  p.   193. 

,  .  .  when  man  first  appeared  as  a  hunting  and  fishing 
savage.  Oman,  Engl.  Conquest  p.  2. 

The  seeming  sleeper  was  thinking  of  her  children, 
away  over  there  in  England. 

Galsworthy,  Caravan  p.   172. 

At  length  he  discerned,  a  long  distance  in  front  of 
him,  a  moving  spot,  which  appeared  to  be  a  vehicle,  .  .  . 

Hardy,  Native  I  ch.  2  p.  9. 

.  . .  the  sporting  pictures  on  the  walls,  and  the  long 
sJiining  row  of  mugs  and  coloured  plates  by  the  fire-place. 

Walpole,  Fort.  I  ch.   i   p.  4. 

December  came  with  its  dark  mornings  and  steadily 
falling  rains.  Waugh,  Loom  of  Youth,  III  ch.   3. 

b.  There  was  not  much  chance  to  ship  again  for  two 
or    three    weeks,    owing  to  the  number  of  men  luaiting. 
Davies,  Super-Tramp,  ch.    11   p.  93. 

The  bodies  were  not  those  of  men  coming  from  the 
city  in  search  of  employment  ...     ib.  ch.   13   p.    102  f. 

...  a  tiny  bookshelf  contai^iing  some  tattered  volumes 
of  Reclame's  (sic)  Universal  Bibliothek. 

Walpole,   Fort.  II  ch.   3   p.    173. 

I    believe    the    frequency    of   these    trips    was  mainly 
owing  to  the  friendship  t^a-zV////^  between  the  two  captains. 
Davies,  Super-Tramp  ch.    i   p.   2. 

The  lilacs  and  chestnut  trees  just  crozvding  forth  in 
little  tufts,  close  ketone lling  in  their  blossom,  were  ruffled 
back,  like  a  sleeve  turned  up,  and  nicked  with  brown  at 
the  corners.     Blackmore,  Lorna  Doone  ch.  17  p.   108. 

Mr.  Wegg  has  gone  deeply  into  the  life  of  Antwerp 
in  its  various  aspects,  and  his  work,  though  ^^(^/zVz^  with 
a  limited  period,  is  a  valuable  contribution  to  civic 
history.  Times  Lit.    15/6,    16. 

96.  Post-position  of  the  attributive  ing  is  plainly  due 
to  the  verbal  meaning  that  is  to  be  expressed  in  the  fol- 
lowing quotations. 


74  VERBS 

No  doubt  he  had  grown  to  love  her  (a  ship),  but  she 
had  gone  beyond  the  control  of  living  man,  and  a  score 
of  the  best  seamen  breathing  could  not  have  made  her 
punctual  to  her  duties. 

Davies,  Super-Tramp  ch.    i   p.   3. 

The  halt  was  but  momentary,  for  the  noise  resolved 
itself  into  the  steady  bites  of  two  animals  grazing. 

Hardy,   Native  I  ch.   8  p.   86. 

"A  perfect  idiot !  Imagine  leaving  anything  out  on 
the  line  in  weather  like  this  .  .  .  Now  my  best  little 
Teneriffe-work  teacloth  is  simply  in  ribbons.  What  is 
that  extraordinary  smell.''  It's  the  porridge  burning. 
Oh,  heavens  —  this  wind!"        Mansfield,  Bliss  p.  137. 

^ 97.     It     has     been     attempted    in    the 

Adverb  or  Attributive  ,.  .  ,...,, 

.  ,    ^  precedmg  sections  to  distmguish  the  plam 

compared  with  Free     ^    ,         ^    .  .       ,  .  ,      ,      1- 

and  prepositional  ings  as  adverb  adjuncts, 
Adjuncts  .,^    .^         ^.  "^       ^    ,  I 

attributive    adjuncts,    and    iree    adjuncts. 

This    seems  to  be  justified  by  the  form  of  the  constructions 

as    well    as    by    the    meanings    expressed.     We    have    a  free 

adjunct    when    the    ing    precedes    the    word  it  may  seem  to 

refer  to  more  particularly,  although  an  adverb  or  attributive 

adjunct    would    require  post-position  in  the  given  case.     We 

also    have    a    free    adjunct  when  it  follows  the  word  it  may 

seem  to  qualify,  but  is  separated  from  this  by  a  pause  which 

is    not    the    consequence    of  any  other  circumstance  than  its 

own  function  in  the  sentence.     Examples  of  these  cases  will 

be  found  in  sections   1 1 5  ff". 

It    may    occur,    however,    that    an    ing    follows  its  leading 

word    and    is    separated    from    it  by  a  pause  that  is  due  to 

other    circumstances  than  the  function  of  the  -ing  itself.     In 

such  a  case  it  may  be  doubtful  whether  we  have  an  adverb 

adjunct  {a)  or  attributive  adjunct  {b)  or  must  look  upon  the 

ing  as  a  free  adjunct.    Occasionally,  it  may  even  be  doubtful 

which    to    choose    between    the    three    kinds  of  adjuncts  {c), 

especially  when  there  is  no  break  {d). 


VERBAL   ING  75 

a.  You  don't  know  what  you  miss,  Evelyn,  not  having 
a  flat  1).  Cotes,  Cinderella,  ch.   15  p.   174. 

He  spent  the  time,  very  cheerfully,  taking  the  things 
out  of  the  black  bag  and  arranging  them. 

Walpole,   Fort.  I  ch.    12  p.    141. 

You    gave    me    quite    a    shock,    telling    me   like    that. 

ib.  II  ch.   5  p.    196. 

When  I  see  you  at  a  party,  so  fresh  and  lovely,  and 
everybody  wondering  at  you,  I  have  a  sort  of  little 
thrill  because  you're  mine  and  afterwards  I  shall  take 
you  home. 

W.  Somerset  Maugham,  Circle  III,  in  Brit.  PI.  p.  635. 

b.  But  there  was  Bromley  Barnes  in  the  flesh,  smiling 
as    usual,    and    gazing  at  me  in  a  quizzical  sort  of  way. 

George  Barton,  Mystery  of  the  Red  Flame 
ch.  17  p.  209. 
But  that  the  spirit  of  intrigue  was  in  him  had  been 
shown  by  a  recent  romantic  habit  of  his;  a  habit  of 
going  after  dark  and  strolling  towards  Alderworth,  there 
looking  at  the  moon  and  stars,  looking  at  Eustacia's 
house,  and  walking  back  at  leisure  2). 

Hardy,  Native  IV  ch.  4  p.   332  f. 

A.  It  can't  take  all  this  time  to  change  one's  shoes. 

B.  One  can't  change  one's  shoes  without  powdering 
one's  nose,  you  know. 

W.  Somerset  Maugham,  Circle  I,  in  Brit.  PI.  p.  588. 

c.  When  James  Forsyte  came  in  again  on  his  way 
home,  the  valet,  trembling,  took  his  hat  and  stick. 

Galsworthy,  Caravan  p.  42. 

d.  I  didn't  mind  it  riding  but  it  was  rather  awkward 
driving.  Sweet,  Spoken  English  p.  72. 

,  c  I,-    +       ®^-   The  ing  is  freely  used  as  a  subject  (a), 

mg  as  a  buDjcct    .     ,    ,.        ,  ,    ,         .        ,, 

including  the  appended  subject  \b). 

a.  Doing  one's  bit,  putting  one's  shoulder  to  the  wheel, 


1)  i.  e.  I  advise  you  to  take  a  Hat. 

2)  The  italic  ings  may  be  parallel  to  going. 


76  VERBS 

proving  the   mettle  of  the  women  of  England,  certainly 
had  its  agreeable  side. 

Rose  Macaulay,  Potterism  I  ch.  3  p.  ^$. 
The  fact  of  the  matter  was  that  Peter  was  so  greatly 
excited    by    it    all  that  abandoning  even  Stephen  was  a 
minor  sorrow.  Walpole,  Fort,  I  ch.  4  p,   39. 

Galileo  found  that  thinking  was  the  road  to  prison, 
and  Bruno  that  it  was  the  road  to  the  stake. 

Bailey,  Question  of  Taste  p.   10. 
Putting    on   his  black  clothes  in  the  morning  brought 
Dawson's  back  to  his  mind. 

Walpole,  Fort.  I  ch.  9  p.   100. 
There    at  any  rate  things  had  happened.     There  had 
been    an    air,  a  spirit.     Fighting  his  father  —  or  at  any 
rate,  escaping  from  his  father  —  had  been  something  vital. 

ib.  II  ch.  4  p.   184. 

It    was    a  very  old  boot  and  much  worn  at  the  heel. 

Seeing    that    made    Serge    notice    for  the  first  time  that 

his  father's  clothes  were  shabby,  out  of  shape  and  dusty. 

Gilbert  Cannan,  Round  the  Corner,  ch.  11  p.  115. 

i/.  It  makes  me  feel  that  it's  hopeless  appealing  to  you. 

Chapin,  New  Morahty  in  Brit.  PI.  p.   554. 
The    sea    is  pretty  rough  this  morning  and  it  will  be 
fun  bathing  in  the  surf.       CoUinson,  Sp.  Engl.  p.  92. 

But  a  little  conversation  was  made  out  of  the  scarcity 
of  a  great  deal,  for  the  persistent  optimism  of  Sally 
recognised  that  it  was  awfully  jolly  saying  nothing  on 
such  a  lovely  evening. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  $8  p.  402. 
You    know,    Peter,    it's    been    most    splendid  knowing 
you  here.  Walpole,  Fort.  I  ch.  6  p.  68. 

"I'm  sure  it  will  be  splendid,"  he  said,  "and  it  will 
be  just  lovely  being  with  you  after  all  this  time." 

ib.  II  ch.   5   p.  201. 
It    would    have    been    pleasanter    and    easier  attacking 
later  .  .  .  Times  W,   12/10,   17. 

It  has  been  very  charming  having  you  all  to   myself; 
but  I  know  Lady  Cumnor  will  be  expecting  us  now. 
Gaskell,  Wives  I  ch.   11  p.   191. 


VERBAL   ING  yj 

99.  The  following  quotation  is  of  interest,  showing  as 
it  does  how  thin  may  be  the  barrier  separating  the  ing 
as  a  subject  from  the  ing  as  a  Iree  adjunct. 

Seeing  this  man  so  merry,  I  knew  that  my  sensitiveness 
would  soon  wear  off;  and,  seeing  him  so  active  was  a 
great  encouragement  i). 

Davies,  Super-Tramp  ch.  20  p.    168. 


.  The  mg  is  occasionalh^  used  as  a  nominal 

Ing  as  a  ,.  .       ^  -^  .....        _ 

„    ,.    ^     predicate  m  a  sentence  expressing  the  identity  01 
Predicate  ^  ,  .  ,         ..  ,  .    K^,  ■      ■   ^ 

subject  and  predicate  («).    1  he  construction  is  less 

uncommon  with  the  neuter  pronoun  it  as  a  formal  subject  {b). 

We    may    here    add   the   ing   as   a  predicative  adjunct  to 

an  object,  rather  for  the  sake  of 'completeness'  than  because 

it  is  of  frequent  occurrence  (c). 

Perhaps  the  great  mistake  made  by  so  many  debutmites 
and  matrons,  preparing  for  their  first  Court,  is  imagining 
that  a  grmid'^)  toilette  of  this  description  must  necessarily 
entail  great  expense.  Daily  Mail. 

Telling  Roger's  father  is  not  making  it  public. 

Gaskell,  Wives  II  p.  245. 

b.  It  would  not  be  doing  justice  to  the  Lippingtons 
if  I  omitted  to  say  that  we  had  prayers. 

Cotes,   Cinderella  ch.    19  p.   212. 
Don't  say  anything  more  to  him;  it's  throwing  words 
away. 

Why,  it  would  really  be  being  unselfish  to  go  away 
and  be  happy  for  a  little,  because  we  would  come  bach 
so  much  nicer. 

The  Enchanted  April  by  Elizabeth.  T.  p.   16. 

c.  "I  call  that  stretching  veracity  too  far,"  he  said 
simply.  Cotes,  Cinderella  ch.   2  p.  23. 


||4)  The   comma  after  and  suggests   that  the  writer  took  what  follows  for 
a   free   adjunct,   although   it    must   be  a  coordinate  sentence  with  seeing  as 
its  subject. 
2^  Sic. 


yS  VERBS 

For  the  use  of  ing  in  such  constructions  as  /  saw  him 
coming,  see  105  ff. 

101.  In  sentences  with  the  introductory  particle  there 
the  ing  is  traditionally  interpreted  as  a  logical  subject; 
see  vol.  3  on  Sentence-Structure.  The  construction  is 
found  in  positive  sentences  {a),  but  more  frequently  in 
negative  sentences,  both  to  deny  a  statement  of  facts  {b)y 
and  a  suggestion  of  a  possibility  {c). 

a.  The  cattle  moved  slowly  about  the  fields,  and  there 
was  harvesting  going  on. 

Benson,  Thread  of  Gold,  p.  27. 

b.  There    is  no  affectation  of  frivolity,  no  cloaking  of 
earnestness  here.  Sturge-Henderson  p.  33. 

There  is  even  here  no  straining  after  effect. 

Ward,  Dickens  ch.   2,  p.  25. 
There  will  be  no  cheerful  shops  open  on  the  morrow, 
no  busy  hurrying  to  and  fro. 

Temple  Thurston,  City  I  ch.    16. 
There  can  be  no  mistaking  the  Doctor's  speech. 

Whibley,  Thackeray  p.  4. 

c.  As    for    tastes,    mamma,  there  is  no  accounting  for 
them.  TroUope,  Framley  ch.  25  p.  248. 

There  was  no  doubting  the  sincerity  of  the  voices. 

Kipling,  Stalky  p.   148. 
There  was  hardly  any  persuading  her  now  to  go  out 
for  a  walk.  Gaskell,  Wives  II  p.  133. 

102.  Another  case  resembling  the  ing  as  an  appended 
subject,  although  in  reality  it  is  an  adverb  adjunct,  is  illustrated 
by  the  following  quotation.  Note  that  there  is  a  distinct 
pause  separating  the  ing  from  the  rest  of  the  sentence. 
There  is  no  such  pause  in  the  quotations  of  gd)b,  although 
appended  subjects  may  be  separated  from  the  rest  of  the 
sentence  by  a  break;  see  vol.  3, 


VERBAL   ING  79 

Gray.     Never    mind    that    now.     Sydney,    get    your 
mother's  wraps. 

Margaret.     Sydney  —  wait  —  no. 
Gray.     Warm  things.     It's  bitter,  driving. 

Dane,  Bill  of  Divorcement,  Brit.  PI.  p.  689. 

Subject  of  the  Ing 

103.  The  action,  occurrence,  or  state,  expressed  by 
the  ing  most  frequently  proceeds  from  what,  in  a  psycho- 
logical sense,  may  be  called  its  subject.  This  subject  is 
not  expressed  grammatically  when  it  is  indicated  by  the 
context  (the  situation).  A  very  few  examples  will  suffice 
to  show  this. 

She  was  dressed  for  going  out. 

I  object  to  going  there. 

Asking    him    for    help    will    be  useless;  you  must  do 
it  alone. 

On    waking,    he    found    himself    on    the    green    knoll 
whence  he  had  first  seen  the  old  man  of  t^je  glen. 

W.   Irving,  Sketch-Book  p.  41. 

104.  In  many  cases  no  definite  subject  is  either  thought 
of  or  expressed  grammatically,  as  in  the  first  part  of  the 
quotation  of  79 :  Huntings  hawking^  and  shooting  were, 
however,  his  chief  delights;  there  is  no  subject  at  all, 
neither  definite  nor  indefinite,  in  the  case  of  88 :  Look  out 
of  the  wijidow,  it's  just  started  snowing.  An  examination 
of  the  quotations  in  sections  75  ff  will  show  that  the  case 
is  far  less  frequent  than  the  ing  with  a  definite  subject. 
The  reason  is  evidently  that  it  is  chiefly  in  general,  or 
'abstract'  statements  that  no  definite  subject  is  thought  of. 

^. .  105.     The  subject  of  the  ing  is  often  expressed 

with  In?   ^^    what    may    be    looked    upon  as  the  object  of 

the  leading  verb,  as  in  this  quotation :  At  a  quarter 

to  nine  Sir  Hector  found  her  waiting  in  the  dining-room, 


80  VERBS 

the  first  down  (Mackenzie,  Rich  Relatives  III  p.  58).  The 
ing  in  this  sentence  must  be  interpreted  as  a  predicative 
adjunct  to  the  object,  as  in  the  one  of  100  c.  But  the 
character  of  the  ing  is  not  really  and  undoubtedly  that 
of  a  predicative  adjunct,  as  the  comparison  with  the 
example  in  100  c  will  prove.  The  reason  is  that  the 
apparent  object  and  predicative  adjunct  are  really  rather 
a  single  group  qualifying  the  leading  verb ;  it  is  necessary, 
therefore,  to  distinguish  the  case  quoted  here  from  the 
one  in  100  c,  and  we  shall  discuss  it  under  the  name  ot 
the  object  zmth  ing. 


The  object  with  ing  is  very  common  with  three 
verbs  of  perception  that  belong  to  the  language  of  famihar 
life :  to  feel,  to  hear.,  and  finally  and  most  frequently  of 
all,  to  see.  A  few  other  verbs  expressing  seeing  also  take 
the  construction,  such  as  to  watch,  to  perceive,  and  the 
literary  to  behold.  It  will  be  observed  that  the  verbs 
cannot  be  classified  as  expressing  physical  perception, 
several  quotations  showing  cases  of  a  mental  process,  as 
far  as  this  distinction  can  be  carried  out. 

To  feel 

Felix    felt    his    heart  beating  —  Clara  was  not  alone 
in  being  frightened  of  this  woman. 

Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.  7  p.  JJ. 
I    felt    an    idiotic    persuasion  trying  to  creep  into  my 
mind,  as  it  were,  that  I  was  in  a  railway  carriage  in  a 
train  just  stopping.  Wells,  Country  p.   148. 

Rip  now  felt  a  vague  apprehension  stealing  over  him. 
W.  Irving,  Sketch-Book  p.  39. 

To  hear 

Quinney    heard    him    chuckling   as   he  made  his  way 
downstairs.  Vachell,  Ouinneys'  p.   197. 

I  heard  her  clattering  up  the  kitchen  stairs. 

Baring-Gould,  Swaen  I  p.   11. 


VERBAL   ING  8 1 

One  would  like  to  hear  Mr.  Brock's  subtlety  applying 
itself  to  this  curious  inquiry.  Times  Lit.    18/5,   22. 

To  see 

"What  are  you  going  to  do,  Humphie?"  he  exclaimed, 
as  he  saw  Humphrey  coming  slowly  across  the  room 
with  a  great  jug  of  water  in  his  arms. 

Montgomery,  Misunderstood  ch.  4. 

Looking  up,  Hazel  could  see  the  sensitive  leaves  of 
the  Cottonwood  vibrating  beneath  the  evening  breeze. 

Vachell,  Spragge  p.    166. 

That  is  the  conviction  which  we  should  like  to  see 
spreading  in  all  classes,  and  especially  in  the  working 
classes.  Star,  Sept.  6,    1927. 

.  .  ;  and  seeing  her  living  there  just  as  she  had  been 
living  before  he  left  home,  he  naturally  suspected 
nothing.  Hardy,  Native  II  ch.  6  p.   174. 

Other  verbs  of  seeing 

It  was  very  pretty  to  watch  her  working  for  her 
very  life.         Blackmore,  Lorna  Doone  ch.  46  p.  318. 

Then  perceiving  Felix  coming ....  he  crossed  the 
pavement.  Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch,    i   p.    16. 

We  behold  sea  power  exercising  its  universal  sway 
in  the  history  of  both  the  Hellenic  and  the  Latin  races. 

Times  Ed.  S.  23/7,  21. 

An  analysis  of  the  preceding  sentences  will  easily  con- 
vince the  student  that  it  is  not  only  impossible  to  look 
upon  the  ing  in  them  as  a  genuine  predicative  adjunct, 
but  that  an  interpretation  of  the  preceding  noun  as  an 
object  would  be  equally  wrong. 

Sometimes  it  may  be  doubtful  whether  we  have  a  case 
of  the  construction  dealt  with  here  or  a  real  object  qualified 
by  an  attributive  ing,  as  in  the  following  sentence. 

He  looked  down  at  the  ewes  beside  him  fumbling  the 
hay  in  the  wooden  racks  with  their  noses  or  chewing 
placidly  while  they  watched  the  lambs  scampering  gaily 
among  the  bins  and  troughs. 

Freeman,  Joseph  ch.  8  p.  60  f. 
Kruisinga,  Handbook  II.  Accidence  and  Syntax.  1.  6 


82  VERBS 

We  may  also  hesitate  over  the  interpretation  of  the 
ings  in  the  following  quotation,  though  the  comma  might 
seem  to  point  to  the  character  of  an  attributive  ing.  It 
even  seems  doubtful  whether  the  interpunction  is  in 
accordance  with  the  real  structure  of  the  sentence. 

In  some  passages,  which  the  editor  of  the  Journals 
preferred  to  suppress,  he  covered  Lord  Granville  with 
his  raillery,  picturing  the  Foreign  Secretary,  lounging 
away  his  morning  at  Walmer  Castle,  opening  the  Times 
and  suddenly  discovering,  to  his  horror,  that  Khartoum 
was  still  holding  out. 

Lytton  Strachey,  Em.  Vict.  p.  292. 

107.  The  object  with  ing  is  also  found  after  a  number 
of  other  verbs.  In  these  cases  it  is  usually  still  more 
difficult  to  interpret  the  noun  or  pronoun  that  serves  as 
the  subject  of  the  ing  as  a  real  object.  This  applies  to 
the  construction  with  the  verbs  to  find,  catch,  take,  keep, 
leave,  start  (a).  The  construction  is  also  used  with  a 
number  of  verbs  that  express  a  kind  of  movement :  to 
bring,  set,  send,  and  some  others  (b).  An  exhaustive  list, 
if  possible,  would  hardly  serve  any  useful  purpose.  But 
it  may  not  be  superfluous  to  remind  the  reader  that  each 
sentence  should  be  considered  independently:  the  identit}^ 
of  form  covers  real,  and  sometimes  important,  differences 
of  sentence-structure  and  of  meaning. 

a.  He  found  himself  hoping  that  his  statement  would 
be  laughed  at.      Meredith,  Harrington  ch.  34  p.  364. 

These  are  the  problems  which  we  find  men  such  as 
Gentz  and  Humboldt  discussing.      Times  Lit.   8/4,   20. 

At  this  he  would  wake  up  to  find  the  lamp  still 
burning  on  the  table  and  Dicky's  father  peering  at  him 
from  over  the  top  of  his  spectacles. 

Temple  Thurston^  Antagonists  I  ch.  I  (T.)  p.  13  f. 

He  even  found  himself  envying  those  old  Treliss  days. 
Walpole,  Fortitude  II  ch.  4  p.   184. 


VERBAL   ING  83 

She  never  kept  a  maid  sitting  up  for  her  i). 

Hichens,  Ambition  ch.  3  p.  29. 

I  can't  keep  the  horses  waiting :  they're  a  new- 
pair  —  stood  me  in  three  hundred. 

Galsworthy,  Caravan  I  p.  2. 
He    suddenly    gripped   her   hand    and  wrung  it  again 
and  again  —  then  he  burst  away  from  her,  leaving  her 
standing  there  in  the  middle  of  the  room. 

Walpole,  Fort.  II  ch.   5  p.  200. 
A  book  entitled  "Education  for  Democracy"  published 
last    year    for    Miss    Alice    Davis    by    the    New    York 
Knickerbocker  Press,  started  the  ball  rolling. 

Times  Ed.  S.  8/7,  20. 
b.  That  minute's  interval  had  brought  the  blood  beating 
into  her  face.  Hardy,  Madding  Crowd  ch.  28. 

This  conversation  set  me  thinking. 

Everyman  22/11,   12. 

Now,    that    is    not  a  very  marvellous  incident;  but  it: 
set  me  wondering.         Benson,  Thread  of  Gold  p.  52. 
By  a  friendly  blink  that  set  him  a-smiling. 

Porcelain  Lady  ch.  6  p.  107. 
(These  activities)  set  the  surrounding  rabbits  curiously^ 
watching  from  hillocks  at  a  safe  distance. 

Hardy,  Native  II  ch.   i   p.   127. 
The  mere  imagined  picture  .  ,  .  sent  the  blood  rushing 
through  him.  Walpole,  Fort,  III  ch.  3  p.  257. 

So  instead  of  running  after  me  with  that  valuable 
parcel,  they  have  sent  it  flying  to  a  friend  of  mine  in 
Westminster. 

Chesterton,  Innocence  of  Father  Brown  p.  21. 

108.  With  a  number  of  verbs  we  have  apparently  the 
same  construction,  but  it  is  rather  the  whole  group  of 
noun   or    pronoun   with  ing  that  is  the  real  object.     Such 


1)  Compare   also    phrases    like    to    keep    the  ball  rolling,  to  Jceep  the  pot 
boiling. 


84  VERBS 

verbs  are  those  that  express  a  mental  perception :  to  conceive, 
fancy,  recollect^  remember,  imagine  {a);  and  some  expressing 
a  feeling:  to  hate,  like,  mind,  want  (b).  We  may  add  the 
verb  to  have  {c),  which  is  treated  in  the  chapter  on  the 
Auxiliaries. 

a.  Can  he  conceive  Matthew  Arnold  permitting  such 
a  book  to  be  written  and  published  about  himself? 

.  .  .  for  they  could  not  conceive  it  being  the  question 
of  an  intelligent  man. 

Locke,  The  House  of  Baltazar  ch.  8  p.  97. 

He  did  not  feel  the  slightest  tremor  of  nervousness. 
He  remembered  Hunter  saying  at  the  end  of  last  term 
that  it  was  rather  ticklish  work  being  captain  of  the 
House.  Waugh,  Loom  of  Youth  ch.   i. 

Then  she  recollected  his  friend's  voice  striking  in  with: 
"What's  that?  Gerry  Palliser  swim!  Of  course  he 
can't .  ."         De  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  12  p.  120. 

We  can  fancy  the  elegant  brute  saying  it. 

ib.  ch.  8  p.  66. 

"You  don't  know  Cyril,  Sir  James,  if  you  fancy  him 
taking  any  risks  —  particularly  when  he's  in  charge  of 
his  ward.     He's  caution  personified." 

Stephen  McKenna,  The  Reluctant  Lover 
ch.   18  p.  284. 

Is  it  possible,  one  can  imagine  the  future  historian 
demanding,  that  anyone  could  have  been  in  those  days 
altogether  sane?  Masterman,  Condition  ch.  i  p.  14. 

You  can't  imagine  me  making  love  to  Muriel,  Wister? 
Chapin,  New  Morality,  Brit.  PI.  p.  544. 

You  can't  imagine  yourself  going  on  the  way  I  did, 
can  you .''  ib.  p.  539. 

b.  Well,  he  knows  I  hate  him  talking  about  that  nasty 
old  town  to  the  baby. 

Walpole,  Fort.  Ill  ch.  8  p.  321. 

"Would  you  mind  me  coming  with  you,  Mrs.  Rouse?" 
said  John  suddenly. 

Temple  Thurston,  City  I  ch.    16  p.   126. 


VERBAL   ING  85 

I  don't  like  him  behaving  hke  that. 

Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  IV  ch.  3  §  3. 

We  don't  want  the  women  meddling. 

H.  Ward,  Tressady  ch.  3. 

She  did  not  want  her  brother  getting  mixed  up  in 
an  oil-strike.  Upton  Sinclair,  Oil  XV,  IV  p.   374. 

c.  They  descended,  Chillon  saying  that  they  would  soon 
have  the  mists  rising,  and  must  not  delay  to  start  on 
their  journey. 

Meredith,   Amazing  Marriage  ch.  4  p.  41. 

The  University  has  undergraduates  other  than  those 
whom  it  lately  knew  knocking  at  its  door. 

Times  Ed.  S.  22/8,   18. 

That's  right.     We'll  soon  have  it  blazing  merrily. 
Collinson,  Spoken  Engl.  p.  32. 

It  would  be  too  horrible  to  have  her  flatly  refusing 
to  do  something  I  told  her  to  do. 

Priscilla's  Fortnight  ch.    17  p.   233. 

109.  The  verbs  to  avoids  prevent,  prohibit,  and  stop 
can  take  an  object  with  plain  ing,  like  the  preceding 
verbs  {a),  but  also  an  object  with  prepositional  ing  in  the 
same  sense  {b).  In  accordance  with  the  meaning  of  the 
verbs  the  preposition  is  from.  It  is  clear  that  the  ing  in 
this  construction  has  rather  the  character  of  an  adverb 
adjunct,  and  that  the  construction  has  little  in  common, 
except  formally,  with  the  object  with  ing  as  used  when 
a  verb  of  perception  such  as  to  see  is  the  leading  verb. 

a.  I  much  regret  that  my  official  duties  at  Crewe  House 
prevent  me  being  present  at  to-day's  gathering. 

Lord  Northcliffe  in  Times  23/8,   18. 

Though  of  course  Mr.  Wister  cannot  prevent  Mrs.  Wister 
proceeding  .  . .     Chapin,  New  Morality,  Brit.  PI.  p.  57  7. 

Milton  spelt  a  number  of  words  variably  to  express 
degrees  of  emphasis ;  it  is  pleasant  to  think  that  nothing 


86  VERBS 

need  prevent  a  successor  of  his  doing  the  same  to-morrow, 
if  he  ever  finds  a  successor. 

B.  de  Selincourt,  Pomona  or  the  Future 
of  English  p.  71. 

.  . .  but  I  certainly  did  think  that  the  kindness  of  your 
nature  might  prevent  you  judging  an  uncontrolled  tongue 
harshly.  Hardy,  Madding  Crowd  ch.   26  p.   202  f. 

Well,  it  stopped  him  marrying  anyone  else.  She 
oughtn't  to  have  let  him.  —  You  can't  stop  a  person 
being  fond  of  you. 

Clemence  Dane,  Bill  of  Divorcement,  Brit.  PI.  p.  685. 

d.  But  this  did  not  prevent  us  from  maintaining  a 
gimlet  eye  on  the  doings  of  next  door. 

Kenealy,  Mrs.  Grundy  p.  60. 

She  had  wanted  him  all  these  years  and  he  had 
allowed  those  other  people  to  prevent  him  from  going 
to  her.  Walpole,  Fort.  I  ch.  7  p.  79. 

Among  imaginary  adventures  which  prevent  children 
from  going  to  sleep  quickly,  a  medical  writer  mentions 
visions  of  themselves  catching  enormous  fish. 

Punch  23/7,    1930  p.   85/1. 

Lady   Kitty    tries    to   give  him  a  withering  look,  but 
she  finds  it  very  difficult  to  prevent  herself  from  smiling. 
W.  Somerset  Maugham,  The  Circle  III, 
Brit.  PL  p.  639. 
"Well,  I'm  not  an  atom  bit  sleepy,"  said  Kezia.   "But 
my  eyes  keep  curling  up  in  such  a  funny  sort  of  wa)^"  — 
She  gave  a  long  sigh,  and  to  stop  her  eyes  from  curling 
she  shut  them.  K.  Mansfield,   Bliss  p.    10. 

110.  The  constructions  are  sometimes  used  with  these 
verbs  when  any  attempt  to  explain  the  noun  or  pronoun 
as  an  object  is  out  of  the  question;  in  the  following  cases 
it  is  nothing  else  than  the  subject  of  the  ing. 

a.  It  is  much  to  be  hoped  that  the  Government  will 
not  allow  any  irresponsible  or  factious  opposition  to 
prevent  this  Bill  becoming  law.       Observer  4/12,  21. 


VERBAL   ING  8/ 

b.  This  view  prevents  us  from  treating  the  poor  child 
as  a  mere  tool  for  the  production  of  wealth. 

Gill,  Government  and  People  p.   i6o. 

Nothing  could  make  Sir  Christopher  so  happy  as  to 
see  a  marriage  which  might  be  expected  to  secure  the 
inheritance  of  Cheverel  Manor  from  getting  into  the 
wrong  hands,       Eliot,  Mr.   Gilfil's  Love-Story  ch.  IV, 

(They)  were  carefully  trying  to  avoid  a  rumpus  from 
breaking  out.  Patterson,  Compton,  p.  72, 

The  Board  of  Agriculture  are  considering  what  powers, 
if  any,  should  be  obtained  to  prevent  good  farmers 
from  being  turned  out  of  their  holdings  owing  to  the 
sale  of  the  property,  Times  W.  21/12,   17. 

The    rigid   uniformity  of  the  examinations  for  schools 
prescribed    by     Oxford     and     Cambridge    prevents    any 
experiments  from  being  tried  or  any  new  method  adopted. 
Prof.  Firth,   Hist.  IV  no.    14  p,  80. 

111.  The  verb  to  excuse  is  construed  both  with  the 
object  and  plain  ing  (1)  and  the  prepositional  ing  with 
from  or  for  (2).  It  must  be  noted  that  in  the  former 
construction  the  sense  may  be  to  excuse  a  person  for 
doing  a  thing,  or  from  doing,  i.  e.  for  not  doing,  a  thing; 
of  course  the  situation  makes  a  misunderstanding  impos- 
sible, at  any  rate  in  spoken  Enghsh. 

(i)  The  vulgarian  who  says  'Excuse  me  getting  up' 
(to  give  a  handshake),  and  his  brother  who  says  'Excuse 
me  not  getting  up',  mean  the  same  thing:  'Excuse  my 
not  getting  up',  or  'Excuse  me  from  getting  up.' 

Grattan,  quoted  in  Engl.  Studies  vol.   12  p.    no, 

'T'm  going  to  say  my  prayers  in  bed  to-night."  — 
"No  you  can't,  Lottie."  Isabeth  was  very  firm.  "God 
only  excuses  you  saying  your  prayers  in  bed  if  you've 
got  a  temperature."  K.  Mansfield,  Bliss  p,   16. 

(2)  I'm  going  down  there  this  evening;  so  you  must 
excuse  me  for  hurrying  away. 

Patterson,  Compton,  p,   176. 

"Excuse  me  from  rising,  Miss  Lyon,"  said  Felix;  "I'm 
binding  up  Job's  finger."     G.  Eliot,  Felix  Holt  ch.  22. 


88  VERBS 

112.  The  alternative  of  an  object  with  plain  ing  and 
v^^ith  a  prepositional  ing  occurs  in  other  cases.  In  all  of 
them  the  ing  has  the  character  of  an  adverb  adjunct,  as 
far  as  the  group  can  be  analysed  at  all. 

It  is  difficult  to  conceive  the  circumstances  which 
would  justify  a  soldier  of  whatever  rank  he  might  be 
disobeying  a  legal  order  lawfully  given  to  him. 

Times  Weekly  Ed.  27/3,    1914. 
His    book    contains    more   than   enough   to  justify  the 
reader  in  refusing  to  accept  his  thesis. 

Times  Lit.    15/2,    18. 

113.  In  many  of  the  cases  when  an  object  with  ing  is 
possible  there  are  alternative  constructions.  Thus  the 
verbs  of  perception  often  have  an  object  with  plain  stem 
(/  heard  him  go  upstairs)  or  an  object  with  stem  with  to 
(/  hate  you  to  talk  like  that).  The  prepositional  object 
with  ing  of  106  has  its  equivalent  in  the  prepositional 
object  with  plain  stem  (see  199  for  some  examples).  And 
some  others,  among  which  are  the  verbs  of  perception,  to 
remember,  conceive,  as  well  as  to  prevent,  excuse,  as 
mentioned  in  Professor  Grattan's  observation  quoted  in 
111,  take  a  possessive  with  ing.  A  comparison  of  these 
alternatives  will  be  possible  when  each  has  been  dealt 
with  in  its  proper  place.  Such  a  comparison  may  be 
expected  to  make  the  peculiar  character,  and  meaning,  of 
each  of  the  constructions  referred  to  somewhat  clearer; 
see  384. 

The  distinction  between  the  cases  in  105  —  7  and  those 
of  108  —  111  is  borne  out  by  the  fact  that  the  ing  in  the 
former  case  is  always  a  verb  expressing  an  action  or 
occurrence,  and  may  be  a  verb  expressing  a  state  in 
the  latter  group;  see  200.  It  must  be  added  that  the 
prepositional  object  with  ing  (see  the  first  quotation  of 
115)   should   be  distinguished   from   the   plain  object  with 


VERBAL   ING  89 

ing;  the  prepositional  object  is  syntactically  identical  here 
with  the  prepositional  adjuncts. 

It  may  finally  be  observed  that  the  verbs  that  take  an 
object  with  plain  ing  or  with  prepositional  ing  can  have 
their  participle  used  predicatively  with  the  same  construction. 
In  most  cases  the  resulting  construction  presents  no  pecuhar 
features,  as  with  the  verbs  of  perception  and  related  cases 
of  105—107  [a).  It  is  not  so  in  the  case  of  the  verbs  of 
108  —  111:  these  are  only  occasionally  so  used,  and  the  con- 
struction clearly  shows  a  somewhat  different  character  {b). 

a.  During  the  whole  of  the  period  before  the  Norman 
Conquest  that  distinction  can  be  seen  gradually  asserting 
itself.  Constit.   Essays  p.   276. 

How,  Henry  James  may  be  heard  grimly  asking,  dare 
you  pronounce  any  opinion  whatever  upon  me? 

Times  Lit.  8/4,  20. 
He  had  often  been  observed  gazing  with  marked  gravity 
at  a  dead  flower.     Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.  up.  124. 

Medley  Lock  is  now  the  nearest  place  to  Oxford 
where  the  reed  warbler  can  be  heard  singing. 

Gunther,  Oxford  Country  p.   33. 

Compare  the  following  sentences  of  a  similar  structure. 

Mr.  Shaw  has  been  photographed  walking  arm-in-arm 
with  two  actresses.  Punch   i/io,   30  p.  365/2. 

The  author  of  a  new  novel  who  served  for  three  years 
in  the  Guards  is  reported  as  saying  that  he  would  not 
do  it  again  for  a  million  pounds. 

Punch   i/io,  30  p.   365/1. 

b.  Dr.  Barnard  has  been  prevented  by  other  learned 
preoccupations  from  making  himself  responsible  for  the 
revision  of  the  volume. 

Medieval  History  ed.  Davis.  Preface. 

Suh'ect         ^^^"     ^^  have  seen  that  what  is  grammatically 

'th  Itiff     ^^^    object  in   the   ing-constructions   examined   in 

the  preceding  sections,  is  the  'subject'  of  the  ing 

when   we    take    the   term   in  its  psychological  sense.     It 


90  VERBS 

occurs  very  often  that  there  is  no  part  of  the  sentence 
that  can  at  the  same  time  serve  as  a  subject  of  the  ing. 
In  such  cases  the  noun  or  pronoun  serving  as  a  subject 
of  the  ing  has  no  other  function,  and  forms  a  close 
syntactic  group  with  the  ing.  According  to  the  form  of 
the  noun  or  pronoun  we  distinguish: 

(1)  indefinite  case  (of  noun  or  pronoun)  with  ing; 

(2)  possessive  with  ing; 

(3)  genitive  (of  noun  or  pronoun)  with  ing; 

(4)  oblique  (form  of  personal  pronoun  of  the  first  and 
third  persons)  with  ing; 

(5)  nominative    (of  personal   pronoun  of  the  first  and 
third  persons)  with  ing. 

The  range  of  each  of  these  syntactic  groups  will  be 
described  and  illustrated.  It  will  then  be  possible  to 
answer  the  question  why  each  of  them  is  required  in  the 
lunctions  it  occupies,  and  also  to  deal  with  the  cases  when 
two  constructions  really  or  apparently  compete  with  each 
other. 

,,,..,  115.     When   the   subject   of  an  ing  is  not 

Indefinite       •    ,.        j  i    ,  r    , 

„  ...  ,  indicated  or  suggested  by  a  part  of  the 
Case  with  Ing  ,        ,  ,  -^   ,      ^^        .        . 

sentence    that   has    also   another  function,  it 

can  always  be  expressed  by  an  indefinite  case.    It  seems 

unnecessary   to   mass   quotations  to  prove  this  statement, 

but   a   limited   number  must  be  given.     The  order  of  the 

quotations  is  that  of  the  functions  of  the  ing  as  enumerated 

in  sections  75  ff. 

75.  (Prep.  adj.  and  objects  to  verbs). 

You  mean  to  insist  upon  Betty  apologizing  personally? 

Chapin,  New  Morality,  Brit.  PI.  p.  551. 
Much     excitement     was     caused    in    Sandgate    Road, 
Folkestone,    yesterday,    by    a    bullock  which  was  being 


VERBAL   ING  9 1 

driven  through  the  town  entering  a  glass  and  china  shop. 

Daily  Mail   i/io,    1908. 

Hurried  reading  results  in  the  learner  forgetting  half 
of  what  he  reads.  Sweet. 

In  this  book  he  looks  forward  to  Russia  more  or  less 
rapidly  overcoming  the  enormous  difficulties  with  which 
it  is  faced.  Times  Lit.   21/12,    17. 

The  completeness  of  the  catastrophe  pointed  to  a 
mine  being  the   cause.  Pilot   16/4,   1904. 

Of  that  time  coming  he  had  no  doubt  i). 

Patterson,  Compton  p.    187. 

76.  (Prep.  adj.  and  objects  to  nouns  and  adj.). 

There  is  no  valid  excuse,  therefore,  for  anyone  who 
has  money  for  investment  not  buying  the  Bonds  to  the 
utmost  of  their  ability.  Times  W.   30/11,    17. 

There  was  a  rumour  of  Martha  marrying  the  son  of 
a  neighbouring  farmer.      Patterson,   Compton,   p.  204. 

Happily  there  is  no  risk  of  Irishmen  becoming  altogether, 
or  even  almost,  as  Englishmen  are. 

Chambers's  Cycl.  Eng.  Lit.  p.  IX. 

She  would  never  get  stout  as  there  was  every  danger  of 
Clara  doing.        Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.  31   p.  396. 

He  could  not  realise  the  possibility  of  any  one  finding 
a  difficulty  in  so  small  a   matter. 

Peard,  Madame  p.   58. 

The  fact  of  the  higher  apes  not  using  their  vocal 
organs  for  speech,  no  doubt  depends  on  their  intelligence 
not  having  been  sufficiently  advanced. 

Darwin,  in  Herrig-Forster  p.  619. 

Poor  child,  she's  still  frightfully  upset  about  her  father 
going  away  ^),  and  I  want  you  to  comfort  her. 

Stephen  McKenna,  Reluctant  Lover  ch.  13  p.  195. 


1)  The   ing   is   an    adjunct    to  the  syntactic  group  have  no  doubt,  not  to 
the  noun  in  this  group  only. 

2)  The  father  is  going,  not  gone. 


92  VERBS 

81.  (Prep,  absolute  adjuncts). 

Mother    whispered   to  him  now  and  then,  not  to  talk 
of  this  or  that,  because  of  the  children  being  there. 
Blackmore,  Lorna  Doone,  ch.   ii   p.  72. 

Now,  with  the  morning  shining  round  them,  come 

Young  men,  and  strip  their  coats 

And  loose  their  shirts  about  their  throats. 

Binyon,  Poems  of  To-Day  I  p.  94. 

Just  now,  with  the  harvest  coming  on,  everything 
looks  its  richest,  the  apples  ripening,  the  trees  almost 
too  green.  Galsworthy,  Caravan  p.  281. 

No  history  of  English  foreign  policy  can  be  written 
without  his  name  filling  a  large  space  in  it. 

Times  Lit.  31/10,   1929. 

Pitt  joined  with  Prussia  to  prevent  it,  and  the  Prussian 
armies  overawed  the  Republicans  without  France  daring 
to  intervene.  Trevelyan,  British  History  p.  43. 

They  enjoyed  a  brief  popularity  for  some  fifteen  years, 
and  then  disappeared  without  their  loss  being  much 
mourned.  Standard,   12/8,    191 2. 

. .  .  any  dialectic  traces  of  that  race  in  the  fifth  or 
sixth  century  inscriptions  may  be  ascribed  to  late-coming 
visitors,  without  it  being  necessary  to  suppose  that  the 
whole  region  was  originally  Goidelic. 

Oman,  Before  Norman  Conq.  p.    19. 

On  Mrs.  Shorley  telling  her  husband  that  at  last  she 
had  secured  a  treasure,  Mr.  Shorley  endeavoured  to 
pretend  that  the  phrase  had  not  reached  his  ears  before. 

Pett  Ridge,  Garland. 

Upon  Kate's  gentleman  friend  being  left  with  seven 
pounds  ten  to  the  good,  listeners  gave  a  long  and  deep- 
drawn  sigh  of  envy.  ib. 

82.  (Conjunctive  adjuncts). 

Anyhow,  that's  better  than  Brown  being  faced  with 
a  suit  for  breach  of  promise. 

CoUinson,  Spoken  Engl.  p.  66. 
The   guard   put   him    and  his  luggage  into  a  carriage 


VERBAL   ING  93 

and    then    left  him  with  a  last  word  as  to  Salton  being 
his  destination.  Walpole,   Fort.  I  ch.  4  p.  44. 

I  have  my  doubts  as  to  this  being  true. 

91.  (Plain  absolute  Adjuncts). 

He  ate  improvised  meals  there  at  odd  times,  Charmian 
acting  as  cook.        Hichens,  Ambition,  ch.    18  p.   207. 

The  sea  was  not  visible,  but  I  could  hear  it  on  the 
other  side  of  the  belt  of  firs ;  and  the  verandah  facing 
south  and  being  hot  and  airless,  a  longing  to  get  into 
the  cool  water  took  hold  of  me.  Eliz.  in  Rugen. 

To  Western  civilization  the  Crusades  contributed  very 
little,  the  truth  being  that  there  was  little  to  be  learned 
from  the  Mohammedans  in  Syria. 

Davis,  Med.  Europe  p.  212. 

The  first  parliament  of  Charles  I.  met  on  17  May, 
1625,  and  was  dissolved  on  12  August,  the  Commons 
protesting.  Maitland,  Const.  Hist.  p.   292. 

He  had  a  high  shining  head,  from  which  the  hair  had 
mostly  departed,  what  little  still  remained  being  of  a 
grizzled  auburn.  Anstey,  Vice  Versa  ch.   i. 

98.  (As  a  subject  of  the  Sentence). 

a.  Charles,  however  can  poor  Linda  having  it  (viz. 
the  smallpox)  possibly  stop  you.-* 

Hutchinson,  One  Increasing  Purpose  III 
ch.    15   p.   326. 
....    she    asked,  because  Peter  being  here  seemed  so 
amusing    that    for    the    moment    she    thought    she    was 
seeing  a  vision. 

Bar.  Orczy,  Pimpernel  and  Rosemary  (T.)  p.   193. 

b.  It  was  quite  ridiculous,  said  the  merpussy  i),  people 
making  such  a  fuss  about  a  few  waves. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  36  p.  374. 
Now  it's  not  a  bit  of  good  you  nagging  at  me,  miss. 
Mackenzie,  Rich  Relatives  I  p.  7. 


i)  A  nickname,  on  the  model  of  me7'maid. 


94  VERBS 

It's  no  earthly  use  the  artist  trying  to  keep  himself 
and  his  talent  in  cotton  wool  in  these  days. 

Hichens,  Ambition  ch.  30  p.  377. 
Mrs.    C.    says    it    is    nonsense,    people    going    a   long 
journey  when  they  are  married  i). 

Eliot,  Middlemarch  III  ch.  28  p.  203. 

It  was  no  use  Virginie  venting  her  wrath  upon 
Humphrey.         F.  Montgomery,  Misunderstood^  ch.  9. 

It  was  no  use  men  being  angry  with  them  for  damaging 
the  links  2).  Times  W.  7/2,   13. 

116.  It  may  not  be  superfluous  to  illustrate  the  use  of 
plural  nouns  or  pronouns  in  -s,  in  the  indefinite  case 
naturally,  since  the  plural  in  a  sibilant  does  not  distinguish 
cases  (a).  The  subject  of  the  ing  ma}^  also  be  accom- 
panied by  a  subordinate  clause,  thus  making  the  construc- 
tion rather  complicated  (b).  The  subject  of  the  ing  may 
also  be  a  clause  (c). 

a.  You  can  always  depend  upon  the  costumes  and 
scenery  being  well  done. 

Collinson,  Spoken  Engl.  p.  80. 
He  doesn't  believe  in  parsons  standing  outside  things 
and  only  doing  soft  jobs. 

Rose  Macaulay,  Potterism  I  ch.  3  p.  25. 
The    excessive    absorption    of   others'    opinions    (even 
the  Spectator's)  ends  in  many  citizens  having  no  opinions 
of  their  own.  Letter  to  the  Spectator   14/1,    1928. 

The  boy  must  have  slept,  because  he  woke  suddenly 
to  all  the  clocks  in  the  house  striking  midnight. 

Walpole,  Fort.  I  ch.  7  p.  83. 

See  also  the  third  quotation  of  \Q9b  (visions  of  themselves 
catching  enormous  fish). 


1)  Note  the  comma  here,  and  its  absence  in  the  other  quotations. 

2)  i.  e.  golf-links. 


VERBAL   ING  95 

h.  I  am  directed  by  the  County  Licensing  Committee 
to  say  that  there  appears  to  be  no  objection  to  the 
body  on  behalf  of  which  you  write  instituting  proceedings 
in  the  case  of  Sunday  entertainments  being  held,  if  they 
see  fit  to  do  so.  Daily  News   191 2. 

c.  There  is,  however,  a  middle-class  prejudice  against 
the  possibility  of  what  is  ornamental  being  useful. 

Cornhill  Mag.  Sept.   1912. 

117.  The  ing  may  also  have  a  formal  subject  //  or 
there.  The  ing  is  chiefly  found  here  of  the  verbs  to  he 
and  to  have;  see  vol.  3  on  Sentence- Structure. 

This  seems  to  abandon  any  belief  in  there  being  an 
absolute  standard  of  morality.        Athenaeum  14/2,  14. 

It  is  unnecessary  to  emphasize  the  lamentable  fact  of 
there  being  so  many  wounded  men  on  their  backs  at 
the  present  time.  Corresp.  Times  Lit.  27/1,   16. 

On  his  way  down  to  Twickenham  Steve  was  glad  at 
there  being  no  particular  debate  in  the  House  that  night. 

Patterson,  Compton. 

Upon  it  being  announced  ^)  .  .  .  that  there  was  a  deficit 
of  over  £  300,  Mr.  E.  S.  Wills  .  .  .  intimated  that  he 
would  give  a  cheque  for  the  amount.  Standard. 

The  next  morning  the  Jesuit  took  him  to  his  father's 
house  on  the  north  side  of  the  Strand,  where  he  saw 
both  his  father  and  his  brother,  it  not  being  the  latter's 
turn  in  waiting  at  the  Court. 

Shorthouse,  Inglesant  ch.  4  p.  47. 

Meanwhile,    Martha    was    more    quiet    and  shorter  of 
words    than    usual  —  except  when  she  and  Uncle  met, 
there    being  a  strong  bond  of  friendship  between  them. 
Patterson,  Stephen  Compton,  p.    143. 

There  being  no  survivors  the  exact  causes  which  led 
to  the  accident  will  never  be  known. 

Times  W.   26/6  '14. 


1)  This  is  an  example  of  the  complex  ing  treated  in  130. 


g6  VERBS 

When  a  true  bill  is  found  (viz.  by  the  grand  jury) 
then  there  will  be  a  trial,  unless  indeed  the  person 
indicted  is  not  in  custody  and  cannot  be  apprehended  .... 
But  there  being  an  indictment  and  a  prisoner,  the  trial 
will  go  forward.        Maitland,  Justice  and  Police  p.  139. 


118.  It  has  been  shown  that  the  indefinite  case  with  ing 
occurs  in  most  of  the  functions  of  a  sentence  that  an  ing 
can  occupy.  No  examples  have  been  quoted  of  the  indefinite 
case  with  ing  as  a  plain  adverb  adjunct  (83 — 90),  nor  of 
the  construction  as  a  plain  attributive  adjunct  (95  f.)  or  as 
a  predicative  ing  as  illustrated  in  lOO.  The  reason  is  that 
in  all  these  constructions  the  subject  of  the  ing  is  indicated 
by  one  of  the  elements  of  the  sentence,  as  far  as  it  need 
be  expressed  at  all. 

119,  It  is  sometimes  doubtful  how  a  sentence  is  to  be 
analysed.  Thus  in  the  following  case :  T/ie  chances  are  about 
ten  to  one  against  Violet  living,  site's  in  a  critical  condition 
(Stephen  McKenna,  Reluctant  Lover  ch.  17  p.  265)  we 
may  call  against  Violet  living  an  adverb  adjunct,  but  this 
does  not  make  it  identical  with  the  adverb  adjuncts  with  a 
preposition  in  the  other  sentences. 

In  this  sentence :  The  first  thing  I  can  remember  was  my 
father  teaching  me  the  alphabet  (Mary  Lamb  in  Selected  Short 
Stories  II  p.  i)  we  might  be  inclined  to  call  my  father 
teaching  me  a  nominal  predicate  on  formal  grounds,  but  if 
we  consider  the  meaning  intended  it  must  be  said  to  be 
rather  an  object  with  ing  to  remember.  We  have  an  apparent 
object  with  ing  in :  1  cannot  help  my  ideas  being  different 
from  yours  and  Samanthd's  (Vachell,  Spragge  p  216),  but 
the  noun  with  help  in  this  sense  is  hardly  a  genuine  object. 

Whenever  a  noun  or  pronoun  in  the  indefinite  case  is 
followed    by   an   ing,    there    is  a  possibility  of  the  ing  being 


VERBAL   ING  9/ 

an  attributive  adjunct  to  the  preceding  word  as  well  as  the 
leading  member  of  a  syntactic  group  in  which  the  noun  or 
pronoun  serves  for  a  subject.  In  most  cases  there  is  no 
difficulty  in  deciding,  but  sentences  occur  where  it  may  be 
doubtful  which  interpretation  is  the  one  intended.  The 
following  quotations  illustrate  this :  those  under  a  may  best 
be  interpreted  as  attributive  ings,  those  under  b  as  examples 
of  the  indefinite  case  with  ing. 

a.  Then  comes  silence,  and  a  consciousness  of  a 
policeman  musing,  and  suspecting  doors  have  been  left 
stood  open. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.   12  p.   121. 
Down    one  of  these  (streets)  they  plunged;  Peter  was 
conscious  of  faces  watching  them. 

Walpole,  Fort.  ch.   5   p.  201. 
Once    when    we    were    passing    through    a    street    in 
New  Orleans,  I  paused  to  listen  to  a  woman  singing. 
Davies,  Super-Tramp  ch.  6  p.  40. 

b.  I  have  .  .  .  seen  many  instances  of  gifted  men 
ruining  their  chances  of  getting  on  in  life  simply  from 
want  of  manners.  Haldane,  Addresses  p.   113. 

She'd  1)  go  through  the  lawcourts  rather  than  deny 
her  expression  of  abhorrence  of  Jones  shopping  for  my 
wife!  Chapin,  New  Morality,  Brit.  PI.  p.  580. 

It  seems  impossible  decisively  to  choose  between  the  two 
interpretations  in  the  following  sentence. 

Mr.  Utterson  had  been  some  minutes  at  his  post  when 
he  was  aware  of  an  odd,  light  footstep  drawing  near. 
Stevenson,  Jekyll,  ed.  Schutt  p.  23. 

p         .         120.     The   possessive  is  as  freely  used  as  the 

.,,    J       indefinite  case,  and  in  the  same  functions,  except 

in    plain    free   adjuncts.     The    construction  is  an 

alternative   to  the   object  with  ing  in  groups  with  one  of 


i)  She  is  Mrs.  Jones. 
KiiuisiNGA,  Handbook  II.  Accidence  and  Syntax,  1, 


98  VERBS 

the  verbs  of  perception  and  will  in  108  for  their  leading- 
member  {conceive,  fancy,  recollect,  remember,  imagine,  hate, 
like,  mind)  and  the  verbs  of  109—112  {to prevent, prohibit, 
avoid,  stop,  excuse,  justify,  etc.). 

75.  (Prepos.  Adjuncts  and  objects  to  verbs). 

I     thought    you    were    so    shocked    at    my    imputing" 
anything  like  enmity  to  Muriel, 

Chapin,  New  Morality,  Brit.  PI.  p.  556. 
That's  what  surprises  me  in  your  coming  to  seek  my 
advice  instead  of  going  to  the  omniscient  Cyril. 

Stephen  McKenna,  Reluctant  Lover  ch.  19  p.  287. 
He    had  been  well  thrashed  by  a  gentleman  who  did 
not  approve  of  his  trespassing  on  his  grounds. 

Sweet,  Element,  no.  79. 
(The    persuasion)    that    the    large,    deep  rottenness  in 
the  British  world  about  them  was  perhaps  in  the  nature 
of  things  and  anyhow  beyond  their  altering. 

Wells,  Joan  and  Peter  ch.    ii   §   15. 
Have    you    any    objection    to  my  approaching  (i,  e.  if 
I  approach)  Violet  on  the  subject^)? 

Stephen  McKenna,  Reluctant  Lover  ch.  20  p.  298. 

76.  (Prepos.  Adjuncts  and  Objects  to  Nouns  and  Adjectives). 

You    see,  it  is  some  years  now  since  v/e  parted  with 

that    land.     The    talk    about  its  being  common  -),  I  am 

sure,    is    nonsense,    but    I    cannot    really  say  about  the 

footpath.  Pickthall,  Larkmeadow,  ch.  9, 

No  mistake  at  all  about  its  being  picturesque  over  here, 

Hichens,  Ambition  ch.  27  p.   331. 
Michael  took  refuge  in  a  dream  of  his  own  fashioning. 

Sinister  Street  p.  254. 
Its  plot  is  apparently  of  his  own  devising  3). 

Herford,  Shakespeare  p.   18. 

1)  to  have  an  objection  \s  an  indivisible  syntactic  group,  like  to  have 
doubts  (115)  so  that  the  ing  should  be  interpreted  as  an  adverb  adjunct 
to  this  verba]  group,  not  to  objection. 

2)  Common  land,  opposite  of  private  land. 

3)  The  ing  seems  to  be  best  interpreted  as  an  adjunct  to  plot. 


VERBAL   ING  99 

81.  (Prepos.  Absolute  Adjuncts). 

Mr,  Bickley  might  very  well  have  cut  down  his  volumes 
considerably  without  our  losing  very  much. 

Engl.  Hist.  Rev.  45  p.   135  (Jan.    1930). 
On    our    knocking,    however,    the    door  was  instantly 
thrown  open  by  a  Hindu  servant.  Conan  Doyle. 

On  his  ascending  the  staircase  this  feeling  had  deepened. 

Patterson,  Stephen  Compton^  p.  97. 
Then    suddenly,    without    a  word  of  warning,  without 
my  being  in  the  least  prepared  for  it,  she  chucked  me. 

English  Rev.,  Sept.   1913. 
To   their  thinking,  there  is  no  essential  difference  be- 
tween the  living  and  the  dead.     Times  Lit.  25/5,  22. 

98.  (Subject  of  the  Sentence). 

a.  His  reading  had,  in  these  latter  years,  been  slender 
enough,  Walpole,  Fort.  I  ch.   10  p.   113. 

Sophia    thought :     "His    coming    down     is     really    no 
excuse  for  his  not  writing  on  Saturday." 

Bennett,  Old.  W.  Tale  IV  ch.  Z  %  Z- 
I  was  not,  as  a  rule,  so  appallingly  silent  with  people; 
and   their   being  earls  when  they  were  earls,  had  made 
no  difference  so  far. 

Cotes,  Cinderella  ch.   10  p.   115. 

b.  I  think  it  was  very  funny  his  going  without  saying 
goodbye  to  anyone. 

W.  Somerset  Maugham,  The  Circle  III,  Brit.  PI.  p.  630. 
It's    funny    your    being    so  stupid  when  your  father's 
so  clever.  Walpole,  Fort.  I  ch.   5  p.  59. 

Something  tells  me  you  will  not.  It  was  a  possibility 
to  me  your  perhaps  coming  to  live  here. 
Hutchinson,  One  Increasing  Purpose  I  ch.   10  p.  61. 
It's    not    a    bit    of  good    my    apologizing    to  her  this 
evening.  Chapin,  New  Morality,  Brit.  PI.  p.   556. 

It's  awful  cheek  my  saying  anything  to  you  at  all. 
Maugham,  The  Circle,  Brit.  PL  p.  612. 
'Look    here,'    said    Michael,    'it's    no    use  my  arguing 
with  you.'  Mrs.  Henry  de  la  Pasture 

in  Cornhill  Magazine,  Sept.   19 12. 


100  VERBS 

A  look  of  perplexity  came  into  his  ruddy  little  face. 
He  stammered  something  about  indifference  to  wealth, 
but  I  brushed  all  that  aside.  He  had  got  to  be  rich, 
and  it  was  no  good  his  stammering. 

Wells,  First  Men  in  the  Moon. 

You  are  assuming  there  is  a  libel.  There  is  no  use 
our  discussing  the  publication  if  there  is  no  libel. 

Lord  Justice  Vaughan  Williams,  Daily  News, 

"It  was  not  worth  while  your  going,"  his  wife  had 
said.  M.  Pickthall,  Larkmeadow. 

It  seemed  so  absurd  my  rushing  back  like  this. 

Hichens,  Ambition  ch.  27  p.  339. 

She  told  him  what  she  knew;  what  was  not  the 
slightest  use  his  contradicting. 

Temple  Thurston,  City  III  ch.   10. 

108  (Verbs  of  mental  perception  and  will). 

I   remember   his    coming    in    to  breakfast  one  day  .  .  . 
Walpole,  Fort.  Ill  ch.  2  p.  253. 

I  remember  your  being  ill,  and  then,  when  you  were 
a  little  older,  I  remember  your  asking  me  all  sorts  of 
questions  that  I  couldn't  answer. 

Cannan,  Corner,  ch.  21  p.  224. 

You  don't  mind  my  mentioning  it? 

Cannan,  Corner,  ch.   11   p.   115. 

You  don't  mind  my  talking  to  you  in  this  manner. 
Do  you .''  Patterson,  Stephen  Compton. 

Lady  Lippington  said  at  once  that  she  hoped  we 
wouldn't  mind  its  not  being  "a.  function." 

Cotes,  Cinderella  ch.  8  p.  85. 

I  suppose  you  think  Aunt  Maria  must  be  mad,  but 
she  thought  Jim  too  cocky.  And  she  hated  his  going  i) 
on  the  stage. 

Vachell,  Miss  Torrobin's  Experiment  (T.)  p.   151. 


i)  i.e.  the  idea  that  he  would  or  might  go. 


VERBy^L   ING  lOI 

109—112.  (To  prevent,  etc.). 

If  it  is  enough  for  us  to  hear  the  same  speeches  and 
read  the  same  books,  there  is  now  nothing  to  prevent 
our  doing  so. 

SeHncourt,  Pomona  or  the  Future  of  English  p.  44. 
There  was  nothing  in  the  world  to  prevent  her  making 
a  really  brilliant  match. 

Lytton  Strachey,  Em.  Vict.  p.    117. 
It    was    very    lonely    here    for  a  girl  who  had  had  a 
gay  time,  and  he  usen't  to  like  my  going  into  Truro  — 
and  at  last  he  even  stopped  my  seeing  people  in  Treliss. 

Walpole,  Fort,    i   ch.  8  p.  94. 
We    would  1)    have    to  excuse  her  getting  up,  but  we 
would    understand    somehow   that   she    never   did,    even 
when  the  Prime  Minister  came  to  tea. 

Cotes,  Cinderella  ch.  5  p.  49. 

Toll  the  bell  in  the  mulberry  tree,  and  Charlctte  will 
come.     You   must  excuse  my  getting  up. 

Mackenzie,  Guy  and  Pauline  p.   192. 
The    cabman    sees    enough    from    his    raised  perch  to 
justify  his  anticipating  this  with  confidence. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.   i   p.  4. 
She  would   not  risk  their  hearing. 

Alfred  Noyes,   The  Highwayman. 

^    .^.        .^,    ,  121.     The    subject    of   the    ing   is    in    a 

Gemtive  with  Ing    ,.    .     ,  ,        -*.  1  ,       , 

hmited  number  01  cases  expressed  by  the 

genitive  of  a  noun  or  pronoun  2)  denoting  a  person,  or  of 

a  noun  expressing  time.    The  construction  is  occasionally 

found  in  prepositional  adjuncts  {a),  and  regularly  in  adjuncts 

of  the   type  a  difficulty  of  his  making  (b).    It  is  common 

when    the  group  with  ing  is  the  grammatical  subject  and 


1)  As  ive  luould  shows,  it  is  indirect  speech  (Yoii  will  excuse  me  gettiurj 
i<p).  And  it  is  perhaps  unnecessary  to  point  out  that  the  speaker  did  not 
get  up;  see  111. 

2)  Not  the  group-genitive;  see  vol.  2. 


102  VERBS 

precedes    the    predicative    verb   (c).   It  finally  occurs  in  a 
special  type  of  nominal  predicate  {d). 

a.  She     saw     nothing     • —     nothing    whatever    —    in 
Mr.    Fenwick's  bringing  her  mother  a  beautiful  sealskin 

jacket   as    a    Christmas   present She  saw  nothing 

either     in     her     mother's     carrying    her    present    away 
upstairs,  and  saying  nothing  about  it  till  afterwards. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  6  p.   51. 
In    talking   to    that   solicitor  at  the  Night  Club  about 
George's  possibly  standing  for  Parliament,  I  had  naturally 
taken  it  that  Mr.  Jeaffreson  would  respect  my  confidences. 
F.  M.  Ford,  The  Marsden  Case  II  ch.   i  p.   140. 
I  don't  remember  what  he  said,  but  he  sort  of  sneered 
at    Beatrice's    keeping   her   head   when  he  asked  her  to 
carry  on  for  the  present. 

F.  Swinnerton,  Summer  Storm  T.  p.  25. 

b.  She  lay  in  bed,  and  her  sister  administered  remedies 
of  the  chemist's  advising. 

Gissing,  The  Odd  Women  ch.  3. 
Fenwick   passed  up   the  aisle,  dreamily  happy  in  the 
smell    of    the    incense^    beside    his    bride    of  yesterday's 
making,     de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.   19,  p.   180. 
The  war  was  not  of  England's  making. 

Times  Lit,  3/2,   1916. 

c.  Yet  this  man's  honouring  Mr.  Smith  with  a  comment 
looked  as  if  he  thought  him  unlike  "most  of  'em." 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.   i   p,  7. 
Why    should    Laetitia's    having   left    her   lips  slightly 
ajar,  instead  of  closing  them,  have  "meant  Dr.  Vereker  ?" 

ib.  ch.  20  p.  200. 
Adelaide's  being  here  will  spoil  everything. 

Hichens,  Ambition  ch.  20  p.  236. 
A     few     months     earlier    Boldwood's     forgetting     his 
husbandry  would  have  been  as  preposterous  an  idea  as 
a  sailor  forgetting  he  was  in  a  ship  i). 

Hardy,  Madding  Crowd  ch.  ^%. 

1)  Note  the  contrast  between  Boldwood's  and  a  sailor. 


VERBAL   ING  IO3 

She  hoped  that  Roger's  coming  home  would  set  it  to 
rights.  Gaskell,   Wives  I  ch.  p  p.    122. 

d.  That's  Dr.  Gwynne's  doing. 

Trollope,  Barchester. 

It  is  not  quite  certain  that  the  examples  under  a  represent 
natural  spoken  EngHsh;  as  will  be  shown  in  the  chapter 
on  Literary  English,  in  the  Appendix  to  volume  2,  the 
genitive  is  frequently  used  in  literary  English  according 
to  a  grammatical  theor}^,  but  contrary  to  the  structure  of 
Living  English. 

Oblique  with  Ing  ^22.  The  subject  of  the  ing  may  be 
expressed  b}^  the  oblique  (or  absolute)  form 
of  a  personal  pronoun  of  the  first  or  third  person.  This  con- 
struction, the  obhque  with  ing,  is  often  parallel  to  the 
indefinite  case  with  ing,  but  it  can  only  be  used  in  pre- 
positional adjuncts  to  verbs,  nouns,  and  adjectives  {a),  not 
in   free   adjuncts;  and  in  appended  subjects  (3).     See  124. 

a.  My  dear  girl,  I'm  much  too  much  of  a  weathercock, 
or  if  you  insist  on  me  being  heavy,  let's  say  a  pen- 
dulum .  .  .  Sinister  Stree^  p.  619. 

"I  quite  believe  it,"  Pat  continued,  with  one  ear  for 
what  Amos  was  telling  the  agent  about  him  and  Steve 
having  been  at  the  Holme  Chapel  School. 

Patterson,  Compton  p.   175. 

By    this    time   he    was   seriously  convinced  that  there 
was  no  hope  of  him  being  among  the  selected  six  or  ten. 
Bennett,  Roll-Call  I  ch.  9  §  3. 

I  don't  like  the  idea  of  us  living  in   Maggie's   house. 

id.  These  Twain  I  ch.  7. 

It  was  the  first  time  that  there  had  even  been  question 
of  him  visiting  a  private  house,  except  his  aunt's,  at 
night.  id,  Clayhanger  II  ch.  6  §  4. 

My  last  memory  of  him  alive  is  of  his  voice  in  the 
stillness  of  his  lamplit  room  when  suddenly  he  mentioned 


104  VERBS 

my  name;  he  must  have  become  aware  of  me  standing 
in  the  doorway.  Wells,  Mr.  Blettsworthy  on 

Rampole  Island  I  p    32. 
"Perhaps,  though,  I  oughtn't  to  say  as  much  as  that, 
because    it    hasn't    gone  any  further  than  me  promising 
not  to  marry  anyone  else  " 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  47  p.   535. 
b.  Is  it  any  use  me  writing  to  him? 

CoUinson,  Spoken  Engl.  p.  2. 
"It's    no    use    us    going    up    till    Tony's   quiet,"    said 
Pauline.  Kennedy^  Constant  Nymph  p.  6  f. 

No,  it's  no  good  them  making  excuses  when  I  try  to 
make  them  see  things_,  and  no  good  them  saying  they 
are  sorry.  Hutchinson,  One  Increasing  Purpose 

I  ch.   8  p.   51. 
"Doesn't  seem  the  least  use  me  speaking  to  her,"  said 
Miss  Meers.  Pett  Ridge,  Name  of  Garland, 

ch.   13,  p.  219. 
It's  no  use  me  staying.        Bennett,  Leonora  ch.  6. 
Compare  the  parallel  sentences  with  the  indefinite  form  you. 

It's    not    a    bit    of    use    you  talking,  I  shan't  wear  it 
again.         Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  II  ch.   2  §  3  p.    170. 
Do  come  in  now.   That's  no  use  you  goin'  on ! 

M.  Pickthall,  Larkmeadow,  p.  7. 
It's  no  use  you  pretending  you've  been  uncomfortable, 
because  I  know  you  haven't. 

A.  Bennett,  Grand  Babylon  Hotel  ch.  27  p.  255. 

,,     .    ^.  123.     The   nominative  of  a  personal  pronoun 

.,.   ,         of  the    first   or   third   person  can  also  be  used 
with  Ing  ,  ,  .       ^-    ,      .        ,         ,  . 

to  express  the  suoject  01  the  mg,  but  this  con- 
struction is  limited  to  one  function,  the  use  in  free 
adjuncts. 

.  .  .  knowing  it  was  our  wish  that  we  should  receive 
thirty  days,  and  that  the  judge  was  at  our  pleasure  — 
we  being  in  fact  our  own  judges. 

Davies,  Super-Tramp  ch.  8  p.  61. 


VERBAL  ING  10$ 

Dr.  Tempest  was  also  there,  the  rector  of  the  parish, 
he  being  both  magistrate  and  clergyman. 

Trollope_,  Last.  Chron.  ch.   i  p.  68. 

Brindle  . . .  gave  Steve  a  warm  welcome,  then  introduced 
him  to  his  sister,  a  much  younger  and  very  pleasant 
woman    who    kept   house    for  him,  he  being  a  bachelor. 

Patterson,  Compton  p.   147. 

We  having  occasion  to  shut  up  our  flat  for  a  month 
or  so,  my  wife  was  all  for  taking  our  silver  round  to 
a  Safe  Deposit  in  order  to  prevent  its  being  stolen. 

Punch,   19/2,   13. 

The  cabmen  on  the  ranks  used  to  say,  seeing  James 
Winter  passing  with  the  pigtailed  daughter  of  John  Winter, 
she  holding  his  sleeve,  dancing  by  his  side  so  that  the 
pigtail  danced  too : 

"There  goes  James  Winter  with  his  little  pal." 

Niven,  Porcelain  ch.   i. 

The  body  was  buried  at  Highgate  Cemetery,  and  Steve 
and  Pat  followed  it  there,  they  and  the  cousin  being  the 
only  mourners.    Patterson,  Stephen  Compton,  p.  217. 

When  we  reached  Piccadilly  Circus  we  separated, 
I  finding  my  way  to  my  lodgings,  Lawrence  Rivers  driving 
to  Arthur  Place  to  make  terms  with  my  father. 

White,  Strood  p.  82. 


124.  In  the  following  report  of  a  speech  by  Mr.  J.  C. 
Squire  (Bulletin  of  the  English  Association  no.  58,  p.  13) 
it  may  seem  that  the  nominative  with  ing  is  used  as  the 
grammatical  subject  of  the  sentence.  But  it  is  quite  likely 
that  the  speaker  v/as  really  imagining  that  he  was  using  a 
free  adjunct. 

When  the  Master  of  Wellington  was  speaking  —  he 
being  a  Master  is  what  brought  it  back  to  my  mind  — 
I  was  endeavouring  to  assess  his  speech  —  'Is  this 
solemn  or  is  it  funny?'  —  and  for  the  life  of  me  I  was 
unable  to  tell. 


I06  VERBS 

•Similarly  in  the  following  case: 

You   don't  seem  to  realise,  you  sleepy  old  thing,  yon 
being   here    with    me    has   got   me    into   a  most  terrible 
mess.     The  Woman  Who  Stole  Everything  (T.)  p.  39. 
Communicated  by  Dr.  F,  Karpf, 
Engl.  Shidien,  65  p.  334. 

Another  quotation  (ib.)  illustrates  the  oblique  me  with  the 
ing  as  the  subject  of  the  sentence,  and  opening  it: 

Me  asking  for  that  £   200  must  have  upset  him. 
Bennett,  Matador  of  the  Five  Towns  (T.)  p.  319. 

125.  After  describing  the  forms  and  range  of 
the  object  with  ing  and  the  various  subject-with-ing 
constructions,  we  must  answer  the  question  what  connection 
there  is  between  the  form  and  the  range  of  each  construc- 
tion. We  shall  thus  be  able,  too,  to  understand  why  in 
some  cases  one  construction  is  possible  only;  why,  in  others, 
there  is  a  possibility  of  choosing  between  two,  e.  g.  between 
the  object  with  ing  and  the  possessive  with  ing  (I  hate  him 
talking  like  that,  or  his  talking),  the  indefinite  case  or  the 
genitive  with  ing  {Peter  being  here  seemed  so  amusing,  in  115; 
and  Adelaide's  beifig  here  will  spoil  everything,  in  121a),  the 
possessive  with  ing  or  the  oblique  with  ing  {who  did  not 
approve  of  his  trespassing,  in  1 20 ;  and  if  yon  insist  on  me 
being  heavy,  in  122). 

126.  In  dealing  with  the  object  with  ing  it  has  been  shown 
that  in  some  cases  (with  verbs  of  physical  perception  for 
instance)  the  group  of  noun  with  ing  can  be  analysed  as 
containing  a  grammatical  object  and  a  predicative  adjunct. 
But  with  verbs  of  mental  perception  {to  remember,  etc.) 
such  an  analysis  is  impossible,  and  we  can  consider  the  noun 
an  object  with  a  kind  of  attributive  ing  quahfying  it,  as  in 
/  remember  my  father  teaching  me  the  alphabet.  But  it  is 
also  possible  to  look  upon  the  ing  as  the  leading  member 
and   upon   the   noun   or   pronoun  as  the  attributive  element, 


VERBAL   ING  lO; 

whence :  /  remember  his  teaching  me  t  e  alphabet.  The  two 
constructions  are  not  identical  in  meaning,  naturally,  however 
slight  and  'practically'  negligible  the  difference  may  be.  The 
difference  seems  to  be  well  brought  out  by  the  following 
quotation;  it  is  a  case  of  a  prepositional  oblique  with  ing, 
but  expresses  the  same  meaning :  he  must  have  become  aware 
of  me  standing  in  the  doorway  (see  1 19).  It  would  seem 
impossible  to  use  my  standing  here,  because  me  is  evidently 
the  leading  element  in  the  group.  The  difference  here  made 
is  based  on  a  private  communication  by  Professor  Grattan, 
and  published  in  Eftglish  Studies  XII  p.  no.  He  also  wrote: 
Thus,  T  remember  him  teaching  me'  r=.  T  have  a  mental 
picture  of  him  in  the  act  of  teaching  me' ;  whereas  T  remember 
his  teaching  me'  t=  T  recall  the  fact  that  he  taught  me'. 

The  difference  is  not  restricted  to  verbs  of  perception ;  we 
seem  to  have  the  same  distinction  in  the  following  quotation. 

You'll  excuse  my  going  away,  I  know,  Miss  Lyon. 
But  there  were  the  dumplings  to  see  to,  and  what  little 
I've  got  left  on  my  hands  now,  I  Hke  to  do  well. 

George  Eliot,  Felix  Holt  ch.  22. 

In  the  following  sentence  the  difference  between  you  and 
your  may  be  due  to  chance ;  but  it  may  also  be  that  calling 
me  a  clog  is  treated  as  a  single  group  because  the  father's 
words  are  repeated,  whereas  each  element  has  its  indepen- 
dence in  mind  you  calling  me  a  donkey,  which  is  prospective, 
with  calling  in  a  more  verbal  meaning. 

"I'm  rather  lost  in  that  plan  of  yours ;  the  details, 
as  you  state  them,  are  a  little  puzzling;  but  if  I  make 
them  out  rightly,  I  am  to  go  about  the  country,  like 
the  donkeys  on  the  common,  with  a  clog  fastened  to 
my  hind  leg." 

"I  don't  mind  your  calling  me  a  clog,  if  only  we 
were  fastened  together." 

"But  I  do  mind  you  calling  me  a  donkey,"  he  replied. 
Gaskell,  Wives  I  ch.  2  p.  40. 


I08  VERBS 

The  personal  pronoun  is  necessary  in  the  following  case 
because  the  proclitic  character  of  the  possessives  makes  it 
impossible  for  them  to  be  separated  from  the  leading  noun 
by  a  number  of  other  sentence-elements. 

I    heard    of  you    the    other    night    at  Lady  Rufford's 
dancmg  till  four  o'clock  in  the  morning. 

O.  Wilde,  An  Ideal  Husband  I. 

127.  The  form  of  the  subject  of  the  ing  may  also  be  due 
to  the  grammatical  function  of  the  ing.  Thus  when  the  ing 
is  the  subject  of  the  sentence  it  naturally  resembles  a  noun, 
and  the  adjunct  to  it  may  consequently  take  the  form  of 
the  possessive.  The  genitive  is  quite  common  here  too  i) 
although  it  finds  a  competitor  in  the  indefinite  case.  The 
reason  for  this  seems  to  be  that  the  genitive  is  almost 
exclusively  restricted  to  personal  nouns  that  are  clearly  used 
attributively  before  the  leading  noun  (see  vol.  2  on  Case). 
This  explains,  too,  why  the  possessive  is  common  in  the 
case  mentioned  in  the  preceding  section,  but  not  the  genitive. 
It  is  also  clear  now  why  the  appended  subject  does  not  take 
a  genitive  for  its  subject,  although  it  can  take  a  possessive. 

It  would  be  a  mistake,  too,  to  take  for  granted  that  all 
the  possessives  are  treated  in  the  same  way.  Thus  it  is 
hardly  chance  that  we  frequently  find  yoii-  in  cases  when  the 
same  author  uses  my  or  his.  And  it  may  be  significant  that 
Professor  .Collinson  in  the  passage  below  transcribes  you  by 
[jo*]  i.  e.  as  if  it  were  your. 

"You    resent    my  being  here."  —   "Resent  you  being 
here.''  I  resent  you  being  a  damn  fool." 

Sherrifif,  Journey's  End. 
What  was  the  cause  of  you  being  so  late  ? 

Collinson,  Spoken  English  p.   12. 

1)  Especially  when  the  ing  precedes  the  predicate;  see  the  last  quotation 
(from  Hardy)  on  p.  102. 


VERBAL   ING  IO9 

The  form  of  the  subject  in  plain  free  adjuncts  is  invariably 
a  nominative  or  an  indefinite  case.  This  is  plainly  the  result 
of  the  similarity  of  this  ing  to  a  predicative  verb.  This 
relation  is  no  doubt  the  reason,  too,  why  the  nominative  (or 
indefinite  case)  is  always  strong  stressed  in  this  function  and 
separated  from  the  ing  by  a  slight  break,  so  that  each  of 
the  two  elements  of  the  group  retains  its  independence. 

The  genitive  and  the  possessive  are  the  only  possible 
forms  in  some  of-adjuncts;  it  will  be  found  that  these  adjuncts 
take  a  verbal  noun  in  the  same  way.  Thus  it  is  easy  to 
see  the  parallelism  between  a  difficulty  of  their  creating  and 
a  force  which  is  of  their  creation.  The  form  of  the  subject 
of  the  ing  here  must  be  the  result  of  the  nominal  character 
of  the  ing.  This  may  explain,  too,  why  the  genitive  with 
ing  is  used  in  the  sentences  of  \2i  a,  although  the  indefinite 
case  with  ing  is  the  usual  construction  here  (115).  For  the 
ings  of  the  first  two  quotations  of  121  express  act  of 
bringing,  plan  of  standing;  the  third  may  be  an  artificial 
genitive :  see  the  sections  on  the  genitive  in  literary  English 
in  vol.  2. 

77?^  Complex  Ing 

128.  Up  till  now  the  ings  have  only  been  illustrated 
in  groups  with  nouns  or  adjectives.  If  a  participle  accom- 
panied an  ing  it  was  in  the  function  of  a  verbal  adjective. 

Wister.  I  suppose  you're  surprised  to  see  me  back 
so  soon. 

Betty.  Oh,  my  dear  man,  I'm  past  being  surprised  at 
anything  ij.     Chapin,  New  Morality,  in  Brit.  PI.  p.  576. 

The  dazzling  consideration  was  whether  it  would  make 
the  least  difference  being  distantly  connected  with  them 
by  marriage.  Cotes,  Cinderella  ch.  24  p.  251. 

1)  See  66. 


I  I O  VERBS 

It  is  also  possible  for  an  ing  to  form  a  close  syntactic 
group  with  a  participle  in  a  purely  verbal  sense,  as  typified 
in  being  seen,  having  seen,  having  been  seen.  In  these 
groups  the  sense  is  expressed  by  the  participle  as  modified 
by  the  verb  in  ing,  which  is  a  quite  subordinate  member 
of  the  group,  and  is  usually  classed  as  an  auxiliary.  The 
meanings  expressed  by  these  verbal  groups  will  be  treated 
in  the  chapter  on  Auxiliaries,  but  the  functions  they  occupy 
in  the  sentence  are  best  treated  here;  the  differences  be- 
tween the  simple  ing  and  the  complex  ing,  as  these  groups 
have  been  called,  help  to  make  the  character  of  each  clear. 

„     .      ,  129.     The    complex   beine    with    a    participle 

Passive  Ins  .  r  .  . 

occurs  in  most  of  the  functions  of  the  simple  ing, 

except   with    proclitic    a-   (80)   and   as   an  object  of  verbs 

taking  an  object  with  predicative  adjunct  (87  a).  It  is  rarely 

used  as  a  grammatical  subject  or  as  a  nominal  predicate; 

if  used  attributively,  it  must  follow  its  leading  noun.   It  is 

very  common  in  free  adjuncts. 

Alice.     But  don't  you  mind  being  thought  unjust? 
Betty.     I  prefer  it  to  being  thought  a  fool. 

Chapin,  New  Morality,  Brit.  PI.  p.   541. 
Well,  Mother,  I  hate  being  hinted  at. 

Clemence  Dane,  Bill  of  Divorcement,  Brit.  PI.  p.  649. 
You  see,  she  doesn't  enjoy  being  hinted  at  either. 

ib.  p.  650. 
Possibly    she    resented    being    made    a    fool  of  before 
her  daughter.  Vachell,  Quinneys'  p.  208. 

If  we  escaped  being  noticed  and  punished  it  was  only 
because  Mr.  Webb  was  away  at  a  wedding  or  funeral 
most  of  the  time.  Sweet,  Spoken  Engl.  p.  52. 

The  side  i)  kept  on  being  altered. 

Waugh,  Loom  of  Youth  III,  ch.   i. 

1)  The  cricket  eleven. 


VERBAL   ING  III 

By  good  fortune  this  trunk  had  missed  being  put  on 
board  the  Wizard  Queen. 

Mackenzie,  Seven  Ages  ch.  2  p.  79. 

After  that,  they  tried  a  smaller  hotel  where  they  were 
fairly  comfortable,  though  Mrs.  Gainsborough  took  a 
long  time  to  get  used  to  being  brought  chocolate  in  the 
morning.  Mackenzie,   Sylvia  p.   349. 

Yes,    there    was    quite    a    rage  at  that  time  for  being 
taken  (i.  e.  photographed)  in  an  artificial  snowstorm. 
W,  Somerset  Maugham,  The  Circle,  Brit.  P.  p.  627. 

(This  plan)  came  near  being  realized. 

Margoliouth,  Pvlohammedanism  p.   19. 

In  the  articles  now  being  published  Mr.  Graham 
describes  his  return  across  Germany  into  Russia  and 
down  to  the  Caucasus.  Times  W.  6/2,   14. 

The  right  thus  acquired  was  grossly  abused ;  but  the 
exercise  of  it,  being  expected,  created  at  first  but  little 
alarm. 

It  seems  that  the  author,  being  called  a  working-man 
poet,  has  written  the  latter  poems  as  a  duty. 

130.  The  passive  ing  can  have  its  subject  expressed  in 
the  same  way  as  the  simple  ing;  this  construction,  too, 
is  frequent  in  free  adjuncts.  Examples  occur  in  the  last 
two  quotations  of  110^  and  also  one  in  117. 

When  the  tenant  died,  his  land  reverted  to  the  lord,  who 
only  granted  it  to  the  heir  ^fter  the  payment  of  a  year's 
revenue,  and  on  condition  of  the  same  service  being 
rendered.        Pollard,  History  of  England  ch.  2  p.   '^^'j. 

She  was  not  afraid  of  her  drawing-room  being  seen 
by  anybody.  Bennett,  Old.  W.  T.  IV  ch.  2  §  i. 

Someone  protested  softly  against  his  being  given  more 
brandy.  Wells,  Joan  and  Peter  ch.   13  p.  ^})J. 

...  a  deliriously  delightful  place,  with  a  shop  full  of 
sweets,  games  without  end,  friends  galore,  and  a  little 
work  now  and  then  to  prevent  one's  being  bored. 

Walpole,  Fort.  I  ch.  4  p.  43. 


112  VERBS 

We  having  occasion  to  shut  up  our  flat  for  a  month 
or  so,  my  wife  was  all  for  taking  our  silver  round  to 
a  Safe  Deposit  in  order  to  prevent  its  being  stolen. 

Punch,   19/2,   13. 

Thus,    the    nightingale    and    crow   have   vocal  organs 
similarly    constructed,    these   being   used  by  the  former 
for  diversified  song,  and  by  the  latter  merely  for  croaking. 
Darwin  in  Herrig-Forster,  Brit.  Authors  p.  619. 

The  facts  being  thus  made  secure,  readers  are  to  be 
left  to  judge  of  the  inferences  on  their  own  merits. 

Times  Lit.   16/3,  22. 

These  things  being  remembered,  it  will  not  seem 
strange  that  the  king  should  have  exercised  a  power  of 
dispensing  with  penal  statutes. 

Maitland,  Constit.  Hist.  p.  303. 

It  certainly  seems  to  have  been  the  common  opinion 
that  the  king  had  a  certain  ordaining  power.  Regard 
being  had  to  the  past  it  was  difhcult  to  deny  this. 

ib.  p.   256. 

He  left  China  steadily  settling  down,  with  the  authority 
of  the  Central  Government  steadily  growing,  with  trade 
everywhere  reviving,  and  with  the  unwieldy  armies  of 
the  revolution  being  gradually  disbanded  and  absorbed 
in  the  civil  population.  Daily  Mail. 

Should  an  untidy  maid  put  her  hand  upon  this  the 
marks  can  easily  be  removed  without  any  damage  being 
done.  Bibliophile  1909  p.  322. 

There  was  no  attempt  to  answer  this  question,  it 
being  felt  probably  that  it  was,  like  the  conventional 
"How  do  you  do?"  one  to  which  an  answer  is  neither 
desired  nor  expected.  Anstey,  Vice  Versa  ch.  IV. 

131.  We  occasionally  find  the  construction  used  with  verbs 
that  generally  take  an  object  with  participle  (60,  i  and  2). 
The  difference  between  the  two  constructions  is  one  of 
aspect :  the  form  with  being  emphasizes  the  durative  aspect 
of  the  action  referred  to  by  the  participle;  see  the  chapter 
on   Aspect.     The   last    two    quotations  of  60a  show  that  the 


VERBAL   ING  II3 

situation  may  be  sufficient  to  make  the  meaning  of  the  simple 
participle  unmistakeable. 

She  foresaw  inquiries  being  made  concerning  her. 
Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  IV  ch.   i   §  4. 

I  like  to  see  Lady  Diana  Duff-Cooper  being  applauded 
when  she  appears  in  the  stalls.     Observer,   31/10,  20. 

It  is  true  and  characteristic  that  in  all  the  negotiations 
with  Germany  during  the  'eighties  and  'nineties  we  find 
a  permanent  place  being  taken  by  Mr.  Chamberlain  as 
Colonial  Secretary.  Times  Lit.  25/10,  23. 

132.  The  passive  ing  is  naturally  more  purely  verbal 
in  its  character  than  the  simple  ing  It  is  in  accordance 
with  this  character  that  the  passive  ing  is  hardly  ever 
found  in  such  a  nominal  function  as  that  of  a  grammatical 
subject  or  nominal  predicate,  but  with  great  frequency  in 
the  most  verbal  function  of  the  ing,  viz.  in  free  adjuncts. 
It  should  be  noted  that  this  observation  agrees  with  the 
explanation  of  the  peculiar  form  of  the  subject  of  the  ing 
in  free  adjuncts  (127). 

133.  The  complex  ing,  being  a  somewhat  clumsy  form, 
is  naturally  used  only  when  the  sense  to  be  expressed 
makes  it  necessary.  In  many  cases  the  simple  ing  is  used 
to  convey  the  same  meaning  if  the  context  makes  this 
evident. 

The  simple  ing  is  used  when  the  idea  of  the  agent  is 
quite  as  prominent  in  the  speaker's  mind  as  the  action 
performed. 

Naturally,  there  were  experiences  on  the  way,  and 
they  do  not  lose  in  the  telling. 

Athen.    i/io,   ii   p.  419/1. 

Some  arrangements  must  have  been  made  between 
the  Doctor  and  my  Mother  about  my  furbishing  up  for 
Penguin's.  De  Morgan,  Vance  ch.  II. 

3VRUISINGA,  Handbook  II.  Accidence  and  Syntax.  1.  8 


114  VERBS 

He  felt  that  if  the  town  had  been  aware  of  his  jilting, 
he  could  not  have  borne  the  humiliation. 

Bennett,  Clayhanger  III  ch.   i  §  2. 

The  want  of  a  national  Army  which  is  still  only  in 
the  forming.  Times  W.   16/10,   14. 

The  difference  between  the  two  constructions  is  well 
brought  out  by  the  following  pair  of  quotations. 

In  view  of  the  prestige  and  power  possessed  by 
Carthage,  the  victory  of  Rome  is  remarkable,  and  its 
causes  worth  considering.  Goodspeed,  History. 

As  he  examined  the  businesses  of  his  clients  he 
discovered  in  himself  the  flair  for  putting  his  finger 
infallibly  on  weak  spots,  on  wasteful  methods,  on  over- 
lappings,  on  neglected  possibilities.  This  was  worth,  he 
saw,  being  paid  for.  There  was  a  profession  in  this. 
Hutchinson,  One  Increasing  Purpose  I  ch.  7  p.  43. 

134.  The  simple  ing  is  frequently  used  as  an  adjunct 
or  object  to  verbs  when  the  meaning  is  clearly  that  of 
an  action  performed,  not  that  of  an  agent  performing  it. 
Such  verbs  are  /o  deserve,  need,  require,  want  (when 
meaning  'to  need'),  to  bear  (especially  in  negative  and 
interrogative  sentences). 

If  I  were  such  a  consummate  ass  as  that,  I  should 
deserve  hanging.  F.  C.  Philips,  Mrs,  Bowerie  p.  86. 

Some  of  her  conclusions  need  filling  out,  and  some 
correcting.  Times   Lit.   30/4,   14. 

Though  its  tactics  seem  rough  and  have  led  to 
excessively  violent  scenes,  its  speakers  have  said  many 
things  that  required  saying.  Times  W.  28/12,   17. 

Something  had  depressed  Londell ;  he  wanted  rousing. 

Punch  31/3,    15. 

She  wants  stirring  up,  that's  what  your  sister  wants. 
Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  IV  ch.  3  §  2. 

John  expelled  from  his  mind  all  misgivings  about 
Hugh,  hoped  it  would  be  a  fine  day  to-morrow  so  that 


VERBAL   ING  II5 

he    could    really    look    round    the  garden  and  see  what 
plants  wanted  ordering. 

Mackenzie,  Guy  and  Pauline  ch.  3. 
There  is  much  in  Victor  Hugo  that  will  bear  skipping. 

Bennett,  Hilda  Lessways. 

135.  The  simple  ing  is  also  usual  in  c»/-adjuncts  (a), 
in  plain  adjuncts  to  worth  {b)  and  in  adjuncts  with  the 
prepositions  beyond  and  past  {c). 

a.  There  is  not  in  my  possession  one  single  note  of 
his  writing.  Hole,  Memories  p.  89. 

Helen  Waddell  has  been  given  a  silver  medal  by  the 
Royal  Society  of  Literature  for  her  book  The  Wandering 
Scholars.    These  medals  are  of  irregular  awarding. 

Constable's  Monthly  List,  June   1928. 

b.  All  the  essays  in  this  volume  were  worth  reprinting. 

c.  He  was  worried  beyond  describing  by  his  own 
particular  followers.  Wells,  Country  p.  225. 

He  is  past  praying  for. 

136.  The  use  of  the  simple  ing  in  the  object-with-ing 
construction  in  the  following  sentence  is  dialectal;  it  is 
quite  exceptional  in  standard  Enghsh,  whether  spoken  or 
written. 

"Now,  mater,"  said  Cyril,  "it's  a  pity  you  don't  want 
that  cake  cutting  into." 

Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  IV  ch.  3  §  3  p.  494. 

p  ,  .  ^  137.  The  second  of  the  complex  ings,  the 
*  type  having  seen,  may  be  called  the  perfect  ing. 
Its  meaning  is  treated  together  with  the  other  groups  of 
to  have  with  a  participle  (see  the  chapter  on  the  Auxiliaries). 
Its  functions  in  the  sentence  are  parallel  to  those  of  the 
passive  ing,  so  that  it  seems  sufficient  to  give  a  number 
of  examples  both  of  the  ing  without  a  subject  of  its  own  {a) 
and  the  ing  with  a  subject  {b). 


Il6  VERBS 

a.  I'm    not   exactly    proud  of  having  done  it,  though. 

Chapin,  New  Morality,  Brit.  PI.  p.   547. 
Let    us    be    sure    that    there    is  something  more  than 
mere    interest    and    entertainment    in    a    book  which  so 
wise  a  man  as  Jowett  confessed  to  having  read  fifty  times. 

Bailey,  Johnson. 
She  blamed  herself  for  having  been  a  dull  companion. 

Phillpotts,   Beacon  I  ch.  8  p.   72. 
He  makes  n-   pretence  of  having  incurred  any  danger 
or    suffered    what    we  should  to-day  regard  as  hardship. 

Times  Lit.  29/6,   16. 
He    had    started    before    daybreak    and    his   wife  was 
terribly    cut    up    at    his    having    left  her  when  she  (his 
wife)  was  ill.  Olive  Schreiner,  Undine,  ch.  7  p.  96. 

And  seeing  Nedda's  smile,  for  the  girl  recollected 
perfectly  having  admired  it  during  dinner  at  Uncle 
John's  .  .  .  Galsworthy,  Freelands,  ch.   26  p.   320. 

I  feel  it  as  a  very  high  honour,  having  succeeded 
dear  Papa  after  an   interval  of  so  many  years. 

Prince  of  Wales  to  Queen  Victoria, 
Engl.    19th  Cent.  II  p.   2. 
Having    had    his    own   way  for  innumerable  years,  he 
had  earned  a  prescriptive  right  to  it. 

Galsworthy,    Man  of  Property  ch.    i. 
They  are  equally  loth  to  draw  the  sword,  but,  having 
drawn    it,    they    are    equally    resolved  not  to  sheathe  it 
until  its  work  is  done  Times  W.   3/5,    18. 

Having  found  a  pretext  for  making  the  expedition, 
he  found  another  for  making  it  in  the  guise  of  a  Turkish 
peasant,  thus  establishing  himself  firmly  in  our  affections. 

Times  Lit.   29/6,    16. 

b.  I'm  beginning  to  think  she'll  never  get  on  as  a 
schoolmistress,  though  why  she  shouldn't  I'm  sure  I 
don't  know ;  for  she's  an  'uncommonly  pretty  woman 
for  her  age,  and  her  having  lived  in  our  family,  and 
your  having  had  her  so  often  with  you,  ought  to  go  a 
good  way.  Gaskell,   Wives  I  ch.   8  p.    141. 

Probably  it  had  come  out  of  one  of  the  old  books  for 
which  he  had  shown  such  a  fondness,  he  having  always 
had  "a  habit  of  reading."       Patterson,  Compton,  p.  i. 


VERBAL   ING  II7 

Aunt  Charlotte  having  been,  in  her  day,  a  busy- 
manufacturer  of  trouble,  the  world  might  well  express 
relief  at  her  departure.  Pett  Ridge,  Garland. 

But  we  shall  waste  no  sympathy  on  her,  she  having 
snapped  at  the  Court  physician. 

Snaith,  Principal  Girl. 

n    .    ,  n     .      ,  138.     The   type   havinp-   been  seen,  the 

r6riCCl    r&SSiVC    lllg  j  r  a  > 

perfect  passive  ing.  is  a  very  clumsy  form 
and  little  used  in  colloquial  English,  In  the  written  language, 
however,  it  is  often  found  convenient. 

As  for  Paul  he  was  perfectly  furious  at  having  been 
so  outwitted  and  overreached. 

Anstey,  Vice  Versa  ch,   2. 

Having  been  brought  up  with  Graham  helped,  I  suppose, 
to  account  for  it.  Cotes,   Cinderella  ch.    10  p.    116. 

Mr.  J.  E.  C.  Bodley  writes  to  the  Westminsier  Gazette 
to  say  that  our  paragraph  about  Sir  James  Murray 
having  been  elected  a  Foreign  Member  of  the  French 
Academy  is  wrong. 

Some  of  this  hospital  party  has  not  yet  reported  itself, 
but  rumours  of  parts  of  it  having  been  seen  at  different 
places  keep  on  arriving.  Times  W.  9/1 1,    17. 

Whatever  may  be  our  opinions  as  to  the  technical 
merits  of  this  legislation  there  can  be  no  two  opinions 
about  its  promoters  having  been  animated  by  a  spirit  of 
patriotism  and  enlightenment. 

Cambrid^je  Legal  Essays  (1926)  p.  40. 

The  treaty  having  been  settled  with  the  Scots,  and 
the  writs  issued  for  a  new  Parliament,  the  King  returned 
to  London.  Shorthouse,  Inglesant  ch.  6  p.  71. 

The  conference  in  Dublin  between  employers  and 
trade  union  oflficials  has  been  adjourned  until  Monday 
next,  no  settlement  having  been  reached. 

Times  W.    12/9,   13. 

Mr.  Povey  was  playing  a  hymn  tune  on  the  harmonium, 
it  having  been  decided  that  no  one  should  go  to  chapel. 
Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  II  ch.  2  §  2  p.   162. 


I  1 8  VERBS 

Meaning  of  the  Complete  Verbal  Ing 

139.  It  has  been  stated  (73)  that  the  ing  is  of  a  partly 
inflectional,  partly  derivative  character.  The  suffix  as  far 
as  used  in  the  latter  function  will  be  treated  in  the  sections 
on  the  formation  of  nouns  and  adjectives  in  volume  3; 
but  it  is  hardly  necessary  to  observe  that  the  delimitation 
of  the  two  functions,  when  not  indicated  by  grammatical 
means,  must  often  be  doubtful.  We  have  clearly  an  in- 
flectional form  when  the  ing  is  accompanied  by  adjuncts 
that  a  noun  or  adjective  cannot  take;  many  of  the  sections 
that  precede  will  supply  examples  of  this.  We  have  clearly 
a  derivative  ing  when  it  is  accompanied  by  adjuncts  that 
do  not  occur  except  in  the  case  of  nouns  or  adjectives, 
as  will  be  shown  in  the  chapter  on   Word-formation. 

But  it  occurs  not  infrequently  that  an  ing  has  com- 
pletely the  construction  of  a  noun,  taking  a  defining  or 
an  anaphoric  article,  a  demonstrative  or  a  possessive  pro- 
noun, although  its  meaning  is  plainly  that  of  a  verb,  i.  e. 
a  process  is  expressed,  not  a  state. 

1.  The  getting  of  Sophia's  ticket  to  Bursley  occupied 
them  next.  Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  IV  ch.  2  §   i. 

2.  He  tells  us  that  it  was  by  reading  Napier's  'Penin- 
sular War'  that  he  was  introduced  to  a  new  world  of 
thought  and  mentally  equipped  for  the  writing  of  his 
earliest  book,  which  dealt  with  the  naval  operations  in 
*The    Gulf   and   Island    Waters'    during    the   Civil  War. 

Athenaeum. 

3.  He  has  given  repeated  proofs  of  his  desire  to  reform 
the  political  institutions  of  China  by  the  gradual  build- 
ing up  of  a  new  structure  of  representative  government. 

Times  W.  23/5,   13. 

4.  Of  the  making  of  books  about  Stevenson  there  is 
literally  no  end.  Athenaeum. 

5.  A  vast  amount  of  research  and  of  hard  thinking 
must  have  gone  to  the  making  of  Prof.  Graves's  'History 
of  Education  in  Modern  Times'.  Athenaeum. 


VERBAL   ING  II9 

6.  The  whole  air^  that  quiet  afternoon,  seemed  full  of 
the  calling  of  forgotten  voices,  and  dead  faces  looked 
out  from  the  closed  lattices. 

Benson,  Thread  of  Gold,  p.   13. 

7.  He  thought  the  marking  of  coins  a  mean  trick. 

Bennett,  Old  W.  T.  II  ch.  4  §  3. 

8.  The  fact  remains  that  the  teaching  of  the  art  of 
writing  in  the  vast  majority  of  English  schools  is  either 
casual  or  unconscious,  and  that  the  results  of  our  system 
are  lamentable.  Vteaching  is  here  system  of  t.,  not  the 
act  of  t.].  Hartog,  Writing  of  English. 

9.  There  is  no  doubt  that  this  barrenness  and  naked 
appearance  is  the  result  of  the  perpetual  cutting  of  heath 
and  gorse,  and  the  removal  of  the  thin  surface  soil  for  fuel. 

Hudson,  Hampshire  Days  ch.  2  p.  29. 

10.  The  finishing  of  his  book  left  the  way  clear  for  a 
number  of  things  to  attack  his  mind. 

Walpole,  Fortitude  II  ch.  2  p.   163. 

11.  Young  Peter  spent  his  days  in  preparation  for  the 
swift  coming  of  Easter  Wednesday.       ib.  I  ch .  i  o  p.  11 1 . 

12.  Suddenly  one  was  leaving  behind  all  those  known 
paths  and  views,  so  dimly  commonplace  in  the  having 
of  them,  so  rosily  romantic  in  the  tragic  wanting  of  them. 

ib.  I  ch.  4  p.  41. 

13.  ...  the  morning  was  fresh  and  made  them  feel 
that  life,  though  it  might  mean  small  finds  and  hard 
work,  was  a  pleasant  thing  and  worth  the  having. 

Olive  Schreiner,  Undine  ch.   19  p.  244. 

14.  He  was  some  kind  of  poor  workingman,  and  you 
could  see  he  was  unhappy  over  this  arguing. 

Upton  Sinclair,  Oil  II  ch.  7  p.  40. 

15.  Secondly  because  of  the  profusion  of  his  imagery 
and  the  extraordinarily  keen  sense  for  beauty  and  sweet- 
ness that  went  to  its  making.     Mair,  English  Lit.  p.  47. 

16.  Lastly,  in  this  connexion,  we  may  refer  to  the 
influence  which  the  mind  has  upon  its  (i.  e.  the  body's) 
sleeping  and  its  waking. 

Laird,  Our  Minds  and  Their  Bodies  p.   iSf. 


120  VERBS 

140.  It  also  frequently  happens  that  an  ing  is  accom- 
panied by  adjuncts  that  are  peculiar  to  verbs  and  by 
others  that  are  characteristic  of  nouns,  as  in  the  signi- 
ficance of  this  leaving  the  land  of  their  birth.  This  apparent 
anomaly  is  the  result  of  an  ing  with  its  adjuncts  (of  a 
verbal  character)  being  taken  as  a  syntactic  group  that 
is  equivalent  to  a  noun  and  taking  the  adjuncts  accordingly. 
This  is  illustrated  by  the  following  quotations. 

1.  "The  reason  for  what?" 

"For  your  never  coming."  Wharton,  Mirth  p.  5. 

2.  Thus  the  Church  of  England  was,  as  the  reign 
of  Elizabeth  advanced,  gradually  strengthened  by  the 
rallying  to  her  side  those  who,  in  the  first  years  of  the 
"Settlement/'   were  sympathisers  with  Rom.e. 

Spence,  Hist.  Eng.  Church  p.    177. 

3.  All  that  she  could  do  would  be  to  tell  her  uncle  so 
much  as  it  was  fitting  that  he  should  know.  The  doing 
this  would  doubtless  be  in  some  degree  difficult. 

TroUope,  Dr.  Thorne  ch.  30  p.  321. 

4.  It  is,  however,  indisputable,  that  those  Greek  scholars 
who  first  taught  Greek  in  Italy  found  that  what  was 
demanded  at  their  hands  was  not  so  much  the  teaching 
of  the  language  as  the  making  known  its  thought  — 
and  hence  the  appearance  of  numerous  translations. 

Edinburgh  Review,  Oct.   1905. 

5.  The  enormous  outlay  absolutely  necessary  for  the 
carrying  out  these  many  costly  religious  works. 

Spence,  History  of  the   English  Church. 

6.  In  the  last  example  the  pluperfect  is  justified  by 
the  fact  that  the  going  for  a  walk  preceded  seeing  the 
donkey  and  it  is  used  here  because  the  seeing  the 
donkey  is  the  really  important  event,  to  which  the 
pluperfect  makes  it  subordinate.  (The  sentence  referred 
to  was :  he  told  them  he  had  gone  for  a  little  walk,  and 
saw  a  donkey).  Sweet,  Grammar. 

7.  The  significance  of  this  leaving  the  land  of  their 
birth  and  of  this  crossing  of  the  frontier  means  nothing 
to  them.  Academy. 


VERBAL   ING  121 

8.  But  with  Peter,  if  you  take  him  from  that  first 
asking  Mrs.  Trussit  (swinging  his  short  legs  from  the 
table  and  diving  into  the  mixed  biscuit  tin),  "Is  it, 
Mrs.  Trussit,  like  David  Copperfield  ?"....  to  his  meeting 
of  her  again  ,  .  .  VValpole,  Fortitude  I  ch.  6  p.  6l. 

9.  The  having  such  a  time  to  look  back  to  in  the 
future  was  quite  as  much  as  one  general  practitioner, 
with  a  duty  to  his  mother,  could  in  reason  expect. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  38  p.  404  f. 

10.  Her  overwrought  mind  shut  away  this  question  — 
almost    in    the  asking  it  —  with   "Dearer  to  me,  .  .  ." 

ib.   ch.  9  p.  88. 

11.  I  haven't  over-estimated  this  making  a  tame  poodle 
of  yourself  for  Muriel  to  teach  tricks  to. 

Chapin,  New  Morality,   in  Brit.  PI.  p.   567. 

12.  But  Aunt  Cuckoo  gets  Ideas  into  her  head.  This 
turning  Roman  Catholic,  this  adopting  a  baby,  this 
packing  you  off  to  poor  old  Uncle  Matthew.    Ideas! 

Mackenzie,   Rich  Relatives  ch.   7  p.    176. 

141.  When  we  compare  the  quotations  of  139  f.  it  may 
seem  that  the  two  constructions  are  identical  in  meaning. 
For  if  in  the  first  two  sentences  of  139  we  substitute 
getting  Sophias  ticket  (or  The  getting  Sophia's  ticket)  and 
the  reading  of  Napier's  book,  the  meaning  does  not  seem 
to  be  really  affected.  But  observations  of  this  kind  are 
of  no  value  in  syntax:  it  is  not  the  cases  when  two  con- 
structions are  identical  that  can  teach  us  their  true  character, 
but  the  cases  when  only  one  of  the  two  is  possible.  And 
the  quotations  of  139  and  140  have  been  given  so  Hberally 
in  order  to  illustrate  this  fact,  and  to  encourage  the  student 
to  collect  others  which  may  contribute  towards  a  complete 
analysis  of  the  differences  between  the  two  constructions. 
All  that  can  be  done  here  is  to  point  out  some  of  the 
most  striking  of  these  differences. 

When  we  take  the  example  of  139,  3  and  try  the  alter- 
native construction  {by  gradually  building  up),  it  is  imme- 


I  2  2  VERBS 

■diately  evident  that  such  a  substitution  would  be  impossible: 
the  gradual  building  up  does  not  express  a  simple  action, 
but  rather  means  'method  of  building  up.'  The  quotations 
of  139,  8  and  9  are  very  similar. 

In  the  sentence  of  139,  10  the  meaning  is  that  the  book 
is  finished;  the  alternative  Finishing  his  book  would  have 
expressed  something  else :  that  he  was  finishing  his  book. 

In  the  construction  of  140  the  ing  with  its  verbal  adjuncts 
is  defined  or  qualified  by  a  nominal  adjunct.  The  contrast 
in  this  respect  with  139  is  very  clear  in  the  first  sentence 
of  140,  but  also  in  no.  6;  negatively  the  same  is  proved 
by  139,  7:  the  marking  coins  would  be  absurd,  because 
the  idea  'coins'  (it  is  a  case  of  discovering  a  thief  by 
marking  the  coins  in  the  till)  is  the  subject  of  the  con- 
versation, so  that  it  is  the  marking  only  that  the  boy- 
culprit  pretends  to  object  to  ^). 

In  140,  7  we  have  a  case  of  anaphoric  this,  showing 
that  the  idea  leaving  the  land  of  their  birth  has  been 
mentioned  in  what  precedes,  and  is  considered  as  a  whole, 
not  leaving  alone.  The  same  applies  to  several  examples 
with  anaphoric  the,  as  in  140,  3,  6  and  10.  Also  with 
affective  this,  as  in  140,  11  f. 

It  may  also  occur  that  the  purely  nominal  construction 
of  139  must  be  used  because  the  o/-adjunct  expresses  the 
subject  of  the  ing,  as  in  139,  6  and  11.  The  alternative 
here  would  be  an  indefinite  case  with  ing  (fidl  of  forgotten 
voices  calling,  for  Easter  Wednesday  coming):  apart  from 
other  objections  which  the  reader  will  easily  supply  him- 
self the  result  would  be  ambiguous,  for  the  ing  in  these 
last  two  constructions  might,  and  would  even  probabl}^, 
be  taken  for  an  attributive  ing  quahfying  the  preceding  noun. 


1)  The  article  before  the  ing  is  anaphoric,  not  defining. 


VERBAL   ING  I  23 

142.  In  some  of  the  quotations  of  139  f.  the  ing  is  pre- 
ceded by  a  possessive,  as  in  139,  15  f.  and  nos,  1  and  8 
of  140.  Looked  at  superficially,  these  examples  may  seem 
identical  with  those  of  the  possessive  with  ing  illustrated 
in  120  ff.  On  closer  inspection,  however,  it  will  soon  be 
discovered  that  the  ing  in  120  ff.  is  distinctly  verbal,  re- 
quiring a  subject  of  its  own,  whereas  the  sentences  in 
139  f.  referred  to  show  nouns  with  a  possessive  as  an 
attributive  adjunct.  The  last  can  also  be  said  of  the 
genitive  preceding  the  ing  in  this  example: 

Another  stirring  passage  describes  Ney's  crossing  the 
Dnieper.  Athenaeum,    14/9,    1912. 

The  use  of  Neys  instead  of  the  indefinite  case  Ney 
would  be  contrary  to  living  usage  if  we  really  had  a 
subject  with  ing  here,  see  121.  But  the  substitution  of 
Ney  would  completely  change  the  sense :  the  form  Ney's, 
bringing  out  as  it  does  the  nominal  character  of  crossing, 
causes  it  to  mean  'manner  of  crossing',  not  'the  act  of 
crossing'. 

143.  When  the  ing  takes  a  plural  suffix  it  may  be 
called  a  noun,  and  a  derivative  formation,  although  this 
does  not  prevent  it  from  expressing  a  verbal  meaning. 

These  list  slippers  were  the  immediate  cause  to  im- 
portant happenings  in  St.  Luke's  Square. 

Bennett,  Old  Wives'  Tale  IV  ch.  3  §   i. 

Naturally  with  so  much  of  her  attention  fixed  upon 
the  raps  downstairs  Sylvia  began  to  fancy  renewed 
rappings  all  round  her  in  the  darkness,  and  not  merely 
rappings,  but  all  sorts  of  nocturnal  shufiflings  and  scrapings 
and  whisperings  and  scratchings,  until  she  had  to  relight 
her  candle.  Mackenzie,  Sylvia  and  Michael  p.  55. 

144.  It  may  be  worth  observing  that  in  all  the  cases 
of  ings  that  waver  more  or  less  between  a  noun-  and  a 
verb-character    we    have    met    with   the   simple   ing  only. 


124  VERBS 

The  reason  is  that  the  complex  ing  is  naturally  of  a  more 
decidedly  verbal  nature. 

Another  point  that  might  be  worth  a  special  examination, 
which  would,  however,  require  more  space  than  can  be 
given  to  it  in  a  handbook,  is  \}aQ  grammatical  function 
of  the  ing  in  a  sentence  as  an  element  deciding  its  noun- 
or  verb-character.  It  is  evident,  for  example,  that  an  ing 
that  is  used  as  a  grammatical  subject  or  nominal  predicate 
of  a  sentence  is  by  that  very  circumstance  more  nominal 
than  an  ing  that  is  used  as  the  leading  element  of  a  re- 
lated, still  more  of  an  absolute,  free  adjunct. 

Occasional  Ings 

145.  What  has  been  said  of  the  ings  that  form  part  of 
a  complete  verbal  system  does  not  necessarily  apply  to 
occasional  formations,  often  nonce-words,  that  do  not  form 
part  of  any  verbal  system,  and  are,  indeed,  generally  con- 
nected with  or  derived  from  other  than  verbs.  These  occa- 
sional ings  are  never  used  in  a  complex  form,  nor  are  they 
found  as  elements  of  a  subject-with-ing  construction.  They 
are  almost  exclusively  used  as  adjuncts  and  as  plain  objects  i). 

For  on  the  previous  evening,  Sally  being  out  musicking, 
and  expected  home  late,  .  .  . 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.   14  p.    13 1. 

Fiddlers  are  not  Baronets,  but  anything  is  better  than 
haberdashing.  ib.  ch.  47  p.   521  f. 

Sam    (accepting    the   sarcasm    with    a    foolish    smile). 
Well,  well. 

Nancy    (sharply).     I    don't    see   that  there's  any  need 
for  so  much  well-welling, 

Bennett,  Milestones  II,  Brit.  PI.  p.   57. 
If  you'd  only  make  me  see  instead  of  you-seeing  me 
all  the  time.         Clemence  Dane,  Bill  of  Divorcement, 
Brit.  PI.  p.  656. 

i)  See  Karpf,  Neuere  Sprachen  35  p.  551. 


VERBAL   ING  125 

146.  In  some  cases  a  verbal  ing  has  other  verbal  forms, 
but  these  may  be  so  exceptional  as  to  be  felt  as  back- 
formations  from  the  ing  rather  than  as  the  base  from  which 
the  ing  has  been  formed.  A  strict  classification,  besides 
being  of  no  value,  would  be  impossible  because  in  cases  like 
this  there  are  individual  differences.  Thus,  a  form  in  ing 
may  be  an  isolated  form  to  most  speakers,  but,  if  a  technical 
term,  it  may  be  part  of  a  complete  verbal  system  to  experts : 
homing  shopgirls  (Niven,  Porcelain  Lady)  is  an  adaptation 
of  the  technical  homing  pigeons,  and  an  occasional  and  isolated 
ing  to  most  people,  but  the  verb  to  home  will  be  familiar  to 
breeders  of  these  pigeons. 

Similarly,  in  the  following  quotation.  Too  much  finessing 
would  be  wanted;  too  many  reserves  (de  Morgan,  Somehow 
Good  ch.  20  p.  193)  we  may  be  right  in  looking  upon 
finessing  as  a  form  derived  from  the  noun  finesse,  but  the 
author  also  uses  the  verb  finesse,  whether  directly  from  the 
noun,  or  as  a  back-formation  from  the  ing,  so  that  to  him 
the  ing  is,  or  may  be,  part  of  a  complete  system. 

I  shall  have  to  finesse  a  good  deal.     ib.  ch.  36  p.  384. 

He  was  one  of  those  useful  people  who  never  finesse,  who 
let  you  know  point-blank  where  you  are.     ib.  ch.  6  p.  52. 

147.  The  following  instances  seem  to  be  more  or  less 
occasional ;  the  last  being  an  evident  nonce-word. 

She  liked  . . .  coming  to  look  at  them  fishing  or  rabbiting. 

We  have  been  cowslipping  to-day  in  a  little  wood 
dignified  by  the  name  of  the  Hirschwald.  Elizabeth. 

I  should  not  like  to  see  you  two  going  off  governessing 
in  strangers'  houses.  Gissing,  New  Grub  Street. 

The  wayside  brambles  were  fruiting. 

She  could  perfectly  well  stop  him  if  she  chose,  and 
she  didn't  choose. 

Stop  him  whattiftg?  asked  Sally  perplexingly. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  6  p.   54. 


126  VERBS 

148.  An  occasional  ing  may  be  exclusively  used  as  an 
attributive  plain  adjunct  so  as  to  resemble  an  adjective, 
except  that  it  has  a  distinctly  verbal  meaning. 

The  black  soil  of  the  hillside  field  glistened  coldly  in 
the    meagre    rays    of  the    westering  sun  which  were  all 
that  it  caught  of  warmth  and  light  during  the  day  .  .  ' 
Freeman,  Joseph  and  his  Brethren,  p.   i. 

Compound  Ings 

149.  The  compound  ing  may  be  formed  from  a  non-verbal 
group:  bird's-nestmg,  blackberrying.  These  ings  are  derivatives 
from  compound  nouns  or  groups :  bird' s  nest,  blackberry ;  and 
should  be  classed  with  such  ings  as  nittting.  They  are  used 
very  much  like  the  usual  ing  except  that  they  do  not  generally 
occur  in  complex  ings. 

(He)  used  sometimes  in  the  middle  of  the  morning's 
work  to  ask  Peter  how  much  he  weighed,  whether  he 
had  ever  considered  taking  up  prize-fighting  as  a  pro- 
fession,   and   how   much    he   measured   across  the  chest. 

Walpole,  Fort.  I  ch.  7  p.  78. 
(It)  had  a  half-fearful  fascination  for  the  Raveloe  boys, 
who  would  often  leave  off  their  nutting  or  bird's-nesting 
to  peep  in  at  the  window  of  the  stone  cottage. 

George  Eliot,  Silas  Marner  ch.   i. 

150.  A  very  dift'erent  type  of  compound  in  living  English 
is  that  of  a  noun  with  a  verbal  ing,  the  noun  expressing 
the  object  or  adverb  adjunct  to  the  ing;  its  character  is 
exactly  similar  to  that  of  the  compound  nouns  in  -er ;  com- 
pare dress-making  and  dress-maker.  These  compound  ings 
are  used  as  nouns  {a)  or  as  adjectives  {I)),  not  in  both  func- 
tions.   They    are    essentially   different    from    the  verbal  ings. 

a.  They  seem  to  have  known  nothing  of  cultivation  or 
of  domestication  of  animals  or  of  pottery  making  or  of 
stone  grinding.  '    Fleure,  Races  of  Man  p.   15. 


VERBAL   ING  12/ 

...  all  about  dogs,  cats,  rabbits,  pigeon-shooting,  bird's- 
nesting,  and  weasel-hunting  with  his  rough  grey  terrier 
Snap.  Sweet,  Primer  of  Spoken  English  p.   50. 

The  ground  chosen  for  lavender  growing  should  slope 
a  little  to  the  south  or  south-west.  Daily  Mail. 

After  a  good  month's  work  at  the  strawberries,  we  had 
three  weeks  at  picking  raspberries,  followed  by  four  weeks 
blackberry-picking.     Davies^,  Super-Tramp  ch.  9  p.  70. 

b.  It's  a  labour-saving  device  of  mine. 

Chapin,    New  Morality,  Brit.  PI.  p.  563. 

.  .  .   many  gold-bearing  rivers. 

Massingham,  Pre-Roman  Britain  p.   34. 

I  hate  people  when  they  keep  up  an  ear-splitting 
chatter  all  the  time.         Punch's  Almanack  for   1931. 

See  the  chapter  on  Composition  in  volume  3. 

151.  A  third  type  of  compound  ing  is  formed  from  com- 
binations of  verbs  with  adverbs,  such  as  to  brifig  tip.  These 
compounds  have  a  regular  ing  that  forms  part  of  the  whole 
verbal  system :  bringing  np.  By  the  side  of  this  form, 
however,  there  is  a  form  that  is  used  as  a  noun  or  as  an 
adjective,  like  the  formations  in  143  f.;  such  a  form  is 
7ipbringing,  used  as  a  noun. 

Poutsma,  Gernnd  (p.  no)  instances:  the  troubles  and 
storms  of  Hester^ s  bringing-iip,  the  subject  of  his  daughter  s 
tipbringifig.  The  ing-iorm.  is  distinctly  nominal  here,  and 
this  is  probably  the  cause  of  the  form  upbringing  by  the 
side  of  bringing-up. 

The  compounds  are  used  adjectively  in  the  following 
sentences. 

Saxon  graves  of  the  pagan  period  give  us  a  good 
deal  of  information  concerning  the  social  life  and  culture 
of  the  incoming  race,  but  not  definite  history. 

Oman,  Engl.  Norman  Conquest  p.    188. 

.  .  .  the  last  good  influence  in  the  lives  of  downgoing 
men.  Stevenson,  Dr.  Jekyll. 


128  VERBS 

152.  The  two  last  types  of  compound  ing  described  in 
I50f.,  though  verbal  in  so  far  as  they  express  an  action  or 
occurrence,  are  only  used  as  nouns  or  adjectives;  they  naturally 
never  form  part  of  a  subject  with  ing,  nor  are  they  found 
in    such    a    purely    verbal  function  as  that  of  a  free  adjunct. 

It  must  also  be  noted  that  the  forms,  being  derivative, 
cannot  be  freely  formed  and  depend  upon  usage.  Formations 
of  the  first  type  are  extremely  common  {letter-writing,  book- 
keeping, Jiorse-breeding,  house- hunti7ig,  school-keeping,  home- 
coming, etc.),  but  it  would  be  impossible  to  use  it  in  order 
to  express  writing  poems,  exchanging  glances,  paying  bills, 
mending  socks,  posting  parcels.  It  should  also  be  remembered 
that  the  first  element  of  compounds  like  zv  ease  I- hunting  is 
taken  in  a  general  or  collective  sense;  it  would  be  impossible 
to  use  the  type  when  the  noun  is  taken  in  an  individual 
sense,  whether  singular  or  plural. 

Verbal  [iz] 

153.  The  regular  verb  has  a  form  with  the  suffix  [iz,  z,  s], 
which  is  the  only  verbal  form  that  is  exclusivel}^  used 
predicatively.  The  verbs  that  do  not  take  the  suffix,  such 
as  can  and  shall,  are  such  as  are  always  used  as  sub- 
ordinate members  of  a  predicative  verbal  group,  and 
cannot  be  used  as  independent  verbs.  The  connection  be- 
tween these  two  facts  is  clearly  shown  by  such  verbs  as 
to  dare  and  to  need,  which  take  the  suffix  when  they  are 
used  predicatively  as  independent  verbs,  but  are  used  in  the 
plain  stem  when  part  of  a  verbal  group  (He  daren't  come). 

The  verbal  |iz]  is  generally  called  the  third  person  singular 
of  the  present  tense,  the  other  'forms'  of  the  present  tense 
being  the  unchanged  stem.  The  only  verb  that  has  a  real 
present  tense  is  the  verb  to  be;  this  present  tense,  it  may 
be    added,    is    a    suppletive    system,    with    special    forms 


PRESENT   TENSE  I 29 

for  the  first  person  singular,  and  a  form  are  that  is 
distinct  from  the  stem,  so  that  it  possesses  three  dis- 
tinctive present  forms  ^j. 

154.  The  traditional  term  present  tense  has  been  re- 
tained here,  although  its  usefulness  is  very  doubtful  in 
English.  The  forms  called  by  that  name  do  not  really 
express  present  time,  except  in  so  far  that  they  do  not 
denote  an  action,  state,  or  occurrence  belonging  to  a  time 
that  is  thought  of  as  distincdy  separated  from  the  present 
time,  and  either  past,  or  future.  Its  most  characteristic 
use  is  perhaps  when  no  time  is  thought  of  at  all  (neutral 
present). 

We  can  leap,  and  run,  and  whistle  when  we  choose. 
When  we  are  tired  we  can  force  ourselves  to  an  increased 
effort  for  a  sufficient  purpose.  And  so  forth.  Other 
voluntary  movements,  therefore,  furnish  the  clearest  prima 
facie  evidence  of  the  influence  of  our  minds  upon  our 
bodies.  They  do  not,  however,  exhaust  this  testimony, 
and  so  it  is  necessary  to  consider  other  and  more  com- 
plicated instances. 

Laird,  Our  Minds  and  Their  Bodies  p.   17. 

Plants  breathe  just  as  well  as  we  do. 

Nobody  remembers  how  he  learned  to  talk. 

Some  birds  build  their  nests  in  trees,  others  on  the 
ground. 

155.  The  neutral  present  is  to  be  distinguished  from 
the  iterative  present  (a),  although  the  distinction  is  not 
always  strictly  applicable  (b).  , 

a.  He  goes  to  Germany  once  a  year. 

d.  Commonly,  when  a  man  acquires  wealth  and 
establishes  a  family  he  begins  to  inquire  into  his  ancestry. 
Satirists  assure  us  that  he  seldom  scruples  to  make  desire 


4)  On  the  use  of  the  third  person  as  a  form  of  address,  see  the  sections 
on  the  use  of  the  personal  pronouns  of  the  third  person. 
Kruisinga,  Handbook  II.  Accide7ice  and  Syntax.  1.  9 


130  VERBS 

serve  for  fact  in  the  weak  links  of  a  distinguished  descent. 
The  same  foible  of  human  nature  is  manifest  in  nations 
when  they  rise  to  power. 

Times  Lit.   14/11,   1929  p.  905. 

156.  The  present  tense  is  also  used  to  refer  to  what 
is  loosely  thought  of  as  belonging  to  the  present  (actual 
present),  as  in  the  following  quotations. 

The  official  statement  from  Sofia  which  we  publish 
elsewhere  i)  confirms  the  good  news  that  an  armistice 
has  been  concluded.  Times  W.  6/12,   12. 

People  from  the  Provinces  coming  into  Tokyo  report 
that  appalling  loss  of  life  and  damage  to  property  have 
been  caused  by  the  typhoon.  ib.  4/10,   12. 

157.  The  verbal  forms  in  the  preceding  section,  though 
undoubtedly  referring  to  the  present  time,  are  concerned 
with  occurrences  that  are  connected  with  the  past;  this 
explains  why  the  perfect  would  be  possible  in  both  cases. 
Occasionally  the  time  referred  to  is  even  more  distinctly 
thought  of  as  connected  with  the  past,  so  that  the  present 
comes  to  have  a  function  that  would  seem  to  require  a  perfect 
with  have.  This  case  is  naturally  found  [a)  when  the  verb 
is  to  be  with  a  participle  or  a  participial  adjective  like  dead 
or  extinct  (see  65),  but  also  in  other  cases  {h).  Observe 
that  in  all  the  cases  quoted  it  is  a  state,  not  an  action  or 
occurrence  that  is  expressed.  The  use  may  be  called  the 
presejit-perfect  2). 

a.  The  Town  and  Gown  rows  s)  which  used  to  provide 
so  attractive  a  picture  for  the  novelist  are  extinct  and 
forgotten  these  last  ten  years. 

Godley,  Aspects  of  Modern  Oxford  p.  35. 


1)  i.  e.  in  anothar  column  of  this  paper. 

2)  To  be  distinguished  from  the  perfect-present  (as  I  have  got). 

3)  i.  e.  the  rows  (fights)  between  the  townsmen  and  the  undergraduates. 


PRESENT   TENSE  I3I 

The  fight  has  been  fought,  and  the  ominous  appre- 
hensions of  the  timid  are  long  since  forgotten. 

Magnus,  Primer,  p.    158. 

"And  you  were  early  left,  I  understand  ?"  — 

"Early  left?  Oh  dear,  yes,"  she  said  briskly.  "He 
is  dead  these  forty  years."  — 

W.  P.  Wilcox,  Wings  of  Desire,  p.  200. 

b.  I  believe  they  are  an  old  French  family  —  de 
Polairet  —  but  they  are  so  long  in  England  —  they 
have  become  Parret.      Barrie,  A  Rolling  Stone,  p.  47. 

"Time  Lady  May  did  call,"  said  Susan.  "We  are 
here  seven  months."  ib.  p.  96. 

"Did  you  ever  see  any  scalping,  or  anything  horrible 
yourself,  my  dear?"  .... 

"Oh  no.  Miss  Tarlton,  all  that  is  over  long  ago.  The 
Indians  are  in  the  reservations  now." 

Humphrey  Ward,  Daphne^ 

For  Mr.  Swinburne's  style  becomes  of  late  more  and 
more  provocative.  Academy  20/12,   1902. 

And  what  is  Rosabel  doing  with  herself  lately? 

J.  O.  Hobbes,  A  Serious  Wooing  (T.)  p.  7. 

In  this  connection  attention  may  be  drawn  to  the  present 
/  hear  in  the  sense  of  'I  have  heard,  I  have  oeen  told'. 

158.  The  present  tense  can  also  be  used  to  express 
what  is  exclusively  and  distinctly  thought  of  as  concerning 
the  present  time.  The  use  is  limited  to  a  comparatively 
small  number  of  verbs,  such  as  to  feel,  to  see,  and  other 
verbs  of  perception;  for  the  further  discussion  of  the  phe- 
nomenon the  reader  may  be  referred  to  the  chapter  on 
the  progressive. 

I  quite  realize  how  greatly  disappointed  you  are  at 
his  desertion. 

I  feel  rather  tired  after  my  walk. 

Sweet,  Element,  no.  63. 
I  see  now  what  you  mean. 

Do  you  see  those  chimneys  to  the  left  of  the  tower .'' 
He  lives  in  a  small  town  in  the  West  of  England. 


132  VERBS 

A  good  many  verbs  are  rarel}^  used  in  the  simple  {i.  e. 
nonprogressive)  actual  present  at  all;  such  verbs  are 
to  persuade,  to  acclaim,  to  fish,  etc. 

There  are  also  verbs  that  rarely  occur,  if  at  all,  in 
either  the  simple  or  the  progressive  actual  present;  such  a 
verb  is  to  ascertain,  and  other  purely  perfective  verbs. 

159.  It  is  not  always  easy,  or  even  possible,  to  distinguish 
between  the  actual  and  the  neutral  present.  In  the  following 
quotation  the  present  time  is  not  specially  mentioned  or  thought 
of;  yet  it  seems  best  to  interpret  the  present  tenses  as  actual 
rather  than  as  neutral  presents. 

The  Five  Towns  seem  to  cling  together  for  safety. 
Yet  the  idea  of  clinging  together  for  safety  would  make 
them  laugh.  I'hey  are  unique  and  indispensable.  From 
the  north  of  the  county  right  down  to  the  south  they 
alone  stand  for  civilization,  applied  science,  organized 
manufacture,  and  the  century  —  until  you  come  to 
Wolverhampton.         Bennett,  Old  W.  T.  I  ch.   I,  §  i. 

160.  The  present  can  also  refer  to  what  is  actually 
future  (the  future  present).  Its  use  in  English  is  very 
much  restricted,  although  less  so  in  colloquial  English 
than  in  the  literar}^  language. 

The  future  present  is  necessary,  the  alternative  with 
shall  and  will  being  unidiomatic,  in  adverb  clauses,  when 
the  verbal  idea  is  dependent  upon  the  verbal  idea  of  the 
leading  clause,  and  the  time  is  indicated  in  the  main  clause 
or  by  the  conjunction. 

With  winter,  in  any  case,  Lake  Baikal  will  cease  to 
be  an  obstacle  to  communication,  for  as  soon  as  it  is 
frozen  over,  there  will  be  sledge  transport  from  one  side 
of  it  to  the  other.  Times  W.   19/7,   18. 

Oh,  he'll  ride  the  brute,  now  he's  promised  to  do  so 
if  it  costs  him  his  life!  Garvice,  Staunch  p.  232. 

I  only  mention  this  simple  incident,  because  it  is 
necessary,   before   I  proceed  to  the  eventful  part  of  my 


PRESENT   TEKSE  I 33 

narrative,  that  you  should  know  exactly  in  what  relation 
the  sisters  stood  towards  one  another  from  the  first. 
W.  W.  Collins,  in  Selected  Short  Stories  III.  p.  240. 

Cannot  you  wait  till  I  come  back.'' 

No  solu  ion  of  the  problems  presented  by  history  will 
be    complete    until    the    knowledge    of    man    is    perfect. 
Pollard,   History  of  England  ch.   i   p.  8. 

General  Cadorna  is  obviously  fighting  delaying  rear- 
guard actions,  until  he  is  able  to  establish  himself  on  the 
Middle  and  Lower  Piave  i).  Times  W.  9/1 1,    17. 

161.  The  restriction  of  the  use  of  the  future  present  to 
adverb  clauses  in  the  conditions  indicated  in  the  preceding 
section  clearly  shows  that  the  use  is  due  to  a  kind  of 
linguistic  economy,  the  group-future  being  excluded  be- 
cause it  would  be  a  repetition  of  the  indication  of  time 
by  the  leading  clause  or  by  the  conjunction.  The  present 
tense  is  only  used,  consequently,  when  the  two  verbal 
ideas  are  connected;  it  is  not  possible  in  noun  clauses, 
nor  in  adverb  clauses  expressing  an  action  or  occurrence 
that  is  not  dependent  on  the  action  or  occurrence  of  the 
leading  clause. 

I  expect  the  parcel  will  come  to-day. 
He  will  help  us,  so  that  we  sliall  be  able  to  finish  it 
to-night. 

162.  In  reported  style  the  future  present  may  be  used 
in  adverb  clauses  to  refer  to  a  future  time  that  is  thought 
of  as  past  with  regard  to  the  time  of  the  verbal  idea 
expressed  by  the  leading  clause  {a).  The  relation  of  time 
may  also  be  inverted  Kb). 

a.  In  despair  the  Ottoman  Government  has  invited 
the  Great  Powers  to  interfere.  France,  in  agreement 
with    other    Powers,    notably    Great   Britain  and  Russia, 


1)  The    clause    with    until   really  depends  in  thought  on  a  sentence  like 
He  will  continue  to  do  so. 


1 34  VERBS 

has  informed  Turkey  that  her  overtures  cannot  be 
accepted  until  she  submits  definite  proposals  with  regard 
to  conditions  of  peace.  Everyman  8/11,   12. 

b.  When  the  proposed  Police  College  is  established 
it  is  anticipated  that  only  a  half-blue  will  be  awarded 
for  playing  in  the  harlequinade. 

Punch's  Almanack  for  1931. 

163.  The  future  present  is  of  a  different  character  when 
used  in  simple  sentences,  or  in  the  main  clause  of  a  com- 
pound sentence.  In  this  case  it  is  only  an  alternative  to 
the  group-future  with  shall  and  will,  and  its  use  is  chiefly 
found  in  spoken  English,  generally  of  a  famiHar  type.  The 
time  is  usually  indicated  by  an  adjunct  of  time. 

Your  subscription  expires  on  the   i6th  inst. 
School  recommences  on  January  14. 
Parliament    does    not    meet  until  February  14th.     No 
one  knows  how  or  when  the  session  will  end. 

Daily  News. 
"Nonsense.    It's  a  weakness.    I'm  not  Garvington.  By 
the  way,  where  is  he?" 

"In  Paris,  but  he  returns  in  a  few  days." 

Hume,  Red  Money,  p.  200. 
"When  do  you  start  for  South  Africa.'*"  she  asked.  — 
"In  three  days.     I  join  my  battery  in  Natal." 

Parker,  Judgment  House  ch.  24. 

164.  The  future  present  is  not  restricted  to  main  clauses; 
it  occurs  or  can  occur  when  the  verbal  idea  is  not  de- 
pendent upon  some  other  verb;  hence  in  continuative 
relative  clauses  {a)  and  in  noun  clauses  {b). 

a.  The  King,  who  leaves  Abbeystead  to-morrow  and 
pays  a  visit  to  Lancaster,  will  go  direct  from  the  latter 
town  to  Balmoral.  Daily  News. 

b.  It  seems  Pavis  Court  must  be  sold  this  spring. 
They  would  go  barefoot  to  keep  it,  but  going  barefoot 
won't  keep  it  —  nothing  will. 

Cotes,  Cinderella  ch.   11.   136. 


PRESENT   TENSE  I35 

Come  for  a  walk  to-morrow.  —  All  right.  Where 
to?  —  Let's  go  to  the  Falls.  I  suggest  we  start  soon 
after  nine  and  I'll  ask  the  landlady  to  put  us  up  some 
sandwiches.  CoUinson,  Spoken  English  p.  86. 

Well,  all  that  remains  is  the  French  match.  Let  us 
hope  that  we  manage  to  win  there.     Graphic  23/3,  1929. 

I    hope    I   don't  get  planted  next  the  Pumpkinette  i). 

Sinister  Street  p.  689. 

Let  us  hope  Haig  improves  quickly  in  strength, 

Manchester  Guardian,   1/6,   1923, 

165.  In  familiar  English  the  future  present  is  also  used 
to  express  determination. 

"Let  me  go,  father,"  Peter  said,  very  white,  and 
putting  down  the  bag.  —  "Be  damned  to  you,"  said 
his  father.     "You  do7it  get  through  this  door." 

Walpole,  Fortitude  I  ch.   10  p.   124, 

"We  go  through  that  arch,"  said  Arthur,  "or  my 
name  is  not  Stubland,"     Wells,  Joan  and  Peter  ch.  3^9, 

"And  what  do  you  do  with  Richard  while  you  are 
absent  on  this  expedition?" 

"Oh!"  said   the  baronet,   "he  accompanies  his  father," 
Meredith,  Feverel  ch    13  p.  90. 

Are  you  for  staying  and  seeing  the  lions  feed,  or  do 
we  cut  back?  Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.   5. 

This  seems  to  account  for  the  case  quoted  by  van  der 
Gaaf  in  Engl.  Studien  (62  p.  402):  "Two  immaculately 
dressed  young  men  in  the  stalls  are  talking  about  the  clothes 
worn  by  the  actors,  which  strike  them  as  wonderful  creations. 
All  at  once  one  of  them  says,  "What's  the  name  of  the  man 
who  supplies  the  clothin'  ?  Here  we  are,  Snipe  and  Snipe, 
Bridge  Street,  Bertie,  Fm,  there  to-morrow,  and  you  must 
come  too,  dear  old  boy."  (Punch,  19/3,  1902  p.  206).  What  he 
means  is  that  he  is  going  there  to-morrow  to  order  some  clothes." 


1)  i.  e.    the   daughter   of   the   Pumpkin,  the  nickname  of  the  Warden  of 
the  College. 


136  VERBS 

166.  It  follows  from  what  has  been  said  that  the  future 
present  is  used  only  when  the  time,  though  future,  is  thought 
of  as  connected  with  the  present  time.  Thus  we  could  not 
use  the  future  present  in  /  shall  work  in  the  garden  to- 
morrow;  nor  in:  As  I  need  some  things,  I  shall  go  out 
shopping  this  afternoon. 

The  future  could  not  be  replaced  by  the  simple  present 
in  the  following  quotations,  even  though  they  occur  in  adverb 
clauses  with  an  indication  of  future  time  in  the  main  clause. 
The  reason  is  that  the  'adverb  clauses'  are  really  continuative. 
They  must  be  treated  as  main  clauses  consequently  (161). 
The  future  is  necessary  here  because  the  future  present 
would  suggest  an  identity  of  the  time  of  the  two  verbal 
ideas  which  is  evidently  out  of  place  here. 

The  Queen  will  arrive  on  the  21th,  when  she  will 
hold  a  general  reception. 

The  first  official  aerial  postal  service  in  Europe  will 
be  inaugurated  on  Saturday,  September  9,  when  letters 
will  be  conveyed  by  aeroplanes  from  the  Hendon 
aerodrome  to  Windsor. 

167.  The  present  tense  is  finally  used  to  express  what 
actually  concerns  the  past,  but  is  represented  by  the 
speaker  as  belonging  to  the  present.  It  often  occurs  in 
historical  narratives,  whence  it  has  been  called  the  historical 
present;  as  it  aims  at  picturing  the  past  as  if  it  were  the 
present  moment  it  is  also  called  the  dramatic  present. 
The  historical  present  is  rarely  continued  for  a  long  time; 
in  most  cases  a  longer  narrative  will  turn  into  the  narrative 
past  tense  after  some  historical  presents. 

"Mother,  you  are  going  to  marry  Mr.  Fenwick !" 
No  change  of  type  could  do  justice  to  ,the  emphasis 
with  which  Sally  goes  straight  to  the  point.  Italics 
throughout  would  be  weak.  Her  mother  smiles  as  she 
fondles  her  daughter's  excited  face. 


PRESENT   TENSE  1 37 

"I  am,  darling.  So  you  may  kiss  him  yourself  when 
he  comes  to-morrow  evening." 

And  Tishy's  passion  for  the  shop-boy  had  to  stand 
over.  But,  as  the  Major  had  said,  the  mother  and 
daughter  talked  till  three  in  the  morning  —  well,  past 
two,  anyhow! 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.   14  p.   140. 

"If  you  choose  to  make  capital  out  of  this  accident," 
said  he,  "I  am  naturally  helpless.  No  gentleman  but 
wishes  to  avoid  a  scene,"  says  he. 

Stevenson,   Dr.  Jekyll   p.   8  f.  (hIso  on  p.    10). 

For  another  example,  too  long  to  quote,  see  Walpole, 
Fortitude  I  ch.   10  §  3  (p.   120  f.). 

168.  The  historical  present  is  occasionally  found  in  dig- 
nified or  serious  narrative  prose,  but  is  not  very  common  in 
literary  P'nglish.  The  reason  is  that  it  is  felt  that  the  narrative 
present,  though  making  for  liveliness,  is  at  bottom  a  sign  of 
weakness.  English  writers  seem  to  feel  a  want  of  dignity 
in  it ;  the  following  quotation  from  a  review  in  the  Literary 
Times  is  instructive. 

.  .  .  Nor  is  the  situation  improved  by  a  rhetorical  style, 
with  a  superabundance  of  superlatives  and  exclamations, 
and  frequent  lapses  at  critical  moments  into  that  most 
tiresome  of  devices,  the  narrative  present  tense. 

Times  Lit.  8//,   15. 

169.  The  historical  present  is  sometimes  used  to  illustrate 
a  statement  of  a  general  kind ;  in  such  a  case  we  have  no 
true  historical  present,  because  it  is  not  narrative.  This  may 
be  illustrated  by  the  following  passage,  which  immediately 
follows  upon  the  quotation  in  I55<^. 

Augustus,  assuming  the  lordship  of  an  empire,  bids 
Virgil  to  construct  for  it  a  poetic  descent  from  that 
Troy  which  was  the  rival  of  Rome's  rival.  Virgil  sings 
of  Aeneas,  progenitor  of  the  Roman  might,  and  of  his 
arduous  journey  to  the  fated  land  in  which,  as  prophecy 


138  VERBS 

assures  him,  his  children  are  to  establish  a  realm  that 
Tuill  embrace  the  earth.  The  Aeneid  may  be  to  us 
simply  a  monument  of  the  poetic  art ;  to  Augustus  it 
zvas  a  means  wherewith  to  foster  in  the  Roman  people 
a  faith  in  their  imperial  destiny. 

Times  Lit.   14/11.   1929. 

170.  We  have  no  narrative  present  in  the  following  quota- 
tion, which  states  a  merely  suppositional  series  of  events. 

"I  may  be  very  obtuse.  Holmes,  but  I  fail  to  see  what 
this  suggests." 

"No?  You  surprise  me.  Look  at  it  in  this  way,  then. 
Captain  Morstan  disappears.  The  only  person  in  London 
whom  he  could  have  visited  is  Major  Sholto.  Major  Sholto 
denies  having  heard  that  he  was  in  London.  Four  years 
later  Sholto  dies.  Within  a  week  of  his  death  Captain 
Morstan's  daughter  receives  a  valuable  present,  which 
is  repeated  from  year  to  year,  and  now  culminates  in 
a    letter    which    describes   her   as    a    wronged    woman." 

Conan  Doyle. 

The  Plain  Verb  Stem 

171.  Apart  from  its  use  as  an  element  of  the  suppletive 
present,  the  plain  verb  stem  can  be  used  predicatively 
and  non-predicatively.     These  uses  will  now  be  treated. 

The  predicative  stem  differs  from  the  present  tense  in 
the  case  of  the  verb  to  be  only;  this  may  justify  us  in 
treating  the  stem  in  two  different  chapters.  The  pre- 
dicative stem  is  used  in  a  number  of  functions,  which 
may  be  classed  as  the  imperative  and  the  exclamative. 

The  non-predicative  stem  is  exclusively  used  as  an 
element  of  a  group:  either  a  purely  verbal  group  (He 
can  talk)  or  a  mixed  nominal  and  verbal  group  (I  saw 
the  boy  run  away).  In  this  use  it  is  generally  called  an 
infinitive;  but  the  traditional  term,  as  experience  teaches, 
is   apt   to    suggest    the  mistaken  idea  that  living  English 


IMPERATIVE   STEM  I  39 

possesses   a   distinct  form  that  is  used  in  these  functions, 
such  as  other  languages,  including  older  English,  have. 

Imperative  Stem 

172.  The  predicative  plain  stem  can  express  a  command 
or  entreaty  {a)\  also  a  challenge  [.h).  It  is  oftenest  used 
without  a  subject,  which  differentiates  it  from  the  present 
tense.  The  imperative  is  also  different  from  the  present 
by  its  intonation  -).  It  is  generally  accompanied  by  the 
name  of  the  person  addressed  or  some  particle  like /'/^a^^, 
or  a  clause  such  as  if  you  like,  etc.  As  in  other  languages 
it  is  used  in  simple  sentences  chiefly,  or  in  the  main  clause 
of  a  compound  sentence. 

a.  Go  home  and  do  what  you  are  told. 
Put  a  kettle  on  the  gas-stove  to  boil. 

Collinson,  Spoken  English  p.  20  ^). 
Please  help  me  translate  this.  ib. 

b.  "Touch  that  bell  if  you  dare!"  screamed  Paul. 

Anstey,  Vice  Versa  ch.  2. 

173.  The  imperative  is  naturally  used  of  those  verbs 
only  that  express  a  voluntary  action.  If  we  find  it  used 
of  the  verb  to  be  as  in  be  quiet,  please,  it  really  answers 
to  this  description,  for  it  requests  the  person  addressed 
to  act  in  the  manner  indicated.  And  when  a  father  or 
mother  says  to  children  going  out  for  the  day :  Now,  boys, 
enjoy  yourselves,  we  still  have  the  same  use;  for  it  is  the 
boys'  own  will  that  the  enjoyment  is  supposed  to  depend 
on.  The  imperative-stem  is  also  used,  however,  to  express 
what  is  purely  a  wish,  as  in  the  familiar  sleep  well. 


1)  The  examples  there  given,  being  massed  together  away  from  a  context, 
suggest  a  form  that  is  really  exceptional  or  less  frequent:  there  is  usually 
some  word  to  soften  the  command,  if  only  a  proper  name. 

2)  Palmer,  Gr.  of  Spoken  English  §§  638  f. 


140  VERBS 

"Good-night,  little  Lord  Fauntleroy,"  she  said.  "Sleep 
well."  Burnett,  L.  Fauntleroy  p.    175. 

"Good-bye,  dear  Uncle  Jolyon,  you  have  been  so 
sweet  to  me." 

"To-morrow  then,"  he  said.  "Good-night,  sleep  well." 
She  echoed  softly:   "Sleep  well!" 

Galsworthy,  Indian  Summer  ch.   5   (Saga  p.  428). 

174.  The  imperative  stem  often  leads  to  interjectional 
use,  as  in  come,  fancy,  etc. 

175.  The  imperative  stem  may  have  its  subject  you 
prefixed  to  it.  The  pronoun  is  used  to  make  the  form 
more  emphatic,  and  is  naturally  strong-stressed.  Stress  and 
intonation  are  the  only  formal  marks  distinguishing  this 
use  from  the  present  tense. 

You  sit  down  and  get  your  breakfast, 

Patterson,  Stephen  Compton  p.    192. 

"Don't  you  talk  so  much  about  glory,"  the  (recruiting) 
sergeant  was  saying.  He  had  drunk  a  good  deal  from 
one  bottle  and  another  and  was  growing  rather  incautious. 
"You've  got  to  learn  your  trade  first.  Yoii.  wait  till  I  put 
you  through  it  on  parade  and  you've  done  a  few  fatigues. 
You  won't  talk  so  much  about  glory  then." 

Freeman,  Joseph  ch.  7  p.   53. 

Now,  there  were  two  Fine  Arts  to  which  this  master, 
Reginald  Aiken,  devoted  himself.  One,  the  production 
of  original  compositions,  which  did  not  pay,  owing  to 
their  date.  Some  of  these  days  they  would  —  you  see 
if  they  wouldn't !  The  other  Fine  Art  was  that  of  the 
picture-restorer,  and  did  pay. 

de  Morgan,  A  Likely  Story  ch.  i  p.   10. 

Further  examples  are  given  in  volume  3,  in  the  sections 
on  sentence-structure  and  word-order, 

176.  The  imperative  group  of  be  with  a  participle  in  a 
verbal  function,  forming  what  might  be  called  a  'passive* 
imperative,  occurs  only  in  a  few  traditional  groups. 


IMPERATIVE   STEM  I4I 

A  few  years  ago,  when  Dr.  Jowett  was  master  of 
Balliol,  there  was  a  discussion  concerning  two  men  who 
had  attained  high  position  at  an  early  age.  One  of 
these  had  become  a  bishop,  the  other  a  judge;  and  the 
conversation  turned  on  the  respective  merits  of  the  two 
careers.  One  of  the  dons  said :  "I  prefer  the  bishop. 
The  judge  can  only  say,  'you  be  hanged';  the  bishop  can 
say,  'you  be  damned'".  "Yes",  said  Dr.  Jowett  sententi- 
ously,  "but  when  the  judge  says  'you  be  hanged'  you  are 
ha7tged'\        Review  of  Reviews,  June   1909,  p.   520/2. 

The  following  case  is  similar  to  the  interjectional  forms  of  174. 

"Let  me  go,  father,"  Peter  said,  very  white,  and 
putting  down  the  bag.  —  "Be  damned  to  you,"  said 
his  father.  "You  don't  get  through  this  door." 

Walpole,  Fortitude  I  ch.   10  p.   124, 

177.  The  imperative  stem  when  accompanied  by  a 
negative  adjunct  expresses  a  prohibition,  both  with  a 
subject  yoii  and  without.  On  the  prohibitive  with  not,  see 
the  sections  on  the  auxiliary  do. 

"What  are  you  crying  for?"  —  "What's  that  to  you.?" 
said  she.  —  "Never  you  mind,  but  tell  me  what  you're 
crying  for."  Kooistra  and  Schutt,  Reader  II  p.  7. 

178.  The  imperative  stem  may  express  a  piece  of  advice 
or  a  warning,  with  the  consequence  expressed  in  the  form 
of  a  coordinated  sentence.  The  construction  outwardly 
seems  a  double  sentence,  but  the  rising  intonation  at  the 
end  of  the  first  sentence  makes  it  clear  that  the  function 
of  the  stem  is  that  of  a  subordinate  clause.  The  two  ele- 
ments of  the  construction  are  joined  by  and. 

Thank  goodness,  the  sun's  shining  at  last.  Give  it 
another  hour  or  so  and  we  shall  be  able  to  sit  out  on 
the  lawn.  ColHnson,  Spoken  English  p.  30. 

Ask  too  many  questions,  and  you'll  spoil  everything. 
Pett  Ridge,  Garland,  ch.    12  p.   215. 

Come  another  step  nearer,  and  I'll  bring  this  poker  on 
your  head.  Van  Doom,  Dramatic  Conv.  p.  53. 


142  VERBS 

Open  Homer  anywhere,  and  the  casual  grandeur  of 
his  untranslatable  language  appears. 

L.  Abercrombie,  Epic  p.   58, 
Hints  on  how  to  open  a  new  book. 

Hold  the  book  with  its  back  on  a  smooth  or  covered 
table;  let  the  frontboard  down,  then  the  back,  holding 
the  leaves  in  one  hand  while  you  open  a  few  leaves  at 
the  back,  then  a  few  at  the  front,  and  so  on,  alternately 
opening  back  and  front,  gently  pressing  open  the  sec- 
tions till  you  reach  the  centre  of  the  volume.  Do  this 
two  or  three  times  and  you  will  obtain  the  best  results. 
Open  a  new  volume  violently  or  carelessly  in  any  one 
place  and  you  will  likely  break  the  back  and  cause  a 
start  in  the  leaves.  Never  force  the  back  of  a  book, 
however  well  bound. 

Earnest  citizen.  "Here  you  are,  my  dear,  there's  your 
British  public.  Give  them  something  really  good  and 
they  sniff  at  it ;  but  give  them  something  risky  and, 
look,  you  couldn't  get  a  seat  if  you  tried." 

His  wife.   "There's  no  harm  in  trying,  dear." 

Punch,   13/11,    13- 

179.  The  same  relation  may  be  expressed  by  two  im- 
perative sentences  connected  by  and. 

Read  English  newspapers  and  periodicals  and  be  well- 
informed.  Advt. 

180.  When  the  stem  is  accompanied  by  once^  the  im- 
perative meaning  is  inevitably  weakened,  so  that  the  first 
sentence  has  the  character  of  a  conditional  clause.  When 
once  opens  the  sentence,  it  comes  to  have  the  function  of 
a  conjunction  rather  than  of  an  adverb  ^),  and  may  be 
looked  upon  as  the  correlative  of  and. 

Shut  them  out  once  and  you  shut  them  out  for  ever. 

Times  Lit.   13/5,  20. 
It's  better  that  the  beast  under  you  should  be  a  Lion 


1)  Once  is  also  used  as  a  conjunction  in  other  kinds  of  clauses;    see  the 
sections  on  Conjunctions. 


IMPERATIVE   STEM  1 43 

rather  than  a  Donkey,  but  let  it  once  fling  you  off  its  back 
and  you're  done  for.    Walpole,  Fortitude  III  ch.  6  p.  304. 

Once  grasp  this  fact  and  you  will  cease  to  be  at  the 
mercy  of  phrases  .  .  .  Once  begin  to  take  the  teaching 
of  English  composition  seriously  in  all  our  schools  and 
universities,  and  our  teachers  will  soon  train  themselves. 

Times  Ed.  S.  29/8,    18. 

181.  The  sentence  is  clearly  a  conditional  clause  when 
the  verb  stem  expresses  a  state  rather  than  an  action,  as  in 
the  following :  Know  one  Frenchman  and  you  know  France. 
(Meredith,  Egoist  p.  95).  The  shifting  is  still  clearer  when 
the  verb  in  the  second  clause  is  a  form  in  id,  or  a  cor- 
responding irregular  form,  which  is  evidently  a  modal 
preterite,  not  a  past  tense.  Observe,  too,  that  in  many  cases 
nobody  is  really  addressed:  instead  of  an  imperative  sentence 
we  have  a  declarative  compound  one. 

Miss  Spencer  could  have  withstood  successfully  any  moral 
trial,  but  persuade  her  that  her  skin  was  in  danger,  and 
she  would  succumb.      Bennett,   Babylon  Hotel,  ch.  9. 

Give  me  the  schools  of  the  world  and  I  would  make 
a  Millennium.  Bennett,  Joan  and  Peter  ch.   2^3. 

182.  A  further  step  away  from  the  imperative  meaning 
is  taken  when  the  two  clauses  are  not  formally  connected; 
this  makes  them  resemble  a  hypothetical  statement  in 
form  as  well  as  in  meaning.  The  preterite  in  the  second 
clause  is  best  interpreted  as  a  modal  preterite,  as  in  the 
preceding  section;  but  it  would  be  possible  to  interpret 
the  verbal  id  as  an  iterative  past  tense. 

Give  him  a  fact,  he  loaded  you  with  thanks;  propound 
a  theory,  you  were  rewarded  with  the  most  vivid  abuse. 

Birrell,  Obiter  Dicta  p.  6. 

Exclamative  Stem, 

183.  When  the  plain  stem  is  used  in  an  exclamatory 
sentence  it  may  be  better  classed  with  the  semi-imperative 


144  VERBS 

constructions  of  178  ff.  than  with  the  non-predicative 
stem  [a).  The  difference  is  evident  in  exclamatory  questions, 
often  introduced  by  an  interrogative  adverb  [b)\  and  some- 
times with  a  subject  preceding  the  stem  {c),  both  in  purely 
exclamatory  sentences  and  in  questions. 

a.  And  talk  about  dukes  being  scarce !  Lady  'Masters'  ^) 
are  a  good  deal  scarcer.  Cotes,  Cinderella  p.  yj. 

b.  To  enforce  their  ascetic  code  the  classicists  had  to 
devise  a  system  of  critical  sanctions.  Chief  among  these 
was  the  stigma  of  vulgarity  attached  to  all  those  who 
insisted  too  minutely  on  the  physical  side  of  man's  exist- 
ence. Speak  of  handkerchiefs  in  a  tragedy .''  The  solecism 
was  as  monstrous  as  picking  teeth  with  a  fork. 

Huxley,   Vulgarity  p.    i8. 
He  found  himself  hoping  that  his  statement  would  be 
laughed  at.  Then  why  make  it  ? 

Meredith,    Harrington  ch,   34  p.   361, 

"I  thought  a  first  visit  to  Africa  must  be  a  wonderful 
experience."  —  ^'But,  then  —  why  refuse  to  come?" 
Hichens,    Ambition  ch.   10  p.    115. 

How  preach  at  a  creature  on  the  bend  of  passion's 
rapids.  Meredith,  Ormont  p.   35. 

c.  "What!"  he  thought.  "Henry  Jekyll  forge  for  a 
murderer!"  And  his  blood  ran  cold  in  his  veins. 

Stevenson,  Dr.  Jekyll. 
Then  she  recollected  his  friend's  voice  striking  in  with: 
"What's  that  ?  Gerry  Palliser  swim  !  Of  course  he  can't . . ." 
de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch,   12  p.   120. 
It's   a   lie!    a   shameless   lie!  I  smash  pots  and  pans? 
I  hurt  my  mistress.''  As  good  a  mistress  as  I  could  but 
wish!  Van  Doom,  Dramatic  Conv.  I  p.  55. 

What's  this,.  Aurora  Leigh, 
You  write  so  of  the  poets,  and  not  laugh? 

Mrs.  Browning,  Aurora  Leigh  I  856  f. 


1)  i.  e.  M.  F.  H.  =  Master  of  the  Fox  Hounds. 


EXCL AMATIVE  PLAIN   STEM  1 45 

184.  The  verb  stem  in  exclamations  and  exclamatory 
questions  has  been  called  a  predicative  form  (171),  and 
its  use  has  been  shown  to  be  related  to  that  of  the  im- 
perative stem.  But  it  must  be  added  that  there  is  a  still 
closer  similarity  to  the  use  of  the  stem  with  to  described 
in  204.  And  from  a  formal  point  of  view  the  stem  should 
rather  be  considered  non-predicative  here,  for  when  it  is 
made  negative  by  not^  this  precedes  the  stem,  whereas 
in  predicative  verbal  forms  the  auxiliary  do  is  used  (also 
in  the  imperative). 

To  prevent  your  pretty  bathing-costumes  getting  v^^et, 
why  not  simply  paddle  in  them,  as  is  done  on  the 
Continent?  Punch,  31/7,   12. 

185.  Observe  the  difference  between  the  independent 
use  of  the  verb  stem,  and  its  repetition,  as  in  the  fol- 
lowing sentences. 

"I  did  not  know  he  ever  did  call  on  her.  He  does 
not  know  her."  —  "Not  know  Miss  Mitchell?" — "I 
thought  you  were  talking  of  Miss  Robertson." 

Sweet,  Element,  no.  70. 

"I  shouldn't  go  to  the  shop  for  a  week  or  two  if  I 
were  you." 

"Not  go?"  said  Peter  astonished. 

"No  —  for  reason  why  — well  —  who  knows?  The  days 
come  and  they  go  and  again  it  will  be  all  right  for  you. 
I  should  rub  up  the  Editors,  I  should  — " 

"Rub  up  the  Editors?"  repeated  Peter  still  confused. 
Walpole,  Fortitude  II  ch.  3  p.    173. 

"Oh!    what    does    it   matter.?    Phil  never  knows  what 
he's  got  on!"  No  one  had  credited  an  answer  so  outra- 
geous. A  man  not  know  what  he  had  on !   No,  no  I 
Galsworthy,  Man  of  Property  ch.   i   p.  8. 

The  Non-predicative  Stem 

186.  The  plain  verb  stem  is  used  as  a  non-predicative 
form  in  two  functions: 

Kruisinga,  Handbook  II.  Accidence  and  Syntax.  1.  10 


146  VERBS 

(1)  as  the  leading  member  of  a  purely  verbal  group. 

(2)  as  a  member  of  a  mixed  noun  and  verb  group. 

187.  The  plain  stem  as  the  leading  member  of  a  verbal 
group  is  chiefly  used  with  the  verbs  that  are  classed  as  auxili- 
aries; see  417  ff.  The  auxiliaries  that  can  form  such  a  group 
are  can,  may,  must,  shall,  will,  and  do.  The  verb  to  have 
is  also  used  but  exclusively  in  the  modal  preterite  had. 
As  the  auxiliaries  are  treated  in  the  second  half  of  this 
volume  there  is  no  need  for  a  detailed  treatment  here. 
It  may  be  observed  that  the  stem  generally  follows  the 
auxiliary,  but  not  necessarily :  Barbour  might  be  reluctant 
to  act,  but  act  he  must  (Walpole,  Fortitude  I  ch.  6  p.  73'. 

188.  The  plain  stem  is  used  pretty  frequently  at  the  be- 
ginning of  a  construction  that  resembles  a  concessive  adverb 
clause  in  its  function,  the  auxiliary  following  the  subject 
in  the  usual  order  so  that  it  is  completely  separated  from 
the  stem.  The  stem  and  the  rest  of  the  clause  are  con- 
nected by  a  relative  pronoun  or  adverb,  or  by  as.  The 
'concessive  clause'  generally  precedes  the  main  clause  [a] 
but  not  always  {b). 

a.  Say  what  you  will  of  him,  and  resent  him  how 
you  may,  you  can  never  open  those  four  grey  volumes 
without  getting  some  mental  stimulus. 

Conan  Doyle,  Magic  Door,  p.  64. 
Look   which    way  they  would,  nothing  could  be  seen 
of  their  poor  little  favourite. 

Van  Neck,  Easy  Engl.  Prose. 

Scoff  as  I  might  at  "Sabbatarianism",  was  I  not  always 
glad  when  Sunday  came?       Gissing,  Henry  Ryecroft. 

The  mangling  orders  fell  away  as  suddenly  and  com- 
pletely as  he  had  feared :  they  were  duly  absorbed 
among  the  local  widows.  Neglect  the  children  as  Lizer 
might,  she  could  no  longer  leave  them  as  she  had  done. 
Morrison,  Tales  of  Mean  streets,  p.  38. 


PLAIN   STEM  147 

Look  at  it  as  he  might,  he  had  been  a  failure  at 
Dawson's.  Walpole,  Fortitude  I  ch.  7  p.  'j6. 

b.  But  the  boy  knew  when  he  met  him  again,  sober 
this  time,  by  the  sad  look  in  his  eyes,  that  Stephen 
must   go    his  way  alone  now,  lead  him  where  it  would. 

ib,  I  ch.  6  p.  6},. 

Consider,   for  example,  the  value  of  public  sanitation, 

not    merely    to    the    poorer    regions  which  would  suffer 

first  if  it  were  withheld,  but  to  the  richer  as  well  who, 

seclude  themselves  as  they  may,  cannot  escape  infection. 

Montgomery,  Modern  British  Problems,  I   'i^'j . 

189.  The  grammatical  character  of  the  verb  stem  in 
the  construction  is  not  evident.  In  a  sentence  like  the  first 
quotation  of  188  it  would  be  intelligible  as  an  imperative; 
but  this  would  only  account  for  the  case  when  the  subject 
is  a  pronoun  of  the  second  person,  and  it  is  evident  that 
we  have  the  same  construction  in  the  other  cases.  It  is 
sometimes  supposed  that  the  verb  stem  is  a  subjunctive; 
now,  apart  from  the  fact  that  living  English  has  no  sub- 
junctive at  all,  it  is  clear  that  the  absence  of  concord  of 
tense,  as  well  as  the  absence  of  a  subject,  would  be  hard 
to  account  for  ^).  And  no  English  speaker  really  interprets 
it  in  this  way. 

It  may  be  thought  that  the  construction  resembles  the 
one  dealt  with  in  178  ff.  The  difference  is  that  the  two 
clauses  in  this  construction  are  never  connected  by  and, 
and  invariably  take  an  auxiliar}^  that  forms  a  group  with 
the  stem.  It  must  be  added  that  the  preterite  in  the  con- 
cessive clause  is  an  undoubted  past  tense,  whereas  in  the 
conditional  statements  of  178  fif.  it  seems  best  interpreted 
as  a  modal  form. 


1)  Students  of  the  history  of  English  must  remember  that  Avhat  is  at- 
tempted here  is  an  interpretation  of  tlie  living  construction,  which  must 
be  understood  before  there  can  be  a  historical  account  of  its  development. 


148  VERBS 

The  construction  of  188  should  be  compared  with  the 
one  illustrated  by  this  sentence:  Short  as  it  is,  it  is  very 
interesting,  or  Much  as  I  tried  I  could  not  find  it.  See 
volume  3. 

190.  We  also  find  the  plain  stem  in  purely  verbal  groups 
with  to  dare  and  to  need,  but  only  when  these  verbs  are 
clearly  subordinated  in  meaning  to  the  stem,  which  is 
shown  by  their  form  without  an  ending  in  the  third  person 
singular  of  the  present.  See  the  sections  on  these  verbs 
in  the  chapter  on  Auxiliaries .  The  use  of  the  construction 
with  a  non-predicative  dare  or  need,  as  in  the  last  quotation, 
is  exceptional. 

No  one  dare  prophesy  the  date  of  the  end  of  the  war. 

Times  Ed.  S.  8/8,   18. 
I  need  not  say  how  we  did  our  lessons  that  day. 

Sweet,  Spoken  English  p.  52. 
(The   word  goodness)   is  sufficiently  spaced  from  good 
itself  not  to  need  fear  absorption. 

Sapir,  Language,  p.  i8i. 

191.  We  have  an  apparently  similar  group  of  the  non- 
predicative  stem  go  with  another  verb  stem  as  the  leading 
element,  as  in  the  following  sentence. 

.  .  .  and  being  unable  or  unwilling,  or  too  jealous,  to 
go  see  for  themselves,  the  jugs,  cans  and  other  re- 
ceptacles began  to  think  there  must  be  something  in  it. 

Times  Ed.  S.  22/8,   18. 

In  spite  of  the  similarity  to  the  groups  with  auxiliaries 
the  construction  with  go  is  essentially  different.  In  the 
first  place  it  is  invariably  the  non-predicative  form  that  is 
used,  and  exclusively  in  its  weak-stressed  form,  so  that  it 
only  serves  to  modify  the  meaning  of  the  leading  verb 
stem,  as  a  kind  of  auxiliary  of  aspect.  The  use  is  more- 
over restricted  practically  to  some  traditional  combinations; 


PLAIN   STEM  149 

the  groups  are  inseparable,  with  a  fixed  word-order,  and 
are  found  in  dialectal  rather  than  in  standard  English. 
See  also  the  sections  on  to  have  in  forming  the  perfect, 
and  on  Apparent  Coordination.  Van  der  Gaaf  {Englische 
Stiidien  62  p.  407j  adds  these  examples : 

She  said  .  .  .  that  papa  and  mamma  wished  her  to  ga 
stay  with  them.  Eliot,  Middlemarch. 

He's  just  got  to  come;  and  if  he  doesn't  like  it,  he  can 
go  hang.  Ethel  Dell,  Keeper  of  the  Door  p.  561. 

Canst  thou  not  hear  a  raven  croak  at  the  gates  of  a 
kraal  but  thou  must  needs  go  tell  those  who  dwell  within 
that  he  waits  to  pick  their  eyes? 

Rider  Haggard,  Nada  the  Lily  ch.  22. 

192.  The  plain  stem  can  also  form  an  inseparable  group 
with  the  verbs  to  hear  and  to  heip,  both  in  their  predicative 
and  their  non-predicative  uses.  This  construction  has 
little  in  common  with  either  of  those  that  have  been 
mentioned  in  the  preceding  sections.  The  verb  to  hear 
is  grouped  only  with  a  few  stems  like  say,  and  tell;  this 
points  to  the  groups  with  hear  being  a  remnant  of  a  con- 
struction that  was  formerly  a  living  one  in  English  (see  60). 
It  is  more  freely  used  with  to  help,  but  here,  too,  the  plain 
stem  is  on  the  decline;  in  standard  English /o /^^^  generally 
takes  the  stem  with  to. 

She  remembered  hearing  tell  that  some  of  the  painted 
pictures  on  the  walls  were  worth  a  power  of  money. 
Jane  Barlow,  Everyman,  Jan    13,   191 3,  p.  372/2. 

I  have  heard  say  that  'fools  think  that  any  fool  can 
write  a  novel  and  many  fools  try,'  possibly  to  their 
lasting  regret.         Patterson,  Stephen  Compton,  p.  266, 

Nobody,  even  if  he  has  never  heard  tell  of  the  matter, 
likes  topsy-turvy  construction,  that  mark  of  the  untrained 
mind.  Brewster,   Writing  of  English  p.    19  f. 

Most  of  us  have  from  time  to  time  read  or  heard  tell 
of  the  wonderful  feats  of  engineering  skill  which  were 
accomplished  during  the  war.        Times  Lit.   17/3,  21. 


150  VERBS 

It  would  be  perfectly  good  Chinese  according  to  my 
very  scanty  information  about  Chinese.  And  I  hear  say 
that  the  best  Chinese  literature  has  some  very  admirable 
effects.  American  Speech  II,    i   Oct.   1926  p.  36  f. 

Go  to  the  scullery  and  help  wash  up  at  the  sink. 

CoUinson,  Spoken  English  p.   20. 
I  was  standing,  still  wondering  whether  I  should  ride 
or  walk  from  this  town  to  Baltimore,  when  a  switchman, 
who  had  just  helped  finish  making  ready  a  train,  said  — 
"Hallo,    lad;  which  way  are  you  going,  to  Baltimore.''" 
Davies,  Super-Tramp  ch.   17  p.   137. 
It  was  while  I  lay  there  sleepless  and  tormented  that 
the   longing   to  help  reunite  Charlotte  and  her  husband 
first  entered  my  head.  Eliz.  in  Rugen. 

The  good  little  shrill  woman,  tender-eyed  and  slat- 
ternly, had  to  help  try   on  dresses. 

Meredith,  Emilia  in  England. 
He  helped  raise  the  coat  bearing  the  ingots. 

Wells,  Country  p.   136. 

Another  example  of  the  same  type  is  to  make  believe'. 

He  made  believe  that  he  was  at  a  loss  to  find  a  foothold 
on  his  greasy  pole  .  .  . 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  28  p.  303. 

193.  The  second  of  the  constructions  mentioned  in  186 
may  be  typified  b}^  Let  John  go  now.  It  is  very  similar 
to  the  Latin  accusative  with  infinitive,  and  is  usually  called 
by  the  same  name.  It  is  clear  that  the  two  constructions 
must  be  different,  if  it  were  only  because  English  has 
neither  an  accusative  nor  an  infinitive  in  the  sense  of  these 
terms  in  Latin  grammar.  Little  seems  to  be  gained  by 
adopting  a  term  that  is  almost  certain  to  mislead  a  good 
many  students,  and  it  is  proposed  to  call  it  the  object 
with  plain  stem,  a  term  that  is  not  perfect  but  that  is 
little  likely  to  cause  misunderstanding  of  the  true  character 
of  the  construction. 


OBJECT   WITH   PLAIN   STEM  151 

The  term  object,  however,  needs  some  comment  here. 
When  we  say :  Let  John  go  now  it  is  possible,  in  anal^^sing 
this  sentence  logicall}^,  to  look  upon  John  as  the  object 
of  let.  Of  course  it  must  be  understood  that  this  analysis 
does  not  bring  out  what  the  construction  means  to  the 
speaker:  John  is  not  really  an  object  at  all,  but  the  subject 
of  go.  Even  a  logical  analysis  of  this  kind  is  frequently 
impossible,  as  in  the  following  sentence:  he  had  seen  this 
part  of  Africa  change  dramatically  under  his  eyes  (Wells, 
Joan  and  Peter  ch.  3  §  3).  Perhaps  the  simple  noun  with 
plain  verb  stem  would  be  the  best  term,  although  this 
would  not  imply  that  personal  pronouns  take  the  oblique 
form . 

194.  The  object  with  plain  stem  is  used  with  three 
small  groups  of  verbs,  most  of  them,  however,  verbs  of 
very  frequent  occurrence: 

(1)  a  number  of  verbs  of  causing; 

(2)  a  number  of  verbs  expressing  'to  experience'; 

(3)  some  common  verbs  of  sensation  and  perception. 

195.  The  verbs  of  causing  that  can  take  an  object  with 
plain  stem  are :  to  have,  to  make,  to  help,  and  the  literary 
to  bid.  On  to  have  see  the  chapter  on  the  Auxiliaries 
in  this  volume.  We  may  perhaps  include  to  let,  although 
it  has  a  somewhat  different  meaning,  and  can  only  occasion- 
ally, as  in  our  last  quotation  here,  be  said  to  express 
causing.     On  to  help  see  192. 

The   Germans,  by  a  sudden  attack  in  strength,  made 
us  give  way.  Times  W.  5/4,   18. 

There  are  some  books  which  tell  us  about  things,  and 
other  books  which  make  us  see  things. 

Athenaeum  24/12,   12. 

Announcing  that  he  must  go  and  help  Annette  prepare 
the  supper.  Cannan,  Corner,  ch.   19  p.  206. 


152  VERBS 

Amy  had  to  help  her  mistress  make  herself  as  comely 
as  she  could  be  made  without  her  best  dress,  mantle, 
and  bonnet.  Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  IV  ch.  2  §  i. 

To  help  her  arrange  the  presents. 

Sidgwick,  Severins  p.   169. 
Please  help  me  translate  this. 

Collinson,  Spoken  English  p.  20. 

I  think  you  need  a  stiff  dose  of  quinine  and  a  couple, 
of  aspirins  to  help  you  get  to  sleep.  ib.  p.  62. 

He  bids  them  admire  and  reverence,  but  at  the  same 
time,  he  would  have  them  remember  that  literature  is  a 
living  influence,  which  should  inspire  to  action  as  well 
as  wonder.  Times  Lit.  30/3,   16. 

It  was  an  indefinite  but  irresistible  call  that  sent  him 
out  into  the  wilderness,  and  an  indefinite  but  irresistible 
call  that  bade  him  leave  it.  Times  Lit.   11/3,  20. 

Let  the  boy  go  now. 

Only  let  me  help  nurse  him. 

Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.  29  p.  368. 

He  denied  that  the  "Narodna  Obrana"  had  partici- 
pated in  the  plot,  but  let  it  be  clearly  understood  that 
it  had  been  decided  upon  by  the  "Black  Hand." 

Times  Lit.   17/10,   1929  p.  802/3. 

196.  The  second  group  of  verbs  taking  the  object  with 
plain  stem  consists  of  to  have,  to  find,  and  to  know.  For 
to  have  see  Auxiliaries.  With  regard  to  the  verb  to  knoiv, 
it  must  be  added  that  it  can  only  express  'experience' 
when  it  is  used  in  the  preterite  or  in  the  group-perfect 
{have  known),  i.  e.  in  the  forms  that  express  a  connection 
with  the  past. 

Your  mother  may  find  it  do  her  good. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  2  p.   11. 

Methodism  and  the  Church  soon  found  their  paths 
diverge.  Wakeman,  Introd.  p.  438. 

It  might  be  well  to  say  a  prayer  against  those  omens. 
He  knew  a  good  one  which  his  father's  mother,  a  wise 


OBJECT   WITH   PLAIN   STEM  1 53 

woman,   had    found   prevail   against    the  powers  of  evil. 
Pickthall,  Larkmeadow  ch.  28  p.   182. 

'Tis  just  the  sort  of  rum,  savage  old  place  you  do  like. 
You'll  find  hobgoblins  and  all  sorts  of  queer  devils  here 
come  presently.         Phillpotts,  Beacon  I  ch    10  p.  84. 

In  short,  the  more  we  study  our  constitution  whether 
in  the  present  or  the  past,  the  less  do  we  find  it  conform 
to  any  such  plan  as  a  philosopher  might  invent  in  his 
study.  Maitland,  Const.  Hist.  p.   197. 

I  never  knew  a  man  die  of  love,  .  .  .  but  I  have  known 
a  twelve-stone  man  go  down  to  nine  stone  five  under 
a  disappointed  passion. 

TJie  Lancet  asserts  that  General  Elections  are  bad 
for  the  health.  This  is  quite  correct.  We  have  known 
Governments  die  from  them.  Punch. 

I  never  thought  of  that  before.  And  yet  I  have  known 
such  strange  things  happen  in  the  way  of  fun  that  I 
can  well  believe  it. 

Blackmore,  Lorna  Doone  ch.  6^  p.  501. 

Have  you  ever  known  me  tell  a  lie?  cried  Ruth  in 
great  indignation.  ib.  ch.   75   p.   568, 

All  right,  lad ;  we'll  get  to  work  at  it  an'  see  what  we 
can  do.  I  only  hope  it  will  be  all  right.  I've  never  known 
you  go  wrong  yet.  Patterson,  Compton  p.    133. 

197.  The  third  group  of  verbs  taking  the  construction 
are  some  of  the  commonest  verbs  of  sensation  or  per- 
ception :  to  feel,  to  hear,  and  to  see.  The  use  of  the  object 
with  plain  stem  with  these  verbs  is  perhaps  the  most 
frequent  of  all  the  cases  enumerated. 

It  should  be  noted  that  the  verbs  of  perception  cannot 
be  strictly  distinguished  from  the  verbs  of  experience  in 
196:  in  the  first  place  a  perception,  whether  it  may  be 
classed  as  a  physical  or  mental  process,  implies  an 
experience;  and  secondly  these  verbs,  like  to  see  in  the 
two  last  quotations  below,  may  express  experience  rather 
than  perception. 


154  VERBS 

The  girl  felt  fear  and  love  rush  up  desperately  to 
overwhelm  her.      Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.  29  p.  368. 

Pauline  felt  her  heart  almost  stop  beating  at  the 
notion.  Mackenzie,  Guy  and  Pauline  ch.  2  p,  71. 

We  heard  the  door  open  and  had  hardly  time  to  put 
the  forms  up  again.        Sweet,  Spoken  English  p.   52. 

Winnie  overheard  the  landlady  tell  the  departing 
Miss  H.  that...  Pett  Ridge,  Garland,  ch.   13. 

Rose  saw  him  approach  and  knew  him  in  the  distance. 
Meredith,  Harrington  ch.  23  p    240, 

She  thought  of  spring  and  how  lovely  it  would  be  to 
see  the  trees  come  out  again,  and  almond  blossom 
against  a  blue  sky.         Galsworthy,  Caravan  p.   172  f. 

To  Lord  Cromer  it  was  given  more  than  to  most 
men  to  see  the  harvest  v/hich  he  had  sown  ripen  into 
splendid  maturity.  Times  W.  2/2,   17. 

He  has  already  said  that  he  wants  to  see  the  United 
States   have   the    greatest   mercantile  fleet  in  the  world. 

Observer,  27/2,  21. 

198.  On  the  analogy  of  the  verbs  in  the  preceding  section 
we  also  find  the  construction,  though  occasionally  only,  with 
some  verbs  of  related  meaning:  to  zvatch  is  very  common, 
resembling  to  see  though  differing  in  that  it  expresses  a 
voluntary  action,  not  a  sensation  only.  The  construction  is 
less  frequent  with  to  behold,  notice,  observe,  perceive,  witness. 

He  Vv'atched  Cards  walk  slowly  down  the  hill. 

Walpole,  Fortitude  I  ch.  6  p.  6Z. 

She  covered  her  awkwardness  by  throwing  a  twig 
into   the   water  and  watching  it  float  down  the  stream. 

Cannan,  Corner,  ch.   18. 

Michael  watched  her  follow  her  husband  through  the 
room,  Sidgwick,  Severins  ch.  4  p.  40. 

It  is  pleasant  to  watch  from  an  open  casement  a 
lonely  remote  upland  village  in  a  gorge  of  the  hills 
renew  its  day.  Times  W.  3/5,   18. 


OBJECT   WITH   PLAIN   STEM  1 55 

They  moved,  however,  and  Lizzie  watched  the  parent 
return,     Phillpotts,  Beacon  II  ch.  15  p.  246  (ib.  p.  252). 

He  watched  me  drink  and  eat  with  a  touch  of  envy. 

Wells,  Country  p.   143. 
He  watched  her  button  one  of  her  gloves. 

James,  Reverberator  p,  7. 
She    beheld    her    brother  pass  these  young  men,  and 
bow  to  them.  She  beheld  them  stare  at  him  without  at 
all  returning  his  salute. 

Meredith,  Harrington  ch.    14  p.    153. 
I  observed  her  draw  a  square-inch  or  two  of  pocket- 
handkerchief  from  the  doll-pocket  of  her  doll-skirt. 

Bronte,  Villette  ch,   i. 
Whilst    waiting    for   their   approach,  he  noticed  them 
pause  from  some  slight  obstacle. 

One  evening,  in  a  potato-patch,  I  witnessed  a  large 
hawk-moth  meet  his  end  in  a  way  that  greatly  sur- 
prised me.  Hudson,  Hampshire  Days  ch.  6  p.  116. 

199.  The  object  with  plain  stem  is  occasionally  used,  evi- 
dently as  a.  parallel  to  the  preceding  cases,  with  verbs  of 
sensation  that  generally  take  a  prepositional  noun-object: 
to  listen  to,  to  look  at.  The  resulting  construction  may  be 
called  the  prepositional  object  with  plain  stem. 

A  half-an-hour  of  to-day  I  spent  in  a  punt  under  a 
copper  beech  out  of  the  pouring  rain  listening  to  Lady 
—  's  gamekeeper  at  A  —  talk  about  beasts  and  local 
politics.  Barbellion,  Journal,  June  5,   1907. 

'Look  at  Glorvina  enter  a  room',  Mrs,  O'Dowd  would 
say,  'and  compare  her  with  that  poor  Mrs,  Osborne, 
who  couln't  say  bo  to  a  goose.' 

Thackeray,  Vanity  Fair  ch.  43. 

For  more  examples  the  reader  may  be  referred  to  English 
Studies  IX,  1 1 5  and  X,  9.  The  construction  is  common  in 
American  English.  Observe,  too,  that  in  the  last  quotation 
we  may  have  Irish  rather  than  British  English. 


156  YERBS 

200.  Now  that  the  object  v/ith  plain  stem  has  been  fully 
illustrated  it  may  be  the  best  place  here  to  discuss  some 
points  that  have  not  yet  been  dealt  with.  Perhaps  the  most 
important  of  them  is  the  observation  that  the  verb  stem  in 
all  these  constructions  invariably  expresses  an  action  or  an 
occurrence,  never  a  state.  This  is  natural  enough  in  the  case 
of  the  verbs  of  causing,  for  these  necessarily  refer  to  a  process 
rather  than  to  the  resulting  state;  but  it  applies  equally  to 
the  verbs  expressing  experience  and  sensation.  When  these 
verbs  are  used  to  refer  to  a  state  another  construction  is 
used,  either  a  subordinate  clause  or  an  object  with  stem 
accompanied  by  to.  As  the  various  constructions  with  verbals 
and  with  subordinate  clauses  will  be  fully  discussed  in  a 
special  chapter  (336  ff.)  a  typical  example  of  each  case  will 
suffice  here:  /  saw  {noticed)  that  he  was  very  pale;  She  felt 
her  feet  to  be  stone-cold  on  the  floor  (Bennett,  Old  Wives 
Tale  III  ch.  7  §   i).  See  also   113. 

With  regard  to  the  construction  in  192  it  is  now  clear 
that  it  is  connected  with  the  object  with  plain  stem  con- 
struction that  these  verbs  can  take. 

201.  It  has  been  mentioned  in  193  that  the  term  object, 
which  is  only  used  to  suggest  that  the  personal  pronouns 
take  the  oblique  forms  in  this  construction,  should  not  be 
taken  to  indicate  that  there  is  a  real  object  in  the  syntactic 
sense.  In  many  cases  the  logical  analysis  applied  to  the 
example  quoted  in  193  is  in  no  way  possible,  as  when  the 
construction  is  used  with  to  make,  or  other  verbs  of  causing. 
It  is  evident  that  the  construction  is  in  all  cases  to  be  taken 
as  an  indivisible  syntactic  unit.  This  is  also  shown  in  the 
following  sentence  by  the  parallelism  between  the  noun- 
object  the  zveight  uf  the  great  man  s  body  and  the  preceding 
object  with  stem.     Similarly  in  the  last  quotation. 

What     a     night    of    nights !     Peter,     trembling    with 


VERB   STEM   WITH   TO  I  57 

excitement,    felt   Henry  Galleoti  put  his  arm  in  his,  felt 
the  weight  of  the  great  man^s  body. 

Walpole,  Fortitude  III  ch.  4  2  p.  253. 
Another   point   of   sympathy    between  those  two  was 
their  passion  for  military  music  and  seeing  soldiers  pass. 

Galsworthy,  Caravan  p.   167  f. 

The  Complex  Plain  Stem 

202.  By  the  side  of  the  simple  plain  stem  we  can  also 
distinguish  syntactic  groups  of  a  plain  stem  of  a  verb  of 
subordinate  meaning  with  another  verbal  form  as  a  com- 
plex plain  stem.  Thus  by  the  side  of  see  we  have  the 
complex  plain  stems  be  seen,  have  seen,  have  been  seen, 
be  seeing,  have  been  seeing;  compare  128-  The  functions 
of  these  complex  plain  stems  are  the  same  as  those  of  the 
simple  plain  stem,  so  that  there  is  no  need  to  treat  of 
them  here;  their  meanings  will  be  dealt  with  in  the  sections 
on  the  respective  auxiliaries. 

The  Verb  Stem  with  to 

203.  The  verb  stem  with  the  proclitic  prefix  to  has  a 
very  different  character  from  the  plain  stem.  The  functions 
of  the  two  forms  are  equally  different,  although  there  are 
some  uses  in  which  they  are  more  nearly  related.  The 
functions  of  the  verb  stem  with  to  can  be  classed  as: 

(1)  predicative;  (2)  non-predicative. 

204.  The  predicative  function  of  the  verb  stem  ^)  re- 
sembles that  of  the  exclamative  plain  stem  in  183  ff.  Its 
predicative  character  is  equally  uncertain;  it  takes  the 
negative  not  [not]  before  it  in  the  same  way  as  the  non- 
predicative  stem  and  the  verbal  ing. 


1)  It  is  not  necessary  always  to  add  with  to,  because  we  use  plain  stem 
/for  the  stem  without  to. 


I  5  8  VERBS 

The  stem  with  to  is  used  in  exclamations,  both  with  a 
subject  {a)  and  without  one  {b)  expressing  astonishment, 
indignation,  sorrow,  or  also,  in  combination  with  an  inter- 
jection, longing  and  regret  (c). 

a.  "Oh,  mamma,  I  cannot  go!"  cried  Molly.  "I've 
been  so  much  with  her;  and  she  may  be  sufifering  so, 
or  even  dying  —  and  I  to  be  dancing!" 

Gaskell,   Wives  I  ch.   17  p.   295. 
I,  to  herd  with  narrow  foreheads  .  .  .  . ! 

Tennyson,  Locksley  Hall,   175. 

b.  "Cyril  has  not  been  a  good  son,"  she  said  with 
sudden,  solemn  coldness.  "To  think  that  he  should 
have  kept  that .  .  .  ."     She  wept  again. 

Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  IV  ch.   i   §  3. 
Only    to    think   that   my   stars   should   let   me   off  so 
^   easily!  R.  H.  Froude,  Rem.  I,  257. 

Cards  wanted  to  be  admired,  but  to  be  liked !  .  .  . 
what  was  the  gain  ? 

Walpole,  Fortitude  I  ch.  6  2  p.  66. 

(Observe  that  to  be  liked  can  hardly  be  interpreted  as  an 
adjunct  to  ivanted  in  the  preceding  sentence). 

c.  Ah !  no  more  to  address  thee  or  hear  thy  kind 
replying.  Brother  ....  Ne'er  to  behold  thee  again ! 

Ellis,  Catullus,  LXV,  9. 
Oh,  to  be  in  England.     Browning,  Home-Thoughts. 

205.  In  exclamatory  questions  there  is  an  interrogative 
pronoun  or  adverb.  In  such  sentences  the  character  of 
the  form  is  to  be  called  non-predicative  rather  than  pre- 
dicative. 

But ....  how  to  hinder  vexatious  prosecutions? 

Newman,  Letters. 
Ah,  what  to  do.?  Morris,  Aeneid. 

206.  The  functions  of  the  stem  with  to  illustrated  in 
the   two   preceding   sections,    whether  predicative  or  not, 


STEM   WITH   TO   AS   AN   ADJUNCT  1 59 

are  at  any  rate  very  unimportant  elements  in  English 
sentence  structure,  English  using  this  type  of  exclamatory 
sentences  in  a  very  limited  measure,  apart  from  the 
moderate  use  that  is  made  of  exclamation  in  English 
generally.  In  all  the  other  cases  the  verb  stem  with  to 
is  not  the  leading  element  of  the  predicate.  The  uses 
may  be  classed  as  follows : 

(1)  as  an  adjunct,  to  verbs,  nouns,  adjectives,  or  in  free 
adjuncts; 

(2)  as  a  member  of  a  plain  or  prepositional  object  with 
stem; 

(3)  as  an  independent  element  of  the  sentence : 
{a)  as  a  subject;  {b)  as  a  nominal  predicate. 

The  Stem  with  to  as  an  Adjunct 

207.  The  stem  with  to  when  used  as  an  adjunct  is 
treated  first  of  all,  not  so  much  because  this  is  perhaps 
the  most  frequent  function,  but  in  the  conviction  that  all 
the  other  functions  can  best  be  understood  as  developments, 
or  rather  special  forms,  of  its  use  and  meaning  in  adjuncts. 

The  following  quotations  show  the  verb  stem  as  an 
adjunct  to  verbs  {a),  nouns  {b),  and  adjectives  (<:).  The 
adjectives  are  nearly  always  used  predicatively,  but  not 
invariably,  as  the  last  two  examples  prove. 

a.  Lady  Adela  had  now  moved  forward  with  Bruii 
to  look  at  the  picture, 

Walpole,  Duchess  of  Wrexe  I  ch.   i   p.  7. 

b.  My  good  Utterson,  this  is  very  good  of  you,  this 
is  downright  good  of  you,  and  I  cannot  find  words  to 
thank  you  in.  Stevenson,  Dr.  Jekyll  p.  32. 

Mrs.  Hafifen  was  the  woman  to  make  the  most  of 
such  fears.        Mrs.  Wharton,  House  of  Mirth  p.   100. 

The  first  German  aeroplane  to  fly  over  London  in 
broad  daylight  came  here  only  last  November. 

Times  W.  5/10,   17. 


l6o  VERBS 

c.  I  shall  be  pleased  to  come. 

He  was  afraid  to  go  alone. 

The  canvas  was  destined  to  adorn  a  gilt  fire-screen 
in  the  drawing-room. 

Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  I  ch.   i   §  2. 

I  hope  you'll  be  able  to  sleep.  ib.   I  ch.  2  §  2. 

Well,  Mr.  Utterson,  you  are  a  hard  man  to  satisfy, 
but  I'll  do  it  yet.  Stevenson,  Jekyll  p.  71, 

These  agricultural  gentlemen  are  difficult  customers 
to  deal  with.  Meredith,  Feverel  ch.   10. 

208.  It  will  be  necessary  to  consider  the  relations  of 
meaning  betv^een  the  stem  as  an  adjunct  and  the  leading 
member  of  the  group.  The  fundamental  relation  is  that 
of  aim  or  purpose;  this  is  natural,  for  /o  is  expressly  added 
to  express  this  meaning.  It  may  be  noted  that  to  can 
express  aim  or  purpose  in  connection  with  the  verb  stem 
onl}',  nouns  taking  for,  as  shown  by  the  last  three  sentences 
quoted  in  the  next  section.  The  adjuncts  to  verbs  will 
be  treated  apart  from  those  to  nouns  and  adjectives,  but 
in  most  cases  there  is  no  difference  of  meaning,  and  the 
distinction  cannot  even  always  be  made. 

209.  The  verb  stem  expressing  purpose  is  most 
frequently  found  as  an  adjunct  to  verbs. 

We  eat  to  live  but  we  don't  live  to  eat. 

I  called  to  see  you. 

Not  to  consult  the  oracle,  although  it  was  war-time, 
but  for  an  excursion,  we  set  out  one  spring  morning 
for  Delphi.  Times  W.  jjG,   18. 

They  generally  paint  their  bodies  all  kinds  of  bright 
colours.  This  they  do  partly  for  ornament,  partly  to 
keep  the  flies  off.  Sweet,  Element,  no    18. 

He  writes  not  for  dramatic  effect,  but  to  please  and 
soothe  himself.  Times  Lit.   17/3,  21. 


STEM   WITH   TO   AS   AN   ADJUNCT  l6l 

210.  Closely  related  to  the  verb  stem  of  purpose  is  the 
verb  stem  of  result.  The  difference  is  only  that  purpose 
is  an  intended  result.  When  the  subject  of  the  action  is 
not  a  person  the  meaning  is  necessarily  result,  not  purpose; 
when  it  is  a  person,  it  may  be  either,  but  the  context 
generally  makes  it  quite  clear  which  is  meant. 

In  the  following  quotations  result  is  intended  to  be 
expressed. 

The  place  was  called  the  Devil's  Bellows,  and  it  was 
only  necessary  to  come  here  on  a  March  or  November 
night  to  discover  the  iorcible  reasons  for  that  name. 
Hardy,   Native  IV  ch.   5   p.   344  f. 

The  Anglian  settlements  north  of  the  Tees  were 
founded  on  a  remote  shore,  but  the  great  body  of  the 
Angle  warriors  pushed  up  the  Humber,  and  up  the 
rivers  of  the  Wash  system,  to  become  neighbours  of  the 
Saxon,  and  to  be  involved  in  the  history  of  the  English 
plain.  Mackinder  p.   203, 

There  is  the  same  machine,  or  at  least  a  machine 
which  is  painted  to  look  the  same. 

Low,   Governance  of  England  p.   5. 

He  was  constantly  taking  up  literary  enterprises,  only 
after  a  short  time  to  lay  them  aside. 

Asquith,  Wotton  p.  6. 

West  of  the  hall  a  perfect  warren  of  smaller  buildings 
grew  up  to  obscure  its  beauty  and  conceal  its  proportions. 

Westlake,   Westminster  p.   56. 

Have  I  been  twenty  years  in  this  man's  house,  to  be 
deceived  about  his  voice .?!)     Stevenson,  Jekyll  p.  71. 

211.  Not  infrequently  it  is  indifferent  whether  the  stem 
is  interpreted  as  an  adjunct  of  purpose  or  of  result  {a). 
Sometimes  the  stem  is  rather  coordinate  with  the  preceding 
verb  {b). 


1)    Note    the    pause    (indicated    by    the    comma),    which   is    due    to    the 
adversative  character  of  the  relation  (and  do  you  imagine,  in  spite  of  that, 
that  I  can  be  deceived). 
Kruisinga.  Handbook  II.  Accidence  and  Syntax.  1.  11 


I 62  VERBS 

a.  You  have  only  to  summarize  events  to  realize  how 
many  of  the  failures  from  which  we  have  suffered  are 
attributable  to  this  one  fundamental  defect  in  the  Allied 
war  organization.  Times  W.   16/11,    17. 

b.  At  this  he  would  wake  up  io  find  the  lamp  still 
burning  on  the  table  .  . . 

Temple  Thurston,  Antagonists  I  ch.   i  p.   13  f. 

In  the  last  example  no  relation  of  cause  and  effect  be- 
tween the  two  verbal  ideas  can  be  thought  of. 

212.  As  an  adjunct  to  nouns  (a)  and  adjectives  [b], 
the  stem  can  also  express  purpose  or  result.  The  last 
quotation  under  a  shows  that  it  is  the  situation  chiefly,  not 
the  form,  that  decides  whether  the  stem  is  an  adjunct  to 
a  verb  or  to  a  noun. 

a.  I  asked  him  if  they  had  got  any  tobacco  to  make 
cigarettes  with.  Sweet,  Spoken  English  p    77. 

Who  was  George  Spragge  to  issue  his  commands  to 
Hazel  Goodrich.''  Vachell,  Spragge  p.  92, 

No  one  would  have  the  audacity  to  ask  him  for  a 
subscription  of  a  hundred  pounds  i). 

Soames's  determination  to  build  went  the  round  of 
the  family. 

He    even  lacked  the  energy  to  crawl  upstairs  to  bed. 

There  is  no  need  to  mince  one's  words  on  the  subject. 

(He)  was  hardly  the  man  to  overawe  a  crowd  of  hard 

characters  gathered  by  chance  from  Tower  Hill,  socialise 

.     them,    and    direct    them    successfully    in    subduing    the 

conflicting    elem.ents    of    a    difficult    enterprise.     Not  he. 

But  we  said  nothing  to  discourage  him  2). 

H.  M.  Tomlinson,  in  Van  Kranendonk,  Cont.  Prose  I  p.  1 74. 


1)  A  number  of  quotations  in  this  and  some  of  the  following  sections 
have  been  borrowed  from  the  material  (without  references)  in  Mod. 
Sprak  for  Dec.  4929  by  Lars  Lindberg. 

2)  If  the  stem  were  an  adjunct  to  the  verb  it  would  be  preceded  by  a 
break. 


STEM   WITH   TO   AS   AN   ADJUNCT  1 63 

b.  Z,z.q)s\zxy  Tan  had  been  always  ready  to  receive 
him  warmly.      Walpole,  Fortitude  I  ch.  9  §  3  p.  106. 

In  a  word,  the  rich  girl  lived  a  life  scientifically 
calculated  to  make  her  unhealthy. 

Huxley,  Vulgarity  p.  8. 

Blinkhorn  was  not  disposed  to  be  too  exacting. 

Are  they  good  to  eat? 

Mother  is  unable  to  come. 

The  river  is  dangerous  to  bathe  in. 

213.  In  many  cases  the  stem  may  seem  to  qualify  a 
noun  or  adjective  when  in  reality  it  is  rather  an  adjunct 
to  the  whole  predicate  including  a  verb.  See  the  last 
observation  in  208. 

Fenwick  was  certainly  not  in  a  position  to  gauge  his 
own  feelings  towards  Mrs.  Nightingale. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.    lO  p.   89. 

Into  its  back  courts  were  born  muddled  indecent  little 
lives,  there  blindly  to  wallow  until  the  earth  called  them 
to  itself  again.  Walpole,  Fort.  II  ch.  7  p.  212. 

I  have  not  the  heart  to  write. 

Will  you  have  the  kindness  to  remain  here  ? 

I  am  not  at  liberty  to  enter  into  any  explanations. 

The  boy  has  the  misfortune  to  be  an  only  child. 

If  a  knowledge  of  the  history  of  our  Church  is 
important,  as  we  presume  to  think,  to  her  members,  it 
must  be  dealt  with  in  a  manner  to  make  it  interesting  and 
palatable.  Judge  Phillimore  in  Pref.  to  Wakeman, 

Hist.  Ch.  of  Engl    p.  X. 

214.  The  stem  with  to  is  frequently  used  as  an  adjunct 
to  words  (verbs,  nouns,  and  adjectives)  expressing  wish; 
it  is  a  kind  of  adjunct  of  purpose  here  too,  but  this  relation 
is  not  clearly  felt. 

"I  should  like  to  be  a  teacher.  That's  what  I  want 
to  be."  ....  But  that  the  daughter  of  comfortable  parents, 
surrounded  by  love  and  the  pleasures  of  an  excellent  home,. 


I 64  VERBS 

should  wish  to  teach  in  a  school  was  beyond  the  horizons  of 
Mrs.  Baines's  common  sense.  Comfortable  parents  of  to-day 
who  have  a  difficulty  in  sympathizing  with  Mrs.  Baines, 
should  picture  what  their  feelings  would  be  if  their  Sophias 
showed  a  rude  desire  to  adopt  the  vocation  of  chauffeur. 
Bennett,  Old  Wives'  Tale  I  ch.  3  §   i. 

A  sign  of  the  temper  of  the  authorities  and  of  their 
determination  7iot  to  be  hampered  in  the  working  out 
of  policies.  Times  Ed.  S.  8  8,   18. 

.  .  .  men  who  wanted  no  steady  employment,  but  to 
make  easy  and  quick  stakes  i). 

Davies,  Super-Tramp  ch,   13  p.   102. 

215,  Closely  related  to  the  preceding  case,  if  not 
identical  with  it,  is  the  stem  as  an  adjunct  to  adjectives 
denoting  a  feeling:  glad,  happy,  contented^  delighted,  afraid, 
eager,  impatient  [a).  Also  with  verbs  such  as  to  like,  to 
hope,  to  trust,  to  hate,  to  fear  {b). 

a.  I  am  glad  to  hear  you  agree  with  me, 
I  should  be  afraid  to  ask  him  for  help. 

Well,  he'd  talked  over  and  over  again  of  this  old  chapel 
till  we  were  mad  to  go  there.      Sweet,  Sp.  Engl.  p.  51. 

b.  I  should  like  to  be  a  teacher.     See  214, 
We  hope  to  see  you  again  soon. 

He  hated  to  look  at  the  letters. 

Bennett,  Roll-Call  I  ch.  8  §  4. 
I  trust  to  meet  you  again  soon. 

Rushing  in  where  Sir  Archibald  and  his  colleagues 
so  wisely  feared  to  tread,  I  shall  try   to  discover. 

Aldous  Huxley,  Vulgarity  p.   i. 

216.  The  idea  of  purpose  or  result  may  be  completely 
absent,  so  that  the  stem,  instead  of  qualifying  the  verb, 
is  used  to  complete  its  meaning,  in  the  same  way  as  a 
noun  can  be  used.     The  stem  is  often  called  an  object  in 


1)  Observe  the  parallelism  between  the  noun-object  and  the  stem. 


STEM   WITH   TO   AS   AN   ADJUNCT  165 

this  function,  but  it  dififers  in  many  ways  from  noun- 
objects  ').  It  may  be  convenient  to  call  the  verb  stem  in 
these  cases  a  complementary  adjunct. 

But  she  did  not  attempt  to  enter  the  room. 

Old  W.  T.  I.  ch.  2  §  I. 
Paul    did    not    really    mean    this,    he    only   meant   to 
frighten  him  2].  Anstey,  Vice  Versa  ch.   2. 

They    did    not    disdain    to   turn  fishermen  in  times  of 
peace,  but  they  despised  all  forms  of  agriculture. 

Times  Lit.  "^[i,   18. 
He  has  promised  to  do  his  best  for  us. 

217.  The  stem  with  verbs  of  thinking  and  declaring  is 
also  best  interpreted  as  a  complementary  adjunct;  this 
apphes  to  such  verbs  as  to  pretend,  profess,  purpose^ 
swear y  threaten^  vow.  See  also  374  ff.  on  the  stem  and 
the  verbal  ing. 

Sometimes,  however,  the  stem  may  most  naturally  be 
looked  upon  as  an  adjunct  of  purpose  or  result. 

218.  To  think,  when  it  is  used  with  a  verb  stem,  can 
express  the  sense  of  'expect,  plan,  propose'  («),  also  'to  re- 
member' {U).  But  in  its  other  meanings  to  think  is  regularly 
followed  by  a  subordinate  clause,  or  by  of  with  a  verbal  ing, 
and  the  stem  is  rather  literary  than  spoken  English  (^). 

a.  Many  a  man  who  thinks  to  found  a  home  discovers 
that   he    has  only   opened    a   restaurant   for  his  friends. 

Eng.  Rev.  Aug.   19 13. 
I  thought  to  find  your  brother  guilty  but  it  seems  he 
is  not.  Hume,  A  Traitor  in  London. 

Mark    Robart's   mistake  had  been  mainly  this,  —  he 
had  thought  to  touch  pitch  and  not  be  defiled. 

Trollope,  Framley  ch.  42. 

1)  See  the  chapter  on  Sentence-Structure. 

2)  Observe  the  parallehsm  between  the  object  this  and  the  verb  stem. 
Similarly  in  the  next  quotation. 


I 66  VERBS 

b.  I  wish  I  had  thought  to  get  you  a  tea-gown. 

De  la  Pasture,  Lonely  Lady  of  Grosvenor  Sq.  p.  216 1). 
Why  had  she  not  thought  to  suggest  the  removal  of 
her  desk  to  the  far  end  of  the  room  ? 

Niven,  Porcelain  p.  24. 

c.  A  quickened  imagination  so  deceived  me  that  I 
thought  to  hear  the  sea  rolling. 

M.  Pemberton,  Pro  Patria  (T.)  p.  83. 

Other  admirers,  again,  have  thought  to  see  in  the 
Soviet  system,  when  applied  to  industry  as  well  as  to 
politics,  a  method  of  separating  the  industrial  and  political 
spheres,  while  giving  to  both  the  means  of  self-govern- 
ment. Times  Lit.  7/8,   1919. 

219.  It  is  significant  that  the  verb  stem  is  never  used 
as  an  object  of  verbs  that  are  construed  with  an  object  and 
predicative  adjunct  {The  road  went  up  hill  and  that  made 
running  difficult.  Walpole,  Fortitude  I  ch.  2  p.  15).  And  if 
we  do  find  the  verb  stem  when  the  'provisional'  it  is  used 
{that  made  it  difficult  to  run)  this  is  only  one  more  proof 
that  it  is  a  different  construction ;  see  the  chapter  on  Sejiteiice- 
Structure. 

220.  The  stem  as  an  adjunct  can  also  express,  or  seem 
to  express,  the  same  meaning  as  an  adverb  clause  of  con- 
dition or  cause. 

1.  You  would  do  well  to  write  more  distinctly. 

2.  You  can't  say  any  one  would  ever  know  to  look 
at  us.  Anstey,  Vice  Vetsa  ch.  2. 

3.  Scrooge  hung  his  head  to  hear  his  own  words 
quoted  by  the  Spirit. 

Dickens,  Christmas  Carol  st.  III. 

4.  It  sounds  nothing  to  hear,  but  it  was  hellish  to  see. 

Stevenson,  Dr.  Jekyll  p.  6. 

5.  What  sort  of  a  man  is  he  to  see.''         ib.  p.   12. 


1)  V.  d.  Cxaaf,  Engl.  Siudien  62  p.  407  f. 


STEM   WITH   TO   AS   AN   ADJUNCT  1 6/ 

6.  Suddenly  he  would  have  given  all  the  wide  world 
and  his  prospects  in  it  not  to  be  going. 

Walpole,  Fortitude. 

The  cause  is  often  not  in  the  meaning  of  the  verb  stem 
itself  but  in  the  nature  of  the  predicate.  Thus,  in  the  first 
two  quotations  here  the  conditional  meaning  of  the  stems  is 
due  to  the  modal  would.  The  third  quotation  may  also  be 
compared  with  the  case  of  215,  for  hung  his  head  is  really 
expressive  of  Scrooge's  feelings.  In  the  fourth  sentence  to  hear 
is  an  adjunct  to  the  predicative  nothing  (equivalent  to  unim- 
portant), parallel  to  hellish  to  see.  In  the  fifth  sentence  to  see 
is  an  adjunct  to  the  predicate  as  well.  In  the  last  sentence 
a  conditional  meaning,  if  real,  is  clearly  the  consequence  of 
the  resultative  sense  of  to  be  going. 

221.  Sometimes  the  stem  is  in  no  wa}'  the  adjunct 
to  a  verb,  but  must  be  considered  as  the  leading  element 
of  the  verbal  group  in  which  the  other  verb  plays  the 
part  of  adjunct :  /  happened  to  see  him.  The  same  relation 
exists,  though  not  so  clearl}',  in  such  a  sentence  as  / 
went  to  see  hiin.  But  when  we  say  /  wettt  home  to  ask 
if  anybody  had  been  for  me  the  stem  with  to  is  clearly 
an  adjunct  of  purpose.  The  use  may  be  illustrated  by 
the  following  quotations. 

Do  you  happen  to  know  how  much  it  costs? 

CoUinson,  Spoken  English  p.  44. 
And    these    thoughts    are    so    extraordinary    that    we 
cannot  fail  to  be  conscious  at  the  outset  of  their  origin 
in  the  mind  of  a  particular  person. 

Times  Lit.  20/12,    1928  p.  997/2. 
Hence    they    tended   to    alienate    from    the    study    of 
English  all  but  the  small  body  whose  interests  and  out- 
look were  scientific  rather  than  literary  i). 

Teaching  of  English  in  England  (192 1)  p.  217. 

1)  See  236.  , 


1 68  VERBS 

But  no!  we  stood  to  lose  in  Armenia,  ...  where  we 
stand  to  gain.        Richard  Le  GalHenne.  quoted  -bngl. 

19th  cent    II  p.   318. 

It  is  obvious  that  the  Transvaal  as  a  unit  stands  to 
gain  by  this  competition.  Graphic  6/10,   1906  '). 

Uncle  Copas's  doll  ...  had  somehow  wmi?^?  to  engage 
her  2).  Quiller-Couch,  Brother  Copas  p.    140. 

The  stem  with  to  is  also  to  be  considered  as  the  chief 
part  of  a  verbal  group  with  to  have:  {I have  to  work  hard; 
cf.  /  must  work  hard),  to  begin,  to  come  ( The  River  Thames 
has  come  to  be  largely  used  as  a  place  of  public  recreation 
and  resort)  and  to  be  {we  are  to  meet  at  j),  etc. 

222.  A  verb  may  form  a  close  group  with  a  verbal  stem 
in  the  way  illustrated  in  221  but  retain  more  of  its  inde- 
pendent meaning. 

But  a  moment  later  he  hastened  to  pick  up  the  hat 
which  C.  had  dropped. 

Pauline  was  aware  of  a  wild  effort  to  prepare  for 
sorrow  whether  near  at  hand  or  still  far  oflf  she  did  not 
know,  but  she  seemed  to  hear  it  like  a  wind  rising  at 
sunset.  Mackenzie,  Guy  and  Pauline  p.  312. 

In  the  first  sentence  hastened  may  seem  an  independent 
verb,  but  if  we  ask  why  it  would  be  impossible  to  substitute 
hurried,  the  answer  must  be  that  hurried  would  make  the 
leading  idea  of  picking  up  subordinate,  thus  reversing  the 
relation  of  the  elements  of  the  group. 

223.  It  must  also  be  remembered,  here  as  well  as  else- 
where, that  the  meaning  of  a  word  is  not  inherent  to  it  but 


1)  V.  d.  Gaaf,  Engl  Studien  62  p.  407  f. 

2)  This  quotation  is  one  of  five,  all  of  them  illustrating  this  use  of  to 
miss,  hut  from  the  same  hook,  in  a  note  by  Dr.  Arvid  Smith  in  Modema 
Sprak,  Dec.  1925,  p.  175  f. 


STEM   WITH   TO   AS   AN   ADJUNCT  1 69 

depends  upon  the  way  it  is  grouped  with  other  elements  of 
the  sentence,  or  rather  that  the  meaning  is  not  expressed 
by  the  individual  words  but  by  the  groups.  Thus  the  verb 
to  look  is  used  in  two  very  different  'meanings'  in  the  following 
quotations,  because  in  the  first  two  it  is  qualified  by  an  ad- 
junct of  result  {a),  whereas  in  the  last  it  rather  serves  to 
modify  the  following  stem  {b). 

a.  We  should  have  looked  to  find  an  all-powerful  king, 

Oman,  Conquest  p,  153. 
The  result  is  that  their  lectures  frequently  provide 
such  stimulus  to  the  mind  of  the  undergraduate  listener, 
and  even  the  outside  reader,  as  neither  undergraduate 
nor  outside  public  ever  looked  in  old  days  to  receive  from 
the  utterances  of  professors.  Times  Lit.  6/9,  23. 

b.  The  tramp  looked  to  be  less  savoury  than  most  tramps; 
and  more  dangerous. 

E.  Wallace,  The  Northing  Tramp  I  ch.  3. 

224.  With  adjectives  the  stem  is  frequently  used  as 
a  complementary  adjunct  similarly  to  the  cases  of  216. 
Adjectives  requiring  such  a  complement  arey?/,  worthy,  glad. 
In  such  a  sentence  as  I  am  glad  he  is  coming  the  subordinate 
clause  is  often  called  an  object-clause;  the  stem  has  clearly 
a  similar  function  in  /  zvas  glad  to  see  him. 

(Michael)  was  shocked  to  hear  that  she  would  not 
accompany  (them).  Sinister  Street  p.   159. 

We  also  find  a  predicative  adjective  as  a  modifying 
element  of  the  following  stem,  in  the  same  way  as  the 
verbs  in  221  f. 

Such  an  exactitude  is  consistent  with  vital  change; 
Milton  himself  is  bold  to  zvrite  "stood  praying"  for 
"continued  kneeling  in  prayer".     Raleigh,  Style  p.  ^i^. 

225.  With  nouns  the  stem  often  has  defining  functions 
similar  to  those  of  an  attributive  clause.  This  use  may  be 
compared  with  the  case  of  216. 


I 70  VERBS 

The   Stubland   aunts  were  not  the  ladies  to  receive  a 
sohcitor's  letter  calmly.     Wells,  Joan  Peter  ch.  5  §  4. 

There  was  no  boy  to  disturb  the  wild  creatures  with 
his  hunting  instincts  and  loud  noises. 

Hudson,  Hampshire  Days  ch.   i   p.  4  f. 
I    have    no    longer    a   great  number  of  years  to  look 
forward  to,  but  I  have  a  great  many  to  look  back  upon. 

Haldane,  Addresses  p.    122. 
But    Caesar   was  not  the  man  to  accept  a  defeat:  he 
was  determined  to  repeat  his  invasion. 

Oman,  Conquest  p.  41. 
Walpole .  .  .    developed    the    office    of  prime  minister, 
which,    without    any    law   to   establish  it  i),  became  one 
of  the  most  important  of  British  institutions. 

Pollard,  Hist,  of  Engl.  ch.   5  p.   142. 

226.  The  leading  element  may  also  be  a  pronoun. 

Was  there  anyone  to  stop  him?     At  that  hour  of  the 
morning,  the  whole  world  he  walked  in  was  his  own. 
Temple  Thurston,  Antagonists  I  ch.    i   p.   12. 
But  I  say,  Ben,  it's  lucky  young  Harry's  old  enough 
now  to  do  without  her  to  look  after  him. 

Freeman,  Joseph  ch.   i   p.  5. 

227.  The   construction   is  frequent  with  an  ordinal  for 
the  leading  element,  or  qualifying  the  leading  noun. 

In    those    early    days  of  spring  the  rook  is  a  hungry 
bird,  with  a  wary  eye  for  the  first  man  to  put  his  corn  in. 

Freeman,  Joseph  p.   i. 
And  this  was  not  the  first  building  to  meet  that  fate. 

Times  Lit.  29/6,    19 17. 
The  last  to  arrive  waited  on  the  roads  .  .  . 

Times  W.  2). 

1)  This    might    be    interpreted    as    a   free    adjunct;  it  is  clearly  different 
from  the  apparently  similar  construction  in  the  last  quotation  of  226. 

2)  Dr.   Arvid   Smith   in  Modsma  Sprak,  March  1925. 


STEM   WITH   TO   AS   AN   AJDUNCT  17I 

228.  The  stem  in  this  function  may  have  or  develop  a 
special  meaning  (a).  One  of  the  clearest  cases  is  to  do. 
The  attributive  function  sometimes  leads  to  the  predicative 
use  of  the  stem  {d). 

a.  To  which  Miss  Conacher  vaguely  looking  round  for  a 
list  of  Mrs.  Williams's  blessings  and  finding  none  to  speak 
ofi)  had  no  reply.      Walpole,  Fortitude  II  ch.  7  p.  213. 

In  the  infinite  universe  there  is  room  for  our  swiftest 
diligence  and  to  spare. 

Walker  was  late  with  his  report  because  he  was  so 
illiterate  that  he  had  an  invincible  distaste  for  anything 
to  do  with  pens  and  paper. 

Maugham,  Trembling  of  a  Leaf  II  p.   17. 
Besides  it  was  nothing  whatever  to  do  with  drink, 
de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.   15  p.   149. 
He  insisted  that  when  a  month  had  passed  he  would 
indeed  be  gone  from  Piashers  Mead.    It  was  nothing  to 
do  with  Michael  P'ane :  it  was  solely  his  own  determination 
to  put  an  end  to  his  unprofitable  dalliance. 

Mackenzie,  Guy  and  Pauline,  p.  355. 
Its    clever    description    of   everything   to  do  with  the 
working  of  our  guns.  Times  Lit.  27/4,   16. 

"It's  nothing  to  do  with  Cyril,"  said  she. 
"Then  what  is  it?" 

Bennett,  Old  W.  T.  IV  ch.   i  p.  3. 
Theresa  .  .  .  was  attired  in  wine-coloured  velvet,    and 
wore  a  jet  bonnet,  trimmed  with  velvet  to  match. 

Leeds  Mercury,  in  NED. 
d.  Mackilleveray  rumbled  deep  in  his  throat,  and  if  the 
sound  meant  laughter,  the  expression  on  his  sullen  face  was 
not  to  correspond.       Richard  Dehan,  The  Pipers  of  the 

Market  Place  II,  91. 

229.  The  attributive  function  of  the  stem  can  be  shown 
to  be  a  development  of  the  final  one  by  transitional  cases 
like  the  foUowins". 


1)  None  worth  calling  'a  blossins'. 


172  VERBS 

But    the    bird    said:    "No,    I  mustn't  be  idle;  I  must 

get  some  hay  to  build  my  nest  with "  But  the  horse 

said:    "No,    I    mustn't    be    idle;  I  must  go  and  plough, 
or  there  won't  be  any  corn  to  make  bread  of!' 

Sweet,  Spoken  Engl.  p.  49. 
The  real  ground  of  his  resentment  was  rather  vexation 
that  anything  should  arise  to  mar  the  unanimity  of  the 
humanist  advance  toward  wider  knowledge. 

P.  S.  Allen,  The  Age  of  Erasmus,  p.   163. 

If  the  idea  of  purpose  is  clearer  in  the  verb  stem  of  the 
first  quotation  than  of  the  second,  the  cause  is  not  in  the 
noun  or  in  the  verb  stem  that  qualifies  it,  but  in  the  relation 
between  the  leading  verb  and  the  stem  in  the  adjunct. 

230.     It  has   been  shown  that  to  prefixed  to 
Connecting      ,  ,  ^  , 

^    ,  the  verb  stem  oiten  expresses  purpose  or  result, 

but    that    it    does    not    do    so    apart   from    the 

situation,    and    is    often    used    when   no   such   meaning   is 

intended.     This   is   natural,  because  to,  though  it  may  be 

looked   on  as  a  kind  of  preposition,  is  never  used  in  this 

meaning  except  with  a  verb  stem;  see  208. 

The  consequence  is  that  a  stem  when  used  as  an  adjunct 

of  purpose   to   a  verb,   often   has  its  relation  made  more 

definite  by  prefixing  in  order  to. 

In  order  to  support  the  roof  a  second  row  of  columns 
was  added.  N.  E.  D. 

I  turned  round  to  see  if  any  person  was  near,  who 
might  by  chance  have  witnessed  so  strange  a  thing,  in 
order  to  speak  to  him  about  it. 

Hudson,  Hampshire  Days  ch.  2  p.   '^d. 

It  will  be  observed  that  the  additional  prefix  is  here 
used  with  the  verb  stem  separated  from  its  leading  verb. 

231.  A  stem  when  used  as  an  adjunct  to  a  noun,  or 
adjective,  is  often  shown  to  be  an  adjunct  of  result  by 
the  adjunct  of  degree  qualifying  the  headword  («).    If  the 


STEM   WITH   TO   AS   AN   ADJUNCT  1 73 

adjunct    is    so    or    suck,    the    stem    is    preceded    by    the 
correlative  as  [b). 

a.  A  man  who  has  light  enough  to  know  he  is  wrong 
but  not  grace  enough  to  forsake  the  evil. 

Spurgeon,  Sermons. 
He  is  wise  enough  to  know  what  is  expected  of  him. 
Jane's    sense    of   psychology    was   far   too  acute,  and 
she    was    far    too   human    and    unpedantic  to  make  such 
an  attitude  possible  to  her. 

Lady   Sackville,  Introd.   p.  X. 
As  a  race  we  are  too  afraid  of  giving  ourselves  away 
ever  to  produce  a  good  autobiography. 

Conan  Doyle,  Magic  Door  p.  2)^,. 

b.  These  things  seem  to  us  at  the  present  day  so 
natural  as  hardly  to  be  noticeable. 

Dicey,  Constitution,  Lect.  VI. 
I  must  do  it  in  such  a  manner  as  to  give  pleasure. 

Times  Lit.   10/8,   16. 

232.  When  so  may  seem  to  qualify  a  verb  it  is  only 
occasionally  a  real  adjunct  of  manner;  this  use  is  literary 
rather  than  colloquial  {a).  In  most  cases  so,  though  originallj^ 
an  adjunct  to  the  leading  verb,  is  transferred  to  as  to,  so 
that  so  as  to  is  a  sort  of  compound.  It  expresses  result  {b) 
or  purpose  {c). 

a.  Put  it  so  as  not  to  offend  him. 

b.  He  trod  about  the  floor  while  putting  by  his  lantern 
and  throwing  aside  his  hat  and  sack,  so  as  to  merge 
the  marks  of  Dunstan's  feet  on  the  sand  in  the  marks 
of  his  nailed  boots  ^). 

Eliot,  Silas  Marner  ch.  5  p.  66. 

c.  Peter  had  been  kneeling  so  as  to  catch  his  grand- 
father's words.  Walpole,  Fortitude  I  ch.  8  p.  ^?>. 


1)  The  situation  leaves  no  doubt  but  result  is  intended,  not  purpose. 


174  VERBS 

"And    now   you    had    better   go    and    dress",  said  his 

father,   "so  as  not  to  keep  your  uncle  and  me  waiting." 

Montgomery,  Misunderstood  ch.  2. 

She   spoke   no  further  on  the  matter  to  me,  but  that 

may  have  been  so  as  to  cause  me  no  further  uneasiness. 

Baring-Gould,  Swaen  I  p,  9. 
Shall  we  go  round  that  way,  and  back  over  Hatchbury 
Down,  so  as  to  get  a  view  of  the  moors  ? 

Sweet,  Spoken  English  p.  71. 

233.  In  interrogative  adjuncts  the  stem  is  connected 
with  its  headword  by  an  interrogative  pronoun,  adverb, 
or  conjunction  (a).  We  also  find  them  with  fo  ieach^  to 
learn,  etc.  ib). 

a.  But  with  us,  hot  summers  are  things  known  by 
tradition  only;  we  generally  have  more  moisture,  espe- 
cially   in    July,    than    we    well    know    what    to    do  with. 

Blackmore,  Lorna  Doone  ch.  46. 
She   hardly   knew,    as    she  waited,  whether  to  expect 
the  little  child  she  had  loved  or  the  grown-up  man  she 
hardly  knew.  Sidgwick,  Severins  ch.   i. 

It  was  now  a  question  whether  to  continue  the  fight 
or  to  withdraw  from  some  valuable  positions. 

Times  W.  ?>l-:,   18. 
I    was    in   two  minds    whether    to   run  away  or  stop. 

Stevenson,  Kidnapped. 
"What?"   said  Swithin,   "six  languages?"  Privately  he 
thought,  'He  knows  how  to  lie  anyway.' 

Galsworthy,  Caravan  p.  9. 
Some  new  curtains  would  make  a  world  of  difierence, 
but  she  did  not  know  where  to  get  the  stuff. 

Freeman,  Joseph  ch.   13  p.   112. 

b.  Her  father  had  taught  her  how  to  jump,  besides 
the  how  of  many  other  practical  things. 

Meredith,  Amazing  Marriage  ch.  4  p.   38. 
The    Alsatians    have    known    how    to  take  advantage 
of  the  German  markets.  Times  Lit.   19/10,   17. 


STEM   WITH   TO   AS   AN   ADJUNCT  1 75 

234.  The  interrogative-relative  pronouns  and  adverbs 
serve  as  objects  or  adverb  adjuncts  to  the  stems  in  the 
above  quotations.  We  also  find  the  interrogative  adverb 
how  to  serve  as  a  connecting  word  between  to  know  and 
to  learn  and  the  stem,  which  has  the  function  of  an  object 
rather  than  that  of  an  adjunct  of  manner. 

It's  part  of  the  matrimonial  game  that  wives  must 
learn  how  to  bear  things.        Kenealy,  Grundy  p.  45. 

She  found  her  way  downstairs  into  the  drawing-room 
in  good  time;  she  could  look  about  her,  and  learn  how 
to  feel  at  home  in  her  new  quarters. 

Gaskell,   Wives  I  ch.   5  p.  99. 
The    long    years    of   the    Peloponnesian    war    bred    a 
generation  who  knew  one  thing  well  —  how  to  fight. 

Goodspeed,  Hist.  p.    192. 
Ariadne     Gale     began    to    babble.     That    girl    didn't 
know  how  to  be  quiet. 

Carolyn  Wells,  Vicky  Van  III  p.  39. 

Perhaps    there    is   always  some  idea   of  manner  in  the 

relation    of   the   two   elements   of  the  group  when  how  is 

used.     The   verbs   can   also  take  the  simple  stem  with  to 

expressing  result,  or  serving  as  a  complementary  adjunct. 

I'll  teach  you  to  cheek  your  mother  i). 

They    soon    learnt  to  concentrate  their  energies  upon 

those    quarters    of   the    globe    in    which    expansion  was 

easiest  and  most  profitable. 

Pollard,  Hist,  of  Engl.  ch.  6  p.   150. 
With   languages    as    with    our  friends,   we  shall  know 
better  how  to  deal  with  them  if  we  learn  to  know  their 
habits  and  tendencies  2). 

Palmer  in  Bulletin  July  1929  p.  4/2. 

235.  A  verb  stem  that  qualifies  a  noun  as  an  attributive 
adjunct,  without  any  interrogative  meaning  being  implied, 


1)  V.  d.  Gaaf,  Enrjlische  Studien  62  p.  408.     2)  Cf.  we  shall  r/et  to  know. 


1/6  VERBS 

takes  a  relative  pronoun  when  the  verb  stem  is  accom- 
panied by  a  prepositional  adjunct.  The  preposition  always 
opens  the  group. 

There  has  never  been  wanting  appropriate  machinery 
by  which  to  carry  the  censorship  into  effect. 

Dicey,  Constitution,  Lect.  VI. 

Peter  gave  himself  a  fortnight  in  which  to  produce 
something  that  he  could  "show," 

Walpole,  Fortitude  II  ch.  7  p.  213. 

Her  plan  \vas  to  detain  this  person  until  her  outraged 
glance  might  fall  upon  some  unattached  male  she  knew, 
with  whom  to  be  found  agreeably  trifling  by  Frank 
himself.     C.  D.  Jones,  Everlasting  Search  ch.  2  p.  25. 

When  there  is  no  relative  pronoun  the  preposition  always 
comes  last;  see  the  quotation  from  Lord  Haldane  in  225. 

236.  The  stem  with  to  is  used  with  verbs,  nouns, 
and  adjectives  that  can  be  construed  with  a  noun-adjunct 
with  the  preposition  to,  so  that  to  forms  a  syntactic  unit 
with  the  noun,  adjective,  or  verb  rather  than  with  the  stem. 

It  will  be  noted  that  in  many  cases  to  has  a  local 
meaning,  although  this  is  naturally  related  to  the  final 
meaning  that  we  have  treated  as  the  fundamental  one  in 
the  preceding  construcdons  of  the  stem  with  to.  See  77  f. 
on  the  use  ot  the  verbal  ing,  and  361  ff.  and  387  for  the 
comparison  of  the  two  constructions. 

Turkey  has  agreed  to  abandon  her  sovereignty  over 
the  whole  of  her  dominions  in  Europe  with  the  exception 
of  the  vilayet  of  Adrianople.  Times  W.  3/1,   13. 

She  almost  brought  herself  to  own  that  she  would 
rather  see  her  darling  the  wife  of  an  idle  ruined  spendthrift, 
than  watch  her  thus  drifting  away  to  an  early  grave. 

Trollope,  Three  Clerks. 
It  was  this,  precisely,  that  had  set  the  Prince  to  think. 

Henry  James,  Golden  Bowl. 


STEM   WITH   TO    AS   AN   ADJUNCT  1 7/ 

But  do  we  not  tend  to  accept  the  eager  and  childish 
hopes  of  humanity  .  .  .  ^) 

Benson,  Thread  of  Gold,  p,  34. 

Ruskin  held  that  there  was  an  intimate  connection 
between  morality  and  art.  This  theory  led  him  to  try 
and  make  the  art  of  England  better  by  first  making 
the  people  live  wholesomer  lives. 

Sefton  Delmer,  English  Lit.,  p.    164. 

There  is  and  always  has  been  a  great  repugnance  at 
the  old  universities  to  accept  State  subsidies. 

Times  Ed.  S.   14/2,   18. 

I  hope  you  will  see  your  way  to  do  it. 

She  is  on  the  way  to  do  it.      Peard,  Madame  p.  95. 

Laud  was  inclined  to  trust  somewhat  to  the  Lords' 
resistance,  Shorthouse,  Inglesant  ch,   10  p.   117. 

We  are  not  disposed  to  take  a  despondent  view  of 
the  present  situation.  Times  W.  3/r,   13. 

The  ear  is  not  accustomed  to  exercise  constantly  its 
functions  of  hearing;  it  is  accustomed  to  stillness. 

Ruskin,  Modern  Painters. 

Stalwart  dangerous  fellows,  used  to  swing  the  sickle 
or  to  wield  the  forest  axe,  were  likewise  shaken  with 
strange  paroxysms,  and  spoke  oracles  with  sobs  and 
streaming  tears.  Stevenson,  Donkey  p.    120. 

237.     The   distinction  of  free  adjuncts  from  the 

^     attributive  and  adverb  adjuncts,  however  necessary 
Adjuncts  ,,  .  ,.•'-„,.,  -^ 

tor  a  true  understanding  ot  English  sentence- 
structure  (see  volume  3),  is  naturally  productive  of  'diffi- 
culties'. But  they  are  difficulties  only  as  long  as  one 
cherishes  the  idea  that  each  case  must  have  its  pigeon 
hole;  the  'difficult'  case  becomes  a  gain  of  insight  into 
the  function  of  these  adjuncts  in  English  sentence-structure 
when   we  look  upon  it  as  a  means  of  understanding  how 


1)   Compare    the    third   sentence   in  221,  and  observe  that  the  subject  is 
non-personal  in  221,  personal  here. 
KuuisiNGA,  Handbook  II.  Accidence  and  Syntax.  1.  42^ 


178  VERBS 

the   attributive  or  adverb  adjunct  can  develop  into  a  free 
adjunct. 

The  following  cases  may  be  classed  as  free  adjuncts, 
though  the  final  meaning  of  the  attributive  or  adverb 
adjunct  is  quite  distinguishable. 

A  great  many  boys,  to  be  efficiently  educated,  need 
close  individual  attention  i). 

Benson^,  Journal  of  Engl.  St.  I,   151. 
To   be   honest,  I  do  not  believe  in  fretting  too  much 
over  a  piece  of  writing.  ib.  p.  86. 

Indeed,  to  speak  frankly,  I  plan  and  arrange  all  my 
days  that  I  may  secure  a  space  for  writing  .... 

Benson,  Thread  of  Gold,  p.  85. 
At    the    same   moment,    to    confuse    little  things  with 
big  ones,  Mrs.  Lazarus  suddenly  decided  to  die. 

Walpole,  Fortitude  II  ch.  3  §  2  p.    175, 

238.  In  other  cases  there  is  no  implication  of  purpose 
or  result,  but  many  of  them  are  in  the  nature  of  tra- 
ditional phrases. 

The  mere  fact  that  he  gives  a  purely  Celtic  name 
to  the  land  is  conclusive,  not  to  speak  of  other  evidence 
to  be  deduced  from  the  fragments  of  his  work  that 
survive.  Oman,  Conquest  p.   10. 

Yet,  to  look  at  her,  you  would  never  have  imagined 
that  anything  but  the  honey  of  speech  could  have 
dropped  from  so  perfect  a  little  rose. 

Allen,  Mettle  of  the  Pasture. 

Then  the  old  gentleman  began  in  the  most  wonderful 
way,    and    to    hear    him    talk    you    would  imagine  that 
school  was  the  paradise  to  which  all  good  boys  were  sent» 
VValpole,  Fortitude  I  ch.  4  §  3  p.  43. 

One  would  think,  to  hear  them  talk,  that  England  is 
full  of  English  traitors.  Times  Lit.  20/1,    16. 


i)  The  stem  may  bo  better  explained  as  an  adjunct  of  purpose  qualifying^ 
need,  and  not  as  a  free  adjunct. 


STEM   WITH   TO   AS   AN   ADJUNCT  179 

Everybody  looked  at  mother,  to  hear  her  talk  like  that. 

Lorna  Doone  p.  6S. 

239.  As  in  other  free  adjuncts,  the  relation  to  the  rest 
of  the  sentence  is  sometimes  defined  by  conjunctions. 

As  if  to  justify  this  illusion,  we  incline  to  isolate  it 
{viz.  the  Elizabethan  era).  Times  Lit.  26/10,   16. 

When  her  husband  had  set  forth,  Amy  seated  herself 
in  the  study  and  took  up  a  new  library  volume  as  if 
to  read.  Gissing,  New  Grub  Street  ch.  6. 

He  raised  his  hand  as  though  to  take  off  his  hat. 

It  is  generally  believed  that  if  the  Government  had 
been  defeated  on  the  measure  it  would  have  had  no- 
02)tion  but  to  resign.  Spectator  10/8,   12. 

240.  The  verb  stem  with  a  subject  of  its  own  {absoluie 
adjuncts)  is  chiefly  found  in  technical,  especially  legale 
English  {a),  but  not  exclusively  («^).  The  connection  with 
the  adjuncts  of  purpose  is  evident. 

a.  In  1888  the  interest  on  the  greater  portion  of  the 
National  Debt  was  reduced  from  3  to  2^1^  per  cent.,  a 
further  reduction  to  2Y2  P^r  cent,  to  take  place  in  1903. 

Gooch;  Hist,  of  our  own  Time  p.   13. 

Mr.  V.  produced  a  will  which  John  Granger  had  exe» 
cuted  a  few  days  before  his  intended  departure,  bequeath- 
ing all  he  possessed  to  Susan  Lorton  —  the  interest 
for  her  sole  use  and  benefit,  the  principal  to  revert  to 
her  eldest  son  after  her  death,  the  son  to  take  the  name 
of  Granger.         Braddon,  In  Great  Waters  (T.),  p.  149. 

In  regard  to  the  Albanian  problem  Austria  and  Italy 
agreed  on  the  principle  of  nationality,  the  country  to 
be  neutralised  under  the  guarantee  of  the  Great  Powers. 

Everyman,  24/12,   12. 

b.  The  pretty  girl  was  to  spend  yet  another  afterHoon 
with  the  elder  lady,  superintending  some  parish  treat  at 
the  house  in  observance  of  Christmas,  and  afterwards  to 
stay  on  to  dinner,  her  brothers  to  fetch  her  in  the  evening. 

Hardy,  Ironies  p.  75. 


1 80  VERBS 

241.  In  a  few  combinations  of  a  traditional  kind  we 
also  find  the  unrelated  verb  stem.  The  final  meaning  is 
usually  quite  evident. 

To  say  truth  she  did  not  know  in  the  least .... 

Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.   14  p.   162. 
Charles  II,  to  do  him  justice,  desired  toleration  in  the 
interests  of  the  Puritan  as  well  as  of  the  Roman  Catholic 
nonconformists.  Wakeman,  Introd    p    385. 

Truth  to  tell,  she  could  not  conceal  her  very  pleased 
surprise  at  the  exceptional  though  severe  good  taste 
which  Steve  had  shown  in  the  whole  affair. 

Patterson,  Compton  p.  220. 
To    return.    The    result    of  Mr,    Alston's  observations 
had  been  to  make  him  an  extremely  shrewd  companion. 
Rider  Haggard,  Witch's  Head  ch.  24. 

242.     When  we  consider  a  sentence  like:  They 

,,,  „,       have   taken    a    cottas^e    by    the   sea   to   spend  the 
with  Stem  ,    ,. ,  -       ,  ,  ,  • 

summer    holidays    tn,    the   stem    to   spend  is   not 

really  an  attributive  adjunct  to  cottage,  nor  is  it  exclusively 

an    adjunct    of  purpose   to   taken:   there  is  some  truth  in 

both  explanations  because  in  reality  to  spend  is  an  adjunct 

to  the  group  have  taken  a  cottage. 

We  have  a  different  construction  when  a  verb  that  can 
be  construed  with  a  verb  stem,  as  /  promised  to  come 
early,  takes  an  object:  /  promised  them  to  come  early; 
also :  /  offered  to  pay  the  difference  and  /  offered  him  to 
pay  the  difference.  In  these  sentences  the  noun  or  pronoun 
is  an  object  of  the  predicative  verb,  and  the  verb  stem 
serves  as  an  adjunct,  but  the  noun  and  the  verb  stem 
are  independent  of  each  other. 

It  may  happen,  too,  that  the  noun  or  pronoun,  though 
an  object  of  the  predicative  verb,  serves  at  the  same 
time  for  the  subject  of  the  verb  stem :  /  advise  yon  to 
give  way  to  him. 


OBJECT   WITH   STEM  l8l 

The  addition  of  the  object  does  not  in  these  cases 
modify  the  relation  of  the  leading  verb  and  the  verb  stem. 
But  we  find  very  frequently  that  this  relation  is  affected 
in  such  a  way  that  the  noun  or  pronoun  is  primarily,  or 
even  exclusively,  the  subject  of  the  verb  stem.  The  verb 
stem  consequently,  does  not  qualify  the  noun  (or  pronoun) 
but  forms  a  close  group  with  the  leading  verb,  in  spite 
of  the  intervening  noun  or  pronoun  ^).  This  construction^ 
for  which  the  term  object  and  verb  stem  with  to  may  be 
used,  must  now  be  treated.  Its  parallelism  to  the  object 
ivith  plain  stem  (193)  is  evident.  See  the  next  chapter  in 
which  the  various  constructions  with  verbals  are  compared. 

243.  The  following  sentences  maj^  show  the  most  im- 
portant types  of  this  construction. 

1.  I  sent  him  to  tell  you  the  news. 

2.  I  taught  him  to  swim. 

3.  I  enabled  him  to  go. 

4.  I  ordered  him  to  go. 

5.  I  wished  him  to  go. 

244.  In  sentences  of  the  first  type  the  verb  stem  is 
clearly  an  adjunct  to  the  predicative  verb  to  express  pur- 
pose. The  construction  does  not  essentially  differ  from 
the  verb  stem  expressing  the  same  relation  to  a  verb 
without  an  object. 

245.  The  second  sentence  of  243  is  very  similar  to 
the  first,  but  it  is  important  to  observe  that  the  verb 
must  take  an  object.  The  pronoun  can  only  be  interpreted 
as    a    direct    object,    to   the   group  taught  to  swim  rather 


1)  A  consequence  of  this  grouping  is  the  shifting  of  the  order  of  words 
in  the  case  of  let:  He  let  the  axe  fall  turning  into  He  let  fall  the  axe; 
see  Auxiliaries  on  to  let.     Also  290  on  the  nom.  with  stem. 


1 82  VERBS 

than  to  taught.  See  Sentence  Structure  in  volume  3.  The 
relation  of  predicative  verb  and  verb  stem  also  differs 
from  the  first  type:  the  verb  stem  is  rather  a  comple- 
mentar}^  than  a  final  adjunct. 

246.  The  third  sentence  resembles  the  first  in  that  the 
pronoun  is  the  object  of  the  predicative  verb;  the  verb 
stem,  however,  serves  as  an  adjunct  of  result  rather  than 
of  purpose. 

247.  In  sentences  of  type  4  the  verb  stem  has  the 
character  of  a  complementary  adjunct  as  in  the  second 
type,  but  the  pronoun  is  plainly  the  object  of  the  pre- 
dicative verb  only;  compare  /  had  given  him  orders  to 
clean  the  stable. 

Of  the  same  character  is  the  construction  with  other 
verbs  expressing  will  as  affecting  other  people:  to  allow, 
ask^  request^  beg,  recommend,  permit,  forbid,  persuade. 

The  character  of  the  construction  seems  to  be  brought 
out  by  the  follov.'ing  examples,  some  with  the  object  and 
verb  stem,  the  others  with  an  object  and  a  prepositional 
adjunct.  It  may  be  observed,  however,  that  to  persuade, 
unlike  the  other  verbs  of  this  group,  never  takes  a  con- 
struction of  the  fifth  type;  the  same  may  be  said  of 
to  seduce  and  to  provoke. 

Despite  his  (i.  e.  Pertinax's)  unimpeachable  conduct, 
Commodus's  informers  are  said  to  have  tried  to  persuade 
their  master  to  accuse  Pertinax  of  treason. 

Oman,  Conquest  p.   127. 

(He)  had  never  thought  of  suggesting  to  Godfrey  that 
he  should  frighten  or  persuade  the  old  fellow  into  lending 
the  money  on  the  excellent  security  of  the  young 
Squire's  prospects.  Eliot,  Silas  Marner  ch.  4. 

I  do  hope  your  friend,  Daisy  Harland,  won't  persuade 
you  into  wanting  to  appear  as  a  female  acrobat. 

Mackenzie,  Seven  Ages  of  Woman  ch.  3  p.   121. 


OBJECT   WITPI   STEM  1 83 

There  is  one  fact  that  has  frequently  tended  to  prevent 
the  recognition  of  language  as  a  merely  conventional 
system  of  sound  symbols,  that  has  seduced  the  popular 
mind  into  attributing  to  it  an  instinctive  basis  that  it 
does  not  possess.  Sapir,  Language  p.   2. 

It  is  he  who  is  provoking  the  old  gentleman's  head 
to  swell.  Punch,   27/7,  21. 

But  it  was  not  Professor  Stoll  but  Mr.  Robertson  and 
Mr.  Eliot  whose  theories  "provoked"  Mr.  Brock,  as  he 
tells  us,  into  publishing  this  little  book. 

Times  Lit.     8/5,  22. 

248.  In  the  fifth  sentence  the  pronoun  can  in  no  wa}" 
be  considered  an  object  of  wish,  but  only  the  subject  of 
the  following  stem.  The  group  of  pronoun  and  verb  stem 
cannot  be  analysed,  it  is  completely  inseparable.  The  term 
object  with  verb  stem  is  meant  to  express  this  character 
of  the  group, 

249.  It  would  be  wrong  to  restrict  the  term  object  ivith 
verb  stem  to  the  constructions  with  verbs  of  this  last  type. 
For  the  same  interpretation  is  necessar}'  when  verbs  of 
type  4  are  construed  with  a  non-personal  object,  as  in  the 
following  sentences  {a),  or  with  a  reflexive  object  (b). 

a.  We  have  allowed  nature  to  become  strange  to  us, 
and  are  on  that  account  very  impressionable  to  her 
surfaces.  Times  Lit.   13/12,  23. 

In  the  first  place,  the  forest,  first  of  pine  and  then 
of  oak,  spread  over  Western  Europe,  and  the  grassy 
plains  which  had  erstwhile  allowed  great  herds  to  roam, 
were  very  much  reduced. 

Fleure,  Races  of  Mankind  p.   17, 
The  stubborn  paganism  of  London  compelled  the  seat 
of  the  southern  archbishop  to  remain  at  Canterbury. 

Wakeman,  Introd.  p.   14. 
Chapman  once  sprained  his  ankle  at  football,  and  did 
not  permit  the  incident  to  fade  from  anybody's  recollection. 

Pett  Ridge,  Garland  p.  221. 


1 84  VERBS 

But  the  thick  obscurity  permitted  only  sky-lines  to 
be  visible  of  any  scene  at  present. 

Hardy,  Native  I  ch.   5  p.  48. 

b.  Religion  is  man's  oldest  and  greatest  possession. 
And  it  is  one  of  which  it  is  certain  that  he  will  never 
allow  himself  to  be  deprived.        Times  Lit.  24/3,  21. 

250.  Verbs  of  type  3  sometimes  require  the  same  inter- 
pretation. Some  of  them  may  perhaps  be  considered  as 
examples  of  type  4. 

It  seemed  as  if  he  knew  she  could  not  bear  him  to 
look  at  her  just  then.       Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.  8. 

It  will  no  doubt  take  some  little  time  for  things  to  settle 
down,  for  a  breathing  space  must  be  given  to  enable 
embittered  feelings  to  become  calm.    Observer,  29/1,  22. 

The  settlement  of  the  strike  at  Glasgow  of  the  firemen 
engaged  in  the  coastwise  trade  enables  the  services  to  and 
from  the  Clyde  to  be  resumed.  Times,  28/8,  20. 

251.  Even  constructions  of  type  2  cannot  be  analysed 
sometimes  so  that  we  must  look  upon  them  as  cases  of 
an  object  with  verb  stem. 

She  reclined,  and  charmingly  left  them  to  manufacture 
the  evening  for  her.  Bennett,  Roll-Call  I  ch.  8  §  2. 

"Of  course  I  shall  be  back  for  tea." 

"Oh,  yes  m'm !"  Ada  agreed,  as  though  saying,  "Need 
you  tell  me  that,  m'm?  I  know  you  would  never  leave 
the  master  to  have  his  tea  alone  i)." 

Bennett,  These  Twain  I  ch.  7. 

1)  It  would  give  good  sense  if  we  interpreted  the  master  as  a  real  object, 
and  the  verb  stem  as  an  adjunct  of  result.  But  this  is  of  no  gram- 
matical importance,  for  it  would  not  be  in  accordance  with  the  linguistic 
sense  of  the  writer.  Compare  also : 

And    what    the    difficulties    of   explanation  were,  I  leave  you  to  imagine. 

de  Morgan,  Vance  ch.  17. 
Sally  ran  straight  upstairs,  leaving  Anne  (i.e.  the  servant  in  the  kitchen) 
to  close  the  door  (i.  e.  the  front  door). 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  26  p.  285. 


OBJECT   WITH   STEM  1 85 

252.  The  name  object  with  stem  will  be  apphed  to  all 
the  constructions  of  types  3,  4  and  5 ;  also,  where  con- 
venient, to  that  of  type  2.  When  it  is  found  necessary 
to  distinguish  between  the  construction  with  a  real  object 
and  the  one  with  a  noun  or  pronoun  that  cannot  be 
interpreted  as  an  object,  we  may  call  the  former  a  se- 
parable, the  latter  an  inseparable  group  of  noun  with 
verb  stem  i). 

It  should  also  be  considered  that  the  very  fact  that  a 
verb  can  be  construed  with  an  inseparable  group  of  noun 
and  verb  stem  can  only  be  accounted  for  by  assuming 
that  what  seems  to  be  a  separable  group  is  not  always 
so  understood  by  English  speakers:  what  else  could  have 
induced  them  to  extend  the  construction  to  cases  where 
the  analysis  of  the  separable  group  is  out  of  the  question? 
Here,  as  often  elsewhere,  the  habit  of  logical  analysis  can 
only  mislead  the  grammarian ;  what  is  of  importance  to 
him  is  the  mental  processes  in  the  mind  of  native  speakers. 

253.  The  construction  is  found  with  a  number  of  verbs 
that  may  be  classed  as  verbs  of  cause  and  will:  allow, 
compel^  command,  force,  get,  induce,  lead,  oblige,  order, 
permit,  persuade,  request,  tell.  In  literary  English  we  also 
find  to  cause  and  to  suffer  used  in  the  same  wa}^ 

The  following  examples  chiefly  illustrate  the  inseparable 
type  (252).  Observe  that  the  meaning  of  a  verb  may  be 
affected  by  the  use  of  the  construction,  as  in  the  last 
quotations  with  to  mean. 

George    was  impressed   by  the  scene,  and  he  eagerly 
allowed  it  to  impress  him. 

Bennett,  Roll-Call,  I  ch.  8  §  2. 


i)  The  terms  separable  and    inseparable   lio    not   refer    to    the    order    a^ 
words:  see  260. 


.l86  VERBS 

(The  world)  will  persist  in  reading  those  books  which 
allow  themselves  to  be  read  most  easily. 

Times  Lit.   19/ro,  22. 
I   never   could  get  the  section  to  lie  down  simultane- 
ously. Punch  31/2,   15. 

The  sloping  stroke  through  the  tail  of  the/  —  forming 
the  contraction  for  per  —  might  be  disregarded  by  the 
scribe,  or  might  help  the  p  to  look  more  like  z. 

Corr.  Times  Lit.   12/6,   1924. 
He  induced  the  chiefs  to  allow  their  sons  to  be  trained 
in  liberal  arts.  Somervell,   Hist,  of  England  p.    12. 

He  heard  a  slight  noise  in  front,  which  led  him  to 
halt.  Hardy,  Native  I  ch.  8  p.  86. 

By  one  of  those  odd  chances  which  lead  those  that 
lurk  in  unexpected  corners  to  be  discovered,  while  the 
obvious  are  passed  by  .  .  . 

Hardy,  Ironies  (To  Please  his  Wife  ch.  4). 
My  friend  Latouche  .  .  .  had  persuaded  me  to  go  with 
him.  James.  Daisy  Miller  p.   243. 

Clara  permitted  herself  to  smile. 

Sidgwick,  Severins  ch.  7  p.  6Z. 
Her    "garden,"    in    the    phrase    which   used   to  cause 
Samuel   to  think  how  extraordinarily  feminine  she  was! 
Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  IV  ch.  2  §  I. 
Her  sins  lie  upon  the  head  of  those  who  suffer  her . . . 
to  grow  up  without  religion. 

Besant,  Orange  Girl  (NED). 
"Do    you    mean   me  to  meet  him,  Max.?"  asked  Mrs. 
Manfield.  Hichens,  Way  of  Ambition,  ch.   i. 

He  didn't  mean  them  to  think  he  meant  them  to  hear. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  26  p.   2S0. 
I    shall   tell   him    that    you  have  been  here;  and  that 
I  mean  you  to  come  again. 

Blackmore,  Lorna  Doone  ch,  Gy  p.  513. 

254.  The  object  with  stem  is  also  used  with  to  forbid; 
this  is  probabl}?'  by  the  analogy  of  to  command,  its  semantic 
opposite. 


OBJECT   WITH   STEM  1 8/ 

My  clerical  position  forbade  me  to  swear  at  them. 
Mackenzie,  Rich  Relatives  ch.  7  p.    195. 

.  .  .  bound  to  the  soil  which  they  were  forbidden  to 
leave.  Somervell,  Hist,  of  Engl.  p.    18. 

This  had  the  effect  of  muffling  and  crushing  the  conver- 
sation and  quite  forbidding  anybody  to  be  cheerful  in  any 
circumstances.        Walpole,   Fortitude  I  ch.    12  p.   144. 

255.  It  is  natural  to  find  that  to  bring  can  be  used  with 
an  object  and  verb  stem,  for  it  is  a  synonym  of  to  induce. 
There   is  an  inseparable  group  when  the  stem  is  to  bear. 

I  cannot  quite  bring  myself  to  write  that  in  the  Hat 
period  (i.e.  when  my  father  wore  a  hat  instead  of  a  cap) 
my  Mother  became  kinder  to  me. 

de  Morgan,  Vance  ch.   16. 

Dr.  Robertson  may  well  be  congratulated  on  the 
courage  and  Sympathy  which  he  has  brought  to  bear 
upon  a  difficult  situation.     Pilot  24/10,  1903  p.  387/2. 

F,nglish  anthropologists  have  been  bringing  intensive 
study  to  bear  upon  nearly  every  native  race  in  tropical 
regions.  Times  Lit.    18/3,    15. 

We  have  a  similar  case  in  /  gave  him  to  understand, 
I  led  hint  to  believe. 


256.  Some  verbs  that  take  the  construction,  though  not 
plainly  denoting  cause,  are  related  to  these  in  meaning.  Such 
are  to  leave,  and  to  trust,  as  in  the  following  sentences. 

From  four  hundred  to  four  hundred  and  fifty  each 
might  carry  them  through  their  terms  with  such  great 
economy  as  she  knew  she  could  trust  them  to  practise. 

Hardy,  Ironies  p.   55. 

"Kezia,"  said  the  grandmother,  "can  I  trust  you  to 
carry  the  lamp.?"  Mansfield,  Bliss  p.    11. 

The  moment  was  hers.  He  trusted  her  to  make  the 
best  of  it.  Temple  Thurston,  City  I  ch.    18. 


1 88  VERBS 

Surely  the  eternal  love  she  believed  in  through  all 
the  sadness  of  her  lot,  would  not  leave  her  child  to 
wander  farther  and  farther  into  the  wilderness  till  there 
was  no  turning.  Eliot,  Clerical  Life  (Janet  ch.  5). 

(The  judge)  generally  comments  upon  the  evidence  given 
on  both  sides,  tells  the  jury  what  the  issues  or  points  in 
dispute  between  the  parties  are,  tells  them  what  is  the 
law  which  applies  to  the  case,  and  then  leaves  them  i) 
to  find  their  verdict.  Ruegg,  Engl.  Law  p.   187. 

Very  v/ell,  Mother.  You're  the  doctor.  I'll  do  my 
best  not  to  throw  them  together  when  next  Hobart 
comes  over.  But  we  must  leave  the  children  to  settle 
their  affairs  for  themselves. 

Rose  Macaulay,  Potterism  I  ch.  4  §  6  p.  50. 

257.  The  second  class  of  verbs  taking  the  object  with 
stem  are  the  verbs  expressing  wish:  desire,  want,  wish, 
like,  prefer,  and  the  verb  to  hate,  expressing  what  may 
be  called  the  opposite  of  to  like  (compare  to  forbid  in  2^^). 

The  verbs  of  wish  differ  from  those  of  will  in  that  they 
refer  to  a  state  of  mind,  whereas  the  verbs  of  will  express 
determination  to  act  upon  another  person.  The  construction, 
consequently,  with  the  verbs  of  wish  is  always  of  the 
inseparable  type.  Observe,  however,  that  to  desire  and 
to  want,  and  occasionally  to  wish,  are  'transitional'  cases, 
for  they  ma}^  express  will  as  well  as  wish.  The  use  of 
to  desire  is  limited  chiefly  to  literary  English. 

I  want  you  to  let  me  go.  You  have  never  cared  in 
the  least  for  me  and  you  do  not  want  me  here. 

Walpole,  Fortitude  I  ch.  9  p.   109. 

They  wanted  to  keep  him  there,  that  was  evident. 
Or,  at  any  rate,  they  didn't  want  him  to  see  the 
Procession.  ib.  II  ch.  4  p.   186. 


1)  Of  course   the  judge  does  not  leave  the  court,  although  the  jury  may, 
and  generally  does. 


OBJECT   WITH   STEM  1 89 

What  was  there  that  they  wanted  him  to  avoid?  ib.  ib. 

And  if  I  am  taken  away,  Utterson,  I  wish  you  to 
promise  me  that  you  will  bear  with  him. 

Stevenson,  Dr.  Jekyll  p.  35. 

But  I'd  prefer  to  be  poor,  and  him  to  be  rude  and 
cross  and  impatient  —  which  he  scarcely  ever  is  — ■ 
than  have  this  feehng  all  the  time. 

Bennett,  These  Twain  III  ch.   20  §  7. 

"I  should  have  preferred  you  to  see  Mr.  Peel-Swyn- 
nerton  here,"  said   Constance.  ib.  IV  ch.  3  §  4. 

(They)    preferred    art    to  be  for  the  sake  of  art  only. 
Rose  Macaulay,  Told  by  an  Idiot  II,  X  (T.)  p.  104. 

How  would  you  like  your  mother  to  marry  Mr.  Fenwick.'* 
de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  6  p.   52. 

"You  know  I  hate  you  to  talk  about  him,"  Margaret  inter- 
rupted. Mackenzie,   Guy  and  Pauline  ch.    i,  p.   23. 

It  was  Blanche  who  asked  him  whether  he  liked 
women  to  hunt.  Thackeray,  Pendennis  ch.  45. 

She  could  not  bear  to  smile  or  to  be  gay,  "because 
she  hated  God  to  hear  her  laugh,  as  if  she  had  not 
repented  of  her  sin." 

Lytton  Strachey,  Em.  Vict.  p.   118. 

I  do  not  thank  you  for  that.  I  should  hate  it  to  be 
all  smooth.  Indeed,  I  think  I  like  you  to  desert  me  a 
little  now  and  then.         Hardy,  Native  I  ch.  9  p.  99. 

258.  Closely  allied  to  the  verbs  of  wish  are  to  expect 
and  to  thank  as  used  in  the  following  quotations  {a). 
Observe,  however,  that  to  expect  is  sometimes  rather  a 
verb  of  will.  But  expect  more  frequently  expresses  'to 
anticipate'  without  any  implication  of  a  wish;  in  this  sense 
it  can  also  take  an  object  with  verb  stem  as  well  as  a 
verb  stem  only,  which  is  of  the  type  of  243,  1  {b). 

a.  They  expected  the  widowed  Queen  to  give  her 
heir  the  opportunities  of  putting  his  qualifications  for 
public  responsibility  to  the  test  without  delay. 

Sidney  Lee,  quoted  Engl.   19th  Cent.  II  p,  7. 


190  VERBS 

I'll  thank  you  not  to  interfere. 

Well,  you  can't  expect  her  to  have  gloves. 

Bennett,  Old  W.  T.  IV  ch.  3  §   i. 
Nobody  expects  you  to  make  a  martyr  of  yourself  i). 
b.  I  don't  expect  to  get  there  before  five. 
I  don't  expect  this  fine  weather  to  continue. 

259.  The  object  with  verb  stem  with  to  is  also  found 
with  a  good  many  of  the  verbs  that  can  take  an  object 
and  plain  stem  il95).  It  is  most  convenient  to  treat  these 
cases  (e.g.  //  is  a  book  full  of  matter  tnaking  one  furiously 
to  think.  Rev.  of  Rev.  Jan.  1910)  in  the  next  chapter  on 
Verbals  Cotnpared. 

260.  The  object  and  the  verb  stem  are  not  generally 
separated  by  other  elements  of  the  sentence,  but  such  a 
word-order  is  possible,  as  is  shown  by  the  following 
example. 

Stephen  had  been  wanting  him,  perhaps,  all  this  time 
to  come  to  him  but  had  been  afraid  that  he  might  be 
interfering  if  he  asked  him. 

Walpole,  Fortitude  I  ch.  7  §  2  p.  81. 

„        .^.      ,       261.     It   has  been  shown  that  the  verb  stem 
Prepositional  ,.  ,         .  ,  ,  .        ,      , 

„. .        .  .     as  an  adjunct  to  verbs  with  an  object  leads  ta 
UDject  wltn  .  ,  111  11    1     1 

„  a  special  construction  that  has  been  called  the 

object  with  verb  stem.     Something  similar  has 

occurred  with  the  verb  stem  when  used  as  an  adjunct  to 

nouns,  adjectives,  less  often  verbs  requiring  a  prepositional 

adjunct;  thus  by  the  side  of  //  is  easy  to  do  that  we  find 

//  will  be  easy  for  you  to  do  that.  The  prepositional  group 

serves  primarily  as  an  adjunct  to  the  noun,  adjective,  or 


1)  v.  d.  Gaaf,  Eng.  Studien  62,  p.  409. 


PREPOSITIONAL   OBJECT   WITH   STEM  IQI 

verb  that  precedes,  but  it  incidentally  denotes  the  subject 
of  the  verb  stem. 

a.  But  he  has  told  us  so  often  that  it's  no  use  to 
him  to  live  like  that. 

Gissing,  New  Grub  Street  ch.   i. 

b.  It    is    very  kind  of  you  to  say  so,  I'm  sure. 

It  is  often  observable,  that  the  older  a  man  gets,  the 
more  difficult  it  is  to  him  to  retain  a  believing  conception 
of  his  own  death.  Eliot,  Silas  Marner  ch.  5. 

...  —  no  easy  thing  for  Mrs.  Pascoe's  blowzy 
thunderings  to  conquer,  but  something  vastlj-^  amusing 
apparently  for  Grandfather  Westcott  to  watch. 

Walpole,  Fortitude  I  ch     10  §  3  p.    118. 

The  conditions  are  in  your  favour,  and  it  is  up  to 
you  to  succeed.  Star  6/9,   1927. 

c.  He  handed  it  (viz.  the  telegram)  to  her  to  read. 

Galsworthy,   Freelands  ch.  34  p.  340. 
William    Morris    began     the     modern    theory    of    the 
practical    value    of    art,    but    left    it    to    other?   to  work 
it  out.  Times  Lit.    15/2,    18. 

I  was  a  perfect  Helliio  Librornni  i),  even  when  the 
books  were  exercise  books  and  called  upon  me  to 
translate  unconnected  statements  into  Latin. 

De  Morgan,  Vance  ch.    12. 
This    is    a  private  matter,  and  I  beg  of  you  to  let  it 
sleep.  Stevenson,  Jekyll  p.  34. 

She   trusted    to  them  to  make  the  arrangements  con- 
cerning her  will.  Mem.  Verney  Family  I  243. 
They  were  pleading  to  him  to  stop.  , 

Walpole,  Fortitude  II  ch.  4  p.   182. 
As  he  reminds  us  in  the  introduction,  he  was  singularly 
fortunate   in    his   advisers ;  he  could  depend  on  them  ta 
interpret  with  full  knowledge  and  insight  the  wishes  and 
points  of  view  of  other  countries. 

Times  Lit.   i/io,  25. 


1)  Swallower  of  books. 


192  VERBS 

It  was  indeed  of  the  greatest  advantage  that  during 
these  ten  years  Lord  Grey  had  to  work  with  men  who 
knew  this  country  so  well  as  Cambon  and  Beckendorff; 
and  he  could  rely  on  them  to  exercise  a  calming  influence 
on  any  apprehensions  that  might  arise  in  Paris  or 
Petersburg.  ib,  ib. 

262.  As  in  the  case  of  the  plain  object  with  stem  a 
shifting  would  almost  inevitabh"  occur,  the  prepositional 
group  from  being  primarily  an  adjunct  to  the  preceding 
word  turning  into  a  subject  of  the  verb  stem  although  the 
connection  with  the  preceding  word  need  not  be  broken 
completely.  This  may  appl}^  to  a  few  of  the  quotations 
of  261,  as  to  the  third  quotation  under  b,  and  perhaps  the 
two  last  oi  c]  it  clearl}'  applies  to  the  following  cases. 

When  a  man  of  letters  who  is  not  by  trade  a  writer 
of  fiction  surprises  us  late  in  his  career  with  a  first 
novel,  as  the  editor  of  the  Spectator  does  with  the 
Madonna  of  the  Barricades,  we  can  generally  count  on 
the  pleasure  he  took  in  writing  it  to  give  an  exhilaration 
to  its  pages.  Times  Lit.   8/io,   1925   p.  654/2. 

The  regulations  allow  of  only  two  preservatives  to 
be  used  in  food  and  drink  i). 

Dr.  Arbuthnot,  Graphic  28/11   28. 

Besides  I  want  to  see  that  boy  of  mine's  being  brought 
up  properly.  I  look  forward  to  him  to  be  the  bread- 
winner when  his  poor  father  is  past  work  ^). 

Pett  Ridge,  Mrs.  Galer's  Business  p.  244  (Nelson). 

263.  The  sentences  quoted  in  the  preceding  section 
show  that  English  has  a  prepositional  object  with  verb 
stem  in  the  same  sense  as  we  take  the  term  object  with 
verb  stem  in  the  case  of  the  verbs  of  wish :  the  pre- 
positional   group   is   essentially  a  means  of  indicating  the 


i)  Arvid  Smith  in  Moderna  Spmk,  Dec.   1929. 


PREPOSITIONAL   OBJECT   WITH   STEM  1 93 

subject  of  the  stem.  The  construction  has  not  extended 
very  far,  however,  except  in  the  case  of  the  preposition 
for.  We  must,  consequently,  deal  with  this  use  more 
fully,  and  finally  attempt  to  account  for  the  exceptional 
position  of  this  preposition  in  these  constructions. 

264.  The  double  interpretation  of  the  prepositional 
group  may  often  seem  possible  to  a  student  who  tries  to 
analyse  a  sentence.  But  for  native  speakers  the  very  fact 
that  in  numberless  cases  the  group  with  for  has  no  other 
function  than  the  one  of  expressing  the  subject  of  the 
verb  stem  influences  their  appreciation  of  cases  when 
both  interpretations  may  seem  equally  'logical'. 

In  the  following  quotations  the  two  interpretations  might 
be  supposed  to  be  both  possible,  although  there  is  no 
doubt  that  an  English  speaker  understands  the  prepositional 
adjunct  as  indicating  the  subject  of  the  verb  stem. 

The  night  is  too  dark  for  us  to  move  in. 

Cooper,  Spy  i). 

In  the  last  century  it  became  more  and  more  the 
custom  for  boys  to  be  at  home  or  with  friends  from 
Saturday  till  Monday.  Westminster  School. 

He  had  cared  so  much  for  the  Earl  of  Dorincourt 
and  his  pleasures  that  there  had  been  no  time  for  him 
to  think  of  other  people.     Fauntleroy,  Gruno  ed.  p.  46. 

I  consider  that  the  time  has  come  for  me  to  follow  in 
the  footsteps  of  my  ancestors.  Marj.   Bowen, 

I  Will  Maintain,   %6. 

265.  In  the  following  sentences  the  shifting  is  complete: 
the  prepositional  group  serves  as  a  subject  to  the  verb  stem, 
although  it  is  not  disconnected  from  the  preceding  word. 

The  girls  made  way  for  him  to  pass  them  at  the 
head  of  the  twisting  stairs. 

Bennett,  Old  \V.  T.  I  ch.   i   §  3. 

1)  Stoffel,  Studies  in  English  p.  74. 
Kruisinga,  Handbook  II.  Accidence  and  Syntax.  1.  13 


194  VERBS 

The  risks  of  war  are  too  momentous,  and  the  inevitable 
and  lasting  set-back  to  progress  is  too  grave  for  any 
nation  lightly  to  engage  in  hostilities. 

Academy,   17/8,   12. 

There  was  too  much  fascination,  too  great  a  sense  of 
entanglement  in  Lady  John's  private  company  for  Steve 
to  look  on  it  with  complete  indifference. 

Patterson,  Stephen  Compton,  p.  221. 

It  was  doubtless  a  step  in  advance  for  the  law  to  admit 
that  insanity  was  a  disease.         Athenaeum,  9/1 1,    12. 

A    book    of   this    kind    divides    itself,  as  naturally  as 

some    other    things,    into    three    parts.     There    are    the 

editor's    remarks,    which,    of  course,  are,  like  all  critical 

remarks,  for  its  readers  to  accept  or  not,  as  they  choose  .  .  . 

Saintsbury  in  Everyman,  25/4,   13. 

266.  In  the  following  sentences  the  noun  (or  pronoun) 
with  for  is  not  an  adjunct  to  the  preceding  noun  (a), 
adjective  (6)  or  verb  (c),  but  exclusively  the  subject  of  the 
following  verb  stem. 

a.  It's  no  use  for  you  to  be  angry  with  me. 

Sinister  Street  p.    105 1. 

It's  no  good  for  Mr.  Lloyd  George  to  attempt  to  cure 
the  gathered  ill  of  a  century  with  half  an  hour  or  so  of 
eloquence.  Wells,  What  is  Coming  p.   iio. 

No.  I  don't  sigh  for  that.  There  are  other  things  for 
me  to  sigh  for.     Hardy,  Return  of  the  Native  IV  ch.  2. 

b.  After  luncheon,  Mrs.  Hamley  went  to  rest,  in 
preparation  for  Roger's  return;  and  Molly  also  retired 
to  her  own  room,  feeling  that  it  would  be  better  for 
her  to  remain  there  until  dinner-time  and  so  to  leave 
the    father    and  mother  to  receive  their  boy  in  privac)''. 

Gaskell,  Wives  I  ch.  8. 
The  opening  years  of  Elizabeth's  reign  are  of  such 
importance  in  the  development  of  both  Church  and  State 
that  it  is  scarcely  possible  for  too  much  attention  to  be 
devoted  to  this  period  of  the  nation's  history  by  genuine 
historical  students. 


PREPOSITIONAL   OBJECT   WITH   STEM  I95 

He  expressed  himself,  of  course,  with  excentric  abandon  — 
it  would  have  been  impossible  for  him  to  do  otherwise; 
but  he  was  content  to  indicate  his  deepest  feelings  with 
a  fleer.  Lytton  Strachey,  Em.  Vict.  p.  292. 

And  he  goes  on  to  argue  that  these  are  values  and 
experiences  too  great  for  us  to  surrender,  and  that  we  are 
entitled  to  demand  for  them  the  only  ground  on  which 
they  can  stand.  Bailey,  Question  of  Taste  p.  6. 

c.  But  one  longs  for  a  novelist  to  arise  with  the 
breadth  of  national  and  intellectual  horizons  of  M.  Romain 
Rolland's  "Jean  Christophe".  Nation,    12/7,    13. 

Fact  is,  she  whispered,  two  friends  of  mine  have  just 
come  in.  Ladies  in  the  same  establishment.  It  would 
never  do  for  them  to  see  me. 

Pett  Ridge,  Name  of  Garland. 

Observe  that  this  interpretation  depends  upon  the  nature 
of  the  sentence,  for  in  similar  cases  a  double  interpretation 
might  be  possible. 

It  is  impossible  for  me  to  alter  my  plans  now, 

267.  Finally,  the  construction  with  for  is  used,  with 
nouns  and  adjectives,  in  such  a  way  that  it  is  clearly 
nothing  but  the  subject  of  the  stem.  The  construction 
cannot  be  interpreted  in  any  other  manner: 

(1)  when  it  occurs  after  adjectives  and  nouns  in  a  way 
that  precludes  the  double  interpretation  of  263. 

(2)  when  for  is  followed  b}^  the  meaningless  words  it 
or  there. 

(3)  when  the  adjunct  with  for  is  separated  from  the 
adjective  or  noun,  by  intervening  words,  or  by  a 
pause. 

(4)  when  it  opens  the  sentence. 

I.  It  was  far  too  much  of  a  gala  day  for  the  work 
of  the  little  town  to  go  forward  with  its  usual  regularity. 

Gaskell,  Wives  I  ch,  2. 


196  VERBS 

When  Dyson  had  got  accustomed  to  the  sound  he 
declared  himself  willing  for  Humphrey  to  try  again. 

Montgomery,  Misunderstood. 

"I  had  to  tell  Miss  Verney,"  Pauline  explained. 
"I  am  delighted  for  Miss  Verney  to  knovv',"  said  Guy. 
Mackenzie,   Guy  and  Pauline  p.    133. 

She  was  so  anxious  that  no  trace  of  the  tempest 
that  had  passed  over  her  should  be  left  for  Sally  to 
see  in  the  morning  that  she  got  as  quickly  as  possible 
to  bed.         de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  43  p,  479. 

Of  course   she  was  glad  for  him  to  like  Margaret . .  . 

Guy  and  Pauline  p.  65. 

The  last  statement,  remarkable  as  it  is,  sounds  true ; 
for  it  would  have  been  still  more  remarkable  for  the 
King  to  have  invented  it.  Times  Lit.   18/9,  24. 

Henry  II  only  crushed  the  barons  with  the  help  of 
the  lower  orders  and  of  ministers  raised  from  the  ranks. 
It  was  left  for  his  sons  to  alienate  the  support  which 
he  had  enlisted.  Pollard,  Hist,  of  Engl.  ch.  2  p.  52. 

Just  half  a  second  for  this  sickness  to  go  off,  and  he 
would  act.     de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  46  p.  500. 

It  is  folly  or  were  wanton  self-deception  for  you  to 
pretend  that  you  can  live  by  poetry. 

Mackenzie,  Guy  and  Pauline  p.  235. 

If  as  she  feared  he  was  feeling  hostile  to  religion  she 
would  accept  the  warning  of  the  night  and  give  all  her 
determination  to  prayer  for  his  faith  to  return,  ib.  p.  3 1 1. 

When  he  sat  down  .  .  .  there  were  cries  for  the  motion 
to  be  put.  Patterson,  Stephen  Compton,  p.  332. 

There  is  always  a  tendency,  a  dangerous  tendenc)', 
as  literature  accumulates,  for  poetry  to  develop  a  language 
of  its  own.       Abercrombie,  Poetry  and  Cont.  Speech. 

Sir  Austin  signified  his  opinion  that  a  boy  should 
obey  his  parent,  by  giving  orders  to  Benson  for  Ripton's 
box  to  be  packed  and  ready  before  noon. 

Meredith,  R.  Feverel,  p.  42. 


PREPOSITIONAL   OBJECT   WITH   STEM  1 97 

2.  We  should  be  sorry  for  there  to  be  many  more 
additions  to  the  literature  of  Stevenson's  life  in  the 
South  Seas. 

The  address  "The  Religion  of  Humanity"  attracted 
at  the  time  it  was  delivered  a  sufficient  amount  of  in- 
terest for  it  to  be  unnecessary  here  to  do  more  than 
record  the  fact  of  its  republication. 

Chaucer  was  not  so  well  off  for  subjects  for  it  to  be  pro- 
bable that  if  he  learnt  this  story  from  Petrarch  in  1373 
he  would  have  left  it  unused  for  a  dozen  years  or  more. 

Chaucer,  Globe  ed.  p.  XXV. 

It  stands  to  reason  that  it  can't  be  right  for  all  the 
wealth  to  be  in  the  pockets  of  the  few,  and  for  there 
to  be  a  distinct  and  cocky  governing  class. 

Ernest  Raymond,  Tell  England  XII,   154. 

3.  It  may  be  reasonably  premised  that  nothing  can  be 
more  unhealthy  than  for  a  party  to  find  itself  strong  in 
the  House  of  Commons  but  weak  in  the  Constituencies. 

Oxf.  and  Camb.  Rev.  n°.   16. 

It  was  as  unsafe  for  a  story-teller  to  depart  from  the 
well-marked  lines  of  inherited  tradition  as  for  him  to 
disregard  orthodox  belief. 

Schofield,  Eng.  Lit.  to  Chaucer  p.  6. 

From  the  OE  period  down  to  the  present  day  there 
has  always  been  a  tendency  to  weaken  the  vowels  in 
unaccented  syllables,  and  then  often  for  the  weakened 
vowels  to  disappear. 

Wright,  El.  MnE  Grammar  §   141. 

Perhaps  it  must  be  admitted  that  interference  in  Ar- 
menia was  too  perilous  for  the  general  peace  of  the  world 
for  us  to  widertake. 

R.  le  Gallienne,  in  Engl.   19th  Cent.  II  p.   138. 
Quite    alright    for    us    for  you  to  arrive  at  any  time. 

Private  postcard. 
He  will  be  glad.  Come  and  see  him  yourself,  for  him 
to  thank  you. 

Besant  and  Rice,  My  Little  Girl  p.   121. 

4.  For     Count    Czernin's    statement    to    be    true    M. 


198  VERBS 

Clemenceau  would  have  had  to  have  taken  the  initiative 
in  the  matter  before  he  became  Prime  Minister  1). 

Times  W.    12/4,   18. 

But  for  this  to  be  worked  into  some  great  structure 
of  epic  poetry,  the  Heroic  Age  must  be  capable  of  pro- 
ducing individuality  of  much  profounder  nature  than  any 
of  its  fighting  champions, 

Abercrombie,  The  Epic  p.   16. 

For  this  desirable  consummation  to  be  feasible  it  is, 
however,  expedient  that...       Times  VV,  23/11    1914. 

268.  It  may  seem  that  front-position  of  the  for-adjunct 
is  not  in  itself  a  proof  of  its  new  function.  For  other  pre- 
positional adjuncts  may  also  have  front-position :  For  your 
brother  it  ivoiild  be  an  excellent  change.  It  should  be  con- 
sidered, however,  that  front-position  in  such  cases  is  necessarily 
emphatic,  which  it  is  not  in  the  case  of  the  adjunct  serving 
as  a  subject  to  the  stem. 

269.  The  function  of  the  /cr-adjunct  as  the  subject  of 
the  stem  is  also  indicated  by  the  pause  v^^hich  often 
separates  it  from  the  preceding  part  of  the  sentence.  In 
the  following  cases  the  pause  is  indicated  by  the  punctuation. 

He  only  needed  to  read  a  passage  over  once  casuall}', 
for  it  to  be  impressed  on  his  mind  ever  afterwards. 

Morison,  Macaulay  2). 
"Cousin  Tom,"  said  mother,  and  trying  to  get  so^)  that 
Annie  and  I  could  not  hear  her;  "it  would  be  a  sad  and 
unkinlike  thing,  for  you  to  despise  our  dwelling-house." 
Blackmore,  Lorna  Doone  ch.   11, 
And  why  not  take  some  of  this  delightful  toadstool  with 
him,  for  them  to  eat.  Wells,  Country  p.  251. 


1)  Note    that  the  prepositional  object  with  slem  in  this  sentence  has  tlie 
function  of  a  freo  adjunct. 

2)  Stoffel,  Studies  in  Evglish  p.  73. 

3)  i.  e.  to  gain  sucli  a  position. 


PREPOSITIONAL   OBJECT   WITH   STEM  1 99 

270.  The  prepositional  object  with  stem  is  also  found 
with  verbs  which  can  take  a  noun-adjunct  with  for:  to 
arrange^  care,  zvait,  long,  etc.     See  266,  c. 

Or    should    she    telegraph    to    Muriel   and    ask  her  to 
arrange    for    a    trustworthy    person    to  escort  the  child. 
Mackenzie,  Seven  Ages  of  Woman  ch.  7  p.  277. 

Well,  confound  him,  it  wasn't  to  be  expected  that  he 
should    much    care    for    his    wife    to  write  for  the  Fact. 
Rose  Macaulay,  Potterism  II  ch.   3   p.   85  f. 

The  enterprise  of  Messrs.  T.  Nelson  &  Sons  and  the 
friendly  accommodation  of  Messrs.  Macmillan  render  pos- 
sible this  collection  in  one  cover  of  all  the  short  stories 
by  me  that  I  care  for  anyone  to  read  again. 

Wells,  Country  of  the  Blind,  Introd. 

Adelaide  knows  quite  well  she  has  lots  of  friends  I 
should  not  care  for  you  to  yacht  with. 

Hichens,  Ambition  ch.   5   p.   53. 

George  waited  for  Irene  Wheeler  to  begin  to  talk.  She 
did  not  begin  to  talk,  Bennett,  Roll-Call  I  ch.  6. 

Constance  rang  the  bell  for  Maggie  to  clear  the  table. 
Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  II  ch.   i   §   i. 

The  Liberals  are  urgently  pressing  for  a  decision  to 
be  made.  Times  W.   2/2,,   17. 

When  they  planned  for  me  to  stop  till  to-morrow, 
I  didn't  like  saying  how  very,  very  much  I  wanted  to 
go  home.  Gaskell,  Wives  I  ch.   2. 

I  can  never  believe  ...  it  can  be  ever  be  meant  for 
me  to  settle  down  to  peace  and  comfort  in  a  simple 
household.         Blackmore,  Lorna  Doone  ch.  35  p.  231. 

John  would  need  every  penny  that  he  earned  to 
support  the  woman  whom  she  longed  for  him  to  make 
his  wife.  Temple  Thurston,   City  III  ch.   2. 

And  then  (he)  sat  on  and  waited  —  waited  as  for  a 
rescue  —  for  Sally  to  come  and  fill  up  the  house  with 
her  voice  and  her  indispensable  self. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.   16  p.   160. 

Nancy,    casting  her  eye  around  the  farm  kitchen  one 


200  VERBS 

dismal  afternoon,  while  she  waited  for  her  irons  to  heat, 
thought  how  dull  and  shabby  it  looked. 

Freeman,  Joseph  ch.   13  p.    112. 
She  longed  for  him  to  say  something.  .  . 

Mackenzie,  Guy  and  Pauline  p.  74. 

271.  When  the  /br-construction  is  used  with  to  hope, 
wish,  like,  love;  it  may  seem  to  be  different  from  the  cases 
in  the  preceding  section,  because  these  verbs  do  not  re- 
quire a  /cr-adjunct,  and  the  last  two  rarely  take  it.  But 
they  caji,  take  such  an  adjunct  with  a  noun  and  pronoun, 
and  are  essentially  identical  with  the  preceding  cases,  hi 
both,  the  /or-adjunct  is  disconnected  from  the  preceding 
verb  and  serves  exclusively  for  a  subject  of  the  verb  stem. 

The  desire  of  the  working-classes,  many  of  them 
now  better  off  than  they  have  ever  been,  is  for  a  better 
life  for  their  children  than  they  have  had  themselves, 
and  it  is  in  the  leisure  years  of  childhood,  above  all, 
that  they  hope  for  their  children  to  find  it. 

Times  Ed.  S.   22/5,    19. 

I  do  think  that  after  all  these  months  of  hoping  for 
your  poem  to  be  a  success  that  you  ought  at  least  to  try 
them  first...        Mackenzie,  Guy  and  Pauline  p.  331. 

I  would  like  for  you  to  tell  the  story  I  told  you  to  your 
uncle  1).     Everett  Green,  Miss  Malory  of  Mote  p.  in. 

We  must  get  this  matter  settled  before  I  go  back  to 
Magda;  .  .  .  she'll  love  for  me  to  go  with  you  —  and  I 
should  like  it  too.  ib.  p.  210. 

Molly    could    not    imagine   how    she  had  at  one  time 
wished  for  her  father's  eyes  to  be  opened. 
Gaskell,  Wives  II  p.  279  (ib.  Ich.  I2p  214;  ch.  13  p.  232). 

He  wished  for  Stella  and  Alan  to  have  all  the  benisons 
of  the  world  2).  Sinister  Street  p.  816. 


4)  V.  d.  Gaaf,  EnjJ.  Siudien  62  p.  408. 

2)  Compare  wish  with  a  pronoun-adjunct  with  for: 

She'd  a  good  home,  and  everything  she  could  wish  for. 

Galsworthy,  Man  of  Property  ch.  3  p.  56. 


PREPOSITIONAL   OBJECT   WITH   STEM  201 

272.  There  are  very  few  verbs  that  cannot  take  for- 
adjuncts  with  a  noun  and  pronoun  though  they  take  the 
prepositional  object  with  stem.  Examples  are  here  given  of 
to  agree,  expect,  want  and  dread.  The  construction  seems 
to  be  less  restricted  in  dialectal  English;  it  is  certainly 
now  pushing  its  way  into  Standard  English. 

I  ought  to  hurry  back ;  but  he  wanted  to  prevent 
Major  Roper  coming  round  and  getting  worn  himself; 
so  we  agreed  for  me  to  come.  I'll  just  give  my  message 
and  come  back. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  23  p.  236. 

I    do    not,   however,   think  that  Magdalena  herself  .  .  . 
had  expected  for  new  callers  to  present  themselves, 
Everett  Green,  Miss  Mallory  of  Mote. 

My  heart  ached  and  ached  and  ached.  I  wanted  so 
for  her  to  die.  If  she  had  asked  me  to  do  it,  I  would 
have  ended  her  life  with  an  injection  of  morphine,  but 
she  said  nothing.     Mary  Borden,  Jane  —  Our  Stranger, 

II  ch.  7  p.   298. 

This  was  a  miserable  hour  for  Michsel,  who  all  the 
time  was  dreading  many  unfortunate  events,  as  for  the 
cabman  to  get  down  from  his  box  and  quarrel  about 
the  fare,  or  for  the  train  to  be  full,  or  for  Stella  to  be 
sick  during  the  journey,  or  for  him  and  her  to  lose 
Nurse,  or  for  all  of  them  to  get  into  the  wrong  train, 
or  for  a  railway  accident  to  happen,  or  for  any  of  the 
uncomfortable  contingencies  to  which  seaside  travellers 
were  liable.  Sinister  Street  p.   79  f. 

273.  Perhaps  to  take  might  have  been  included  in  the 
preceding  section. 

It  takes  one  hundred  years  or  more  for  the  Copernican 
system  to  get  itself  established. 

Bailey,  Question  of  Taste  p.  7. 

274.  The  quotations  of  272  have  shown  that  the  for- 
construction   is   not   only  a  substitute  for  the  plain  object 


202  VERBS 

with  verb  stem  in  the  case  of  verbs  that  do  not  take  the 
latter  construction  (such  as  to  hope  and  to  dread\  but  is 
also  a  competitor  of  the  other  construction:  thus  in  the 
case  of  to  like,  love,  wish,  ivant,  expect.  This  is  also  the 
case   with    to   ask  and  to  beg  in  the  following  quotations. 

Somehow,  he  rather  disliked  asking  for  Molly  to  pro- 
long her  visit.  Gaskell,   Wives  I  ch.  7  p.    113. 

I    guess    your    request.     I    make    it    before    you    do. 
I  beg  for  dear  little  Molly  to  stay  on  here. 

ib.  ch.    7  p.    114. 

275.  The  quotations  of  274  are  instructive:  they  show 
that  one  reason  for  taking  the  /or- construction  instead  of 
the  plain  object-with-stem  is  that  the  latter  prevents  the 
noun  {Molly)  from  being  taken  for  an  adjunct  to  the 
leading  verb  that  precedes  it  {asking,  beg). 

In  the  case  of  to  wish  (see  the  last  two  quotations  of 
271)  it  seems  to  the  present  writer  that  the /or-construction 
carries  the  event  or  state  into  the  unknown,  perhaps 
distant,  future,  whereas  the  plain  object-with-stem  {ivished 
her  father  s  eyes  to  be  opeiied,  wished  Stella  and  Alan  to 
have)  refers  to  what  practical  people  call  the  present. 
The  /or-construction  consequentl}^  seems  to  occupy  a 
place  that  in  other  languages  is  sometimes  occupied  by 
a  'future  infinitive'. 

„         ^.  276.     The /cr-construction,  like  the  plain  object- 

Connecting     .  ,  .  '  .  „  '      ,.        *^  ■'    , 

^    ,       with-stem,    is    essentially    an    adjunct  to  a  verb, 

noun,    or  adjective.     It  has  been  shown  that  the 

stem  often  takes  a  fuller  connecting  word  than  the  simple 

to:  ill  order  to,  so  as  to  (230 ff.).     This  is  never  found  in 

the    case    of   the    plain    object-with-stem,   rarely   with  the 

prepositional  object-with-stem,  at  least  in  Standard  English. 

Exactly  how  much  more  was  implied,  whether  in  order 
for    an    eiitry    to    be    accepted  it   was    necessary  for  the 


FOR-COIsSTRUCTION   AS   AN   INDEPENDENT   GROUP       203 

enterer     to     exhibit     the     authorization     of    the    official 
hcensers  ...  is  an  open  question. 

McKerrow,  Bibhography  p.    136. 


an  independent 
Group 


„  ^     ^,  277.     In  all  the  precedms:  sections  the 

F  0  r-construction  as    .  ^  '='         ,. 

/or-construction   serves    as  an  adjunct  to 

some    noun    or    adjective,    or   to  a  verb. 

But  when  this  verb  is  to  be  used  as  a 
copula,  the  result  is  that  the  /or- construction  has  the 
function  of  a  nominal  predicate.  This  is  a  very  common 
construction. 

I  have  decided  that  the  best  plan  will  be  for  you  to 
be  sent  somewhere  by  me,  to  make  a  real  thing  of  the 
excuse.  Hardy,  Native  II  ch.  4  p,   155. 

It  may  be  remarked  that  the  tendency  in  Jamaica 
had  almost  always  hitherto  been  for  the  Crown  officials 
to  take  the  part  of  the  negroes,  and  for  the  Jamaica 
authorities  to  side  with  the  local  magnates. 

Justin  McCarthy,  Hist,  of  Our  Own  Times, 
in  Engl.    19th  cent.  II  p.   20  f. 

The  present  tendency  among  the  larger  civilized  nations 
is  for  each  of  them  to  use  its  own  language  in  diplomacy, 
this  practice  having  been  begun,  I  believe,  by  Germany 
and  Great  Britain. 

H.  W.  Steed  in  Mod.  Languages   1929  p.  72. 

The  only  expedient  method  by  which  land  may  be 
nationalised  is  for  the  State  to  buy  it.  Everyman. 

The  reader,  therefore,  will  have  no  right  in  future  to 
complain  that  our  literary  criticism  is  too  dogmatic.  It 
will  be  for  him  to  challenge  our  dogmatism,  to  criticise 
our  criticisms.  Everyman,  3/1,   13. 

278.  In  such  a  sentence  as  W s  no  use  for  yoii  to  be 
angry  voith  me  (266  «)  it  is  evident  that  the /br-construction 
qualifies  the  predicative  no  use,  so  that  it  may  be  defined 
as  its  adjunct.  But  it  is  impossible,  at  the  same  time, 
not  to  see  that  the  /br-construction  expresses  what  is  'no 


204  VERBS 

use*,   i.  e,  that  it  serves  as  a  subject.     This  interpretation 
applies  to  the  following  sentences. 

It  is  better  for  a  municipal  election  to  be  decided  by 
political  considerations  than  by  considerations  of  social 
position. 

The  tales  are  not  amusing.  It  is  good  for  this  to  be 
said  bluntly.     It  is  perfectly  true. 

279.  The  /or-construction  is  clearly  an  independent 
element  of  the  sentence  when  it  opens  it  as  a  grammatical 
subject. 

For  her  not  to  go  would  look  as  if  she  were  afraid 
of  meeting  him.  London  Magaz.  July   1918. 

For  man  to  reclaim  much  of  this  man-made  wilderness 
will  be  hard  and  within  the  life  of  modern  explosives 
at  least,  dangerous  work.  Times  W.    11/5,    17. 

For  a  woman  to  look  at  her  best  is  a  point  of 
discipline  as  much  as  that  the  British  soldier  shall  shave, 
even  under  fire.  ib.  21/12,    17. 

It  is,  however,  devoutly  to  be  desired  that  the  incident 
will  not  close  without  a  searching  inquiry.  For  thirteen 
houses  to  collapse  suddenly,  argues  surely,  that  there  is 
something  rotten  in  their  condition. 

Everyman,   5/9,   13. 

Talking  in  private  I  hope  still  may  do  good.  But  for 
me  to  attempt  to  discuss  the  merits  of  the  question  this 
afternoon  can  do  no  good.  Daily  News, 

There   was    nothing   for  it  but  for  Gaston  to  go,  and 
go  quickly,  though  the  moment  was  rather  awkward. 
Henry  James,  Reverberator,  p.   123. 

There  is  nothing  for  it  but  for  men  of  education  to 
carry  the  war  into  the  enemy's  camp. 

Oxf.  and  Camb.  Rev.  n°.   16. 

In  the  eyes  of  a  British  jury  for  a  woman  to  offer 
a  reason  for  doing  anything  only  makes  her  offence  the 
blacker.       Chapin,  New  Morality,  in  Brit.  PI.  p.   561. 


USE   OF    FOR  205 

280.  It  has  been  tried  to  show  in  the  preceding 
sections  how  natural  it  is  for  a  prepositional  adjunct 
to  a  noun,  adjective,  or  verb,  if  it  incidentally  serves  to 
express  the  subject  of  a  following  verbal  form,  to  come  to 
be  used  exclusively  in  this  last  function.  It  remains^  however 
to  explain  why  this  shifting  has  taken  place,  not,  indeed', 
exclusively  (261  f.)  but  nearly  so,  in  the  case  oi  for. 

Perhaps  the  most  important  cause  of  this  special  position 
of  for  is  its  frequency.  A  great  many  adjectives,  such  as 
easy,  dificuli,  hard,  pleasant \  also  many  nouns  or  verbs 
{arrangement,  to  arrange^  can  freely  take  it,  to  denote  the 
person  concerned.  The  following  sentence  contains  two  cases, 
both  perfectly  natural. 

Of  course  it  is  a  duty  for  Judith  to  kill  Holofernes, 
and  it  is  the  proper  alternative  for  her  to  choose. 

Essays  and  Studies   13  p.   24. 

Other  prepositions  are  occasionally  found,  but  these  cases 
are  a  minority,  and  frequently  would  allow  of  for  being 
substituted,  not  vice  versa. 

It  is  often  observable,  that  the  older  a  man  gets,  the 
more  difficult  it  is  to  him  to  retain  a  believing  conception 
of  his  own  death.  Eliot,  Silas  Marner  ch.   5. 

281.  Another  cause  is  the  possibility  of  emphasizing  the 
final  meaning  of  the  verb  stem  by  using  for  to  connect  the 
noun  and  the  leading  word:  this  second  meaning  of  for  has 
already  been  alluded  to  in  208.  This  meaning  oi for  is  plain 
in  many  of  the  quotations  in  the  preceding  sections,  but  the 
following  seem  to  be  very  instructive  in  this  respect. 

We  have  already  referred  to  the  trackway  system  of 
the  megalithic  culture  in  England,  but  it  needs  a  little 
more  extensive  treatment  for  the  reader  to  grasp  the 
idea,  first,  of  a  grouping  of  settlements  upon  a  system- 
atic plan  .  .  .     Massingham,  Pre-Roman  Britain  p.  igf. 


206  VERBS 

"I  have  found  you  a  gown  after  all." 

"Where  is  it?" 

"Where  is  it?"  her  uncle  repeated.  "Why,  waiting 
upstairs  in  your  bedroom,  of  course,  for  you  to  put 
it  on  ..."    Mackenzie,  Rich  Relatives  ch.   12,  p.   298. 

Observe  that  in  the  last  quotation  the  use  of  it  [to  put 
it  on)  proves  the  complete  separation  of  the  /(7r-construction 
from  waiting  upstairs. 

282.  The  meaning  oi  for  in  the  construction  can  also  be 
shown  negatively:  when  for  does  not  express  the  meanings 
mentioned  we  cannot  use  the  construction  with  the  verb  stem. 

No  Danish  inroads  are  recorded  in  his  day :  this  does 
not  prove  that  none  took  place,  but  there  is  such  an 
ample  list  of  ravagings  in  the  Prankish  realms  and  in 
Ireland  during  859 — 60  that  it  is  easy  to  account  for 
England  being  spared  for  the  moment. 

Oman,  Conquest  p.  433. 

Similarly,  although  agree  can  take  the  /<?r-construction^ 
we  must  use  a  different  construction  v/hen  no  future  arrange- 
ment is  to  be  expressed. 

I  do  not  agree  with  you  in  thinking  her  right  in 
refusing  a  second  marriage. 

Meredith,  Harrington  ch.  47  p.  471. 

283.  The  character  of  the  y(?r-construction  also  comes 
out  when  we  study  the  cases  when  a  verb  takes  both  the 
plain  and  the  prepositional  object-with-stem:  this  has  been 
indicated  in  275. 

f...         . ,  284.     In  dealing  with  the  object-with-plain 

UuJCCt     WItn  •         1  1  1       /r^^/-^\  1  1 

n    J.    ,.      o^       stem   It  has  been  stated  (200)  that  the  con- 
Predicative  Stem  .        .  .       ,  ,  , 

struction    is    restricted    to    the    stems    that 

denote    an    action   or   occurrence,  and  is  never  used  with 

a    stem    expressing    a    state.     The    distinction   is  natural, 

for  in  the  case  of  verbs  expressing  actions  or  occurrences 


OBJECT   WITH   PREDICATIVE   STEM  20/ 

the  group  is  a  much  closer  unit,  the  action  and  its  agent: 
or  the  occurrence  and  its  source,  being  a  closer  group  in 
the  mind  of  the  speaker,  than  with  verbs  expressing  a. 
state.  An  outwardly  similar  construction  is  possible,  how- 
ever, with  the  latter  class :  No  one  could  possibly  enter 
his  rooms  without  perceiving  him  to  be  a  man  of  wealth 
(Galsv^'orthy,  Man  of  Property  ch.  3.  p.  43).  It  seems 
evide.it  that  the  functions  of  each  element  of  the  group 
perceiving  him  to  be  can  be  distinguished  more  satisfactorily 
than  in  the  apparently  parallel  seeing  him  i^tm  azvay.  We 
may  grant  that  hmt  is  to  be  interpreted  as  an  object  in 
both  cases,  but  if  to  be  is  called  a  predicative  adjunct  to 
this  object,  it  will  be  impossible  to  account  for  run  away 
in  the  same  manner.  But  if  we  fail  to  account  for  run 
away  our  'interpretation'  of  the  preceding  him  is  shown 
to  be  without  foundation.  And  with  regard  to  perceive, 
etc.,  though  the  interpretation  of  the  stem  as  a  predicative 
adjunct  may  seem  more  acceptable,  it  should  be  considered 
that  the  stem  with  to  is  never  used  as  a  predicative  ad- 
junct to  the  object  of  many  verbs  that  are  construed  with  an 
object  and  predicative  noun  or  adjective.  See  the  sections 
on  Sentence  Structure  (vol.  3),  and  compare  100  on  the  ing^ 
in  this  function  (/  call  that  stretching  veracity  too  far). 

The  two  constructions  do  not  only  differ  in  their  gram- 
matical character:  they  also  belong  to  different  planes  of 
English.  Whereas  the  object-with-plain  stem  is  one  of  the 
most  frequent  constructions  in  English,  with  the  firmest 
'roots'  in  the  language  of  every  speaker,  the  object-with- 
predicative  stem  with  to,  though  found  v.'ith  the  same  verbs 
and  with  verbs  that  are  identical  with  them  in  meaning  or 
closely  related  to  them,  is  almost  exclusively  restricted  to 
what  may  be  called  literary  English,  The  term  'literary' 
English  should  not  be  taken  to  mean  the  language  of  artists,, 
but  the  language  of  those  who  habitually  handle  the  pen,  or 


208  VERBS 

the  typewriter.  With  regard  to  a  number  of  verbs  that 
take  the  construction,  its  character  is  also  stated  in  the 
following  passage:  The  truth  is  that  "oratio  obliqua"  (i.  e. 
in  classical  Latin)  was  a  highl}^  artificial  device  of  the 
literar}^  style,  probably  as  alien  to  the  common  speech 
as  the  diction  "1  know  him  to  be  a  good  man",  is  to  our 
vernacular  EngUsh  (Times  Lit.  6/4,  22). 

285.  The  object  and  predicative  stem  with  to  is  used 
with  many  verbs  denoting  a  sensation  or  a  perception  (in- 
cluding to  feel,  hear,  see)  and  an  expression  of  opinion 
{verba  sentiendi  et  declarandi) :  to  ascertain,  assume,  believe, 
conceive,  conclude,  consider,  denote,  discover,  doubt,  fancy, 
fear,  find,  guess,  hold,  imagine,  know,  note,  observe,  per- 
ceive, presume,  recognize,  remember,  suppose,  suspect, 
thinks  understand;  to  acknowledge,  admits  assert,  confess, 
declare,  deny,  maintain,  proclaim,  pronounce,  report,  state, 
swear,  warrant,  etc. 

A  good  man}^  of  the  verbs  enumerated  cannot  take  a 
real  personal  object  so  that  the  analysis  of  the  construction 
attempted  in  the  preceding  section  is  shown  to  be  in- 
adequate. In  the  following  illustrative  sentences  the  stem 
is  a  verb  expressing  condition  or  state,  generally  to  be. 
Both  the  familiar  verbs  that  take  an  object-with-plain  stem 
v^hen  an  action  or  occurrence  is  referred  to  {a)  and  the 
more   literary   words  enumerated  above  {b)  are  instanced. 

a.  She  felt  her  feet  to  be  stone-cold  on  the  floor. 

Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  III  ch.  7  §  i. 
I  have  lingered  thus  long  over  Balzac,  because  I  feel 
his  case  to  be  so  instructive,     Huxley,  Vulgarity  p.  50. 

George    felt    himself   to    be   within    the  sphere  of  un- 
guessed  and  highly  perturbing  forces. 

Bennett,  Roll-Call  I  ch.  8  §  2. 
As    he    stood   on   the  pavement   by  the  fountain  and 
watched    them   all  passing  by   —  just  like  what  he  had 


OBJECT   WITH   PREDICATIVE  STEM  209 

heard  the  Lord  Mayor's  Show  to  be  —  he  heard  one 
lady  in  a  carriage  say  to  her  companion  —  "Look  at 
that  Httle  boy!"       Temple  Thurston,  Thirteen  I  p.  26. 

b.  .  .  .  {things)  that  we  have  no  right  to  assume  to  be 
any  concern  of  ours. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch,   3  p.   20. 

The  singular  practice  that  we  believe  to  exist  in  many 
families  of  keeping  back  all  information  about  testamentary 
dispositions  as  long  as  possible  from  the  persons  they 
concern,  especially  minors,  had  been  observed  in  her  case. 

ib.  ch.  8  p.  69. 

These  views  we  believe  to  be  fair  and  true. 

Times  W.  22/3,   18. 

She  discovered  Constance  to  be  a  little  better,  as  regards 
the  neuralgia.      Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  IV  ch.  3  §   i. 

Amid  the  rustles  which  denoted  her  to  be  undressing 
in  the  darkness  other  heavy  breaths  frequently  came. 

Hardy,  Native  I  ch.  6  p.   ^6. 

Derek  told  Margery  that  she  was  cold.  She  discovered 
it  to  be  true. 

D.  C.  Jones,  Everlasting  Search  II  ch.  16  p.  281. 

Charmian  guessed  him  to  be  twenty-six  or  twenty-seven. 

Hichens,  Ambition  ch.   2. 

And  she  kneiv  herself  to  be  sagacious  and  prudent. 
Bennett,  Old  W.   Tale  I  ch.   3   §  5, 
Soames  noted  his  dress-clothes  to  be  well-cut. 

Galsworthy,  Man  of  Property. 

Peter  sneezed,  and  was  suddenly  conscious  of  a  large 
won-'an    zvhom  he  knetv  by  instinct  to  be  Mrs.   Brockett. 
Walpole,  Fortitude  I  ch.    12   p.    140. 

The  second  Mrs.  Samphire  maintained  Betty  to  be  a 
spoiled  beauty  before  she  was  out  of  pinafores. 

Vachell,  Brothers  I  ch.  4  p.    58. 
I  am  puzzled  by  the  note,   which  seems  to  prove  him 
to  be  still  alive.  Stevenson,    L)r    Jekyll.  p.  75. 

James  showed  himself  to  be  a  master  of  these  simple 
arts.  Vachell,  Quinneys'  p.   200. 

Kruisinga,  Handbook  II.  Accidence  and  Syntax.  1.  14 


2IO  VERBS 

Tradition  states  him  to  have  been  steward  to  the  Abbot 
of  Glastonbury.  Times  W.   19/10,   17. 

At  first  the  Crescent  supposed  her  to  be  a  widow,  for 
Mr.  Crewe  was  never  forthcoming. 

Sidgwick,  Severins  ch.    i. 

On  account  of  their  ill-judgment  in  thijtkmg  her  to  be 
a  fool.  Trollope,  Framley  ch.  24  p.   237. 

286.  It  is  possible,  however,  for  some  at  least  of  the 
verbs  enumerated,  to  be  construed  with  an  object  and 
verb  stem  expressing  an  occurrence,  more  rarely  an  action. 

It    is    true,    I    imagine    myself   to    have   made   a    dis- 
covery 1).  Butler,  Erewhon  ch.   i   p.   i. 

For  as  long  as  it  lasted  I  never  observed  him  to  draiv 
breath.  Stevenson,  Ballantrae. 

As    he    raised   his   head    upon  my  coming,  I  thought 
I  could  perceive  his  cotmtettance  to  lighten. 

Stevenson,  Ballantrae. 

The    early    Middle   Ages,    which    we  may  take  to  end 
at  about   1300.  Somervell,  Hist,  of  England,  p.  8. 

By  a  Port  one  may  understand  them  to  indicate  some- 
thing unsympathetically  impressive. 

Meredith,  Harrington  ch.   2.  p.  9, 

Equally    true    of  all  faces  of  forty,  do  we  understa-nd 
you  to  say?      de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  3  p.  20. 

287.  The  following  cases  ma}^  seem  doubtful,  hut  possess 
and  contain  are  probably  best  classed  with  the  verbs 
expressing  state. 

Unlocking  the  case  he  found  it  to  cojitain  a  necklace. 

Hardy,  Tess  ch.   34. 
Beyond    question    his    father    was  proving   himself  to 
possess  a  mind  equal  to  the  grand  situation. 

Bennett,  Clayhanger  II  ch.   14. 

1)  Note,  however,  that  the  group  have  made  expresses  a  state  rather 
than  an  occurrence. 


OBJECT   WITH   PREDICATIVE   STEM  211 

The  removal  of  her  anxiety  about  the  future  had 
developed  qualities  of  cheerfulness  which  formerly  no 
one  would  have  suspected  her  to  possess. 

Gissing,  New  Grub  Street  ch.  2. 

288.  Some  verbs  that  can  take  an  object-with-stem 
with  to  can  also  be  construed  with  a  stem  only. 

This  appHes  to  the  verbs  expressing  wish,  when  the 
subject  of  the  stem  is  the  same  as  the  subject  of 
the  sentence  (/  wish  to  see  him).  It  does  not  apply, 
naturally,  to  those  which  express  will,  i.  e.  a  wish  with 
regard  to  the  action  of  other  persons  {/  ordered  him  to 
be  present). 

We  also  find  the  construction  with  a  stem  only  after 
many  of  the  verbs  mentioned  in  285,  such  as  to  fear, 
recollect,  remember,  think;  to  acknowledge,  confess,  declare, 
deny,  proclaim,  prove. 

289.  A  number  of  the  verbs  in  285,  however,  can  take 
an  object-with-stem  only.  When  the  subject  of  the  stem 
is  the  same  as  that  of  the  leading  verb,  it  is  expressed  by 
a  compound  personal  pronoun. 

He  believed  himself  to  have  been  unfairly  treated. 
He  fancied  himself  to  be  right. 

The  details  we  leave  to  the  doctors^  but  we  suppose 
ourselves  to  know  the  outlines.  Laird  p.    i8. 

„    ^.  .  ,       .^,        290.     The   verbs  that  take  an  object  with 
Participle  witli     ,  .  ,  ,  ,    •       ^    rr      , 

p,         .^.    .       plain   stem  («),   treated   in    193  fr.,    the  verbs 
Stem  with  to    ^^  .        ^  '\      .„     ,,  r     •  i  ■. 

01  causing   and  vv-ill  (t>),  not  oi  wish,  treated 

in  242  ff.,  and  the  verba  sentiendi  et  declarandi  {c)  of  285, 

can    have   their   participle  used  in  a  verbal  meaning  with 

an   adjunct   containing   a   stem  with  to :  It  is  true  he  was 

rarely    heard   to    speak,    but    smoked  his  pipe  incessantly 

(W.    Irving,    Sketch-Book).     It    may    be    useful   to  give  a 


2  12  VERBS 

number  of  sentences  illustrating  the  use  before  we  examine 
the  character  of  the  construction. 

a.  He  was  frequently  heard  to  say  that  his  first  desire 
for  knowledge,  and  his  earliest  passion  for  reading,  were 
awakened  by  his  mother. 

For  the  standards  of  vulgarity  are  seen  to  change  as 
you  move  vertically  upwards  through  the  strata  of  a 
single  society.  Huxley,  Vulgarity  p.   2. 

She  wore  a  black  serge  gown,  with  white  collar  and 
cuffs;  her  thick  hair  rippled  low  upon  each  side  of  the 
forehead,  and  behind  was  gathered  into  two  loose  ver- 
tical coils;  in  shadow  the  hue  seemed  black,  but  when 
illumined  it  was  iee7i  to  be  the  darkest,  warmest  brown, 

Gissing,  Odd  Women  ch.  3. 

And  though  they're  her  friends  and  not  mine,  I've 
been  made  to  go  too. 

Mackenzie,  Guy  and  Pauline  ch.  2  p.  98. 

They  were  bidden  to  conduct  an  English  force  to 
Gascony.  Gardiner  and  Mullinger,  Introd.  p.  80. 

Criminals  have  been  known  to  jest  even  upon  the 
scaffold. 

b  She  is  very  like  him  in  her  contempt  for  mere 
sentiment,  and  for  the  'cant'  of  which  Boswell  was  ;r- 
commended  to  clear  his  mind.     Bradley,  Essays  II  p.  14. 

Yet  the  reader  is  advised  not  to  be  in  any  hurry 
with  his  kindly  conclusions.     C.  Bronte,  Villette  ch.  30. 

She  was  begged  to  veil  herself,  and  to  make  her 
entry  under  the  veil  of  darkness. 

Lytton   Strachey,  Books  and  Characters  p.   285. 

Moreover  he  is  expected  to  outlive  you. 

de  Morgan,   Somehow  Good  ch.    16  p.   164. 
The    fellow-victims    at    old    Parlow's   might  have  been 
expected   to    do    these  things,   but  they  were  too  young, 
too  uninterested,  too  unenterprising. 

Walpole,   Fortitude  I  ch    4  p.   '^^Z. 
Flora  could  not  be  got  to  take  the  matter  very  seriousl}'. 
Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.  34. 


PARTICIPLE   WITH   STEM  21  3 

The  Geddes  Committee  was  not  instructed,  and  has 
not  attempted,  to  shape  a  financial  poHcy  for  the  nation. 

Observer,   12/2,  22. 
On    rare   occasions    an  aunt  from  Longshaw  was  per- 
mitted as  a  tremendous  favour  to  see  her  in  the  subter- 
ranean den  ...  It  was  undeniable,  for  instance,  that  she 
was  allozved  to  fall  in  love  exactly  as  she  chose. 

Bennett,  Old  W.  T.  I  ch.  §  2. 
Do    pray    excuse    me    for   asking,    but  do  you  find  it 
does  you  good?  My  mother  was  recoinine?ided  to  try  one. 
de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  2  p.   11. 
Visitors  are  requested  to  keep  off  the  grass. 
Owing    to    all    which,    the    reference  to  Sally's  father 
got  lost  sight  of;  and  she  wasn't  sorry,  because  Theeny, 
at  any  rate,  wasn't  wanted  to  know  anything  about  him, 
whatever    Laetitia   and   her    mother   knew  or  suspected, 
de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.   15   p.    147. 
c.     The  Countess  was  mnioiinced  to  be  imminent. 

Bennett,  Card  ch.  i   p.   18. 
We    urged    it    in   the    days  when  the  shutters  of  the 
Board  of  Education  were  announced  to  be  up. 

Times  Ed.  S.   13/10,   16. 
The  entire  length  of  our  farm  is  assumed  to  be  about 
thirty-two  miles.  Peard,   Water-Farm  (NED). 

Once  on  a  time  all  roads  were  assumed  to  lead  to 
Rome,  and  once  on  a  time  they  certainly  did,  so  far  as 
these  islands  of  ours  are  concerned. 

Times  Lit.   19/5,   1921. 
However  this  may  be,  a  variety  of  supernatural  persons 
are  believed  to  affect  the  life  of  the  natives. 

Lowie,  Pr.  Rel.  p.  60. 
The    individual    worker   is  believed  to  have  a  right  to 
control    based    on    his    ideal    equality    with    all    other 
individuals.  Times  Lit.    14/4,   21. 

It  (viz.  the  theory)  must  be  conceded  to  have  a  high 
degree  of  probability.  ib.  p.    108. 

This  is  a  large  concession ;  and,  however  necessary  or 
justifiable,  it  can  hardly  be  denied  to  be  dangerous. 

Times  Lit.  'jjZ,   19. 


2  14  VERBS 

.  .  .  and  has  finally  been  discovered  to  be  a  book  of 
promise  .  .  .  Walpole,  Fortitude  III  ch.  2.  p.  245. 

It  had  a  good  garden  to  the  back,  and  Mr,  Clavering 
had  built  capital  stables,  with  what  were  then  considered 
the  latest  improvements.  The  point  of  good  stabling 
was  expected  to  let  the  house,  as  it  was  in  a  hunting 
county. 

Gaskell  (Selected  English  Short  Stories  I  p.  207). 
Few   people   will   be  found  to  deny  that  the  English 
schoolboy  has  shown  himself  worthy  of  the  country  he 
is  serving.  Times  Ed.  S,   19/10,   16, 

The  soul  is  held,  literally,  to  depart  in  dreams. 

Laird  p,  7. 
It  had  waited  thus,  unmoved,  during  so  many  centuries, 
through  the  crises  of  so  many  things,  that  it  could  only 
be  imagined  to  await  one  last  crisis  —  the  final  overthrow. 

Hardy,  Native  I  ch.   i   p.  4, 
He  had  rarely  been  known,  in  the  past,  to  fulfil  exactly 
the  prophecy  of  the  letter  of  advice  concerning  his  arrival, 
Bennett,  Old  W,  Tale  I  ch.  6  §  2. 
Cnut  is  recorded  to  have  rebuilt  the  destroyed  churches. 
Medieval  England  ed,  Davis  p.   10. 

291.  The  constructions  illustrated  in  290  are  in  some 
respects  not  identical.  In  the  sentences  under  c  the  con- 
nection of  the  participle  and  the  stem  is  closer  than  in 
those  of  a  and  b;  indeed,  it  u^ould  be  possible  to  consider 
the  stem  an  adjunct  to  the  participle.  But  the  verbs  of 
a  and  b  are  also  used  with  a  non-personal  subject  in  which 
case  the  participle  with  the  stem  form  the  real  predicate 
and  are  as  closely  connected  as  the  verbs  under  c.  This 
is  shown  by  the  following  examples. 

Parliament  was  allowed  to  separate  without  any  warning 
of  the  true  state  of  affairs.  Times  21/8,  20, 

Every  pre-arranged  assemblage  comprising  more  than 
two  persons  beyond  the  family  was  a  'function'  —  a 
term  implying  both  contempt  and  respect  for  ceremonial; 


PARTICIPLE   WITH   STEM  21  5 

and    no    function    could  be  allowed  to  occur  without  an 
excuse  for  it.       Bennett,  These  Twain  III  ch.  20  §  6. 
The  words  were  meant  to  make  him  furious. 
Nothing   was  permitted  to  arrest  the  gang's  progress. 

Pett  Ridge,  Mord  Em'Iy,  p.   15. 
The   local    inspection  which  was  reserved  by  the  Act 
to    municipal    authorities    is   gradually  being  suffered  by 
these    authorities    themselves    to    become    a    dead  letter. 

Escott,  England  I,   no. 

292.  Even  with  a  personal  subject  the  connection  be- 
tween  the   participle  and  the  stem  may  be  equally  close. 

A  little  while  ago  we  used  to  be  given  to  understand 
that  quite  another  kind  of  book  was  needed  for  such  a 
subject.  Times  Lit.   19/10,  22. 

But  Aidan  was  not  permitted  to  see  much  direct  fruit 
of  his  labours.  Wakeman,  Introd,  p.  27. 

He  was  granted  on  that  occasion  to  hold  the  city,  as 
it  were,  imprisoned  in  a  crystal  globe. 

Sinister  Street  p.   576. 

293.  The  construction  is  generally  considered  the 
'passive'  parallel  to  the  'active'  object-with-stem  con- 
structions. It  may  be  useful  to  warn  the  reader  that  we 
are  concerned  only  with  the  cases  that  the  participle  has 
a  verbal  meaning.  The  following  sentence  contains  an 
example  of  an  apparently  parallel  case;  which  does  not 
concern  us,  however,  because  the  participle  is  adjectival, 
clearly  expressing  a  state. 

Philip  Bosinney  was  known  to  be  a  young  man  without 
fortune,  Galsworthy,  Man  of  Property  ch.   I. 

294.  The  identification  of  the  object-with-stem  con- 
struction with  the  participle-with-stem  one  is  not  acceptable- 

With  regard  to  the  verbs  that  take  an  object-with-plain- 
stem  it  must  be  noted  that  in  the  participle-with-stem 
construction   the  prefix  to  is  almost  invariably  used.    Ex- 


2l6  VERBS 

ceptions  such  as  the  one  from  Meredith  that  follows  are 
so  rare  and  so  little  in  accordance  with  spoken  English 
that  they  may  be  neglected. 

And  then  the  postillion  was  bidden  proceed,  and  he  did 
not  like  it.       Meredith,  Amazing  Marriage  ch.  2  p.  19. 

On  the  participle  let  with  a  plain  stem,  see  Auxiliaries. 

It  must  also  be  observed  that  the  connection  with  the 
object-with-stem  construction  is  not  strong  enough  to 
enable  the  verbs  of  wish  to  take  the  participle-with-stem. 

A  second  point  against  the  current  view  is  that  verbs 
which  take  the  participle-with-stem  construction  are  often 
used  in  a  way  that  has  no  corresponding  'active'  form  in 
the  same  meaning  («),  or  no  'active'  form  at  all  {h). 

a.  That  was  a  day  of  many  little  incidents,  and  a 
fine  day  into  the  bargain.  Perhaps  the  next  day  was 
helped  to  be  a  flat  day  by  the  barometer,  which  had 
shown  its  usual  untrustworthiness  and  gone  down. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  39  p.  41 8. 
One  critic  has  been  found  to  say  that  he  would  have 
made  a  very  good  kind  of  Frenchman. 

Times  Lit.   19/10,   1922. 
"What  that  Mahdi  is  about,"  Lord  Granville  is  made 
to  exclaim  in  another  deleted  paragraph,  "I  cannot  make 
out..."  Lytton  Strachey,  Em.  Vict.  p.  293. 

•  b.  Mr,  Holmes's  volume  is  agreed  to  be  the  best  book 
on  its  subject  in  any  language. 

Class.  Rev.  vol.  25  p.  257. 
Indeed  it  was  not  till  after  the  battle  of  Telamon  (225 
B.    C.)  in  the  period  between  the  two  Punic  wars,  that 
the  Gaulish  danger  may  be  counted  to  have  wholly  come 
to  an  end.  Oman,  Conquest  p.   12. 

Human  civilization  may  be  roughly  said  to  be  100.000 
years  old.  Lowie,  Pr.  Rel.  p.  IX. 

Nobody  could  be  said  to  understand  the  heath  who 
had  not  been  there  at  such  a  time. 

Hardy,  Return  of  the  Native  I  ch.   i. 


PARTICIPLE   WITH   STEM  21/ 

Every  man  was  supposed  to  have  free  choice  to  go 
with  the  general  or  to  stay.         Trevelyan,  Garibaldi. 

The  dead  are  supposed  to  dwell  in  the  neighbourhood 
of  the  village.  Times  Lit.  25/5,  22. 

295.  A  third  consideration,  and  an  important  one,  is 
the  fact  that  the  participle-with-stem  is  used  in  all  forms 
of  English,  whereas  the  supposedly  corresponding  object- 
with-stem,  as  \n  \he  C2iS&  o{  \hQ  verba  sentiendi  et  declarandi, 
is  unknown  in  colloquial  English  and  of  very  limited  use 
even  in  written  English. 

It  must  also  be  remembered  that  the  participle  con- 
struction, though  generally  used  predicatively,  occurs  in 
attributive  use;  see  50^. 

296.  For  all  these  reasons  it  seems  necessary  to  look 
upon  the  participle-with-stem  as  a  special  case  of  the 
adjectives  with  a  stem  as  a  final  or  complementary  adjunct, 
as  detailed  at  the  beginning  of  this  chapter. 

That  the  connection  between  the  participle  and  the 
stem  is  sometimes  very  close  seems  to  be  well  shown 
by  the  following  cases. 

"Those    things  on  the  path  have  to  go,  don't  they?" 
"Yes,  everything  outside  the  house  is  supposed  to  go'' 

said  Linda  Burnell  -i).  K.  Mansfield^  Bliss  p.  2. 

My  dear,  what  is  to  be  done  about  her?    We  cannot 

have   her   supposed  to  be  here  for  ever. 

Barrie,  Quality  Street  ed.  Kooistra  p.  90. 

£,,  297.     In   all   the   uses  of  the  stem  with  to  in 

Stem  as  a    ,  ..  .         .    ,       ,  ... 

e  . .    ,       ,  the    preceding   sections   it  has  been  possible  to 

p    ,.    .      reduce    the    construction   to   that  of  an  adjunct, 

whether  of  a  final  or  complementary  character. 

This    must   incline    us    to    consider  the  same  explanation 


1)  The  reference  is  to  the  furniture  of  people  moving  into  another  house. 


2 1  8  VERBS 

for    the    use    of  the    stem    as    a    grammatical    subject    or 
predicate,   and   living  English  makes  it  possible  to  do  so. 

298.  When  a  sentence  has  a  formal  it  for  its  grammat- 
ical subject  and  a  predicate  containing  a  stem  with  to, 
the  latter  may  often  be  understood  as  the  subject  of  the 
predicate.  The  construction  will  be  found  discussed  more 
fully  in  the  chapter  on  Sentence- structure  so  that  some 
examples  will  suffice  here. 

It  would  be  a  futile  meanness  to  deny  that  the  philo- 
sophy, the  theology,  the  criticism,  and  the  science  of 
the  nineteenth  century  owe  a  vast  debt  to  German  work. 

Times  Lit.   11/5,   17. 

It  is  to  say  much  of  the  dinner  that  Adrian  found  no 
fault  with  it.  Meredith,  Feverel  ch.  34  p.  300. 

It's  no  use,  I  fear,  to  ask  Tod. 

Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.  37  p.  78. 

But  they  laughed  at  her;  and  she  knew  it  was  no 
good  to  scold,  with  all  the  men  behind  them. 

Blackmore,  Lorna  Doone  ch.  29  p.   186. 

It  remains  only  to  notice  with  what  kindred  indignation 
the  two  writers  complain  of  the  little  honour  accorded 
to  their  craft. 


299.  From  sentences  of  the  type  of  298  it  is  easy  to 
pass  to  such  as  open  with  the  stem  as  a  grammatical 
subject.  This  construction,  though  frequent  in  written 
English,  is  less  common  in  spoken  EngHsh.  In  many 
cases  the  sentences  are  of  an  abstract  kind,  there  being 
no  definite  subject. 

To  go  on  like  this  was  dangerous. 

Galsworthy,  Man  of  Property  ch.  3  p.  57. 

To  decry  Dickens,  even  to  protest  that  you  could  not 
read  him,  became  a  fashion.     Bradley,  Reaction  p.  3. 


STEM   AS   A   SUBJECT   AND   PREDICATE  219 

To  undertake  such  duties  at  such  a  time  is  an  act  of 
signal  courage  which  deserves  the  fullest  popular  support. 

Times  W.   30/11,   17. 

Where  to  begin  is  perhaps  less  obvious. 

Trevelyan,  British  History  in  the  19th  Century,  Preface, 

To  invade  Britain  was  singularly  easy  before  the 
Norman  Conquest,  singularly  difficult  afterwards. 

Trevelyan,  Hist,  of  Engl.  p.   i. 

To  disturb  such  a  community  was  a  serious  matter, 
and  one  not  to  be  undertaken  without  a  clear  necessity. 

C  man,   Conquest  p.  62. 

To  see  from  the  top  of  the  Grey  Hill  the  rising 
of  the  sun  on  Easter  morning  was  one  of  them  (viz. 
of  the  customs).  .  . 

Walpole,  Fortitude  I  ch.   10  §  3  p.   117. 

It  seemed  to  him  that  not  to  say  another  word  would 
almost  have  amounted  to  an  insinuation  against  the 
eyebrows  and  the  teeth. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  2  p.   10. 

And  these  factors  must  have  played  their  due  part 
in  determining  territorial  settlement.  To  conclude  that 
they  were  sufficing  motives,  or  even  other  than  secondary 
ones,  is  inadmissible  for  several  convincing  reasons. 

Massingham,  Pre-Roman  Britain  p.  7. 
For    a    familiar    truth  ceases  to  shock.     To  render  it 
familiar   is   therefore   a  duty.     It  is  also  a  pleasure. 

Huxley,  Vulgarity  p.  22. 

300.  The  use  of  the  stem  with  to  as  a  nominal  predicate 
can  be  understood  in  the  very  same  way  as  its  use  as  a 
grammatical  subject.  It  is  sufficient  to  take  a  couple  of 
sentences  like  the  following,  in  which  the  stem,  though  a 
nominal  predicate,  is  at  the  same  time  an  adjunct  to  the 
noun  that  forms  the  subject. 

My  hope  is,  if  possible,  to  do  a  little  to  encourage  a 
wider  reading  of  poetry  by  a  wider  public. 

F.  L,  Lucas,  Eight  Victorian  Poets,  Preface. 


220  VERBS 

The  difficulty,  with  poetry,  is  to  read  it.  There  are 
so  many  easier  things  to  read.  ib. 

301.  From  sentences  hke  those  of  300  it  is  easy  to 
pass  into  the  kind  illustrated  here. 

The  only  possible  course  was  to  conceal  the  whole 
scheme  from  him.  Freeman,  Joseph  ch.  5  p.  29. 

The  aim  of  all  British  biography  is  to  conceal. 

Wells,  Harman  ch.   11  §   i,  p.  378. 

But  this  is  to  anticipate.         Life  of  Ainger  p.   118. 

My  second  purpose  is  to  show  teachers  what  can  be 
done  by  furnishing  examples  of  work  already  accom- 
plished. Perse  Playbooks,  n°.  2.  p.   i. 

Of  the  close  of  the  pic-nic  more  remains  to  be  told. 
Meredith,  Harrington  ch.  31   p.  340. 

302.  In  abstract  sentences  we  often  find  a  verbal  stem 
both  as  a  subject  and  as  a  nominal  predicate. 

To  be  correct  is  already  to  be  mechanical. 

B.  de  Selincourt,  Pomona  (To-Day 
and  To-Morrow)  p.  49, 
To    live    is    to    change,  some  one  said,  I  forget  who ; 
and  to  live  long  is  to  have  changed  often. 

Bailey,  Question  of  Taste  p.  3. 

303.  Not  infrequently,  however,  the  construction  is 
found  when  there  is  a  subject  in  the  mind  of  the  speaker, 
even  though  it  is  not  mentioned. 

To  read  him  is  to  warm  your  hands  before  the  fire 
of  loyal  admiration.  Times  Lit.  29/7,   15. 

So  with  many  another  book  on  the  thronged  shelves. 
To  take  them  down  is  to  recall,  how  vividly,  a  struggle 
and  a  triumph.  Gissing,  Ryecroft  XII. 

To  say  that  he  failed  because  his  genius  was  unsuited 
to  tragedy  is  to  tell  us  nothing  at  all. 

Times  Lit.   13/11,    19. 


ASPECT  221 

Aspect 

304.  After  the  individual  treatment  of  each  verbal  form 
in  the  preceding  sections,  we  must  now  turn  to  a  comparison 
of  those  that  have  points  of  contact.  Such  a  comparison 
will  help  to  make  the  character  of  each  form  and  the 
reasons  for  its  range  clearer. 

It  will  be  necessary  in  these  comparisons  to  study  the 
aspects  of  the  verbal  action  or  occurrence  that  the  various 
forms  express.  The  grammatical  term  aspect  may  be  more 
or  less  unfamiliar  to  some  readers ;  and,  apart  from  that, 
the  absence  of  forms  in  English  that  clearly  express  con- 
trasting aspects  has  sometimes  induced  grammarians  to 
introduce  distinctions  that  are  not  justified  by  the  facts  of 
usage  but  have  been  suggested  by  theoretical  views  based 
on  facts  observed  in  other  languages,  if  not  a  product  of 
the  imagination.  For  these  reasons  it  will  be  advisable  to 
treat  of  aspect  in  general  before  we  enter  upon  a  comparison 
of  English   (/erbal  forms  from  this  point  of  view. 

305.  Aspect  is  the  translation  of  a  term  used  in  Slavonic 
grammar  to  denote  the  meaning  of  a  verbal  form  in  so  far 
as  it  expresses  whether  the  speaker  looks  upon  an  action 
in  its  entirety,  or  with  special  reference  to  some  part  (chiefly 
the  beginning  or  end) 

Many  languages  have  no  grammatical  forms  to  express 
these  differences  of  aspect.  But  this  does  not  prevent 
speakers  of  these  languages  from  being  sometimes  conscious 
of  such  differences.  Consequently,  languages  that  have  no 
grammatical  categories  into  which  all  verbal  forms  are  arranged 
from  the  point  of  view  of  aspect,  inevitably  possess  pairs  of 
words  or  forms  that  serve,  partly  or  exclusively,  to  express 
these  or  other  differences  of  aspect, 

306.  In    Slavonic    grammar    the    forms    of  the  languages 


222  VERBS 

make  it  necessary  to  distinguish  an  imperfeciive  (or  durative) 
and  a  perfective  aspect. 

The  difiference  between  imperfective  and  perfective  is  soonest 
understood  when  the  two  aspects  are  contrasted.  An  im- 
perfective aspect  is  generally  expressed  by  to  sit,  a  perfective 
by  to  sit  down:  he  sat  in  a  corner  of  the  room;  he  sat  down  in 
a  corner  of  the  room. 

It  should  be  remembered  that  the  English  parallels  are 
not  identical  with  the  Slavonic  verbal  forms.  For  it  is  evident 
that  to  an  English  speaker  to  sit  and  to  sit  down  express 
what  he  looks  upon  as  two  actions,  and  what  are  in  his  view 
two  distinct  actions,  not  two  aspects  of  the  same  action. 
And  as  a  Slavonic  verbal  form  necessarily  expresses  aspect, 
it  is  evident  that  the  choice  must  sometimes  be  a  matter  of 
usage  only.  It  would  be  vain  to  attempt  a  classification  of  verbs 
into  the  two  groups  of  perfective  and  imperfective  on  purely 
logical  grounds,  without  reference  to  formal  characteristics. 
Many  verbs  may  be  said  to  be  indifferent  with  respect  to 
aspect,  e.g.  to  give,  lend,  explain,  revenge,  punish,  greet,. 
confess,  justify,  etc. 

307.  As  few  readers  are  likely  to  be  familiar  with  the 
real  working  of  aspect  in  the  structure  of  the  various  Sla- 
vonic languages  it  will  be  more  instructive  to  mention  some 
traces  of  such  a  distinction,  though  much  less  clear  ones  than 
in  Slavonic,  in  such  languages  as  most  readers  are  acquainted 
with.  It  will  be  found  that  distinctions  of  aspect  may  find 
expression : 

(i)  in  the  verbal  forms  themselves. 

(2)  by  means  of  verbs  that  are  completely  subordinated 
to  a  non-predicative  verbal  form,  the  two  forming  a 
close  syntactic  group. 

(3)  in  verbs  that  resemble  those  of  the  preceding  group- 
but  have  an  independent  meaning  of  their  own. 


ASPECT  223 

(4)  by  independent  pairs  of  verbs  that  are  not  formally- 
related,  so  that  the  expression  of  aspect  is  purely 
lexical. 

(5)  in  the  character  of  the  adjuncts  that  accompany  the  verb. 

308.  French  has  i)  a  means  of  expressing  the  perfective 
or  momentaneous  aspect  when  the  verb  refers  to  the  past : 
the  passe  defini.  This  is  similar  to,  but  not  identical  with, 
the  Greek  aorist;  it  should  be  observed  that  the  Greek 
aorist  does  not  necessarily  express  past  time  2),  the  difference 
between  the  infinitive  ^aleZv  of  the  aorist,  which  expresses 
'to  hit',  and  the  present  infinitive  §dlXsLv  'to  throw',  e.g., 
being  independent  of  timiC. 

309.  The  'perfect'  in  Dutch  is  a  verbal  group  consisting 
of  a  participle  with  the  verb  hebbeii  or  ziJ7i.  Although  the 
use  of  the  auxiliaries  is  partly  a  matter  of  tradition,  the 
connection  of  the  use  with  the  difference  of  aspect  of  the 
verbal  idea  of  the  participle  is  still  felt.  And  an  intransitive 
verb  of  motion  takes  one  of  the  two  auxiliaries  according  to 
the  aspect  of  the  action  in  the  mind  of  the  speaker.  It  takes 
hebben  when  the  action  is  thought  of  as  such:  ivij  Jiebben  een 
paar  uiir  gewandeld  (we  have  walked,  or  been  walking  3), 
for  a  couple  of  hours).  It  must  take  zijii  when  the  change 
of  position  is  prominent  in  the  speaker's  mind  {imitative 
aspect) :  We  zijn  weer  naar  huis  gewandeld  (we  have  walked 
home  again). 

310.  Dutch  also  has  a  regular  grammatical  means  of  ex- 
pressing the  durative  aspect :  the  copula  zijn  {to  be)  with  aan 
and  the  infinitive  of  a  verb  expressing  action  used  as  a  noun 


1)  Or  had,  for  it  is  really  lost  in  spoken  French. 

2)  Brugrriann — Thumb,  Gricchisohe  Grammatik  f%  554  ff. 

3)  Observe  that  the  distinction  of  aspect  between  the  English  progressive 
and  non-progressive  is  not  made. 


224  VERBS 

with  the  neuter  article:  Hij  is  aan  het  verven,  which  is  per- 
fectly equivalent  to  He  is  painting. 

French  uses  a  similar  construction  to  ours:  jfe  suis  a  lire, 
je  suis  en  traitt  de  lire  i).  In  German  dialects,  too,  this  con- 
struction is  used,  the  prepositions  being  an  and  bei'.  er  ist 
am  essen,  es  ist  am  regneji;  er  ist  beim  schreiben  2). 

Another  construction  is  er  ist  baden,  without  a  preposition; 
it  is  identical  with  the  Dutch  construction :  hij  is  baden, 
wandelen,  etc.  It  does  not  express  the  durative  aspect,  and 
may  be  compared  with  a  parallel  use  of  wezett  in  Dutch, 
expressing  movement^  but  chiefly  in  the  perfect:  Ik  ben  hem 
in  Amsterdam  wezen  opzoeken  (I  have  been  to  visit  him  in 
Amsterdam). 

311.  The  last  case  in  the  preceding  section  shows  that  it 
is  impossible  strictly  to  distinguish  the  verbal  groups  ex- 
pressing aspect  that  are  formed  by  means  of  a  verb  without 
any  meaning  from  those  groups  which  contain  what  may  be 
called  an  auxiliary  of  aspect,  i.  e.  a  verb  that  is  subordinate 
in  meaning  to  the  other  verb  with  which  it  forms  a  group, 
but  has  yet  some  meaning  of  its  own. 

312.  In  Dutch,  liggen,  staan,  zitten,  all  three  verbs  of 
position  or  motion,  are  used  to  express  what  may  be 
called  the  durative  aspect  3).  The  same  observation  applies 
to  many  other  languages;  compare  Italian  sta  tictto  il  giorno 
a  lavorare  'he  is  working  all  day';  il  ragazzo  lostaamirare 
e  niente  dice  'the  boy  is  looking  at  him  in  astonishment  and  says 
nothing'.  The  phenomenon  is  very  frequent  in  Spanish,  too 4). 


1)  Meillet,  Linguistique  historique  et  linrjuistique  generale,  p.  187. 

2)  Deutschbein,  in  Handhuch  p.  33. 

3)  Not  of  verbs  expressing  action  only   but   also    of   such    as    express    an 
occurrence;  see  my   Grammar  of  Modern  Dutch  §  163. 

4)  A  full  and  instructive  treatment  is  to   be  found   in    F.    Kruger's   Ein- 
leitung  in  das  Neuspanisc ke  pp.  32  ff.,  43,  and  164. 


ASPECT  225 

313.  In  English,  the  verb  to  come  frequently  occurs  as 
a  member  of  a  syntactic  group,  expressing  the  result  of  a 
gradual  process. 

The  reproach  of  being  a  nation  of  mere  imitators  has 
been  so  frequently  directed  against  the  Japanese  that  it 
has  come  to  be  regarded  as  a  truth  specially  applicable 
in  their  case. 

The  undisturbed  stability  of  the  motor-car  market  here 
can  be  explained  only  in  one  way,  and  that  is  that  the 
motor-car  is  more  and  more  coming  to  be  realized  as  a 
commercial  necessity.  Times  W.    14/12,   17, 

"This  is  a  strange  note,"  said  Mr.  Utterson ;  and  then 
sharply,   "How  do  you  come  to  have  it  open?" 

Stevenson,   Dr.  Jekyll  ed.  Schutt  p.   J^. 

Perhaps  you  come  to  know  a  person  better  when 
she  is  fog-bound  in  your  flat. 

Cotes,  Cinderella  ch.   14  p.   157. 

Approached  in  this  light,  even  the  'salle  du  palais 
de  Pyrrhus'  begins  to  have  a  meaning.  We  come  to 
realise  that,  if  it  is  nothing  else,  it  is  at  least  the 
meeting-ground  of  great  passions  .  .  . 

Lytton  Strachey,  Books  and  Characters  p.   10. 

As  soon  as  I  let  myself  begin  to  tell  about  the  people 
we  came  to  know  and  the  things  that  happened  to 
us,   ....  Cotes,   Cinderella  ch.   8  p.   85. 

Nor  was  it  only  with  the  action  of  these  persons 
that  she  was  familiar.  She  sounded  their  hearts,  and 
came  to  know  instinctively  what  each  one  of  them  was 
capable  or  incapable  of  doing. 

S.  R.  Gardiner  in  Introd.  to  Verney  Memoirs  I. 

Nor    can    this    theory    make    clear    to    us    how  men, 
dominated    by    their    sheep    and    their    oxen,    fearful  of 
venturing  into  the  wilderness  of  trees  below  them,  came 
to  leave  such  numerous  and  laborious  monuments  .  .  . 
Massingham,  Pre-Roman  Britain  p.   7. 

After    four    years    of    married   life,    when   both  Anne 

and    Dickey  had  been  born  to  her,  she  came  to  realise 

'ivRUisiNGA,  Handbook  II,  Accidence  and  Syntax.  1.  15 


226  VERBS 

that    without    imagination,    without    a  sense  of  humour, 
no  man  can  make  Romance. 

Temple  Thurston,  Antagonists  I  ch.  4  p.  39. 

Style,  the  Latin  name  for  an  iron  pen,  has  come  to 
designate  the  art  that  handles,  with  ever  fresh  vitality 
and  wary  alacrity,  the  fluid  elements  of  speech. 

Raleigh,  Style  p.    i. 

"I  used  to  detest  port,"  she  told  Sir  Thomas  Tanner, 
"but  having  to  drink  it  so  constantly  of  late  years  when 
Lord  Lippington  proposed  the  Royal  toast,  I  have 
almost  come  to  like  it."     Cotes,  Cinderella  ch.  8  p.  54. 

The  land  had  become  an  island,  the  greater  part  of 
the  terrible  beasts  of  old  had  disappeared,  and  conditions 
of  climate  and  geography  had  apparently  come  to  be 
not  very  different  from  what  they  are  at  present,  when 
neolithic  man  begins  to  be  discernible. 

Oman,  Conquest  p.  3. 

314.  To  fall  is  sometimes  used  with  a  verbal  ing  to 
express  the  inchoative  aspect. 

One  night  during  this  last  illness  that  had  brought 
him  home  he  fell  thinking  of  Zimbabwe  and  the  lost 
cities  of  Africa.  Wells,  Joan  and  Peter  ch.  9  §  3. 

315.  Similarly,  to  keep  is  used  with  a  verbal  ing  to  express 
that  the  natural,  or  expected,  cessation  of  an  action  or  occur- 
rence does  not  take  place. 

He  kept  changing  his  plans. 

Tout,  History  of  England. 
"I  always  do  have  the  thought,"  she  will  very  likely 
say,  as  she  has  said  it  to  us,  "that  the  picture  can  as 
good  as  hear  us  speak,  for  all  the  world  as  if  it  was  a 
Christian,  and  not  an  inanimate  object.  Because  its  eyes 
keep  looking  —  looking." 

de  Morgan,  A  Likely  Story  ch.   11   p.  332. 

316.  We  might  also  look  upon  to  continue,  to  begin,  to 
cease,  to  stop,  to  Jinishy  to  get,  as  auxiliaries  of  aspect. 


ASPECT 


227 


No    one    is    more    loud    or  insistent  than  he  who  has 
just  ceased  to  be  labelled  new. 

Waugh,  Loom  of  Youth  p.   26. 
We  never  stop  changing,  yet  we  never  change  altogether. 

Times  Lit.  25/5,  22. 
But  the  historians  will  stop  talking  of  Chaucer  as  a 
solitary  lighthouse  in  a  dark  sea,  and  tiresomely  recounting 
the  names  of  Lydgate  and  Hoccleve  as  those  of  two 
dullards  who  happen  to  be  remembered  because  there 
is  nothing  better  to  remember. 

J.   C.  Squire  in  Observer  Oct.   30,    192 1. 
As    I    finished    speaking   to    Bony,  he  looked  over  to 
the  grief-worn  figure.  .  .  . 

de  Morgan,  Vance,  ch.  41   p.  416. 
We  get  to  know  (from  the  book  reviewed)  such  things  • — ■ 
profoundly    useless,    profoundly  charming  to  the  dweller 
in  cities  —  as  that  beech  and  ash  are  the  best  logs  for 
the  winter's  fire.  Daily  News   13/10,    191 1. 

Similarly  to  be  apt  might  be  said  to  express  the  frequen- 
tative aspect. 

Separation  ....  is  apt  to  idealise  the  removed  object. 
Hardy,  Far  from  the  Madding  Crowd,  ch.    5. 

317.  Sometimes  a  verb,  though  formally  quite  independent 
as  a  member  of  a  loose  syntactic  group,  has  really  no  more 
independent  meaning  than  the  preceding  verbs  in  close  syn- 
tactic groups.  In  this  way  to  come,  and  the  preterite  went, 
are  sometimes  used  to  indicate  an  action  that  is  thought  of 
as  beginning  from  a  certain  point  and  continuing  after  that. 

When  she  had  vanished  the  artist  ivent  and  stood  with. 
his  back  to  the  stove,  for  it  was  too  dark  to  work, 
de  Morgan,  A  Likely  Story  ch.   i  p.  5. 


Two  verbs  that  are  formally  independent  of  each 
other  may  express  two  aspects  of  the  same  verbal  idea. 
This    applies   to  such  a  pair  as  to  read  and  to  peruse.     The 


228  VERBS 

aspect  expressed  by  to  pertise  a  book  might  perhaps  be  called 
terminative,  because  the  verb  expresses  the  action  as  occupying 
an  amount  of  time  but  with  special  reference  to  its  end. 
Such  a  distinction  would  only  be  useful,  however,  if  there 
were  pairs  of  verbs  showing  the  same  difference;  it  would 
be  necessary  if  there  were  grammatical  forms  expressing  it. 
But  neither  of  these  cases  is  found  in  English. 

319.  The  aspect  of  a  verb,  though  not  shown  in  any  way 
by  the  verb  itself,  may  appear  in  the  form  of  its  adjuncts. 
Thus  we  find  that  in  Dutch,  which  generally  expresses 
direction  by  means  of  the  preposition  naar  (naar  Frankrijk 
reizen:  to  travel  to  France),  perfective  verbs  of  motion  (both 
transitive  and  intransitive)  can  express  direction  by  words 
that  are  generally  used  to  express  position. 

This  distinction  of  aspect  must  explain  the  difference 
between  the  imperfective  7iaar  huts  gaan  'to  go  home',  and 
the  perfective  thuis  komen  'to  come  home' ;  naar  boveji  gaan 
'to  go  upstairs'  and  boven  komen  'to  come  upstairs'. 

By  the  side  of  thuis  komen  'to  come  home',  we  can  also 
use  naar  kuis  komen,  as  also  naar  boven  komen,  but  only 
when  we  specially  think  of  the  movement  necessary  to  reach 
the  final  stage.  The  same  difference  is  made  between  thuis 
brenge7i  and  naar  liuis  brengen  'to  take  home',  l) 

We  find  the  same  distinction  in  the  use  of  the  pro- 
nominal adverbs  of  place  hier,  daar,  and  hierheen,  daar- 
hee7i.  We  can  say,  therefore :  koni  hier  or  kom  hierheen 
'come  here',  breng  het  hier  or  breng  het  hierheen  'bring  it 
here' ;  but  we  can  only  say  ga  daar  eens  heen  'just  go  there', 
stmir  het  hierheen  'send  it  here'.  Compare  also  hij  ko)nt  in 
Den  Haag,  or  naar  den  Haag  'he  is  coming  to  the  Hague', 
but  only  hij  gaat  naar  Den  Haag  'he  is  going  to  the  Hague'. 


•1)  Van  der  Meer,  Neuniederl.  Gr.  §  457. 


ASPECT  229 

The  reality  of  the  distinction  is  also  shown  negatively, 
by  the  fact  that  the  imperfective  verbs  cannot  take  both 
kinds  of  adjuncts.  It  would  be  meaningless  to  say  tlinis 
gaan,  boven  gaayi,  hier  gaan,  etc. 

It  should  be  noted  that  the  distinction  here  shown  to 
exist  between  verbs  of  motion  is  not  to  be  identified  with 
the  classification  of  verbs  as  mutative  and  non-mutative 
(309) :  both  gaati  and  koinen  are  mutative  (taking  zijn  in 
the  perfect),  and  yet  they  differ  in  their  adjuncts  expressing 
direction. 

320.  In  German  a  parallel  distinction  is  made  by  using 
prepositional  adjuncts  in  the  dative  or  in  the  accusative  case: 
see  E.  A.  Meyer,  Ruhe  ttnd  Richtungy  1928.  This  distinction 
was  also  made  in  Gotic,  as  was  first  shown  by  Streitberg, 
who  thus  accounted  for  the  twofold  construction  with  verbs 
like  qiman,  galagjan,  gadriusan  i). 

321.  In  languages  that  do  not  possess  regular  forms  to 
express  differences  of  aspect  the  same  verb  is  used  to  denote 
clearly  different  aspects  of  the  same  verbal  idea  without  any 
formal  distinction.  We  say  then  that  the  verb  expresses 
various  'shades  of  meaning'  according  to  the  situation, 

1.  The  Signer  saw  in  a  fog  as  a  cat  sees  in  the  dark, 
and    he    led    Peter    to  the  bookshop  without  hesitation. 

Walpole,  Fortitude  II  ch.  2.  p.   162. 
I  see  what  you  mean. 

2.  We  call  a  man  deaf  when  he  cannot  hear. 
I  did  not  hear  what  you  said. 

3.  I  have  thought  of  your  proposal,  but  I  don't  think 
it  is  a  practicable  plan. 

4.  He  knows  English  very  well. 

I  wonder  how  he  should  have  known  us  for  Americans^ 

NED. 

i)  Festschrift  fur  Windisch,  4915. 


230  VERBS 

Then,  curiously,  as  he  met  her  more  often  and  knew 
her  better  there  came  a  certain  easy,  almost  casual 
intercourse.  Walpole,  Fortitude  III  ch.  3  p.  257. 

As  he  came  towards  her  he  knew  at  once  that  she 
was  the  little  girl  who  had  talked  to  him  on  a  hill-top 
one  Good  Friday  afternoon.  She  did  not  know  him  at 
all  when  he  came  forward. 

Walpole,  Fortitude  II  ch.  2  p.   167. 

5.  Go  and  learn  your  lessons  now. 

All  that  he  knew  about  their  treachery  he  had  learned 
at  second  hand.  Macaulay.  NED. 

6.  Stephen  was  sitting  on  one  of  the  beds,  looking 
in  front  of  him.  Peter  moved  forward  heavily  and  sat 
on  the  other  bed. 

Walpole,  Fortitude  II  ch.  8.  p.  226. 

7.  ...  he  moved  to  the  corner  where  his  clothes  lay. 

ib.  I  ch.   I   p.  23  f. 
The  man  dropped  without  a  word  and  lay  motionless. 

id.  ib. 

322.     Some  verbs  are  evidently  connected,  both 
Character    .     ^  ,  .         ,        ,     ,  ,.    . 

m  form  and  meanmg,  though  they  express  distmct 

ideas.     Such   pairs    of  verbs   are    to  crack   —    to  crackle,  to 

elimh   —    to   clamber,    to  prate  —  to  prattle.     We  may  also 

group    others   that   show  greater  differences  in  form  but  are 

similarly    related    in    meaning:    to  fly   —  to  flutter,  or  even 

verbs  that  have  the  same  suffix  -le  or  -er  without  a  parallel 

simple  verb:  to  sparkle^  to  slumber. 

All    these    verbs    with    the  suffixes  -le  and  -er  express  an 

action  that  is  thought  of  as  the  result  or  sum  of  repetitions 

of   a    single    action :    we    have    really    two    different  actions, 

although   they   are    related  to  each  other.     These  groups  of 

verbs    show    a    difference    in    the    character    of   the    actions 

expressed.     The  distinction  does  not  depend  upon  the  mental 

attitude    of  the    individual    observer,    but   upon    a  difference 

between   the   actions  that  can  be  thought  of  as  independent 


CHARACTER  2$ I 

of  the  observer;  in  popular  terms:  the  difterence  o'i character 
is  objective,  whereas  the  difference  of  aspect  is  subjective. 

323.  The  character  expressed  by  crackle,  clamber,  etc., 
in  which  an  action  is  represented  as  consisting  of  a  series 
of  repeated  actions,  is  also  expressed  by  means  of  repetition, 
often  with  vowel-change :  tip-tappings,  pitter-patter,  etc, ;  see 
vol.   3  on   Occasio?ial  Methods  of  Word-formation. 

324.  Repetition  of  the  same  action  does  not  necessarily 
lead  to  the  summing  up  expressed  by  the  verbs  or  nouns 
in  322  f. :  the  actions  may  remain  independent  and  isolated. 
This  character,  which  it  may  be  convenient  to  distinguish 
by  a  special  name :  the  iterative,  is  often  indicated  by  an 
adverb  adjunct,  or  it  can  be  inferred  from  the  situation. 

After  dinner  sit  a  while,  after  supper  walk  a  mile. 

School  begins  at  8.30  A.M.  except  on  Wednesdays 
and  Saturdays. 

He  goes  to  Germany  once  a  year. 

He  always  declared  that  it  was  impossible  for  him 
to  interfere. 

When  I  have  asked  a  singer,  as  I  have  constantly 
had  to  do,  whether  he  sang  a  particular  song,  I  have 
often  received  the  reply,  etc.     Sharp,  Folksong  p.  17. 

325.  The  distinction  of  an  iterative  character  enables  us 
to  state  the  difference  between  to  have  and  to  have  got.  It 
makes  no  difference  to  the  meaning  expressed  whether  we 
say  He  has  a  lot  of  money  or  He  has  got  a  lot  of  money. 
And  yet,  instead  of  Every  year  he  has  a  motitli's  holiday  it 
would  be  impossible  to  say:  he  has  got.  The  reason  is  that 
the  perfect  of  get  is  not  iterative. 

Repetition  may  produce  a  custom  or  habit,  and  this  variety 
of  character  may  be  expressed  by  special  verbs  which,  being 
subordinated    in   meaning   to   the    accompanying  verbal  stem 


232  VERBS 

or  verbal  ing,  are  classed  as  auxiliaries.  See  the  final  sections 
of  this  volume. 

326.  Sometimes  a  verb  is  used  to  express  the  beginning 
of  the  action,  the  inchoative  character.  Such  verbal  expres- 
sions are  to  catch  sight  of,  to  take  possession  of,  to  take  one  s 
stand.  Very  often,  however,  it  is  the  context  only  that  shows 
us  that  this  character  is  meant,  as  in  the  following  sentences 
with  to  know  and  to  stand. 

When  I  first  knew  him,  during  my  engagement  to 
my  husband,  he  had  just  practically  —  though  not 
formally  —  given  up  his  orders. 

Mrs.  H.  Ward,  Harper's,  May   191 8. 

Five  minutes  went  by,  and  then  a  man  in  uniform, 
like  a  'bus  conductor,  came  out  of  nowhere,  and  stood 
in  front  of  him.     Temple  Thurston,  Thirteen  I  p.  29. 

The  term  inchoative  is  often  applied  to  verbs  with  the 
suffix  [n],  as  redden,  sicken.  But  it  should  be  noted  that  these 
verbs  do  not  so  much  express  the  beginning  of  an  action, 
but  rather  the  passing  from  one  state  into  another.  There  is 
no  need  for  a  special  term,  because  it  is  not  a  character 
with  special  grammatical  forms,  apart  from  this  suffix. 

327.     It   has  been  pointed  out  that  the  difference 

between  aspect  and  character  is  the  difference  between 

individual  views  and  objective  fact  i).  This  may  seem 

as    rigid    a    barrier    between   the  two  ideas  as  could 

be  wished.  But  it  is  not  so:  the  distinction  is  no  more  absolute 

than  the  one  between  subjective  and  objective.  When  we  say 

that   the  difference  between  Greek  ^aXetv  and  §alleiv   is  one 

of   aspect,    we   probably  give  a  correct  interpretation  of  the 

forms:    to    a    Greek    speaker   the   two    forms  expressed  two 

aspects    of   what   was    essentially  one  action.     But  when  we 


1)  Admirably  shown  by  H.  Jacobsohn,  in  Gnomon  II,  379,  IT. 


CHARACTER   AND   ASPECT  233 

render  the  meanings  of  the  two  form  by  to  hit  and  to  throw ^ 
we  use  two  verbs  that  to  an  English  speaker  are,  indeed, 
connected,  but  still  distinct.  The  two  English  verbs  are  of 
different  characters.  This  difficulty  is  insuperable :  our  ideas 
of  the  world  outside  us  are  not  independent  of  the  words 
that  are  used  to  classify  and  name  them.  In  other  words : 
each  linguistic  group  has  its  own  system  of  classifying  the 
ideas  that  observation  produces.  Language  thus  decides,  not 
only  the  forms  in  which  we  express  our  ideas,  but  the  nature 
of  the  ideas  themselves. 

It  is  natural,  therefore,  that  character  and  aspect  cannot 
always  be  distinguished.  When  we  explained  the  perfective 
aspect  of  the  Slavonic  verb  by  means  of  the  English  compound 
sit  down  (306)  we  really  substituted  a  verb  of  a  different 
character  from  the  simple  verb  to  sit,  not  of  a  different  aspect. 
For  to  an  English  speaker  to  sit  and  to  sit  dozvn  are  not 
two  aspects  of  the  same  action,  but  two  distinct  actions. 

328.  Composition  is  a  frequent  means  in  English  of 
expressing  a  variety  of  character  in  verbs  of  motion  when  the 
prefix  expresses  a  passage  from  one  position  into  another : 
to  sit  down,  to  sit  up  {in  bed),  to  sink  down,  to  btirn  down, 
to  lie  down,  to  stand  up,  to  pull  up,  to  drive  away.  These 
groups  are  separable  compounds. 

Composition  with  a  prefix  expressing  place  is  also  frequent 
in  Dutch;  compare  the  simple  verb  and  its  compound  in  the 
following  cases :  uitlesen,  opeten,  inslikken,  uitspnwen,  inschrij- 
ven,  etc. 

A  translation  of  the  Dutch  words  will  show  that  English 
sometimes  uses  different  words,  in  other  cases  uses  one  verb 
for  both  meanings. 

Thus  opeten  would  often  be  rendered  by  to  finish,  ete7i  by 
to  eat;  inschrijven  by  to  enter,  schrijven  by  to  write ;  tdtlezen 
by    to   finish,    leze^t    by    to    read.    On    the   other  hand  both. 


234  VERBS 

slikken  and  inslikken  are  to  szvalloiu :  It  hurts  me  to  sivallow 
[slikken)  and  Baby  will  swallozv  the  ball  if  yoii  donU  take  it 
away  {inslikken), 

329.  An  adverb  used  in  composition  with  verbs  may 
often  lose  its  original  meaning  in  these  compounds.  Dutch 
kleden  and  aankleden  must  both  be  rendered  by  dress  in 
English :  zij  kleedt  de  kinder  en  eenvoudig  'She  dresses  the 
children  plainly';  ik  sal  de  kinderen  zvel  aankleden,  juffrouiv 
'I'll  dress  the  children,  Nurse.'  Similarly  in  these  English 
sentences: 

They    seem  to  have  eked  out  a  rather  poor  existence 
on  the  shores.  Fleure,  Races  of  Mankind  p,   17. 

That  he  fought  through  all  his  troubles,  and  received 
the  homage  of  the  whole  nation  as  a  saint,  .... 

Oman,  Conquest  p.   537. 

Compare  also  to  follow  out,  to  follow  up,  to  fill  up,  to 
hurry  up,  etc.  Compare  also  the  definition  of  the  verbs  to 
post  and  to  post  up  as  terms  in  book-keeping  given  by  the 
NED. :  'to  complete  (the  ledger  or  other  book)  by  trans- 
ferring to  it  all  the  items  in  the  auxiliary  books,  and  enter- 
ing them  in  their  proper  accounts;  to  make  the  proper 
entries  in  all  the  books,  so  that  they  contain  a  complete 
record  of  all  the  transactions;  often  post  up  (i.e.  up  to  date, 
or  to  completion).^ 

330.  It  may  happen  that  the  prefix  loses  its  independent 
meaning  altogether,  so  that,  instead  of  adding  a  new  element 
that  modifies  the  character  of  the  action,  it  only  expresses 
another  aspect  of  the  same  action.  Thus  Dutch  ver-  in  ver- 
horen  'to  grant  a  request'  is  a  means  of  expressing  the  per- 
fective aspect  of  what  is  Jioren  in  its  imperfective  aspect. 
When  we  say:  de  koning  verhoorde  zijn  versoek  'the  king 
granted  his  request',  we  may  really  think  of  the  king  listening 
to  the    request  and  granting  it  after  that.  The  English  trans- 


CHARACTER   AND   ASPECT  235 

lation  cannot  render  this,  which  shows  once  more  that  aspect 
is  not  an  inherent  part  of  the  action  itself,  but  an  element 
in  the  manner  of  viewing  it  by  a  speaker  of  a  certain  language. 

331.  Composition  by  means  of  an  adverb  or  prefix  to 
■express  aspect  is  found  in  several  Indogermanic  languages. 
Students  of  Old  Germanic  may  be  reminded  of  the  Gotic 
prefix  ga-  (Dutch  ge-)  i).  In  Modern  French  the  prefix  re 
(or  r,  before  vowels)  is  often  used,  especially  in  colloquial 
French,  to  express  the  perfective  aspect  2).  Thus  rabattre, 
rabaisser,  rattraper,  reunir  chiefly  differ  from  the  simple 
verbs  abattre,  abaisser,  attraper,  wiir  by  the  aspect  they 
express.  The  original  meaning  of  re-  'again'  is  often  com- 
pletely lost,  so  that  renirez  done  may  be  said  although  the 
person  addressed  has  never  entered  the  house. 

The  prefix  de-  is  similarly  used  in  French  demontrer,  dc- 
peindre,  delaisser,  detenir. 

332.  Sometimes  two  completely  different  verbs  may  be 
looked  upon  as  a  pair,  one  expressing  what  corresponds  to 
the  imperfective,  the  other  the  perfective  aspect. 

Imperfective  Perfective 

to  live  to  settle 

to  strike  to  hit 

to  say  to  tell 

to  hold  3)  to  seize 

to  acquire  to  obtain 

Another  pair  is  to  ascejid  (imperf.)  and  to  mount  (perfective). 
This  difference  is  clear  when  we  compare  to  ascend  a  hill, 
and  to  mount  a  hill.  Hence  also,  though  we  can  say  to  mount 
XI  horse,  it  would  be  absurd  to  say  to  ascend  a  horse. 


!)  Streitberg,  Paul  unci  Eraune's  Beitrage  15  p.p.  70 — 177. 

2)  Vendryes,  Le  Langage,  p.  130  f. 

3)  But  to  hold  up,  to  hold  in  (the  reins),  are  perfective,  according  to  328. 


236  VERBS 

333.  When  a  verb  expresses  an  action  with  special  attention 
concentrated  on  its  final  stage,  it  is  used  with  reference  to- 
past  time  or  future  time  rather  than  present  time.  Thus 
we  do  not  say  /  mount  my  horse  to  express  something  con- 
cerning the  present  time.  We  see  from  this  that  the  aspect 
expressed  by  a  verb,  though  aspect  is  independent  of  time, 
may  influence  the  verbal  tense  in  which  the  verb  occurs. 

Similarly  the  Dutch  verb  gaan  'to  go',  as  well  as  alter  in 
French,  though  expressing  an  action  as  starting  from  a  certain 
point  of  time,  and  serving  primarily  as  an  auxiliary  of  aspect, 
has  come  to  be  used  as  an  auxiliary  of  the  future  tense  i). 
We  see,  therefore,  that  aspect  and  tense,  like  aspect  and 
character,  cannot  always  be  kept  distinct. 

334.     In    the    preceding   sections    it    has  seemed 
Aspect  of         .  ,    ^       ,        ..^     ,        ^  -  .  - 

,,     .         useful    to    describe    the   traces    of  an  expression  01 
the  ing      ,  ,    ,  .  ,    ,  . ,      . 

the    aspect  and  character  of  a  verbal  idea  in  some 

of   the    better    known   languages.     It   has   been    shown    that 

neither  aspect  nor  character  is  a  regular  grammatical  category 

in  most  of  the  languages  referred  to :  there  are  generally  no 

pairs  of  verbal  forms  differing  only  in  the  aspect  or  character 

they   express.     A   pair   like  the  Greek  imperfect  and  aorist, 

and    the    French   imparfait   and   passe  defini  is  not  found  in 

most   of  the    modern   languages    referred    to.     The  traces  of 

a    distinction    of  aspect,    though  real  enough  in  some  cases, 

are    of   little    importance    for    the    general    structure    of  the 

language.     And    in    many   cases   the    distinction    is  not  of  a 

grammatical  but  of  a  lexical  character.    Now  it  is  true,  and 

indeed  clearly  shown  by  the  treatment  of  aspect  and  character 

in  these  pages,  that  the  division  of  linguistic  facts  into  matters 

for  the  dictionary  and  for  grammar  is  not  essential.     It  has 


1)  See   Haas,   Franz.   Syntax  §  123;  Kriiger,  Einl.  in  das  Neuspayiische 
p.  127. 


ASPECT   OF   THE   ING  23/ 

also  been  shown  that  ideas  that  in  one  language  are  expressed 
by  grammatical  forms  can  only  be  expressed  by  lexical  means 
in  another.  But  the  division  of  labour  between  dictionary  and 
grammar  is  a  practical  necessity,  and  we  can  say  that,  speaking 
grammatically,  there  is  only  one  form  in  living  English  that 
really  serves  the  purpose  of  expressing  aspect,  and  even  that 
only  in  some  of  its  uses :  the  verbal  form  in  ing. 

335.  It  is  important  to  consider  that  the  verbal  ing  is 
a  non-predicative  form.  For  it  is  its  non-verbal  function, 
whether  it  is  substantival  or  adjectival,  that  is  at  the  bottom 
•of  its  capacity  for  expressing  aspect.  Hence  we  may  expect 
to  find  this  aspect  most  clearly  when  the  ing  is  used  in 
functions  resembling  those  of  a  noun  or  of  an  adjective. 

The  verbal  ing  is  most  clearly  a  form  expressing  what 
may  be  defined  as  the  diirative  aspect  when  it  forms  a  group 
with  the  verb  to  be  ^).  In  this  case  the  group  is  called  the 
progressive;  its  use  will  be  discussed  in  the  sections  on  the 
auxiliary  to  be. 

In  the  following  chapter  the  meanings  of  the  single  verbal 
ing  will  be  treated.  Its  true  nature  with  regard  to  aspect 
can  be  fully  understood  only  when  we  compare  it  with  its 
alternatives :  the  verbal  stem,  and  the  simple  predicative  verb. 


VERBALS  AND  CLAUSES 

By   verbals   we   shall  mean  the  plain  stem  of  the 
verb,  the  stem  with  to^  and  the  form  in  ing. 


1)  The  terra  durative  does  not  imply  that  the  English  verbal  ing  ex- 
presses the  same  aspect  in  all  its  details  as  the  Slavonic  durative  (or 
imperfective)  verb.  They  may  be  related  without  being  identical.  It  should 
.also  bf;  noted  that  the  Slavonic  languages  themselves  differ  in  details. 


238  VERBS 

We  shall  compare : 

(1)  Plain  stem  and  stem  with  to. 

(2)  Plain  stem  and  ing. 

(3)  Stem  with  to  and  ing. 

(4)  Verbals  and  verbal  derivatives. 

(5)  Verbals  and  clauses. 

Plain  Stem  and  Stem  with  to 

337.  The  plain  stem  is  largely  used  as  the  leading 
element  of  the  predicate;  in  these  functions  it  is  called 
the  present,  the  imperative,  and  the  exclamative.  It  has 
a  point  of  contact  with  the  stem  with  to  in  the  last  ot 
these  functions  only. 

338.  When  we  compare  the  exclamative  plain  stem 
as  illustrated  in  183  f.  with  the  similar  stem  with  to  in 
204  f.,  it  is  evident  that  they  do  not  express  the  same 
meaning:  one  construction  cannot  be  substituted  for  the 
other.  We  may  rule  out  the  sentence  of  183  a,  for  it  is 
so  closely  connected  with  the  sentence  that  follows  it  that 
the  whole  group  should  rather  be  looked  upon  as  a  case 
of  the  type  discussed  in  178  ff.,  as  has  been  suggested  in 
183.  It  is  clear  that  all  the  sentences  of  183  express  the 
rejection  of  an  idea. 

The  sentences  of  204  f.,  on  the  other  hand,  even  if  they 
express  rejection  or  repudiation,  as  in  the  first  quotation 
of  204,  do  not  refer  to  an  idea,  but  to  a  wish,  plan,  or 
suggestion.  This  is  clearly  the  effect  of  the  preposition 
to  expressing  purpose,  etc.,  and  consequently  referring  to 
a  future  time. 

339.  The  chief  point  of  contact  between  the  two  forms 
of   the    stem    in   their  decidedly  non-predicative  use  is  in 


PLAIN   STEM   AND   STEM   WITH   TO  239 

the  object-with-stem  construction  with  the  verbs  of  sensation 
or  perception  and  of  experience,  less  often  with  the  verbs 
of  causing. 

With  regard  to  the  first  group,  the  verbs  of  sensation 
and  perception,  it  has  already  been  shown  that  the  two 
forms  of  the  stem  have  their  range  clearly  defined:  the 
object-with-plain  stem  is  used  to  express  the  perception 
of  a  fact  or  occurrence,  the  object-with-stem  with  to  is  found, 
though  chiefly  in  written  English,  to  express  the  perception 
of  a  state,  it  is  true  that  the  latter  construction  is  occasi- 
onail}^  found  when  an  occurrence  is  perceived  (286),  but 
it  should  be  remembered  that  an  exclusively  literary  con- 
struction is  never  handled  with  the  certainty  that  colloquial 
use  brings  with  it.  And  no  native  speaker  would  be 
capable  of  using  to  feel,  hear,  or  see  with  an  object-with- 
stem  with  to  if  an  action  was  to  be  referred  to :  /  saw 
him  to  run  away  is  unimaginable.  It  may  be  useful  to 
point  out  that  the  difference  between  the  two  constructions 
is  not  only  in  the  meaning  expressed  by  the  stem  (action 
and  occurrence,  or  state)  but  also  in  the  leading  verbs 
them.selves :  to  see,  feel,  and  hear  express  a  sensation  or 
involuntary  perception,  to  watch,  observe,  etc.  chiefly 
express  a  voluntar}^  action.  It  is  not  to  be  wondered  at 
that  the  familiar  object-with-plain  stem  construction  is 
occasionally  used  with  watch,  observe  etc,  as  shown  in 
198 :  the  distinction  of  meaning  is  too  delicate  to  be  alwa}- s 
effective  in  its  influence  upon  the  construction  chosen. 
And  the  opposite  is  also  possible :  when  to  see  or  feel  are 
used  with  an  object-with-stem  with  to  they  mostly  express 
a  mental  (voluntary)  rather  than  a  physical  perception, 
as  in  the  quotations  of  285  a  (except  the  first)  and  in  the 
following. 

A  traveller  who  should  walk  and  observe  any  of  these 
visitants  as  Venn  observed  them  now  could  feel  himself 


:240  VERBS 

to  be  in  direct  communication  with  regions  unknown  to  man. 
Hardy,  Native  I  ch.    lO  p.   104  {. 

340.  The  distinction  between  stems  expressing  an 
action  or  occurrence  and  such  as  express  a  state  or  con- 
dition will  also  enable  us  to  understand  why  in  the  fol- 
lowing sentences  to  make  must  take  the  stem  with  to. 

The  history  of  the  Turkish  Empire  for  more  than  a 
hundred  years,  its  extraordinary  combination  of  races, 
and,  above  all,  its  wonderful  geographical  position  astride 
the  Eastern  Mediterranean,  have  always  made  its  con- 
dition and  its  relations  to  be  of  prime  importance  to 
the  European  powers. 

F.  Harrison  in  English  Rev.  Jan.   191 3. 

So  also  history  is  full  of  anomalies  and  single  events 
giving  colouring  to  periods  and  making  things  to  be 
what  they  are.     Stubbs,  Lect.  Early  Eng.  Hist.  p.  i. 

341.  And  if  to  have  takes  the  same  construction  in  the 
following  quotations,  it  is  not  a  matter  of  indifference  that 
in  both  cases  it  is  dependent  upon  a  verb  expressing  will. 
See  also  the  chapter  on  Auxiliaries. 

It  is  enough  for  me  ...  to  cut  at  the  roots  of  igno- 
rance .  .  .  not  to  pull  off  the  leaves  one  by  one  as  you 
would  have  me  to  do.     M.  Cholmondely,  Ked  Pottage. 

And  he   would  have  had  her  to  suppose  that.  .  .  . 
Meredith,  Beauchamp  ch.  2  p.   18. 

342.  Of  the  verbs  of  causing  that  take  the  traditional 
object-with-plain  stem  [let,  help,  make,  bid)  the  last  two  are 
also  found  with  the  object-with-stem  with  to.  The  first 
two  sentences  below  probably  take  to  as  a  result  of  the 
unusual  word-order;  the  other  cases  may  be  influenced 
by  rhythmical  or  other  'literary'  considerations.  This  is  still 
jnore  natural  for  the  purely  literary  verb  to  bid. 

It  is  a  book  full  of  matter  making  one  furiously  to 
think.  Rev.  of  Rev,  Jan.   19 10. 


PLAIN   STEM   AND   STEM   WITH   TO  24 1 

The  British  were  the  dominant  colonizing  race  destined 
by  fate  to  make  to  blossom  the  waste  places  of  the 
earth.  Times  W.    19/12,    1902. 

A  mere  device  for  making  the  deaf  to  hear. 

Sketch  ejd,,    13. 
. .  .   making    the  cabman  above  bound  and  sway,  and 
the  cab-horse  to  start  and  antic. 

Meredith,  Rhoda  Fleming  ch.   19. 

After  an  exciting  subject  which  has  made  the  general 
tongue  to  wag,  and  just  enough  heated  the  brain  to 
cause  it  to  cry  out  for  spiced  food — then  start  your  story. 

Meredith,  Harrington  ch.   31. 
She    would    have   given  the  world  that  he  should  ask 
her  questions;  but  she  could  not  bid  him  to  do  so, 
Troliope,   Dr.  Thorne  ch.  33   p.   355. 
In    another    place   he  characteristically  bids  his  angry 
colleagues  to  join  with  him  .  .  .  Bailey,  Johnson. 

Two  days  later  came  letters  from  the  administration, 
accepting  his  voluntary  services,  and  bidding  him  to 
repair  at  once  to  headquarters. 

Buchanan,  That  Winter  Night  ch.  2. 
They    are    averse    from    all   wars,    and  above  all  from 
wars  which  would  entangle  them  now  and  for  the  future 
in  those  "European  entanglements"  their  traditional  policy 
bids  them  to  avoid.  Times  24/7,    15. 

"He  is  acting,  Carry."  —  "No,"  said  Caroline,  "he 
is  not.  I  have  never  known   Evan  to  lie." 

Meredith,   Harrington  ch.   ■^'j  p.    183. 
"My  dear  brother,  you  did  not  do  what  you  said  you 
would  do."    "Have  you  ever  known  me  not  to  do  what 
I  said  I  would  do?"  ib.  ch.  36  p.  381. 

I  have  known  him  to  get  up  at  three  o'clock  in  the 
morning.  Times   VV.   21/12,    17. 

"Poor  St.  Joseph,"  they  say  —  "I  always  get  what 
I  want  from  him.  I've  never  known  him  to  fail." 

Temple  Thurston,  City  p.  4. 

343.     Of  the  other  two  verbs  of  causing:  to  let  and  to 
help,  the  former  is  as  good  as  always  construed  with  the 

Khuisinga,  Handbook  II.  Accidence  and  Syntax.  1.  16 


242  VERBS 

object-with-plain  stem ;  to  help,  on  the  contrary,  though  it 
is  sometimes  used  with  the  same  construction,  usual!}- 
takes  the  other. 

Nothing  was  ever  done  to  help  him  to  understand  the 
processes  of  his  own  mind. 

Cannan,  Corner,  ch.  20  p.  216. 

„       .  344.     It  is  naturally  possible  for  two  plain  stems 

Grouping        ,  ,.         ,  ,  ,  .       ,     •  •      ^  , 

.  to  be  coordmated  by  and,  or;  and  to  be  jomed  by 

as,  than,  but,  except  ^). 

There  is  a  world  of  difference  between  speaking  to  a 
voluntary  audience  whom  you  must  interest  or,  as  a 
lecturer,  perish,  and  speaking  to  an  academic  audience 
over  whom  you  can  crack  the  whip  of  an  attendance 
register.  Times  Ed.  S.   18/3,  20. 

And  ultimately,  to  the  commonest  tourist,  spots  like 
Iceland  may  become  what  the  vineyards  and  myrtle- 
gardens  of  South  Europe  are  to  him  now;  and  Heidelberg 
and  Baden  be  passed  unheeded  as  he  hastens  from  the 
Alps  to  the  sand-dunes  of  Scheveningen. 

Hardy,   Native  I  ch.    i   p.   5. 

"Oh !  there's  no  harm  in  starting  at  the  top.  They 
can't  do  more  than  refuse  it.  But  I  don't  think  they 
will  .  .  ."  Walpole,  Fortitude  II  ch    5  p.   196. 

Why,  in  spite  of  all,  should  I  go  back  .  . .  simply 
to  save  hundreds  of  millions  of  common  people,  whom 
I  did  not  love,  whom  too  often  I  could  not  do  other 
than  despise,  from  the  stress  and  anguish  of  war  and 
infinite  misrule.  Wells,  Country  of  the  Blind,  14/9,  12. 
What  could  they  do  but  avoid  her ! 

Galsworthy,  Man  of  Property  ch.   i. 

345.  When  two  plain  stems  are  connected  by  and  it 
sometimes  happens  that  the  second  is  clearly  subordinated, 
forming  an  adjunct  of  attendant  circumstances. 


1)  On    the   character  of  these  conjunctive  words,  see    Sentence-Structure. 


GROUPING   OF   STEMS  243 

A  woman  with  an  ice-cold  brain  who  could  pass 
through  a  Stock  Exchange  cataclysm  and  show  no 
emotion  l).  Graphic  29/6,   1929. 

He  could  sit  up  reading  a  whole  night  and  not  feel 
sleepy. 

346.  The  connecting  and  may  introduce  what  should 
be  called  a  free  adjunct,  separated  from  the  rest  of  the 
sentence  by  a  clear  break. 

He  could  throw  it  (viz.  the  knife)  from  the  top  of  a 
bus  and  no  one  notice.     M.  Arlen,  May  Fair  p.   132. 

For  instance,  can  a  man  disappear  like  that,  even  in 
Constantinople,  and  no  questions  be  asked.'' 

Strand,  Jan.   191 7. 

There  isn't,  I  suppose,  anything  in  the  world  more 
irritating  than  to  be  angry  with  a  woman  and  she  not 
notice.  M.  Arlen,  Green  Hat  p.  247. 

347.  When  two  stems  with  to  are  coordinated,  it  is 
naturall}^  possible  to  use  to  twice.  This  construction  leaves 
the  two  stems  independent  of  each  other. 

She  was  anxious  to  make  her  friend  smile,  and  to  smile 
with  her.  Trollope,  Dr.  Thorne  ch,   26  p.  277. 

1  he  subject  of  money  is  a  very  complicated  one,  and 
you  are  recommended  to  devote  yourself  to  the  rules 
for  'making'  it  rather  than  to  waste  your  time  under- 
standing it.  quoted  in  Athen. 

We  have  indicated  its  general  character;  we  cannot 
pretend  to  do  more  than  to  draw  attention  to  a  few 
points  in  it.  Times  W.  4/12,   14. 

He  sought  to  raise  the  civilization  of  his  own  country 
by  the  employment  of  Englishmen  in  Denmark,  rather 
than  to  gratify  the  pride  of  his  countrymen  by  placing 
Danes  in  command  in  England. 

Wakeman,  Introd.  p.  y2. 

1)  This  quotation,  like  several  others  here,  is  borrowed  from  an  article 
in  Moderna  Sprak.  (.Dec.  1929)  by  Dr.  Arvid  Smith. 


244  VERBS 

348.  It  is  also  possible  when  two  stems  are  connected 
by  and  to  use  the  prefix  once,  so  that  it  may  be  supposed 
to  precede  the  group.  The  two  stems  may  remain  in- 
dependent of  each  other  (a),  but  when  there  is  no  break 
the  effect  of  single  to  is  frequently  to  subordinate  one 
stem  to  the  other;  in  this  case  repetition  would  be  im- 
possible. In  many  groups  the  second  stem  is  the  subordinate 
element  of  the  group  {b);  this  case  cannot  always  be 
distinguished  from  that  of  345,  as  is  clearly  shown  in  the 
second  quotation.  Occasionally  it  is  the  first  stem  that 
is  subordinated  {c). 

a.  Another  simplification  is  to  follow  the  stream  and 
ignore  the  eddies  in  the  river  of  human  history. 

Times  Lit.   1 1/3,  20. 

It  is  incontestably  much  easier  to  read  French  than 
read  Greek.  Times  Ed.  S.  7/9,   16. 

He  is  considerately  sparing  you  the  trouble  of  having 
to  take  a  bath,  fumigate  yo\xrse.\{,  dind  change  yGViV  undQ^- 
clothing.  Huxley,   Vulgarity  p.  4. 

b.  He  used  to  loiter  behind  on  their  walks  and  pretend 
that  he  did  not  belong  to  Nurse.     Sinister  Street  p.  80. 

We  all  go  to  and  fro  in  a  state  of  the  observing 
faculties  which  somewhat  resembles  coma.  We  are  content 
to  look  and  not  see. 

Arnold  Bennett,   English  Rev.  April  1913. 
For  the  third  time  that  evening  he  had  to  fight  against 
a  disposition  to  blow  his  nose  and  be  absurd. 

Walpote,  Fortitude  II  ch.   5   p.   199. 

c.  Will  you  ask  her  to  come  and  see  me? 

Gissing,  Odd  Women  ch.   3. 
What  is  this  life  if,   full  of  care, 
We  have  no  time  to  stand  and  stare  .  .  . 

Davies,  in  Poems  of  To-Day  I   loi. 

349.  V/e  also  find  a  stem  without  to  after  hut,  than, 
except,  no  matter  whether  another  stem  precedes  [a]  or 
not  [b).     Sometimes  the  stem  takes  to  {c). 


COORDINATION   OF   STEMS  245 

a.  Here  it  is  impossible  to  do  more  than  briefly 
indicate  a  few  of  the  prominent  names. 

Millar,  Mid -eighteenth  Cent. 

You  mustn't  think  I've  got  nothing  to  do  but  enjoy 
myself.  Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  IV  ch.  3  §  4- 

Meanwhile  Amos'  gaze  was  soon  bent  on  the  floor 
as  usual;  then  it  began  to  roam  about  the  room,  anywhere 
except  meet  his  brother's. 

Patterson,  Stephen  Compton,  p.  29, 

It    (i.  e.    a    well-proportioned  mind)  never  would  have 
allowed    Yeobright    to    do    such    a    ridiculous    thing    as 
throw  up  his  business  to  benefit  his  fellow-creatures. 
Hardy,  Native  III  ch.  2  p.  213. 

b.  Adam  should  have  been  wiser  than  do  that,  she 
told  him. 

Peter  does  nothing  but  pick  holes  in  Americans. 

Cotes,   Cinderella  ch.    14  p.   167. 

c.  We  cannot  do  better  toward  showing  the  value  of 
this  volume  than  to  quote  this  passage  concerning 
Shakespeare. 

We  now  know  better  than  to  make  any  such  con- 
cession. Times  W.    i/ii,    12. 

350.  When  of  two  coordinated  verbs  with  the  same 
stem  as  an  adjunct  after  them  the  one  requires  a  stem 
without  to,  the  other  a  stem  with  to,  the  stem  must  be 
repeated. 

(The  two  functions)  can  be,  and  ought  to  be,  dis- 
tinguished in  analysis.  Times  Lit.   10/8,   16. 

^  ,  ,.  351.     The    plain    stem   when   used  predic- 

Time  of  Action      .     ,  ^  ^  .       .  .  ^ , 

atively,    apart    irom    its    imperative    and   ex- 

clamative  use,  is  counted  a  present  tense.   We  have  seen 

that  in   reality   the  time  of  the  verbal  idea  depends  upon 

the  situation,  and  may  be  present,  luture  or  past. 


246  VERBS 

When  the  plain  stem  is  used  as  a  non-predicative  form 
it  does  not  in  any  way  indicate  time;  the  time  in  which 
the  action,  occurrence  or  state  is  thought  of  depends 
entirely  upon  the  rest  of  the  sentence,  as  far  as  it  is 
grammatically  expressed :  /  do  not  agree  with  you,  I  did 
not  agree  ivith  you,  I  shall  never  agree  with  you. 

352.  The  same  applies  to  the  stem  with  to :  I  am  pleased 
to  see  you,  I  was  pleased  to  see  you,  I  shall  be  pleased  to 
see  you.  But  when  the  stem  clearly  expresses  purpose, 
result,  or  destiny,  it  must  naturally  refer  to  what  is  future, 
as  in  the  following  cases. 

It  did  not  signify  what  those  times  had  been,  they 
were  gone  never  to  return. 

Gaskell,  North  and  South  ch.  2. 

He  ate  his  breakfast  heartily,  and  smoked  his  pipe, 
making  no  more  of  death  than  if  he  had  been  to  take 
a  journey.  Times  Lit.    i/ii,   18, 

A  month  ago  the  Prime  Minister  insisted  upon  the 
exceptional  importance  of  the  coming  Conference  of  the 
Allies  to  be  held  in  Paris.  Times  W.  30/11,   17. 

With  the  exception  of  an  aged  highway,  and  a  still 
more  aged  barrow  presently  to  be  referred  to  ...  . 

Hardy,  Return  of  the  Native  I  ch.   i. 

353.  The  consequence  of  this  future  meaning  of  the 
stem  is  that  to  be  is  sometimes  equivalent  to  a  predicative 
adjective,  meaning  future. 

The  English  Plato  is  still  to  be.     Times  Lit.  15/1,  20. 

354.  When  the  stem  with  to  is  not  used  in  the  final 
sense,  however,  as  in  adjuncts  to  nouns,  and  as  an  in- 
dependent element  of  the  sentence  (subject  or  nominal 
predicate)  it  may  refer  to  other  than  future  time  (a),  or, 
indeed,  to  no  particular  time  at  all  {b).  Of  course,  future 
time  may  also  be  referred  to  [c). 


PLAIN   STEM   AND   STEM   WITH   TO  247 

a.  Nicholas  Breakspear,  Pope  (d.  1159),  the  only 
Englishman  to  attain  that  eminence  was  born  at  Langley, 
near  St.  Albans. 

Diet.  Eng.  Church  Hist.  ed.  OUard  s.  v.  Adrian  IV". 
The  first  apparently  to  point  out  Milton's  indebtedness 
to  Dante  were  the  two  Richardsons. 

b.  To  read  George  Eliot  attentively  is  to  become  aware 
how  little  one  knows  about  her.     Times  Lit.  20/11,  19. 

c.  A  man  would  often  cut  his  hands  with  the  shells, 
which  would  poison  and  swell,  and  render  him  helpless 
for  some  time  to  come. 

Davies,  Super-Tramp  ch.    1 1   p.   87. 

355.     After  the  detailed  comparison  of  the  two 
Sammary   ^  -    ,  .       ,  ^     ,. 

forms    01    the    stem    m    the   preceding  sections  it 

seems  desirable  to  sum  up,  in  as  few  words  as  possible, 
what  we  may  consider  the  outcome  of  this  comparison. 

The  plain  stem  differs  from  the  stem  with  to  in  the 
first  place  in  that  it  can  be  used  in  a  predicative  as  well 
as  in  a  non-predicative  function.  The  plain  stem  in  itself 
never  suggests  any  idea  of  the  time,  nor,  as  we  shall  see 
more  clearl}^  below,  of  the  aspect,  of  the  verbal  idea  it 
expresses.  The  stem  with  to  shows  the  traces  of  its 
starting-point  (in  the  final  adjunct)  in  many  uses  even 
when  no  purpose  or  result  is  expressed.  Its  aspect  may 
not  be  perfective,  it  is  certainly  never  durative;  this  is 
the  reason  why  it  is  impossible  to  use  it  in  the  object- 
with-stem  construction  with  verbs  expressing  a  sensation 
of  some  thing  happening  (with  to  feel,  hear,  see). 

The  reason,  finally,  why  the  'auxiharies'  take  the  plain 
stem,  and  why  ought  takes  the  stem  with  to,  can  now 
also  be  stated.  The  plain  stem  is  neither  exclusively 
predicative,  nor  exclusively  non-predicative.  The  auxili- 
aries, being  verbs  that  are  completely  subordinate  members 
of  the  verbal  group  they  form  with  the  stem,  are  not 
clearly   predicative    for    that    very    reason,    and   take   the 


248  VERBS 

plain  stem  which  may  be  either.  It  may  be  added  that 
if  the  stem  with  to  is  out  of  the  question  here,  the 
same  applies  to  the  verbal  ing.  And  if  ought  takes  the 
stem  with  to  this  is  in  agreement  with  the  plain  fact  that 
ought  is  not  subordinated  to  the  stem,  whether  in  form 
or   meaning,    as  the  related  vMist  frequently  is;  see  417  ff. 

Plain  Stem  and  Ing 

356.  The  only  point  of  contact  between  the  plain  stem 
and  the  ing  is  in  the  object-with-plain  stem  and  the  object- 
with-ing  constructions  with  verbs  expressing  a  sensation 
[feel,  hear,  see)  or  experience  {have,  find).  The  aspect  of 
the  ing  in  contrast  to  the  plain  stem  is  shown  to  be  the 
cause  of  the  use  of  the  two  forms  in  the  following  quotations. 
The  same  verb  is  shown  to  take  either  construction 
according  to  the  principle  indicated. 

1.  We  heard  the  dog  barking  loudly,  and  ran  to  the 
place  as  quick  as  we  could  .  .  .  The  next  moment  we 
again  heard  the  dog  bark,  and  when  we  came  up  to  him, 
we  found,  etc.  Sweet,  Spoken  English  p.   55. 

He    had    seen  her  twice ;  he  had  rather  liked  a  short 
speech  of  five  sentences  she  made  at  a  Flower  Show,  and 
he    had    heard    her    being   extremely    rude    to  a  curate. 
Wells,  Joan  and  Peter  ch.   5   §   i. 

2.  Long  before  he  reached  Piccadilly,  he  saw  the  very 
person  approaching  him.  He  was  walking  a  little  more 
leisurely  than  most  of  those  whom  he  had  seen.  His 
top-hat  glistened  in  the  sunlight  and  a  cane  with  a  gold 
band  swang  loosely  on  his  arm. 

As  he  came  nearer,  Johnny  saw  him  take  a  gold 
cigarette-case  from  his  pocket,  and  he  stopped  to  light  a 
cigarette.  Temple  Thurston,  Thirteen  I  p,  23. 

Edwin  in  the  darkness  could  see  him  feeling  in  his 
waistcoat  pocket  and  then  raise  his  arm,  and  throzv  in 
the  direction  of  the  dimly  lighted  yard. 

Bennett,  These  Twain  I  ch.   5. 


PLAIN   STEM   AND   ING  249 

Accordingly,  when  watching  on  the  night  after  the 
festival  (Venn)  saw  him  ascend  by  the  little  path,  lean 
over  the  front  gate  of  Clym's  garden,  sigh,  and  turn 
to  go  back  again. 

Hardy,  Return  of  the  Native  IV  ch.  4. 

That  is  the  conviction  which  we  should  like  to  see 
spreading  in  all  classes,  and  especially  in  the  working 
classes.  Star  6  Sept.   1927. 

But  some  thoughtful  persons,  who  had  seen  him  walking 
across  one  of  his  fields  on  a  certain  December  morning  — 
sunny  and  exceedingly  mild  —  might  have  regarded 
Gabriel  in  other  aspects  than  these. 

Hardy,  Madding  Crowd  ch.   i   p.   3. 

3.  After  lunch  they  walked  to  the  Parks  to  ivatch  Alan 
playing  for  the  Varsity,  Sinister  Street  p.  704. 

Michael  watched  very  carefully  Alan's  meeting  with 
Stella,  ivatched  Alan's  face  fall  when  he  saw  her  beside 
Maurice  and  marked  how  nervously  he  fidgeted  with  his 
gloves.  ib.  on  the  same  page. 

And  ivaiching  Stanley  buttoning  his  braces,  she  grew 
enthusiastic.  Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.  8  p.  84. 

It  was  jolly  to  watch  his  eyes  twinkle  and  his  thin 
cheeks  puff  out.  ib.  p.  95, 

The  kettle  boils  at  last,  I  am  so  glad.  It's  always 
said  to  be  dull,  watching  a  kettle  boil,  but  I  think  it's 
rather  interesting.         Cotes,  Cinderella  ch.    12   p.    143. 

4.  The  student  .  .  ,  will  probably  find,  the  language 
present  little  difficulty, 

McKerrow,  Engl.  Assoc.  Pamphlet  no.  49.  p.  27. 
It  is  altogether  exceptional  to  find  two  of  the  greater 
states  uniting  for  the  humiliation  of  a  third,  as  England 
and  the  Empire  united  against  Philip  Augustus  of  France. 

Davis,   Med.  Europe  p.    158. 

5.  But  I  won't  have  that  young  man  speaking  of 
them  so.  Gaskell,  Wives  II.  p.    14. 

357.     When    we    study    these    sets   of  quotations   it   is 
impossible   not   to  see  that  the  ing  is  used  because  of  its 


2  50  VERBS 

durative  aspect;  and  that  in  many  cases  the  plain  stem 
must  be  used  because  a  durative  form  would  be  out  of 
the  question.  This  is  very  clear  in  cases  when  the  two 
forms  are  used  successively,  whether  in  the  same  sentence, 
or  in  succeeding  sentences:  see  1  (first  sentence)  and  3 
(first  two  sentences).  It  is  also  evident  that  in  the  last 
sentence  of  3  it  would  be  impossible  to  use  boiling. 

358.  In  accordance  with  the  durative  aspect  expressed 
by  the  ing  this  construction  ma}^  not  only  express  duration  {a) 
but  also  frequent  repetition  {b). 

a.  Through  the  still  night  I  heard  the  nightingale 
calling,  calling,  until  I  could  bear  it  no  longer  and  went 
softly  out  into  the  luminous  dark. 

Fairless,  Roadmender  V. 
We  saw  a  tall  gentleman  standing  looking  at  us  intently 
and    silently.     So   off  we  went  again  through  the  wood, 
while    we    heard    the    gentleman  shouting:   "Stop  there, 
stop!"  Sweet,  Spoken  Engl.  p.  6i. 

Oftentimes  in  winter,  when  no  doors  or  windows  were 
open,  I  have  seen  the  glass  panes  streaming  with  wet 
inside,  and  women  carried  out  fainting. 

Rutherford,  Autobiogr.  p.  8. 

b.  We  shall  have  the  young  men  coming  to  dinner 
pretty  often,  you'll  see.  Gaskell,   Wives  II  p.    19. 

We  saw  the  doves  and  starlings  going  in  and  out  the 
tower,  and  the  black  swifts  screaming  round  it. 

Sweet,  Spoken  English  p.   58. 
I  won't  have  you  coming  in  here  (i.  e.  the  sick-room). 
Bennett,  Clayhanger  III  ch.   16  §   i. 

359.  The  object-with-plain  stem,  to  the  exclusion  of  the 
object-with-ing,  is  used  with  the  verbs  expressing  cause 
[let,  make,  have) :  this  is  clearly  in  agreement  with  the 
explanations  given  in  the  preceding  sections. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  object-with-ing  is  the  only  con- 


PLAIN   STEM   AIS'D   ING  25 1 

struction  used  with  prevent,  excuse,  negative- interrogative 
help  and  mmd.  This  is  not  necessarily  the  result  of  the 
meanings  expressed,  but  may  be  due  to  the  origin  of  the 
construction  and  its  grammatical  character.  See  373. 

360.  When  one  studies  the  object-with-ing  construction 
one  should  be  careful  to  distinguish  it  from  a  noun  with 
an  attributive  ing.  We  find  both  constructions  successively 
in  the  two  stanzas  of  the  following  poem  by  Ralph  Hodgson, 
The  Hammers. 

Noise  of  hammers  once  I  heard, 
Many  hammers,  busy  hammers, 
Beating,  shaping,  night  and  day, 
Shaping,  beating  dust  and  clay 
To  a  palace ;  saw  it  reared ; 
Saw  the  hammers  laid  away. 

And  I  listened,  and  I  heard 

Hammers  beating,  night  and  day. 

In  the  palace  newly  reared, 

Beating  it  to  dust  and  clay :  ^ 

Other  hammers,  muffled  hammers. 

Silent  hammers  of  decay. 

Van  Doom,  Primrose  Path  p.   12. 

Stem  with  to  and  Sng  Compared 

361.  The  stem  with  to  and  the  ing  share  a  good  many 
grammatical  functions.  In  some  cases  one  form  is  possible 
only,  however.  It  will  consequently  be  necessary  in  order 
to  promote  a  full  understanding  of  each  form : 

(i)  to  consider  in  what  cases  one  of  the  two  forms  only 

is  used,  and  to  find  out  why. 
(2)  to    consider    the    cases    when  both  forms  are  possible, 

and  what  difference  is  expressed  if  any. 


252  VERBS 

...  ,  362.     The    stem    with    to  is  used  to  the 

Stem  with  to  only        ,     .         ^   ,      • 

exclusion  oi  the  ing : 

(i)  in  final  and  in  complementary  adjuncts  to  most  verbs, 
nouns,  and  adjectives,  and  in  free  adjuncts  (207  fif.). 

(2)  in  the  plain  object-with-stem  construction  with  verbs 
expressing  cause  and  will  (242  ff.). 

(3)  in  the  prepositional  object-with-stem  construction  with 
adjectives,  nouns,  and  verbs  (261  ff.). 

(4)  in  the  object-with-stem  construction  with  the  verbs  of 
perception  and  of  declaring  (284  ff.),  except  the  verbs 
of  perception   that  can  take  the  object-with- plain  stem. 

(5)  in  complementary  adjuncts  with  a  connecting  interro- 
gative-relative word  230  ff.). 

(6)  in  exclamatory  sentences  (204  f.). 

363.  The  first  statement  of  the  preceding  section  is  the 
result  of  the  fact  that  the  stem  with  to  can  express  what 
we  may  perhaps  call  the  perfective  aspect.  This  is  the 
natural  consequence  of  the  use  of  the  preposition  to ;  it  does 
not  mean,  and  it  is  important  to  understand  this  clearly  at 
the  outset,  that  the  stem  with  to  is  always  or  naturally 
perfective;  it  is  so  only  when  the  stem  with  the  prefix 
expresses  the  final  meaning.  It  has  been  shown  (236)  that 
to  can  also  be  used  in  a  local  meaning,  and  further  that  the 
distinction  between  local  and  final  to  is  not  always  possible. 
This  is  natural  because  direction  frequently  implies  purpose. 

Words  expressing  will  take  the  stem  with  to  in  the  object- 
with-stem  construction  because  they  are  closely  allied  to  the 
adjuncts  of  purpose;  this  is  still  clearer  in  the  case  of  the 
verbs  of  causing  that  take  the  same  construction. 

It  is  hardly  necessary,  in  the  case  of  the  prepositional 
object-with-stem,  to  point  out  that  purpose  is  a  prominent 
element  in  this  construction. 


STEM   WITH   TO   AND   ING  253 

364.  Words  expressing  wish  take  the  stem,  both  in  ad- 
juncts and  in  the  object-with-stem  construction,  and  for  the 
same  reason  (a).  And  even  when  the  stem  is  to  be  best 
interpreted  as  a  complementary  adjunct  it  is  usually  possible 
to  find  something  of  purpose  in  it,  or  of  a  future  time  that 
is  looked  forvard  to  {b).  If  some  words  of  wish  take  the 
object- with-ing  construction  (108  b)  it  is  because  these  verbs 
may  express  a  different  meaning,  as  will  be  explained 
below  (384). 

a.  She    had    the    desire    to    do    something    which    she 
objected  to  doing. 

Bennett,    Old   W.  Tale  IV  ch.    i   §   5. 
The  least  Amy  could  do  was  to  show  contrition  and 
amiability  and  an  anxiety  to  please.  ib.  ch.   3  §  i. 

She  made  a  sign  to  the  guard  for  leave  to  go  upstairs 
again.  Mackenzie,   Sylvia  and  Michael  p.   261, 

(They)  are  anxious  to  confide  in  each  other. 

Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  IV  ch.  2  §  2  p.  458. 
Sophia  was,  very  careful  to  make  no  observation. 

Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  IV  ch.  3  §  3  p.  492. 
There    are    plenty    of   admirable  scholars  capable  and 
willing  to  take  up  the  work  of  advanced  classical  courses 
if  reasonable  salaries  are  provided. 

Times  Ed.  S.    1 1/3,   20. 

b.  We  have  no  time  to  explore  the  backwaters. 

Times  Lit.   11/3,  20, 
We  were  a  locally  minded  people,  and  local  was  our 
history.   We  had  not  even  the  intelligence  to  write  very 
much  of  that.  ib. 

365.  The  verbs  of  perception  that  take  an  object-with- 
stem  may  seem  to  weaken  the  theory  brought  forward  here 
with  regard  to  the  aspect  expressed  by  the  stem  with  to. 
For  many  verbs  of  perception,  such  as  to  see,  feel,  and  Jiear, 
can  freely  and  naturally  take  the  object-with-ing.  It  must  be 
•considered,  however,  that  the  verbs  that  take  the  stem- con- 


254  VERBS 

struction  primarily  express  mental  perception  or  activity,  i.  e. 
an  action  thought  of  with  regard  to  a  definite  end,  hence 
naturally  requiring  a  perfective  form.  The  verbs  that  take 
the  ing-construction,  on  the  other  hand,  expressing  as  they 
do  sensation  rather  than  a  mental  activity,  can  naturally  take 
a  durative  form. 

It  is  in  complete  agreement  with  this  that  the  verb  to 
feel  can  take  a  stem  with  to  as  an  adjunct  when  a  mental 
perception  is  referred  to. 

I  feel  partly  to  know  it  (viz.  the  house)  f  om  my  mother's 
descriptions.  E.  Everett-Green,  The  Temptation 

of  May  Lister  ch.  7  p.   106. 

366.  The  fifth  group  of  361  has  been  already  dealt  with 
in  364.  As  to  the  sixth,  it  does  not  seem  to  the  present 
writer  that  the  exclusive  use  of  the  stem  in  exclamations  is 
connected,  directly  at  any  rate,  with  the  aspect  expressed 
by  the  two  forms  that  are  here  compared.  It  may  chiefly 
be  the  more  definitely  verbal  character  of  the  stem  in  con- 
trast to  the  semi-derivative  ing  that  has  enabled  the  stem 
to  hold  its  ground  here  so  successfully. 

„  ,  ,  .  ,  367.  The  verbal  ing  is  used,  to  the  exclusion 
Verbal  mg  only     ^    ,  .  ,  ^^ 

of  the  stem  with  to: 

(1)  in  prepositional  adjuncts,  except  those  with  to  when 
expressing  purpose  or  result  (207  fif.). 

(2)  in  plain  adjuncts  completing  the  meaning  of  some 
adjectives  (90). 

(3)  as  an  object  or  complementary  adjunct  to  a  number 
of  verbs. 

(4)  as  an  object  and  as  a  predicative  adjunct  with  verbs 
that  are  construed  with  an  object  and  predicative 
adjunct. 

(5)  in  the  object-with-ing  construction  with  the  verbs 
enumerated  in   109  fT.  {to  prevent,  excuse,  etc.). 


STEM   WITH   TO   AND   ING  255 

368.  Before  we  treat  of  the  first  group  of  the  preceding 
section  it  may  be  well  to  warn  the  reader  that  it  is  not 
always  evident  whether  we  have  to  do  with  a  preposition 
or  with  a  conjunction.  The  subject  is  dealt  with  in  the 
second  volume  in  the  chapter  on  Conjunctions,  so  that  it 
will  be  sufficient  to  give  a  few  examples  here.  The  con- 
junctive character  of  the  stem-group  may  be  shown,  as  in 
the  second  example,  by  the  use  of  to  with  reference  to  both 
stem-forms:  this  is  possible  because  they  are  coordinated  (344), 
which  implies  that  the  connecting  word  {instead  of)  is  a 
conjunction,  unless  we  prefer  to  define  it  as  an  adverb  of 
negation,  like  not. 

Seymour  was  impeached  for  having  misappropriated 
these  supplies  —  using  them  to  retain  histead  of  to 
disband  the  soldiers.        Maitland,  Const.  Hist.   p.   328. 

(They)  helped  to  lower  ijistead  of  raise  the  standard 
of  morality  in  the  community.     Const.  Essays  p.  335, 

369.  With  respect  to  the  first  of  the  groups  that  take 
an  ing  only  as  enumerated  in  367,  there  seems  to  be  no 
reason  to  doubt  that  we  must  look  for  the  cause  in  the 
distinctly  more  nominal  character  of  the  ing  in  this  con- 
struction than  of  the  stem  with  to.  This  is  also  in  agreement 
with  the  form,  for,  as  we  have  seen  {72)),  the  ing  is  in 
some  respects  rather  a  derivative  than  an  inflectional  form. 
And  if  an  additional  argument  were  wanted,  it  would  be 
sufficient  to  point  to  the  adjuncts  of  the  ing,  which  may  be 
those  peculiar  to  nouns  as  well  as  those  that  can  accompany 
verbs  only. 

If  the  ing  is  not  used  in  adjuncts  with  final  to,  this  is 
plainly  due  to  the  character  of  the  group  of  to  with  stem 
in  this  meaning:  the  group  is  inseparable,  or  nearly  so 
(considering  the  'split  infinitive'),  and  a  similar  (hardly  the 
same)   meaning   in   adjuncts  to  nouns  must  be  expressed  by 


256  VERBS 

for;  see  79,  208.  And  this  explanation  is  supported  by  the 
fact  that  local  to  can  take  an  ing  as  well  as  any  noun.  In 
short,  we  may  say  that  the  to  before  the  stem  is  a  prefix 
that  has  become  one  with  the  stem,  and  is  never  a  real  pre- 
position, not  even  when  the  group  expresses  purpose. 

370.  The  second  group  of  367,  as  far  as  the  ings  with 
near  and  like  are  concerned,  are  probably  best  accounted  for 
in  the  same  way.  For  near  and  like  are  in  many  respects 
to  be  classed  as  prepositions  rather  than  as  adjectives. 

The  exclusive  ing  with  busy  and  ivorth  may  be  a  mere 
result  of  tradition,  although  a  durative  form  with  busy  is  so 
natural  that  one  is  inclined  to  look  on  this  as  a  cause,  if 
not  of  its  growth,  at  least  of  its  continuance.  And  worth  as 
naturally  takes  an  ing  as  it  takes  any  other  word  of  a 
nominal  character  {worth  a  great  deal,  zuorth  notice^ 

371.  The  verbs  that  take  an  ing  and  never  a  stem  with  to 
can  be  distinguished  as  transitive  and  intransitive,  the  former 
taking  the  ing  as  an  object,  the  latter  as  an  adjunct.  The 
classification  cannot  be  strictly  carried  out  because  the  ing, 
if  used  with  a  verb  that  can  take  a  noun-object,  may  have 
a  more  or  less  important  effect  on  the  meaning  of  the  verb, 
so  that  the  object-character  of  the  ing  may  become  doubtful; 
similar  causes  affect  the  ing  with  verbs  that  are  generally 
used  intransitively.  On  this  account  the  classification  is  not 
insisted  on  here. 

Among  the  verbs  that  take  an  ing  only,  the  most  impor- 
tant are  such  as  express  the  voluntary  beginning  or  end  of 
an  action  or  occurrence:  to  burst  out,  to  finish,  leave  off",  to 
give  up,  to  have  done,  to  stop ;  also  the  following  verbs  that 
express  the  non-occurrence  of  an  action :  to  avoid,  to  miss, 
put  off,  to  escape,  to  defer;  and  such  as  express  continuation: 
to  keep,  to  keep  on,  to  go  on.  Finally  the  following  verbs: 


STEM   WITH   TO   AND   ING  257 

to  repent,  to  stand;  to  want,  when  meaning  'need,'  to  require, 
and  to  7ieed,  when  the  ing  expresses  the  action  as  affecting 
the  subject,  not  proceeding  from  it;  and  to  help  and  to  mind 
when  used  in  a  negative  sense  (mostly  in  negativ^e  or  inter- 
rogative sentences). 

372.  In  some  cases  it  is  quite  clear  that  the  use  of  the 
ing  is  the  result  of  its  noun-character :  thus,  to  zvant,  need,  and 
require  can  be  used  in  the  same  meanings  with  verbal  nouns 
{to  want  treatment),  and  cannot  take  nouns  in  another  meaning 
[to  want  to  make  an  excursion,  but  not :  to  zvant  an  excursion). 

It  is  well-known  that  a  negative  cannot  be  proved ;  hence 
the  author  can  only  state  his  conviction  that  in  the  following 
sentences  the  ings  which  illustrate  the  statements  here  made 
could  not  be  replaced  by  a  stem  with  to  in  standard  English. 

He    had    scarcely    finished    doing    these    things    when 
there  was  a  tap  at  the  door. 

Walpole,  Fortitude  I  ch.   12  p.   141. 
I  have  not  quite  finished  packing  yet. 

Sweet,  Element,  no.  35. 
Mrs.    Soames  had  actually  given  up  wearing  feathers. 

Galsworthy,  Property  ch.    i   p.  8. 
He  (an  airman)  attempted  too  short  a  turn  in  endeavouring 
to  avoid  dropping  among  the  spectators. 

Times  W.  27/9,    12. 
I  hope  she  does  not  contemplate  coming  to  the  morning 
reading.  Dickens,  Letters  N.E.D. 

She  deferred  writing  the  irrevocable  words  of  parting 
from  all  her  little  world.     Ehot,  Romola  II  ch.  4.  N.E.D. 

373.  If  the  statement  that  the  verbs  enumerated  in  the 
preceding  section  take  an  ing  only  is  accepted,  the  explanation 
seems  to  be  the  same  as  in  the  case  of  to  need,  etc. :  the 
noun-character  of  the  ing.  This  will  be  even  more  acceptable 
as  an  explanation  of  the  fourth  case  of  ^6^  \  the  ing  as  the 
object  or  predicative  adjunct  of  verbs  that  take  these  two 
KuuisiNGA,  Handbook  II.  Accidence  and  Syntax.  1.  17 


25 8  VERBS 

forms  to  complete  their  meaning.  With  regard  to  the  fifth 
group  {to  prevent,  etc.)  it  is  evident  that  the  ing  has  the 
function  of  an  object  when  the  possessive  with  ing  is  used 
{to  prevent  his  joinhig  us),  but  the  object-character  is  far 
from  being  so  acceptable  when  the  oblique  with  ing  is  used 
[to  prevent  him  joining  us).  The  latter  construction  may  be 
a  development  of  the  former.  See  359. 

„    ,    „  374.     After  attempting  the  task  mentioned  in 

Both  Stem       ^         ,      ^  ^  •  f       ,         -.11 

„     ,   301  under  (i):  to  consider  when  either  the  stem 
and  Ing  Used  ^     ,     .      \  '  ,     ^ 

or  the  ing  is  the  only  torm  possible,  and  explain 

why,   we  must  turn  to  the  second  problem  to  be  dealt  with 
in  this  chapter :  to  collect  the  cases  when  both  verbal  forms 
are  possible  in  what  are  more  or  less  similar  functions,    and 
to  define  the  differences  of  meaning,  if  there  are  any. 
We  find  both  forms : 
(i)  as  adjuncts  to  verbs,  and  in  the  object-with-stem  or  -ing. 

(2)  as  adjuncts  to  nouns  and  adjectives. 

(3)  as  subjects  and  nominal  predicates. 

375.  It  may  be  premised  that  the  stem  with  to  is  invariably 
used  when  purpose  must  be  expressed,  even  with  the  verbs 
that  have  been  enumerated  in  371  as  taking  the  ing  only. 
It  would  be  superfluous  to  give  more  than  a  few  examples 
of  both  constructions  with  these  verbs. 

I.  A  cock  in  the  loft  over  our  heads  went  on  crowing, 
as  if  it  would  never  stop.     Sweet,  Spoken  Engl.  p.  62^. 

"Likewise    your    father    may  just   as   well  have  his," 
said  my  Mother. 

And    she  went  on  to  give  me  the  details  of  the  pre- 
mises and  the  little  ofiice  round  the  corner  i). 

Morgan,  Vance  ch.   14  p.   121. 


1)  The  idea  of  purpose,  it  is  true,  is  quite  subordinate  here;  but  the  stem 
to  give  at  any  rate  introduces  a  fresh  action,  Avhereas  the  ing  is  used  when 
continued  action  is  to  be  expressed. 


STEM   WITH   TO   AND   ING  259 

2.  The  clock  stopped  striking.  NED. 

Nevertheless,  I  could  not  stop  to  argue  the  matter 
with  her.  Blackmore,  Lorna  Doone  ch.  56  p.  414. 

The  cases  of  an  ing  with  a  verb  of  motion  in  84  a  seem  to 
contradict  these  statements.  It  may  be  that  the  predicative 
verb  is  really  the  subordinate  element  of  the  groups,  just 
as  in  the  sentences  of  84  b. 

376.  The  matter  becomes  more  difficult  when  we  turn  to 
the  verbs  that  can  take  either  a  stem  or  an  ing  as  a  com- 
plementary adjunct  or  object.  The  number  of  these  is  very 
large,  and  the  difference  of  meaning  between  the  two  con- 
structions, though  sometimes  clear  enough,  is  not  easy  to 
define  even  then,  and  very  often  the  difference  seems  too 
small  to  be  real  in  ordinary  spoken  English.  And  yet,  there 
can  be  no  doubt  that  there  is  a  difference.  Thus  Miss  Harri- 
son 1),  after  mentioning  that  Russian  has  two  forms  for  the 
infinitive,  one  imperfective  and  the  other  perfective,  remarks  : 
"Now  English  has  not  these  two  infinitives  and,  being  a 
sensitive  language,  it  feels  the  need  and  often  substitutes  for 
the  imperfective  infinitive  a  participle  or  a  substantive  ...  'I 
don't  like  to  write'  —  that  is  foreigner's  English.  An  Eng- 
lishman would  substitute  for  the  Russian  imperfective  infinitive 
a  gerund  —  I  don't  like  writing." 

In  the  same  way  dining  is  more  appropriate  than  the  stem 
would  be  in  the  following  quotation. 

I'm  so  sorry  I've  had  to  leave  you  entirely  to  yourself, 
but  I've  not  had  a  moment,  and  I  hate  dining  when  I 
can't  talk.  Mackenzie,  Sylvia  and  Michael  p.  229. 

377.  It  may  seem  that  the  explanation  suggested  by  Miss 
Harrison,   that   the  difference  between  the  stem  and  the  ing 


1)  Aspects,  Aorists  and  the  Classical  Tripos.      Cambridge  1919. 


26o  VERBS 

is  one  of  aspect,  is  at  variance  with  the  distinction  between 
the  two  forms  made  in  considering  the  reasons  for  the  exclu- 
sive use  of  the  ing  (367  ff.).  But  the  durative  aspect  of  the 
ing  is  not  really  independent  of  the  grammatical  character 
of  the  ing  as  an  abstract  noun :  on  the  contrary,  it  is  when 
the  ing  is  most  clearly  an  abstract  noun,  when  it  is  a  gram- 
matical subject,  e.  g.,  that  its  durative  aspect  is  most  apparent. 
In  other  cases^  however,  when  it  is  used  in  a  prepositional 
adjunct,  e.g.,  there  is  no  question  of  a  durative  aspect;  this 
aspect  would  be  hard  to  account  for  if  only  because  in  such 
a  case  the  ing  is  the  only  form  possible.  The  abstract  verbal 
noun  naturally  expresses  a  durative  aspect  because  it  ex- 
presses the  action  as  a  process,  not  as  a  single  actual  event. 
This  explains,  too,  why  the  ing  is  naturally  used  to  express 
the  repetition  of  an  action. 

378.  Verbs  expressing  the  beginning  or  ending  of  an 
action  generally  take  the  ing  (371).  But  some  may  take 
either  form :  to  begin,  to  cease,  to  recommence.  This  is  not  a 
'freak  of  language,'  as  outsiders  are  apt  to  express  it,  but 
shows  real  differences  in  the  speaker's  mind  i).  These  verbs 
take  an  ing  when  they  are  the  leading  element  in  the  verbal 
group,  so  that  the  ing  takes  the  nature  of  an  object,  expressing 
a  process  {a).  But  when  these  verbs  are  used  as  modifiers 
of  the  following  verb  the  latter  takes  the  form  of  the  stem, 
and  the  former  assumes  something  of  the  character  of  an 
auxiliary  {b).  Observe  also  that  to  begin  with  an  ing  expresses 
a  voluntary  action  whereas  with  a  stem  it  may  express  a 
gradual  process,  not  a  beginning  at  all  {c). 


1)  If  to  finish  and  to  leave  off  take  an  ing  whereas  the  'synonymous'  to 
end  does  not,  the  reason  is  the  same.   Compare  this  quotation: 

Does  not  Aristotle  say  that  a  drama  ends,  but  an  epic  poem  only  leaves 
off?  English  history,  as  it  is  popularly  related,  not  only  has  no  distinct 
end,  but  leaves  off  in  such  a  gradual  manner,  etc.  Seeley,  Expansion  Lect.  I. 


STEM   WITH   TO   AND   ING  26 1 

a.  On  his  return  to  England  he  began  studying  law^ 
but  very  soon  abandoned  it  for  literature. 

Sturge-H.,  Meredith  p.  9. 
Without    raising    her    voice   she    began  answering  his 
question.  ib.  ch.    19  p.  231. 

Charmian   threw    herself  down  with  a  movement  that 
was    very   young  and  began  taking  off  her  long  gloves. 
Hichens,  Ambition  ch.  9  p.   107. 
Now  don't  begin  eating  at  once. 

Bennett,  Old  W.  T,  III  ch.  4  §   i. 
Mrs.    Bute    and    Lady    Southdown    never   could  meet 
without  battles,  and  gradually  ceased  seeing  each  other. 

Vanity  Fair  ch.  40. 

b.  About  this  time  he  left  off  alluding  to  his  "work" 
and  began  to  call  his  writings  "stuff". 

Galsworthy,  Caravan  p.  419. 

Frederic  saw  it  with  immense  relief,  and  ceased  to  take 
any  interest  in  old  Lawrie.     Cannan,  Corner  ch.  9  p.  88. 

Sir  Francis  doubtless  found  more  satisfaction  in  ambitious 
work  which  decreased  in  value  as  they  ceased  to  depend 
upon  his  researches  in  the  Chapter  House  or  Chancery 
Lane.  Times  Lit.  22/5,   19. 

Moreover,  she  was  conscious  of  a  new  feeling  in  her 
body,  as  though  the  fount  of  physical  energy  within 
her,  long  interrupted,  had  recommenced  to  flow — but 
very  slowly,   a  trickling, 

Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  III  ch.   5  §   i  p.  345. 

c.  It  was  only  in  this  relative  calm  that  the  Clayhanger 
family  and  its  dependants  began  to  realise  the  intensity 
of  the  experience  through  which  they  had  passed. 

Bennett,  Clayhanger  I  ch.   13  §  i. 

Daylight  began  to  forsake  the  red  room ;  it  was  past 
four  o'clock,  and  the  beclouded  afternoon  was  tending 
to  drear  twilight.  Bronte,  Jane  Eyre,  ch.  2. 

We  are  beginning  to  realise  that  punishment  alone  is 
not  sufficient.  English  Review,  March  1914  p.  575' 

Two  weeks  of  comfortable  if  monotonous  travelling 
land  us  in  the  capital  of  the  Chinese  Empire,  and 
European    residents    in   China   are   already  beginning  to 


262  VERBS 

arrange  to  spend  their  summer  holidays  in  the  Mother- 
country.  Everyman,  28/2,   1913,  p.  618/1. 

His  views  on  the  religious  and  political  condition  of 
the  country  began  to  crystallise. 

Lytton  Strachey,  Em.  Vict.  p.   179. 

From  two  sides,  this  system  of  education  was  begin- 
ning to  be  assailed  by  the  awakening  public  opinion  of 
the  upper  middle  classes.  ib.  p.   181. 

379.  It  seems  in  contradiction  with  what  has  been  said 
in  the  preceding  section  under  c  that  we  find  begin  with  an 
ing  in  the  following  sentences. 

And  her  eyes  began  filling  with  tears. 

Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.   14  p.   170. 
It  was  so  piteous  to  her  poor  human  nature  that  her  heart 
began  wildly  palpitating.     Meredith,  R.  Feverel,  ch.  i. 

It  is  possible  that  the  writers  of  these  sentences  have  used 
the  exceptional  form  in  an  attempt  to  be  'literary.'  But  they 
may  be  genuine  English :  degin  may  be  so  much  weakened 
in  meaning  that  it  does  not  suffice  to  express  the  aspect  of 
the  action,  so  that  we  have  here  an  equivalent  to  the  pro- 
gressive with  /o  be. 

380.  What  has  been  said  of  to  begin  may  also  be  said 
of  to  start. 

a.  Look  out  of  the  window,  it's  just  started  snowing. 

Collinson,  Spoken  English  p.  32. 

b.  I  threw  the  bobbin  high  into  the  air,  and  started 
rapidly  to  recite  Wordsworth's  Excursiojt. 

Punch,  9/10,   1907  p.  266. 

"If  I  may  be  permitted  to  say  so,"  said  the  maid,  as 
she  started  to  shut  the  door,  "she  might  quite  possibly 
like  to  see  you".  ib.  29/10,    1909,  p.   221. 

Whereupon  we  started  to  argue  the  whole  question  over 
again.  Kingsley  and  Malet,  Tutor's  Story  p.  369. 


STEM   WITH   TO   AND   ING  263 

I  seized  the  knife  and  fork  and  started  to  carve. 

Jerome,  Idle  Thoughts  p.   126.  i) 

381.  It  seems  unnecessary  to  add  any  comments  to  the 
following  quotations;  they  are  essentially  of  the  same  type 
as  those  that  have  been  treated  more  fully  in  the  preceding 
sections,    but   will   repay  careful  comparison  by  the  student. 

At  the  jeopardy  of  her  life  a  woman  confesses  having 
a  snake  familiar,  which  appears  to  her  in  her  sleep. 

Lowie,  Pr.  Religion  p.   5  i  f . 

Burke  .  .  .  had  decided  to  keep  himself  in  hand  until  the 
time  should  come  when  he  should  dare  risking  a  declaration 
in  form.  Bar.  von  Hutten,  Pam  IV  ch.    1   p.    158. 

Miss  Payne  said  she  was  very  fond  of  aeroplaning, 
and  had  no  fear,  but  she  declmed  to  be  strapped  into 
the  seat.  Daily  News. 

Molly  dreaded  seeing  either  of  the  brothers  again. 
Gaskell,  Wives  I  ch.   18  p.   314. 

Lizzie  often  enjoyed  to  break  from  work  for  half  an 
hour,  stroll  down  to  the  quarry,  and  climb  to  the  mouth 
of  the  kilns.  Phillpotts,  Beacon  II  ch.   12  p.  254. 

'T  don't  think  you  ought  to  cherish  that  luncheon," 
I  told  him;  "it  just  didn't  happen  to  agree  with  us,  and 
we  ought  to  forget  it." 

"Well,  if  you  think  going  to  dinner  will  help  you  to 
forget  going  to  lunch  . . ."     Cotes,  Cinderella  ch.  9  p.  99. 

I  hate  being  called  Mr.  Westcott  by  anybody. 

Walpole,  Fortitude  III  ch.   i   §  3  p.   238. 

Suppose,  for  example,  that  the  Salvationists  advertise 
throughout  the  town  that  they  intend  holding  a  meeting 
in  a  field  which  they  have  hired  near  Oxford,  that  they 
intend  to  assemble  in  St.  Giles's  and  march  thence  with 
banners  flying  and  bands  playing  to  their  proposed  place 
of  worship.  Dicey,  Constitution,  Lect.  VI,  p.  289. 

I  had  intended  translating  all  or  nearly  all  these  Idylls 
into  blank  verse  .  .  .  But  I  found  that  other  metres  had 
their  special  advantages.  Calverley  p.  XXXI. 

1)  The    quotations   under    h  are   borrowed   from  van  der  Gaafs  article  in 
Engl.  Studien  62  p.  409. 


264  VERBS 

The  summer  was  well  advanced  and  most  people  who 
intended  going  out  of  Town  had  already  left. 

Garvice,  Staunch  as  a  Woman  p.  211. 
He    did    not   intend  to  tell  her  that  he  was  going  to 
ride  in  a  race.  ib.  p.  244. 

Se  liked  going  to  the  theatre. 

A.  C.  Bradley,  Essays  II  18. 
Johnson    had    a    strong   affection  for  his  College,  and 
liked  going  to  stay  there  in  the  days  of  his  glory.    His 
usual  host  was  one  Dr.  Adams,  the  Master  of  Pembroke. 

Bailey,  Johnson. 
"I    think    I  should  like  gambling,"  Lily  said,   "if  only 
one  didn't  have  to  shuffle  and  cut  all  the  time." 

Mackenzie,  Sylvia  p.  317. 
The  Country  in  a  general  way  does  want  the  Constitution 
preserved,    and    particularly  disliked  seeing  it  arbitrarily 
broken  by  the  irresponsible  Peers.  Daily  News. 

He  forgave  her  because  she  was  a  nice  girl,  with 
beautiful  rows  of  teeth  and  merry  eyebrows.  He  might 
have  forgiven  her  if  she  had  been  a  dowdy.  But  he 
liked  forgiving  those  teeth,  and  those  eyebrows. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  2  p.  9. 
I  never  was  a  wireless  "fan,"  though  I  /z/^i?(af  pottering  (to 
potter)  about  with  it.     Collinson,  Spoken  English  p.  76. 

Kezia  liked  to  stand  so  before  the  window.  She  liked 
the  feeling  of  the  cold  shining  glass  against  her  hot 
palms,  and  she  liked  to  watch  the  funny  white  tops  that 
came  on  her  fingers  when  she  pressed  them  hard  against 
the  pane.  Mansfield,  Bliss  p.  6. 

He  liked  to  invite  people  and  to  pay  for  them,  and 
he  disliked  to  be  invited  and  paid  for. 

Henry  James,  Reverberator  p.   54. 
I  mean  having  this  out  with  the  beggar. 

F.  Anstey,  In  Brief  Authority  ch.   14  p.  236, 
"They  told  grandpapa  that  you  were  going  to-night."  — 
"Then  they  were  wrong,"  he  replied  in  his  curt  fashion. 
"I  didn't  mean  going,  so  here  I  am." 

Garvice,  Staunch  as  a  Woman  p.  28. 
I  resolved  to  begin  as  I  meant  to  end.    Bailey,  Johnson. 


STEM   WITH   TO   AND   ING  265 

They  neglected  to  use  certain  parts  of  the  rite  of  Holy- 
Baptism  upon  which  Roman  theologians  in  recent  years 
had  come  to  lay  great  stress.     Wakeman,  Introd.  p.  16. 

We  have  neglected  looking  after  our  safety. 

Sat.  Rev.  (Poutsma). 

Nor  did  this  collector  of  celebrities  omit  to  visit 
Rousseau.  Bailey,  Johnson  p.  'j6. 

They  omit  to  consider  what  poetry  is  ^). 

Abercrombie,   Epic  p.  24. 

What  our  new  race-improvers  propose  doing,  when 
they  get  their  chance,  I  dare  not  conjecture. 

English  Review,  Aug.  '13. 

When  on  the  eve  of  their  marriage  he  had  proposed 
to  her  building  a  house,  she  had  suggested  that  perhaps 
one  of  the  beautiful  old  ones  already  existing  in  Paris 
might  do.       Mary  Borden,  Jane  —  Our  Stranger  I,  130. 

Well,  that's  plain  enough  at  any  rate  — ■  and  when  do  you 
propose  leaving  us?  Walpole,  Fortitude  I  ch.  5  §  4  p.  109. 

Mrs.  Johnson  brought  her  husband  several  hundred 
pounds,  part  of  which  was  at  once  spent  in  hiring  and 
furnishing  a  large  house  at  Edial  where  Johnson  proposed 
to  take  pupils.  Bailey,  Johnson. 

He  pledged  his  word  she  would  not  regret  following 
his  advice.  Mackenzie,  Sybda  p.  352. 

382.  The  following  sentences  may  finally  be  added  by 
way  of  showing  that  each  case  must  be  treated  on  its  own 
merits,  although,  of  course,  the  general  principles  stated  must 
be  applied. 

Herr  Gottfried,  he  reflected,  must  think  that  he,  Peter, 
had  mints  of  money  if  he  could  so  lightly  and  on  so  slender 
a  warning  propose  his  abandoning  his  precious  two  pounds 
a  week.  Walpole,  Fortitude  II  ch.  3  p.   173  f. 

What  is  it  to  me  if  That  Man  is  that  Spanish  woman's 
lover?  —  Her    own,    sincere    heart   answered   her    with 


1)   To  omit  is  generally  stated  to  be  a  verb  that  can  take  aning;  I  have 
never  found  an  example  in  living  English,  however. 


266  VERBS 

new-born  knowledge :  "You  mind,  not  only  to  find  him 
that  Spanish  woman's  lover,  but  any  woman's  lover". 
Ruck,  The  Pearl  Thief  p.  259. 
Originally,  a  shower-bath,  coal-storage  and  a  water  draw 
off  on  the  upper  storey  were  projected,  but  had  to  be 
abandoned  on  account  of  cost.  It  is  highly  desirable  that 
the  margin  of  cost  should  be  increased,  to  allow  of  these 
being  included.  Studio,  March  193 1  p.   176  f. 

In  the  first  of  these  sentences  the  ing  must  be  used  be- 
cause the  subject  is  required.  In  the  second  the  stem  to  find 
is  not  really  the  object  of  mind,  from  which  it  is  separated 
completely,  but  rather  an  adjunct  expressing  circumstances 
or  cause.  In  the  last  quotation  to  allow  of  is  really  a  different 
verb  from  to  allow. 

383.  Verbs  that  are  construed  with  a  fixed  preposition 
{to  aim  at,  to  object  to,  etc.)  naturally  take  an  ing  only. 
But  many  of  these  verbs  can  also  take  a  stem  with  to;  the 
result  is  a  more  or  less  subordinate  position  of  the  first 
verb  of  the  group. 

All  his  successors  have  aimed,  according  to  their 
capacity,  at  providing  us  with  studies  of  the  same 
subject  from  different  points  of  view. 

Leslie  Stephen,  George  EHot  p.   113. 
Literatures  that  aim  to  have  more  than  a  local  appeal. 

Sapir,  Language  p.   159. 
Instead    of  men   aiming  to  advance  in  life  with  glory 
they   should    calculate    how  to  retreat  out  of  it  without 
shame.  Hardy,  Return  of  the  Native  VI  ch.   i. 

384.  We  have  seen  that  both  the  plain  object  and  the 
prepositional  object  can  form  a  syntactic  group  with  the  stem 
(/  should  like  you  to  help  me  and  /  waited  for  him  to  come 
and  help  us)  and  with  the  ing  (/  shan't  prevent  you  going, 
and  I  depend  upon  them  understanding  that  I  am  quite  serious). 
Each  of  these  constructions  has  its  own  range:  they  cannot 
be  substituted  for  each  other. 


STEM   WITH   TO   AND   ING  26/ 

The  reason  for  the  use  of  the  stem  in  these  constructions 
is  generally  so  clearly  the  final  meaning  of  the  verb  that  no 
discussion  seems  necessary  here  after  what  has  been  said 
about  these  constructions.  Nor  does  it  seem  necessary  to 
do  more  than  refer  to  the  comparison  of  the  constructions 
with  an  object-with-plain  stem  and  with  an  ing  after  the 
verbs  of  sensation  and  perception  (339).  But  a  word  must 
be  added  here  about  the  verbs  of  wish  that  take  both  an 
object-with-stem  (with  to)  and  an  object-with-ing,  such  as  to 
%vish,  to  like,  etc.   (see   108  b). 

The  stem  in  the  construction  with  verbs  such  as  to  wish, 
to  like,  to  hate,  has  been  explained  as  being  ultimately  an 
adjunct  of  purpose  or  result.  It  is  impossible  thus  to  account 
for  the  ing,  and  yet  it  is  used  with  these  verbs.  It  must 
be  considered,  however,  that  the  verbs,  though  connected 
with  those  of  will,  are  really  rather  verbs  of  sensation :  to 
like  does  not  express  will  but  a  pleasant  sensation,  and  the 
same  can  be  said  of  the  other  verbs  that  take  both  construc- 
tions. A  careful  consideration  of  the  examples  in  108  b 
will  show  that  the  ing  is  used  when  the  sensation  is  con- 
temporaneous, whereas  the  stem  is  apt  to  be  used  when  it 
is  expected  in  the  future.  For  this  reason  the  sense  would 
be  affected  if  in  the  following  sentences  an  ing  were  substi- 
tuted for  the  stem,  or  vice  versa. 

In  an  article  describing  some  household  novelties  it 
is  suggested  that  many  ladies  prefer  the  telephone  to  be 
out  of  sight.  We  ourselves  prefer  the  thing  to  be  out  of 
earshot.  Punch's  Almanack  for  1931. 

It  was  so  funny  that  it  set  me  thinking  afresh. 

H.  James,  Sacred  Fount  ch.  2  p.  21. 

Martial  set  himself  2*^  «;^z//i-<?  Rome,  Times  Lit.  18/3,  20. 

"No,"  said  Bags.  *T  don't  want  to  give  you  three  with 
a  racquet-handle,  as  we  made  it  up  last  night.  And  I 
don't  want  you  turning  everything  upside  down  in  my 
cubicle."  Benson,  Blaize  ch.  p.  46. 


268  VERBS 

I'd  put  down  three  hundred  a  year  to  pension  the 
old  boy  —  but  I'm  damned  if  I  want  him  living  within 
a  morning's  drive  of  me  —  as  boots  at  a  pub.  i) 

Warwick  Deeping,  Old  Pybus  III,  4  p.    '^i. 

Similar  considerations  will  account  for  the  fact  that  such 
a  verb  as  to  depend  upon  can  take  either  the  prepositional 
object-with-stem  or  with-ing;  but  to  insist  upon  takes  the  ing 
construction  only  (/  insist  upon  Betty  apologizing). 

385.  It  has  been  shown  that  nouns  and  adjectives,  like 
verbs,  take  a  stem  with  to  when  the  meaning  of  purpose  or 
result  is  more  or  less  evident  (214  f.).  On  the  other  hand,  an  ing 
must  be  used  with  nouns  and  adjectives  that  are  construed 
with  a  fixed  preposition  such  as  facility  for,  faculty  for,  joy  at, 
objection  to,  and  bent  on,  clever  at,  etc.  as  illustrated  in  ^6. 
When  the  relation  is  one  that  would  be  expressed  by  of 
with  a  noun,  the  ing  (with  of)  is  the  only  construction  that 
is  possible  or,  at  least,  usual. 

Few  methods  of  falsifying  historical  truth  are  more 
seductive  than  its  simplification.       Times  Lit.  11/3,  20, 

In  little  more  than  another  hundred  years  they  are 
full-blown  national  histories ;  towns  only  become  vocal  on 
the  eve  of  merging  into  the  nation. 

It  would  have  given  to  Constance  the  air  of  being  in 
awe  of  Sophia. 

Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  IV  ch.  2  §  i,  p.  452. 
This  business  of  preparing  for  the  advent  of  Sophia  had 
appeared  to  her  genuinely  colossal.  ib.  p.  455- 

The  practice  of  encouraging  a  servant  to  plunge  without 
warning  of  any  kind  into  a  drawing-room  had  never  been 
favoured  in  that  house.  ib.  §  2  p.  462. 


1)  It  is  evident  that  this  sentence  is  negative  in  meaning,  and  that  there 
is  no  reference  to  the  establishment  of  a  condition  of  things  that  the  speaker 
wishes  to  prevent :  the  'old  boy'  is  living  near.  Observe,  too,  that  all  the 
examples  of  xi^ant  with  an  object  and  ing  in  1086  are  also  negative. 


STEM  WITH   TO   AND   ING  269 

She  tasted  dainties  for  the  sake  of  tasting. 

ib.  p.  461, 
Sylvia  was  really  glad  when  the  sound  of  loud  knocking 
upon  the  door  downstairs  prevented  any  further  discus- 
sion of  the  accident  of  their  relationship. 

Mackenzie,  Sylvia  and  Michael  p.  261. 
Vives's   record   up  to  the  time  of  coming  to  England 
was  noteworthy,  even  for  a  Renascence  scholar. 

Times  Lit.  25/11,  20. 
But    if   these    eastern    merchants    have    the    credit    of 
bringing  civilization  to  Britain,  the  Iberian  tribesmen  had 
the  wit  to  adapt  their  teaching. 

Trevelyan,  Hist,  of  Engl.  p.  7. 

386.  Some  nouns  {a)  and  adjectives  {b)  are  construed 
with  a  fixed  preposition,  at  least  in  some  of  their  meanings. 
Thus  need  in  one  of  its  meanings  requires  an  adjunct  with 
for.  Such  words  can  naturally  take  an  ing  with  the  pre- 
position, but  also  a  stem  with  to. 

a.  He  had  a  singular  aptitude  for  dealing  with  the 
difficulties  of  a  crisis.  Lit.  World, 

Sophia  watched  the  preparations,  and  the  increasing 
agitation  of  Constance's  demeanour,  with  an  astonishment 
which  she  had  real  difficulty  in  concealing. 

Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  IV  ch.  3  §  3. 

They  have  good  honest  hatred,  as  a  motive  for 
accusing  him.  Lewes,  Hist,  of  Phil. 

Hastings  had  no  motive  to  treat  the  late  ministers 
with  rigour.  Macaulay,  Essays. 

Hastings  was  now  confident  of  victory.  It  seemed 
indeed  that  he  had  reason  to  be  so.  ib. 

There  is  reason  for  believing  that  Erasmus  manifested 
no  inclination  to  acquire  the  vernacular  language  in  any 
of  the  various  countries  in  which,  from  time  to  time, 
he  took  up  his  residence.  Times  Lit.  25/11,  20. 

I  really  sympathised  with  him  for  his  reluctance  to 
give  his  consent.  — 


2/0  VERBS 

"Oh,    I   shall  be  all  right."     He  was  very  gruff.     He 
felt  now  a  furious  angry  reluctance  at  leaving  her  behind. 
Walpole,  Fort.  II  ch.   5  p.   196. 

h.  I  was  surprised  to  meet  him. 

But  the  Grenvilles  would  have  been  almost  as  much 
surprised  at  finding  their  conduct  provoke  a  sermon  as 
at  learning  what  kind  of  people  have  become  their 
successors  to  day.  Times  Lit.   14/10,  20. 

I  do  not  agree  with  you  in  thinking  her  right  in 
refusing  a  second  marriage. 

Meredith^  Harrington  ch.  47  p.  471. 

You  were  quite  right  to  refuse  his  invitation. 

387.  It  has  also  been  shown  that  some  words  that 
regularly  take  an  adjunct  with  to  and  a  noun,  can  also  take 
a  stem  and  an  ing,  both  with  to. 

Sometimes  both  forms  are  possible.  The  difference  between 
the  two  constructions,  as  far  as  there  is  any,  is  one  of  aspect. 

1.  Hence,  on  second  thoughts,  he  felt  dislike  to  refuse 
the  invitation.  Patterson,  Compton  p.   146. 

Here  he  had  a  dislike  to  being  an  outsider  in  such  a 
matter  as  common  garb.  ib.  p.   105. 

2.  I  am  trying  to  find  a  means  to  get  rid  of  him. 
We   should   be   engaged    in    finding  means  to  getting 

rid  of  that  more  serious  danger. 

Freeman,  Growth  p.   157. 

3.  We  are  accustomed  to  call  the  first  the  cause,  and 
the  last  the  effect.  NED. 

Another  reason  is  that  Europeans  are  accustomed  to 
seeing  women,  and  Turks  are  not. 

Athenaeum  28/3,   14.  4. 

4.  For  this  purpose  the  four  Vice-Presidents  of  the 
Chamber  would  be  requested  to  examine  the  whole  mass 
of  evidence  and  documents  collected  by  the  Commission, 
and,  after  choosing  those  necessary  /^/(?r?«m^  judgment 
on  the  case,  to  publish  and  lay  them  before  Parliament. 

Times  W. 


STEM   WITH   TO   AND   ING  2/1 

5.  Their  eyes  met  and  saw  a  thousand  things  in  a 
moment  that  their  lips  came  near  to  say. 

Wells,  Country  p.  30. 

It  was  near  to  being  a  uniform.  See  92. 

6.  These  are  the  artifices  which  go  to  make  up 
comedy.  Times  Lit.  20/6,   14. 

Loving  thought  and  care  had  gone  to  making  the 
place  seemly  and  beautiful. 

Benson,  Thread  of  Gold  p.   11, 

388.  Just  as  there  are  many  verbs  that  may  take  an  ing 
as  well  as  a  stem  with  to  as  an  object  or  complementary 
adjunct,  there  are  many  nouns  and  adjectives  that  may  be 
completed  by  a  stem  with  to  or  by  an  ing  with  of.  The 
meaning  naturally  varies  more  or  less  markedly  according 
to  the  construction  that  is  used,  as  is  shown  with  special 
clearness  by  the  first  two  quotations. 

He  was  in  the  act  of  consummating  all  earthly  bliss 
by  pressing  his  lips  to  the  small  white  hand. 

Meredith,  Feverel  ch.   14. 
He  was  in  act  to  fire. 

Buchanan,  That  Winter  Night  ch.  3. 
The  pitiful  ambition  of  possessing  five  or  six  thousand 
more  acres.  Burke. 

An  intelligent  jury  has  been  fired  with  the  ambition 
to  find  an  answer  to  the  momentous  question:  "Are 
dramatic  critics  of  any  use?"  Times. 

And    Constance    did    not  estimate  highly  the  chances 
of  picking  out  an  unknown  Sophia  from  that  welter. 
Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  IV  ch.   2  §  2. 

This  would  at  least  give  our  boys  a  chance  to  be 
pitted  against  the  Americans.  Rev.  of  Rev. 

He    repudiates    all    charges    of  aiming  at  dictatorship.. 

Graphic. 

She  had  strict  charge  to  avoid  the  subject. 

Dickens,  Copperfield. 


2/2  VERBS 

To  whom  have  I  the  honour  of  talking? 

Trevelyan,  Life  of  Macaulay. 

I  had  not  the  honour  to  belong  to  so  sacred  a  pro- 
fession, ib. 

It  was  a  habit  which  she  had  formed  in  the  Rue 
Lord  Byron  —  by  accident  rather  than  with  an  intention 
to  utilize  list  slippers  for  the  effective  supervision  of 
servants.     Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  IV  ch.  3  §  i  p.  474. 

She  had  no  intention  of  donning  her  best  mantle  for 
such  an  excursion.  ib.  IV  ch.  2  §  i  p.  452. 

Sylvia  went  down  to  the  cabaret  that  evening  with 
the  firm  intention  of  its  being  the  last  occasion  i). 

Mackenzie,  Sylvia  and  Michael  p.   13. 

"The  fear  of  death  is  by  way  of  being  an  impertinent 
assumption  of  a  knowledge  of  the  hereafter,  and  ...  we 
have  no  reason  to  believe  it  is  any  worse  condition  than 
our  present.  I  am  not  afraid  to  die  —  but  I  am  afraid 
of  dying."     Wallace,  The  Four  Just  Men  ch.  3  p.  50. 

389.  Nouns  that  can  take  either  a  stem  or  an  ing  with 
-a  fixed  preposition  can  sometimes  also  be  construed  with 
^f  and  an  ing. 

The  difficulty  of  answering  the  question  "What  is 
truth.'"'  involves  a  corresponding  problem  in  the  definition 
of  what  is  fiction.  Times  Lit.   12/8,  20. 

We  must  neglect  no  opportunity  of  putting  her  in 
her  place.     J.  C.  Snaith,  The  Adventurous  Lady  p.  69. 

He  always  had  some  audience,  so  that  Alvina  had 
opportunity  to  come  into  contact  with  all  the  odd  people 
of  the  inferior  stage  2), 

D.  H.  Lawrence,  The  Lost  Girl  p.   132. 

1)  The  ing  is  the  only  form  that  can  be  used  here  because  it  enables  the 
subject  to  be  expressed.  But,  apart  from  that,  a  noun  like  intention  can 
take  the  stem  of  a  verb  expressing  action  only,  not  a  state;  this  is  the  con- 
sequence of  the  final  meaning  of  the  relation  expressed  by  the  stem  after 
'words  of  will. 

2)  Compare  213. 


STEM   WITH   TO   AND   ING  2/3 

They  could  have  hardly  devised  a  better  opportunity 
for  furthering  their  own  projects. 

Freeman,  Joseph  ch.  5  p.  29. 

390.  When  nouns  or  adjectives  take  both  a  stem  and 
a  prepositional  ing  {surprised  to  hear  it,  surprised  at  hearing 
it)  the  difference  in  meaning  between  the  two  constructions 
is  that  between  an  adverb  adjunct  and  a  prepositional  object. 
It  may  be  compared  with  the  difference  between  clauses  with 
that  and  those  with  a  conjunctive  adverb,  e.  g.  /  am  surprised 
that  he  is  not  coming,  I  am  surprised  because  he  is  not  coming. 

391.  The  stem  with  to  and  the  plain  ing  are  both  used 
as  adjuncts  to  nouns;  the  stem  invariably  follows  the  leading 
noun,  the  ing  may  follow  or  precede.  Both  forms  have 
been  illustrated  in  this  function  in  the  chapters  on  the 
respective  verbal  forms  (95  f.,  212  ff.).  It  is  hardly  necessary 
to  mention  here  that  the  stem  is  the  only  form  that  can  be 
used  as  long  as  there  is  something  of  purpose  or  result  in 
the  relation  of  meaning  between  the  two  elements  of  the 
group.  But  we  also  find  the  stem  when  there  is  no  such 
meaning,  as  shown  in  225  ff.,  and  it  will  be  useful  to  compare 
this  use  of  the  stem  with  the  attributive  ing. 

392.  One  point  of  difference  is  evident :  the  ing  can 
precede  or  follow  the  noun,  the  stem  can  follow  only.  The 
reason  is  plain:  just  as  the  ing  when  used  in  a  function 
resembling  that  of  a  noun  is  more  of  a  noun  than  the  stem 
which  is  similarly  used,  so  the  ing  when  used  attributively 
is  more  of  an  attributive  adjective  than  the  stem.  There  is 
also  a  difference  of  meaning  between  the  two  forms,  however. 
On  studying  the  quotations  of  225  ff.  it  will  be  easy  to  see 
that  the  substitution  of  an  ing  for  the  stem  would  be  out  of 
the  question ;  the  alternative  form  would  be  equally  inadmis- 
sible in  the  sentences  with  the  attributive  ing.  One  difference 
is  clear :  the  ing  expresses  the  verbal  meaning  as  actual,  the 
Kruisinga,  Handbook  II.  Accidence  and  Syntax.  1.  18 


2/4  VERBS 

stem  as  prospective,  a  difference  which  naturally  proceeds 
from  the  fundamental  meaning  of  each  form.  But  the  prospective 
meaning  is  absent  in  a  case  like  the  last  to  arrive,  and 
other  examples  of  227;  compare  also  coming  events  cast 
their  shadows  before  and  Bright  dreams  of  happiness  yet  to 
come  (NED  s.v.  come  no.  32  U).  In  these  cases  the  difference 
seems  to  be  one  of  aspect,  the  ing  expressing  the  durative 
aspect,  the  stem  an  action  or  occurrence  that  is  looked  at,  if  not 
with  respect  to  its  end,  at  least  without  any  durative  meaning. 
The  explanation  suggested  seems  to  account  for  the  un- 
doubted fact  that  resting  in  the  following  sentence  could  not 
be  replaced  by  to  rest,  although  both  forms  are  used  attributively. 

As  the  resting  man  looked  at  the  barrow  he  became 
av/are  that  its  summit,  etc.     Hardy,  Native  I  ch.  2  p.  14. 

393.  The  last  functions  to  be  discussed  are  the  stem  and 
the  ing  as  subjects  and  as  nominal  predicates. 

We  have  seen  that  the  ing  when  used  as  a  verbal  noun  is  dis- 
tinctly more  of  a  noun;  this  is  the  cause  of  the  ing  expressing 
a  state  whereas  the  stem  with  to  is  rather  a  phenomenon- 
word.  Hence  the  ing  is  often  used  as  a  subject  in  abstract 
sentences,  i.  e.  sentences  making  a  general  statement.  The 
stem,  on  the  other  hand,  is  more  verbal  in  character;  hence 
it  is  found  in  sentences  referring  to  a  special  case. 

We  can  say :  To  talk  for  hours  at  a  stretch  is  more  ex- 
hausting than  you  seem  to  think.  It  would  be  said,  e.  g., 
by  a  man  who  had  just  spoken  for  a  long  time. 

But  talking  would  be  substituted  if  the  observation  was 
made  in  the  course  of  a  conversation  on  the  physical  effects 
of  speaking  for  a  long  time  by  persons  not  thinking  of  their 
own  experiences. 

394.  The  following  sentences  seem  to  illustrate  the  dis- 
tinction made  between  the  two  verbal  forms  when  used  as 
the  grammatical  subject  of  the  sentence. 


STEM   WITH   TO   AND   ING  2/5 

Speech  is  so  familiar  a  feature  of  daily  life  that  we 
rarely  pause  to  define  it.  It  seems  as  natural  to  man  as 
walking,  and  only  less  so  than  breathing.  ( Walking  and 
breathmg  are  compared  with  the  noun  speech). 

Sapir,  Language  p.   i. 

Then  it  was  recollected  that  there  was  a  family  ghost : 
•and  though  no  member  of  the  family  believed  in  the 
ghost,  none  would  have  given  up  a  circumstance  that 
testified  to  its  existence;  for  to  possess  a  ghost  is  a  dis- 
tinction above  titles  (the  statement  in  italics  represents 
the  thoughts  of  the  inhabitants,  hence  it  is  a  special  case). 

Meredith,  R.  Feverel. 

To  attain  to  a  finely  ordered  artistic  structure  was 
beyond  Malory's  power. 

Vaughan  had  been  very  near  to  death;  and  to  be 
turned  back  from  that  door  gives  a  strange  and  crooked 
look  to  the  street  of  life.  Times  Lit.   15/7,   15. 

It  was  so  odd  not  knowing  that  fellows  swore  when 
they  jammed  their  fingers  in  doors,  or  were  suddenly 
annoyed  at  anything.  Benson,  Blaize  ch.  4  p.  j"] . 

It's  dreadful  waiting  on  people  one  doesn't  like. 

Vachell,  Brothers  II  ch.  5   p.   55. 

To  suggest  that  there  is  no  time  to  write  dispatches 
would  be  almost  as  bad  as  explaining  that  an  army 
was  too  busy  to  fight.  Times  W.  21/9,   17. 

395.     Sometimes  it  seems  reasonable  to  suppose  that  the 
ing  is  used  because  it  has  a  durative  aspect. 

Reading  him  is  like  looking  at  a  series  of  pictures  by 
Rubens  which  are  all  so  energetic  and  masterly  in 
manner  that  we  cannot  tell  which  he  painted  only  for 
the  sake  of  painting.      Times  Lit.   14/9,  22,  p.  574/i- 

It  is  a  conversational  style  and  to  read  it  is  like 
hearing  him  speak.  ib.  p.  573/4  (same  author). 

To  read  the  pages  of  M.  de  Labriolle's  most  interesting 
work  is  to  be  convinced  that  the  literature  he  writes  of 
so  learnedly  and  excitingly  ought  not  to  be  left  so 
much  to  specialists.  ib.  p.  582  4. 


276  VERBS 

396.  Naturally,  there  is  often  no  necessity  to  distinguish 
between  a  general  or  a  special  sentence;  or  rather  a  general 
statement  may  be  made  even  when  it  is  intended  to  apply 
to  a  special  case.  Compare  the  use  of  the  indefinite  pronoun 
07ie  meaning  anyone. 

Thus  a  girl,  riding  on  horseback  in  the  company  of  her 
father,  says  (Gaskell,  Wives  I  ch,   2  p.  39) : 

We're   getting    into  the  shadow  of  the  trees,  and  it's 
not  safe  riding  fast  here. 

The  form  riding,  no  doubt,  causes  the  sentence  to  convey 
a  general  statement.  But  that  does  not  prevent  it  from 
being  applied  to  the  special  case. 

When   we  quote  a  proverb  it  is  to  apply  a  general  state- 

"ment   to    a   special  case;  this  explains  why  the  ing  must  be 

used  in  the  first  of  the  following  quotations,  and  its  contrast 

with   the    apparently   identical    case    in    the  second  sentence, 

where  both  forms  would  be  possible. 

It  is  no  use  crying  over  spilt  milk. 

Blackmore,  Lorna  Doone  ch.  30  p.   197. 
It    is    no    use  to  deny  that  I  was  greatly  dashed  and 
scared  at  first.  ib.  ch.  59  p.  447. 

397.  The  use  of  the  stem  as  a  subject  at  the  head  of 
the  sentence,  or  at  any  rate  before  the  predicative  verb,  is 
not  very  common  (299).  It  will  be  useful,  therefore,  to 
compare   the    stem    as  a  subject  in  sentences  with  formal  it. 

On  the  interpretation  of  sentences  with  'provisional'  it, 
see  the  chapter  on  Sente7ice-Striicture. 

It's  absurd  your  going  in  one  of  those  awful  steamers 
,    from    Marseilles    when    the    yacht   is   only  half  an  hour 
away.  Hichens,  Ambition  ch.  20  p.  232. 

Claude  won't  go.  It's  no  use  for  me  to  say  anything. 

ib.  ch.  26,  p.  327. 
Oh,    we  women  are  contemptible,  sometimes.     It's  no 
use  our  pretending  we  aren't.  ib.  ch.  34  p.  433. 


STEM   WITH   TO   AND   ING  277 

It's  no  use  for  you  to  be  angry  with  me. 

Sinister  Street  p.   105 1, 

It's    not  a  bit  of  good  your  running  me  down,  Fane. 

ib.  p.  910. 

It  is  worth  while  asking  how  far  their  education 
influenced  or  contributed  to  their  success. 

It  is  perhaps  worth  while  remarking  that  competition 
is  a  method  which  to  a  superficial  observer  is  not  to 
the  interests  of  the  less  wealthy. 

Still,  the  book  is  one  which  even  advanced  scholars 
may  find  it  worth  their  while  to  peruse. 

It  is  worth  while  to  remark  that  in  some  instances 
words  have  undergone  changes  of  meaning  because  in 
their  literary  use  they  have  been  popularly  misunderstood. 

It  is  perhaps  superfluous  to  remind  the  reader  that  the 
ing  is  the  only  form  that  is  possible  when  the  meaning  is 
not  exclusively  verbal,  as  in  the  following  quotation. 

We  reached  the  fruit  country  a  week  or  two  before 
picking  commenced.     Davies,  Super-Tramp  ch.  9  p.  66. 

398.  The  difference  between  the  ing  and  the  stem  with 
to  as  nominal  predicates  is  probably  the  same  as  when  they 
are  subjects  (393  ff^.);  but  the  ing  in  this  function  is  com- 
paratively rare;  see  100.  In  the  following  sentences  the 
alternative  form  would  be  inadmissible  for  the  reasons  stated 
in  the  preceding  sections  on  the  use  of  the  forms  as  gram- 
matical subjects. 

(395)-  OxvQ:  of  the  habits  that  Sylvia  had  acquired 
on  tour  in  France  was  card-playing. 

Mackenzie,  Sylvia  p.  317. 

(393  ^O-  I^  India,  when  you  leave  your  hotel  and 
want  to  tip  the  sweeper,  you  must  not  hold  out  the 
coin,  expecting  him  to  take  it.  His  immediate  reaction 
to  your  gesture  will  be  to  shrink  azvay;  for  if  your 
fingers  were  to  touch  his  receiving  palm  you  would  be 
defiled.  Huxley,  Vulgarity  p.  4. 


278  VERBS 

(393  f-)'  I  ^^  eliminating  entirely  the  possibility  of  com- 
pounding two  or  more  radical  elements  into  single  words  or 
wordlike  phrases.  To  expressly  consider  compounding  in 
the  present  survey  of  types  would  be  to  complicate  our 
problem  unduly.       Sapir,  Language  p.   145   (footnote). 

Verbals  and  Other  Verbal  Words 

399.  By  the  side  of  the  plain  verb  stem,  the  stem  with 
to,  and  the  form  in  ing  there  are  frequently  other  words  of 
related  form  that  serve  similar  or  identical  purposes.  Thus, 
by  the  side  of  cry,  to  cry,  and  crying,  we  have  an  apparent 
'noun'  in  to  have  a  good  cry,  and  a  really  different  word, 
different  also  in  meaning,  in  the  class-noun  cry  [I  heard  two 
distinct  cries).  And  it  is  impossible  to  identify  the  verbal  ing 
crying  with  the  word  as  used  in  a  crying  shame,  which 
contains  what  we  may  call  the  adjective  crying.  Similarly, 
by  the  side  of  treat  and  its  usual  verbal  companions,  we  have 
treatment,  as  well  as  the  class-noun  a  treat.  And  we  have 
temptation,  afflictiofi,  Jnimiliation,  promotion,  etc.  by  the  side 
of  the  more  'purely  verbal'  tempt,  tempting,  etc. 

No  grammatical  description  of  living  English  can  be  con- 
sidered at  all  complete,  in  whatever  sense  this  much-abused 
term  may  be  taken,  without  a  mention  of  this  important  side 
of  English  sentence-structure.  But  it  is  a  borderland  between 
the  grammar  and  the  dictionary  that  we  are  here  dealing 
with,  i.  e.  no  satisfactory  treatment  is  likely  to  be  provided 
by  either  on  account  of  its  inherent  difficulty,  not  so  much 
the  difficulty  of  understanding  each  individual  case,  as  the 
difficulty  of  reducing  the  facts  to  anything  even  remotely  re- 
sembling a  system.  What  will  be  attempted  here  is  the  supplying 
of  some  considerations  that  will  draw  the  student's  attention 
to  some  leading  points,  as  a  guide  to  personal  study. 

400.  The  case  oi  cry  as  illustrated  in  the  preceding  sec- 
tion  has    shown   that  by  the  side  of  the  three  verbal  forms 


VERBALS   AND   OTHER   VERBAL   WORDS  2/9 

treated  until  now  (the  plain  stem,  the  stem  with  to,  and  the 
ing)  there  may  be  a  clearly  verbal  noun  of  the  same  form 
as  the  stem  that  can  hardly  be  called  a  class-noun  in  spite 
of  the  indefinite  article  {to  have  a  good  cry),  and  differs 
materially  from  the  class-noun  cry.  There  is  more  to  be 
considered;  for  the  word  class-noun,  however  convenient  and 
indeed  necessary  it  is  in  grammatical  discussion,  covers  very 
different  nouns.  It  may  be  best  to  take  an  example  illustrating 
one  of  these  points  of  difference. 

Virginia's  reply  to  Miss  Nunn's  letter  brought  another 
note  next  morning  —  Saturday.  It  was  to  request  a 
call  from  the  sisters  that  same  afternoon. 

Gissing,  The  Odd  Women  ch,  3. 

In  the  first  of  these  sentences  note  is  followed  by  next 
morning,  but  it  is  not  necessary  to  show  that  the  latter  is 
an  adjunct  to  brongJit:  it  is  only  verbs  that  take  a  non- 
prepositional  adjunct  of  this  sort.  A  noun  Hke  note  requires 
a  preposition  to  connect  it  with  another  noun  (apart  from 
the  attributive  use  of  nouns).  It  is  in  contradiction  with  this 
statement  that  call  in  the  next  sentence  does  take  such  an 
adjunct :  that  same  afternoon.  The  explanation  is  clear  enough  : 
call,  though  a  class-noun  in  its  syntactical  use,  is  so  clearly 
verbal  in  meaning  that  it  shares  a  peculiarity  with  verbs 
that  other  class-nouns  do  not.  A  'complete'  classification 
of  the  functions  of  verb  stems  would  consequently  have  to 
distinguish  between  the  non-predicative  stem  in  purely  verbal 
groups  ( Yoii  may  call  me  John),  the  converted  noun  {to  have 
a  good  cry),  the  verbal  class-noun  {call  as  used  in  the  sentence 
quoted),  and  the  non-verbal  class-noun  (/  heard  two  distinct 
cries).  Another  case  is  presented  by  the  following  sentence 
from  the  same  book :  It  was  a  face  that  invited,  that  compelled 
study  (ch.  3).  The  noun  study  is  not  a  class-noun,  but  rather 
an  abstract  noun;  but  it  is  quite  as  verbal  as  the  class-noun 
cry   or   the  noun  call  in  the  sentence  just  discussed. 


280  VERBS 

There  is  no  doubt  that  further  consideration  would  reveal  the 
justification  for  making  more  distinctions,  based  on  real 
grammatical  {not  semantic)  differences.  No  attempt  to  increase 
the  number  of  distinctions  between  the  various  uses  of  the 
verb  stem  will  be  made  here:  because  it  can  hardly  be  of 
use  to  the  student.  It  is  of  far  greater  importance  for  him 
to  understand  that  all  our  classifications  are  really  extremely 
crude,  however  refined  and  delicate  they  may  seem. 

The  forms  with  ing  present  similar  complications.  Thus, 
by  the  side  of  the  verbal  forms  long,  to  long,  longing,  or 
warn  with  its  companions,  we  also  have  the  class-nouns 
longing,  warning ;  by  the  side  of  the  verbal  ing  of  charm 
we  have  the  adjective  charming;  by  the  side  oi  co7itemplate, 
etc.  with  its  usual  verbal  companions  we  have  the  abstract 
derivatives  contemplatioji,  ministratioji,  intercession,  etc.  The 
existence  of  such  nouns  naturally  has  an  effect  on  the  use 
of  the  regular  verbal  which  thus  finds  parts  of  its  'proper' 
field  occupied.  The  following  quotations  illustrate  this  clearly, 
so  that  no  comment  seems  needed. 

The  truth  of  the  matter,  as  Mr.  Chesterton  would 
say,  is,  first,  that  writing,  along  with  speaking,  eating, 
sleeping,  and  putting  on  clothes,  and  coming  out  of  the 
rain,  is  one  of  the  great  universal  acts  of  modern  life. 
In  the  second  place  it  is  also  true  that  writing  is,  in 
its  finer  qualities,  comparatively  rare,  a  distinction  which 
it  shares  with  speaking,  cookery,  dressing,  house-building, 
and  the  sleep  of  a  tranquil  and  untroubled  mind, 

Brewster,  Writing  of  English  p.  7. 

The  subject  deserves  fuller  treatment  than  can  be 
given  to  it  here.  NED  s.v.  deserve. 

The  charge  that  they  have  been  used  in  an  arbitrary 
and  capricious  manner  will  not  bear  investigation. 

Times  Lit.  25/1,   18. 

A  force  which  is  not  of  their  creation. 

Escott,  England  I   123. 


VERBALS   AND   OTHER   VERBAL   WORDS  28 1 

There  is  a  second  point  in  this  passage  which  needs 
discussion.  Essays  and  Studies  IX  p.  38. 

It  is  beyond  argument  that  the  need  for  educational 
revolution  exists.  Times  Ed.  S.   1/2,   16. 

For  three  days  passion  has  run  very  high  in  the 
Chamber,  and  the  sittings  have  been  stormy  beyond 
description.  Times  W.  28/12,   17. 

There  are,  as  ever,  excellent  reasons  for  personal 
despair ;  while  the  reasons  for  despairing  about  society 
are  actually  a  good  deal  more  cogent  than  at  most 
times.  A  Mallarmean  shrinking  away  into  pure  poetry, 
a  delicate  Henry-Jamesian  avoidance  of  all  the  painful 
issues  would  seem  to  be  justified.  But  the  spirit  of  the 
time  —  the  industrially  heroic  time  in  which  we  live  — 
is  opposed  to  these  retirements,  these  handings  over  of 
life  to  footmen.  Huxley,  Vulgarity  in  Lit.  p.    13. 

In  the  heath's  barrenness  to  the  farmer  lay  its  fertility 
to  the  historian.  There  had  been  no  obliteration,  be- 
cause there  had  been  no  tending. 

Hardy,  Native  I  ch.   3  p.    18. 

She  moved  back  with  a  last  little  nod  at  him  and 
he  went  awkwardly  out  of  the  room  with  a  curious 
little  sense  of  sudden  distmssal. 

Walpole,  Fortitude  II  ch.   5   p.    197. 

After  some  persuasion  he  relented. 

Lytton  Strachey,  Books  and  Characters  p.  3. 

If  there's  any  more  snow,  the  children  will  be  able 
to  toboggan  down  the  hill.  —  Then  there'll  be  lots  of 
tumbles  and  bruises.     CoUinson,  Spoken  English  p.  32. 

And  yet,  in  spite  of  multitudinous  handicaps,  man 
continued  the  struggle  to  free  himself  from  the  worn-out 
shackles  of  the  past.     Botsford,  Engl.  Soc.  i8th  cent.  p.  3. 

For  when  the  Greek  delegate  (too  Socratic  by  half) 
suggested  that  it  might  be  a  good  thing  to  establish  a 
preliminary  definition  of  the  word  'obscene',  Sir  Archibald 
Bodkin  sprang  to  his  feet  witJi  a  protest  i). 

Huxley,  Vulgarity  p.   i. 


4)  Compare:   to  i^rotesl. 


282  VERBS 

401.  The  verbal  ing  has  been  treated  here  as  a  part  of 
the  verbal  system,  as  far  as  we  can  speak  of  one  in  English ; 
and  the  nouns  and  adjectives  in  -ing  have  been  relegated 
to  the  chapter  on  Derivation,  in  the  third  volume.  But  it 
is  often  a  very  arbitrary  classification,  as  may  be  shown  by 
the  two  uses  of  singittg  in  this  passage,  and  by  the  distinctly 
verbal  meaning  of  parting,  although  it  is  frequently  purely 
nominal. 

To  a  Concert.  —  Was  there  any  singing  as  well?  — 
Yes.  The  bass  was  best  of  all.  The  baritone,  tenor, 
contralto  and  alto  sang  correctly,  but  their  singing  was 
rather  uninspired.       Collinson,  Spoken  English  p.  So. 

I  found  myself  saying  ''Good-bye."  I  heard  the  word 
'good-bye'  spoken.  It  was  a  signal  not  of  a  parting  but 
of  a  uniting.      Edward  Thomas,  in  Van  Kranendonk, 

Contemp.  Prose  I  p.   183. 

402.  With  regard  to  the  aspect  of  the  verbal  forms 
Dr.  Murray,  in  the  NED  s.  v.  -ing,  observes  that  the  ing 
expresses  continuous  action  in  a  good  many  cases,  a  single 
action  being  expressed  by  the  stem  used  as  a  class-noun: 
crying  and  cry.  As  shown  above  this  is  true  only  if  we 
except  the  use  of  cry  as  a  converted  verb  in  to  have  a  good 
cry,  when  the  action  is  certainly  as  continuous  as  in  crying, 
however  used. 

Such  pairs  as  crying  and  the  class-noun  cry  are  also  used 
in  the  case  of  fall,  kick,  push,  run,  sleep,  strike,  and  a  great 
many  more  verbs.  But  it  will  be  shown,  in  the  chapter  on 
Derivation,  that  the  words  in  -iftg  often  denote  single  actions 
and  also  concrete  ideas:  christening,  wedding,  meeting ;  binding, 
sewing,  etc.  The  use  of  plural  words  in  -i7ig  as  in  her  comings 
and  goings  (Hardy,  Native  II  ch.  6  p.  177),  its  successive 
rises  'and  fallings  itt  level  (Oman,  Conquest  p.  i)  will  also 
be  treated  there. 


VERBALS  AND  SUBORDINATE  CLAUSES        283 

Verbals  and  Subordinate  Clauses 

403.  Many  of  the  uses  of  the  verbals  are  similar  to  such 
as  can  be  served  by  subordinate  clauses  too.  The  difference 
is  generally  that  the  subordinate  clause  more  clearly  expresses 
the  relations  between  the  parts  of  the  sentence.  It  does  this 
by  the  conjunction,  by  its  definite  subject  and  its  verbal 
form,  which  may  clearly  express  time  and  person. 

404.  Thus  the  plain  stem  always  has  its  subject  indicated 
■either  by  the  subject  of  the  sentence  (when  it  is  used  with 
auxiliaries)  or  by  the  noun  or  pronoun  preceding  it  (in  the 
object- with-plain  stem). 

There  is  one  case,  however,  when  there  may  be  a  necessity 
of  indicating  the  subject  specially;  this  may  occur  when  the 
plain  stem  forms  a  group  with  the  modal  preterite  /  ]iad,  I 
zvoiild,  usually  V d.  In  such  a  case  a  subordinate  clause  is  the 
only  way  to  express  the  meaning  required. 

I'd  rather  people  didn't  know  that  your  mother  was  only 
a  governess.  Temple  Thurston,  Antagonists  I  ch.  4  p.  41. 

"I'd  much  rather  you  wouldn't  make  me  hit  you,  you 
know,"  he  said.  Anstey,  Vice  Versa  ch,  2. 

We    had    rather    that    you    should   come  to  Rome  at 
first  under  the  patronage  of  another. 

Shorthouse,  Inglesant  ch.  21  p.  215. 

No    one   shall  know ;  but  I  think  I  would  rather  you 
chose  for  me ;  what  you  like  I  shall  like. 

Montgomery,  Misunderstood. 

Would    you    rather  he  remained  obscure  and  entirely 
yours.''  Hichens,  Ambition  ch.  34  p.  422. 

Would    she    rather   he    didn't  know  Miss  Rossiter,  he 
vaguely  wondered.     Women  were  such  queer  creatures, 
Walpole,  Fortitude  II  ch,   5  p.   197, 

405.  We  have  seen  that  with  the  verbs  to  feel,  to  hear, 
and  to  see,  and  a  few  others  we  find  the  object- with-plain 
stem    of   verbs    to    express    an  action  or  occurrence  (197  ff). 


284  VERBS 

By  the  side  of  the  sentence  I  heard  him  say  that,  h:wever^ 
we  also  find  /  heard  that  he  said  that.  There  is  something 
in  the  explanation  that  the  first  sentence  relates  a  sensation, 
the  second  a  mental  perception.  But  it  cannot  be  denied  that 
the  distinction  is  rather  vague  and  hardly  bears  a  close 
analysis.  Perhaps  the  difference  is  more  satisfactorily  stated 
when  we  say  that  to  hear  in  the  first  sentence,  when  it  is 
construed  with  an  object-with-plain  stem,  expresses  a  durative 
aspect,  and  in  the  other  a  perfective  aspect. 

This  would  enable  us  to  understand  why  the  object-with- 
plain  stem  is  only  used  when  the  stem  expresses  an  action 
or  occurrence :  a  durative  verb  necessarily  refers  to  an  action 
or  occurrence.  It  would  also  enable  us  to  understand  why 
to  watch  is  construed  with  the  object-with-plain  stem,  but 
not  with  a  subordinate  clause  nor  an  object- with-stem  with 
to,  for  the  verb  is  invariably  durative. 

The  use  of  the  ing  instead  of  the  plain  stem  depends  upon 
the  aspect  of  the  second  verb  in  the  construction ;  this  diffe- 
rence has  been  fully  treated  in  the  chapter  on  the  ing  and 
plain  stem_,  356  ff.  The  following  quotations  may  help  to  il- 
lustrate the  distinctions  made. 

Mrs.  Conisbee,  sympathetic  in  her  crude  way,  would 
see  that  the  invalid  wanted  for  nothing. 

Gissing,  The  Odd  Women  ch.  3. 

Note  the  plainly  perfective  aspect  of  see  here :  equivalent 
to  take  care. 

Does  Mother  imagine  for  one  moment  that  she  is 
going  to  darn  all  those  stockings  knotted  upon  the  quilt 
like  a  coil  of  snakes?  Mansfield,  Bliss  p.   141. 

406.  It  should  be  noted  that  the  stem  Jtear  is  frequently 
used  as  a  present-perfect  i),  denoting  'to  have  been  informed'. 
It  always  takes  a  clause  in  this  meaning.     See   157. 


1)  Not  to  be  mistaken  for  a  'perfect  present,  as  I  have  got  (see  Auxiliaries). 


VERBALS   AND   SUBORDINATE   CLAUSES  285 

I  hear  he  is  out  of  town. 

I  hear  that  he  will  start  to-morrow. 

I  hear  you  made  a  speech  yesterday. 

407.  The  explanation  suggested  for  the  verbs  of  sensation 
and  perception  makes  it  possible  to  account  for  the  fact  that 
to  perceive,  to  notice,  etc.  (198)  take  both  the  plain  stem 
and  the  stem  with  to,  usually  the  last:  they  may  express 
sensation,  like  to  see  and  to  hear ;  but  they  usually  express 
a  perception,  implying  a  perfective  aspect,  when  a  subor- 
dinate clause  is  necessary  in  spoken  English,  and  literary 
English  has  the  alternative  with  the  stem  with  to.  It  may 
finally  be  observed  that  the  literary  construction,  though  not 
current  in  colloquial  English,  is  not  an  arbitrary  invention : 
if  it  were,  writers  would  not  be  able  to  make  the  distinction 
we  have  tried  to  formulate,  which  is,  of  course,  far  too  fine 
for  practical  application,  and  can  be  made  only  when  it  is 
•done  unconsciously. 

We  can  also  account  now  for  the  facts  observed  by  van 
<ier  Gaaf  {Englische  Studien  62,  409)  with  regard  to  expect. 
The  verb  can  take  an  object-with-stem  with  to  as  well  as 
a  clause  when  it  expresses  an  event  that  is  foreseen  [a).  If 
it  is  a  state  that  is  foreseen  we  naturally  use  a  clause, 
although  the  object-with-stem  is  perhaps  not  exclusively 
literary  {b).  If  expect  is  to  express  will  or  wish  the  object- 
with-stem  must  naturally  be  used  {c).  It  can  also  express 
'to  suppose,  guess,  imagine,'  when  it  is  construed  with  a  clause, 
as  usual  in  such  cases  {d). 

a.  We  hardly  expected  him  to  be  successful. 
We  hardly  expected  that  he  would  be  successful. 

b.  I  don't  expect  this  fine  weather  will  continue. 
I  don't  expect  this  fine  weather  to  continue. 

c.  Nobody  expects  you  to  make  a  martyr  of  yourself. 

d.  I  expect  he  knows  more  about  it. 


286  VERBS 

408.  We  have  seen  that  some  verbs  when  forming  a  group 
with  a  stem  with  to  are  completely  subordinate  in  meaning 
to  the  stem,  and  serve  to  modify  it  or  to  express  some  aspect 
of  the  action  or  occurrence  {to  happen,  to  fail,  to  come,  etc.; 
see  221).  They  naturally  take  a  different  construction  when 
expressing  an  independent  meaning,  as  may  be  shown  by 
the  example  of  to  happen. 

It  happened  now  and  then  that,  on  reaching  the  house 
at  Knightsbridge,  I  was  informed  that  Mr.  .  .  felt  too 
tired  to  rise.  This  concerned  me  little,  for  it  meant  no 
deduction  of  fee.  Gissing,  Ryecroft. 

409.  The  stem  with  to  as  an  adjunct  to  adjectives  ex- 
pressing a  feeling  (/  am  sorry  to  hear  that)  has  the  same 
subject  as  the  grammatical  subject  of  the  sentence.  When  this 
is  not  the  case  a  clause  is  used :  /  am  sorry  you  can't  come. 

A  clause  is  also  necessary,  though  the  subject  of  the  sen- 
tence may  be  the  subject  of  the  second  verb,  when  the  time 
must   be   expressed :   /  am   sorry  I  was  not  told  this  before, 

410.  The  same  causes  as  are  mentioned  in  the  preceding 
section  may  prevent  a  stem  from  being  used  in  an  inter- 
rogative adjunct. 

Martial  knew  when  he  should  stop,  luhat  he  was  doing, 
and  how  to  do  it  with  brevity  and  point. 

Times  Lit.   18/3,  20. 
Here  it  would  be  impossible  to  substitute  what  to  be  doing 
for  what  he  was  doinp;. 

411.  Although  to  bear  can  take  an  object-with-stem, 
chiefly  in  literary  English,  it  must  be  construed  with  a  clause 
in  the  following  cases,  because  the  time  must  be  expressed  {a). 
In  other  cases  the  clause  is  not  inevitable,  perhaps,  but 
certainly  the  most  natural  construction  {b). 

a.  Himself  in  revolt  against  the  institution  of  marriage, 
Edwin    could    not    bear    that    Ingpen   should   attack   it. 


VERBALS   AND   SUBORDINATE   CLAUSES  2Zf 

(The  subordinate  clause  shows  that  E.  wanted  to  prevent 
Ingpen  ^from  attacking  it;  the  stem  would  suggest  that 
Ingpen  was  doing  it,  and  the  ing  expresses  contempo- 
raneous actions  or  occurrences). 

Bennett,  These  Twain  III  ch.   17. 
b.  I  could  not  bear  that  we  should  be  only  muddling 
on,  and  you  so  rich  and  thriving! 

Hardy,  Ironies  (To  Please  his  Wife  ch.  2). 
Mademoiselle   could    not   bear   that   the  gratitude  and 
affection  of  a  little  child  should  be  thus  discouraged. 
Mackenzie,  Seven  Ages  of  Woman  ch.  2  p.   100. 

412.  The  subordinate  clauses  in  the  following  quotations 
are  of  an  uncommon  type,  but  need  no  comment.  The 
use  of  should  suggests  that  the  clause  is  due  to  an  element, 
of  zvill  in  the  verb  of  the  leading  clause. 

He  liked  that  people  under  him  should  thrive,  —  and 
he  liked  them  to  know  that  they  throve  by  his  means. 

Trollope,  Dr.  Wortle  ch.    i. 

Constance  had  been  there  all  the  time,  but  of  course, 
though  she  heard  the  remembered  voice,  her  maidenliness 
had  not  permitted  that  she  should  show  herself  to 
Mr.  Scales.  Bennett,  Old  W.  T.  I  ch.  6  §  2. 

He  would  have  preferred  that  Darius  should  never 
have  felt  gratitude,  or,  at  any  rate,  that  he  should  never 
have  shown  it.  He  v/ould  have  preferred  that  Darius 
should  have  accepted  his  help  nonchalantly,  grimly, 
thanklessly,  as  a  right.      id.  Clayhanger  III  ch.  14  §  2. 

413,  A  number  of  verbs  can  take  a  prepositional  object- 
with-stem  ( You  may  depend  tipon  him  to  help  you)  or  a 
prepositional  ing  with  a  possessive  [depend  tipon  his  coming}, 
and  take  a  subordinate  clause  as  well  ( You  may  depend  upon 
it  that  what  I  say  is  true).  These  constructions  have  also 
been  illustrated  in  the  sections  on  the  pronoun  it,  because 
the  clause  makes  this  pronoun  necessary.  Professor  CoUinson, 
Spoken  English  p.  68,  provides  this  sentence :    You  can  depend 


:288  VERBS 

Upon  it  he  never  has  to  preach  to  empty  pews,  with  this 
alternative :  n'po?!  his  never  having  to  preach.  The  latter  is 
not  really  colloquial,  of  course. 

We  may  also  mention  here  the  case  of  to  remember,  which 
takes  an  ing  (simple  or  perfect:  see  585  f.)  or  a  perfect  stem 
with  to,  but  may  also  take  a  subordinate  clause.  The  latter 
construction  must  be  used  when  the  verb  refers  to  the  future 
and  is  similar  in  meaning  to  'consider.' 

I  remember  his  coming  in  to  breakfast  one  day. 

Walpole,  Fort.  Ill  ch.  2  4  p.  253. 
You  .  .  .  must  remember  that  a  great  charge  has  been 
given  you  ...  ib.  p.  255. 

414.  In  some  cases  a  relative  clause  {a),  or  an  adverb 
clause  with  a  conjunction  (^)  have  the  same  function  as  a 
construction  with  a  verbal. 

a.  "My  fool  of  a  doctor  told  me  to  make  my  will," 
he  said.  "I  hate  a  fellow  who  tells  you  to  make  your 
will  ..."  Galsworthy,  Caravan  p.   i. 

b.  I  hate  people  when  they  keep  up  an  ear-splitting 
chatter  all  the  time,  but  I  simply  loathe  them  zvhen  they 
whisper.  Punch's  Almanack  for  193 1. 

She  said:  "D'you  mind  if  I  drive,  because  I'm  learning." 
Galsworthy,  The  Dark  Flower  I,  ch.   11   p.  56. 

415.  After  to  wish  a  subordinate  clause  is  used  to  express 
a  wish  that  is  supposed  to  be  incapable  of  fulfilment,  a  stem 
in  other  cases. 

I  wish  I  knew  what  to  do. 

Even  those  who  agree  with  them  wish  that  they  would 
not  expose  their  cause  to  ridicule.     Times  Lit.  20/1,  16. 

416.  Owing  to  the  small  number  of  verbal  forms  in  living 
F^nglish,  the  formal  difference  between  a  construction  with  a 
verbal  and  the  one  with  a  subordinate  clause  without  a  con- 
junction is  frequently  only  just  perceptible.  Sometimes  it  can 


AUXILIARIES  289 

only  be  inferred  from  a  comparison  with  similar  clauses 
containing  a  subject  which  takes  a  verbal  iz ;  this  is  the 
case  in  the  following  sentence. 

,  .  .  the  influence  which  we  suppose  our  minds  have 
upon  our  bodies,  and  secondly  the  influence  which  we 
take  our  bodies  to  have  upon  our  minds.     Laird  p.  16. 

Here  it  is  only  the  comparison  with  our  mind  has  that 
can  prevent  us  taking  have  for  a  non-predicative  use  of  the 
stem,  in  an  object-with-plain  stem  construction. 


AUXILIARIES 

417.  When  a  verb,  whether  used  predicatively  or  not, 
forms  a  close  syntactic  group  with  a  verbal  (participle, 
ing  or  verb  stem),  the  verbal  generally  serves  as  an  adjunct 
or  object  to  the  other  verbal  form.  But  it  sometimes  happens 
that  the  relation  of  the  two  elements  is  reversed.  Examples 
have  been  given  in  the  chapter  on  the  participle  (56)  as 
in  /  got  caught  in  a  shower;  on  the  ing  (88,  129),  of 
which  the  ice  has  stopped  comings  the  trunk  had  missed 
being  sent  on  hoard  are  typical  specimens;  and  in  the 
chapter  on  the  stem  with  to  (221),  as  in  he  happened  to 
come,  we  stood  to  lose;  also  in  the  chapter  on  aspect  (311  ff.), 
as  in  the  motor  car  is  coming  to  be  realized^  he  fell  thinking. 
A  detailed  treatment  of  each  of  these  verbs  must  be  left  to 
the  dictionary  because  they  show  no  formal  or  syntactic 
peculiarities  distinguishing  them  from  other  verbs. 

There  are  a  number  of  verbs  and  verbal  groups,  however, 
which  share  the  position  of  the  subordinate  element  of  a 
verbal  group  that  has  just  been  illustrated  with  the  verbs 
/o  get,  to  stop,  to  happen,  to  miss,  to  come,  etc.,  but 
differ  from  them  by  having  formal  and  syntactic  pecuharities 

Kruisinga,  Handbook  II.  Accidence  and  Syntax.  1.  19 


290  VERBS 

which   are  connected  with  their  semantic  subordination  in 
verbal  groups. 

418.  With  regard  to  the  formal  peculiarities  referred 
to  we  may  begin  by  taking  to  dare  and  to  need.  These 
can  be  used  as  independent  verbs  and  do  not  differ  in 
that  case  from  other  verbs.  But  they  can  also  form  a  close 
group  with  a  plain  verb  stem  in  negative  sentences;  in 
that  case  the  third  person  does  not  take  the  suffix  -5. 
Some  other  verbs,  can,  may,  shall,  and  will  never  take 
the  suffix  -s;  they  have  two  forms  only;  the  stem,  which 
is  exclusively  used  as  a  present  tense,  and  a  preterite. 

419.  The  verbs  mentioned  in  the  preceding  section,  and 
a  number  of  others,  also  show  syntactic  deviations.  The 
most  important  of  these  is  that  they  can  take  the  negative 
adverb  7wt,  both  in  its  strong-stressed  form  [not]  and 
weak-stressed  enclitic  [nt],  without  the  verb  do.  Nor  do 
they  take  this  verb  in  cases  when  other  verbs  cannot  be 
used  without  it  (as  in  interrogative  sentences,  or  sentences 
with  inversion  of  subject  and  predicative  verb  generally). 
This  applies  to  the  verbs  to  be,  to  have,  do,  and  the 
isolated  forms  ought  and  used  [just].  All  these  verbs  are 
important  as  members  of  verbal  groups;  several  of  them, 
viz.  those  that  never  take  the  suffix  -5  and  have  two  forms 
only  {can,  may,  shall,  will),  are  never  used  except  in  verbal 
groups.  The  preterites  of  some  of  them  are  only  used 
as  modal  preterites,  not  as  past  tenses. 

420.  For  the  reasons  enumerated  it  is  necessary  in 
grammar  to  treat  these  verbs  separately;  they  are  tra- 
ditionally called  auxiliaries,  a  term  that  may  be  retained, 
as  long  as  the  word  is  taken  in  the  sense  explained  here, 
without  any  reference  to  its  etymological  origin,  or  to  the 
grammatical  ideas  that  led  to  its  introduction. 


AUXILIARIES  291 

No  classification  of  the  auxiliaries  can  be  invented  that 
does  justice  to  all  their  peculiarities.  Thus,  can  and  must 
considered  from  the  point  of  view  of  their  meaning  are 
closely  related  to  the  verbs  of  independent  use,  but  form- 
ally can  and  must  differ  more  from  them  than  to  have 
or  to  dare.  To  have  or  to  do,  on  the  other  hand,  may  be 
used  as  verbs  of  full  meaning,  and  have  the  formal  character 
of  such  verbs,  but  in  some  uses  (as  in  I've  got  it,  What 
do  you  mean  ?)  they  express  no  meaning  at  all  and  serve 
a  purely  grammatical  function.  For  this  reason  the  fol- 
lowing classification  is  here  proposed  as  one  out  of  several 
possible  ones;  it  will  be  justified  in  the  retrospect  at  the 
end  of  the  chapter  (748  f). 

(1)  to  be,  to  have;  to  do. 

(2)  to  dare,  to  need;  to  let. 

(3)  ought,  used. 

(4)  can,  may,  must. 

(5)  shall,  will. 

421.  When  a  verb  forms  an  element  in  two  connected 
sentences,  it  is  not  necessarily  repeated.  This  matter  is 
fully  dealt  with  in  the  third  volume  from  a  general  point 
of  view,  but  it  may  be  convenient  to  treat  it  here  with 
respect  to  the  details  that  specially  concern  the  auxiliaries. 
An  example  with  a  verb  of  full  meaning  may  be  prefixed: 
You  need  not  go  to  bed  unless  you  want  to.  The  two 
verbs  need  and  want  form  a  group  with  the  verbal  go ; 
the  former  requires  the  plain  stem,  the  latter  can  take 
a  stem  with  to.  This  explains  the  final  to,  which  is 
naturally  found  with  the  auxiliaries  taking  the  stem  with 
to  {a),  although  not  invariably  (b).  The  auxiliaries  that 
take  a  plain  stem  naturally  do  not  require  the  'suspended' 
to  (c).  Repetition  of  the  verbal  is  possible,  too,  and  may 
serve  the  purpose  of  emphasis  {d). 


292  VERBS 

a.  One  day  in  the  course  of  conversation  Murray  said 
he   knew  something  of  law,  or  at  least  he  ought  to. 

Daily  Mail. 
"Go  and  smack  his  head." 

"Am  I  to  really?"  Sinister  Street  p.   lOi. 

Lady  Agnes  can  marry  any  one  she  chooses  to. 

Hume,  Red  Money  p.   150. 
I    was   listening,    oh    intently !     One  had  to,  to  make 
out    what    she    was    saying. 

Arlen,  Green  Hat  ch.   i   p.  8. 

b.  "You  see,"  she  said  to  me,  "Gerald  and  I  are  the 
last  Marches,  and  we  ought  to  stand  together.  Don't 
you  think  so?" 

"Yes,  you  ought,"  I  said  gravely. 

Arlen,  Green  Hat  ch.   i  p.   17. 
They  stand  where  they  ought  not. 

Oxf.  and  Cambr.  Rev.  no.   16  p.  ^6. 

c.  I  could  tell  you  but  I  won't. 

The  wedding  happened  as  perfectly  as  Pauline  had 
imagined  it  would. 

Mackenzie,  Guy  and  Pauline  p.  383. 
If  she  would  she  could  be  useful. 

Kipling,  Day's  Work. 
If  you   can   without   fatigue,    dear,  do  come  down  to 
dinner  to-day.  Gaskell,  Wives  III  p.  258. 

With  a  fluttering  heart  Virginia  made  what  haste  she 
could  homewards.  Gissing,  Odd  Women  ch.  3. 

d.  She  would  not  wear  an  apron  in  an  age  when 
aprons  were  almost  essential  to  decency.  No !  She  would 
not  wear  an  apron,  and  there  was  an  end  of  it  i). 

Bennett,  Old  W.  T.  I  ch.  4  §  i  p.  77. 

422.  It  is  not  necessary  to  give  many  examples  of 
auxiliaries  with  a  verbal  participle  or  with  a  verbal  ing, 
because   they   will   be   found  in  the  sections  on  to  be,  in 


1)  The    italics    are    in    the    original,    to   denote    the    pronunciation   [not] 
whereas  in  the  first  sentence  it  is  enclitic  [nt]. 


AUXILIARIES  293 

the  groups  with  a  participle  usually  called  the  passive 
(449),  and  those  with  the  ing  called  the  progressive  (497); 
also  in  the  groups  of  to  have  with  a  participle  called  the 
perfect  (564). 

Mr.  C.  could  have  said  all  he  has  much  better  if  he 
had  not  wrapped  it  up  in  so  many  words. 

Athenaeum,  21/12,   12. 

From  the  age  of  Milton  to  that  of  Wesley,  puritanism, 
to  all  appearance,  had  been  struck  out  of  art,  as  it  had 
out  of  the  brilliant  superficial  life  of  the  world. 

Cambridge  Hist,  of  Lit.  X,   i. 

The  public  opinion  of  his  country  wanted  to  know 
why  he  did  not  go  to  office  daily,  as  his  father  had 
before  him. 

Would  that  nature  had  done  the  same  for  the  intrinsic 
outcastes    of   our    ideal    society!     But,    alas,  she  hasn't. 

Huxley,  Vulgarity  p.   5. 

423.  The  examples  in  the  preceding  sections  show 
that  it  is  not  only  the  verbal  that  is  expressed  once  only, 
but  the  verbal  with  its  adjuncts.  Occasionally  the  adjunct 
is  used  although  the  leading  verbal  is  not  repeated  {a). 
It  is  also  unusual  for  an  auxihary  to  be  used  without  a 
verbal  when  this  is  not  present  in  the  first  group  either, 
and  can  only  be  inferred  from  it  {b). 

a,  I  don't  think  we  could  get  a  cart  from  Lymington 
to  the  cottage,  although  we  can  a  horse  perhaps. 

Marryat,  New  Forest. 

b.  She  kisses  it,  animation  and  all,  caressing  the  rich 
black  hair  with  a  hand  that  seems  thoughtful.  A  hand  can  i). 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.   11  p.   104. 

424.  The  repetition  of  auxiliaries  gives  rise  to  some 
constructions  that  it  may  be  instructive  to  illustrate  more 
fully  here,  although  the  question  is  really  one  of  sentence- 


1)  i.e.  he  thoughtful. 


294  VERBS 

structure,  and  will  be  dealt  with  from  a  general  point  of 
view  in  the  third  volume.  In  several  cases  the  sentences 
with  the  auxiliary  repeated  have  the  character  of  appended 
clauses  ^). 

_  ,.  ,.  425.  Both  the  auxiliary  and  the  subject  of  a 
Confirmative  ,.  -^  ^   .      \      . 

^     ^.        precedmg    statement   are   repeated   m  the  form 

Questions   ^,  ^       .    .  .  .  ^ 

01    an  appended  mterrogative  sentence,  so  that 

the   two  sentences  form  one,   serving  to  invite  the  person 

addressed    to    express   his   agreement  with  the  statement. 

Either    the    question    or   the  statement   is  negative,  never 

both.  It  should  be  remembered  that  such  words  as  hardly, 

scarcely,  only  are  considered  to  make  a  sentence  negative. 

The  types  are: 

(i)  John  can  do  it,  cannot  he? 

(2)  John  cannot  do  it,  can  he? 

You  had  rather  a  disturbed  night,  did  not  you  2)  ? 
Cassell's  Magazine  of  Fiction. 

"We  are  not  a  critical  audience,  are  we,  Mr.  Wal- 
singham?"  Sidgwick,  Severins  p.  221. 

He  need  not  go  there,  need  he? 

"I  told  you  down  the  Embankment,"  Michael  shouted 
through  the  trap  3). 

"I  cannot  go  down  the  Embankment  before  I  gets 
there,    can   I,   sir?"  the  cabman  answered  reproachfully. 

Sinister  Street  p.  837. 

"Well,  of  course,"  Lord  Lippington  said  seriously, 
"here  in  the  house  we  hardly  want  it,  do  we?" 

Cotes,  Cinderella  ch.   19. 

We  only  played  there  for  a  few  minutes,  did  we,  Lucy? 


1)  When   there    is  no  auxiliary  the  verb  to  do  is  used.     It  is  convenient 
to  include  this  case.     See  621. 

2)  Note  the  auxiliary. 

3)  i.  e.  in  the  roof  of  the  cab. 


REPETITION   OF   AUXILIARIES  295 

^L  J.'       426.     When   both   statement  and  question  are 
Sympathetic         .  .       .  ,  ,     ,  .       ...    ^ 

positive  (a)    or    both    negative  (6),    we    have   a 
Questions    ^  .  '     ,       .      .      ^    . ,     \ '  ,  .     . 

construction  that  is  almost  identical  in  lorm  but 

differs  considerably  in  meaning.  It  is  not  really  interrogative 
but  expresses  the  speaker's  interest  in  the  statement.  The 
construction  may  express  a  friendly  interest  or  surprise; 
it  may  also  be  ironical.  These  feelings  are  shown  by  the 
context  and,  chiefl}^,  by  the  intonation. 

The    construction  differs  from  the  one  discussed  in  425 
in  that  the  statement  is  made  on  the  ground  of  the  words 
or  the  attitude  of  the  person  addressed. 
The  types  are: 

(i)  John  can  do  it,  can  he? 

(2)  John  cannot  do  it,  can't  he? 

a.  So  you   are  back  from  Norway,  are  you  ?  —  Yes. 

Sweet,  Element,  no.  71. 
"I    thought  it  too  good  to  be  true  when  Edwin  heard 
it    from    Mr.   Biffen  .  .  ."   "Oh,  Biffen  told  you,  did  he?" 
Gissing,  New  Grub  Street  ch.  6. 
"Any    boy    would    love    his    grandfather,"    continued 
Lord  Fauntleroy,  "especially  one  that  has  been  as  kind 
to  him  as  you  have  been." 

Another  queer  gleam  came  into  the  old  nobleman's  eyes. 
"Oh!"  he  said,  "I  have  been  kind  to  you,  have  I?" 
"Yes,"  answered  Lord  Fauntleroy  brightly. 

Burnett,  Lord  F.  Gruno  ed.  p.  97. 

"Why,"  said  Fauntleroy,  "she  has  been  thinking  about 
me  all  the  morning,  and  I  have  been  thinking  about  her." 

"Oh!"  said  the  Earl,  "You  have,  have  you?  Ring 
the  bell!"  ib.  p.   119  i). 

"You  are  acquainted  with  Miss  Jane  Fairfax,  sir,  are 
you?"  said  Mr.  Woodhouse,  always  the  last  to  make 
his  way  in  conversation. 

Jane  Austen,  Emma,  end  of  ch.  23. 


1)  Note  that  no  answer  is  expected. 


296  VERBS 

b.  "Oh,  oh  !  The  bishop  wouldn't  hke  it  —  wouldn't  he?" 

Trollope,  Framley  p.  23. 

(Casual  angler  who  has  left  the  packing  of  impedi- 
menta to  boy)  "Haven't  seen  no  rod,  haven't  you? 
What  the  deuce  do  you  think  I  was  going  to  catch 
fish  with  then?"  Punch. 


427.  The  appended  question  may  also  be  addressed 
to  oneself  [a).  We  have  essentially  the  same  construction 
when  the  question  is  asked  by  another  person  than  the 
one  who  makes  the  statement  {b). 

a.  So  they  had  taken  his  book,  had  they  ? 

Walpole,  Fortitude  II  ch.  8  p.  229. 

b.  "Oh!"  said  Cedric,   "that's  like  the  President." 
"Is  it?"  said  Mr.  Havisham. 

Little  Lord,   p.  34  (also  ib.  p.   36,    151). 
"The   bishop,    for    instance,    must  attend  the  House." 
"Must  he  ?"  asked  Mrs.   Grantley,  as  though  she  were 
not  at  all  well  informed  with  reference  to  this  branch  of 
a  bishop's  business.  Trollope,  Framley  Parsonage, 

p.   168  (ib.  p.   157). 
"You  have  been  wonderfully  good  to  him." 
"Have  I?"     The  faint  colour  rose  to  her  cheek. 

Crawford,  Tale  of  a  Lonely  Parish,  p.  "jt,. 
"Darling  boy,  it's  a  fairy  tale." 
"Is  it?"  he  said  doubtfully. 

Compton  Mackenzie,  Sinister  Street,  p.   18. 
"You  are  trying  to  fidget  me  into  a  passion."  "Ami?" 
said    Mrs.  Gresham^  standing  opposite  to  a  big  bowl... 

Trollope,  Framley  P.,  p.  369. 
"Now,  I  like  this  kind  of  thing,  once  in  a  way." 
"Do  you?"  said  Frank,  in  a  tone  that  was  almost  savage. 

Trollope,  Dr.  Thorne,  Everyman  Series,  p.  211. 
"You    —    you're    only    doing    that   to    frighten    me," 
stammered  Miss  Spencer,  in  a  low,  quavering  voice. 
"Am  I?"  Nella  replied,  as  firmly  as  he  could. 

Bennett,  Babylon  p.  2)T,. 


REPETITION   OF    AUXILIARIES  297 

"You  didn't  see  the  other  arm  at  the  station,  doctor?" 
she  said. 

"Didn't  I?" 

"I  was  asking." 

"Well,  no.  Now  I  come  to  think  of  it,  I  don  v  think 
I  did.     We'll  have  a  look  now,  anyhow. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  3  p.   18. 

428.  Sometimes  we  find  the  order  of  a  declarative 
sentence  («).  In  negative  sentences  there  is  regularly 
inversion  (b).   See  vol.  3  on  word-order. 

a.  Baron.    Nay,    Sir,    we   think  him    a  little  reserved. 
Duke.  You  do,  now?  Hope,  Swaen  I  p.  28. 
"I  even  know  a  girl  who  lives  in  a  flat." 

She  sat  up  in  surprise.     "You  do?" 
"I  do,"  he  assured  her. 

Wharton,  House  of  Mirth  p.  4  f. 

b.  "Perhaps  they  wouldn't  be  earls  if  they  knew  any 
better,"  said  Cedric,  feeling  some  vague  sympathy  for 
their  unhappy  condition. 

"Wouldn't  they!"  said  Mr.  Hobbs.  "They  just  glory 
in  it.  It's  in  'em.  They're  a  bad  lot." 

Burnett,  Little  Lord. 

Compare  the  following  two  quotations  from  Bennett's 
Grand  Babylon  Hotel: 

"It  won't  do  any  good." 

"Won't   it.?"    repeated   Racksole,  with  a  sudden  flash. 

ch.   II. 

"I  happened  to  see  Jules  to-day." 

"You  did!"  Racksole  remarked  with  much  calmness.. 
"Where?"  ch.  21. 

429.  In  both  constructions  (425  f.)  a  second  person  with 
will  is  generally  repeated  by  will  {a),  but  also  by  shall  [b). 
In  the  first  person  it  is  also  possible  to  use  both  will  ive 
and  shall  we  in  the  enclitic  question,  but  only  shall  I  [c.) 


298  VERBS 

a.  "You'll  tell  me  when  there  is  any  news,  dear  boy, 
won't  you?"  "Indeed  I  will.  Or  suppose  I  tell  you  now 
—  Nolly  has  told  about  me  and  Janey  Spencer  — 
isn't  it?  1)"     "That's  the  ticket.  .  ." 

Morgan,  Vance  ch.  28  p.  268  f. 

b.  You  will  like  to  play,  shan't  you.-* 

Ehot,  Mill  on  the  Floss  VI  ch.  7. 
"You    will    not    be    afraid  to  stop  in  this  house",  she 
asked    contemptuously,   "and  go  on  bathing  Miss  Hale's 
forehead,  shall  you?     I  shall  not  be  ten  minutes  away." 
Gaskell,  North  and  South  ch.  22. 

c.  Some  day  we  too  will  come,  will  we  not,  to  greet 
the  sun  on  May-Day?  Barbara. 

"By  Gad,  what  a  glorious  night,"  sighed  Guy,  staring 
out  at  the  orchard.     "We'll  take  a  walk,  shall  we?" 

Sinister  Street  p.  765. 

We  will  be  ready  in  a  quarter-of-an-hour,  shall  we 
not,  Mrs.  Proudie?  Trollope,  Framley  ch.  6. 

"Did  you  count  the  number  of  seconds  between  the 
lightning  and  the  thunder?" 

"No." 

"We  will  next  time,  shall  we?" 

We    would    love  to  keep  you,  wouldn't  we,  Graham  ? 

Cotes,  Cinderella  ch,   13. 

I'll  call  the  boys,  shall  I? 

Compare  also  the  following, 

"You'll  be  just  a  counter  in  the  game,  no  doubt." 
"Shall  I?  Not  much !  I  play  my  own  games.  You  ought 
to  know  that."      Phillpotts,  Forest  on  the  Hill  ch,  2. 
"I  shall  speak  to  him  first." 
"Oh  no,  you  won't." 
"Shan't  I  ?     You'll  see."       Bennett,  Leonora  ch,  7. 


1)  Here  isn't  it  seems  to  be  used  for  hasn't  he.  But  isn't  it  may  refer 
to  the  speaker's  thought:  that  is  in  your  inind.  In  Eleanor  Glyn,  When 
the  Hour  Came  (p,  10)  we  find:  -'You  think  so  too,  isn't  it?"  But  the 
speaker  is  specially  called  "a  foreigner." 


REPETITION   OF   AUXILIARIES  299 

,  ,  430.     The  repetition  of  auxiliary  and  subject 

^     may  serve  to  emphasize  the  speaker's  conviction 
Statements      .  -;  ,     r  ,  t     , 

01  the  truth  oi  the  statement.  In  the  two  precedmg 

constructions    the    subject   is    repeated    in   the   form   of  a 

pronoun;  in  this  one  the  real  subject  is  generally  announced 

by  a  personal  pronoun  in  the  first  statement,  and  expressed 

fully  in  the  form  of  a  noun  in  the  second  statement. 

It  was  all  ranged  upon  a  slope,  was  this  old  garden  .  . , 

Temple  Thurston,  Thirteen  p.  66. 
He  hated  being   "messed  about,"   did  Gerald. 

Arlen,   Green  Hat  ch.   2  p.   54. 
He    could    arouse   all  that  was  worst  in  a  man,  could 
Hilary,  ib.  ch.   3   p.  99. 

My   father  had  a  kind  heart,   and  there  was  snow  on 
the  ground  that  night.     He  could  not  turn  her  off,  and 
she's  done  well  by  us,  has  Betsy.     English  Rev.  19 14. 
She's  a  dear,  good  woman,  is  my  aunt  de  Courcy. 
Trollope,  Dr.  I'horne,  p.   192. 
It  is  very  gay,  is  Lacville  on   Sunday  night. 

Mrs.  Belloc-Lowndes,  Chink  in  the  Armour 
(Tauchnitz),  p.  34. 
He's  interested  is  George  in  all  beasts  and  birds. 

Vachell,  Spragge's  Canyon,  p.  81. 
Never  saved  a  cent,  did  old  Don  Juan.  ib.  p.  16  v. 
They're  keen,  are  ghosts.  New  Numbers  I,   14, 

"He  will  have  his  joke,  will  the  doctor!"     Constance 
smiled,  in  a  brighter  world. 

Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  IV  ch.  3  §  2. 

431.  As  to  the  order  of  words  in  appended  statements, 
the  noun-subject  generally  has  end-position,  as  the  preceding 
section  has  shown.  When  the  repeated  subject  is  a  pro- 
noun it  precedes  the  verb  {a);  the  same  order  is  occasionally 
found  in  the  case  of  noun-subjects  [b). 

a.  You  look  full  of  sense,  you  do. 

Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.   18. 


300  VERBS 

Come  on  surprisingly,  you  have.     Vachell,  Quinneys'. 
b.  She    takes    hold    of   housework    better    than    I  do, 
Hannah  does.  Wiggin,  Rebecca  ch.   i. 

Thinks  things  out  for  herself,  Barbara  does  —  surprises 
you  sometimes.  Cotes,  Cinderella  ch.  22. 

Well,  she  thinks  the  world  of  you,  Sarah  does. 

Bennett,  Hilda  Lessways. 
She  is  very  sympathetic.  Daphne  is. 

Rose  Macaulay,  Keeping  up  Appearances  p.  38. 

432.  The  construction  is  sometimes  found  in  combination 
with  an  emphatic  do. 

He    never    did    care    for   the  river,  did  Montmorency. 
Jerome,  Three  Men  in  a  Boat  ch.   i. 

433.  The   three   cases   discussed  above  are  sometimes 
found  in  consecutive  sentences. 

"What's  this  I  hear  about  Roger.'"'  said  Mr.  Gibson, 
plunging  at  once  into  the  subject.  "Aha!  so  you've  heard, 
have  you?  It's  famous,  isn't  it.?  He's  a  boy  to  be  proud 
of,  is  old  Roger..."  Gaskell,  Wives  II  p.  210. 

„    ,.      ,.  434.     We  also  find  repetition  of  auxiliary  and 

Confirmative      ,  .  _  ^   ,.  -^     . 

„,  subject  to  conhrm  a  precedmg  statement  made 

by    another    person.     Positive    statements    are 

referred    to    by    so  {a) ;   in   the   case  of  negative  ones  the 

confirmatory  sentence  opens  with  no  more  {b). 

a.  "Why,  we've  forgotten  to  call  on  Miss  Mitchell!" 
"So  we  have.  But  it  doesn't  much  matter;  she  would 
be  sure  to  say  she  wasn't  at  home." 

Sweet,  Element,  no.  70. 

"Someone  told  me  you  went  to  France  with  your 
brother."   "So  I  did."  ib.  no.  73. 

"But  they  told  me  that  Lord  Brock  had  sent  for  him 
yesterday." 

"So  he  did,  and  Harold  was  with  him  backwards  and 
forwards  all  the  day." 

Trollope,  Framley  Parsonage,  p.   170. 


REPETITION   OF   AUXILIARIES  3OI 

b.   "Harriet,  my  dear,  you've  gone  too  far  —  we  had 
no  right  to  pry  into  Mr,  Preston's  private  affairs." 
"No  more  I  had,"  said  Lady  Harriet. 

Gaskell,  Wives  III  p.   134. 
"He  thought  you  had  no  wish  to  see  him." 
"No  more  I  have."       White,  Mr.  John  Strood  ch.  8. 

435.  So  and  no  more  serve  to  connect  the  two  sentences; 
they  are,  natural!}'',  not  used  when  the  two  sentences  are 
quite  independent. 

"He  seems  to  be  a  very  mature  httle  fellow/'  Mr.  H. 
said  to  the  mother. 

"I  think  he  is,  in  some  things,"  she  answered. 

Little  Lord  F.,  p.  30. 
"I  cannot  do  it."     "I  am  sure  you  cannot." 

436.  Both  statements  may  be  by  the  same  person. 

She  fancied,  as  she  passed  on,  that  she  heard  her 
mother  address  him  as  "Fenwick,"  without  the  "Mr."  So 
she  did.         de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  12  p.  107. 

_    .  ,  437.     Another  use  of  the  repetition  of  the  auxili- 

ary  and  subject  is  to  deny  a  preceding  statement. 
In  this  case  no  connecting  so  or  no  more  is  used. 

"And  now  you  are  angry  with  me,"  said  Miss  D. 

"No,  I  am  not." 

"Oh,    but    you  are  .  .  ." 

Trollope,  Framley  Parsonage,  p.  368. 
"One  of  us  has  got  a  sunstroke,"  he  exclaimed. 
"No,"  returned  Cedric,   "we  have  not." 

Little  Lord  F.,  p.   18. 
Cedric    thought    she    had    come    to    buy    some  sugar, 
perhaps^  but  she  had  not.  ib.  p.   13. 

Mrs.  C.  Oh,  I  shall  faint. 

Bertha.  No,  you  won't.  But  Martha  will  very  soon  if 
5he  continues  to  be  fed  at  this  preposterous  rate. 

Van  Doom,  Dramatic  Conversations,  p.  49. 


302  VERBS 

,  X    i^-  •     X-  438.     It  is  hardly  necessary  to  say 

Answers  to  Disjunctive    ,         ,  ...         .       ,  -^        ,  y 

„      ^.  that    the   auxihary   is   also  repeated  in 

Questions  ,  -^,.  .        .        ^      . 

the  answer  to  a  disjunctive  question. 

"Do    you    think    you    could  do  it?"  he  asked  gruffly. 
"I  think  I  could,"  said  Cedric. 

Burnett,  Fauntleroy  p.  Z'j. 
"Do  I  look  a  great  object?" 
"Well,  you  do  rather."         Sweet,  Element,  no.  62. 

„      ^  ,.    ,       439.     Repetition   of  a  preceding  auxiliary  is 
JNew  oUDject     ,  ,  ,      ,  ,.  ,. 

also   used  to  apply  the  preceding  predicate  to 

a  new  subject.     In  the  case  of  positive  sentences  there  is 

an   introductory   so  («);  in  the  case  of  negative  sentences 

we  find  no  more,  neither ^  nor. 

In   this  construction  the  subject  has  end-position  and  is 

naturally    strong-stressed,    whereas    in    all    the   preceding 

constructions    it    is    the    repeated    auxiliary    that    has    the 

strongest  stress. 

"I  feel  as  if  I  had  had  enough  walking  for  one  day." 

"So  do  I."  Sweet,  Element,  no.   "/o, 

"I  am  quite  satisfied,"  said  Juley  quietly, 

"Of  course  you  are,"  Rose  snubbed  her  cousin.  "So 
would  anybody  be."  Meredith,   Harrington  ch.    16. 

"An  earl  is  —  is  a  very  important  person,"  he  began. 

"So  is  a  president!"  put  in  Ceddie. 

Little  Lord  F.,  p.  34. 

As  there  are  anomalies  in  every  history,  so  there  is  a 
history  for  every  anomaly.  Our  constitution  is  full  of 
such,  so  are  our  time-honoured  customs,  our  laws  and 
liturgy,  our  territorial  divisions,  our  language  written  and 
spoken.  Stubbs,  Lectures  p.   i. 

Mrs.  Proudie  was  an  imperious  woman  ;  but  then  so 
also  was  Lady  Lufton.         TroUope,  Framley  P.  ch.  7. 

He  has  no  ground  of  complaint;  neither  have  I. 

Mr.  Asquith,  reported  Times  29/7,   15. 

"I  can't  make  out  how  it  has  come  about."  "No  more 
can  I."  Gaskell,  Wives  III  p.   151. 


TO   BE  303 

"I  will  try  to  speak  to  him  myself  if  you  like,  but  I 
don't  feel  that  much  good  will  come  of  it,"  "No  more 
do  I,  Doctor,  to  say  the   truth." 

Morgan,  Vance  ch.  23. 

Compare  also  the  following  example  without  any  auxiliary. 

"I  never  thought,"  she  exclaimed,  "that  the  Westmin- 
ster House  of  Commons  could  be  so  cheerful."  "Nor  I." 

Cotes,  Cinderella  ch.   11. 

To  Be 

440.  The  verb  to  be,  Hke  the  other  verbs  in  the  first 
two  groups  of  420,  is  to  be  looked  upon  as  an  auxihary 
in  some  of  its  uses  only.  There  is  no  division  of  the 
meanings  of  the  word  into  two  classes,  however,  but  a 
number  of  meanings  that  can  be  arranged  so  as  to  present 
a  scale  leading  from  complete  independence  to  complete 
meaninglessness.  Although  the  detailed  presentation  of 
these  meanings  is  the  domain  of  the  dictionary,  it  will  be 
necessary  here  to  outline  them  so  as  to  make  the  use  of 
to  be  as  a  member  of  various  groups  intelligible. 

441.  To  be  is  used  in  various  meanings  which  differ 
considerably  from  each  other,  but  are  best  understood 
when  we  look  upon  them  as  different  aspects  of  the  fun- 
damental meaning:  to  exist  [a).  When  considered  per- 
fectively  this  leads  to  the  meaning  to  happen  {b).  When 
taken  locally  both  meanings  may  express  something  like 
to  move,  considered  duratively  {c)  or  perfectively  [d). 

a.  Tyrants  and  sycophants  have  been  and  are. 
There  are  photographs  and  photographs.  NED. 

b.  The  flower-show  was  last  week.  NED. 

c.  There  was  a  Russian  girl,  too,  who  was  about  the 
shop  uneasily  on  this  day. 

Walpole,  Fortitude  II  ch.  3  p.   177. 


304  VERBS 

d.  So    long   as  he  was  home  by  six  o'clock  he  could 
spend  the  day  where  he  pleased. 

Walpole,  Fort.  I  ch.  3  p.  26. 
As    we    rode    down-town  Vance  was  thoughtful.    We 
were   nearly   to    the  Criminal  Courts  building  before  he 
spoke.  S.  S.  Van  Dine,  The  Canary  Murder 

Case  ch.   18,  p.   198. 
Have  you  been  to  the   Crystal  Palace?  NED. 

She  had  been  into  every  room  of  the  tiny  house. 

Sovereign  Magaz.  Aug.   1922. 
The  hopeless  sound  of  the  chubby  one's  crying  caused 
Peter  suddenly  to  go  red  hot  somewhere  inside  his  chest, 
and  like  a  bullet  from  a  gun  he  was  into  the  middle  of 
the  circle.  Walpole,  Fort.  I  ch.  5  p.  52. 

442.  It  is  more  difficult  to  define  the  meaning  of  to  he 
when  used  with  an  adverb  or  prepositional  group, 
to  state  where  or  how  a  person  or  thing  is. 

Your  book  is  in  your  study. 

"How    is    Mrs.    Smith?"    —    "Very  well,  thank  you." 

443.  The  verb  has  no  meaning  at  all,  but  serves  a 
:grammatical  function  only  in  sentences  like  the  following, 
when  it  forms  a  group  with  an  adjective,  a  noun  or 
-an  adverb. 

The  work  is  very  satisfactory.    -^ 
He  is  a  clever  workman. 
The  stove  is  out. 

444.  The  distinctions  here  made  are  clearer  and  greater 
than  the  reality:  thus  to  be  and  to  exist  are  not  actual 
synonyms,  although  they  are  sometimes  related  in  meaning. 
The  difference  is  shown  phonetically;  for  to  be  is  often 
weak-stressed  even  when  it  may  be  defined  as  meaning 
"'to  exist'  or  something  like  it. 

(53  W3z  wans  9  :litl  boi;  hij  woznt  a  ;big  :boi,  etc. 
Sweet,  Pr.  of  Spoken  English  p.  48. 


TO  BE  IN  VERBAL  GROUPS  305 

445.  To  be  is  also  used  in  purely  verbal  groups,  with 
a  participle,  an  ing,  or  with  a  stem  with  to. 

The  construction  with  a  participle  must  be  distinguished 
according  as  the  verb  is  transitive  or  intransitive.  The 
latter  construction  will  be  treated  in  the  sections  on  to 
have  with  the  participle  of  intransitive  verbs  because  it 
can  best  be  treated  by  comparing  it  with  the  similar  use 
of  to  have. 

We  shall  here  treat  of  the  other  three  constructions. 

446.  It  has  been  shown  (56  ff.)  that  the  participles  of 
transitive  verbs  can  form  a  close  group  with  verbs  of 
little  independent  meaning  to  express  an  occurrence  or  an 
action.  The  most  important  verb  giving  rise  to  such  a 
purely  verbal  group  is  to  be.  It  is  usual  to  call  this  verbal 
group  the  passive.  The  traditional  term  may  be  useful  as 
long  as  it  is  understood  that  it  is  not  identical  with  the 
passive  of  such  languages  as  Latin  or  Sanskrit,  and  that 
the  term  is  only  applied  to  the  verbal  group  when  it 
expresses  an  occurrence  or  an  action.  Thus,  we  have  a 
group-passive  in  The  book  is  sold  for  /  s.,  but  when  a 
second-hand  bookseller  informs  a  would-be  purchaser  that 
a  book  in  the  cattilogue  is  sold,  the  group  expresses  a 
state  or  condition  and  is  not  a  passive.  It  is  a  curious  and 
naturally  accidental  result  of  this  that  the  same  verbal  group 
comes  to  express  two  opposite,  and  mutually  exclusive, 
meanings.  The  three  sentences  that  follow  also  illustrate 
the  participle  expressing  a  state,  not  as  a  member  of  a 
^roup-passive. 

King  Constantine  is  given  not  more  than  48  hours  in 
which  to  reply.  Times  W.    12/1,    191 7. 

Constance    and    he    were    not  estranged,  but  the  rela- 
tions between  them  were  in  a  state  of  feverish  excitation. 
Bennett,   Old  Wives  Tale  II  ch.  5  §  3  p.  226. 
Kruisinga,  Handbook  II.  Accidence  and  Syntax.  1.  20 


306  VERBS 

In  Mr.  Nevinson's  war  pictures,  now  to  be  seen  at 
the  Leicester  Gallery,  there  is  expressed  a  modern  sense 
of  war  as  an  abnormal  occupation. 

Times  Lit.  5/10,   16. 

In  the  first  of  these  sentences  the  change  into  has  been 
^zWw  would  produce  a  passive.  A  comparison  with  languages 
which  distinguish  the  two  meanings  formally  would  be 
instructive;  Dutch  and  German  would  both  serve  this  end. 

447.  The  group-passive  is  possible  with  verbs  that  can 
take  a  noun-object  (or  pronoun-object)  in  the  first  place. 
But  it  is  not  limited  to  these,  and  is  also  found  of  verbs 
that  take  other  kinds  of  complements.  We  can  distinguish: 

(1)  verbs    that   can   take  an  object  with  stem  (plain  or 
with  to). 

(2)  verbs  that  can  take  an  object  with  ing. 

(3)  verbs  with  a  complementary  stem  with  to. 

(4)  verbs  with  an  object  clause. 

The  classification  just  made  should  not  lead  the  reader 
to  imagine  that  the  group-passive  is  a  kind  of  derivative 
form  from  the  constructions  that  have  been  mentioned. 
We  shall  see  that  the  passive  is  sometimes  freely  used 
when  a  corresponding  'active'  form  does  not  exist,  and 
other  cases  when  the  corresponding  active  is  purely  literary. 
The  quotations  in  the  following  sections  will  be  partly 
arranged  so  as  to  distinguish  the  cases  when  the  group- 
passive  expresses  an  occurrence  {a)  from  those  when  it 
denotes  an  action  {b). 

448.  Verbs  that  can  be  construed  with  a  noun-  or 
pronoun-object  are  called  transitive.  We  may  distinguish 
the  following  varieties: 

1.  with  one  plain  object. 

2.  with  one  prepositional  object. 

3.  with  two  plain  objects. 


PASSIVE  307 

4.  with  one  plain  object  and  a  prepositional  group. 

5.  with  one  plain  object  and  a  predicative  adjunct. 

r.      «u.    X       449.     Verbs   construed   with  a  noun-  or  pro- 
One  Object  ,  .  ,  ,    •       ,  •        4^,  • 
noun-object    can    be    used   in   the  passive.   Ihis 

may  be  called  the  direct  passive;  see  461. 

a.  Violets  and  T^xivaxos&s  have  beeit  gathered 'Ca\'s>Q\\x'\s,\.- 
mas  at  Barcombe,  Mills,  Sussex.       Times  W,  5/1,  17. 

She  spoke  rapidly,  looking  about  the  room  and  seldom 
hearing  what  was  said  to  her, 

Hichens,  Ambition  ch.  7,  p.  71. 
If  anyone  who  was  present  at  the  wedding  was  still 
constructing  theories  about  his  identity  i)  —  whether 
he  had  divorced  his  wife,  was  divorced  himself  or  was 
dead  —  certainly  none  of  those  theories  connected  them- 
selves with  the  present  bridegroom. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  16  p.  156. 

b.  At  this  time  of  day  it  all  seems  ancient  and  distant 
enough ;  the  book  has  been  praised,  blamed,  lifted  up, 
hurled  down  a  thousand  times,  and  has  finally  been 
discovered  to  be  a  book  of  promise,  of  natural  talent, 
with  a  great  deal  of  crudity  and  melodrama  and  a  little 
beauty.  Walpole,  Fortitude  III  r.h.  2  p.  245. 

450.  The  distinction  between  the  passive  of  occurrence 
and  of  action  does  not  prevent  the  construction  from 
being  used  in  both  meanings  in  the  same  sentence.  This 
shows  that  the  distinction,  though  doubtless  real,  is  of 
no  importance  for  the  structure  of  the  sentence. 

The  youngsters  were  stretching  themselves  with  repletion 
before  the  dishes  had  been  emptied  (a).  Thanks  were  offered 
(b)  and  then  my  friend  of  the  spectacles  got  up  on  two 
forms  to  deliver  an  address.  Hall  Caine,  Drink. 

In  the  last  example  of  the  preceding  section  the  group 
has  been  discovered  illustrates  case  a. 


4)  i.  e.  the  identity  of  the  bride's  first  husband. 


308  VERBS 

451.  We  have  essentially  the  same  construction  with 
the  introductory  there.  It  is  found  when  the  subject  is  so 
weighty  that  it  has  end-position.  The  construction  generally 
expresses  an  occurrence. 

a.  On  January  i,  1847,  there  was  published  in  a 
yellow  wrapper,  now  famous,  the  first  number  of  Vanity 
Fair.  Whibley,  Thackeray  p.  90. 

There  has  just  been  published  as  a  Parliamentary 
paper  the  Convention  between  this  country  and  the 
United  States  respecting  the  Protection,  Preservation 
and  Propagation  of  Food  Fishes  in  the  Waters  contiguous 
to  the  United  States  and  Canada. 

Athen.   11/6,   1908. 

A  turn  in  the  road,  and  there  is  wafted  to  me  a 
faint  perfume,  that  of  meadow-sweet. 

Gissing,  Henry  Ryecroft. 

On  the  death  of  an  acquaintance,  more  his  friend  than 
he  imagined,  the  wayworn  man  of  letters  learnt  with 
astonishment,  that  there  was  bequeathed  to  him  a  life 
annuity  of  three  hundred  pounds.  ib.  Preface. 

b.  From  the  Norwegian,  Danish,  and  Icelandic  histo- 
rians, and  from  some  parts  of  the  old  Northern  poetry, 
there  may  be  formed  a  different  idea  about  the  character 
and  domestic  manners  of  the  men  who  made  themselves 
so  unpleasant  in  their  visits  to  the  English  and  neigh- 
bouring coast.  Ker,  Mediaeval  English  Lit. 

452.  The  construction  with  the  introductory  there  is 
also  used  to  give  the  subject  mid-position,  between  the 
verb  and  the  participle.  The  result  is  that  noun  and  verb 
(participle)  remain  a  closely  connected  group  which  serves 
as  a  predicate  expressing  an  occurrence;  the  noun  is  so 
closely  incorporated  with  the  verb  that  the  latter  may  be 
best  interpreted  as  used  intransitively.     See  490. 

There  was  very  little  tea  eaten  that  evening. 

Montgomery,  Misunderstood. 


PASSIVE  309 

And  still  there  had  been  hardly  a  word  spoken  between 
him  and  Lily.        Trollope,  Last  Chron.  ch.  45  II  p.  13. 
There  were  nine    V.   C.'s  gained  in  that  one  fight. 

Times  Lit.   14/9,   16. 
There  was  no  hockey  played  within  the  precincts. 

Wells,  Harman  ch.  4  §  2  p.  75. 
There    is   a  great   deal  of  nonsense  talked  about  this 
matter  in  England  and  other  countries. 

Times  Lit.  21/12,    17. 

453.  We  have  probably  the  same  construction  in  the 
following  sentence,  although  the  participle  might  be  inter- 
preted  as    an   attributive  adjunct,  parallel  to  of  earlier  date. 

M.  le  Maistre  remarks  that  it  was  St.  Louis's  bene- 
volence which  prom^pted  the  lords  to  free  them ;  there 
are  in  fact  a  large  number  of  manumissions  given  in  his 
reign :  but  there  are  also  some  of  earlier  date. 

Coulton,  Medieval  Village  ch.   13  p.  161. 

454.  When  the  object-character  of  the  adjunct  to  the 
active  verb  is  not  perfectly  clear,  or  when  the  construction 
is  not  usual,  in  other  words  when  the  verb  is  not  clearly 
transitive,  the  passive  construction  is  apt  to  produce  the 
impression  of  being  somewhat  peculiar. 

a.  Gay,  who  spent  most  of  his  time  with  the  Queens- 
berrys,  faded  out  when  Pope  was  little  more  than  forty, 
and  ivas  survived  but  three  years  by  the  beloved 
Arbuthnot.  Times  Lit.  21/8,   19. 

'What  I  meant  to  tell  you  was  only  this .  . .  that 
nobody  has  got  me  yet  as  a  sweetheart,  instead  of  my 
having  a  dozen  as  my  aunt  said ;  I  hate  to  be  thought 
men's  property  in  that  way,  though  possibly  I  shall  be  had 
some  day.  Hardy,  Madding  Crowd  ch.  4  p.  32. 

b.  Should  he  try  to  repeat  his  offence,  he  will  be  stood 
in    the    corner    and   compelled   to  wear  tartan  pyjamas. 

Punch. 

But  he  (i.  e.  an  M.  P.)  has  not  only  himself  to  cater 
for.  There  are  visitors,  especially  those  who  come  from 


310  VERBS 

a  distance,  to  whom  tea  on  the  Terrace  is  almost  essential. 
There  are  others  who  must  be  dined  or  who  require  to 
be  offered  coffee  or  other  refreshments. 

J.  M.  Hogge,  M.  P.  in  Daily  Mail. 
He    was    sitting    in    the    one  sitting-room  on  the  left 
side  of  the  passage  as  the  house  was  entered. 

Trollope,  Last  Chron.  ch.  4  p.  26. 
Once    or    twice    he    stayed    to   dinner,    and   the   long 
dining-room    with    the   sea-grey  wall-paper  and  curtains 
of  the   strawberry-thief  design  was  always  entered  with 
a  particular  contentment  of  spirit. 

Mackenzie,  Guy  and  Pauline  p.  55. 
Though    personality    pervades    style    and    cannot    be 
escaped,    the     first    sin    against    style    as    against    good 
manners  is  to  obtrude  or  exploit  personality. 

Sir  A.  Q.-Couch,  Art  of  Writing. 
Men's  hearts  had  not  changed,  but  they  had  learned, 
through    the    events    of   that    awful    year,    to  submit  as 
cheerfully    as    might    be    to    the  doom  v/hich  could  not 
be  escaped.  Freeman,  Herrig-Forster,  Brit. 

Authors  II  p.  604/1. 

455.  It  may  be  doubtful  whether  we  have  a  passive  or 
a  participle  expressing  a  state  in  the  following  sentence.  The 
present  writer  prefers  the  latter  interpretation, 

.  . .  yet  there  was  in  his  attitude  just  as  much  incre- 
dulity mingled  with  disdain  of  useless  learning  as  would 
preserve  his  dignity  without  jeopardizing  the  financial 
compliment  his  services  were  owed. 

Mackenzie,  Guy  and  Pauline  p.  9. 

456.  For  the  reason  given  in  454,  cognate  objects  are 
infrequently  found  as  subjects  of  a  passive  construction,  espe- 
cially when  verb  and  cognate  object  are  the  same  word. 
Both  of  the  following  examples  express  an  activity,  not  an 
occurrence. 

Enough  that  peaceful  lives  had  been  lived  there; 
children  had  been  born  .  .  . 

Benson,  Thread  of  Gold,  p.  31. 


PASSIVE  3  1 1 

Or  if  we  wish,  not  for  problems  of  any  kind,  but  just  for 
a  picture  of  life  as  it  was  lived  a  hundred  and  fifty  years 
ago,  there  is  nothing  like  Boswell's  pages.  Bailey,  Johnson. 

457.  When  a  verb  forms  a  close  group  with  an  accom- 
panying noun  there  is  generally  no  passive  at  all.  Such 
groups  are  to  feel  panic,  to  give  a  glance,  etc.;  see  the  chapter 
on  the  Simple  Sejitence  in  volume  3. 

Occasionally  a  noun  that  has  the  character  of  an  adverb 
adjunct  rather  than  of  an  object  can  be  made  the  subject  of 
a  group-passive. 

Knitted  woollen  goods  for  outer  wear  are  much  wanted, 
and  overtime  is  still  being  worked  in  this  section. 

Times  Trade  &  Eng.  S.   1930. 

Verbs    that    can    be    construed   with  a 


Prepositional  .....  ,  ,  •      , 

„. ,    ^       prepositional  obiect  can  be  used  in  the  passive 
Object  -Y.  .    ,      ,  .      ^ 

with  the  noun  as  a  grammatical  subject. 

a.  As  Pansy  was  driven  home,  feeling  under  herself 
for  the  first  time  the  elasticity  of  a  perfect  carriage,  she 
experimented  with  her  posture.  "The  carriage  is  not  to 
be  sat  in  in  the  usual  way,"  she  said. 

J.  L.  Allen,  Mettle  of  the  Pasture,  p.  278. 
Meanwhile  the  press-cutting  agency  to  which  he  sub- 
scribed kept  him  well-informed  as  to  how  his  speeches  were 
written  about  in  Tory,  Liberal  and  Socialist  newspapers 
from  Aberdeen  to  South  Wales. 

Patterson,  Compton  p.   313. 

b.  The  doctor  was  sent  for.  The  bed  has  been  rolled  on. 
The    carpet    has   been  trodden  on.  The  proposal  was 

approved  of. 

Every  man  likes  to  flirt  with  a  pretty  girl,  and  every 
pretty  girl  likes  to  be  flirted  with. 

The  beginnings  of  Hungarian  speech  must  be  sought 
for  in  the  language  itself.  Athenaeum, 

Her  room  was  empty,  the  bed  had  not  been  slept  in; 
the  window  was  open,  and  the  bird  had  flown. 

W.  Irving,  Sketch-Book. 


312  VERBS 

For  Knossos  was  lived  in  from  Stone  Age  days. 

Burrows,  Discoveries  in  Crete,  p.  6. 

The  scene  of  their  exploits  was  arrived  at  by  way  of 
Gibraltar.  Athenaeum. 

Now,  to  be  properly  enjoyed,  a  walking-tour  should 
be  gone  upon  alone.  R.  L.  Stevenson. 

A  sick  man  had  been  prayed  for  twice  daily  in  his 
cathedral  during  several  weeks.        Hole,  Mem.  p.  147. 

And  then  Edward  Clayton  had  to  be  explained  to 
and  Joey  and  I  only  just  got  in  time  for  dinner. 

Vance  ch.   10. 

When  Dolly  had  been  kissed  and  whispered  to  they 
gave  Peter  to  his  father  to  hold. 

Wells,  Joan  and  Peter  ch.   i. 

"So  an  adversary  may  be  reckoned  with,  a.  book  quoted 
from,  a  house  Iwed  in,  a  divinity  sworn  by,  a  man  rim 
through,  or  run  over,  i)  or  stared  at,  or  despaired  of,  or 
talked  about,  or  looked  after.  A  doctrine  may  be  fought 
against.  An  argument  may  be  insisted  on,  or  lost  sight  of, 
and  in  newspaper  English  an  opportunity  may  be  availedof. 
Not  all  sorts  of  such  combinations  can  be  made,  for 
nothing  is  so  freakish  as  language  in  new  formations 
by  analogy,  but  many  have  become  good  English,  and 
the  number  is  increasing." 

Greenough  and  Kittredge,  Words  and 
their  Ways  p.   190  f. 

So  it  didn't  matter  much  that  his  mother  counter- 
manded his  proposal  that  bed  should  be  gone  to,  on  the 
ground  that  it  was  so  late  now  that  she  wouldn't  be 
able  to  sleep  a  wink. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  28  p.  306. 

And  now  a  fresh  succession  of  struggles  (viz.  between 
a  young  cuckoo  and  a  young  robin  in  the  same  nest) 
began,  the  whole  process  being  just  the  same  as  when 
the  Q.^^  was  struggled  with. 

Hudson,  Hampshire  Days  ch.   1   p.   19. 


1)  In  to  run  over,  and  probably  in  to  run  through  we  must  rather  look 
upon  over  and  through  as  adverbs.     See  460. 


PASSIVE  313 

459.     In   the  following  passives  of  activity  the  agent  is 
expressed  by  an  adjunct  with  by. 

The  scientific  tactics  and  economic  use  of  forces,  of 
which  the  battle  of  Trafalgar  is  a  supreme  example,  are 
not  so  easily  come  by,  and  were  achieved  by  Nelson 
after  years  of  thought,  and  work,  and  discussion. 

Athenaeum. 

This  unconquered  country  was  the  Welsh  kingdom  of 
Strathclyde,  and  was  dwelt  in  by  the  Celtic  race. 

Stopford  Brooke,  Pr.  Eng.  Lit.  p.  61. 


The  verbs  that  form  a  compound  with  an  adverb 
can  be  used  in  the  same  wa}^ 

This  practice  has  long  been  done  away  with. 
The  tragedy  is  led  up  to  by  a  pathetic  love-story. 
I  imagined  the  questions  that  would  be  asked  me,  and 
was    considering    the    proper   answers  to  make  to  them, 
when  my  morbid  dreams  were  suddenly  broken  in  on  by 
Martha  Rod.  Walter  de  la  Mare,  Riddle  p.  29. 

T       i^,  •    L        461.     Verbs   construed   v^^ith  two  objects  can 
Two  Objects  „     ,  .  .  .  , 

generally  have  two  passive  constructions,  either 

object    being    possible    as    the    grammatical    subject    of  a 

group-passive,    which    is    accordingly    called  the  direct  or 

the    indirect   passive  (449).     When    the  personal  object  of 

the    active   is  the  grammatical  subject  of  a  passive  group 

it  must   be  accompanied  by  its  'direct  object.'     It  will  be 

shown    below   that  it   is  not  really  the  verb  alone  that  is 

used    in   the  participle  construction,  but  the  verb  with  its 

direct   object,   which   form  an  inseparable  semantic  group. 

For  the  noun  in  such  a  passive  the  name  'retained  object' 

has  been  proposed  by  Sweet  ^). 


1)  In  the  direct  passive  the  indirect  object  can  be  retained  if  it  is  a  personal 
pronoun ;  in  the  case  of  nouns  a  construction  with  to  is  substituted.  Observe 
that  the  direct  passive  is  also  possible  without  mentioning  the  person  in- 
directly affected. 


J 14  VERBS 

It  has  seemed  more  practical  in  this  section  to  arrange 
the  examples  without  considering  the  distinction  of  the 
passive  of  occurrence  and  of  activity,  and  to  give  examples 
of  retained  objects  in  the  form  of  nouns  only  and  of  those 
pronouns  that  do  not  distinguish  a  nominative  and  an 
•oblique  form. 

The    Lord    Mayor    was    accorded   a  mixed  reception. 

Times  W. 
A   part   of  the   glebe  was  grazed  in  common  by  the 
villagers,  who  were  advanced  money  for  the  purchase  of 
cows,    and    strips    were   personally    reserved    for  laying 
down-  the  hay.  Spectator  14/1,   1928. 

The  Countess  gave  him  the  recognition  that  is  occa- 
sionally afforded  the  family  tutor. 

Meredith,  Harrington  ch.  46  p.  463. 
India  is  allotted  real  representation  at  that  Conference. 

Times  W.  5/1,   17. 
By  the  first  Morrill  Act,   1862,  lands  were  allotted  to 
the  several  States.  Times  Ed.  S.  9/9,  20. 

As    a    critic   Johnson    must   be   allowed   a  high  place, 

Mair,  Eng.  Lit.  p.   143. 
This  opportunity  has  not  yet  been  allowed  them. 

Times  W.  20/2,   14. 
More  space  was  necessary,  and  the  sea-green  dining- 
room  was  awarded  shelves.         Sinister  Street  p.  'J'J'] . 

If  you  are  asked  the  question.  What  is  religion?  you 
may  answer  in  terms  hostile  or  friendly  to  religion  itself; 
you    can    hardly    answer    in   terms   that   are  indifferent. 

Times  Lit.  22/7,  20. 
The  end  of  the  struggle  is  nearly  always  that  the  public 
is  conceded  everything.  Times  Lit.  27/11,   14. 

Well,  we  guess,  that  she  wants  some  independent  part 
in  life  which  she  can  herself  play,  and  she  takes  that 
part    on   the    stage,    because   she  is  denied  it  elsewhere. 

Athenaeum,  8/2,   13  p.   173/2. 
Has    there    ever   been    a  time  when  Greek  poetry  or 
•Greek  sculpture  has  been  denied  its  glory? 

Bailey,  Question  of  Taste  p.   11. 


PASSIVE  3  I  5 

Details  that  the  sceptic  would  fasten  on  are  denied  him. 

Times  Lit.    19/10,    16. 
Annette    was    brought    home    from    Edinburgh    at  the 
end  of  the  term  and  was  found  a  situation  with  an  iron- 
master's family  named  Fender. 

Gilbert  Cannan,  Round  the  Corner,  p.  6$. 
His  failing  health  showed  itself  before  the  end  of  the 
novel,  but  had  the  latter  half  equalled  the  first,  .  .  .  then 
the  book  could  not  have  been  gainsaid  its  rightful  place 
in  the  very  front  rank  of  the  novels. 

Conan  Doyle,  Magic  Door,  p.   35  f. 
Since  prosperity  came  upon  the  younger  brother,  and 
Amos    had    been  given  a   stool  in  the  office,  the  former 
had    insisted    on    Amos's    living    with    him  in  first-class 
lodgings.  Patterson,  Stephen  Compton,  p.  92. 

The  Sixth  Form  was  not  only  excused  from  chastise- 
ment ;  it  was  given  the  right  to  chastise.  The  younger 
children,  scourged  both  by  Dr.  Arnold  and  by  the  elder 
children,  were  given  every  opportunity  of  acquiring  the 
simplicity,  sobriety,  and  humbleness  of  mind,  which  are 
the  best  ornaments  of  youth. 

Lytton  Strachey,  Em.  Vict.  p.   186. 
The  Act  did  not  create   a  single  unit.     It  did  not  do 
what  Lord  Durham  recommended.  His  scheme  was  never 
given  a  chance.  Times  Lit.  2/10,   19. 

This  book  was  given  me  in  1885,  on  the  occasion  of 
my  marriage,  by  Frank  and  Margaret  Pattison. 

Prof.  Bywater. 
Some    have    done   bravely   and    well  the    work  which 
was  given  them  to  do.  Hole,  Mem.  p.   174. 

He  was  also  granted  a  monopoly  of  the  news. 

Camb.  Hist.  Eng.  Lit.  IX,  2. 
To    the    first    two    or    three   states  admitted  after  the 
adoption  of  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States  several 
hundred    thousand    acres    were    granted  by  special  Act. 

Times  Ed.  S.  9/9,  20. 
In  both  islands  they  (i.  e.  the  Moors)  were  guaranteed 
the  use  of  their  native  customs  and  religion. 

Davis,  Med.  Europe  p.   195. 


3  1 6  VERBS 

Michael    was    handed    a    thin    sky-blue  book  labelled 
Office  of  the  B.    V.  M.  Sinister  Street  p.  224. 

Well,  X  was  left  a  legacy. 

G.  Street,  Eng.  Rev.  Aug.   1913. 
She   does    not   comprehend   the  joys  of  scholarship  in 
her  employment  of  Latinisms.  It  will  be  pardoned  to  her 
by   those   who    perceive   the  profound  piece  of  feminine 
discernment  which  precedes  it. 

Meredith,  Harrington,  ch.  27  p.  288. 
Annette    came    up,    kissed    Serge,    and  was  promised 
her  finished  portrait  for  a  wedding-present. 

Cannan,  Corner,  p.  255. 
Mrs.    Despard    was    refused    a    hearing  at  a  suffragist 
meeting    at    Thornton    Heath    Public    Hall  on  Saturday 
evening.  Times,  Weekly  ed.  Febr.  28,   191 3, 

p.    176/3.^ 
They  ask  for  £  2  and  also  for  an  additional  war  bonus 
of  1 2 1/2  per  cent;  and  we  do  not  see  how  it  can  be  re- 
fused them  at  this  time  of  day.        Times  31/8,   1918. 

The    parochial    historian    will    find    that   he  has  been 
saved  weeks  of  labour.  Times  Lit.   19/10,    16. 

All  this  unnecessary  labour  would  be  saved  to  them. 

Jerome,  Three  Men  on  the  Bummel. 
Then  he  followed  the  squire  down  to  the  churchyard, 
and    was   shown    the  church  as  well  as  the  view  of  the 
house.  Trollope,  Last  Chron.  ch.  28,  p.  253. 

That    unnatural    and    barely    imaginable    we    and  the 
world  have  been  spared.  Observer,   5/2,   22. 

I  was    spared    the    deep    anxieties   of  a  married  man. 

Wells,  Country  p.    161. 
"However,"  she  went  on,  "all  that  is  not  worth  dwelling 
on.     My  boy  was  spared  to  me." 

W.  B.  Maxwell,  Gabrielle  p.   112. 
All    this    is    taught   to  every  school-child  in  Holland. 

Graphic,  23/3,   1907. 
We  are  told  their  folktales    and  songs. 

Times  Lit.  3/12,   14. 
The  sad  tidings  were  not  told  to  Grace  till  the  evening. 
Trollope,  Last  Chron.  ch.  9  p.  75. 


PASSIVE  317 

There  are  traces  of  the  'British  War'  which  filled  the 
earlier  years  of  Commodus,  and  for  which  he  was  most 
undeservedly  voted  the  title  of  Britannicus  by  the  sub- 
servient senate.  Oman,  Conquest  p.   125. 

462.  When  the  retained  object  is  a  personal  pronoun  of 
the  first  or  third  person  the  oblique  forms  are  used,  as  in 
any  other  object.  Both  of  the  following  quotations  illustrate 
the  passive  of  activity. 

M.  Bordeaux  has  done  his  best  to  explain  the  man 
and  his  writings  to  us.  We  are  shown  him  as  a  devoted 
son,  as  student,  professor,  lecturer. 

Times  Lit.   2/9,   20. 
But  now  it  is  generally  admitted  that  boys  do  not  pick 
up  things  unless  they  are  taught  them  i). 

Benson  in  Journal  of  English  Studies  I,   152. 

463.  The  equality  of  the  retained  object  to  the  direct 
object  is  shown  by  the  groups  in  the  following  sentences. 
The  last  two  may  prove  at  the  same  time  that  the  grammatical 
subject  that  corresponds  to  an  indirect  object  in  the  active 
construction  is  in  every  way  a  subject  like  the  one  cor- 
responding to  the  direct  object.  The  first  and  last  example 
illustrate  the  passive  of  activity,  the  second  is  a  passive  of 
occurrence,  unless  it  is  interpreted  as  an  example  of  a  parti- 
ciple expressing  condition,  not  a  passive  at  all. 

The  result  was  that  Steve  was  offered  and  took  the 
leadership.  Patterson,  Compton  p.  203. 

Saving    a    certain   technical  excellence,  both  they  and 
their  works  are  owed  only  the  scantiest  reverence. 
James  Stephens  in  Eng.  Rev.  April   1914,  p.   84. 
Most    servants    and     workers    were    slaves    who    were 
paid  not  money  but  in  kind. 

Wells,  Short  History  p.   100. 

■1)  The  subject  they  must  be  taken  to  refer  to  the  boys. 


3l8  VERBS 

464.  Some  verbs,  especially  those  that  are  only  occasion- 
ally used  with  two  objects,  nearly  exclusively  make  the 
direct  object  the  subject  of  a  passive  construction.  Such  are 
to  bring,  do,  pass,  send,  write.  All  the  passives  in  the  fol- 
lowing sentences  express  activity. 

The  book  was  brought  to  him. 

Kind    messages    were    sent    me    by  (Turkish)  women 
who  would  have  perished  rather  than  be  seen  of  me. 
M.  Pickthall,  quoted  Athenaeum,  28/3,  p.  442/3. 
They   are   sensible    of  the    good   or   evil  that  is  done 
them.  Times  Lit.  25/5,  22. 

But  what  harm  has  been  done  you.? 

Trollope,  Last  Chron.  ch,  58. 
A  letter  must  be  written  to  the  inspector. 

„   ,        .^.         ,  .  465.     When   verbs  are  construed  w^ith 

Verbs  with  a  plain  ,          ,  .             , 

^.    ^       ,  a  plain   obiect   and   a    noun    or    pronoun 

object  and  a  pre-  .\             -^     .  .        ,                           ,,     , 

,     ,.      ^  with  a  preposition  they  can  srenerallv  be 

positional  adjunct  ,.^,              .           ,,            ,-, 
used   m  the  passive  only  by  making  the 

plain    object   the    subject,    even    though   the   prepositional 

group    often    has   the   character   of  a  prepositional  object^ 

as  in  the  case  of  dedicate  to,  send  for,  devote  to. 

a.  His  life  was  devoted  to  the  abolition  of  slavery, 

b.  He  dedicated  the  book         The  book  was  dedicated 
to  his  father.  by  him  to  his  father. 

We  sent  the  servant  for         The  servant  was  sent  for 
the  doctor.  the  doctor. 

He  aimed  the  chestnut  at         The  chestnut  was  aimed 
me.  at  me. 

For  further  details  the  reader  is  referred  to  the  notes 
at  the  end  of  the  book. 

His   question    was   asked  of  his  wife  as  he  came  into 
her  bedroom  on  his  return. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  38  p,  414. 

466.  Sometimes  a  verb  with  a  plain  object  followed 
by  a  prepositional  group  forms  a  semantic  unit,  e.  g.  tO' 


PASSIVE  319 

pay  attention  to,  to  take  care  of,  to  lose  sight  of-  In  this 
case  the  noun  in  the  prepositional  group  can  also  be  the 
subject  of  a  passive  construction. 

These  group-compounds  are  also  phonetically  dis- 
tinguished from  other  verbs  with  an  object  and  a  pre- 
positional group,  for  the  verb  is  subordinated  in  stress  to 
the  noun:  to  ^pay  attention  to,  to  fose  ^sight  of,  to  ^set 
fire  to.  See  also  the  sections  on  the  absence  of  the  Article. 

a.  And    my  gentleman  had  baffled  him,  he  could  not 
quite  tell  how;  but  he  had  been  got  the  better  of. 

Meredith,  Harrington  ch.  6  p.   54, 
Unfortunately,  works  of  fine  reticence  and  quality  are 
apt    to    be    smothered    and  lost  sight  of  in  the  popular 
stream.  Nation,   12/7,   13. 

b.  When  the  powder  in  the  barrel  of  a  gun  is  set  fire 
to,  it  explodes,  and  drives  out  the  bullet  with  great  force. 

Sweet,  Element,  p.  64. 
Substantially    the    possibility    of  trying    press  offences- 
by  special  tribunals  was  put  an  end  to  by  the  abolition 
of  the  Star  Chamber  in   1641. 

Dicey,  Const.  Lect.  VI  p.  265. 
I    was   a  good  deal  taken  notice  of  by  Mrs.  Bretton. 

Bronte,  Viliette  ch,    i. 
There  he  was  taken  care  of  at  once  by  Beatrice. 

Sidgwick,  Severins  p.   34. 
Other  forms  of  the  dance  are  had  recourse  to  on  special 
occasions,  and  there  are  also  various  kinds  of  dance  plays. 
Henderson,  The  Ballad  in  Lit.  p.    5. 
If  it    wasn't    for  papa,  Julius  Bradshaw  would  simply 
be  said  not-at-home  to,  and,  have  to  leave  a  card  and  go. 
de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.   18  p.   176. 

467.  In  the  verbal  groups  of  the  preceding  section  the 
prepositional  noun  is  really  an  object  to  the  group  formed 
by  the  verb  with  what  looks  like  an  object ;  in  other  words,. 
the  construction  is  essentially  identical  with  the  case  treated, 
in  458. 


320  VERBS 

It  follows  that  when  the  phonetic  unity  of  these  groups 
is  broken  by  adjuncts  to  the  noun-object,  the  noun  in  the 
prepositional  group  is  generally  not  used  as  the  subject  of  a 
passive  construction,  unless  the  adjunct  to  the  noun  is  very 
general  (such  as  no,  aiiy).  The  passives  in  the  following 
examples  express  activity. 

It  asserted  a  principle  which  might  be  appealed  to 
in  future  debates  in  the  House  of  Commons,  but  it 
asserted  no  principle  which  could  be  taken  any  notice 
of  by  a  Judge  in  any  Court  of  Law. 

Freeman,  Growth  p.   155. 

On  p.  10  we  have  the  sentences  He  would  be  made  an 
end  of,  This  must  be  kept  tight  hold  of.  These,  although 
allowable  in  conversation,  would  be  monstrosities  in 
literature.      H.  T.  Price,  Beiblatt  zur  Anglia  24,   156. 


The  construction  is  quite  exceptional  when  the  group 
has  no  phonetic  or  semantic  unity  at  all. 

I  ought  to  note  that  even  before  he  went  to  the  Uni- 
versity he  had  already  achieved  a  certain  amount  of 
publication,  and  was  predicted  great  things  of  by  a  small 
circle  of  admirers.  Morgan,  Vance  ch.  18  p.  178. 

Wee  Willie  Winkie  had  once  been  read  to,  out  of  a 
big,    blue    book,    the    history    of   the    Prince  of  Goblins. 

Kipling. 

The  unusual  effect  of  the  construction  in  the  last  sentence 
is  due  to  the  position  of  the  object  at  the  end;  not,  as  in 
the  other  cases,  immediately  after  the  verb,  so  that  it  can 
at  least  formally  constitute  a  group  with  it.  As  in  467  the 
passives  all  express  activity. 

469.  If  the  object  in  a  group-compound  can  be  separated 
from  its  verb  by  an  adjective  (which  proves  that  it  does 
not  form  an  indivisible  whole  with  the  verb),  the  object 
can  sometimes  also  be  the  subject  of  a  passive  sentence, 
according  to  465. 


PASSIVE  321 

Such  verbal  phrases  are  to  take  care  of,  to  pay  attention 
io,  for  we  can  say  to  take  good  care  of,  to  pay  careful 
attention  to.  But  a  double  construction  is  not  possible 
for  to  lose  sight  of;  hardly  for  to  keep  hold  of  (see  467). 

a.  No  attention  was  paid  to  my  words. 

b.  In  the  account  of  its  mineral  riches  mention  might 
have  been  made  of  the  theory,  largely  accepted  by  men 
of  science,  that  the  age  of  iron  began  in  Noricum. 

Athenaeum. 

So    much    has    recently    been   said  about  jay-walking 

and  the  particular  circumstances  of  the  road,  that  sight 

seems    almost    to   have  been  lost  of  the  elementary  fact 

that    the   one    great   danger    factor  is  just  simply  speed. 

Letter  to  the  Editor,  Nation  25/1,   1930. 

„   ^       .,,         „. .    ^      470.     When  a  verb  is  construed  with 
Verbs  with  an  Object         ,  .  .  .       ,      ,  .  , 

,  ^    ,.    ^.  a    plain    or    prepositional   object   and  a 

and  Predicative  ^..      .        ^,.  ,  •  •  , 

-,.  predicative    adjunct    the    participle    can 

also  become  a  member  of  a  group- 
passive,  with  the  noun  of  the  object  as  a  grammatical 
subject. 

Then  the  great  organ  pealed  out  again,  the  Marshal 
bade  the  heralds  proclaim  me,  and  Rudolf  the  Fifth  was 
crowned  king,  of  which  imposing  ceremony  an  excellent 
picture  hangs  now  in  my  dining-room.   Hope,  Zenda. 

I  won't  be  called  a  fool  by  you. 

He  was  foimd  very  ill. 

It  is  possible  for  this  construction  to  occur  with  a  verb 
that  can  take  two  objects,  as  in  the  first  example  of  462. 

\i   u     -it.      Au-    X       471.     Closely  related  to  the  construction 
Verbswith  an  Object  .      ,  ,.  ...  .  , 

J  .  ox         in  the  preceding  section  is  the  use  01  the 

and  ing  or  Stem  ,•      •  ■  •   ,        r        ^        , 

. .  .  predicative    participle    01   verbs   that  can 

take  an  object  with  ing  or  an  object  with 

stem   with   to.     These    kind    of   constructions    have    been 

treated  when  dealing  with  the  ing  (113)  and  with  the  stem 

Kruisinga,  Handbook  II.  Accidence  and  Syntax,  1,  2i 


322  VERBS 

with  to  (290),  as  it  seemed  more  convenient  not  to  separate 
them  from  the  other  constructions  with  these  verbal  forms. 
It  is  sufficient,  therefore,  simply  to  refer  to  these  sections 
here,  reminding  the  reader  of  the  constructions  by  quoting 
some  typical  instances:  it  can  be  seen  gradually  asserting 
itself;  In  1636  the  letter-carriers  had  been  prevented  from 
gotjig  to  London  by  the  plague  (Mem.  Verney  Fam.  I  225); 
His  master  was  prohibited  as  a  delinquent  from  keeping 
his  school  (ib.  Ill  356);  he  was  heard  to  say  . .  .;  he  luas 
ordered  to  go  away;  the  shutters  were  announced  to  be  up. 

„   .       . ,  472.     When  dealing  with  the  stem  with 

ox       to  we  have  shown  that  the  stem  with  to 
complementary  Stem  .  ..,.,., 

.,,   ,  .,.         IS  never  quite  identical  with  a  noun-obiect, 

with  to  or  with  an        ,    ,      ^  ,     ,  -^      ' 

^, .    ^  „,  and    have    proposed    the    term    comple- 

Object  Clause  ,-  a  ,1  , 

mentary   adjunct.     A   verb  that  can  take 

such   a   Stem    as   he  attempted  to  reorganize  the  company, 

can  be  used  as  a  part  of  a  group-passive:  it  was  attempted 

to  reorganize  the  company  [a).    Similarly  these  verbs  can 

take   this  construction  when  accompanied  by  a  clause  {b). 

The  last   case  {c)   is  a  very  rare  variety  of  those  in  461. 

a.  Hence  the  need  for  such  a  congress,  which  it  is  hoped 
to  hold  every  five  years.  Times  Lit.    12/1,   22. 

b.  It  was  hoped  he  was  getting  on  pretty  well. 

Flora  Masson,  The  Brontes,  p.   53. 
At    Lado    it    was  learned  that  the  poachers  had  split 
up,    and    that    each    section    had   made  a   14  days'  tour. 

Daily  News,  21/9,  12. 
It  may  be  wondered  whether  a  century  or  two  hence  a 
student  of  University  life  to-day,  if  he  is  willing  to  admit 
that  it  was  vigorous  —  and  he  is  at  least  as  likely  to 
consider  its  energy  feverish  —  will  declare  that  it  was 
sane.  Athenaeum. 

And    here    it    may  be  remarked  that  the  company  of 
the    entomologist    is    often  quite  as  distasteful  to  me  .  .  . 
Hudson,  Hampshire  Days  ch.  6  p.   113. 


PASSIVE  323 

c.  Evan  was  whispered  that  he  was  to  join  them. 
Meredith,  Harrington  ch.  5,  p.  46. 

473.  Direct  speech  in  subordination  to  such  a  passive  is 
exclusively  literary.  The  passive  sentence  may  be  prefixed  {a) 
or  may  be  an  appended  clause  (b). 

a.  To  every  man  it  is  decreed :  thou  shalt  live  alone. 

Gissing,  Ryecroft  ch,  20. 

It  is  asked  him:  "Wilt  thou  wed  this  Fate,  and  give 
up  all  behind  thee?"  Meredith,  Feverel  ch.  29. 

Compare  also  Beauchamp's  Career  ch.  ^i^  p.  334  (Mr. 
Culbrett,  etc.)  and  p.   S?^)  Harrington  ch.   10  p.    103. 

b.  'The  cap'n  said  I  might  come  in  without  any  fuss', 
was  answered  in  a  lad's  pleasant  voice. 

Hardy,  Native  II  ch.  4  p.   147. 

474.  The  construction  of  472a  is  sometimes  an  alterna- 
tive to  the  personal  construction  of  verbs  construed  with  an 
object  and  stem.  Thus  we  find  it  was  permitted  to  me  to  read 
them,  although  it  is  more  usual  to  say  /  was  permitted  to 
read  them.     See  292. 

These  volumes  belonged  to  my  father,  and  before  I 
was  old  enough  to  read  them  with  understanding,  it  was 
often  permitted  me,  as  a  treat,  to  take  down  one  of  them 
from    the    bookcase,    and    reverently   to  turn  the  leaves. 

Gissing,  Ryecroft. 

As  a  schoolboy  it  had  been  definitely  forbidden  to 
him  to  go  out  at  night. 

Bennett,  Clayhanger  I  ch.  9  §  2. 

May  it  be  allowed  one  to  wonder  why  your  cor- 
respondents speak  of  Tennyson's  rhyme  only  as  "repeti- 
tion" when  both  English  and  French  have  technical 
terms  for  this  form  of  rhyme,  —  "perfect  rhyme"  and 
"rime  riche"  ? 

John  Sargeaunt  in  Times  Lit.   1/3,   1918. 


324  VERBS 

„     „    J.    ,.  475.     In   all   the   sentences  illustratinsr  the 

Non-Predicative  i        •,  ,  •  •  , 

p     .  group-passive  quoted  until  now  the  participle 

was   accompanied    by   a   form   of  to   be  that 

served   as  a  predicate.     Some  sentences  contain  the  plain 

stem  with  the  participle,  but  it  has  been  shown  in  treating 

of   the   plain   stem   that   in  a  group  with  an  auxiliary  the 

plain  stem  is  essentially  predicative  (355).  For  this  reason 

such   cases  have  been  included  in  the  preceding  sections. 

We  have  the  same  group-passive  with  non-predicative 
verbal  forms,  however,  i.  e.  with  being  and  the  stem  to  be. 
It  has  seemed  convenient  to  treat  of  the  group  with  being 
in  the  chapter  on  the  verbal  ing  (see  128  ff  on  the  complex 
ing).  An  examination  of  the  examples  in  those  sections 
will  show  that  in  most  of  them  the  passive  expresses 
activit}^,  far  less  often  an  occurrence.  A  discussion  of  the 
relations  of  the  complex  ing  and  the  simple  form  will  be 
found  in  133  ff. 

The  group-passive  consisting  of  the  stem  to  be  with  a 
participle  has  not  been  treated  in  the  chapter  on  the  use 
of  the  stem  with  to,  because  these  constructions  give  rise 
to  some  uses  that  can  only  be  discussed  after  the  other 
uses  of  the  passive  have  been  dealt  with. 

476.     The  passive  with  to  be  is  used  in  all  the  functions 
of    the    simple    stem    with    to.     The    following    sentences 
illustrate  it  as  an  adjunct  to  verbs  (a),  including  the  case 
that  the  verb  is  only  formally  the  leading  element  {b). 
a.  He  hopes  to  be  appointed. 

The  true  beauty  always  includes  its  proper  utility.  Many 
a  dainty  French  chair  of  the  eighteenth  century  fails  in  that, 
because  it  is  obviously  made  to  be  looked  at  and  chairs 
ought  to  be  made  to  be  sat  upon.     Times  Lit.  io/8,  i6. 

The  author  appears  to  have  been  accorded  quite 
exceptional  opportunities  of  acquiring  information. 

Quoted  ib.  20/4,   17. 


PASSIVE  325 

They  expected  to  be  submitted  to,  and  obeyed. 

Gaskell,  Wives  I  ch.   i   p.   10. 
b.  When    it   is    remembered   that   our  submarines  are 
now  navigated  in  the  open  seas  for  thousands  of  miles, 
the  meaning  of  that  record  cannot  fail  to  be  seen. 

Times,  Weekly  ed. 

The  discovery  will  enable  science  to  determine  the 
conditions  in  which  the  infection  takes  place,  and  it  is 
expected  that  preventive  measures  will  be  able  to  be 
taken.  Everyman,  3/1,    13. 

In  public  school  education,  as  in  everything  else,  a 
new  system  is  needed.  Enquiry  wants  to  be  made,  not 
of  the  persons  who  run  the  show ;  not  even  of  those 
who  have  taken  good  places,  but  of  the  rank  and  file, 
who  naturally  never  get  their  voices  heard, 

English  lUustr.  Magaz.,  June,   1912. 

477.  The  group-passive  with  to  be  is  also  used  in 
adjuncts  to  nouns  and  adjectives.  It  is  hardly  necessary 
to  point  out  that  we  find  the  passive  of  verbs  taking  an 
indirect  or  prepositional  as  well  as  a  direct  object,  for 
the  non-predicative  verb  does  not  really  differ  from  the 
predicative  verb  in  these  respects,  and  it  can  hardly  be 
expected  to  do  so,  because,  as  the  reader  will  remember, 
it  is  in  reaUty  the  meaning  of  the  participle  itself  that 
makes  all  the  constructions  possible ;  see  45  ff. 

Thus  ever  about  her  rooms  she  moved  on  this  mournful 
occupation  until  the  last  thing  had  been  disposed  of  as 
either  to  be  sent  back  or  to  be  destroyed  i). 

Allen,  Mistletoe. 

The  last  eleven  to  be  rescued  from  the  flooded  mine 
had  some  terrible  experiences  during  their  twelve 
hours'  imprisonment.  Daily  News. 

There  was  nothing  to  be  done  but  to  possess  our 
souls  in  patience. 


1)  The  passive  groups  are  predicative  adjuncts  here. 


326  VERBS 

There  was  not  a  house  to  be  seen  except  a  solitary 
farmhouse.  Sweet,  Spoken  Engl.  p.   56. 

She  agreed  that  a  large  house  in  the  West  End  was 
a  worthy  aim,  and  one  to  be  kept  in  mind. 

Pett  Ridge,  Garland  ch.   13. 

But  for  all  that,   "The  Harbor"  is  a  book  to  be  read. 

111.  London  News   14/8,   15. 

The  result  is  a  finished  piece  of  work,  to  be  commended 
to  the  study  of  those  who,  guided  by  Teutonic  models, 
deem  lumbering  involutions  and  a  muddy  terminology  the 
certain  concomitants  of  profundity.  Times  Lit.  30/10,  15. 

In  the  great  peril  to  be  feared  from  Mr.  Scales, 
Constance's  heart  had  been  put  aside  as  a  thing  that 
could  wait.  Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  I  ch.  7  |  2. 

She  had  no  retainers  to  be  maintained  because  they 
were  retainers.  Trollope,  Last  Chron.  ch.  52  (vol.  II,  90). 

An  important  question  to  be  determined  is,  in  what 
sense  is  Absalom,  and  Achitophel  a  'satire'.'' 

Verrall,  Dryden  p.   58. 

Easy  to  please  and  be  pleased. 

Vachell,  Quinneys'  p.    175. 

The  temptation  was  too  strong  to  be  resisted. 

Sweet,  Spoken  Engl.  p.   59. 

Little  dainty  tiny  poems,  with  not  too  much  in  them, 
not  too  difficult  to  be  comprehended  by  children  of  that 
good  age.  Jack,  Essays  III  37. 

And  plain  to  be  heard  in  the  early  quiet  was  the 
sound  of  the  creek  in  the  paddock  running  over  the 
brown  stones  .  .  .  Mansfield,  Bliss  p.   19. 

The  print  was  almost  too  small  to  be  read  by  the 
light  of  a  single  candle  . .  . 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  44  p.  482. 

Well  —  next,  don't  you  think  it  very  dignified  of 
Mr.  Bradshaw  to  be  able  to  be  condescended  to  and 
explained  in  corners  under  people's  breaths  and  not  to 
show  it?  ib.  ch.    15   p.   153. 

He  went  to  call  indeed ;  but  he  was  perhaps  relieved 
to  be  denied  admittance.  Stevenson,  Jekyll  p.  60. 


PASSIVE  327 

478.  The  passive  group  is  used  when  the  meaning 
distinctly  requires  it.  In  many  cases,  however,  the  verb 
can  be  understood  as  the  predicate  to  an  agent  as  well 
as  to  the  object  affected  or  effected  by  the  action;  in  such 
cases  the  simple  form  is  the  usual  one,  both  in  adjuncts 
to  nouns  {a)  and  to  adjectives  {b).  The  last  sentence  of 
those  under  a  is  specially  instructive  because  it  shows 
that  in  two  stems  to  one  noun  the  agents  may  be  different 
persons.  In  the  cases  quoted  under  b  the  stem  is  an 
adjunct  of  purpose  or  result.  Other  relations  are  expressed 
in  the  cases  under  c. 

a.  His    garments    had    been    made    for  him,    that  was 
all  that  could  be  said.     That  is  something  to  know, 
de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.   i   p.    i. 

But  come  —  do  let  us  go  at  once.  There  is  no  time 
to  lose  — .  Walpole,  Fortitude  II  ch.  8  p.  229. 

It  was  two  miles  across  the  common  to  Stephen's 
farm  and  it  took  the  boy  nearly  an  hour,  because  the 
ground   was  uneven  and  there  were  walls  to  climb,  .  .  . 

ib.  I  ch.   3  p.  30. 
According  to  him  it  was  not  a  place  to  visit  by  night. 

Sweet,  Spoken  Engl.  p.  51. 
"Now   you're   sneering,    Drummond,"   said  Rose,  "for 
you  know  there's  no  mystery  to  clear  up." 

Meredith,  Harrington  ch.   17  p.   175. 
My    hair   does  not  want  much  brushing;  there  is  not 
much  of  it  to  brush.  Sweet,  Element,  no.  53. 

But  there  are  serious  difficulties  yet  to  overcome 
before  we  reach  the  full  standard  of  production  of  which 
the  country  is  capable.  Times  29/7,   15. 

In  all  Bursley  there  could  have  been  few  drawing- 
rooms  to  compare  with  Constance's. 

Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  IV  ch.  2  §   i. 
She    had    long    felt    that    he    would  lose  much  of  his 
nervous   instability   and  preoccupation   if  he  had  a  wife 
to  look  after  and  to  look  after  him. 

Stephen  McKenna,  Reluctant  Lover  ch.  8  p.   120. 


328  VERBS 

b.  Yes,  that  was  all  very  pleasant  to  think  of. 

Walpole,  Fort.  I  ch.  4  p.  39. 
The    secret    of  Busby's  success  and  unique  reputation 
is  not  hard  to  explain.     Annals  of  Westminster  p.  113. 
The  opportunity  was  too  good  to  throw  away. 

Galsworthy,  Freelands,  ch.  8. 
The  roads  and  open  spaces  in  woods  in  October  and 
November  are  delightful  to  walk  in  when  they  are  richly 
variegated  floors  composed  of  small  pieces,  .  . 

Hudson,  Hampshire  Days  ch.   3   p.  ^t^. 

c.  There  are  many  things  worse  than  fighting;  and 
there  are  many  wounds  and  injuries  which  people  inflict 
on  each  other  worse  than  bodily  wounds  and  injuries  — 
only  they  are  not  so  plain  to  see.     Times  Lit.  29/7,  15. 

His  face  was  so  ghastly  to  see  that  I  grew  alarmed 
both  for  his  life  and  reason. 

Stevenson,  Dr.  Jekyll,  p.    102. 

479.  When  we  find  to  do  and  to  be  done  in  the  following 
sentences,  both  as  adjuncts  to  a  noun,  it  must  be  considered 
that  in  the  first  it  is  an  intransitive,  in  the  second  a  tran- 
sitive verb,  so  that  the  contradiction  is  only  an  apparent  one. 

No  —  you  couldn't  help  it,  Stephen  —  it's  nothing 
to  do  with  you.  Walpole,  Fort.  II  ch.  7  p.  2 18. 

There  was  silence  again  —  a  silence  now  of  incre- 
dulity and  amazement.  But  there  was  nothing  to  be 
done ;  if  any  one  claimed  a  fight,  by  all  the  rules  and 
traditions  of  Dawson's  he  must  have  it. 

Walpole,  Fort,  I  ch.  5  p.  57. 


It  may  also  be  remarked  that  the  simple  form  is 
not  possible  when  the  agent  must  be  expressed.  Thus, 
although  we  can  say  Ifs  not  a  place  to  visit  at  night,  we 
must  say  It's  not  a  place  to  be  visited  by  young  children. 
In  other  cases  the  simple  stem  may  be  traditional.  We 
say  There  is  nothing  to  do  (compare  479)  and  There  isnt 
much   to   see,  but  in  similar  cases  the  complex  stem  is  at 


PASSIVE  329 

least    quite    as    common :    There   is  much  to  be  explained^ 
accounted  for. 

The  simple  stem  is  naturally  also  possible  when  it 
qualifies  the  adjective  preceding  the  noun  to  which  it 
serves  as  an  adjunct. 

This  is  no  easy  work  to  translate. 

Times  Lit.  61^,   17. 

481.  The  passive  group  of  to  be  with  a  participle  can 
occur  in  the  plain  object  with  stem  constructions,  frequently 
with  the  verbs  of  will  and  wish  (a),  less  often  with  the 
verba  sentiendi  et  declarandi  {b);  also  in  the  prepositional 
object  and  stem  (c).  The  object  with  plain  passive  stem 
occurs  with  to  let  only,  at  least  in  spoken  English;  in 
iiterar}^  English  the  construction  is  occasionally  found  with 
to  bid  [d). 

a.  Julius  Caesar  had  permitted  worship  to  be  offered 
to  himself,  Goodspeed,  Hist.  p.  368. 

Lady  Malloring  had  caused  Tryst  to  be  warned  that 
he  could  not  marry  his  deceased  wife's  sister  and  con- 
tinue to  remain  on  the  estate. 

Galsworthy,   Freelands  ch.   34  p.  424. 

(The  question  was)  how  far  men  and  women  should 
try  to  rule  the  lives  of  others  instead  of  trying  to  rule 
their  own,  and  how  far  those  others  should  allow  their 
lives  to  be  so  ruled?  id.  ib. 

Inglesant  ordered  some  refreshment  to  be  given  to 
the  messenger,  and  his  own  horses  to  be  got  out. 

Shorthouse,  Inglesant  ch.   11   p.   121. 

But  he  could,  and  he  did,  play  the  Company's  game, 
as  it  meant  that  game  to  be  played. 

Times  Lit.  21/4,  21. 

An  official  return  issued  yesterday  enables  a  compa- 
rison to  be  made  between  the  number  of  emigrants  to 
Canada  and  Australia  during  the  seven  months  ending 
July  31  this  year  as  against  the  corresponding  period 
of  last  year.  Daily  Mail,   23/10,    12. 


J30  VERBS 

Use  of  Mahomedan  and  Saracenic  enables  the  epithet 
Arab  to  be  avoided.  Times  Lit.   5/6,   24  p.  350/2. 

b.  If  a  stranger  heard  him  talk  about  leather  he  would 
.   imagine  him  to  have  been  bred  a  tanner. 

c.  The  Liberals  are  urgently  pressing  for  a  decision 
to  be  made.  Times  W.  2/2,   17. 

The  time  for  this  problem  to  be  solved  has  not  yet  come. 

d.  "Let  me  be  promised,"  she  seemed  to  say,  "that 
I  will  never  have  any  trouble  or  sorrow  with  my  son 
and  I  will  love  him  devotedly." 

Walpole,  Fort.  Ill  ch.  8  p.  319. 
In  his  busiest  da3^s  Alfred  found  time  to  learn  the  old 
songs    of  his   race    by  heart,  and  bade  them  be  taught 
in  the  palace-school.  Green,   Short  Hist.  p.  51. 

482.  A  comparison  of  the  sentences  in  the  preceding  section 
with  those  of  section  60  shows  that  a  number  of  verbs  can 
take  an  object  with  to  be  and  a  participle,  or  with  the  par- 
ticiple only:  ordered  the  play  to  be  stopped,  and  ordered  the 
play  stopped.  It  seems  the  best  place  here  to  compare  the 
two  constructions. 

We  may  observe  in  the  first  place  that  the  same  twofold 
-construction  (with  to  be  and  without)  is  found  with  a  number 
of  verbs  that  take  an  object  with  a  predicative  noun  or  ad- 
jective; in  the  former  case  we  speak  of  an  object  with  stem, 
and  as  this  construction  has  been  sufficiently  illustrated  (470), 
it  will  be  possible  to  restrict  ourselves  to  some  examples  of 
the  second  construction  only,  which  is  also  treated  in  the 
third  volume  in  the  chapter  on  the  simple  sentence. 

It  is  curious  and  interesting  to  find  our  younger  men 
of  letters  actively  concerned  with  the  present  condition 
of  literary  criticism.  Times  Lit.   13/5,  20. 

Amid  laughter  and  exclamations  Hamilton  confessed 
himself  the  man  who  had  guessed  Latin  to  be  the  cause 
of  Miss  Current's  remaining  an  old  maid. 

Meredith,  Harrington  ch.   16  p.   167. 


PASSIVE  331 

In  Fallowfield,  among  impertinent  young  men,  Evan's 
pride  proclaimed  him  a  tailor.  ib.   ch.   16  p.  162. 

As  to  my  works  I  know  them  faulty. 

id.  quoted  Sturge-Henderson  ch.    i   p.    i. 

When  we  know  ourselves  fools,  we  are  already  some- 
thing better.  ib. 

483.  Of  the  verbs  of  60  it  is  those  mentioned  under  3 
'(verbs  of  will)  and  4  (verbs  of  liking  and  preference)  that 
can  take  both  constructions,  whereas  the  verbs  under  i  (verbs 
of  sensation  and  perception)  and  2  (verbs  of  experience)  cannot. 

The  two  questions  that  naturally  arise  are: 

(1)  What  is  the    difference,  if  any,  between  the  two  con- 
structions   in    the  case  of  verbs  that  can  take  either? 

(2)  Why  do  the  verbs  of  60,   i   and  2  take  the  object  with 
participle  only,   and  not  the  participle  with  to  be? 

It  will  be  clear  to  the  reader  that  the  answer  to  the  first 
question  can  be  satisfactory  only  if  it  at  the  same  time 
makes  it  possible  to  answer  the  second. 

484.  If  we  compare  two  sentences  like  /  wish  the  thing 
to  be  done  and  /  wish  the  thing  done,  it  is  clear  that  there 
is  some  difference.  In  the  former  case  [to  be  done)  the  action 
is  looked  upon  with  respect  to  its  beginning  in  the  future, 
in  the  second  {done)  the  action  is  rather  looked  upon  as 
completed.  In  other  words,  the  group  with  to  be  is  inchoative, 
the  simple  participle  is  terminative.     Compare  also : 

No,    I   don't    want    Alan  hurt  —  I  want  everyone  in 
the  world  to  be  happy,  happy  —  as  I  am. 

Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.  9. 

The  distinction  between  the  two  constructions  is  a  very 
delicate  one,  and  it  cannot  be  expected  that  even  the  most 
careful  writers  will  always  make  it.  For  it  must  be  remem- 
bered that  the  simple  participle  (without  to  be)  is  the  usual 
construction    in    spoken    English    in    those   cases    when  it  is 


332  VERBS 

possible.     This    may    account    for    the    construction    in    the 
following  sentences. 

But    I    want    you   to    know   all  I  can  tell  you.     I  do 
not  want  any  groundless  excuses  made  for  me. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.   12  p.   no. 
This   and   other  similes  occur  over  and  over  again  in 
these    essays    and    lectures.     I  let  them  stand  because  I 
want  these  useful  formulae  learned  by  heart. 

Vernon  Lee,  HandHng  of  Words  p.  41  footnote. 

When  the  durative  aspect  must  be  expressed  the  complex 
ing  can  be  used :  She  foresaw  hiquiries  being  tnade ;  see  131. 

485.  The  explanation  suggested  in  the  preceding  section, 
if  correct,  must  incline  us  to  look  upon  aspect  as  the  cause  of 
the  necessity  to  use  the  simple  participle  with  to  hear,  etc. 
and  the  verbs  expressing  'experience.'  There  is  no  difficulty 
in  this,  for  these  verbs  naturally  require  a  form  expressing 
the  durative  aspect,  or  a  neutral  form,  not  a  distinctly  per- 
fective form  of  the  verb. 

One  more  point  must  be  considered :  the  verbs  of  causing 
{get,  make,  have)  never  take  to  be  with  participle,  although 
the  closely  connected  verbs  of  will  do.  The  reason  is  evidently 
that  the  verbs  of  causing  cannot  take  a  form  that  is  inchoative. 

Observe  that  to  let,  and  the  literary  bid,  never  take  the 
simple  participle,  but  only  the  plain  stem  be  with  participle,  as 
shown  in  481  d.  This  peculiarity  may  be  the  result  of  tradition. 


We  have  dealt  with  the  group  of  to  be  and  a  parti- 
ciple as  an  adjunct  to  verbs,  nouns,  and  adjectives;  also 
as  a  member  of  an  object  with  stem  construction.  Like 
the  simple  stem  with  to,  the  group  with  the  participle 
can  also  be  used  as  a  subject,  and  as  a  predicate  in  a 
sentence  expressing  identity,  but  neither  of  these  con- 
structions is  frequent. 


PASSIVE  333 

Meanwhile   to   be   waited  upon  was  an  attention  that 
had  other  charms  than  novelty.    Pett  Ridge,  Garland. 

On  such  constructions  as  are  exemplified  by  The  story 
is  not  to  be  credited^  see  below. 

^    ^,    _     .  487.     We  sometimes  find  a  sentence  with 

Double  Passive  .  r       •  i-  >  •  ,    • 

a    passive    group    lor    its  predicate  which  is 

qualified  by  another  passive  group;  this  double  passive  is 
the  result  of  the  general  fact  that  the  participle  of  a 
transitive  verb  can  be  so  used,  but  the  resulting  con- 
structions are  somewhat  complicated. 

We  can  distinguish  two  groups : 

id)  the  verbs  that  take  a  stem  with  to  as  a  comple- 
mentary adjunct; 

iU)  the  verbs  that  take  an  object  and  stem  with  to. 

An  example  of  the  first  class  is  to  attempt.  According 
to  472  we  have  It  was  attempted  to  form  a  new  plan. 
But  to  form  is  also  transitive,  and  we  can  consequently 
say:  A  new  plan  ivas  attempted  to  be  formed. 

The  second  group  is  very  similar.  We  find :  They 
allowed  no  building  to  be  erected,  in  accordance  with  481. 
Consequently  we  can  also  have  this  type  of  passive:  No 
.building  was  allowed  to  be  erected. 

a.  If   a  distinction  is  attempted  to  be  drawn  between 
the    indigent  and  those  in  comfortable  circumstances  .  . . 

Rev.  of  Rev.  Jan.   1899. 
Newcastle   takes    its  name  from  the  castle  which  was 
begun  to  be  rebuilt  by  Rufus. 

Lit.  World  3/2,   1899  i). 
It    was    whispered    about    that    the    first  cause  of  the 
outbreak  (a  fire)  was  a  bottle  of  turpentine  which  was  being 


•1)  Both   this   and    the    preceding  quotation  are  borrowed  from  an  article 
in  Engl.  Studien  by  C.  Stoffel. 


334  VERBS 

used  or  proposed  to  be  used,  in  the  pickling  of  an  un- 
popular boy  by  his  fellows.     De  Morgan,  Vance  ch.  12. 

There  had  been  a  rumour  that  Claydon  House  was 
threatened  to  be  burnt.  Mem.  Verney  II  p.   205. 

Then,  with  a  dryly-closing  throat  he  recalled  the  faint 
blush  in  which  Frank  was  arranged  to  be  met  at  the 
station.      D.  C.  Jones,  Everlasting  Search  I  ch.  7  p.  56. 

What  is  hoped  to  be  gained  by  the  repetition  of  these 
tirades  against  Liberalism  just  now  I  cannot  conceive. 
Fowler,  Diet,  of  Modern  Usage  s.  v.  hope, 
b.  Recoids  of  proceedings  were  ordered  to  be  kept. 

Constit.  Essays  p.  305. 
New  legislation  is  believed  to  be  contemplated. 

Jenks,  Short  Hi^.   of  English  Law  p.  388. 
I  have  to  search  the  house.     Especially  since  a  light 
was  seen  burning  in  this  room,  and  after  my  men  came 
round  the  house  was  observed  to  be  put  out. 

Temple  Thurston,  Jane  Carroll  p.   213. 
It  (the  ms.)  is  believed  to  be  based  upon  a  Chronicle- 
now  lost  which  had  its  origin  at  Winchester  i). 

Plummer,  Saxon  Chron.   I  p.  X. 
The   book    was    declared    to    be   scandalous  .  .  .  and  it 
was    ordered  to  be  publicly  burned  by   the  executioner. 
Lytton  Strachey,  Books  and  Characters  p.    130. 

488.  When  we  compare  the  sentences  under  a  with 
those  arranged  under  b  in  the  preceding  section  it  is 
easier  to  see  the  similarity  than  the  difference.  Indeed, 
we  may  say  that  the  two  groups  are  identical  in  character: 
in  both  a  participle  forms  a  close  syntactic  group  with 
another  participle,  the  two  being  connected  by  to  be;  both 
participles,  too,  are  used  in  a  distinctly  verbal  sense, 
expressing  an  occurrence  or  an  action  and  not  a  state 
or  condition.  No  difference  seems  to  exist  at  all,  unless 
we     comp.ire     the     'corresponding'    active    constructions. 


1)  Perhaps  based  should  rather  be  interpreted  as  a  verbal  adjective. 


PASSIVE  335 

It  may  be  asked,  however,  if  they  really  correspond,  and 
what  is  meant  by  the  term.  It  is  usual  to  consider  the 
passive  as  a  kind  of  secondary  form  of  the  verb,  a  de- 
rivative form  dependent  upon  the  'active'.  But  we  have 
already  seen  that  this  treatment,  though  supported  by 
tradition  and  convenience,  does  not  really  permit  us  to 
state  the  facts  completely  or  correctly.  In  dealing  with 
the  passive  group  with  a  stem  we  have  found  some  cases 
that  had  no  corresponding  active  at  all:  He  is  said  to  have 
objected  to  the  proposal. 

„       .    ,  489.     In    the   preceding   sections   an   attempt 

p     .  has    been   made   to  give  a  fairly  complete  des- 

cription of  all  the  constructions  that  the  predicative 
participle  with  to  be  as  a  purely  verbal  group  (446)  gives 
rise  to.  In  accordance  with  tradition  the  cases  have  been 
classified  on  the  basis  of  the  construction  taken  by  the 
verb  in  its  'active'  use.  It  has  been  pointed  out  more  than 
once,  however,  that  what  is  remarkable  about  the  con- 
structions is  not  so  much  the  combination  of  the  participle 
with  the  verb  to  be  as  the  meaning  of  the  participle  itself. 
On  the  other  hand,  it  must  be  stated  that  the  combination 
of  the  participle  with  to  be  does  make  a  difference:  thus 
it  is  rare  for  the  participle  to  be  used  attributively  to  a 
personal  noun  when  the  verb  can  take  two  objects  {labourers 
refused  a  minimum  wage:  see  51)  and  yet  this  construction 
is  perfectly  usual  when  the  participle  is  grouped  with  to 
be  (see  461),  i.  e.  when  the  participle  is  used  predicatively. 
The  group  with  to  be  is  essentially  like  a  combination  of 
to  be  with  an  adjective,  as  is  shown  by  the  following  case, 
where  two  participles  are  coordinated  with  one  predicative 
form  between  them  («)  and  especially  by  the  grouping  of 
a  verbal  participle  with  an  adjective  {b).    See  499. 

a.  Hence    when    a    bad   man  dies,  who  in  his  lifetime 


336  VERBS 

dabbled  in  black  magic  or  was  believed  to  be  possessed 
by  an  evil  spirit,  he  is  buried  outside  the  village  and 
magical  fences  are  erected  and  other  defensive  measures 
adopted  to  prevent  his  ghost  from  returning  and  troubling 
the  inhabitants.  Times  Lit.   25/5,  22. 

b.  His  eyes  were  watching  for  the  moment  when  the 
accounts  should  be  finished  and  Stephen  free, 

Walpole,  Fortitude  I  ch  3  §  2  p.  31. 

490.  The  preceding  illustrations  have  shov^^n  many 
cases  when  the  passive  construction  has  for  its  grammatical 
subject  the  noun  that  would  be  the  object  in  the  active 
construction.  It  must  be  pointed  out,  however,  that  this 
relation  between  the  passive  and  the  active  does  not 
necessarily  exist. 

When  a  verb  takes  a  complementary  stem  with  to  [it 
was  attempted  to  form  a  plan)  there  is  no  such  relation, 
for  there  is  no  real  object,  and  the  stem  forms  part  of 
the  verbal  group  in  the  predicate  in  both  constructions. 
And  when  a  verb  can  take  two  objects  the  passive  con- 
struction is  possible  only  when  one  of  the  objects  is  retained 
in  the  predicate :  such  a  sentence  as  /  was  told  the  news 
contains  a  passive  of  tell  the  news,  not  of /^// only  ^).  And 
even  when  a  verb  has  one  object  only  it  is  possible  for 
the  object  to  remain  part  of  the  predicate,  as  in  the  sentences 
with  introductory  there  in  452.  (There  was  no  word  spoken, 
and  he  closed  the  door  behind  him.  Walpole,  Fortitude 
I  ch.  6  §  3  p.  75). 

Verbs  that  can  take  no  object  or  complementary  stem 
do  not  occur  in  the  passive.  The  following  sentence,  though 
written    by    the    author    of   a    book   on   style   for  English 


1)  It  might  be  said,  therefore,  that  the  personal  objects  of  such  verbs 
-can  become  the  subject  of  a  passive  construction  when  it  is  understood  as 
the  direct  object  i.  e.  the  person  directly  affected  by  the  action  expressed 
by  the  verb  luith  the  direct  object. 


PASSIVE  337 

schools,    does   not  illustrate    genuine   British   English,  but 
may  be  due  to  the  Irish  origin  of  the  writer. 

But  the  dialects,  especially  the  country  dialects,  must 
not  go.  Of  them  it  shall  be  spoken  later. 

Hardress  O'Grady,  Mod.  Lang.  Teaching  8,  io6. 

491.  An  examination  of  the  many  quotations  illustrating 
the  passive  will  show  the  student  that  nearly  all  the  verbs 
express  an  activity.  We  may  say  indeed  that  the  construction 
enables  a  verb  of  activity  to  express  an  occurrence.  This 
does  not  exhaust  the  functions  of  the  passive,  for  as  we 
have  already  pointed  out,  the  passive  sometimes  expresses 
activity.  In  that  case  the  difference  between  the  active 
and  the  passive  is  that  the  latter  does  not  require  the 
agent  to  be  mentioned.  The  passive  construction  is  important 
because  English  has  no  pronoun  that  can  be  generally 
used  to  express  an  indefinite  personal  subject;  the  pronoun 
one  does  not  correspond  to  such  indefinites  as  Dutch  mert, 
German  man,  and  French  on.  The  following  sentence  is 
a  case  in  point. 

Much    has    been    written    in    praise  of  books  and  the 
pleasure  of  reading  has  been  celebrated  by  mighty  pens. 

Times  Lit.   2/9,   20. 

492.  The  predicative  participle  of  some  verbs  is  almost 
invariably  used  to  express  an  occurrence,  so  that  the  con- 
struction enables  the  transitive  verb  to  serve  as  an  in- 
transitive. Such  predicative  participles  are  to  be  blown 
out,  to  be  frozen,  overset,  drowned.  Other  verbs  are  only 
occasionally  used  in  this  way. 

The  candle  was  blown  out  when  I  entered. 
They   used   to   say   that    I  should  be  frozen  to  death 
one  night. 

He    was  killed  on  the   15  th  of  March  in  an  unimpor- 
tant skirmish. 

KuuisiNGA,  Handbook  II.  Accidence  and  Syntax.   1.  22 


338  VERBS 

When  several  well-known  men  have  died  in  succession 

in    an    Ekoi    village,    suspicion    is  naturally  aroused  that 

they  are  the  victims  of  black  magic,  and  some  friendless 

woman    may    be    pounced  upon  as  the  probable  culprit. 

Lowie,  Primitive  Religion  p.  2)?)- 

The  power  of  the  drug  had  not  been  always  equally 
displayed.  Once,  very  early  in  my  career,  it  had  totally 
failed  me.  Stevenson,  Dr.  Jekyll. 

Sometimes  a  passive  of  occurrence  is  avoided  because 
it  might  suggest  a  passive  of  activity.  In  such  a  case  the 
verb  may  be  used  intransitively  without  any  formal  in- 
dication of  the  change. 

The  boats  will  hold  something  over  300  people. 
Therefore   the    men   must  drown,  said  Lord  Holmhurst, 

Haggard,  Meeson's  Will. 

We  let  a  thousand  seamen  drown  without  an  effort 
to  save  them,  while,  if  twenty  people  are  burnt  in  a 
playhouse,  we  tear  our  hair,  and  legislate  .  .  . 

The  steersman  was  left  alone  in  charge  of  the  boat 
when  the  vessel  blew  up, 

493.  In  the  introduction  to  the  sections  on  the  passive 
(446)  it  has  been  mentioned  that  the  term  is  applied  only 
to  the  groups  expressing  occurrence  or  activity,  not  to 
the  participle  denoting  a  state.  This  distinction  becomes 
very  shght,  though  it  is  still  real,  when  the  passive  of 
occurrence  is  to  be  taken  in  its  iterative  aspect,  as  in 
the  following  case. 

He  (Squire  Cass)  was  only  one  among  several  landed 
parishioners,  but  he  alone  was  honoured  with  the  title 
of  Squire  .  .  .  Eliot,  Silas  Marner  ch.  3. 

494.  The  passive  of  activity,  though  primarily  used 
when  no  agent  is  required  to  be  mentioned,  is  also  found 
with  the  agent  expressed  by  means  of  an  adjunct  with  by. 
It  is  not  necessary  to  add  examples  to  those  given  in  the 


PASSIVE  339 

preceding  sections.  In  this  case  the  value  of  the  passive 
lies  in  the  possibility  of  making  the  person  or  thing  affected 
b}^  the  action  the  grammatical  subject,  and  it  is  this  case 
that  has  caused  the  impression  that  the  passive  primarily 
serves  this  purpose,  and  must  be  considered  as  a  derivative 
form  from  the  active  verb. 

An  adjunct  with  by  does  not  necessarily  express  an 
agent.  It  may  be  an  adjunct  of  cause  to  a  passive  of 
occurrence,  as  in  the  first  two  sentences  here  («);  it  may 
occur,  too,  with  a  participle  expressing  a  state  ib). 

a.  The  discussion  was  given  another  turn  by  the  en- 
trance of  Mr.  Godbold  himself. 

Mackenzie,  Guy  and  Pauline  p.   lO. 

Virginia's    thin,    timid    voice    and  weak  manner  were 
thrown  into  painful  contrast  by  Miss  Nunn's  personality. 
Gissing,  The  Odd  Women  oh.  3. 

b.  All  was  surrounded  by  old  oak  woods,  and  the 
river  was  close  by. 

Hudson,  Hampshire  Days  ch.   i   p.  6. 

495.  In  the  great  majority  of  instances  quoted  in  the 
preceding  sections  the  passive  was  used  of  a  verb  expressing 
activit}^;  this  is  the  result  of  the  fact  that  these  passives 
are  far  more  common  than  the  passives  of  verbs  expressing 
a  sensation.  But  the  verbs  of  sensation  do  occur  in  the 
passive,  as  shown  by  the  following  examples. 

Then  she  would  clasp  herself  close  —  afraid  to  stretch 
out  her  arms,  lest  she  should  be  seen. 

Galsworthy,  Dark  Flower  II  ch.  25  p.   182. 

What  always  astonishes  me  about  young  people  is  the 
way  they  think  they're  not  seen  —  poor  dears. 

ib.  II  ch.  3  p.   115. 

Now  that  their  voices  and  the  cawings  of  the  rooks 
had  ceased  there  was  nothing  heard  but  the  dry  rustle 
of  the  leaves.  ib.  I  ch.   12  p.  66. 


340  VERBS 

The  national  sentiment  was  also  seen  in  the  young 
drama.  Sefton  Delmer,  Eng.  Lit.  p.  48. 

She  knew  that  she  did  not  wish  that  little  procession 
passing  through  the  courtyard  to  be  seen  by  the  man 
of  the  red  car.  C.  N.  and  A.  M.  Williamson,  The 

Wedding  Day  p.  26. 
No  doubt  he'll  be  heard  from  in  good  time. 

J.  Erskine,  Galahad  II  ch.  5  p.   127. 
It    will    be    seen,    therefore,    how   rash    it  is  to  quote 
Pater's   words  in  about   1130  as  if  they  were  conclusive 
for  monastic  practice  in  general. 

Coulton,  Med.  Village  ch.   12  p.   148. 

496.     It  may  be  found  useful  if  we  try  to  sum 
Summary  •  ,        •  •  ,  1  ,      r 

up  our  considerations  with  regard  to  the  lunction 

of   the   passive  in  Enghsh  sentence-structure  as  briefly  as 

possible. 

The    participle    with    to    be,    or    another   verb    of  little 

independent    meaning    (56),    may   express    condition   or   a 

more  verbal  meaning  (occurrence  or  activity).  It  is  in  the 

latter  function  that  the  term  passive  is  applied  to  it.  This 

passive,  though  not  essentially  differing  from  the  participle 

in  attributive  use,  is  more  freely  employed  than  the  attributive 

participle,  and  makes  it  possible: 

(1)  for  a  verb  of  activity  to  express  an  occurrence. 

(2)  for  a  verb  of  activity  or  sensation  to  be  used  without 
the  mention  of  an  agent. 

(3)  for  a  verb  of  activity  or  sensation  to  express  the 
person  or  thing  affected  by  it  in  the  form  of  the 
grammatical  subject. 

The  Progressive 

497.  The  verb  to  be  not  only  forms  a  close  syn- 
tactic group  with  the  participle,  but  also  with  an  ing.  As 
in    the    former    case   the  group  with  the  ing  is  related  to 


PROGRESSIVE  34 1 

combinations  with  other  verbs,  as  illustrated  in  84:  sat 
waiting,  stood  looking.  But  the  group  of  to  be  with  the 
ing,  like  the  one  with  the  participle,  is  syntactically  very 
important  for  the  very  reason  that  the  apparently  leading 
verb  has  no  meaning  of  its  own,  so  that  the  second  element 
of  the  group,  here  the  ing,  decides  the  character  of  the  group. 
And  the  ing  nowhere  shows  its  character  with  regard  to 
aspect  so  clearly  as  when  used  predicatively  with  to  be.  This 
has  led  to  a  special  name  for  this  group:  i\ie  progressive. 

498.  We  speak  of  a  progressive  only  when  the  ing 
has  a  verbal  meaning.  Thus  there  is  no  progressive  in 
The  book  is  amusing  enough;  The  statement  may  not  be 
incorrect^  but  it  is  certainly  misleading ;  Three  leaves  of 
the  manuscript  are  still  missing;  He  writes  with  that  per- 
sonal air  of  conviction  that  is  so  telling  (Everyman,  20/12 
1912).  The  following  ings  may  be  similarly  used  as  pre- 
dicative adjectives:  improving,  ailing, disappointing,  edifying, 
forthcoming,  obliging,  willing,  etc.  But  many  of  these 
words  can  express  a  verbal  meaning  as  well;  we  have 
progressives  in  the  following  sentences. 

I  have  been  amusing  the  baby. 

I  am  not  misleading  you. 

She  has  been  telling  me  her  secrets. 

I  don't  know  what  made  me  come  back  to  London. 
I'm  missing  so  much  fun.  Sinister  Street,  p.  756. 


With  regard  to  the  character  of  the  progressive 
as  a  syntactic  group  it  may  be  added  that  it  is  not  a 
close  unit,  so  that  the  ing  can  be  coordinated  with  other 
predicative  words  {a),  or  separated  from  the  predicative 
verb  in  other  ways  {b).     See  489. 

a.  We    were    clear    of  the  harbour  and  steering  with 
a  fine  breeze  for  the  English  coast. 

Poor  Jack  (a  boys'  book). 


342  VERBS 

We  were  free  and  making  good  headway.  ib. 

The  town's  murmur  was  dying,  the  house  Hghts  were 
dead  already.  Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.    17. 

(He)  was  allowed  to  be  present  as  a  very  great  favour 
because  it  was  Christmas  Eve  and  snowing  so  hard. 

Walpole,  Fort.  I  ch.   i  p.   5. 
b.  Nobody  asked  where  you  were  going,   with    whom 
going,  or  how  going. 

Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.  26  p.  328. 

500.  The  progressive  is  used  of  verbs  denoting  an 
action  or  occurrence,  to  express  that  this  is  thought  of  as 
being  in  progress,  continuous,  during  a  certain  limited 
time;  it  always  implies  incompletion. 

If  the  progressive  occurs  of  a  verb  usually  expressing 
a  state,  hke  to  be,  it  will  be  found  to  denote  or  refer  to 
an  action  or  occurrence.  The  progressive  with  an  adverb 
expressing  unlimited  time  will  be  specially  dealt  with. 

The  progressive  occurs  both  predicatively  and  in  the 
non-predicative  forms  of  to  be;  these  uses  will  be  separately 
treated  because  the  effect  of  the  construction  sometimes 
depends  upon  this. 

The  progressive  can  also  be  combined  with  a  passive 
group  (is  being  done);  this  does  not  make  a  difference  in 
the  meaning,  so  that  it  will  be  sufficient  to  add  examples 
in  the  proper  places. 

The  progressive  does  not  affect  the  time  of  the  action 
or  occurrence,  so  that  it  will  be  possible  to  illustrate  the 
cases    in    the   order   suggested   by  the  forms  of  the  verb. 

501.  The  present  progressive  is  frequently  used  with 
reference  to  present  time. 

Margaret.     Sidney,  my  dear,  be  good ! 
Sidney.     I    am    being    good.     I'm    returning    hint  for 
hint.  Dane,  Bill  of  Div.  in  Brit.  PI.  p.  649  f. 


PROGRESSIVE  343 

"Selina!"  Jasmine  gasped.  "You're  making  the  most 
dreadful  accusation.     You  really  ought  to  careful." 

"That's  what  I  am  being.  Careful  . .  ." 

Mackenzie,  Rich  Rel.  ch.  9  p.   229. 

The    Tasmanians    are    gone,    the    Bushmen,    the    Au- 
stralians,   the    Pygmies    seem   to  be  going,  the  Eskimos 
are  being  kept  from  extinction  by  stringent  measures. 
Fleure,  Races  of  Mankind  p.    17. 

Therefore  it  is  that  this  country  has  made,  is  making, 
and  is  prepared  to  make  sacrifices  of  blood  and  treasure 
unparalleled  in  its  history.  A.  Balfour. 

Even  where  Departments  are  most  free  from  these 
defects,  we  find  that  there  are  important  features  in 
which  the  organisation  falls  short  of  a  standard  which 
is  becoming  progressively  recognised  as  the  foundation 
of  efficient  action. 

Report  of  the  Machinery  of  Government  Committee  p.  4. 

A  plain  categorical  proposition  is  becoming  less  and 
less  credible  to  average  minds.  Or  at  least  the  slovenly 
willingness  to  hold  two  directly  contradictory  propositions 
at  one  and  the  same  time  is  becoming  more  and 
more  common  i).  Morley,  Compromise  p.    18. 

"Perhaps  I'm  being  too  inquisitive?"  she  suggested 
gently.  This  is  only  another  way  of  getting  one's 
question  answered.       Temple  Thurston,  City  I  ch.  8. 

She  tapped  with  her  foot  on  the  ground.  "You  are 
being  too  ridiculous,"  she  said. 

Cannan,  Corner  ch.    19. 

The  steps  that  have  been  taken  are  a  beginning  and 
a  promise  that  this  business  is  being  handled  at  last  in 
a  systematic  way.  Times  W.    12/1,    17. 

Lord  Derby  protested  with  great  earnestness  that  all 
in  his  power  has  been  done,  is  being  done,  and  will  be 
done  to  secure  the  fulfilment  of  the  pledge. 

Times   16/3,   16. 

In  the  following  quotation  the  present  are  talking  refers 
to    a    time    that    is   actually   past   but   connected  with  the 


1)  Note  the  addition  of  pt'ogressivehj,  less  and  less,  more  and  more. 


344  VERBS 

present  time  in  the  mind  of  the  speaker,  whereas  the 
preterite  were  talking  is  used  to  express  the  absence  of 
such  a  connection. 

(When  Mrs.  Mansfield  entered  the  room,  "there  was 
silence.") 

"You  are  talking,  or  you  were  talking,  of  something 
or  somebody  interesting,"  she  said  at  once,  looking 
round  her  at  the  three  occupants  of  the  room, 

Hichens,  Ambition  ch.   i   p.  3. 

The  same  idea  seems  to  be  differently  expressed  by  the 
following  construction. 

The  democratic  method  is  not  infallible,  as  we  are  in 
process  of  discovering.  Observer,   30/10,  20. 

502.     The   present   progressive  is  also  used  to  refer  to 
future  time,  both  in  main  clauses  [a)  and  in  adverb  clauses  [b). 

a.  "What  are  you  doing  next  Sunday?" 
"We're  going  out  to  Epping  together." 
"Ah  —  and  the  Sunday  after  that?" 
"He  works  every  other  Sunday." 

Temple  Thurston,  Thirteen  III  p.  49  t. 
"I'm    sleeping    here    to-night,  you  know,  for  the  first 
time,"  said  Guy.  He  had  tried  all  the  way  back  not  to 
make  this  announcement,  but  the  sight  of  his  own  gate- 
way destroyed  his  reserve. 

Mackenzie,  Guy  and  Pauline  p.   ii. 
"Hallo,    Marsham !    Are    you    dining   here  to-night?" 
asked    the    newcomer.    —    "No,    I    was  just  going  out." 
Compton  Mackenzie,  Old  Men  of  the  Sea 
ch.   I   p.  9  f. 
Come    to-morrow    evening,    won't    you,    after  dinner? 
Heath  is  dining  with  me^).       Hichens,  Ambition  ch.  i. 

The    girl's    coming    out   in  three  days'  time.    They're 
giving  a  ball  ^)  in  Portland  Place  for  her.  Nobody  knows 
■  much  about  her.     Walpole,  Duchess  of  Wrexe  ch.  i  §  3. 


1)  The  time  is  indicated  in  the  preceding  sentence. 


PROGRESSIVE  345: 

The  English  Association  is  holding  its  annual  general 
meeting  on  January  1 2th  and  13th  at  University  College, 
Gower  Street.  Some  interesting  papers  and  discussions 
are  promised,  and  a  large  company  of  men  of  letters 
will  be  in  attendance.  Mr.  A.  C.  Bradley  is  delivering 
the  address  from  the  chair,  Prof.  Boas,  a  vice-president 
of  the  Association,  is  to  open  an  interesting  conference 
on  'The  Teaching  of  English  Composition'  on  Saturday. 
Dr.  "VV.  H.  D.  Rouse  is  to  read  a  short  paper.  On  Friday 
the  members  and  their  friends  are  dining  together  at  the 
Holborn  Restaurant.  Athenaeum  23/12,   ii. 

b.  I  shall  be  working  hard  when  you  are  enjoying 
yourself  in  England. 

503.  The  historical  present  progressive  is  rare. 

This  (pamphlet)  was  briefly  noticed  in  the  May  issue 
of  the  'Monthly  Review,'  where  Goldsmith  was  then 
acting  as  scribbler-general  to  Griffiths,  the  proprietor  of 
the  Magazine  .  .  .  ,  and  it  was  described  as  in  Montes- 
quieu's manner.  A  year  later  Goldsmith  is  writing 
mysteriously  to  his  friend  Bob  Bryanton,  of  Ballymulrey, 
in  Ireland,  about  a  'Chinese  whom  he  shall  soon  make 
talk  like  an  Englishman  .  .  .' 

Dobson,  Eighteenth  Century  Vignettes,  p.  152. 

504.  On  the  neutral  present  progressive  see  513  ff. 

505.  The  past  progressive  is  frequently  used  to  define 
the  time  of  another  action  or  occurrence. 

At  this  point  Oswald  ceased  to  read.  He  was  realizing 
that  these  words  meant  that  Dolly  was  dead. 

Wells,  Joan  and  Peter  ch.  6  §  2. 

But  meantime  journalism  was  giving  him  the  reputation 
that  literature  could  not  give,  and,  like  many  another 
man  of  letters,  he  was  being  loudly  acclaimed  for  work 
unworthy  his  talent.  Whibley,  Thackeray  p.  ^6. 

An  hour  later,  they  were  calmly  fishing  as  if  nothing 
had  happened.  Vachell,  Spragge  p.    164. 


346  VERBS 

They  (i.  e.  the  doctors)  stretched  me  out,  with  a  con- 
venient exposure  of  my  side,  and,  almost  before  I  realised 
what  was  happening,  the  chloroform  was  being  admi- 
nistered. Wells,  Country  p.   165. 

Mr.  Gibson  had  come  in  very  late,  and  was  having  a 
solitary  dinner  in  the  dining-room. 

Gaskell,  Wives  I  ch.   19. 

In  1880  California  was  emerging  from  its  mining  stage 
of  existence.  Times  W.  2/1,   14. 

But  even  in  the  earliest  forms  of  English  society  of 
which  we  catch  traces  this  right  of  self-defence  was 
being  modified  and  restricted  by  a  growing  sense  of 
public  justice.  Green,  Short  Hist.  p.  2. 

From  1750  to  1752  he  was  writing  The  Rambler,  a 
sort  of  newspaper  essay  which  appeared  every  Tuesday 
and  Friday. 

In  the  reign  of  Elizabeth  England  was  just  entering 
on  her  part  in  that  great  struggle  among  European 
peoples  for  the  dominion  and  exploitation  of  the  outlying 
and  recently  discovered  portions  of  the  planet,  which 
still  continues.  The  foundations  of  the  Empire  were 
being  laid  by  Drake  and  Hawkins  in  the  Atlantic. 

Seccombe  and  Allen,  Age  of  Shakesp.  p.  3. 

It  was  Saturday,  and  all  over  the  Square  little  stalls, 
with  yellow  linen  roofs,  were  being  erected  for  the 
principal  market  of  the  week. 

Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  I  ch.  3  §  4. 
When  Monica  and  Margaret  were  being  critical .  .  . 
Mackenzie,  Guy  and  Pauline  p.   58. 
Where    now    is    the    fame    of  Herbert   Spencer  who, 
forty  years  ago,  was  being  translated  into  all  languages? 
Bailey,   Question  of  Taste  p.    10. 
He    was   drinking,  they  said,  and  his  farm  was  going 
to    ruin,    and    he   would   speak    to   nobody  —  and  they 
shook  their  heads.  Walpole  Fort.  I  ch.  7  p.  80. 

The    last  quotation   shows   clearly  the  limited  duration 
expressed  by  the  progressive:  drank  v^'ould  certainly  make 


PROGRESSIVE  347 

a    great    difference,    for   it   would   express   the  permanent 
character  of  the  vice. 


506.     Both  the  perfect  (a)  and  the  past  perfect  (b)  occur 
very  frequently  in  the  progressive  form. 

a.  The  broad  process  of  change  which  has  now  been 
going  on  continuously  for  some  years  is  one  of  rising 
guaranteed  earnings,  shortening  hours,  and  slackening 
effort.  It  cannot  go  on  indefinitely  without  causing 
economic  disaster,  which  is,  in  fact,  already  in  progress. 
Works  are  closing  down,  because  it  it  impossible  to 
cover  the  cost  of  production  by  sales,  and  unemployment 
is  beginning  to  make  itself  seriously  felt. 

The  Mail  22/9,   20. 

The  changes  in  the  Ministry  announced  this  morning 
should  dispose  of  the  crop  of  rumours  with  which  the 
Conservative  Press  has  been  entertaining  its  readers  for 
some  time  past.  Daily  News   14/2,    12. 

Delightful  people  —  I've  been  seeing  a  great  deal  of 
them  lately.  Cotes,  Cinderella  ch.  7  p.  81. 

You  already  know  we  have  been  having  an  exciting 
time  here.  Times  W.  7/12,   17. 

Notoriously  the  novelist  (including  the  playwright, 
who  is  a  sub-novelist)  has  been  taking  bread  out  of  the 
mouths  of  other  artists. 

Bennett,  Eng.  Rev.  June   191 3. 
We  are  at  present  being  borne  up  on  a  wave  of  good 
trade,    and    we    have  been  having  the  strikes  associated 
with  it,  many  in  number  and  large  in  extent. 

Times  W.  6/12,   12. 
Two    or    three    times    I    have  been  beginning  to  talk 
about  it,  and  forgetting  you  weren't  to  know. 

Montgomery,  Misunderstood. 

d.  Peter's  mother  had  been  moaning  but  now  she 
moaned  no  more  . .  .  All  night  Peter's  father  had  been 
thinking  what  an  imperfect  husband  he  had  always  been. 

Wells,  Joan  and  Peter  p.   i  f. 


348  VERBS 

Mr.  Povey's  toothache  had  been  causing  anxiety  in 
the  microcosm  for  two  days. 

Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  I  ch.   i   §  2. 

The    camp    at    which    his  letters  met  him  was  in  the 
Busoga    country,    and    all    day  long  the  expedition  had 
been  tramping  between  high  banks  of  big-leaved  plants. 
Wells,  Joan  and  Peter  ch.  6  §  2. 

But  while  the  county  court  was  thus  losing  its  high 
place  as  a  judicial  tribunal,  it  had  been  becoming  the 
very  foundation  of  the  political  constitution. 

Maitland,  Const.  Hist.  p.  43. 

They  were  full  of  welcome,  full  of  curiosity.  All 
through  the  long  day  they  had  been  missing  their  bright 
young  visitor,  and  three  or  four  times  in  every  hour 
they  had  been  wondering  and  settling  what  everybody 
was  doing  at  that  exact  minute, 

Gaskell,  Wives  I  ch.   14. 

All  this  time,  while  the  father  was  fretting  and  fuming 
in  his  arm-chair,  the  son,  the  unlucky  cause  of  all  this 
discomtort,  had  been  standing  on  the  mat  outside  the 
door,  trying  to  screw  up  enough  courage  to  go  in  as  if 
nothing  was  the  matter  with  him. 

Anstey,  Vice  Versa  ch.   i. 

The  boy  in  blue  had  been  looking  over  his  shoulder 
at  a  black  barge  advancing  slowly,  towed  by  a  gaunt 
white  horse.  Wells,  Country  p.   172. 

507.  The  future  tenses  are  also  used  in  the  progressive 
forms,  but  the  meaning  is  seldom  the  one  mentioned  until 
now  (a).  The  progressive  future  generally  differs  from 
the  non-progressive  forms  in  drawing  attention  to  the 
process  of  the  action  or  state;  it  is  more  descriptive,  re- 
presenting the  future  event  as  the  result  of  causes  which 
are  independent  of  the  speaker's  will  ^). 

a.  You  won't  be  having  to  go  down  to  the  shop 
much  longer.  Walpole,  Fortitude  II  ch.  4  p.   113. 


1)  Sweet,  JVew  English  Grammar  2251. 


PROGREESSIVE  349 

b.  I  am  very  busy  and  must  stop ;  but  Tom  says  he 
will  be  writing  to  you  next  week. 

I  know  if  I  wait  much  longer,  I  shall  be  telling  you 
the  secret  before  I  can  stop  myself. 

Montgomery,  Misunderstood  p.  8i. 
When    do    you    suppose    you'll  be  giving  me  another 
shilling,  father?  ib.  p.  82. 

After  a  few  chapters  we  find  ourselves  wondering, 
not  what  will  happen  next  in  the  way  in  which  ordinary 
story-wrights  arouse  our  wonder,  but  what  the  folk 
will  be  saying  or  doing  next. 

W.  Jerrold,  Meredith,  p.    146. 
"Ten  years  hence,"  he  said,   "if  Reardon  is  still  alive, 
I  shall  be  lending  him  five-pound  notes." 

Gissing,  New  Grub  Street  ch.   i  1). 
"Don't    go    on    talking   so    fast,"    said  Molly.     "Rest. 
No  one  will  interrupt  us ;  I  will  go  on  with  my  sewing ; 
when  you  want  to  say  anything  more  I  shall  be  listening." 

Gaskell,  Wives  III  p.  79. 
But    Sheila    touched    his    arm,    and    he   stopped  very 
suddenly.      "She    doesn't    trust    us.     I    shall    always    be 
being  pushed  away  from  him  by  her." 

Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.  9. 
"I  shall  be  going  to  Paris  soon,"  she  said.   "When  I'm 
there  I'll  look  her  up."        Sidgwick,  Severinb  p.    185. 

If  miners  and  mineowners  prove  able  to  devise  a 
system,  along  the  lines  agreed  upon  last  week,  they 
will  be  opening  a  new  phase  of  industrial  history  2). 

Observer,  31/10,  20. 
"When  will  you  be  going  back,  sir  ?"  asked  the  driver. 
And  Mr.  Brumley  reflected  too  briefly  and  committed 
a    fatal    error.      "No,"   he  said  with  his  mind  upon  that 
loose  silver.     "We  shall  go  back  by  train." 

Wells,  Harman  ch.  6^5. 


1)  The    non-progressive    /  shall    lend    would    be    impossible;    it    would 
suggest  the  speaker's  intention. 

2)  i.  e.  this  will  be  the  effect. 


350  VERBS 

We  should  not  be  doing  our  duty  by  the  pubhc  if 
we  echoed  without  considerable  qualification  the  expres- 
sion of  pleased  surprise  with  which  the  House  of  Com- 
mons   on    Tuesday    received    Mr.    Bonar    Law's  figures. 

Times  W.   2/1 1,    17. 

I  knew  that  as  soon  as  my  father  had  got  to  Swit- 
zerland he  would  be  wanting  to  push  on  to  Italy. 

Sweet,   Element,  no.   'j-^. 

Those  reeds  burn  like  thatch,  and  if  the  poor  devils 
ran  out  they  got  stabbed  or  shot,  and  if  they  went  into 
the  water  the  crocodiles  would  be  getting  them. 

Wells,  Joan  and  Peter  ch.   3  §  3. 

It  was  part  of  the  etiquette  of  the  shop  that  customers, 
at  any  rate  chance  customers,  should  not  exist  for  the 
daughters  of  the  house,  until  an  assistant  had  formally 
drawn  attention  to  them.  Otherwise  every  one  who 
wanted  a  pennyworth  of  tape  would  be  expecting  to  be 
served  by  Miss  Baines  or  Miss  Sophia,  if  Miss  Sophia 
were  there.  Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  I  ch.  5   §  4. 

Who  could  have  foretold  ten  years  ago  that  Joan 
would  have  been  declaring  with  tears  in  her  voice  but 
much  stiffness  in  her  manner  that  she  had  "stood  enough" 
from  Peter.  Wells,  Joan  and  Peter  ch.   11   §  i . 

He  rose.  "Ah,  well,  tea  will  be  getting  cold.  Good 
day,  Miss   Winter."         Niven,  Porcelain  Lady  p.    lOO. 

"...  Had  your  tea,  Mr.  Brough.?" 

"No  —  it  will  be  waiting  I  expect.   It's  after  four  now." 
ib.  p.    142  (same  speaker  in  both  cases)  i). 

The  watcher  wondered,  with  a  little  prick  of  jealousy, 
what    they    would    be    discussing  in  the  large  bedroom. 
Bennett,  Old  W.  T.  II  ch.  2  §  2. 

508.  The  progressive  is  also  used  in  the  non-future 
tenses  in  this  descriptive  function.  Indeed  it  may  be  that 
this  is  the  fundamental  function  of  the  progressive,  whereas 
the  function  that  has  given  rise  to  the  name  'progress  ive'  is 


\)  Observe  that  the  last  three  quotations  illustrate  the  future  of  inforence. 


PROGRESSIVE  35 1 

only  due  to  the  context.  It  should  be  added,  however, 
that  the  progressive  function  is  the  usual  one  in  the 
present  and  the  preterite. 

In    the    following   quotations   the   progressive  has  a  de- 
scriptive function. 

"We're  simply  loving  it  here"  2),  Stella  said. 

Sinister  Street  p.  987. 

We're  hoping  you  will  be  able  to  come  and  dine  with 
us  for  Twelfth  Night.  ib.  p.  98S. 

Alan  was  evidently  pleased  that  he  was  being  able  to 
show  Stella  his  own  college.  ib.  p.   813. 

Michael  was  relieved  when  Alan  offered  to  drive  his 
mother  and  Stella  back  to  the  Randolph.  He  was  not 
wishing  for  company  that  morning,  but  rather  to  walk 
slowly  down  to  college  alone.  ib.  p.  818. 

The    other    day    an  intelligent  London  bookseller  was 
lamenting    that    he    scarcely  ever  sold  a  copy  of  Burns. 
Times  Lit.  21/1,    15   (introductory  sentence). 

Guy  looked  doubtful.  It  was  seeming  a  pity  to  waste 
this  afternoon  without  unpacking  a  single  case. 

Mackenzie,   Guy  and  Pauline  ch.   i   p.  9. 

And  how  have  you  been  spending  the  money.'' 

Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  II  ch.  4. 

No  doubt  we  could,  if  necessary,  carry  on  for  a  time 
without  the  press;  and  I  agree  with  those  newspaper 
writers  who  have  been  saying  recently  that  the  impor- 
tance of  the  press  is  monstrously  exaggerated  by  some 
of  its  critics.  Raleigh,  War  and  the  Press  p.  8. 

When  I  call  something  or  somebody  'vulgar,'  what 
precisely  (as  Mr.  T.  S.  Eliot  would  critically  ask)  am  I 
saying.?  Huxley,  Vulg.  p.    i. 

Stephen  caught  him  by  the  arm  and  held  him.  The 
old  dog  came  from  under  the  table  and  wagged  his  tail. 

"Bless    my    soul,"    said  Stephen,  looking  at  him :   "all 


i)  i.  e.  loving  to  live  here. 


352  VERBS 

these    weeks    I've   been  forgetting  him.     I've  been  in  a 
kind  of  dream,  boy  —  a  kind  o'  dream.' 

Walpole,  Fort.  I  ch.  7  §  2  p.  84  f. 

509.     The    progressive    imperative    is   chiefly   found   in 
negative  sentences,  but  it  is  httle  used. 

Don't   be  talking.  Let  me  just  suck  this  in  as  we  go 
along.  Phillpotts,  Beacon  I  ch.  5. 

„     ^    J.    ,.  510.     In    the    preceding    sections    the   pro- 

Non-Predicative  .        ,        ,  •„  ■,  ■      ^      r        ■ 

gressive  has  been  illustrated  in  the  function 
Prosrcssivc 

of   a    verbal   predicate,    including   the  verbal 

groups  with  the  participle  (perfect)  and  the  plain  stem 
(future).  But  we  also  find  the  form  in  the  non- predicative 
functions  of  the  verb,  both  with  the  plain  stem  and  the 
stem  with  to.  The  progressive  ing  is  so  rare  as  to  be 
negligible.  It  is  sufficient  to  show  its  possibility  by  giving 
one  of  the  few  quotations  met  with  (all  in  Jane  Austen) 
in  the  course  of  a  quarter  of  a  century's  reading. 

To  be  driven  by  him,  next  to  being  dancing  with  him, 
was  certainly  the  greatest  happiness  in  the  world. 

Jane  Austen,   Northanger  Abbey  ch.   20. 

511.  The  progressive  plain  stem  has  been  illustrated 
with  the  auxiliaries  shall  and  will  in  507.  It  is  also  found 
with  the  other  auxiliaries  that  take  the  plain  stem,  but 
never  in  the  object  with  stem  construction. 

We'd  better  be  going  back,  or  they'll  be  there  before  us. 

Sweet,  Spoken  Eng.  p.  85. 
And    it    happens    that    I    have    money    that    I    must 
presently  be  leaving,  and  never  a  child  have  I  to  leave 
it  to.  Wells,  Country  p.   140. 

It  is  a  strange  thing,  he  says  in  another  letter,  that, 
because  she  is  handsome,  he  must  be  always  giving  her 
an  account  of  every  trifle  and  minute  of  his  time. 

Dobson,  Vignettes,  p.  21. 


PROGRESSIVE  353 

By  1.30  I  must  have  been  being  introduced  in  the 
dark,  large  hall  of  the  place  to  Miss  Heimann  and  Miss 
Jeaffreson,   who  had  been  getting  their  things  on. 

F.  M.  Ford,  The  Marsden  Case  ch.  2  p.   18. 

On  the  last  example,  compare  520. 

512.  The  progressive  stem  with  to  is  more  frequent 
than  the  plain  stem,  in  nearly  all  the  functions  of  the  stem 
with  to,  except  in  free  adjuncts  and  exclamations  (a);  it 
is  of  hmited  use  in  the  object  with  stem  {b).  The  durative 
aspect  of  the  ing  naturally  prevents  its  being  ever  used 
to  express  aim;  nor  is  it  used  in  the  object  with  stem 
depending  upon  verbs  of  cause  or  will. 

a.  We  didn't  know  anything  about  towns,  and  Ma 
had  made  us  very  excited  by  talking  about  the  rich 
people  we  were  going  to  know  —  and  marry.  She 
always  used  to  be  talking  about  marriage.  She  doesn't 
do  it  so  much  now. 

Gilbert  Cannan,  Round  the  Corner,  p.  93. 
I  suspect  M.  Mermeix  of  laughing  at  us  even  when  he 
professes  to  be  admiring,  for  he  is  the  kind  of  man  that 
would  speak  disrespectfully  of  the  Equator.     Daily  Mail. 

Nothing  looks  worse  in  a  boy  than  to  be  always 
intruding  where  he's  not  wanted. 

Pett  Ridge,  Name  of  Garland  ch.    10,  p.    167. 
Mr.    Webb    looked    rather    grave   and   seemed   to  be 
thinking  the  matter  over.       Sweet,  Spoken  Engl.  p.  52. 

On   such  a  night  it  seemed  more  than  ever  romantic 
to  be  setting  out  to  Spain.         Sinister  Street  p.  ^^6. 
I  cannot  bear  to  be  always  suspecting  people. 

Sweet,  Sp.  Engl.  p.  'i'^. 
How  did  you  come  to  be  taking  my  pheasant's  nest.'' 

ib.  p.  65. 
You    are    much   too    young  yet  to  be  meeting  young 
men.  Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  p.   127. 

There  is  no  need  to  be  always  bringing  up  your  age  on 
every  possible  occasion.     Gaskell,  Wives  I  ch.  8  p.  138. 
Kruisinga,  Handbook  II.  Accidence  and  Syntax.  1.  23 


354  VERBS 

To  be  rising  is  in  many  respects  more  agreeable  than 
to  have  risen.  J.  O.  Hobbes,  Emotions  II  ch.  3. 

It  was  perhaps  that  Clare  had  always  had  a  cloud 
of  young  men  about  her,  perhaps  that  Peter  was  thought 
to  be  having  too  wonderful  a  time,  just  now,  to  be 
falling  in  love  as  well  —  that  would  be  piling  Life  on 
to  Life !  .  .  .  no  one  could  live  under  it. 

Walpole,  Fort.  Ill  ch.  3  p.  258. 

Can  you  tell  me  where  the  lists  are  for  football?  I 
ought  to  have  been  playing  yesterday,  only  I  didn't 
know  where  to  look.  ib.  I  ch.   5   p.   51. 

Early  one  summer  morning  in  England,  in  the  year 
1893  in  the  reign  —  which  seemed  in  those  days  to 
have  been  going  on  for  ever  and  to  be  likely  to  go  on 
for  evermore  —  of  Queen  Victoria  there  was  born  a 
little  boy  named  Peter.  Wells,  Joan  and  Peter  p.  i. 

b.  It  (viz.  Mrs.  B's  death)  might  be  soon,  for  I  can 
see  worthy  Mrs.   Bonner  to  be  breaking  visibly. 

Meredith,  Harrington  ch.   19  p.  204. 

„     .  ,  ,,      .  513.     The  progressive,  as  has  been  stated 

Special  Meanings     .      ^  ^  ,°  '  ,        . 

,    .  in   500,   generally  expresses    duration,   al- 

n  .  though   this    may    not   be  its  fundamental 

Progressive  °  .      -^  ,  •  ,,     ,       , 

meaning,  as  is  suggested  especially  by  the 

progressive  forms  with  shall  and  will  (507).  The  progressive 
when  implying  duration  always  refers  to  a  limited  time, 
but  it  may  be  used  with  such  adverb  adjuncts  as  always, 
constantly,  perpetually,  ete.  expressing  repetition  [a).  Some- 
times there  is  no  adverb,  the  sense  being  implied  by 
another  element  of  the  sentence  ij?). 

a.  We  are  always  saying  that  boys  and  girls  must 
think  for  themselves,  yet  they  are  rarely  allowed  to  do  so. 

Perse  Playbooks  no  2.  p.   2. 

Our  Vienna  Correspondent  says  he  is  constantly  being 
asked:  —  "Is  there  no  means  of  avoiding  war?"  The 
same  question  is  now  being  asked,  with  some  bewilder- 
ment, by  millions  of  men  in  this  country.     Times  W. 


PROGRESSIVE  355 

It  is  an  old  story  and  one  that  is  always  being 
renewed.  Times  Lit.  20/1,   16. 

This  elusive  line  between  journalism  and  literature  is 
always  appearing  and  always  fading  away. 

ib.    16/9,    15. 

Only  he  has  rather  a  peculiar  temper.  He  is  per- 
petually getting  angry  with  no  ostensible  reason  —  and 
then  he  glares  at  one  like  an  angry  cat. 

Crawford,  Lonely  Parish  ch.  9. 

The  curfew  is  being  rung  at  Wigan  every  evening 
as  a  warning  for  the  subduing  of  lights. 

Times  W.   1916. 

From  the  Riga  region  to  that  of  Jacobstadt,  on  the 
Eastern  front,  Russian  attacks  are  being  made  with 
persistence.  ib.    12/1,    17. 

And  every  week  he  was  being  offered  these  "cripples." 

Vachell,  Ouinneys'  p.    171. 

Her  benevolence  was  eternally  rising  up  and  over- 
powering her  reason.        Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  p.  24. 

If  he  rarely  spoke  to  me  of  Charis  Darley,  although 
they  were  meeting  almost  daily,  it  was  not  because  he 
then  mistrusted  me.     White,  Mr.  John  Strood  p.  192, 

"That  is  the  same  drug  that  I  was  always  bringing 
him,"  said  Poole.  Stevenson,  Dr.  Jekyll,  p.  S^. 

Where  he  got  the  phrase  I  do  not  know,  but  he 
liked  it,  and  was  always  repeating  it. 

Rutherford,  Autobiography  p.  44. 

Some  of  my  abodes  I  have  utterly  forgotten ;  for  one 
reason  or  another  I  was  always  moving. 

Gissing,  Ryecroft  X, 

He  had  seen  the  death-like  pallor  on  his  wife's  face ; 
not  a  new  sight,  and  one  which  had  been  presented  to 
him  gradually  enough,  but  which  was  now  always  giving 
him  a  fresh  shock.  Gaskell,  Wives  I  ch.    17. 

Sam  Figgis  had  hung  holly  about  the  walls  and 
dangled  a  huge  bunch  of  mistletoe  from  the  middle 
beam,  and  poor  Jane  Clewer  was  always  walking  under 
it  accidentally  and  waiting  a  little,  but  nobody  kissed  her. 

Walpole,  Fort.  I  ch.   i  p.  5. 


356  VERBS 

Clare  spends  her  days  in  successive  enthusiasms. 
She's  always  being  enthusiastic  —  dreadful  disillusions 
in  between  the  heights.  ib.  Ill  ch.  3  p.  261. 

The  difficulties  of  getting  and  sending  money  seem 
to  have  been  great  indeed,  and  Ralph  and  his  father 
were  always  lending  money  to  impecunious  friends  who 
take  a  long  time  to  return  it,  if  at  all. 

Mem.  Verney  Fam.  I  p.  229. 

The  shell  of  the  house  on  Robin  Hill  was  thus  com- 
pleted by  the  end  of  April.  Now  that  there  was  something 
to  be  seen  for  his  money,  he  had  been  coming  down 
once,  twice,  even  three  times  a  week,  and  would  mouse 
about  among  the  debris  for  hours. 

Galsworthy,  Man  of  Property  II  ch.  i. 

Thus  between  1560  and  1580  the  influence  of  Italy 
was  suggesting  to  English  dramatists  an  ever  widening 
range    of    choice  in  character  and  subject  .  .  . 

Seccombe  and  Allen,  Shakespeare  I  p.   12, 

b.  As  a  result  of  the  Turkish  defeats,  there  is  consi- 
derable unrest  among  the  native  population  in  India. 
Hindu  agitators^  joined  by  Mahometans,  are  holding 
meetings,  at  which  violent  speeches  are  being  delivered. 

Everyman. 

514.  There  is  no  doubt  that  in  all  these  sentences 
repetition  is  meant  to  be  understood.  But  that  is  not  saying 
that  repetition  is  really  expressed,  at  any  rate  expressed 
by  the  progressive  form  of  the  verb. 

In  most  of  the  sentences  there  is  an  adverb  of  time 
{always,  perpetually,  for  ever)  which  is  essentially  used 
to  express  continuation.  We  must  therefore  conclude  that 
the  progressive  has  its  usual  meaning  here. 

But  it  is  also  true  that  the  speakers,  though  they  express 
continuation,  do  not  really  mean  the  hearer  to  understand 
that  as  literally  true.  Thus,  if  we  say  of  a  man:  he  is 
always  grumbling  and  complaining,  we  express  a  continuous 
action,  although  it  is  really  something  that  is  repeated  so 
regularly  that  it  only  seems  to  be  continuous. 


PROGRESSIVE  35/ 

Another  proof  that  it  is  not  the  progressive  that  conveys 
the  idea  of  repetition,  is  supplied  by  the  sentences  where 
the  non-progressive  form  expresses  the  same  meaning,  as 
in  the  following  sentence. 

I  constantly  remark,  both  in  our  popular  histories 
and  in  occasional  allusions  to  the  eighteenth  century, 
what  a  faint  and  confused  impression  that  period  has 
left  upon  the  national  memory. 

Seeley,  Expansion  Lect.  II  p.  20. 

We  also  find  both  forms  in  the  same  sentences. 

Dolf  was  continually  getting  into  scrapes;  his  mother 
was  incessantly  harassed  with  complaints. 

W.  Irving,  Sketch-Book. 

A  man  who  thinks  much  about  success  must  be  the 
drowsiest  sentimentalist ;  for  he  must  be  always  looking 
back.  If  he  only  likes  victory  he  must  always  come  late 
for  the  battle.  Chesterton,  What's  Wrong  with 

the  World  (T)  p.   18. 

515.  Sometimes  the  progressive  seems  to  contribute  to 
the  expression  of  personal  interest. 

Our  forefathers,  those  extremely  wise  forefathers  who 
are  always  being  held  up  to  us  foolish  sons  as  examples 
and  shining  lights,  had  a  custom  of  inscribing  over  the 
doors,  etc.  Garvice,  Staunch  as  a  Woman,  p.  5. 

This  Age,  we  are  always  being  told,  is  sceptical  and 
materialistic ;  and  so  in  many  of  its  aspects  it  is. 

Times  W. 

He  had  an  unfailing  source  of  pride  in  his  wife,  who 
was  really  beautiful  and  had  frequently  been  likened  to 
the  Marquise  in  Caste,  a  play  which  his  daughters  were 
always  performing  in  the  cause  of  charity. 

Cannan,  Corner,  p.  31. 

Minna  was  decidedly  pretty,  with  a  wide  delightful 
grin  and  a  mocking  humour.  The  most  serious  and 
solemn  young  men  were  always  proposing  to  her,  but 
she  always  refused  them  or  became  engaged  to  them  for 


358     '  VERBS 

about    a    week.    Her    betrothals    hardly  ever  seemed  to 
survive  the  visit  to  their  families.  ib.  p.   59. 

Frederic  was  always  sending  in  small  bills  that  were 
too  large  for  his  (i.e.  the  father's)  small  earnings. 

ib.  p.  60. 

She  did  not  care  about  golf,  and  to-day  the  mere 
sound  of  the  name  irritated  her.  Englishmen  were  always 
playing  golf,  she  said  to  herself. 

Hichens,  Ambition  ch.   15. 

He  was  a  marvel  of  tact  and  good  nature.  "My  wife 
is  unfortunately  not  here,  and  the  house  is  rather  at 
sixes  and  sevens;  but  I  have  sent  out  for  some  tea." 
She  followed  him  downstairs  into  the  parlour.  He  poured 
out  a  cup  of  tea. 

"I  was  forgetting,"  she  said.  "I  am  forbidden  tea. 
I  mustn't  drink  it." 

Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  IV,  ch.  4  §  3. 

"And  when  you're  not  bored  with  anybody,"  said 
Monica,   "you're  rather  apt  to  make  that  too  obvious  also." 

"Monica,  why  are  you  saying  that?"  Pauline  asked 
with  wide  open  eyes. 

Mackenzie,  Guy  and  Pauline  p.    100. 

516.  There  is  no  doubt  that  these  sentences  express 
the  writer's  interest,  sometimes  impatience,  as  in  several 
of  the  quotations,  or  humour,  as  in  the  one  about  Minna. 
But  it  is  the  context  that  causes  this  meaning.  The  function 
of  the  progressive  is  here  to  express  continuation  or  to 
be  descriptive. 

If  in  the  sentence  about  Minna  the  author  had  said  that 
many  young  men  proposed  to  her,  he  would  have  stated 
a  bare  fact.  But  the  progressive  were  always  proposing 
conjures  up  a  most  humorous  picture  of  the  never-ending 
procession  of  these  would-be  lovers. 

517.  The  verbal  ing,  being  a  nominal  form  of  the  verb, 
does   not   express  its  relation  to  the  agent  or  'subject'  in 


PROGRESSIVE  359 

the  way  a  predicative  verb  does  (153).  The  consequence 
of  this  is  that  the  progressive  can  be  used  in  a  way  that 
makes  the  verb  intransitive,  although  the  predicative  forms 
of  the  verb  always  express  a  transitive  meaning. 

The  house  has  been  building  for  some  months. 

Your  book  is  binding. 

Guns  were  firing  and  trumpets  blowing. 

Hope,  Zenda. 

The  other  oven  was  firing.       Bennett,  Anna  ch.  8. 

The  next  day  Edward  resumed  his  forester's  dress, 
while  another  one  was  preparing  for  him. 

Marryat,  New  Forest  ch.   24. 

At  the  very  moment  that  this  painful  piece  of  perfidy 
was  acting  inside  the  prison  walls,  Henson  was  himself 
on  his  way  to  London. 

Hammond,  Town  Labourer  p.  255. 

From  that  distant  tower  he  kept  a  surprisingly  close 
watch  upon  what  was  doing  among  the  bookmen. 

But  meanwhile  the  seeds  of  a  mighty  revolution  were 
sowing.  Freeman,  Norman  Conquest  I,   39. 

All  the  substantialities  of  his  scheme  of  policy,  most 
of  its  details,  even,  had  been  tossing  about  in  the  public 
journals  and  other  channels  of  information  for  days 
before.  Pilot   10/12,    1903. 

"But  you  will  allow  that  in  matters  musical  my  opinion 
is  worth  something,  my  serious  and  deliberately  formed 
opinion." 

"How  long  has  this  opinion  been  forming?" 

"Some  months."  Hichens,  Ambition  ch.   i. 

The  sneer  at  St.  Luke's  Square  was  his  characteristic 
expression  of  an  opinion  which  had  been  slowly  forming 
for  some  years.     Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  II  ch.  7  §  i. 

In  brief,  something  new  had  come  to  the  front  and 
was  submitting  to  the  ordeal  of  the  curse.  ib.  ib. 

It  is  true  that  the  actual  machinery  of  educational 
reform  is  shaping  very  slowly.      Times  Ed.  S.  28/9,  16. 


360  VERBS 

The  warm  weather  always  sets  me  up  in  a  wonderful 
way;  but  alas!  our  days  in  Hampstead  for  this  summer 
are  numbering  i)  —  for  on  July  i  I  am  due  as  usual 
in  Bristol.  Ainger,  Life  p,   i6i. 

National  states  were  forming. 

Pollard,  Hist,  of  Engl.  p.  88. 

These  uses  of  the  ing  are  clearly  identical  with  the 
meaning  of  printing  as  an  adjunct  in  the  following  sentence. 

Dick  once  asked  a  maid 
To  be  his  (so  it's  said) 
While  the  photos  were  finishing  printing  — 

Jessie  Pope  in  Van  Doom,  Golden  Hours  II,  122. 

518.  In  some  cases  a  verb  may  be  used  both  transitively 
and  intransitively  in  the  simple  predicative  forms  as  well  as 
in  the  progressive,  but  many  verbs  are  chiefly  used  in- 
transitively in  the  progressive.  Thus  to  publish  is  indeed 
found  used  intransitively  in  the  simple  forms,  but  only 
exceptionally,  whereas  the  intransitive  progressive  is  quite 
frequent. 

Who  know  the  London  newspapers?  How  many 
outside  a  strictly  commercial  circle  are  aware  that  the 
Public  Ledger,  to  which  Oliver  Goldsmith  contributed 
the  'Citizen  of  the  World'  papers,  still  publishes  each 
morning  on  Tower  Hill,  in  its   ISS''^  year? 

Athenaeum  28/9  '12. 

A  collection  of  photographic  views  is  now  publishing 
by  the  Werner  Company. 

519.  As  a  personal  subject  may  cause  the  verb  to  be 
taken  in  a  transitive  meaning,  it  is  natural  that  the  subject 
of  the  sentence  should  rarely  be  a  name  of  a  person  when 
the  verb  is  used  intransitively.  But  a  personal  subject  is 
possible. 


1)  Italics  in  the  original. 


PROGRESSIVE  $6^ 

How  is  that  Mrs.  Gilchrist  shaping  as  a  nurse? 

Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  II  ch.  3. 

But  the  thoughtful  woman  teacher  would  herself  be 
the  first  to  acknowledge  that  for  the  effective  training 
of  elder  boys  and  of  the  youths  who  fill  our  continuation 
schools  masters  are  really  indispensable.  The  plain  truth 
is  that  they  are  not  offering.     Times  Ed.  S.   17/7,  19. 

520.  The  progressive  when  making  a  verb  assume  an 
intransitive  meaning  is  an  alternative  to  the  passive  of 
occurrence  {ts  bemg  done).  It  has  been  shown  in  the 
preceding  sections  that  this  form  is  freely  used  in  English; 
it  is,  indeed,  more  usual  than  the  construction  with  the 
simple  ing  illustrated  in  517 — 9,  which  is  limited  to  some 
traditional  groups  and  is  perhaps  Hterary  rather  than 
colloquial. 

When  activity  is  to  be  expressed  the  passive  group 
must  be  used.  The  last  quotation  of  518,  though  there 
is  an  adjunct  with  by,  does  not  express  activity;  the  adjunct 
is  one  of  means  and  does  not  denote  the  agent. 

The  progressive  passive  is  rather  cumbersome,  and 
when  the  verb  group  contains  have,  shall,  or  zvill,  the 
construction  becomes  too  complicated  {has  been  being  done, 
will  be  being  done)  to  be  used  other  than  exceptionally. 
An  example  has  been  given  in  507  b  in  the  quotation 
from  Galsworthy,  another  in  the  last  example  of  511. 

„   .         ,        J  .    xu        521.     Some   verbs    are    rarely    used 
Verbs  not  used  m  the  .      ,  .  ,,i     -r-.  • 

„  .  m  the  progressive  or  not  at  all  M.    I  his 

Progressive  , 

may  be : 

(1)  because  they  are  not  usually  connected  with  a  limited 
time.  Such  are  many  verbs  expressing  feelings  and 
mental  or  physical  perceptions  (not  sensations): 
to  love,   to  hate,  to  detest,  to  like,  to  prefer,  to  see^ 


\)  Palmer,  Grammar  of  Spoken  English  p.  149. 


362  VERBS 

to  hear,  to  believe;  also  to  belong,  to  consist,  to  con- 
tain, to  possess,  to  resemble,  to  suffice. 
(2)  because  they  are  purely  perfective :  to  think  (i.  e.  be 
of  opinion),  to  persuade,  to  accept,  to  forgive,  to  re- 
cognize, to  result,  to  understand. 

Some  of  the  verbs  of  the  first  group  can  also  express 
an  activity  depending  upon  a  person's  will;  in  that  case 
the  progressive  can  be  used,  naturally.  For  an  example, 
see  508,  the  first  quotation  {love  means  'to  enjoy'  there), 
and  the  following. 

He  is  hearing  lectures  on  political  economy. 

Far  off,  an  owl  hooted,  an  otter  barked;  and  then  as 
he    crossed    the    middle    of  the  orchard  he  was  hearing 
nothing    but    apples    fall    with    solemn    thud,    until    the 
noise  of  the  lock-gate  swallowed  all  lighter  sounds. 
Mackenzie,   Guy  and  Pauline  p.   22. 

That's  because  you  don't  know  any,  said  Christopher, 
who  wasn't  liking  Lewes  at  that  moment. 

Love,  by  Elizabeth  and  her  German  Garden  p.  20. 

Guy  laughed.  Misgivings  about  the  wisdom  of  his 
choice  vanished,  and  he  was  being  conscious  of  a  very 
intimate  pleasure  in  thus  driving  back  to  Wychford 
from  the  station.       Mackenzie,  Guy  and  Pauline  p.  14  f. 

"But  I  mean,  brother,  dreaming  is  what  I  detest  so." 

"Don't  be  detesting,  my  dear;  reserve  your  strength," 
said  he.  Meredith,  Amazing  Marriage  p.  43. 

A  great  many  quotations  of  the  progressive  of  verbs 
of  the  first  group  have  been  given  by  van  der  Gaaf  in 
Englische  Studien  vol.  62  p.  405.  I  repeat  the  following, 
suggesting  the  possibility  at  the  same  time  that  some  of 
the  examples  of  the  construction  in  George  Eliot  may  be 
dialectal:  it  is  probably  not  chance  that  van  der  Gaaf  has 
found  so  many  in  her  novels,  because,  as  he  points  out 
himself,  the  progressive  is  far  more  frequent  in  dialectal 
than  in  Standard  English. 


PROGRESSIVE  363 

Violet  Campion  is  hating  me  pretty  badly,  and  —  she  — 
is  thinking  it  clever  to  follow  suit. 

Ethel  Dell,  Keeper  of  the  Door  p.   196. 
"Were  you  wishing  to  see  Mr.  Blackburn?" 

Beatrice  Harraden,  Interplay  (T.)  II  p.  218. 
In  my  mind's  eye  I  was  seeing  my  dear  girl  as  if  by 
flashes  of  lightning.  Hall  Caine,  Drink  III. 

I  believe  half  his  time  he  was  seeing  visions. 

H.  Ward,  Elsmere  VI. 

He  was  believing  that  he  should  triumph. 

Eliot,  Deronda  ch.   27. 

Mrs.  Arrowpoint,  who  was  hearing  this  dialogue,  per- 
ceived quite  a  new  tone  in  Gwendolen's  speech,    ib.  ch.  5. 

The  same  explanation  may  account  for  the  progressive 
of  to  see  in  the  following  quotation;  but  perhaps  it  was 
used  only  to  make  the  sentence  more  descriptive. 

And  anyone  who  saw  her  would  have  wondered  what 
on  earth  she  might  be  seeing,  gazing  out  with  her  dark, 
glowing  eyes.  Galsworthy,  Freelands,  Prologue. 

If  a  verb  is  purely  momentaneous  the  durative  pro- 
gressive cannot  be  used;  yet  a  verb  hke  to  persuade  is 
used  in  the  progressive.  The  result  is  that  the  meaning 
changes:  /  was  persuading  him  to  come  with  us  means 
/  was  trying  to  persuade  him^).  Apart  from  this  case, 
however,  purely  momentaneous  verbs  are  rarely  used  in 
the  progressive. 

The  progressive  of  to  think  in  the  following  quotation 
is  not  durative  but  descriptive. 

You've  known  each  other  for  some  time,  I'm  thinking.''  — 
Why,    yes,    we    have,    indeed;    though    it  is  only  lately 
that  we  have  found  out  how  fond  we  are  of  one  another. 
Strand  Mag.  Aug.   1926  p.   124. 

])  Compare  the  Latin  and  Greek  ■ini'perfectum  de  conatu.  But  in  Englisli 
the  use  is  not  limited  to  the  past  tense:  J  am  'persuading,  I  have  been 
persuading  are  also  possible. 


364  VERBS 

Progressive  and  Non-progressive  Forms  Compared 

522.  It  has  been  stated  that  the  progressive  present, 
as  it  la3^s  stress  on  the  process  of  the  action,  is  specially 
used  in  connection  with  the  present  time;  whereas  the 
non-progressive  present  is  often  timeless,  or  at  least  leaves 
the  idea  of  time  in  the  background. 

The  difference  seems  to  be  well  brought  out  by  the 
following  quotations. 

"You  ought  to  remember,"  said  a  worthy  master  to 
a  boy  bungling  over  a  passage  of  Virgil,  "that  you  are 
translating  poetry!"  —  "It's  not  poetry  when  I  trans- 
late it,"  said  the  boy  with  pathetic  veracity. 

Journal  of  Eng.  St.  I,   153. 

.  .  .  and  in  his  book  on  Magdalen  College  the  existing 
President,  Dr.  T.  H.  Warren,  describes  the  tapestry 
presented  to  the  Lodgings  i)  in  memory  of  the  Prince's 
marriage.  The  tapestry  still  hangs  in  the  President's 
Lodgings,  Times  W.   ii/io,   12. 

The  progressive  is  still  hanging  would  emphasize  the 
idea  of  limited  time,  thus  suggesting  that  there  was  a  plan 
of  removing  the  tapestry. 

523.  For  the  same  reason  the  non-progressive  preterite 
seems  to  be  used  in  the  following  sentence  of  the  intro- 
ductory chapter  of  J.  L.  Allen's  Mettle  of  the  Pasture: 

One  of  her  hands  lay  palm  upward  on  her  white  lap ; 
in  the  other,  which  drooped  over  the  arm  of  the  chair, 
she  clasped  a  young  rose  red  amid  its  leaves. 

The  non-progressive  forms  are  used  because  the  writer 
describes  a  picture.  The  progressive  would  suggest  that 
the  description  was  introductory  to  the  relation  of  an  event 
that  took  place  at  the  same  time.    This  also  accounts  for 


1)  i.  e.  the  President's  official  residence. 


PROGRESSIVE   AND   NON-PROGRESSIVE  365 

the    non-progressive    in    Old    Wives'   Tale   II   ch.   3  §  1 : 
Constance  stood  at  the  large  many-paned  window,  etc. 

524.  The  progressive  present  is  freely  used  to  refer 
to  future  time.  It  is  also  used  when  the  future  time  is 
not  indicated  otherwise  than  by  the  context,  in  cases  when 
the  non-progressive  form  would  be  inadmissible. 

Mr.  A.  D.  Godley  is  publishing  with  Messrs.  Smith  and 
Elder  on  the  31st  inst.  'The  Casual  Ward:  Academic 
and  Other  Oddments'.  Athen,  9/11,   12. 

I  am  going  to  the  theatre  to-night. 

When  is  he  coming  back  from  America? 

I  am  not  playing  football  any  more  this  year. 

Are  you  dining  there  on  Saturday.^ 

I  am  remaining  in  America  till  after  the  elections. 

There  is  no  other  river  in  the  wide  world  quite  like 
the  Thames,  and  the  life  on  the  Thames  during  the 
summer  months  is  different  from  life  anywhere  else. 
There  are  some  who  revel  in  it,  and  some  who  declare, 
after  a  very  brief  experience,  that  they  are  never  coming 
near  the  Thames  because  they  do  not  like  the  crowds, 
the  strange  people.  Academy   17/8,    12. 

525.  The  non-progressive  form  may  also  help  to  make 
the  statement  more  general,  i.  e.  less  descripti/e. 

Then  give  it  up.  His  future  bride  is  now  pinafored  and 
bread-and-buttery.  She  romps,  she  cries,  she  dreams  of 
play  and  pudding.  Meredith,  Feverel  ch.    13. 

The  toll  of  damage  to  property  has  mounted  day  by  day 
as  new  facts  have  become  known.     Spectator,  14/1,  28. 

The  number  of  publications  dealing  directly  and  indi- 
rectly with  the  Montessori  method  steadily  grows. 

Teacher's  World  28/1,   14. 

Everywhere  there  reigns  a  just  suspicion  of  the  whole 
of  that  tendency  in  criticism  which  would  substitute 
legislation  for  understanding;  and  it  is  more  and  more 
recogfiized  that  there  can  be  no  possible  predetermination 
of  the  creative  activity  of  art.      Times  Lit.  14/10,  20. 


^66  VERBS 

In  the  first  sentence  the  progressive  (z's  romping,  etc.) 
would  suggest  that  a  definite  person  was  referred  to. 

The  progressive  in  the  following  quotation  evidently 
serves  to  express  the  writer's  personal  interest  in  his 
statement.     Compare  also  Svv^eet's  remark  in  507. 

Good  work  has  been  done  by  Mikkelsen,  who  has 
been  in  the  Arctic  for  nearly  three  years,  and  has  made 
many  journeys  in  the  north-east  of  Greenland,  There  is 
not  so  much  to  be  done  in  the  North  as  there  is  in  the 
South,  but  from  time  to  time  no  doubt  expeditions  of 
various  sizes  and  with  various  objects  in  view  will  be 
starting  out.  Sir  E.  Shackleton  in  Everyman. 

526.  The  contrast  between  the  future  progressive  ex- 
pressing an  event  that  is  considered  as  independent  of 
the  will  of  the  person  concerned  and  the  future  with  shall 
or  will  and  the  simple  plain  stem  is  clearly  shown  b}''  the 
following  sentences. 

How  long  will  you  stay?  —  For  a  couple  of  days,  a 
week  at  most.  We're  just  going  for  a  long  week-end, 
that's  all.  Collinson,  p.   lo. 

How  long  have  you  been  in  London }  —  Only  a  short 
time.  I've  been  in  England  for  close  on  a  month  now.  — 
How  long  will  you  be  staying?  —  Another  three  weeks. 
I  hope  to  stay  till  the  end  of  next  month.  id,  ib. 

527.  It  has  been  shown  that  repetition  may  be  expressed 
by  the  non-progressive  as  well  as  by  the  progressive  forms. 
The  following  two  passages  seem  exactly  parallel,  but 
the  alternative  construction  would  be  a  mistake  in  both 
cases. 

Mrs.  Shiffney,  who  was  perpetually  changing  her  mind 
in    the    chase    after    happiness,    changed  it  about  India. 

Hichens,  Ambition  ch.  20. 

Very  soon  Alston  was  almost  as  one  of  the  Heath 
family.  He  came  perpetually  to  the  studio  "to  try  things 
over,"  ib.  ch.   18. 


TO   BE   TO  2)^J 

The  use  of  the  progressive  was  coming  might  suggest 
that  his  frequent  visits  were  not  quite  v^^elcome. 

528.  Not  infrequently  the  progressive  is  avoided  be- 
cause it  has  just  been  used,  so  that  its  repetition  vi^ould 
be  over-emphatic. 

A  Saturday  afternoon  in  November  ivas  approaching 
the  time  of  twilight,  and  the  vast  tract  of  unenclosed 
wild  known  as  Egdon  Heath  embroxvued  itself  moment 
by  moment.  Hardy,  Native,  opening  sentence. 

Stephen  was  sitting  in  the  upstairs  room  scratching 
his  head  over  his  accounts,  whilst  his  old  mother  sat 
dozing,  with  her  knitting  fallen  on  to  her  lap  by  the 
fire  1).  Walpole,  Fort.  I  ch.   3   §  2  p.   30. 

529.  The  definition  of  the  progressive  as  a  form  for 
the  continuous  aspect  might  suggest  a  comparison  with 
the  verbs  accompanied  by  the  adverb  on:  to  be  living 
and  to  live  on.  It  is  easy  to  see  the  difference:  the  pro- 
gressive often  expresses  (or  implies)  continuity;  the  semi- 
compounds  with  on  also  express  that  something  continues, 
but  they  emphasize  the  break  between  the  two  periods 
of  time. 

To  Be  To 

530.  The  third  of  the  purely  verbal  groups  with  to  be 
is  the  one  with  the  stem  with  to.  Whereas  in  the  two  pre- 
ceding groups,  the  passive  and  the  progressive,  the  verb 
to  be  has  no  meaning  at  all,  and  is  identical  in  function 
with  the  verb  when  forming  a  group  with  a  predicative 
adjective,   noun,   or  adverb  (444),  it  may  have  a  meaning 


1)  It  will  be  observed  that  sat  is  a  subordinate  element  of  this  verbal 
group,  and  has  medium  stress  consequently.  This  is  not  the  reason  why 
the  writer  used  the  non-progressive  form,  but  its  accidental  effect. 


368  VERBS 

when   forming   a   group   with  the  stem  with  to.     The  fol- 
lowing cases  can  be  distinguished: 

(1)  to  be  with  a  perfective  meaning,  expressing: 

a)  movement;  type:  /  have  been  to  see  John. 

b)  to  happen;  type:  Virginia's  reply  to  Miss  Nunn's 
letter  brought  another  note  next  morning  —  Saturday. 
It  was  to  request  a  call  from  the  sisters  that  same 
afternoon  (Gissing,   The  Odd  Women,  ch.  3). 

(2)  to  be  as  a  copula;  type:  he  is  to  blame. 

(3)  to  be  with  a  meaning  that  is  difficult  to  define,  but 
approaches  'to  exist';  type:  We  are  to  be  down 
before  nine  i). 

The  last  two  constructions  will  now  be  treated  in  the 
order  indicated.  They  are  not  distinguished  by  any  tra- 
ditional names,  and  it  does  not  seem  advisable  to  invent  new 
names  for  them;  it  is  probably  more  practical  to  indicate 
each  of  them  by  a  typical  example. 

,      •    ,     /  7  531.     The   simple  stem  with  to  is  a 

Type  he  ts  to  blame  .     ,         ,.       ^ .      ,  ...  , 

nommal  predicate  m  the  case  illustrated 

by  the  following  sentences. 

Mr.  Aiken  was  certainly  to  blame  for  not  locking  the 
door  and  not  taking  away  the  key. 

de  Morgan,  A  Likely  Story  ch.  i  p.  I2. 
And  I  unfolded  what  there  was  to  unfold  about  South 
Africa  and  the  Minnebiac  Rifles. 

Cotes,  Cinderella  ch.  8  p.  91. 
This,  of  which  I  once  was  scornfully  proud,  seems  to 
be  now,  if  not  a  calamity,  something  I  would  not  choose 
if  life  were  to  live  again.  Gissing,  Ryecroft  VIII. 


i)  However  difficult  it  may  be  to  find  a  meaning  in  to  he  in  some  of 
these  constructions,  there  evidently  exists  a  difference  between  the  first  as 
against  the  other  two  groups.  Observe,  too,  that  to  he  in  the  first  group  is 
stronger-stressed  than  in  the  other  two;  this  difference  is  evident  in  1  h. 


TO   BE   TO  369 

No  other  house  in  the  neighbourhood  was  in  any  way 
to  compare  with  it.  Besant,  All  Sorts. 

Speaking  of  artists  in  general,  she  (viz.  Mrs.  Craigie) 
said:  "They  think  more  than  there  is  to  think,  feel  more 
than    there    is    to    feel,    see    more   than  there  is  to  see." 

Academy  15/11,   1902. 

Nor  did  he  see  more  than  a  little  of  what  there  was 
to  see.  Galsworthy,  Beyond. 

The  second  thought  is  this :  that  some  books  are  to 
borrow  and  others  are  to  buy.     Davies,  Super-Tramp, 

Foreword  to  new  edition  p.  XVI. 

532.  The  character  of  the  stem  in  the  preceding  con- 
struction is  so  much  that  of  a  nominal  predicate  that  a  stem 
may  become  the  equivalent  of  a  predicative  adjective,  so  that 
it  can  take  an  adverb  of  degree  before  it.     Compare  537. 

The  King's  English  is  rather  to  seek  in  the  circular 
which  has  been  issued  i).  Academy  2/1,   1901. 

And  far  and  long  are  rather  adjuncts  to  the  stem  than 
vice  versa  in  the  following. 

The  reason  is  not  far  to  seek. 

Pollock  (NED  s.  v.  Seek). 
However,    there    was  not  long  to  wait  before  Selina's 
voice  . . .  greeted  her.    Mackenzie,  Rich  Rel.  ch.  9  p.  227. 

533.  It  will  be  noted  that  the  stem  of  verbs  that  are 
usually  transitive  is  not  unaffected  by  the  character  of  the 
construction;  for  in  many  of  the  examples  quoted  in  531  it 
is  intransitive  rather  than  transitive.  This  is  in  accordance 
with  what  we  have  observed  in  the  other  non-predicative 
verbal  form,  the  ing  (128  ff.).  It  should  be  observed,  how- 
ever, that  the  simple  stem,  though  it  might  be  said  to 
express  the  meaning  of  the  passive  of  occurrence,  is  never 
an   equivalent   of  the   passive   of  activity:  the  predicative 


1)  It  is  probably  better  to  interpret  rather  as  a  sentence-adverb  here. 
Kruisinga,  Handbook  II.  Accidence  and  Syntax.  1. 


370  VERBS 

simple  stem  in  this  construction  never  takes  an  adjunct  with 
by  denoting  the  agent. 

534.  The  predicative  stem  in  this  construction  can 
naturally  be  qualified  by  a  following,  or  preceding,  adverb 
in  -ly.  In  the  latter  case  the  construction  may  closely 
resemble  a  stem  as  an  adjunct  to  a  predicative  adjective 
(478),  provided  that  the  adjective  can  take  this  construction,, 
as  is  the  case  with  easy^  hard,  difficult,  etc. 

But  women  are  not  easily  to  be  read. 

Hichens,  Ambition  ch.   34  p.  412. 
He    had    been    refused    charity    at    a   house   and,    on 
leaving  the  place,  had  spied  a  small  outhouse  in  which 
he    saw    many    things   easy    to    carry,   and  easily  to  be 
converted  into  money. 

Davies,  Super-Tramp  ch.   16  p.   126. 
But  the  true  inwardness  of  their  position  is  not  easily 
to  be  understood.  Pilot  30/4,   1904  p.  410/2. 

But  there  is  no  alternative  with  a  predicative  adjective 
in  the  following  case. 

The  subject  is  not  thus  lightly  to  be  dismissed. 

_,  ^    ,  535.     The  type  of  which  we  are  now 

Type  we  are  to  be        .  ,  ,  1        , 

,   J.         .       gomg  to  treat  strongly  resembles  the  pre- 
down  before  nine         ,.  •  ,  ,     ,    7    •      , 

cedmg  construction;  the  verb  to  be  m  the 

sentence  we  are  to  be  down  before  nine,  though  not  quite 

a    copula,    is    certainly  very    far  from   expressing  such  a 

distinct  independent  meaning  as  'to  exist',  which  has  been 

the    definition    of  the    meaning   of  to   be  in  the  sentences 

quoted  in  441a.  On  the  other  hand,  to  be  in  the  sentences 

to  be  treated  in  the  following  sections  cannot  be  considered 

as   a   verb  without  any  meaning  at  all;  the  cases,  though 

resembhng   those   of  531^  cannot  be  identified  with  them. 

536.  The  verb  to  be  followed  by  a  stem  with  to  (in- 
cluding to  be  with  participle  as  a  passive  group-stem)  can-, 


TO   BE   TO  371 

be  used  to  express  an  arrangement  (i.  e.  an  intended  result). 
The  predicative  verb  is  almost  invariably  a  present  tense 
or  a  preterite;  other  cases  will  be  mentioned  at  the  end 
of  this  chapter  by  way  of  appendix,  because  they  are  of 
no  importance  to  the  character  of  the  construction. 
The  arrangement  may  be: 

(1)  an  agreement  made  between  two  or  more  persons. 

We  were  to  meet  at  5  under  the  Big  Clock  at  the 
Station ;  we  promised  each  other  to  be  punctual. 

If  we  are  to  be  down  before  nine  we  shall  have  to  be 
quick ;  and  we  ought  to,  for  we  have  a  lot  of  work  to  do, 

Normandy  was  to  be  invaded  on  each  side. 

Freeman,  Norman  Conquest, 

(2)  an  arrangement  made  by  one  person  for  another. 
The  construction  often  expresses  mere  futurity. 

With  the  verb  in  the  second  person  (or  in  interrogative 
sentences  in  the  first  person)  it  is  often  equivalent  to  a 
command,  for  it  states  the  thing  to  be  done  as  something 
settled,   about   which   discussion   is   not   to  be  thought  of. 

The  arrangement  or  command  may  proceed  from  the 
speaker  (in  interrogative  sentences  from  the  person 
spoken   to),  or  from  a   third   person. 

In  reported  speech,  to  be  may  express  the  command 
of  the  subject  of  the  main  clause. 

Here  is  the  plan  I  had  made.  A  strong  party  under 
Sapt's  command  was  to  steal  up  to  the  door  of  the 
chateau.  If  discovered  prematurely,  they  were  to  kill 
any  one  who  found  them  —  with  their  swords,  for  I 
wanted  no  noise  of  firing.  If  all  went  well,  they  would 
be  at  the  door  when  Johann  opened  it.  They  were  to 
rush  in  and  secure  the  servants  if  their  mere  presence 
and  the  use  of  the  king's  name  were  not  enough.  At 
the  same  moment  —  and  on  this  hinged  the  plan  — 
a  woman's  cry  was  to  ring  out  loud  and  shrill  from 
Antoinette  de  Mauban's  chamber  ,  .  ,        Hope,  Zenda. 


3/2  VERBS 

Large  sums  are  now  being  spent  on  educational 
developments,  and  still  larger  sums  are  to  be  spent  in 
the  near  future  i).  Times  Ed.  S.  25/9,   19. 

(Master  to  servant) :  "You  are  to  go  to  Mr.  B.  first, 
and  then  take  these  letters  to  the  post," 

"Write,  Tom."  —  "What  am  I  to  write,  father?" 

"No,  no,  Muriel!  You're  not  to  go,  Jim,  you  can't  — 
you  shan't  —  take  her!     I  won't  allow  it." 

Ethel  M.  Dell,  Way  of  an  Eagle  p.  242. 

You  said  I  was  to  write  the  letter  before  I  might 
go  out,  but  how  could  I  when  I  had  no  note-paper.'' 

Remember  the  last  thing  papa  told  us  at  the  window, 
Herbert:  we  were  to  keep  our  mouths  closed  and  to  breathe 
through  our  noses.        Allen,  Doctor's  Christmas  Eve. 

In  the  New  Year  of  19 14  Oswald  was  to  take  Peter 
to  Russia  for  three  weeks. 

Wells,  Joan  and  Peter  ch.   11   §  19. 

(3)  an  arrangement  in  which  the  acting  persons 
arerathervaguelythoughtof. 

Two  papers  by  Ouida,  which  have  been  held  over  by 
express  agreement  until  her  death,  are  to  appear  in  an 
early  number  of  Lippincotf  s  Magazine. 

537.  When  the  future  event  expressed  by  the  con- 
struction is  not  regarded  from  the  standpoint  of  the  people 
to  whom  the  actions  are  future,  but  from  the  standpoint  of 
the  observer,  the  idea  of  arrangement  disappears  completely. 
With  the  verb  in  the  past  tense  it  can  express  destiny. 

All  that  is  implied  by  the  romance  of  Rome  brings 
to  the  slopes  of  the  Vatican  Hill  year  by  year  an 
enormous  crowd  and  a  diversity  of  pilgrims.  And 
throughout  the  holy  year  of  1925  they  are  to  come  in 
numbers  which  even  in  our  crowded  world  of  to-day 
are  significant.  Times  Lit.    i/i,    1925   p.   1/2. 


1)  If  the  two  cases  of  are  here  do  not  show  a  ditference  of  meaning',  they 
show  a  difference  all  the  same,  the  second  being  stronger-stressed. 


TO   BE   TO  373 

Of  the  men  who  were  to  illustrate  the  Victorian  age, 
only  one  or  two  had  given  earnest  of  their  powers. 

Forster-Gissing  p.  49. 

It  was  felt  even  then  that  a  remedy  of  some  kind 
would  have  to  be  found,  if  the  empire  was  not  to  drift 
upon  the  rocks. 

The  year  19 17  in  Canada  was  full  of  great  events,  which 
were  to  determine  the  share  that  Canada  should  take  in 
the  ■'future  prosecution  of  the  war.     Times  W.  4/1,  18. 

When  the  stem  is  a  verb  of  little  independent  meaning 
it  is  sometimes  equivalent  to  a  predicative  adjective  ex- 
pressing the  idea  of  'future'.     Compare  532. 

The  English  Plato  is  still  to  be. 

Times  Lit.    15/r,    1920. 
Lennan    . .  .    seemed  to  know  all  that  had  passed,  all 
that  might  be  to  come. 

Galsworthy,  Dark  Flower  III  ch.   11  p.  268. 

538.  The  construction  sometimes  expresses  what  should 
be  {a)  or  what  can  be  [b).  The  stem  is  often  a  group-passive, 

a.  Whether  the  story  of  Gottfried  Plattner  is  to  be 
credited  or  not  is  a  pretty  question  in  the  value  of 
evidence.  Wells,   Country  p.   204. 

Meanwhile  the  critical  party  were  by  no  means  agreed 
among  themselves  as  to  the  theory  which  was  to  take 
the  place  of  the  traditional  theory. 

Times  Lit.  22/2,   18. 

Johnson's  resolute  insistence  on  life  and  reason,  not 
learning  or  ingenuity,  as  the  standard  by  which  books 
are  to  be  judged. 

Both  editor  and  contributors  are  to  be  congratulated 
on  the  performance  of  a  great  task. 

Such  answers  are  not  to  be  called  rude  when  the  rude- 
ness, if  such  there  be,  is  only  one  ingredient  in  a  com- 
pound of  which  the  principal  parts  are  humour  and  felicity. 

'What  was  one  to  do,'  exclaimed  Mrs.  Fyne  with 
almost  comic  exasperation.  Conrad,  Chance. 


374  VERBS 

The  construction  is  most  likely  to  be  regarded  as 
elliptical. 

b.  How  are  we  to  know  that  you  are  not  one  of  the 
enemy's  spies?  Buchanan,  Winter  Night  ch.  8. 

But  how  was  I  to  gain  admission  to  the  house? 

Weyman,  Red  Robe  ch.  2. 

How  are  we  to  get  rid  of  this  distinction  we  have 
made  between  the  artist  and  the  tradesman?  How  are 
we  to  recover  for  the  artist  the  virtues  of  the  craftsman 
and  for  the  craftsman  the  virtues  of  the  artist? 

Times  Lit.   15/6,   16. 

London  is  not  to  be  loved  at  first  sight.  You  must 
get  to  know  her.  ib.  23/3,   16. 

It  seems  that  possibility  is  chiefly  expressed  in  negative 
and  interrogative  sentences,  as  in  all  the  cases  above. 
But  this  meaning  is  also  found  in  affirmative  sentences. 
See  also  101. 

The   twins   were    to   be  distinguished  by  their  voices. 

539.  Sometimes  it  is  difficult  to  decide  whether  duty, 
obligation  or  possibility  is  expressed,  especially  in  con- 
ditional clauses. 

The  experiment  is  one  requiring  many  talents  in  the 
writer  if  success  is  to  be  ensured.  Athenaeum  14/3,  1908. 

But  if  this  charge  is  to  be  rebutted  it  is  time  for 
Churchmen  to  realize  that  the  proposal  for  compromise 
should  come  from  them.  Pilot  17/10,   1903. 

The  transitory  mental  aberration  of  Sidney  Davidson,  re- 
markable enough  in  itself,  is  still  more  remarkable  if  Wade's 
explanation  is  to  be  credited.     Wells,  Country  p.   Zj. 

We  need  to  be  equally  frank  in  recognizing  the  existing 
drawbacks  in  the  connexion  between  Church  and  State  if 
we  are  to  find  a  remedy  for  them.     Times  Lit.  ii/i,  18. 

540.  We  do  not  find  the  group-perfect  (with  have)  nor 
the  group-future  (with  shall  and  will)  of  to  be  in  this  con- 
struction.    The    reasons    for   this   seem  evident.     For  the 


TO   BE   TO  375 

perfect  serves  to  look  back  upon  the  past  in  its  bearing 
upon  the  present,  whereas  the  construction  of  to  be  to 
here  treated  is  concerned  with  the  future.  And  as  it 
distinctly  refers  to  future  time  there  is  no  need  for  ex- 
pressing this  by  means  of  shall  and  will. 

The  group-perfect  is  used  to  express  motion,  as  shown 
in  441. 

It  is  also  quite  exceptional  for  the  non-predicative  be  to 
be  used  in  this  construction,  although  it  is  possible,  as  in 
the  following  sentence. 

But  he  could  have  followed,  even  guided  only  by  the 
scattered  pursuing  units  that  came  from  far  behind  him, 
endowed  with  a  mysterious  knowledge  (acquired  Heaven 
knows  how)  that  there  was  a  fight,  and  that  it  would 
be  to  be  found  (if  not  too  late)  acrost^)  the  Gas-gardens  on 
some  land  with  a  board  up.      de  Morgan,  Vance  ch.  i. 

541.  Although  to  be  in  the  construction  dealt  with  here 
is  not  quite  a  meaningless  verb,  it  is  evident  that  there  is 
a  close  connection  between  this  construction  and  the  pre- 
ceding one,  in  which  to  be  was  interpreted  as  a  copula. 
This  is  also  shown  by  the  fact  that  the  stem  with  to  can 
express  the  meanings  enumerated  here  when  it  is  used 
with  another  verb  of  little  independent  meaning,  as  in  these 
quotations. 

His  language  is  substantially  the  ordinary  literary 
English  of  his  day,  and  he  falls  therefore  to  be  considered 
among  English  authors. 

Chambers's  Cyclopaedia  of  Engl.  Lit. 
(This)  seemed  to  him  the  greatest  danger  that  remains 
to  be  encountered  by  the  Anglo-Saxon  race. 

Times  Lit.  %\6,   i6. 

542.  To  be  is  distinctly  a  copula  in  such  sentences  as 
//  is  easy  to  do. 

1)  Dialectal  form  of  across. 


I'jG  VERBS 

She  was  by  no  means  bad  to  look  at. 
That  question  was  not  easy  to  answer. 
The    puma   never  should  be  attempted  single-handed, 
for  it  is  so  hard  to  kill. 

But  occasionally  this  construction  is  mixed  with  the 
preceding  one  so  that  the  group-passive  is  used:  //  is 
not  easy  to  be  done. 

To  say  what  in  her  judgment  was  best  to  be  done. 
Rev.  of  Rev.,  Febr.   1901,  p.   1 1.3/2. 

To  Have 

543.  Next  in  importance  after  to  be,  as  an  auxiliary, 
comes  to  have.  It  will  be  most  convenient  to  treat  it  in 
the  same  way  as  to  be,  and  first  to  enumerate  its  meanings 
as  a  verb  of  full  meaning,  or  at  least  as  a  verb  with  a 
noun-adjunct  only,  and  to  refer  to  these  meanings  when 
we  deal  with  to  have  as  a  member  of  mixed  nominal- 
verbal  or  purely  verbal  groups. 

544.  The  fundamental  meaning  of  to  have  may  be  taken 
to  be  'to  hold,'  as  is  still  clear  in  the  compound  to  behave 
'to  hold  oneself,'  although  this  is  not  connected  with  the 
simple  verb  in  living  English.  This  is  also  the  meaning 
in  the  following  sentences:  She  had  a  book  in  her  hand; 
I  have  no  money  zvith  me. 

When  the  object  denotes  a  person's  possessions  the 
verb  naturally  comes  to  mean  'to  possess',  as  in  the 
alliterative  legal  term  to  have  and  to  hold.  This  meaning 
is  found  in :  How  many  shares  have  yott  in  the  company  ? 
The  construction  does  not  change  when  the  object  is 
accompanied  by  an  adjunct  as  in  the  following  sentence: 
If  riches  have  wings  to  fly  away  from  their  owner,  they 
have  wings   also  to  escape  danger  (New  Engl,  Diet.  s.  v. 


TO   HAVE  377 

have  no.  3) ;  They  had  him  to  dine  with  them  at  the  inn 
(Thackeray,  Esmond,  ib.  no.  2). 

The  last  sentence  hardly  illustrates  the  meaning  'to 
possess';  the  same  must  be  said  of  to  have  with  such 
objects  as  a  father,  a  wife,  a  husband,  etc.:  She  had  two 
sons  married  in  New  York,  and  another  who  was  now  in 
Europe  (Henry  James,  Daisy  Miller  ch.  2  p.  28);  also 
when  the  subject  is  non-personal:  The  house  has  a  very 
high  roof;  The  room  has  three  ivindows;  February  has 
tiventy-cight  days. 

Not  infrequently  the  object  expresses  the  real  meaning 
of  the  group,  to  have  serving  for  little  more  than  a  con- 
necting verb  like  the  copula  to  be.  This  is  the  case  in 
such  groups  as  to  have  a  cold,  to  have  grey  hair,  and  in 
these  sentences : 

She  moved  back  from  him  and  pushed  at  her  hair 
in  the  nervous  way  that  she  had. 

VValpole,  Fort.  II  ch.   5   p.   197. 
The  sloes  had  a  very  sour  taste. 

See  626. 

545.  When  the  object  expresses  a  mental  process,  and 
in  other  cases,  to  have  comes  to  mean  'to  experience'. 

I  have  no  doubt  the  Italian  is  at  the  bottom  of  all 
this.  Shorthouse,  Inglesant  I  ch.    15. 

The  worst  administration  which  we  have  ever  had, 

NED. 

She  had  intended  to  have  a  stormy  scene.  But  she 
did  not  have  it.  Rosalind  Murray,  Moonseed. 

Sir  Edward  Grey  went  on  to  deal  with  current  politics. 
He  said  that  if  they  did  not  have  a  great  industrial 
crisis  they  should  proceed  with  the  ordinary  business  of 
the  Session.  Daily  News   19/2,    12. 

Similarly  in  the  folowing  sentences. 


SyS  VERBS 

On  one  trip  we  had  a  very  stormy  passage. 

Davies,  Super-Tramp  ch.   i   p.  2. 
They  were  having  dinner  —  Bobby,  Mrs.  Galleon  and 
Peter  —  in  the  studio  of  the  Cheyne  Walk  House. 
Walpole,  Fort.  Ill  ch.   i  §  3  p.  236. 

This  meaning  of  to  have  is  very  frequent  with  the  stem 
of  verbs  used  as  an  abstract  noun  with  the  indefinite 
article:  to  have  a  smoke,  wash,  feed,  etc.  See  volume  3 
on  Conversion. 

546.  All  the  preceding  meanings  of  the  verb  to  have 
may  be  said  to  be  durative,  as  far  as  the  aspect  can  be 
defined.  But  to  have  can  also  have  a  perfective  sense, 
as  in  the  following  quotations. 

James  Forsyte  said:  "You  ought  to  have  another 
opinion  i).  Have  Blank ;  he's  the  first  man  now.  I 
had  him  for  Emily;  cost  me  two  hundred  guineas..." 

Galsworthy,  Caravan  p.   i. 

Matter  and  form  are  not  so  separable  as  the  popular 
philosophy  would  have  them.       Raleigh,  Style  p.  62. 

She  had  the  steps  up  into  her  bedroom  and  reached 
down  from  the  dusty  top  of  the  wardrobe  the  box 
which  she  had  put  there  after  Samuel's  funeral. 

Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  ch.  8  §  i   p.  269. 

It  would  indeed  hardly  have  surprised  me  if  I  had 
been  had  into  a  room,  or  shown  strange  symbols  of 
good  and  evil.  Benson,  Thread  of  Gold  p.  26. 

To  have  as  a  verb  of  full  meaning  is  also  illustrated  in 
the  sections  on  the  auxiliary  do. 

547.  In  544  an  example  has  been  quoted  of  to  have 
with  to  {riches  have  wings  to  fly  away) ;  the  stem  here  is 


1)  i.  e.  send  for  or  consult  him  as  a  doctor. 


TO   HAVE  379 

as  much  an  adjunct  to  the  group  have  wings  as  to  wings 
alone.  The  stem  may  be  an  attributive  adjunct  to  the  noun 
and  the  meaning  of  the  verb  may  be  much  weakened. 
This  is  the  case  in  the  following  sentences. 

I'm  sick  of  hearing  that  I  ruined  your  career.  You 
never  had  a  career  to  ruin. 

W.  Somerset  Maugham^,  The  Circle  II,  Brit.  PI.  p.  6i8. 

Miss  Monogue  had  things  to  tell  him  about  the  book. 
Walpole,  Fort.  II  ch.  4  p.   183. 

Perhaps  the  laughing  attitude  of  Cards  to  Peter's  books 
had  something  to  do  with  it  all.     ib.  Ill  ch.  8  p.  317. 

Writers  like  Blake  and  Shakespeare,  like  Stendhal 
and  Dostoevsky,  still  have  plenty  to  teach  the  modern 
scientific  professional.  Huxley,  Vulgarity  p.   20. 

The  ice  arrived  by  motor-cycle  just  before  her  watch 
began.  It  was  some  comfort  to  have  that  definite  thing 
to  see  to.  Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.  29  p.  ^y^. 

Ursula  was  happy  to  have  somebody  to  look  after. 

Sinister  Street  p.  624. 

(The  Englishman),  too,  has  a  national  ideal  to  set 
against  the  German.  Edinb.  Rev.  April   191 5. 

In  Henry  I.  Anselm  had  another  kind  of  man  to 
deal  with.  Gardiner  and  Mullinger,  Introd.  p.   52. 

Of  Wake,  Archbishop  from  1716  to  1737,  Mi.  Rowden, 
as  is  right,  has  nothing  but  good  to  say. 

Times  Lit.   16/3,   16. 

Here    we    have    to    help    us    the   works  of  Gildas,  an 
absolutely  contemporary  writer,  since  he  composed  . .  .  ^) 
Oman,  Engl.   Conquest  p.   233. 

548.  When  a  noun-object  is  quahfied  by  a  stem  with  to 
as  an  adjunct  of  purpose,  the  meaning  cannot  be  identified 
with  the  construction  in  which  the  noun  becomes  the 
object  to  the  verb  with  stem  as  a  single  group.  This  is 
shown  by  the  following  example. 


1)  Note  the  word-order. 


380  VERBS 

There  is  a  great  deal  of  difference  between  the  eager 
man  who  wants  to  read  a  book  and  the  tired  man  who 
wants  a  book  to  read.  Daily  News  30/8,   1906, 

But  when  the  leading  verb  has  so  little  meaning  as  to 
have  in  the  following  sentences,  the  difference  between  the 
two  constructions  becomes  very  small. 

But  he  had  an  amazing  number  of  things  to  think 
about  and  the  solicitor's  office  was  the  barest  background 
for  his  chasing  thoughts.    Walpole,  Fort.  I  ch.  10  p.  1 1 1. 

All  words,  the  weak  and  the  strong,  the  definite  and 
the    vague,    have    their    offices    to   perform  in  language. 

Raleigh,  Style  p.  21. 
They   know   that    England    has  you  to  thank  for  the 
fact  that  we  are  not  at  this  moment  preparing  for  war. 
E.  Ph.  Oppenheim,  A  People's  Man 
ch.  21   p.   146. 
Towards    the    solution    of   this    question    the    present 
Dublin  Week  has  a  valuable  lesson  to  contribute. 

Times  W.  29/8,   13. 
*I    have    a    favour    to    ask,'  I  stammered  desperately. 

Weyman,  Red  Robe  ch.   i. 
For  criticism  has  also  its  part  to  play. 

Times  Lit.  9/12,    15. 

_,    „        ,        549.     Cases    such    as    those    quoted    in    the 
To  Have  to  ,.  .  ,       .  ^  , 

precedmg  section   make   it   easy  to  understand 

how  a  shifting  in  the  order  of  words  may  come  to  take 
place,  the  verb  and  the  stem  being  grouped  together  with 
the  noun  as  the  object  to  the  group;  thus  I  have  something 
to  see  to  ma}^  be  turned  into  /  have  to  see  to  something. 
The  group  to  have  to  expresses  a  duty  or  a  necessity 
imposed  by  circumstances. 

He  is  considerately  sparing  you  the  trouble  of  having 
to  take  a  bath.  Huxley,  Vulgarity  p.  4. 

The  construction  is  freely  used  when  the  verb  is  intran- 
sitive as  well  as  transitive,  and  with  passive  groups. 


TO   HAVE  381 

In  October  the  expedition  sailed,  but  it  had  to  make 
its  way  against  adverse  winds. 

You  have  not  surely  to  be  reminded  that  it  hurts  them. 

Meredith,  Beauchamp  ch.  27  p.  245. 
It    may    have    been   worth  while  to  pay  the  price  for 
the  new  greatness  of  poetry  that  came  in  with  the  nine- 
teenth century ;  but  it  is  at  any  rate  right  to  remember 
that  there  was  a  price,  and  that  it  has  had  to  be  paid. 

Bailey,  Johnson. 

550.  The  two  constructions  of  to  have  are  sometimes 
contrasted,  as  in  the  sentence  with  to  ivant  in  548. 

There  are  two  kinds  of  speeches ;  there  is  the  speech 
which  a  man  makes  when  he  has  something  to  say,  and 
the  speech  .  .  .  when  he  has  to  say  something. 

Such  practised  speakers  as  Dr.  W.  and  Sir  Lewis  D. 
who  had  something  to  say  which  the  Congress  mani- 
festly wanted  to  hear,  had  just  cause  of  complaint. 

Pilot,   24/10,   1903   p.   397/1. 

The  explanation  of  this  is  in  the  difference  in  the 
character  of  the  adjuncts:  in  had  something  to  say  the 
stem  is  not  an  adjunct  of  purpose  as  in  the  contrasted 
construction.  We  have  a  similar  contrast  in  the  following 
sentence. 

She  had  never  expressed  an  opinion,  and  the  inference 
was  that  she  had  no  opinion  to  express. 

Princess  Priscilla's  Fortnight  6. 

551.  The  formal  difference  between  the  two  constructions, 
to  have  something  to  do  and  to  hav&  to  do  something , 
depends  exclusively  on  word-order.  When  the  object  must 
have  front-position,  as  in  attributive  clauses  (with  a  relative 
pronoun  or  a  conjunction,  or  without)  and  in  interrogative 
sentences,  the  context  shows  which  is  meant. 

Such  was  the  story  which  Commander  Evans  had  to 
tell,  and  it  stirred  the  sympathetic  admiration  of  his 
hearers.  Times  W.  23/5,   13. 


382  VERBS 

.  .  .  and  oh,  such  lovely  gentle  peasants  as  she  had 
to  exercise  her  charity  upon ! 

Upton  Sinclair,  Oil!  XIV  ch.   13  p.  356. 

The  only  suggestion  we  have  to  make  about  this  and 
similar  good  plans  in  other  volumes  is  that  they  well 
merit  a  canvas  lining,  or  else  should  be  placed  in  a 
cover-pocket.  Athenaeum,  4/1,   13. 

What  I  have  to  say  is  not  for  other  ears. 

Vachell,  Quinneys'  p.   194. 

Annie  heard  the  General's  voice  reply :  "Let  her  come 
in  at  once"  .  .  .  "Well,  my  little  girl,"  said  the  General, 
"I  am  General  Cornwallis  i) ;  what  have  you  to  say  to 
me?"  —  "I  want  my  cow." 

In  the  last  quotation  the  sentence  with  to  have  means 
'What  is  it  that  you  wish  {want)  to  say  to  me?'  But  the 
question  '  What  have  you  to  say  now  'f  might  also  be  put 
by  a  mother  wishing  a  child  to  repeat  a  message  she  had 
given  it.  In  that  case  to  have  would  express  the  meaning 
treated  of  in  549. 

552.  There  is  no  double  construction  when  the  noun- 
or  pronoun-object  is  negative- 

I  have  no  letters  to  write  to-night. 
She  had  no  suggestion  to  offer. 
We  had  nothing  to  say  to  each  other. 
The   English  Protestants  had  no  help  to  expect  from 
their  brethren  on  the  Continent. 

Gardiner  and  Mullinger,  Introd.  p.    1 1 6. 
She  seems  respectable,  and  she  does  her  work  system- 
atically. I  have  no  fault  to  find  with  her,  none  whatever. 

Baring-Gould,  Swaen  I  p.   i. 
The    drinking    public    in    general    took    no  notice,  but 
went    on    as    before;    they   made    compulsory    restriction 
inevitable,  and  had  only  themselves  to  thank  for  it. 

Times  Lit.  25/1,   18. 

1)  Annie  had  asked  to  see  the  General. 


TO   HAVE  383 

553.  In    the    following    sentences    there    seems    very 

little    to    choose    between   the   construction   used   and  the 

alternative  one. 

We  had  some  miles  to  drive,  even  from  the  small 
station.  Shorthouse,  Inglesant,  ch.   i. 

What  the  state  of  our  knowledge  of  the  boy's  home 
means  is  that  he  had  his  own  way  to  make. 

Times  Lit.  7/5,  14. 
...  he  did  not  doubt  that  but  a  fortnight  would  see 
him  in  a  magnificent  position.  And  then  —  the  fortnight 
passed  and  he  and  Stephen  had  still  their  positions  to 
discover  —  the  money  moreover  was  almost  at  an  end; 
.  .  .  another  fortnight  would  behold  them  penniless. 

Walpole,  Fort.  II  ch.  8  p.  221. 
.  .  .    there    he   resumed  that  struggle  which  is  hell  to 
the  most  of  those  who  have  it  to  fight. 

Patterson,  Stephen  Compton  ch.  4  p.   19. 

554.  The  stem  in  this  construction  may  also  have  its 
subject  expressed,  when  necessary,  by  an  adjunct  with  for. 

Father  St.  Clare,  after  an  interview  with  the  King, 
told  Inglesant  that  he  had  a  mission  for  him  to  perform 
in  London.  Shorthouse,  ch.   10  p.  115. 

You  are  very  young,  but  you  are  years  older  than 
most  of  your  age,  and  your  youth  renders  you  all  the 
more  fit  for  the  work  I  have  for  you  to  do, 

ib.  ch.  3  p.  43. 

555.  In  the  preceding  sections  to  have  was  construed 
with  the  stem  with  to,  evidently  because  a  perfective  form  of 
the  verb  was  required.  When  to  have  is  taken  in  the  sense  of 
*to  experience',  however,  it  naturally  takes  a  verbal  form 
that  is  not  perfective:  either  the  neutral  stem  without  to  or 
the  participle,  or  the  durative  ing.  We  find  consequently: 

(1)  the  modal  preterite  had  with  plain  stem; 

(2)  to  have  with  an  object  and  plain  stem; 

(3)  to  have  with  an  object  and  ing; 

(4)  to  have  with  an  object  and  participle. 


384  VERBS 

The  first  of  these  constructions  hardly  requires  more 
than  a  single  example :  We'd  better  keep  a  sharp  look  out 
here,  said  Ned  (Sweet,  Sp.  Engl.  p.  56);  see  also  404. 
We  need  only  treat  here  of  the  other  three,  in  which 
to  have  can  be  used  as  a  complete  verbal  system. 

_.,    ^       ,        556.     The    following   quotations   illustrate   to 
Object  and    ,  .  ,  ,  .  ,     ,  • 

.  have  with  an  object  and  plam  stem  to  express 

what  may  be  defined  generally  as  'to  expe- 
rience', although  here  as  in  similar  cases  the  verb  comes 
to  be  an  element  of  the  whole  group  rather  than  an 
independent  verb  with  a  distinct  meaning  of  its  own. 

But    I    am  not  sorry  to  have  my  place  look  its  best. 
Allen,  Kentucky  Cardinal  ch.  4  p.   28. 

I  am  fifty-one  next  year,  and  the  only  thing  I  ever 
had  happen  to  me  was  seeing  a  man  stop  a  runaway 
horse  and  cart.  Jacobs,  Dialstone  Lane  II. 

For  Mr.  Gibson  he  had  a  warm  respect,  a  strong 
personal  liking,  which  he  should  be  glad  to  have  ripen 
into  friendship,  if  there  was  time  for  it  in  this  bustling 
world.  Gaskell,  Wives  II  p.  291. 

And  why  not?  I  can't  have  Rosey  know  I  have 
another  wife  living  .  .  . 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.   '^Q  p.  385. 

I  would  rather  have  lost  them  twice  over  than  have 
had  this  happen.         Hardy,  Native  IV  ch.  2  p.  307. 

I  would  not  for  worlds  have  you  do  so  for  my  sake  .  .  . 
I  would  not  for  worlds  that  you  should  do  that  i). 

Trollope,  Framley  ch.  29  p.  287 

557.  Sometimes  this  construction  comes  to  express 
what  may  be  defined  as  a  perfective  aspect,  so  that 
have   is    equivalent    to    'get'.     We   might    be    inclined    to 


1)  This  last  sentence  shows  that  a   subordinate   clause    is   an    alternative 
construction. 


TO   HAVE  385 

refer  this  meaning  to  the  perfective  sense  of  to  have 
illustrated  in  546.  But  it  must  be  considered  that  the 
verb  in  this  construction  expresses  the  perfective  meaning 
when  forming  a  group  with  will,  get,  or  a  similar  verb 
expressing  purpose  (a),  or  in  a  construction  implying  this, 
as  in  the  stem  with  to  ib).  It  seems  all  the  more  acceptable 
to  consider  the  perfective  sense  of  the  construction  as  a 
special  case  of  the  preceding  because  it  is  often  indifferent 
for  the  sense  in  which  meaning  the  verb  is  taken. 

a.  This,  indeed,  is  precisely  what  Mr.  Burnet  would 
have  us  think  of  the  perturbing  doctrines  of  Socrates. 

Laird,  p.  8. 
He    exposed    ruthlessly    the   sort  of  peace  these  men 
would  have  us  accept.  Times  W,  ^Ij ,   17. 

We  would  not  have  later  generations  know  the  whole 
agony  of  our  own  unhappy  day.     Times  Lit,  9/11,  17. 

He  would  have  us  consider  what  are  the  facts  in 
history  which  really  count,  and  he  proves  to  us  that 
we  have  not  yet  done  with  the  Greeks. 

Times  Lit.  26/10,   17. 
He  talked  his  extremest  Fabianism.   He  would  have  the 
Government  control  all  railways,  land,  natural  products. 
Wells,  Joan  and  Peter  ch.  2  §   i. 
Why  would  photographers  not  leave  her  alone }  Why 
would  theatrical  managers  have  her  accept  boxes  gratis 
which  they  could  sell  for  money? 

Bennett,  Roll-Call  I  ch.  6  §  4. 

b.  I  haven't  done  anything  to  have  you  send  money 
for.  Mackenzie,  Sinister  Street  p.  974. 

...  ,  ,  _,,  .„  ,  558.  The  perfective  sense  of  the 
Object  and  Stem  with  to  ,     ,  , 

group    may   lead   to   the   stem  with  to 

being  used ;  but  this  construction  is  not  current  in  spoken 
English. 

In  vain  would  a  recent  essayist  on  Peel  have  us  to 
believe  that  fear  was  Peel's  guiding  motive. 

Times  W.  30/5,   1929. 
Kruisinga,  Handbook  II.  Accidence  and  Syntax.  1.  25 


386  VERBS 

Now,  having  achieved  so  capital  a  marriage,  Caroline, 
worthy  creature,  was  anxious  that  her  sisters  should 
not  be  less  happy,  and  would  have  them  to  visit  her  in 
spite  of  her  husband's  protests. 

3/leredith,  Harrington  ch.   3   p.    17. 
What,  I'll  have  you  to  know  .  .  . 

Vachell,   Quinneys'  p.  259. 

^, .    ,     .^,    ,  559.     The  durative  character  of  the  group- 

Object  with  Ing  .  ,  J    .       ,         ,  •  .  ,     .     *=       ^ 

IS  emphasized   in   the   object   with   ing    con- 
struction {a).     The  ing  may  express  repetition  (b). 

a.  Nonsense,  dear.  I  can't  have  you  giving  in  to  the 
silly  fancy  of  being  affected  by  the  weather. 

Gaskell,  Wives  III  p.   y^. 
"You    had    better    take    care,"    said  Percy  Beaumont,, 
"or  you  will  have  an  offended  father  or  brother  pulling: 
out  a  bowie-knife."       H.  James,  Daisy  Miller  p.    138. 

b.  I  will  not  have  dirty  old  men  like  that  coming 
into  the  house.         Walpole,  Fort.  Ill  ch.  5  §  2  p.  2S8. 

See  also  108  and  339  ff. 

. .        560.     The  primary  meaning  of  to  have  when- 
uDject  witn  ,       .  ,  ,  .  .  ..... 

p     .  .  .       construed   with    an   object   and    participle  is    to 

experience'.     This  meaning  is  often  quite  clear 

when    there    is    a    personal    subject  {a).     In    other    cases^ 

however,    the    meaning    becomes   much   vaguer  [b).     The 

object  may  be  a  provisional  it  [c). 

a.  "I  have  had  my  best  chairs  for  fifteen  years,  and 
have  never  had  them  sat  upon",  sobbed  an  old  lady  in 
Sheffield  County  Court  yesterday  when  claiming  damages 
for  injury  to  her  furniture  during  removal.     Daily  News. 

I  deemed  it  no  small  matter  to  have  all  the  various 
productions  of  the  sea  with  which  he  was  acquainted 
pointed  out  to  me.      Hugh  Miller,  My  Schools  ch.  4. 

We  think  of  religion  as  something  moralized;  we  have 
even  had  it  defined,  inadequately  enough,  as  'morality- 
touched  with  emotion'. 

G.  Murray,  in  Engl.  Lit.  and  the  Classics  p.    lO. 


TO   HAVE  387 

She  had  had  a  story  taken  by  The  Green  Volume. 
Walpole,  Fort.  II  ch.   i    3   p.   156. 

An  eye-witness  —  a  Mr.  Frank  Harris,  butcher,  of 
82  Cheapside  —  had  his  veracious  account  journah'stically 
doctored.  ib.  II  ch.   5   p.   193. 

b.  This  again  has  been  completely  reformed  in  the 
present  grammar,  in  which  the  spoken  language  has  had 
its  proper  importance  assigned  to  it. 

Sweet,  N.  E.  G.  Preface  p.  X. 
Recent  studies  have  made  a  change.  Bohemian  history 
has  had  much  new  light  thrown  upon  it. 

Times  Lit.  23/3,    16. 

c.  He  knew  that  he  had  found  her  questions  difficult 
to  answer  and  that  he  had  had  it  driven  in  upon  him 
that  it  was  not  really  because  she  was  interested  in  the 
subtleties  of  his  art  that  she  inquired  .  .  . 

Walpole,  Fort.  Ill  ch,  8  p.  317. 

561.  The  construction  with  the  participle  seems  to  be 
used  in  order  to  enable  the  writer  to  make  the  psycholo- 
gical subject  the  grammatical  subject  of  the  sentence. 

Pope  has  three  chapters  devoted  to  his  genius  as 
exhibited  in  his  character,  his  poetry,  and  his  optimism, 
(instead  of:  Three  chapters  are  devoted  to  the  g.  of 
P.  etc.).  Athenaeum,    \\2,   13. 

I  have  had  my  imagination  deeply  thrilled  lately  by 
reading  about  the  discovery  in  America  of  the  bones  of 
a  fossil  animal  called  the  Diplodocus. 

Benson,  Thread  of  Gold. 

No  new  version  can  have  its  goodness  finally  assessed 
at  first;  obvious  badness  is  somewhat  more  easily  deter- 
mined. Omond,  Essays  III  72. 

Once  more  we  have  Sterne  set  before  us  —  this  time 
by  the  deft  hand  of  Mr.  Walter  Sichel. 

Everyman  29/11,    12. 

Not  far  from  the  scene  of  the  disaster  (a  munitions 
explosion)  there  were  five  cotton  mills.  (One  of  the  mills 
was  set  on  fire) . .  .  The  other  mills  had  their  windows 
shattered.  Times  W.  22/6,   17. 


388  VERBS 

We    are    no    longer  children,  but  men :  .  .  .  who  have 
had  our  hearts  bruised  and  cover  them  with  armour  .  . . 
Meredith,  Harrington  ch.  41  p.  420. 

The  aristocracy  to  whom  the  leadership  of  the  state 
now  fell  had  a  twofold  task  imposed  upon  them. 

Goodspeed,  History. 

Never  mind,  I  won't  have  Miles  led  into  any  more 
mischief.  Montgomery,  Misunderstood. 

I  was  myself  for  seven  years  at  Eton  and  for  nearly 
four  years  at  Cambridge,  and  I  never  had  a  piece  of 
English  writing  criticised,  as  my  Greek  and  Latin  exer- 
cises were  criticised,  by  any  of  my  instructors. 

Benson,  J.  of  Engl.  Studies  I   151. 

The  Village  told  how  Farmer  Blaize  had  his  rick 
feloniously  set  fire  to.  Meredith,  R.  Feverel. 

562.  As  in  the  case  of  the  object  with  plain  stem  the 
construction  with  an  object  and  participle  may  denote  'to 
cause'  in  certain  contexts. 

I  want  to  have  these  books  bound. 
In  the  meantime  the  Mayor  was  having  the  prisoner's 
apartment  searched  for  treasonable  papers. 

563.  The  following  sentences  seem  to  be  best  interpreted 
with  to  have  in  the  sense  of  'to  hold,  or  possess.' 

It  was  the  man  who  had  "Elinor"  and  "Bessie"  tat- 
tooed on  his  arm. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  44  p.  480. 
Balked   of  what   mattered  most  on   earth  to  her,  she 
grieved  and  pined  until  all  her  strength  was  drained  and 
misery  had  her  numbed. 

Julia  Peterkin,  Scarlet  Sister  Mary  ch.  14  p.  130. 

_    ,    ,       564.     In   548  f.   it  has  been  shown  how  a  mixed 
Perfect 

noun-and-verb   group   may  lead  to  a  purely  verbal 

construction.     The  same  has  happened  in  the  case  of  the 

object    with    participle    construction    after    to    have.     The 


TO   HAVE  389 

intermediate    stage    may    be    seen    in    sentences    like    the 
following. 

I've  heard  most  of  our  own  great  speakers  and  a 
good  many  of  the  Englishmen,  but  Samara  has  them 
beaten  to  a  frazzle. 

E.  Ph.  Oppenheim,  Gabriel  Samara  II  ch.  i  p.  189. 

The   baby   stirred  and  wailed  dismally;  in  a  moment 
Carola  had  it  caught  up  and  pressed  to  her  heart. 
Marjorie  Bowen,  The  Quest  of  Lory  I  ch.  6  p.  45. 

Besides,  this  unseemly  war  will  be  over  in  six  months. 
The  Germans  will  have  us  beaten  by  then. 

Ernest  Raymond,  Tell  England  II  ch.  2  p.   187. 

Compare  these  with  the  purely  verbal  group  in  the 
following  sentences. 

He  had  packed  his  bag  in  readiness,  and  now  he 
fetched  it...  Walpole,  Fort.  I  ch.   12  p.   138. 

Mr.  W.  H.  Davies  has  won  his  place;  he  is  a  writer 
who  is  read,  a  singer  who  never  lacks  listeners. 

Times  Lit.  23/9,   1920. 

565.  The  combination  of  to  have  with  a  participle  of 
a  transitive  or  intransitive  verb  corresponds  in  many 
respects  to  the  perfect  of  several  Indogermanic  languages, 
and  the  term  is  for  that  reason  applied  to  the  group  in 
English.  Thus  we  speak  of  a  perfect  in  /  have  loaded 
tny  revolver,  but  of  an  object  with  participle  in  /  have 
my   revolver  loaded'^).     The  difference  is,  of  course,  real: 


1)  The  difference  is  generally  shown  in  English  (not  invariably,  as  we 
shall  see  below)  by  the  word-order.  When  this  is  not  the  case,  as  in  Dutch, 
a  misunderstanding  may  arise,  if  exceptionally.  The  following  actual  con- 
versation  between   two  examiners  in  a  railway  carriage  may  illustrate  this. 

A.  "Ik  heb  de  stukken  getypt."  (I  have  the  papers  type-written,  or  I 
have  *ype--written  the  papers). 

B.  "Dat  zal  u  heel  wat  tijd  gekost  hebben."  (That  will  have  taken  you 
a  good  deal  of  time). 

A.  "0  nee,  ik  bedoel  dat  ik  ze  getypt  van  de  voorzitter  gekregen  heb." 
(Oh  no,  I  mean  that  I  have  received  them  type-written  from  the  chairman.) 


,390  VERBS 

the  latter  construction  expresses  a  state  as  the  result  of 
an  action,  the  former  expresses  an  action  considered  as 
the  source  of  a  state. 

566.  The  perfect  is  used  to  express  the  bearing  of  a 
past  action  or  state  on  the  present  time.  This  is  the 
most   frequent   function  of  the  perfect  {resultative  perfect^. 

Staffordshire  rivers  have  remained  virgin  of  keels  to 
this  day.  Bennett,  Old  W.  T.  I  ch.   i   §   i. 

The  recurrence  of  the  Italian  national  festival  of  Venti 
Settembre  reminds  us  that  half  a  century  has  now  passed 
away  since  "Italy  entered  Rome."    Times  Lit.  16/9,  20. 

Canon  Ollard,  as  we  have  said,  has  secured  contributors 
of  reputation.  Two  especially  eminent  men  have  died  shice 
their  articles  were  written  —  the  late  Bishop  of  Salisbury  . . . 
and  Dr.  James  Gairdner.  Athenaeum,    16/11,    12. 

The  time  seems  near,  if  it  has  not  actually  arrived, 
when  the  chastened  sublimity  of  a  moor,  a  sea,  or  a 
mountain  will  be  all  of  nature  that  is  absolutely  in 
keeping  with  the  moods  of  the  more  thinking  among 
mankind.  Hardy,  Native  I  ch.    i   p.   5. 

Half  a  lifetime  of  additional  reading  and  writing,  and 
of  ruminating  over  what  I  have  read  and  have  written, 
has  brought  some  general  conclusions  clearer  and  clearer 
to  my  mind,  the  implicit  growing  explicit  i). 

Vernon  Lee,  Handling  of  Words  p.  VII. 

567.  The  resultative  perfect  is  naturally  found  passim 
in  prefaces;  quotations  would  be  superfluous.  It  may 
also  be  observed  that  the  result  in  the  case  of  transitive 
verbs  is  to  be  observed  in  the  object,  in  the  case  01 
intransitive  verbs  in  the  subject.  The  action,  occurrence, 
or  state  referred  to  by  the  group-perfect  may  be  thought 
of   as    continuing    into    the    present    time;   this    is  onl}^  a 


1)  In    sentences    with    more    than    one    perfect   italics  denote  the  groups 
that  illustrate  the  statement. 


TO   HAVE  391 

special    case    of   its    resultative    use,    which   is   often   dis- 
tinguished by  a  special  term :  the  continuative  perfect. 
We  have  lived  here  for  the  last  ten  years. 
Ever    since    the    so-called    settlement    of   last    year's 
national    dispute,    railwaymen    have    gradually    become 
more    and   more  convinced  that  their  leaders  committed 
a   grave    blunder    in  sending   them   back  to  work  when 
they  did. 

568.  The  resultative  perfect  expresses  a  similar  meaning 
when  the  form  depends  upon  a  main  clause  referring  to 
the  future.  In  this  case  it  denotes  the  bearing  of  an  action 
that   is   thought  of  as  occurring  at  a  future  point  of  time. 

Wait  till  I  have  finished  my  letter. 

The  feeling  thus  aroused  in  a  time  of  peril  needs  to 
be  fostered  and  deepened  within  our  own  borders  when 
the  clouds  have  passed  away.  Times  W.   3/1,    13. 

It  is  the  instrument  that  is  given  to  you  and  if,  when 
you  come  to  die,  you  know  that,  for  brief  moments,  you 
have  heard,  and  that  what  you  have  heard  you  have 
tvritten.  Life  has  beeji  justified.  (Reference  lost). 

569.  The  resultative  perfect  may  express  an  iterative 
aspect.  In  this  meaning  the  link  with  the  past  naturally 
becomes  stronger  than  in  the  examples  given  until  now, 
because  the  result  is  not  thought  of  as  connected  with  the 
present  time. 

The  other  species  (of  woodpecker)  have  the  same 
habit  of  drumming  on  one  tree.  I  have  noticed  it  in  the 
small  spotted  or  banded,  woodpecker ;  and  have  observed 
that  invariably  after  he  has  drummed  two  or  three  times 
the  female  has  come  flying  to  him  from  some  other  part 
of  the  wood,  and  the  two  birds  have  then  both  together 
zittered  their  loud  chirping  notes  and  flown  away. 

Hudson,  Hampshire  Days  ch.    i   p.    12. 

As  further  showing  how  barbaric  ideas  persist  in  the 
heart  of  civilisation,  there  is  an  overwhelming  feeling 
against    hiring    men    bearing    the    reprobated    names  as 


392  VERBS 

hands  for  the  boats  in  the  herring-fishing  season;  and 
when  they  have  bee^i  hired  before  their  names  were 
known,  their  wages  have  been  refused  if  the  season  has 
been  a  failure. 

Clodd,  Tom  Tit  Tot  (Duckworth,   1898)  p.  118. 

"Bring  your  chair  close  up  to  the  bed  —  so  —  like 
that.  You  have  never  come  to  sit  in  here  before,  Peter, 
do  you  know  that.-"' 

"Yes,  mother"  ... 

"You  have  come  in  before  because  you  have  been 
told  to.  To-day  you  were  not  told  —  why  did  you 
come?  Walpole,  Fort.  I  ch.  8  3  p.  91. 

570.  The  perfect  can  also  express  an  action  or  occur- 
rence thought  of  in  a  time  that  is  present,  but  regarded 
as  a  whole,  not  in  its  result  only,  so  that  the  past  is 
included.  This  perfect  is  used  when  we  want  to  consider 
or  discuss  the  action  or  occurrence;  it  is  distinctly  different 
from  the  narrative  past  tense.  This  function  may  be  called 
the  declaratory  perfect. 

London  has  been  repeatedly  attacked  by  squadrons 
of  German  aeroplanes  during  the  last  few  nights. 

Times  W.   5/10,    17. 

Prince  Henry  has  decided  to  travel  to  Tokio  by  the 
overland  route.  Twice  already  he  has  visited  Japan,  in 
1898  and   1900.  Standard,   16/8,   12. 

The  motor  has  relegated  the  cabriolet  to  the  coach- 
house long  ago  1).  Daily  Sketch  22/8,   1912. 

571.  The  preterite  of  to  have  can  be  used  in  the  same 
way  as  the  present  to  form  a  group  with  the  participle;  the 
combination  .is  called  the  preterite  perfect.  The  preterite 
perfect,  like  the  simple  preterite,  can  be  used  as  a  past 
tense  and  as  a  modal  preterite  (29).  We  can  distinguish  the 
past  perfect  and  the  modal  preterite  perfect  accordingly. 


1)  van  der  Gaaf,  Engl.  Studien  62  p.  403  f. 


TO   HAVE  393 

p    ,  572.     The  past  perfect  can  express  the  same 

meanings  as  the  present  perfect,  but  with  re- 
ference to  a  past  time.  The  following  examples  are  arranged 
so  as  to  bring  out  the  parallelism. 

(1)  resultative  (566). 

The  other  snarled  aloud  into  a  savage  laugh ;  and  the 
next  moment,  with  extraordinary  quickness,  he  had 
unlocked  the  door  and  disappeared  into  the  house. 

Stevenson,  Dr.  Jekyll. 

The  Norman  Conquest  of  io66  brought  England  into 
close  contact  with  Europe.  Our  ancestors  had  suffered 
from  isolation.  Watson,  Engl.  Church  p.  $6. 

He  alighted  at  Liverpool  Street,  however,  quite  con- 
scientiously secure  that  he  had  not  missed  the  criminal 
so  far.     Chesterton,  Innocence  of  Father  Brown  p.  4. 

(2)  continuative  (567). 

Eor  many  days  now  he  had  lain  in  bed  in  a  room 
exuding  silver,  crimson,  and  electric  light. 

Galsworthy,  Caravan  p.  3. 

(3)  resultative  (568). 

Elence  the  great  Valentin,  when  he  set  out  to  find  Flam- 
beau, was  perfectly  well  aware  that  his  adventures  would 
not  end  when  he  had  found  him.     Chesterton,  ib.  p.  3. 

He  would  never,  until  his  own  end  had  come,  forget 
that  evening.  Walpole,  Fort.  I  ch.  b  §  4  p.  95. 

(4)  iterative  (569). 

Instead  of  flying  to  her  friendly  lap  for  that  protection 
which  I  had  so  often  experienced  when  I  have  been 
weak  and  timid,  I  shrunk  back  terrified  and  bewildered 
to  my  bed  . . .  Charles  Lamb  in  Sel.  Short  Stories  I  p.  58. 

(5)  declaratory  (570). 

The  morning  the  pony  had  been  tried  the  Earl  Aad 
been    so    pleased   that  he  had  almost  forgotten  his  gout. 

Burnett,  Fauntleroy. 
The    house    had  belonged  to    a    family  of  some  note, 
whose  heirs  had  outstripped  their  fortunes. 

Lytton,  Eugene  Aram  ch.  3. 


394  VERBS 

For  some  time  past  it  had  been  assumed  that  the 
following  British  and  French  merchant  vessels,  which 
have  been  long  overdue,  had  been  sunk  by  a  German 
raider  .  .  .  Definite  information  has  now  been  received 
from  Pernambuco  confirming  this  assumption. 

Times  W.  26/1,   17. 

Modal  Preterite       ^^^-     '^^^  preterite  perfect  is  used  in  the 
p    -  same    function    as    the    simple    preterite    of 

modesty;  see  36. 

"I  thought,"  said  she,  presently,  "you  had  told  me 
your  name  was  John.''" 

Temple  Thurston,  City  I  ch.  8. 
One   would   think,    to    hear  him  talk,  that  those  who 
are   fighting   for    England   had    left  behind  nothing  that 
was  worth  fighting  for  except  himself. 

Times  Lit,  20/1,   16. 
It  might,  perhaps,  have  been  better  if  these  (i.  e.  these 
additions,    by  the  translator)  had  been  distinguished  by 
brackets  or  initialed.  Athenaeum,  28/8,    15. 

Comradeship    is    at   the  most  only  one  half  of  human 
life ;    the    other    half  is    Love,    a  thing  so  different  that 
one  might  fancy  it  had  been  made  for  another  universe. 
Chesterton,  What's  Wrong,  p.  90. 

574.     The   preterite   perfect  is  also  used  as  an  irrealis ; 
see  37  f.     It  occurs  in: 

(1)  adverb  clauses. 

They  were  not  brother  and  sister,  but  they  loved 
each  other  as  much  as  if  they  had  been. 

Andersen,  Fairy  Tales. 

Had  he  been  able  to  consult  it  he  would  have  found 
that   it  contained  a  wealth  of  materials  for  his  purpose. 
Mod.  Lang.  Notes,  Nov.   191 2. 

(2)  attributive  clauses,  in  literary  English  chiefly. 

There  was  a  httle  art  in  her,  that  had  perhaps  found 
a  medium  had  she  been  born  to  a  different  environment. 
Phillpotts,  Beacon,  book  I  ch.  6, 


TO   HAVE  395 

(3)  object  clauses  depending  upon  /  zvish  or  we  wish 
as  the  main  clause. 

We  wish  that  Tvlr.  Macdonald  had  touched  upon  Bret 
Harte's  literary  influence.  Times  Lit.  3/2,    16. 

I  have  received  many  messages,  of  pleasure  in,  and 
even  gratitude  for,  the  book,  which  leave  me  in  no  sort 
of  doubt  that  it  was  worth  writing  ;  though  I  wish  with 
all  my  heart  that  it  had  been  worthier  of  its  motive, 
and  had  been  better  able  to  communicate  the  delight 
of  my  visions  and  dreams.  A.   C.  Benson. 

575.  When  the  past  perfect  is  completed  by  an  object 
clause  with  a  predicative  past  tense  [a),  or  with  a  stem 
with  to  (b),  or  an  ing  (c),  the  perfect  expresses  a  contrast 
with  the  present.  When  the  verb  in  the  perfect  refers  to 
the  future,  the  construction  contrasts  the  present  time  with 
some  point  of  time  in  the  past  that  was  future  at  the  time 
referred  to  (d). 

a.  I  am  sure  that  Theocritus  has  handled  these  scenes 
with  an  art  altogether  transcending  that  of  his  rivals, 
but  I  had  thought  that  they  ivere  the  fruit  of  his  own 
genius  and  invention.  It  is  a  pity  that  Herodas  should 
have  disabused  us  of  a  pleasing  illusion,  seeing  that  he 
has  given  us  so  little  in  exchange  for  it. 

Tyrrel  in  Calverley  p.  XVII. 

b.  A  deliberate  student  of  prosody,  on  which  he  had 
intended  to  leave  a  treatise,   but  did  not. 

Saintsbury,  Manual  p.   303. 
The  circumstance  needs  explanation.  Are  we  to  assume 
that    Munich    is    more    intimately    in    the    confidence   of 
Vienna  than  Berlin?  That  has  happened  before  now,  but 
we  had  not  supposed  it  to,  be  the  case  at  present. 

Times  W.  4/12,    14. 

c.  I  had  intended  translating  all  or  nearly  all  these 
Idylls  into  blank  verse  .  .  .  But  I  found  that  other  metres 
had  their  special  advantages.  Calverley  p.  XXXI. 

It  would  have  been  pleasanter  and  easier  attacking 
later  .  .  .  Times  VV.    12/10,    17. 


396  VERBS 

d.  I  had  hoped  that  in  this  twentieth  century  one  would 
not  have  found  any  of  enlightened  culture  making  such 
an  unjust  and  foolish  statement. 

C.  Robertson  in  Everyman  13/12,   12. 

-  ,  D  f  4  5^^-  I"  the  sentences  illustrating  the  per- 
Loinpl6x  rcricct  .  ,  i        -i  1  /- 

lect  we  have  quoted  until  now  the  perfect 
Groups  ,  ,  .     ^  .  ,  -      ,  ,  .      . 

has   almost   invariably   been   a   combination 

of  the  present  or  past  tense  of  have  with  a  participle.  It 
may  happen,  however,  that  the  perfect  is  combined  with 
a  passive  group  (type  has  been  done).  Another  form  of 
the  predicative  perfect  is  the  combination  with  auxiliaries 
that  take  a  plain  stem  (type  will  have  come)  and  the  corre- 
sponding passive  (type  will  have  been  done).  A  very  few 
examples  will  suffice. 

The  method  of  Macbeth  has  been,  as  it  were,  absorbed 
by  that  of  the  modern  novel ;  the  method  of  Britannicus 
still  rules  the  stage. 

Lytton  Strachey,  Books  and  Characters  p.  9. 

The  object  of  this  essay  is,  .  .  .  Whether  the  attempt 
succeed  or  fail,  some  important  general  questions  of 
literary  doctrine  will  have  been  discussed  ;  and,  in  addition, 
at  least  an  effort  will  have  been  made  to  vindicate  a 
great  reputation.  ib.  p.   5  f. 

,,  ,.    ..  577.     The  perfect  is  also  used  in  the  non- 

Non-predicative  ...  ,    ,    ,  ,  •  , 

p   J  predicative    verbal    forms:   the  stem  with  to 

(type  to  have  done)  and  the  ing  (type  having 

done);  and  in  the  complex  groups  corresponding  to  those 

of   576    (types    to   have   been  done  and  having  been  done). 

Examples  of  these  groups  have  been  given  when  dealing 

with   the   non-predicative   verbal  forms,  but  the  meanings 

of   these    groups   and   their  relation   to   the  simple  forms 

must  be  treated  briefly  here. 

578.     The  meaning  of  the  non-predicative  group-perfect 
is  perhaps  chiefly  resultative,  as  in  the  following  sentences. 


TO   HAVE  397 

He  seems,  to  have  worked  hard. 
We  shall  hope  to  have  passed  A.  by  7  P.  M. 
To    have    been    accused    was    very   bad;    but  now  it 
seemed  to  be  the  opinion  of  every  one  that  the  verdict 
must    be    against   the    man. 

Trollope,  Last  Chron.  ch.  61. 
His  motive  is  not  ignoble,  and  his  success  in  life  will 
be    to  have  put  all  his  manifold  resources  at  the  service 
of   the    toilers,    the   thinker,    and  the  student  —  in  the 
broadest  sense,  to  have  saved  them  trouble. 

Baker,  Uses  of  Libr.  p,  3. 
By   consistently  stressing  the  psychological  aspects  of 
primitive  religion  I  hope  to  have  contributed  something 
to    a    closer    alliance    of   two    sister    sciences    that    too 
frequently   have   pursued    their  paths  in  mutual  neglect. 
Lowie,  Primitive  Religion,  Pref.  p.  V. 
His  heart  was  full.     A  God  there  must  be  somewhere 
to    have    given    him    all  this   splendour    —  a  splendour 
surely  for  him  to  work  upon. 

Walpole,  Fort.  I  ch.   12  p.   146. 
To  have  overburdened  the  book  with  a  large  number 
of    details    would    only    confuse    the   student  and  render 
him  unable  *to  see  the  wood  for  the  trees.' 

Wright,  Elem.  ME  Grammar  p.  IX. 

579.  In  the  following  cases  we  have  a  parallel  to  the 
declaratory  perfect. 

He  is  said  to  have  been  an  honest  man. 

He  pretended  to  have  walked  as  fast  as  he  could. 

Cynewulf  was,  in  the  opinion  of  a  large  number  of 
critics,  a  Northumbrian,  but  some  think  him  to  have  been 
Mercian.       Stopford  Brooke  in  Chambers's  Cyclop.  I. 

580.  The  perfect  stem  is  frequent  with  a  predicative 
verb  in  a  past  tense  to  express  the  meaning  discussed 
in  575. 

But  tell  me;  has  he  left  this  neighbourhood.''  I  wanted 
to  have  seen  him.  Gaskell,  Wives  II  p.  233. 


398  VERBS 

I  had  hoped  to  have  had  a  very  remarkable  diagram 
prepared  by  the  Admiralty  —  I  may  have  it  before  I 
sit  down  —  showing  the  losses  of  shipping,  Allied  and 
British.  Lloyd  George,   rep.   Times  W.  28/12,    17. 

He  stepped  inside,  and  the  cab  rolled  off.  "Were  you 
going  to  have  walked.-*"  she  asked  presently. 

Temple  Thurston,  City  I  ch.   15. 

"Oh,  there's  no  doubt  he  was  clever  enough  to  have 
been  a  doctor.  Only  of  course  with  his  family  he  had 
to  be  a  soldier,"  Mackenzie,  Sylvia  p.  266. 

A  glorious  vision  to  the  youth,  who  embraced  it  as 
a  flower  of  beauty,  and  read  not  a  feature.  There  were 
curious  features  of  colour  in  her  face  for  him  to  have 
read,  Meredith,  Feverel  ch.   15  p.  98. 

"I  did  not  know  Lord  Fane  was  at  the  Abbey, 
grandpapa.     When  did  he  come?" 

The  old  man  rubbed  his  eyes  wearily.  "I  —  I  did 
hear.  Yes,  he  was  to  have  arrived  last  night.  I  thought 
I  told  you.  No?  Then  I  forgot  it.  I  remember  now. 
Yes,  he  was  to  come  last  night." 

"It  is  evident  he  has  come!"  remarked  the  girl,  with 
a  touch  of  humour  that  lit  up  her  dark  eyes. 

Garvice,  Staunch  as  a  Woman. 

We  should  like  to  have  seen  the  secondary  school 
element  more  fully  represented.      Times  Ed,  S.  7/9,  16, 

How  could  he  go  away.^  How  could  he  desert  his 
people?  It  was  impossible  . .  .  Sir  Evelyn  Baring  thought 
differently.  In  his  opinion  it  was  General  Gordon's 
plain  duty  to  have  come  away  from  Khartoum. 

Lytton  Strachey,  in  Engl,    19th  Cent,  II  p,   "iZ. 

His  first  intention  was  to  have  printed  a  collection  of 
letters,  chiefly  of  the  time  of  Elizabeth  and  James  the 
First . .  .  Ellis,  Original  Letters  Pref.  p.  V, 

To  have  been  killed  in  battle  would  have  been  a 
better  fate  for  the  brave  young  soldier  than  that  which 
was  reserved  for  him.     Mem.  Verney  Fam.  II  p.  344. 

581.     The  modal  function  of  the  perfect  stem  also  occurs 
with  a  predicative  present  tense. 


TO   HAVE  399 

Those  of  us  who  feel  that  we  are  clever  enough  to 
have  succeeded  at  the  Bar,  and  regret  that  we  did  not 
choose  to  pursue  the  fugitive  prizes  of  that  honourable 
and  profitable  calling,  can  generally  derive  some  comfort 
from  the  perusal  of  the  reminiscences  of  a  successful 
barrister.  Times  Lit.   17/5,   18. 

582.  The  perfect  stem  is  occasionally  found  in  the  same 
function  when  non-fulfilment  is  already  indicated  by  the 
predicative  verb.  This  double  perfect  stem  is  generally 
disapproved  of  by  critics. 

And,  when  I  remember  all  that  this  man  (viz. 
Charles  II)  did,  and  all  that  he  did  not  do,  all  that  he 
was,  and  all  that  he  would  have  chosen  to  have  been, 
I  am  not  at  all  sure  that  the  second  Charles  Stuart  was 
a  more  fortunate  man  than  the  first. 

Cecil  Chesterton,  Everyman. 

Mr.  H.  J.  White  is  an  Australian  and  he  has  written 
far  too  much.  At  least,  he  would  have  done  better  to 
have  published  a  very  small  selection  of  these  verses. 

Academy,   17/8,   12. 

Molly  did  not  like  the  idea  of  going  out  for  a  tete- 
a-tete  walk  with  Mr.  Preston ;  yet  she  pined  for  a  little 
fresh  air,  would  have  liked  to  have  seen  the  gardens^ 
and  have  looked  at  the  Manor  house  from  different 
aspects.  Gaskell,  Wives  I  ch.   14.  p.  241. 

A  notoriety  which  he  would  have  done  much  to  have 
avoided  was  forced  upon  him. 

Oppenheim,  A  People's  Man  ch,  27. 

But  Mrs.  Ambrose  seemed  to  be  obtuse,  and  the  vicar 
would  have  been  the  last  to  have  spoken  of  his  suspicions^ 
even  to  the  wife  of  his  bosom. 

Crawford,  Lonely  Parish  ch.  9. 

He  would  have  given  much  money  to  have  been 
spared  the  experience. 

Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  IV  ch.   i  §  3. 

583.     The    result    of   the    constructions    described    and 
illustrated   in   575   and  580  ff.  is  that  the  meaning  defined 


400  VERBS 

can  be  expressed  either  by  a  predicative  perfect  completed 
by  a  clause  or  stem  with  a  simple  form,  or  by  a  predi- 
cative simple  verbal  form  and  a  perfect  stem :  /  hoped  to 
have  seen  him  or  /  had  hoped  to  see  him.  The  type  I  had 
hoped  to  have  seen  him  may  be  considered  a  blending  of 
the  two  others, 

584.  The  functions  of  the  complex  ing  with  the  auxiliary 
to  have  (the  perfect:  having  fl'oW(?/ and  the  perfect  passive: 
having  been  done)  have  been  treated  in  the  chapter  on 
the  ing  (137  f.).  The  meaning  of  these  forms  is  parallel 
to  those  of  the  complex  stem.  Here,  as  in  the  case  of  the 
stem,  the  resultative  meaning  seems  to  predominate  {a), 
but  the  modal  meaning  of  575  and  580  ff.  is  current,  too  (b). 

a.  He  acknowledged  having  organized  the  plot,  and 
armed  the  conspirators.  Times  Lit,   17/10,   1929. 

Having  dealt,  so  far  as  is  possible,  with  the  social 
organisation  of  the  early  English  kingdoms,  we  must 
now  turn  to  their  political  organisation. 

Oman,  Engl.  Conquest  p.  ^,66. 

b.  See  575  ^. 

585.  The  perfect  ing  is  chiefly  found  in  prepositional 
adjuncts,  in  free  (including  absolute)  adjuncts,  and  in 
objects;  for  examples,  see  137  f.  Verbs  expressing  an 
act  of  memory  take  both  the  simple  and  the  perfect  ing, 
whereas  they  can  take  a  perfect  stem  with  to  only: 
/  remember  hearing,  having  heard,  but  /  remember  to 
have  heard. 

Peter  was  tremendously  excited.  He  could  never  re- 
member being  quite  so  excited  before. 

Walpole,  Fort.  I  ch.   i  §  2  p.   10. 
I   can   remember  turning  round  to  stare  at  the  pneu- 
matic  tyres  of  a  bicycle  from  here,  yes,  and  even  at  a 
young  man  in  a  Homburg  hat. 

Compton  Mackenzie,  Old  Men  of  the 
Sea  ch.   i  p.   11  f. 


TO   HAVE  401 

An  example  of  a  perfect  ing  (with  recollect)  is  to  be 
found  in  137  a;  the  simple  ing  is  illustrated  in  120  (p.  100). 

586.  The  use  of  these  various  forms  is  not  arbitrary, 
of  course.  The  meaning  clearly  varies  according  to  the 
form  used.  The  difference  between  the  simple  and  the 
perfect  ing  can  be  brought  out  most  conveniently  by 
comparing  the  difference  between  the  predicative  verbal 
forms:  the  past  tense  and  the  perfect.  The  simple  forms 
in  the  first  two  sentences  of  the  preceding  section  mean: 
remember  that  he  ever  was  so  excited  before,  remember 
that  he  turned  round.  In  the  example  of  137  a,  with  the 
perfect  ing,  on  the  contrary,  the  equivalent  would  be : 
recollect  that  I  have  been  admired  (or,  in  the  reported  style 
of  the  text:  that  she  had  been  admired). 

The  reason  why  the  stem  must  be  in  the  perfect  form 
is  that  the  stem  serves  as  an  adjunct  of  result  here. 

Character  of  the       ^^'^      ^'^\  group-perfect    like  the  group- 

„  .         passive  (489),  is  a  separable  group,  whence 

we  find  two  coordinated  participles  with  the 

same   form   of  to  have,  as  the  predicative  verb,  or  with  a 

non-predicative  have,  as  the  leading  member  of  the  group. 

He  had  looked  at  his  watch  and  seen  that  it  was  near 
two  in  the  morning. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  43  p.  477. 
Mankind  has  always  desired  to  know  what  was  going 
on  outside  its  immediate  surroundings,  and  wished,  when 
it  suited,  to  tell  what  was  going  on  within. 

Robbins,  The  Press  p.  7. 
I   can't   think    what   I   should   have  done,  or  where  I 
should  have  gone,  if  Mr.  Brent  had  not  come  out  of  the 
bank  and  seen  me.       Marie  Connor  Leighton, 

The  Mystery  of  the  Three  Fingers  ch.  2  p.  31. 
"I've    been   engaged    to   him  a  year  and  he  ought  to 
have   sent   me   the    ring  long  ago,  and  not  waited  till  a 
week  before  the  wedding."  ib.  ch.   i   p.   10. 

Kruisinga,  Handbook  II.  Accidence  and  Syntax.  1.  26 


402  VERBS 

She  would  have  listened  to  them  and  not  herself 
talked,  but  Gerald  did  not  allow  her  to  be  silent. 

W.  B.  Maxwell,  Gabrielle  p.  96. 

„  ,  ,  „  ,  588.  A  group-perfect  sometimes  becomes 
Perfect-Present  . 

a   specially   close  group  because  it  develops 

a  special  meaning.  Such  group-perfects  are  to  have  done 
and  to  have  got.  The  connection  with  the  action  that  has 
preceded  may  be  completely  gone,  so  that  they  have  the 
meaning  of  simple  present  tenses;  we  may  call  them  perfect- 
presents  in  this  function  ^).  To  have  got  is  not  onl}^  used 
with  a  noun  object,  but  also  with  a  stem  with  to  and  with 
a  participle. 

When  my  mother  died,  I  determined  to  have  done 
with  teaching.  Gissing,  Odd  Women  ch.   3. 

I  have  got  a  very  good  knife;  you  may  just  try  if  it 
is  of  use. 

Show  me  your  purse;  what  money  have  you  got? 

"Well,  I  must  say  good-bye,  Miss  Green,  I've  got  my 
sermon  to  prepare."  Punch,  2/3   1889  p.   107/2. 

At  that  rate  I  shall  be  up  first  after  all.  —  Oh  no^ 
you  won't.  I've  only  got  to  do  up  my  collar,  if  I  can 
find  that  blessed  stud,  and  put  on  my  coat. 

Collinson,  Spoken  English  p.  38. 

Wij  v  ounli  :got  tu  aask  lijv  fa  juw  ta  -kam  an  sij  mij^, 
an  "^'3  ]3ii]gz  dan.  Sweet,  Spoken  Engl,  p.  51. 

How  much  money  have  you  got  left.'' 

589.  To  have  got  is  not  in  all  respects  identical  irt 
meaning  with  the  simple  have.  It  invariably  refers  to  the 
present  moment,  and  cannot  express  the  iterative  aspect; 
it  could  not  be  used,  consequently,  in  a  case  hke  the 
following :  Every  year  he  has  a  month's  holiday.    See  569. 

1)  They  can  be  used  as  ordinary  perfects:  I  have  got  out  of  the  way  of 
smoking  cigarettes  and  am  getting  into  the  way  of  smoking  a  pipe  (Col- 
linson,, Spoken  English  p.  26). 


TO   HAVE  403 

It  might  be  supposed  that  we  have  the  same  group  in 
a  sentence  hke  this:  Have  you  got  your  passport  visaed? 
(Colhnson,  ib.  p.  48);  but  a  comparison  with  a  similar 
sentence  containing  the  simple  get  is  enough  to  show  that 
the  construction  is  not  the  same :  /  want  some  passport 
photos.  Can  you  get  them  developed^  toned  and  printed  by 
three  this  afternoon?  (ib.  p.  48). 

n   c    .      A  r.u-    L        590.     The    perfect    of  transitive   verbs 
Perfect  and  Object-        ,    ,  ,    ^    , 

•xt.  n    i-  •  1         and  the  verb  to  have  with  an  obiect  and 
with-ParticipIe  ...  1,      ■,•    •        ■  ^  \  c 

„  ,  participle  are  usually  distinguished  form- 

ally by  their  word-order:  He  had  pointed 
out  the  difficulty  to  him  and  He  had  the  difficulty  pointed 
out  to  him.  But  it  may  happen,  as  in  the  case  of  the  verb 
with  the  stem  (551),  that  the  object  must  have  front-position, 
so  that  the  meaning  must  be  made  out  from  the  situation. 
It  is  the  situation  that  makes  it  certain  that  we  have  an 
object  with  complex  stem  in  the  following  sentences  {a)\ 
also  in  the  case  under  b,  in  which  the  object  follows  the 
complete  verbal  group. 

a.  How  on  earth  was  he  to  find  words  to  say  that 
which  he  now  wished  to  have  said'? 

Trollope,  Framley  ch.  39  379. 

In  the  pause  that  followed  her  words,  Mrs.  Sawbridge 
appeared    from    the    garden    smiling    with   a  determined 
amiability,  and  bearing  a  great  bunch  of  the  best  roses 
(zvhich  Sir  Isaac  hated  to  have  picked)  in  her  hands. 
Wells,  Harman  ch.  3  §  7  p.  'Ji. 

These  beds  were  the  only  sign  of  any  attempt  at 
gardening  to  be  seen,  .  .  .  ,  and  these  I  had  sown  with 
ipomaea,  the  whole  eleven  . .  .  ;  being  entirely  ignorant 
of  the  quantity  of  seed  necessary,  I  bought  ten  pounds  of 
it  and  had  it  soivn  not  only  in  the  eleven  beds  but  round 
nearly  every  tree.  Elizabeth,  Solitary  Summer. 

b.  Thus  by  a  process  of  bribery,  cajolery,  and  threats 
the  working  classes  are  to  have  thrust  upon  them  a  re- 


404  VERBS 

actionary  system  of  education  which  would  secure  a  more 
efficient  system  of  child  slavery,  while  the  parent  and 
the  Labour  world  are  to  be  kept  quiet  by  the  policy  of 
small  bribes.  Times  Ed.  S.  28/2,   18. 

Thomas  Mann's  "Novelle"  is  a  triumph  of  technique. 
In  its  pages  we  have  shown  us  the  heart  of  child  awa- 
kening to  girlhood,  to  puberty. 

Times  Lit.  17/3,   1927  p.   178/2. 

591.  When  a  perfect  of  to  have  is  construed  with  an 
object  and  participle,  there  can  be  no  doubt  about  the 
construction,  even  if  it  is  not  shown  by  the  order  of  words. 

The  Scottish  members  of  Parliament  have  had  sent 
to  them  a  memorandum  from  the  Business  Committee 
of  the  General  Council  of  the  University  of  Edinburgh, 
protesting  against...  Everyman,  6/12,   12. 

What  but  spiritual  solaces  could  assist  me  to  live  after 
the  degradations  I  have  had  heaped  on  me? 

Meredith,  Harrington  ch.  44  p.  446. 

592.  The  difference  between  the  perfect  and  the  object 
with  participle  may  be  shown  by  the  phonetic  form  of 
the  verb.  For  it  is  natural  that  to  have  as  an  auxiliary 
of  the  perfect  should  have  very  weak  stress,  and  this 
weakening  very  commonly  goes  so  far  that  the  vowel  is 
completely  lost 

In  his  Primer  of  Spoken  English  Sweet  distinguishes 
strong-stressed  [haev]  'must',  from  weak-stressed  -[haev] 
'cause,  let',  and  from  weak-stressed  [(h)9v]  as  an  auxiliary 
of  the  perfect. 

Juwl  haev  -i^  -haev  -jo  hcS  :kat. 

Sweet,  Hist.  Engl.  S.  §  45. 

But  compare  the  following. 

I've  a  proposition  to  lay  before  you,  Joe. 

Vachell,  Quinneys'  p.   194. 
See  also  600. 


TO   HAVE  405 

p    ,  ,       593.     The  perfect,  being  a  present  oi  to  have 

p  with    a    participle,    is  naturally  a  present  tense 

with  regard  to  time.  But  it  looks  upon  the 
present  in  connection  with  the  past,  treating  the  present 
as  it  were  retrospectively.  This  is  well  brought  out  by  the 
following  passage  in  William  de  Morgan's  Joseph  Vance 
(ch.   14  p.  124): 

I  made  up  my  mind  that  I  would  ask  Miss  Lossie 
what  she  thought  on  this  point  as  I  walked  along  the 
road  to  Poplar  Villa.  But  here  was  a  disappointment! 
Miss  Lossie  had  gone  to  Mrs.  Spencer's  at  Hampstead 
to  stay  over  Monday  and  had  taken  Master  Joseph.  The 
Doctor  was  in  his  Library  —  he  always  was.  Anne 
suggested  what  I  hesitated  to  ask,  that  she  should  tell 
the  Doctor  I  had  come.  I  said  "Please,  yes"  —  because 
the  expression  "You  have  come"  revealed  to  me  that 
I  was  expected.  Whereas  the  expression  "You  are  here" 
would  not  have  done  so.  What  nice  phases  there  are  in 
language !  —  I  was  told,  after  application  above,  to  go 
up  to  the  Library. 

The  following  passage,  too,  may  show  the  character 
of  the  perfect  as  a  present  tense. 

But  the  Artist's  wife  declined  to  fall  in  with  current 
opinion  about  the  picture.  "I  suppose  it's  very  beautiful, 
and  all  that,"  said  she.  "Only  don't  ask  me  to  admire 
it!  I  never  have  liked  that  sort  of  thing,  and  I  never 
shall  like  it.  i)     de  Morgan,  A  Likely  Story  ch.  i  p.  21. 

594.  The  present  and  the  perfect  are  often  contrasted; 
the  contrast  is,  of  course,  not  one  of  time  but  of  aspect: 
the  perfect  considers  the  action  or  occurrence  retrospec- 
tively, the  present  in  its  actual  aspect. 

Change  has  been,  and  is,  the  breath  of  our  existence 
and  the  condition  of  our  growth. 
Pollard,  Hist,  of  England  ch.    i   p.   8. 

1)  Italics  in  the  original. 


406  VERBS 

It    was    this    knowledge    that    made    me   idle    and  so 

undifferent  to  saving;  and  it  was  this  small  income  that 

has  been,  and  is  in  a  commercial  sense,  the  ruin  of  my 

life-  Davies,  Super-Tramp  ch.    1/  p.    134. 

In  England  they  have  always  existed,  and  do  so  still. 

Low,  British  Constitution  p.   18. 

It  follows   from   what  has  been  said  that  the  perfect  is 

not  used  to  refer  to  the  future  (on  an  apparent  use  of  this 

character,  compare  568).  We  may  say,  therefore,  that  the 

perfect  is  more  truly  a  present  tense  than  the  simple  present. 

595.  The  aspect  of  the  perfect  and  past  perfect  with 
to  have  can  also  be  expressed  by  means  of  an  adverb 
.adjunct:  hy  now, 

I  said  I  never  drank  before  lunch  and  tried  to  make 
up  my  mind  to  leave  them.  I  was  by  now  so  anxious 
to  be  accepted  for  this  expedition  that  I  could  almost 
have  brought  myself  to  ask  humbly  if  something  could 
not  be  managed  about  the  cabin. 

Mackenzie,  The  Old  Men  of  the     Sea  ch,   5  p.  6y . 

In  this  sentence  was  by  now  is  equivalent  to  had  become 
(not  to  had  been,  clearly). 

n    ,    ^       ,       596.     The   difference  between  the  resultative 
Perfect  and  r  ,     1 

p       .  perfect    and   the   narrative   past   tense  is  very 

clear,    in    spite    of  the   circumstance  that  both 

forms  refer  to  something  in  the  past. 

Every  one  who  has  been  to  school  and  still  remem- 
bers what  he  was  taught  there,  knows  that  Rugen  is  the 
biggest  island  Germany  possesses.         Eliz.  in  Riigen. 

The  extreme  section  of  Indian  opinion  asserted  some 
time  ago  a  clear  ascendancy  over  it  (viz.  over  the  Indian 
National    Congress),    and    have    retained    it   ever    since. 

The  Mail  22/9,   1920. 

The  Sultan  has  sent  a  message  of  congratulation  to 
Nazim   which   was   received    with   cheers  by  the  troops. 

ib.  Nov.   1912. 


TO   HAVE  407 

The  "Street  of  Adventure,"  as  Fleet  Street  was  recently 
called,  has  a  history  which,  it  has  been  said,  no  man 
can  write.  Athen.  28/9,   12. 

During  the  last  few  days  nothing  was  done  to  insure 
peace  in  the  coal  industry,  but  preparations  for  a  strike 
have  gone  steadily  on.  Daily  News   17/2,    12. 

How  good  Punch  is  this  week !  One  of  the  very  best 
I  have  ever  read  —  cuts  i^«^  letter-press.  Who  wrote  A  City 
Idyll.''  It  is  inimitably  funny.       Ainger,  in  Life  p.  136. 

But  though  it  (viz.  the  proposal)  has  been  withdrawn, 
it  was  none  the  less  put  forward ;  indeed  it  is  more  than 
possible  that  the  appearance  of  the  criticism  was  the 
cause  of  its  withdrawal.  Pilot  22/8,   1 903. 

The  material  (i.  e.  for  the  present  book)  is  found  in 
logbooks.  Consular  letters,  and  whaling  account  books, 
which  have  scarcely  been  looked  at  before  for  research 
purposes.  Times  Lit.  29/11,   1928  p.  934/4. 

Compare  the  following  examples  both  of  the  perfect 
and  of  the  past  tense. 

Betty.  You're  a  marvel!  How  in  the  world  did  you 
manage  not  to? 

Alice.     Not  to  what? 

Betty.     Not  to  hear  about  my  row  with  Muriel  Wister. 

Alice.  Oh,  I  (very  slightly  embarrassed)  —  I  didn't 
manage  not  to. 

Betty  (surprised).     You  have  heard  about  it? 

Alice.  Well,  I  (her  embarrassment  is  a  shade  deeper 
perhaps)  —  I  heard  it. 

Chapin,  New  Morality^  Brit.  PI.  p.  536. 

"I  have  met  you  before,"  he  said  suddenly.  "You 
don't  remember."     Walpole,  Fort.  II  ch.  2  2  p.   167. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  perfect  would  be  impossible  in 
the  following  sentence,  because  the  writer  refuses  to  accept 
any  connection  between  the  past  occurrence  and  the  present 
moment. 

For  instance,  I  can  assert  that  'this  man  is  vulgar. 
The  fact  that  he  is  of  good  family  and  ivas  educated  at 


408  VERBS 

the    right    place    makes    no    difference.     He    is    vulgar 
intrinsically.'  Huxley,  Vulgarity  p.  3. 

597.  The  iterative  («)  and  the  declaratory  [b)  perfect 
are  more  nearly  related  to  the  past  tense,  but  the  essential 
difference  remains. 

a.  That  was  one  of  the  moments  of  my  life  when  I 
have  tasted  exquisite  joy. 

Gissing,  Ryecroft  I  ch.  9  p.  24. 

b.  We  now  know  that  the  first  dramatic  lesson,  which 
I  have  already  quoted,  many  years  ago,  in  these  columns, 
was  sound.  Dr.  Saleeby,  Pall  Mall  Gazette. 

One  should  never  go  again  to  a  place  where  one  has 
been  happy. 

W.  Somerset  Maugham,  Circle,  Brit.  PI.  p.  630. 

It  is  very  easy  to  jump  to  conclusions  like  these ;  but 

Sir    Edwin    Pears,    who    is    a  judge  of  "atrocities,"  and 

has  not  spared  the  Turkish  soldier  in  the  past,  measures 

his  words  carefully  when  he  writes  of  these  recent  doings. 

Athenaeum  7/10,   11. 
In  the  past  our  Army  has  been  a  separate  profession 
with  a  peculiar  glitter  and  pride  of  its  own. 

Times  Lit.   5/8,    15. 
The    first    of  these    (books    or   manuscripts)  has  been 
lost,  but  it  has  lately  been  discovered  at  Cambridge. 

Stopford  Brooke,  Primer. 
King  Manoel,  who  has  been  playing  lawn  tennis  at 
Felixstowe  every  day  during  the  tournament  there, 
having  games  among  others  with  Mrs.  Hilliard  and 
Mrs.  Lambert  Chambers,  presented  prizes  to  the  winners 
at  the  close  of  the  tournament.     Daily  Mail,  20/8,  12. 

598.  The  perfect  and  the  preterite  as  a  narrative  past 
tense  are  often  used  in  one  sentence.  This  is  apt  to  bring 
out  the  difference  of  meaning  very  clearly  {a).  Not  in- 
frequently we  find  all  three  forms  contrasted :  the  simple 
present,  the  group-perfect,  and  the  past  tense.  These 
cases    may    help    to    show   that  the  contrast  between  the 


TO   HAVE  409 

first   two  is  one  of  aspect,  whereas  the  contrast  between 
them  and  the  past  tense  is  one  of  time  {b). 

a.  "Ah  well,"  an  American  visitor  is  said  to  have 
soliloquized,  on  the  site  of  the  battle  of  Hastings,  "it 
is  but  a  little  island  and  it  has  often  been  conquered.''^ 
We  have  in  these  few  pages  to  trace  the  evolution  of 
a  great  empire,  which  has  often  co7iqiiered  others,  out 
of  the  little  island  which  was  often  conquered  itself. 

Pollard,  History  of  England  p.  i. 
Unwittingly  Norman  and  Angevin  despotism  made  an 
English  nation  out  of  Anglo-Saxon  tribes,  as  English 
despotism  has  made  a  nation  out  of  Irish  septs,  and 
will  make  another  out  of  the  hundred  races  and  religions 
of  our  Indian  Empire.  ib.  ch.   2  p.   33. 

b.  The  hundred  as  a  geographical  division  remained, 
but  the  hundred  court  gradually  lost  its  importance. 
Not  so  the  shire  or  county  which  was,  and  always  has 
beenj  and  still  is,  the  chief  unit  of  local  government. 

Low^  British  Const,  p.  7. 

_      J,    ,  .       599.     Both   the  past  perfect  and  the  pre- 

rESt  rCrtCCt  3.0(1  ... 

„    ^    .^  terite   when  used  as  a  narrative  past  tense 

Pretente  ^ 

express  a  past  action,  occurrence,  or  state; 

naturally  enough,  for  the  past  perfect  has  a  past  tense  had 

for   one   of  the  elements  of  the  group.     The  past  perfect, 

however,    expresses    the   meanings   of  the  present  perfect 

transferred  to  a  point  of  time  in  the  past.    When  the  past 

time  from  which  the  action  or  occurrence  is  regarded  has 

once  been  mentioned,  it  often  occurs  that  the  speaker  goes 

on  with  a  simple  past  tense,  without  showing,  consequently, 

that  he  thinks  of  them  in  connection  with  a  preceding  period. 

Thus  we  can  say:  He  went  away  after  I  had  given  him  the 

necessary  instructions;  but  also:  He  went  away  after  I  gave 

him  the  necessary  instructions.  The  past  perfect  expresses 

the  break  between  the  two  actions,  the  preterite  does  not. 

This  is  the  history  of  Silas  Marner,  until  the  fifteenth  year 
after  he  came  to  Raveloe.        Eliot,  Silas  Marner  ch.  2. 


410  VERBS 

After  Miss  Matty  went  to  bed  I  lighted  the  candle 
again.  Mrs.  Gaskell,  Cranford,  p.   286. 

After  he  left  Stourbridge  he  spent  two  years  at  home 
in  desultory  reading.  Bailey,  Johnson,  p.  89. 

Even  Kate  was  not  pleased  either  with  the  company 
or  the  frivolous  course  of  things  in  her  friend's  house, 
where  matters  had  changed  considerably  since  Kate  ivas 
there  some  six  months  before  her  marriage. 

Patterson,  Stephen  Compton,  p.  252. 

It  was  understood  that  after  the  railway  was  completed 
they  would  return  to  Petersburg.  But  the  Caucasus  is 
a  wonderful  country.  It  grows  upon  one,  and  holds 
one  by  a  thousand  invisible  links.  Thirty  years  later 
my  father  still  lived  on  the  same  spot  where  he  settled 
first.  A  Mere  Woman,  p.  2. 

Shortly  after  the  war  was  over,  he  was  murdered  by 
the  Persians  among  whom  he  had  taken  refuge. 

Goodspeed,  History  p.   178. 

That  Nurse  was  ever  young  Michael  could  not  bring 
himself  to  believe.  Sinister  Street  p.   11. 

It  was  dark  for  some  time  before  Mr.  Farman  ended 
his  long  flight.  111.  London  News  4/9,   1901. 

To  Have  and  To  Be  in  Verbal  Groups  Compared 

600.  It  has  been  shown  that  to  have  as  a  member  of  a 
verbal  group  may  be  quite  subordinated  in  meaning  so  that 
it  has  hardly  any  independent  existence,  and  loses  its  phonetic 
independence  as  well  (592).  This  may  happen  when  the  verb  is 
used  with  a  nominal  adjunct,  as  in  /  have  a  tooth-ache,  etc. 
but  even  when  it  may  be  said  to  have  some  meaning  of 
its  own,  as  in  the  following  sentence. 

She'd  a  good  home,  and  everything  she  could  wish 
for.  Galsworthy,  Man  of  Property  ch.  3   p.   56. 

Compare  also  these  sentences  in  CoUinson's  Spoken  English 
p.  64  f. 

aiv  9n  ofal  tuJDeik.  —  ai  h^ev  a  holou  tu]). 


TO   HAVE   AND   TO   BE  4II 

601.  In  all  these  respects  to  have  resembles  to  be.  Both 
verbs  can  also  form  groups  with  a  participle  which  are 
occasionally  identical  in  meaning.  When  to  be  is  used  with 
the  participle  of  a  mutative  intransitive  verb  it  may  serve 
as  a  copula  linking  the  subject  with  a  predicative  verbal 
adjective  (55);  but  to  be  and  the  participle  may  also  form 
a  group  with  the  same  meaning  as  the  perfect  of  the  verb, 
i.  e.  the  group  with  to  have  (56). 

The  verbal  group  with  to  be  is  chiefly  found  with  verbs 
of  motion  {a),  but  not  exclusively  {b).  The  construction 
seems  to  be  disappearing ;  one  objection  to  it  is  that  it  may 
often  be  taken  as  a  copula  with  a  verbal  adjective. 

a.  When  she  became  conscious  of  externals  it  was 
dusk.     The   furze-rick   was  finished;  the  men  had  gone. 

Hardy,  Native  II  ch.    i   p.    131. 

She  was  stouter.  Although  always  plump,  her  figure  had 
been  comely,  with  a  neat,  well-marked  waist.  But  now  the 
shapeliness  had  gone.      Bennett,  Old  W.  T.  II  ch.  3  §  i. 

Clara  also  had  passed  most  of  the  day  there,  with  a 
few  intervals  at  her  own  home;  but  now  Clara  was 
gone,  and  Janet  too  had  gone. 

Bennett,  Clayhanger  III  ch.   17  §  4. 

But  the  clerk  had  left  it  in  the  inner  sanctum.  He 
would  get  it,  and  disappeared  to  do  so.  Wiien  he  came 
back  with  it,  however,  he  found  its  owner  had  gone, 
saying  never  mind,  it  didn't  matter. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.   i  p.  2. 

In  such  contrast  the  heath  wore  the  appearance  of  an 
instalment  of  night  which  had  taken  up  its  place  before  its 
astronomical  hour  was  come.     Hardy,  Native  I  ch.  i  p.  3, 

Did  you  tell  him  whom  you  were  come  to  see? 

Hardy,  Ironies. 

A  hard  and  ugly  look  was  now  come  into  the  big 
clean-shaven  face.       Parker,  Judgment  House  p.   100. 

b.  The  truth  is,  I  was  begun  to  think  uncomfortably 
of  the  dedication.      Barrie,  Little  White  Bird  ch.  26. 

Mr.    Winter    was    retired.     His    money^    sufficient    to 


412  VERBS 

retire  upon  the   interest  accruing  from  it,  he  had  hoarded 
in  Hastings,  and  there  Ruth  had  been  educated. 

Niven,  Porcelain  Lady  p.   12. 
"I  am  become  calm  in  beholding  him  now." 

Eliot,  Deronda,  ch.  6"] . 
The  journey  is  as  yet  but  begun. 

Peterson,  Fate  and  the  Watchers  (19 17)  p.  7. 

In  the  following  pair  of  sentences  the  first  illustrates  the 
verbal  adjective  finished,  the  second  the  group-perfect. 

Your  shoe  has  come  undone  and  I  shall  be  finished 
by  the  time  you  have  done  it  up. 

Collinson,  Spoken  English  p.  38. 

Anything  else?  —  No  thanks,  I've  finished.  I've 
really  made  a  very  good  breakfast.  ib.  p.  40. 

602.  The  aspect  of  the  perfect  is  sometimes  expressed 
by  have  with  a  coordinate  group  of  two  participles,  the  first 
of  to  be,  less  often  to  go,  the  second  of  the  verb  with  the 
meaning  that  is  to  be  expressed.  The  construction  can  hardly 
be  considered  Standard  English,  except  of  the  most  familiar 
type.     Many  would  call  it  vulgar  English. 

What's  he  done  ?  Why,  he's  been  and  punched  me 
in  the  intercostal  region.       Punch  6/12,   1905  p.  409. 

I've  been  and  dropped  my  pencil  on  the  floor  and 
broken  the  point.      Collinson,  Spoken  English  p.  26  i). 

After  he's  gone  and  done  what's  proper  for  the 
child,    the   boy  could  easily  slip  Lazarus  into  Laurence. 

Jerrold,  Caudle  Lect.  XVI. 

Sometimes  a  triple  group  arises  when  both  be  and  go  are 
used. 

"Oh,  if  you  please.  Mum,  there's  no  meat  for  dinner 
to-day.  The  butcher  'as  been  and  gone  and  never  come 
this  mornine."  Punch. 


1)  The  same  author  (p.  38)  supplies  the  following  sentences  as  mutual 
alternatives:  What  a  nuisance,  I've  been  (I've  gone)  and  put  ou  my  socks 
wrong  side  out! 


TO   DO  413 

I've    been    and   gone  and  written  or  got  in  my  head 
a   one-vol,   novel   for   boys,    to   wit,   Rugby  in  Arnold's 
time.        Thomas  Hughes,  in  a  letter  to  his  publisher, 
Graphic  21/10,   1922,  p.   578  ^). 

To  Do 

603.  To  do,  to  be,  and  to  have  form  a  special  group 
of  the  verbs  classed  as  auxiliaries  because  they  have  a 
complete  verbal  system  and  can  serve  the  function  of 
independent  verbs  as  well  as  of  elements  of  a  verbal 
group.  To  do  differs  from  the  other  two  verbs,  however, 
in  two  respects: 

(1)  it  can  form  a  verbal  group  with  the  plain  stem  only, 
not  with  the  other  non-predicative  verbal  forms; 

(2)  it  is  used  as  an  element  of  a   verbal   group   in   its 
predicative  function  only. 

604.  The  auxiliar}^  use  of  do  is  a  development  of  its 
use  as  a  verb  of  full  meaning,  just  as  is  the  case  with 
to  be  and  to  have.  It  is  necessary,  therefore,  at  least  to 
refer  to  its  meaning  as  an  independent  verb,  although  the 
reader  must  consult  the  dictionary  for  a  complete  treatment 
of  its  meanings. 

As  a  verb  of  full  meaning  to  do  is  used,  both  transitively 
and  intransitively,  to  express  all  kinds  of  actions :  to  do 
work,  to  do  a  man  justice,  to  do  ones  duty;  do  as  I  tell 
you.  This  is  the  meaning  that  has  led  to  its  auxiliary 
uses,  and  it  seems  superfluous  to  deal  any  further  with 
the  independent  verb  here, 

„.     .       ,        605.     As  a  natural  result  of  the  meaning  just 

Vicarious  do   .  „      .    ,      ,  -  1     r     .•       1    . 

denned,  to  do  can  reier  to  a  verb  01  action  that 

has    been    mentioned    shortly    before.     This     function    is 

1)  Nearly  all  the  quotations  in  this  section  are  taken  from  van  der  Gaaf  s 
notes  in  iJngL  Studien  vol.  62  p.  404  f. 


414  VERBS 

distinguished  as  the  vicarious  do.  It  is  easy  to  see  that 
vicarious  do,  when  used  to  refer  to  a  verb  of  voluntary 
action  {a),  cannot  be  classed  with  the  auxiliaries.  It  ap- 
proaches the  auxihary  character  when  it  is  a  substitute 
for  a  verb  of  involuntary  action  {b), 

a.  He  used  to  direct  and  superintend  our  games  with 
the  strictness  that  some  parents  do  the  studies  of  their 
children. 

His  simple  seafaring  men  pursue  their  duty,  as  did 
the  alchemists  the  philosopher's  stone. 

Times  Lit.  yjS,   19. 
The   long   Anglo-Saxon    and    Anglo-Danish  period  of 
our    history    laid   the   foundations   of  our  constitution  as 
it  did  those  of  our  language  and  nationality. 

Low,  Brit.  Const,  p.   11. 

b.  Of  course  I  began  with  the  common  penny  novel  of 
the  worst  type,  but  acquired  a  taste  for  better  work  in 
a  shorter  time  than  boys  usually  do. 

Davies,  Super-Tramp  ch.   i   p,   10. 

606.  Vicarious  do  is  also  used  to  refer  to  a  verb  of 
occurrence;  in  this  function  it  becomes  still  more  of  a  gram- 
matical form-word. 

The  thirteenth-century  Parliament  did  not  become 
an  assembly  of  the  "estates"  as  in  France  and  elsewhere. 
At  one  time  it  threatened  to  do  so  .  .  . 

Low,  Brit.  Const,  p.  26. 

She  would  never  get  stout  as  there  was  every  danger 
of  Clara  doing.        Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.  31  p.  396. 

607.  Vicarious  do  is  very  frequent  with  the  demonstrative 
so,  a  construction  treated  more  fully  in  volume  2  {Demon- 
strative Pronouns  and  Adverbs),  so  that  one  example  will 
suffice  here : 

She  could  not  have  said  why  she  told  him  this ;  an 
instant  before  she  spoke,  she  had  no  intention  of  doing  so. 

Gaskell,  Wives  I  ch.   10. 

The    difference    between    vicarious   do   (do  so)  and  the 


TO   DO  415 

verb  of  full  meaning  (do  it)  is  sometimes  very  slight; 
see  vol.  2  ib. 

Very    similar    to    the   cases  with  so  are  those  with  the 
conjunction  as. 

The  fourth  volume,  covering  as  it  does  the  usual 
allowance  of  five  plays,  now  brings  the  number  up  to 
twenty.  Athenaeum. 

In  connection  with  this  church,  one  of  the  most 
beautifully  situated  in  England,  standing,  as  it  does,  in 
a  lovely  fold  of  the  sheep-cropped  downs  over  the 
Bristol  Channel,  we  may  recall  one  of  Mr.  Andrew 
Lang's  happiest  poems.  ib. 

,  .,.  ,  608.  The  predicative  forms  of  to  do,  i.  e. 
Auxiliary  do    ,  ,  ,  , 

the   stem   do   used   as  an  imperative,  and  as  a 

present  tense  with  the  additional  form  does,  and  the  pret- 
erite did,  can  form  a  verbal  group  with  the  simple  plain 
stem  of  another  verb  or  of  do  itself.  We  can  distinguish 
three  functions,  which  are  characterized  phonetically: 

(1)  with  the  stronger  stress  on  the  auxihary :  emphatic  do; 

(2)  with  equal  stress  on  do  and  the  plain  stem:  even  do; 

(3)  with  weak  stress  on  do:  weak  do. 

^  ,  ,.  J  609.  Emphatic  do  is  used  in  statements  to 
Emphatic  do  ,  .    .         -    ,  ,         1         , 

express    the  conviction  01  the  speaker  that  the 

statement  is  really  true. 

You  do  seem  off  colour.       Sidgwick,  Severins  p.  266. 
"But  what's  all  this  nonsense  of  socialism?  You  don't 
mean  to  say  you  have  turned  socialist.''" 
"That's  just  what  I  do  i)  mean  to  say." 

Sweet,  Spoken  Engl.  p.  88. 
Suddenly  aunt  Agatha  had  an  inspiration.  Aunt  Agatha 
was  the  kind  of  person  who  always  does  have  inspirations 
at  critical  moments.  Cornhill  Mag.  Nov.    1915- 


1)  Marked  with  extra-strong  stress. 


4l6  VERBS 

Of  course   he's   wise  —  as  wisdom  goes.     But,  then, 
wise  men  do  do  foolish  things  at  intervals. 

TroUope,  Prime  Minister  ch.  2. 

610.  Emphatic  do  is  used  in  statements  to  contrast  fact 
with  its  negation  (a),  or  actuaUty  with  possibiHty,  etc.  {B). 
This  use  differs  from  the  one  in  609  only  in  that  the 
contrast  is  not  imphed,  but  exphcitly  stated. 

a.  It  was  inconceivable  that  Florence  should  dream 
of  anything  else;  yet  dream  she  did. 

Lytton  Strachey,  Em.  Vict.  p.   116. 
We  shuddered  as  we  stood  below,  and  saw  him  hanging 
some    forty    feet    above  our  heads,  where  there  seemed 
nothing  to  support  him,  and  what  did  support  him  was 
continually  crumbling  under  him. 

Sweet,  Spoken  Engl.  p.   58. 
She  must  have  opened  the  door  and  looked  in  without 
my   hearing  her,  for  the  first  thing  I  did  hear  was  her 
voice  outside,  speaking  to  the  servant. 

de  Morgan,  Vance,  ch.  28  p.  264. 
"If  I'd  known  — "  he  began;  but  she  cut  him  short. 
"You  did  know,"  she  said. 

Phillpotts,  Beacon  I  ch.  6  p.  45. 

b.  We  expect  to  find,  and  we  do  find,  infinite  varieties 
of  detail  in  their  laws,  their  social  distinctions,  their 
methods  of  government.         Davis,  Med.  Europe  p.  24. 

An  example  or  two  will  best  show  the  mode  in  which 
the  "judiciary"  (to  use  a  convenient  Americanism)  can 
and  do  by  means  of  the  writ  of  habeas  corpus  keep  a 
hold  on  the  acts  of  the  executive. 

Dicey,  Constitution,  Lect.  VI  p.  237. 

She  was  really  going  to  get  up,  though,  that  was 
flat!  The  fire  would  blaze  directly,  although  at  the 
moment  it  was  blowing  wood-smoke  down  Jane's  throat, 
and  made  her  choke.  Directly  was  five  or  six  minutes, 
but  the  fire  did  blaze  up  royally  in  the  end. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  5  p.  43. 

But   the   full  value  of  these  volumes  will  be  apparent 


TO   DO  417 

only  when  the  time  comes,  if  it  ever  does  come,  for  the 
League  of  Nations  to  endeavour  to  profit  by  the  ex- 
perience of  the  Great  War.  Times  Lit.  9/12,  20. 

It  may  be  worth  noting  that  emphatic  do  contrasts  two 
kinds  of  modahty,  but  not  two  actions  or  states.  Compare: 
IVe  did  not  take  the  tram,  we  walked. 

611.  In  pronominal  questions  emphatic  do  expresses 
wonder,  astonishment,  or  impatience.  Compare  the  com- 
pound interrogatives  in  -ever. 

What  do  you  mean  ? 

612.  In  disjunctive  questions  two  kinds  of  modality  are 
contrasted,  just  as  in  statements  {a).  Two  kinds  of  modality 
may  also  be  contrasted  by  emphatic  do  in  dependent 
pronominal  questions  ijb). 

a.  "I    knew    that    as    soon    as    my  father  had  got  to 
Switzerland,  he  would  be  wanting  to  push  on  to  Italy." 

''Did  they  go  on  to  Italy?"   "Yes." 

Sweet,  Spoken  Engl.  p.  y},. 

b.  But  you  haven't  told  me  where  you  did  go  after  all  i). 

Sweet,  Element,  no,  yi)- 

613.  Emphatic  do  as  an  imperative  expresses  an  urgent 
request,  not  a  command. 

Do  change!  Do,  please,  be  lively,  and  yourself  again. 

Meredith,  Harrington  ch.  4  p.  27. 
Good   night,    it's   getting  rather  late  and  we  must  be 
going.  Oh,  do  stay  a  bit  longer,  the  night  is  still  young. 
Collinson^  Spoken  English  p,  28. 

614.  It  might  be  asked  whether  do  and  be  in  the  first 
-quotation  of  613  really  form  a  group,  as  they  are  separated 
by  please,  which  is  preceded  and  followed  by  a  short 
pause.  We  might  consider  do  as  an  introductory  particle, 


1)  In  both  quotations  of  this  section  did  is  marked  with  extra-strong  stress. 
Kruisinga,  Handbook  II,  Accidence  and  Syntax.  1,  27 


41 8  VERBS 

such  as  is  frequently  used  in  other  languages  before  an 
imperative,  e.  g.  toe  in  Dutch :  Toe,  zeg  het  me  equivalent 
to  Do  tell  me,  or  Tell  me  please.  This  interpretation  is 
not  acceptable,  however,  because  emphatic  do  is  freely 
used  with  verb  stems  in  other  than  imperative  uses.  And 
in  very  familiar  English  it  may  even  occur,  if  exceptionally^ 
prefixed  to  please  with  a  group  of  don^t  and  a  verb  stem  {a). 
The  closeness  of  this  group-imperative  with  please  is  also 
the  explanation  of  its  use  as  a  stem  [b). 

Compare    also    the   use   of  let  with  an  object  and  such 
a  group  in  the  function  of  a  plain  stem  {c). 

a.  "Oh,  Tishy  dear,  how  aggravating  you  are !  Now 
do  please  don't  be  penetrating.  You  know  you're  trying 
to    get  at  something ;  and  there's  nothing  to  get  at .  .  ."^ 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  9  80. 

b.  Her  husband  asked  me  to  please  go  away  once  or 
twice.  Chapin,  New  Morality,  Brit.  PI.  p.   537. 

c.  "Look  here,  let's  shut  up  this  place  and  get  out 
to  Florida  or  somewhere  for  the  winter!" 

"Let's  don't  do  anything  of  the  kind." 

P.  G.  Wodehouse,  The  Coming  of  Bill  ch.  7  p.  76. 
"Let's  don't  talk  of  it.  Papa." 
"Let's  do,"  he  returned  genially. 

Booth  Tarkington,  Women  (T.)  p.   199. 

615.     Emphatic    do    is    also   used   in  negative  sentences 
(apart   from  those  with  not,  which  will  be  treated  below).. 

But  you  don't  look  jolly,  Mr.  Miggot.  You  never  do 
look  very  jolly.   And  I  have  wondered  —  why.'' 

Vachell,  Quinneys'  p.   182. 

The  ordinary  mortal  had  no  hope  of  ever  getting 
beyond  the  downstairs  sitting-room  and  Dr.  Sutherland. 
For  that  indefatigable  disciple  did,  indeed,  never  desert 
her  1).  Lytton  Strachey,  Em.  Vict.  p.    164. 


1)  The    reference    is    to    p.  162:    Miss  Nightingale  had  suspected  him 
intending  'to  go  off.' 


TO   DO  419 

He  never  did  do  that. 

Temple  Thurston,  City  III  ch.  2  p.  228. 

.         616.     Strong-stressed   do  with  a  strong-stressed 
Even  do     ,  .  ^        .  j  •       , 

plain  stem  occurs  in  sentences  made  negative  b}^ 

not,    which    is   weak   [nt],  unless  it  has  contrasting  stress 

(see    18).     This    group,   which   may  be  called  even  do,  is 

used   in   statements  (a),   questions  (^),    and  commands  [c). 

a.  It  doesn't  matter  to  me  in  the  least  what  he  says, 
I  don't  care  whether  he's  telling  the  truth  or  not. 

Collinson,  Spoken  English  p.  6. 

b.  Don't  you  mind?  —  Not  a  bit. 

Collinson,  Spoken  Engl.  p.  6. 

c.  If  you're  in  a  hurry  we'd  better  take  a  taxi.  Don't 
bother  to  ring  up,  there's  any  amount  of  them  on  the 
rank  round  the  corner. 

Collinson,  Spoken  English  p.  42. 
Don't  you  worry  about  me  and  Kit. 

Dane,  Bill  of  Div.,  Brit.  PI.  p.  651. 

The  use  of  do  in  this  function  enables  us  to  distinguish 
the  functions  of  the  verb  stem  ;  for  in  its  non-predicative 
function  it  is  made  negative  by  prefixing  not  [not]:  She 
tried  not  to  smile.  As  it  is  by  no  means  evident  in  all 
cases  whether  a  stem  is  used  in  a  predicative  or  in  a  non- 
predicative  function,  the  formal  characteristic  may  be  de- 
cisive, as  in  the  following  sentence  ^). 

"Oh  my  dear  Chris,  try  and  not  be  a  fool." 

Love,  by  Elizabeth  (T.)  p.  289. 

This  shows  that  be  is  not  a  coordinated  imperative  verb 
stem  here  but  a  non-predicative  plain  stem. 

617.  It  should  be  noted  that  a  negative  sentence  with 
not   takes    do    only    when    not   qualifies    the    verbal    pre- 


1)  It  may  be  remarked  that  the  construction  is  unusual. 


420  VERBS 

dicate.  The  following  sentences  are  affirmative  {a).  The 
last  two  are  negative,  but  not  qualifies  the  following 
noun  {b). 

a.  I  believe  I  asked  him  to  hold  his  tongue  about 
them  —  he  says  not  (=   /  did  7iot  ask). 

The  present  work  has  a  much  wider  scope,  for  it  Jiot 
only  treats  the  subject  on  wider  lines,  but  also  looks  back 
to  predisposing  causes,  and  forward  to  subsequent  de- 
velopments. Athenaeum. 

Moreover,  art  and  religion  exist  not  even  chiefly  for 
the  optimistic,  but  even  more  for  the  melancholy  and 
dissatisfied.  ib.  no.   i. 

Sir  Norman  Lockyer  seems  not  to  recognize  that  there 
are  many  branches  of  human  endeavour,  notably  that  of 
history,  that  of  criticism,  biblical  and  other  ...        ib. 

She  tried  not  to  senile.  Meredith. 

"I  am  afraid  we  shall  find  him  out."  —  "I  hope  not^ 

b.  But  Mr.  Rhodes  gave  not  the  slightest  indication  that 
such  was  his  desire.         Oxf.  and  Camb.  Rev.  no.  lo. 

But  at  Pisa,  where  he  (i.  e.  Addison)  admires  'the  great 
church,  baptistery  and  leaning  tower',  and  at  Rimini, 
which  'has  nothing  modern  to  boast  of,'  he  gives  not  a 
thought  to  the  tragedies  of  Ugolino  and  Francesca. 

Edinb.  Rev.  April   1908. 

In  none  of  these  sentences  is  the  adverb  not  used  to 
make  the  predicative  verb  negative. 

Note  that  the  adverb  not  is  pronounced  with  weak 
stress:  [nt]  when  quahfying  the  predicative  verb,  unless 
emphasis  requires  a  strong  stress  on  not;  but  it  is  always 
pronounced  [not]  when  it  qualifies  another  word  than  the 
predicative  verb. 

618.  A  negative  verb  without  do  is  used  in  some  tra- 
ditional adverbial  or  parenthetic  phrases,  such  as  /  know  not 
how,  I  doubt  not,  if  I  mistake  not.  See  620.  The  phrases  are 
restricted  to  written  Ensrlish. 


TO   DO  421 

It  had,  I  know  not  why,  the  mysterious  air  of  romance 
all  about  it.  Benson,  Thread  of  Gold,  p.  31. 

I  had  a  vague  sense  of  a  duty  overlooked  —  I  knew 
not  what.  Wells,  Country  p.   165. 

Nature  is  wise  in  her  young  children,  though  they  wot 
not  of  it,  and  are  always  trying  to  rush  away  from  her. 
Meredith,  Harrington  ch.  34  p.  364. 

(She)  seemed  to  thirst  to  make  him  show  his  qualities, 
and  excel,  and  shine.  Billiards  or  jumping,  or  classical 
acquirements,  it  mattered  not  —  Evan  must  come  first. 

Meredith,  ib.  ch.   20  p.   207. 

^  _  619.  The  present  and  preterite  of  do  are  used 
with  weak  stress  when  the  subject  follows  the 
rest  of  the  verbal  predicate.  In  spoken  English  this  occurs 
chiefly  in  interrogative  sentences  {a);  in  literary  English 
it  is  also  frequent  in  other  cases,  especially  in  sentences 
opening  with  some  part  of  the  sentence  that  requires 
emphasis  {b).  On  these  questions  of  word-order,  see  vol.  3. 

a.  How  many  eggs  did  you  buy }  .  .  .  What  did  he 
do?...  Did  you  meet  him.\..  At  what  angle  do  the 
tracks  intersect?         Collinson,  Spoken  English  p.   16. 

How  does  one  bring  in  a  motion?  —  By  some  such 
phrase  as :  Mr.  Chairman,  I  beg  to  move  that  .  .  . 

ib.  p.  94. 

b.  But  there  is  no  reason  to  suppose  that  anywhere 
in  Britain  did  the  pre-Celtic  population  maintain  itself 
independent.  Oman,  Conquest  p.  20. 

,  ,     ...  620.     The  uses  of  auxiliary  do  have  been 

Uses  of  Auxiliary     ,      .  ^    ,    .       ,  ,  , 

„     „  ,       classified    in    three    groups,    but    it  needs 

Do  Compared      ,.   ,      ,        ,  ,        ,  ,       i 

httle  thought  to  see  that  these  are  closely 

related.     Indeed,   it   may   be  said  that  emphatic  and  even 

do    are    essentially   identical;   the  difference  is  that  in  the 

former  case  do  has  extra-strong  stress  owing  to  contrast. 

The  distinction  between  the  two  is  hardly  real  in  the  case 

of  the   imperative:  do  come  is  classified  as  a  case  of  em- 


422  VERBS 

phatic;  don't  come  as  even  doy  although  it  may  also  be 
uneven  (623).  The  essentially  emphatic  character  of  even 
do  is  the  explanation  of  the  constructions  in  618,  which 
are  used  in  clauses  of  subordinate  importance  only. 

The  distinction  between  even  do  and  weak  do,  though 
plain  enough  in  case  of  emphatic  front-position  of  some 
part  of  the  predicate  (619  b),  is  hardly  perceptible  or  not 
at  all  in  the  interrogative  sentences  (619  a)  when  compared 
with  the  corresponding  negative-interrogative  sentences : 
What  did  he  say  ?  and   What  did  not  he  pay  ? 

,,.     .  ,  ,    ...  621.     It    has    been   pointed   out  that 

Vicarious  and  Auxiliary    ,       ....         r    i  ■    ^  ^ 

^     _  ,  the  distinction  oi  do  as  an  independent 

Do  Compared  ,  ,  ,      ,        , 

verb   and   as  a  vicarious  verb,  though 

evidently  justified,  is  sometimes  of  no  real  importance  (607). 
The  same  applies  to  the  distinction  of  vicarious  and 
auxiliary  do;  it  will  be  useful  to  show  this,  because  these 
'doubtful'  cases  show  how  easy  it  is  for  one  use  to  lead 
to  another. 

The  distinction  between  vicarious  and  auxiliary  do  is 
fundamentally  based  on  a  fact  that  can  be  easily  observed : 
vicarious  do  is  independent,  auxiliary  do  expresses  a 
meaning  only  in  combination  with  a  plain  stem.  But  a 
difficulty  arises  when  we  find  sentences  with  do  not  accom- 
panied by  a  plain  stem  because  it  has  just  been  mentioned, 
as  in  the  following  cases. 

"I    believe    you    like    fighting   and   getting   over  diffi- 
culties". 

"I  believe  I  do,"  said  Charlotte  complacently. 

Eliz.  in  Riigen. 
"You  saved  me,"  he  said  curtly.  —  "Oh.  George."  — 
"Yes  you  did."  Spragge,  Canyon. 

.  . .  and  meanwhile  he  takes  it  for  granted  that  Clare 
feels  the  same  .  .  .  Well,  she  doesn't. 

Walpole,  Fort.  Ill  ch.  7  p.  308. 


TO   DO  423 

"Won't    you  come  into  the  drawing-room?"  she  said. 
And  they  did,  looking  rather  sheepish. 

Haggard,  Mr.  Meeson  ch.   15. 
But  serious  harm  has  not  yet  accrued,  and  a  change 
should  be  made  before  it  does. 

New  Statesman   18/1,   19. 

In  these  sentences  do  does  not  express  the  sense  without 
the  addition  of  the  verb  and  adjuncts  it  refers  to,  and  it 
would  be  impossible  to  substitute  do  it,  did  it  (as  if  it 
were  a  verb  of  full  meaning)  or  do  so,  did  so  (as  if  it 
were  a  vicarious  verb).  We  must  consequently  recognize 
the  existence  of  emphatic  or  even  do  when  there  is  no 
accompanying  plain  stem. 

And  when  we  consider  a  case  like  the  following  we 
must  do  the  same  with  regard  to  weak  do. 

I  feci  rather  tired  after  my  walk.  —  So  do  I. 

Many  examples  ot  emphatic  do  in  such  constructions 
will  be  found  in  425  ff.     For  weak  do,  see  431  b. 

_      .^.   ,    ...    .  622.     In  425  ff.  it  has  been  shown  that 

Do  with  Auxiliaries    ,  ....  ,  . 

the  auxiliaries  are  repeated  in  many  cases 

when    full    verbs    are    referred  to  by  do,  whether  looked 

upon   as   a   vicarious  or  an  auxiliary  do  (621).     We  must 

now    deal    with   the   use  of  emphatic,  even,  and  weak  do 

with  auxiliaries  in  statements,  questions  and  commands. 

It  will  be  convenient  first  to  deal  with  those  auxiharies 

that  have  a  plain  stem,  and  after  that  with  the  auxiliaries 

that    cannot    take    do    because   they   occur  in  the  present 

and  preterite  only,  or  exclusively  in  the  preterite. 

623.  To  be  with  emphatic  do  is  freely  used  in  the 
imperative,  also  in  the  imperative  with  not.  The  fact  that 
it  is  not  generally  used  in  other  cases  (statements  and 
questions)  is  an  additional  argument  in  favour  of  the  view 


424  VERBS 

expressed    in    620   that   the   distinction  between  emphatic 
and  even  do  is  not  a  real  one  here. 

Do  be  a  little  less  noisy,  please. 
Don't  be  naughty,  Jackie. 

624.  We  sometimes  find  do  with  be  in  rhetorical  negative 
questions;  its  emphatic  character  need  not  be  pointed  out. 

"Why  don't  you  be  thoroughly  original  and  issue  no 
invitations  to  women  at  all?"   Margaret  inquired. 

E.  Ph.  Oppenheim,  The  Evil  Shepherd  ch.  'i,^  p.  274. 
When    you    are    reading    one    of  those    things  about 

cavalry,  by  that  idiotic  Prince  —  why  doesn't  he  be  a 
Prince  instead  of  a  stableboy  ? 

Kipling,  Story  of  the  Gadbys  i). 

Why  don't  you  be  mannerly,  Bob,  instead  of  shouting 
that  way?  Carr,  Daily  Dialogues. 

625.  Auxiliary  do  is  freely  used  with  to  have  when 
used  with  nominal  adjuncts,  i.  e.  as  a  verb  of  full  meaning, 
both  in  sentences  with  not  {a)  and  in  cases  of  weak  do 
with  inversion  of  subject  and  predicate  (Z>). 

a.  We  don't  have  many  visitors. 

What  the  precise  virtue  of  this  invocation  was,  we  did 
not  have  an  opportunity  of  testing. 

Benson,  Thread  of  Gold  p.  29. 

F.  T.  Bullen  did  not  have  the  style,  the  imagination, 
the  passion  for  involved  psychology  which  characterise 
the  genius  of  Mr.  Conrad. 

Williams,  Modern  Engl.  Writers  p.  393. 
"Let  me  see,  you  didn't  have  any  golf-clubs,  did  you, 
■  sir?"  asked  the  porter.  Sinister  Street  p.  499. 


•  i)  This  and  the  following  example  have  been  borrowed  from  Dr.  Arvid 
Smith's  Strodda  Anmarkningar  till  Engelska  Syntaxen  III  in  Moderna 
Sprak  for  December  1929. 


TO   DO  425 

b.  "'S>o   you   are  back  again  from  Norway,  are  you?" 

"Yes." 

"Did  you  have  a  good  passage?" 

Sweet,  Element,  no.  71. 
Did  Margaret  really  have  a  suspicion  that  he  was  in 
love  with  Pauline? 

Mackenzie,  Guy  and  Pauline  ch.  2  p.  93. 

Did  you  have  a  smooth  passage? 

Collinson,  Spoken  English  p.  46. 

When  do  you  have  breakfast?     Sweet,  Element.  53. 
Did  you  ever  have  a  quarter  of  an  hour  of  absolutely 
unalloyed  happiness? 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  47  p.  519, 

What    effect    did   they   have  on  the  social  graces,  on 
making  the  art  of  private  living  more  attractive? 

Botsford,  Engl.  Soc.   iSth  Cent.  p.   16, 

Belasis  (with  a  smile).  Do  you  always  have  lobster  on 
the  river,  Betty  ? 

Betty.  Oh,  no,  we  have  salmon  sometimes;  don't  we, 
Alice?  Chapin,  New  Morality,  Brit.  PI.  p.   578. 

626.  When  to  have  is  accompanied  by  a  permanent 
attribute  it  does  not  take  the  auxiliary  (Bradley,  Making 
of  English  p.  71).  The  reason  evidently  is  that  have  in 
these  groups  has  little  independent  meaning,  as  explained 
in  544. 

He  had  not  a  good  character. 
Has  she  blue  eyes? 

627.  To  have  can  also  take  the  auxiliary  do  when  it 
is  construed  with  a  stem  with  to^  as  shown  by  the  fol- 
lowing sentences. 

a.  "I   wish   you    didn't   have  to  go!"  he  had  replied. 

J.  L.  Allen,  Choir  Invisible. 

You    don't    have    to    meet    your   young    man  on  the 
pier,  because  there  isn't  a  pier. 

Bennett,  Anna  ch.   10  p.   155. 


426  VERBS 

I  think  I'm  glad  I  don't  have  to  wear  a  scholar's  gown. 

Sinister  Street  p.   509. 

So  Michael  did  not  have  to  walk  to  the  station  beside  a 
gown  that  reminded  him  of  Mrs,  Walsingham's  drawing- 
room  chairs.  Sidgwick,  Severins  ch.  4  p,  43. 

b.     We  don't  have  far  to  go  to  the  kitchen. 

There's  one  thing  I  am  thankful  for ;  that's  that  I 
don't  have  to  wear  skirts. 

I  have  got  some  linen  I  want  to  send  off  laundry 
rate.     Do  I  have  to  fill  in  a  form? 

628.  The  use  of  to  have  got  as  an  alternative  of /o  have, 
both  as  a  verb  of  full  meaning  and  as  a  member  of  a  syn- 
tactic group  with  a  stem  with  to  has  been  mentioned  in 
588  f.  Like  the  other  purely  verbal  groups  with  have  it 
does  not  take  do. 

He  has  not  got  any  money  now. 
I  wish  you  hadn't  got  to  go. 

629.  To  dare  and  to  need  are  hardly  used  apart  from 
verbal  groups  in  spoken  English;  on  literary  uses,  see  the 
final  chapter  of  vol.  2,  and  634. 

To  let  is  exclusively  used  in  verbal  groups. 
Both    dare    and   let  often  take  emphatic  do  in  negative 
imperative  use;  see  615  on  a  special  case  of  do. 

"Mind,"  in  lower  tones,  "don't  you  dare  touch  him 
whilst  you're  out." 

Pett  Ridge,  Name  of  Garland  p.  40. 
Now,  don't  let's  have  any  nonsense. 

Bennett,  Clayhanger  II  ch.   17  §  5. 
"This    cellar    must    be   roofed,    walled,    and   floored," 
repeated  the  archdeacon.     "Now  mind  what  I  say,  and 
don't  let  the  architect  persuade  you  that  it  will  do !" 

TroUope,  Barchester  Towers. 
"Very  well  then,"  he  concluded  triumphantly,   "don't 
let's  have  so  much  talk." 


TO   DO  427 

630.  Both  dare  and  need  are  frequent  in  negative 
sentences  with  not;  in  this  case  their  auxiliary  character 
is  emphasized,  however,  so  that  they  are  generally  used 
without  do.  See  below,  in  the  sections  on  these  verbs. 
To  let  is  generally  treated  like  any  full  verb  with  regard 
to  the  use  of  do. 

He  didn't  let  me  finish  what  I  wanted  to  say. 

631.  To  need  is  frequently  used  with  do  in  negative 
statements,  also  in  verbal  groups.  The  reason  seems  to 
be  that  the  verb  has  a  clear  independent  meaning  in  these 
cases.  The  use  is  probably  literary  rather  than  spoken 
Engli^,  but  it  is  a  natural  construction.     See  638. 

The  relevancy  of  the  foregoing  features  in  the  earlier 
history  of  the  study  of  Greek  to  the  whole  current  of 
classical  learning  in  subsequent  times  does  not  need  to 
be  explained  to  the  well-read  scholar. 

Edinburgh  Rev.,  Oct.   1905. 

Our  family  doesn't  need  to  do  things.     Hope,  Zenda, 

But  Thackeray  did  not  need  to  go  back  to  the 
eighteenth  century  for  an  example. 

Whibley,  Thackeray  p.  46. 

But  the  unity  of  Germania  —  the  community  of  sen- 
timent among  the  early  German  nations  —  does  not  need 
to  be  proved  by  such  philological  notes  as  the  opposition 
of  "Dutch"  and  "Welsh."  Ker,  Engl.  Lit.  p.  27. 

But  all  the  ordinary  affairs  of  life  were  provided  for 
by  ancient  customs  of  the  tribe  which  were  not  written 
down,  and  did  not  need  to  be  written  down,  because 
every  one  knew  them. 

C.  Gill,  Government  and  People  p.   133. 

632.  The  third  group  of  auxiliaries  distinguished  in 
420  consists  of  ought  and  used.  Both  of  these  can  take 
not  after  them,  as  shown  in  the  sections  dealing  with  these 
auxiharies  below. 


428  VERBS 

In  familiar  spoken  English,  however,  ought  is  treated 
sometimes  as  a  stem,  taking  did  not  in  negative  sentences, 
and  did  in  interrogative  use  [a).  This  use  is  perhaps 
more  usual  still  in  the  case  of  used^  which  is  naturally 
looked  upon  as  a  preterite,  although  the  stem  use  [jus], 
not  [juz],  does  not  exist,  apart  from  groups  with  did  not 
and  did  {b). 

a.  I  didn't  ought  to  have  done  that. 
Didn't  I  ought  to  shut  the  door  ?  i) 

b.  pijpl  didnt  juwstu  ijt  sou  matj  mijt  sz  %€\  duw  nau. 
See  23,  7. 

It  may  be  remarked  here  that  ought  is  also  used  as  a 
participle  to  form  a  group-perfect. 

She  never  worried  about  what  she'd  done  that  she 
hadn't  ought  to. 

Glenway  Wescott,  The  Apple  of  the  Eye.   1926. 

633.  The  other  auxiliaries:  can,  may,  must,  shall,  and 
will  never  take  do.  And  instead  of  taking  vicarious  do 
they  are  repeated,  as  is  shown  in  425  ff.  The  same  thing 
applies  to  be  and  have  in  the  purely  verbal  groups.  It 
may  be  most  convenient  to  give  a  number  of  sentences 
showing  the  use  of  these  auxiliaries  in  emphatic  use  {a), 
in  sentences  with  the  sentence-negative  not  {b),  and  with 
inversion  of  subject  and  predicate  (c). 

In  all  of  the  following  quotations  the  italics  are  in  the 
original  text,  except  for  the  phonetic  transcriptions  which 
indicate  extra-strong  stress  by  other  means. 

a.  Here  we  have  on  a  very  small  scale  the  exact 
differenoe  between  constitutional  or  fundamental  laws 
which  cannot,  and  ordinary  laws  which  can,  be  changed 
by  the  company.  Dicey,  Constit.  Lect.  Ill  p.  87. 


1)  The  sentences  have  been  heard  from   educated   speakers.     No   printed 
examples  have  ever  come  under  my  observation. 


TO   DO  429 

Well,  you  are  going  ahead ;  you  are  a  most  promising 
socialist  baby.  Sweet,  Spoken  Engl.  p.  89. 

"Now  I  shall  tell  your  mother.  Mark  my  words,  this 
time  I  shall  tell  your  mother." 

Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  II  ch.  4  §  i,  p.   196. 

We  are  not  for  the  moment  concerned  with  the  poli- 
tical merits  of  the  question  at  issue;  but  we  are  concerned 
with  the  prestige  of  the  House  of  Commons. 

Everyman  29/11,    12. 

"A  month  or  two  ago  I  really  was  afraid  you  were 
going  mad  over  it  like  poor  Snipe."  "How  is  poor 
Snipe?     I  haven't  heard  of  him  for  ever  so  long." 

Sweet,  Spoken  Engl.  p.  89. 

She  felt  depressed  and  uncomfortable.  What  an  odd, 
queer  kind  of  fortune  had  been  told  her !  And  then  it 
had  all  been  so  muddled.  She  could  scarcely  remember 
what  it  was  that  had  been  told  her. 

Lowndes,  Chink  ch.  2  p.  23. 

"Randolph,"  said  the  young  lady,  "what  are  you 
doing.''"  James,  Daisy  Miller  ch.   i   p.    13. 

Humphrey,    snatching   it  up,  rushed  out  of  the  room. 
"What  is  the  matter?"  asked  Sir  Everard. 

Montgomery,  Misunderstood  ch.  7. 

"There  is  nothing  I  like  better  than  lying  on  dry  hay." 
"Is  it  dry?"  Sweet,  Element,  no.  65. 

We've  only  got  to  ask  leave  for  you  to  come  and 
see  me,  and  the  thing's  done.  We  both  said:  "Yes, 
yes,  that'd  be  glorious.  But  will  Mr.  Webb  let  us  go?". 
Ned  said :  "Leave  that  to  me.     I'll  manage  it." 

Sweet,  Spoken  Engl.  p.   51. 

She  has  smelt  a  rat,  and  suddenly  fixes  her  eyes  on  a 
tell-tale    countenance    fraught    with    mysterious   reserves. 

"Mother  you  are  going  to  marry  Mr.  Fenwick !"  No 
change  of  type  could  do  justice  to  the  emphasis  with 
which  Sally  goes  straight  to  the  point.  Italics  throughout 
would  be  weak.  Her  mother  smiles  as  she  fondles  her 
daughter's  excited  face. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.   14  p.   140. 


430  VERBS 

As  it  was,  she  very  nearly  came  away  from  Krakatoa 
Villa  next  morning  without  waiting  to  see  the  letter 
from  Rheims,  the  post  being  late.  Why  is  everything 
late  on  Monday?  ib.  ch.   i8  p.   174. 

Left  alone  after  this  second  interview  he  had  thought : 
"The  beggar  '11  jump."     And  the  beggar  had. 

Galsworthy,  Caravan  p.  56. 

b.  There  is  not  [iznt]  generally  much  dew,  if  the  sky 
is  not  [iznt]  clear.  Sweet,  Element,  no.  5. 

You  are  an  hour  late.     I  am  very  sorry,  but  I  could 
not  help  it.     It  was  not  [wnznt]  my  fault,     ib.  no.  32. 
It  can't  be  helped.     Collinson,  Spoken  English  p.  4. 

See  also  18  ff. ;  and  compare  7iot  as  a  word-modifier. 

It's  not  [its  niDt]  much  use. 

Collinson,  Spoken  English  p.  2. 

c.  What  sort  of  book  is  it?  —  Is  it  any  use  me 
writing  to  him  ?            Collinson,  Spoken  English  p.  2. 

Who's  he  with?  ib.  p.  6. 

When  will  you  be  going  there  again?  ib.  p.  8. 

How  long  have  you  been  in  London  ? 

How  old  would  you  take  him  to  be? 

Is  it  thawing  yet? 

Might  I  trouble  you  for  a  light? 

Have  you  ever  been  up  in  an  aeroplane?     ib.  p.  46. 

The  auxiliary  character  of  come  in  a  verbal  group  may 
cause  it  to  be  used  without  do  in  a  question. 

"How  comes  he  to  have  stayed?"  he  mused. 

Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.  25. 

To  Dare 

634.  The  second  group  of  auxiliaries  (420),  consisting 
of  the  verbs  dare,  need,  and  let,  contains  verbs  that  are 
almost  exclusively  used  as  members  of  verbal  groups. 
The   use    of  dare   and    need  as   independent  verbs  (with 


ib. 

P- 

10. 

ib. 

P- 

12. 

ib. 

P- 

32. 

ib. 

P- 

40. 

TO   DARE  431 

nominal  adjuncts)  is  chiefly  literary.    This  is  the  character 
of  the  following  quotations  with  independent  dare. 

I  saw  and  felt  London  at  last  .  .  I  dared  the  perils 
of  the  crossings. 

To  range  the  savage  haunts,  and  dare 

In  his  dark  home  the  sullen  bear. 

He  knew  she  was  daring  him  to  contradict  her. 

635.  When  dare  is  a  member  of  a  verbal  group  it  may 
be  accompanied  by  a  stem  with  to  or  without.  The 
auxiliary  character  of  dare,  i.  e.  its  subordination  to  the 
stem,   is   greater  when  the  other  element  is  a  plain  stem. 

And  negative  dare,  expressing  'to  lack  the  courage  to 
do  something',  is  much  less  of  an  independent  verb  in  its 
meaning  than  positive  dare,  which  expresses  not  only 
to  have,  but  to  show  the  courage  to  do  something.  This 
is  the  reason,  the  chief  reason  at  any  rate,  why  the  plain 
stem  is  the  usual  form  in  negative  sentences.  But  rhyth- 
mical considerations  are  probably  responsible  sometimes 
for  the  selection  of  the  stem-form,  especially  in  literary 
English;  the  weak  negative  syllabic  [nt]  not  can  serve 
the  same  phonetic  function  as  to,  both  separating  two 
strong  stresses. 

On  the  use  of  dares,  see  23,  6. 

(1)  dare  with  plain  stem. 

a.  present  tense. 

He  dare  not  say  no  to  anybody. 

How  dare  she  come?       Sidgwick,  Severins  p.  219. 

And  though  Sir  Ensor  Doone  is  now  so  old,  and  growing 
feeble,  his  own  way  he  will  have  still,  and  no  one  dare 
deny  him.      Blackmore,  Lorna  Doone  ch.  21   p.   130. 

Damn  you,  Gelstrap,  how  dare  you  be  so  infernally 
careless  as  to  leave  that  hamper  littering  about  the  cellar? 
Samuel  Butler,  The  Way  of  All  Flesh. 


43  2  VERBS 

And  no  modern  author  dare  reproduce  the  lust  and 
rapine,  murder,  robbery  and  outrage  that  characterised 
the  period  of  which  Malory  wrote. 

b.  past  tense. 

She  hardly  dared  put  her  thoughts  into  words. 

Vachell,  Spragge  p.   190. 

As  for  me,  I  dared  not  speculate  as  to  the  causes  of 
the  affability  which  shone  upon  me. 

Even  to  visit  his  mother's  tomb  Horace  Walpole  dared 
not  venture  his  fairy  limbs  in  the  precincts. 

He  tried  to  feel  content,  but  he  dare  not. 

Orestes  knew  well  enough  that  the  fellows  must  have 
been  bribed  to  allow  the  theft ;  but  he  dare  not  say  so. 

There    was   none  dare  tell  him  that  he  was  childiess. 

c.  non-predicative  dare. 

And  as  to  the  thing  said,  there  are  some  who  would 
dare  mention  the  "Appreciations  with  an  Essay  on  Style" 
in  the  same  breath  as  "The  English  Humourists  of  the 
Eighteenth  Century." 

He  did  not  dare  turn  his  head. 

Wells,  Country  p.  228. 

Gracious  mercy,  people  will  laugh  at  me  so  that  I 
shall  not  dare  show  my  head. 

At  last  we  found  shelter  by  the  merest  chance  in  the 
prettiest  house  in  the  place  —  we  had  not  dared  inquire 
there,  certain  that  its  room  would  be  taken  first  of  all. 

(2)  dare  and  stem  with  to. 
If  he  dares  to  touch  me! 
He  did  not  dare  to  meet  his  uncle. 
Florence  hardly  dared  to  raise  her  eyes. 
No  one  would  dare  to  desert. 

636.  It  is  rare  for  the  form  dares  to  be  used  with  a 
plain  stem,  as  in  the  following  quotations,  which  are 
probably  literary  rather  than  spoken  English. 


TO   NEED  433 

Nature  has  caprices  which  art  dares  not  imitate. 

What  man  over  thirty  dares  hope  for  the  Republic 
before  he  die? 

They  positively  loathe  the  woman  who  dares  turn 
them  into  ridicule. 

To  Need 

637.  To  need  2.^  an  independent  verb  is  literary  rather 
than  colloquial  English;  see  634.  This  use  may  be 
illustrated  by  a  few  quotations.  The  literary  character  of 
needed  in  the  first  quotation  is  proved  by  its  use  as  a 
modal  preterite  in  a  main  clause,  vi^hich  is  never  done  in 
spoken  English. 

The  English  plays  of  Shakespeare  needed  but  the 
completion  of  one  unimportant  interval  to  possess  the 
unity  of  a  popular  chronicle  from  Richard  the  Second 
to  Henry  the  Eighth  .  .  .      Walter  Pater,  Appreciations, 

Pickwick  needed  no  second  invitation. 

Such  a  deed  needed  a  worse  man  than  was  needed 
for  any  of  William's  earlier  deeds. 

There  needs  no  better  picture  of  his  destitute  and 
piteous  situation,  than  that  furnished  by  the  homely 
pen  of  the  chronicler. 

638.  In  spoken  English  need  is  almost  exclusively  used 
as  a  member  of  a  verbal  group,  either  the  plain  stem  or 
the  stem  with  to,  apart  from  the  uses  which  have  been 
treated  in  the  chapters  on  the  verbal  ing  (134)  and  on  do 
{631),  because  need  has  the  character  of  an  independent 
verb  in  those  constructions,  expressing  'to  require'. 

The  use  of  the  plain  stem  or  the  form  with  to  follows 
the  same  lines  as  in  the  case  of  dare.  Here,  as  in  the 
case  of  dare,  the  unchanged  form  with  the  plain  stem  is 
almost  exclusively  used  in  negative  sentences,  including 
questions   with   why,   and   for  a  similar  reason.     We  may 

KUUISINGA,  Handbook  II.  Accidence  and  Syntax.  1.  28 


434  VERBS 

say   that   the   construction  with  the  stem  with  to  is  prac- 
tically restricted  to  literary  English. 

(1)  need  with  plain  stem. 

si  nijd  nt  sei  hau  wij  did  sua  lesnz  -i^'set  :dei. 

Sweet,  Pr.  of  Sp.  Engl.  p.   52. 
I  need  hardly  ask  again. 
Why  need  he  bother  us? 

(2)  need  with  stem  with  to. 

The  small  building  at  the  right  of  the  entrance  is  a 
bicycle  stowage  shed.  In  Holland,  bicycles  need  to  be 
catered   for  seriously,  owing  to  their  general  popularity. 

Studio,  March   193 1   p.   177. 

It  is  very  plain  that  an  inquiry  of  this  kind  needs  to 
be  fixed  by  reference  to  a  given  set  of  social  circum- 
stances tolerably  well  understood. 

Morley,  Compromise. 

Ideals  are  always  destructive  things;  part  of  their 
business  is  the  destruction  of  something  which  needs  to 
be  replaced  by  something  else.       Times  Lit.  6/1,  21. 

They  (viz.  the  landlords)  needed  to  spend  much  less 
on  labour  in  pasture  lands.  Athenaeum  8/1 1,   13. 

If  it  were  true  —  and  he  believed  every  word  his 
father  said  —  then  it  must  be  possible.  You  only 
needed  to  ask  —  that  was  all. 

Temple  Thurston,  Thirteen  I. 

Those  readers  who  know  Dr.  Cox's  book  on  that 
other  "Garden  of  England",  his  "Rambles  in  Surrey", 
will  not  need  to  be  told  that  he  does  not  write  merely 
for  the  lover  of  the  country  or  the  casual  tourist. 

Athenaeum,   3/5,   13. 

We  shall  not  need  to  reflect  whether  those  older  condi- 
tions were  natural.  Coulton,  Medieval  Village  p.  8. 

639.  In  negative  sentences  need  with  a  plain  stem  is 
used  in  the  function  of  a  past  tense  («).  When  grouped 
with  a  plain  perfect  stem  it  has  a  modal  function  {b)^ 
but  this  is  in  consequence  of  the  stem,  not  of  ^^^^/(see  580j. 


TO   LET  435 

a.  I  felt  all  the  luxury  of  convalescence  creeping  into 
my  bones.  All  that  I  need  do  was  to  lie  there  and  let 
people  feed  me  . . .   Walpole,  The  Secret  City  ch.  1 5  p.  1 00. 

b.  We  need  not  have  been  in  such  a  hurry  after  all. 
Who  knows  whether  I  need  have  fled.? 


To  Let 

640.  Although  grouped  with  dare  and  need,  to  let  differs 
from  these  verbs  in  taking  one  mixed  noun-and-verb  con- 
struction only,  the  object  with  plain  stem.     See  193  ff". 

The  word-order  sometimes  shows  how  close  is  the  con- 
nection between  the  verbal  elements  of  this  group:  the 
plain  stem  sometimes  precedes  the  noun  that  according 
to  logical  analysis  would  serve  as  its  subject:  for  the 
original  he  let  the  axe  slip  there  is  substituted  he  let  slip 
the  axe.  In  the  last  construction  the  verb  let  is  completely 
subordinated,  both  in  meaning  and  in  phonetic  form,  so 
that  it  is  Httle  more  than  a  prefix  making  the  following 
stem  transitive. 

I  remember  when  I  let  fall  a  remark. 

Gissing,  Henry  Ryecroft,  XIV. 

James  Thomson  was  another  writer  of  great  ability 
who  let  pass  no  opportunity  of  doing  admiring  homage 
to  Mr.  Meredith.  W.  Jerrold,  Meredith,  p.   19. 

Clarendon,  the  historian  of  those  mutable  times,  lets  pass 
no  conspicuous  actor  in  the  struggle  without  weighing 
his  character  and  summarizing  it. 

O.  Couch,  17th  Cent.  Characters,  Introd.  p.  3. 

For  reasons  best  known  to  himself  Chaucer  lets  slip 
this  opportunity.        Raleigh,  Hist,  of  the  Novel  p.  6. 

It's    my    forlorn   hope    not    to    betray   those   who  are 
•   following    me;    and    not    to  help  let  die  a  fire  —  a  fire 
that's  sacred  —  not  only  now  in  this  country,  but  in  all 
countries  for  all  times.  Galsworthy,  The  Mob. 


436  VERBS 

Later  on  I  was  vexed  with  myself  for  letting  slip  this 
unique  opportunity  for  acquiring  some  genuine  under- 
graduate slang.  Barbara. 

641.  The  difference  of  word-order  between  the  two  con- 
structions cannot  be  observed  in  relative  clauses,  but  the 
phonetic  character  of  let  as  well  as  the  syntactic  character 
of  the  whole  is  the  same. 

She  picked  up  the  brush  which  she  had  let  fall. 

Garvice,  Staunch  p.  8. 

642.  The  shifted  order  of  words  is  especially  found  in 
groups  of  let  v/ith  verbs  of  movement,  such  as  let  fall, 
let  pass,  let  slip.  These  groups  are  so  much  units  that 
they  can  form  single  passive  groups  with  be  {a),  and  can 
also  be  used  as  participles  (b). 

a.  It  was  a  field  that  had  been  let  go  by  the  previous 
tenant,  who  was  always  in  arrears  with  his  work. 

Freeman,  Joseph  ch.    i   p.   i. 

But  the  opportunity  was  let  slip  after  the  days  of 
Bishop  Bedell.  Everyman. 

A  man  ought  not  to  be  let  drift  to  the  point  of  un- 
teachable  incapacity.     Wells,  Joan  and  Peter  ch.  1 1  §  1 1. 

d.  It  was  as  clear  as  daylight  from  hints  let  fall  in 
"The  Bible  in  Spain",  that  (his  adventures)  must  have 
been  very  strange  and  outlandish. 

Borrow,  Lavengro,  Introd.  to  Everyman  ed,  p.  VII. 

643.  Sometimes,  probably  in  literary  rather  than  col- 
loquial English,  let  retains  its  independent  meaning  of 
'allow,  permit'.  In  such  a  case  the  word-order  is  naturally 
the  old  one,  and  we  even  find  let  used  in  a  passive  group 
with  a  stem  with  to. 

I've  always  been  of  the  Forward  Party,  which  wanted 
to  send  expeditions  to  explore,  but  I  was  never  let  to  go. 
Rose  Macaulay,  Orphan  Island  (T.)  p.  107. 
(Korner  in  Moderna  Sprak,  Sept.  1930). 


TO   LET  437 

644.  To  let  is  also  used  with  an  object  and  plain  stem 
to  express  exhortation.  Thus  Let  us  go  may  mean  Allow 
us  to  go,  but  it  may  also  be  used  as  an  exhortative  ^). 
Compare  also  Let  him  write  his  letters  in  peace  with  Let 
him  pay  his  oivn  bills  before  meddling  with  mine.  Let  is 
an  auxiliary  of  modality  (exhortation)  in  the  instance  quoted 
from  Bennett  in  629. 

645.  From  the  adhortative  use  of  the  preceding  section 
there  is  an  easy  transition  to  the  purely  m.odal  use  in 
optative  (a),  conditional  \b),  and  concessive  [c)  sentences. 
On  the  latter  sentences  compare  178  ff. 

a.  "Do  take  some  of  these  flowers,"  said  Miss  Nunn, 
collecting  a  rich  nosegay  from  the  vases.  "Let  them  be 
my  message  to  your  sister  .  .  ." 

Gissing,  Odd  Women  ch.  3. 
But  let  not  the  public  misjudge  me. 

White,  Strood,  ch.    i   p.   i. 
Let   there    be    no    mistake  about  the  real  meaning  of 
the  speech.  Times   16/3,   16  p.  9/2. 

It  does  not  follow  that  this  is  the  only  explanation, 
but  if  there  are  others  let  them  be  ascertained. 

The  Mail,   22/9,   20. 

b.  Let  him  be  flattered  sufficiently  and  Peter  saw 
that  his  way  would  be  easy. 

Walpole,  Fort.  I  ch.   7  §  2  p.  7^. 
The    son  of  a  tradesman,  if  a  boy  fell  under  the  im- 
putation, was  worthy  of  honour  with  him,  let  the  fellow 
but  show  grip  and  toughness  2). 

Meredith,  Ormont  ch.    i   p.    10. 
Jekyll  was  now  my  city  of  refuge;  let  but  Hyde  peep 


1)  Dutch  distinguishes  the  two  meanings  formally,  using  Laat  ons  gaan 
for  the  first,  iMten  we  gaan  for  the  second.  In  the  second  case  laten  is 
clearly  an  auxiliary. 

2)  For  the  use  of  the  imperative  let  in  this  quotation,  and  in  the  next, 
see  178ff. 


438  VERBS 

out  an  instant,  and  the  hands  of  all  men  would  be  raised 
to  take  and  slay  him.        Stevenson,  Dr.  Jekyll  p.  126. 

c.  And  the  time  will  never  come  when  the  other  towns 
—  let  them  swell  and  bluster  as  they  may  —  will  not 
pronounce  the  name  of  Bursley  as  one  pronounces  the 
name  of  one's  mother. 

Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  I  ch.   i,  p.  20. 

Let  them  look  at  the  matter  in  any  way,  the  punish- 
ment was  very  heavy.    Trollope,  Framley  ch.  42  p.  412. 

They  two,  let  their  loyalty  to  Lady  Lufton  be  ever  so 
strong,  could  not  justify  it.  ib.  ch.  31  p.  306. 

The  character  of  let  as  an  auxiliary  is  emphasized  in 
the  second  sentence  by  the  absence  of  to  do ;  see  629  f. 

Ought 

646.  The  isolated  form  ought  must  be  considered  a 
verbal  stem  that  is  chiefly  used  as  a  present  tense  ^).  This 
is  shown  by  the  use  of  the  auxiliary  do  in  familiar  English 
(632).  It  denotes  a  moral  obligation,  also  what  is  befitting, 
proper,  correct,  advisable,  or  naturally  expected. 

We   ought  to  call  on  them ;  let  us  go  this  afternoon. 
He  was  close  to  her  just  then,  gentlemen,  so  he  really 
ought  to  know. 

647.  The  interpretation  of  ought  as  a  present  tense, 
although  this  is  clearly  its  chief  function,  is  not  exhaustive. 
It  is  sometimes  used  in  a  function  that  is  parallel  to  the 
preterite  of  other  verbs.     This  is  the  case : 

(I)  when  it  expresses  a  future  occurrence  or  state  that 
is  looked  upon  as  certain  or  probable.  This  is  com- 
pletely parallel  to  the  use  of  the  modal  preterite 
should  described  in  700. 


1)  On    the   use   of  ought  as  a  secondary  past  tense  in  reported  style  see 
vol.  3  {Concord  of  Tense). 


■   OUGHT,   USED  439 

There  ought  to  be  some  high  bidding  at  Messrs. 
Sotheby's  on  Dec.  i8th,  when  a  valuable  series  of  auto- 
graph letters  and  literary  Mss.  will  be  disposed  of. 

Everyman. 
Jonson  and  Dryden  .  .  .  were  men  from  whom  prosodic 
discussion  might  naturally  have  been  expected,  and  from 
whom    it    ought    to    have    been    exceptionally    valuable. 
Prof.  Saintsbury  in  Cambr.  Hist,  of  Lit.  VIII,  238. 
"Land   ought   to   be    very  dear  about  here,"  he  said. 
Galsworthy,  Man  of  Property  ch.  3  p.  54. 

(2)  when  it  forms  a  group  with  a  perfect  stem  to  express 
the  meaning  explained  in  575  and  580. 
We  ought  to  have  done  that  long  ago. 
I   ought   to   have    married ;   yes    I  should  ha'  married 
long  ago.  Gissing,  A  Life's  Morning  ch.  9  p.  137 

(Poutsma  I  p.  75). 

Used 

648.  The  preterite  used  [just]  expresses  the  iterative 
aspect  of  a  past  action  or  occurrence,  and  may  be  defined 
as  denoting  what  was  generally  or  repeatedly  seen  or 
done  at  a  past  period. 

The  60  mile  section  of  the  line  from  the  new  Baghdad 
station  north  of  Adana  eastward  to  Mamureh  used,  in 
peace-time,  to  be  covered  in  five  hours. 

Times  W.  5/1,   17. 

Turning  criticism  into  what  Swinburne  used  sneeringly 
to  call  'finger-counting'.  Quarterly  Rev.  July  191 5. 

"Used  I  to  grumble.?"  asked  Michael. 

Sinister  Street  p.  890. 

Michael,  when  Sylvia  had  said  something  particularly 
broad,  used  to  look  away  from  Lily;  and  yet  he  knew 
he  need  not  have  bothered,  for  Lily  was  always  outside 
the  conversation.  ib.  p.    lOlO. 

You  don't  practise  as  much  as  you  used. 

ib.  p.  603. 


440  VERBS 

Aunt  Sarah,  who  usen't  to  talk  to  Nina,  turned  to  her 
and  said  .  .  .  Aunt  Sarah  and  the  War. 

See  23,  7  and  632. 

649.  When  the  stem  that  accompanies  used  does  not 
express  an  action  or  occurrence  but  a  state,  the  group 
naturally  cannot  denote  repetition.  In  such  a  case  it  ex- 
presses what  was  formerly  the  regular  state  of  things  {a). 
This  meaning  inevitably  subordinates  the  idea  of  regularity 
or  rule,  so  that  the  group  comes  to  express  the  contrast 
between  the  past  and  the  present  time  [b':.  The  distinction 
is  not  an  absolute  one,  naturally;  and  the  classification  of 
the  following  quotations  must  be  judged  accordingly. 

a.  I  was  half  inclined  to  jump  in,  and  swim  through 
such  glorious  scenery ;  for  nothing  used  to  please  me 
more  than  swimming  in  a  flooded  river. 

Blackmore,  Lorna  Doone  ch.  46  p.  318. 
"You    don't    mean    to    say   you  get  German   bands  in 
this    out    of  the    way    place?"   "Oh,  yes,  sometimes  two 
or  three  a  week,  or  rather,  we  used  to  have  them.  They 
don't  come  now;  the  dogs  keep  them  away." 

Sweet,  Spoken  Engl.  p.  69. 

b.  What  did  it  all  mean .''  England  used  to  be  a  place 
to  live  in.  Galsworthy,   Freelands  ch.  20. 

I  knew  him  by  his  voice.  I  should  never  have  known 
him  by  sight  because  of  his  beard,  fie  used  only  to 
have  a  moustache.  Sweet,  Element,  no.  43. 

It  (viz.  the  hair)  doesn't  curl  as  it  used  once. 

Trollope,  Dr.  Thorne  p.   315. 
The    Norman    Conquest    used   sometimes  to  be  repre- 
sented as  a  mere  set-back  in  the  evolution  of  our  political 
system.  Some  of  the  writers  of  the  last  century  ,  .  , 

Low,  Brit.  Const,  p.   11. 
Far  in  a  western  brookland 
That  bred  me  long  ago 
The  poplars  stand  and  tremble 
By  pools  I  used  to  know. 

Housman,  Shropshire  Lad  no.  52. 


CAN   AND   COULD  44 1 

The  following  example  may  be  classed  differently 
according  as  think  is  taken  to  express  a  state  ol  mind 
(to  be  of  opinion)  or  a  mental  activity. 

I  used  to  think  that  actresses  paid  their  maids  to  go 
into  the  pit  and  applaud  them  as  they  entered  the  au- 
ditorium,   but   this  was  a  very  foolish  and  unjust  belief. 

Observer,   34/10,  20. 

650.  The  two  functions  of  used  are  found  successively 
in  the  following  quotation. 

Father  used  to  tell  me  that  in  each  guest-chamber, 
at  the  foot  of  the  bed,  there  used  to  stand  a  table 
loaded  with  silver,  piles  of  dollars  covered  with  a  cloth. 

Vachell,  Spragge  p.   17. 


Can  and  Could 

651.  Can  belongs  to  the  fourth  group  of  auxiliaries 
distinguished  in  420.  The  peculiar  character  of  this  and 
the  following  group  will  be  best  discussed  in  the  retrospect 
at  the  end  of  this  chapter,  but  one  thing  it  seems  necessary 
to  premise:  if  can,  like  the  other  auxiliaries  to  be  treated 
in  the  following  sections,  has  forms  for  the  present  tense 
and  the  preterite  only,  not  for  the  non-predicative  functions, 
nor,  consequently,  for  the  groups  formed  with  a  non- 
predicative  verbal,  it  is  because  the  meaning  of  these 
auxiliaries  is  such  that  the  non-predicative  forms  are 
not  required.  Any  term  like  the  traditional  defective 
verbs  must,  therefore,  be  rejected  as  completely  mis- 
leading. It  has  been  pointed  out  (26)  that  the  form 
coidd  is  only  in  a  restricted  sense  to  be  looked  upon 
as  a  preterite  of  can.  This  applies  not  only  to  the  forms 
but  also  to  their  syntactic  functions,  so  that  it  will  be 
most    convenient    and   instructive   to   deal  separately  with 


442  VERBS 

each    form.     The    same    will    be    done    with    the    other 
auxiliaries  that  have  to  be  treated  still. 

652.  Can  expresses  all  kinds  of  ability  or  capability, 
power  or  fitness.  The  most  important  point  about  it  is 
that  it  is  chiefly  used  as  a  neutral  present  {a).  It  is  also 
possible  for  can  to  express  the  same  meanings  in  the 
function  of  an  actual  present  {b), 

a.  What's  the  use  of  pretending  ?  We  can  all  see 
through  you.  Collinson,  Spoken  English  p.   2. 

Can  we  have  dinner  on  the  train?  ib.  p.  44. 

The  nurse  had  slept  profoundly,  but  she  was  one  of 
those  fortunate  people  who  can  do  so  at  will,  and  then 
wake  up  at  an  appointed  time,  as  many  great  soldiers 
have  been  able  to  do. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  24  p.  262. 

The  king  can  declare  war  and  make  peace. 

A  parrot  can  talk  like  a  man ;  she  can  repeat  whole 
sentences,  and  knows  what  they  mean.  We  call  this 
talking,  but  it  is  not  real  speaking,  for  the  parrot  can 
no    more   make   up   sentences    of  itself  than  a  dog  can. 

Sweet,  Element,  no.  23. 

b.  I  am  going  to  the  post.  Anything  I  can  do  for  you? 

Collinson,  Spoken  Engl.  p.  54. 

653.  The  neutral  present  is  frequently  used  when  the 
future  is  referred  to,  so  that  there  can  be  no  question  of 
any  time  being  distinctly  expressed  by  the  verb. 

I  will  take  the  rooms.  When  can  I  move  in?  Shall  I 
pay  you  a  week's  rent  in  advance? 

Collinson,  Sp.  Engl.  p.  54. 

Phone  up  the  box-office  and  book  two  stalls.  We  can 
call  for  them  about  ten  minutes  before  the  performance 
begins.  ib.  p.  82. 

If  we  can  get  some  more  subscriptions  we  ought  to 
be  able  to  offer  a  very  attractive  programme  of  lectures 
and  social  evenings.  ib.  p.  98. 


CAN   AND   COULD  443 

654.  The  distinction  between  the  actual  and  the  neutral 
present  is  often  impossible.  Perhaps  the  distinction  should 
not  be  made  at  all  here,  for  speakers  are  quite  unaware 
of  any  difference. 

Can  I  have  some  more  bread,  please? 

Collinson,  Sp.  Engl.  p.  52. 
I'll   put  on  the  reading-lamp  on  the  desk  .  .  .  Perhaps 
we  can  manage  with  that.  ib.  p.  70. 

655.  A  special  case  of  neutral  can  is  its  use  to  denote 
that  a  quality  which  a  person  possesses  appears  now  and 
then.  In  this  case  can  expresses  the  effect  of  a  natural  law. 

Personality  can  be  irresistible. 

Vachell,  Quinneys'  p.   286. 

I  am  merely  telling  you  all  this  to  prove  to  you  how 
silly  a  girl  can  be  if  she  attaches  too  much  importance 
to  sentiment.  Hobbes,  Some  Emotions  I  ch.  6, 

Yet  Jane  Austen  can  be  tart  enough  —  insipidity  is 
the  last  accusation  which  can  be  raised  against  her  — 
only  her  gift  of  kindly  humour  prevents  her  from  ever 
becoming  shrewish.  Lady  Sackville. 

What  an  irritating  thing  a  conversation  can  be ! 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  2  p.   10. 

Nell  looked  at  her  and  just  laughed.  Girls  can  be 
beasts!  I'd  punch  a  fellow's  head  but  I  wouldn't  laugh 
at  him  like  that.  Owen  Oliver,  Home  Defence. 

Their  faces  are  pale,  partly  from  fasting,  partly  from 
anticipation,  for  the  passage  can  be  rough  in  February. 
E.  M.  Forster,  Philo's  Little  Trip. 

656.  The  preterite  could  is  used  as  a  past  tense  in 
the  same  meanings  as  the  actual  present  of  can  in  652  {a) 
and  655  {b).  It  can  also  serve  as  a  modal  preterite  in  the 
sense  of  652  {c). 

a.  I  tried  to  lift  the  sack  but  I  could  not. 

b.  "I  used  to  be  rather  hot  once." 
"You  could  be  peppery,  my  lady." 

Meredith,  Harrington  ch.  28  p.  292. 


444  VERBS 

(The  story  is  a  sad  one).  The  question  arises,  Was  this 
sadness  inherent  to  the  temperament  of  the  man  who  in 
his  private  correspondence  and  conversation  could  be 
gay,  humorous,  and  sometimes  overflowing  with  high 
spirits?  Athenaeum. 

To  have  introduced  French  blood  into  the  Flowers, 
notwithstanding  the  pride  of  the  family  in  their  Norman 
origin,  still  seemed  to  him  an  astonishing  piece  of  au- 
dacity ;  even  now  he  could  shudder  to  think  what  his 
father  would  have  said,  had  his  father  been  alive  when 
he  married. 

Mackenzie,  Seven  Ages  of  Woman  ch.   i   p.   i6. 

c.  In  the  year  1852  Livingstone  made  up  his  mind  to 
strike  into  the  interior,  and  find  a  healthy  station  which 
could  become  a  centre  for  missionary  w^ork. 

What,  if  now  he  should  discover  suddenly  that  it 
(his  book)  was  bad  .  .  .  Could  he  endure  it? 

Walpole,  Fort.  II  ch.    i   §  2  p.   155. 

For  more  than  a  week  my  pen  has  lain  untouched  .  .  . 
I  could  imagine  that  my  old  penholder  feels  reproach- 
fully towards  me.  Gissing,  Ryecroft  I. 

"What  rot!  Is  that  friendship?  I  call  that  the  most 
selfish  thing  I've  ever  known".  No,  obviously  enough, 
Bobby  could  never  understand  that  kind  of  thing. 

Walpole,  Fortitude  II  ch.   3   §  3   p.    178. 

657.  When  could  is  combined  with  a  perfect  stem  the 
meaning  is  modal,  as  usual  in  this  group  (580). 

These  seven  years  had  been  well  enough  as  a  pre- 
paration; now  at  last  he  was  to  be  flung,  head  foremost, 
into  life. 

He  could  have  sung,  he  could  have  shouted  .  .  . 

Walpole,   Fort.  II  ch.   5   p.    194. 

658.  Can  may  also  express  possibility  due  to  circum- 
stances {a),  especiall}^  in  sentences  that  are  negative  in 
meaning  ib). 

a.  We  can  expect  opposition  from  vested  interests. 

Times  16/3,   16,  p.  9/2, 


CAN   AND   COULD  445 

The  book  is  a  real  contribution  to  our  knowledge  of 
historical  syntax,  and  we  can  look  forward  with  interest 
to  that  larger  work  which  M.  Courmont  promises  us  in 
his  preface.  H.  T.  Price,  Beibl.  z.  Anglia  23. 

Privy  Councellors,  other  than  Ministers  and  certain 
high  officials,  have  a  titular  rank  and  no  duties.  They  can 
safely  take  an  oath  not  to  betray  State  secrets  for  they 
will  not  get  the  chance.  Low,  Brit.   Const,  p.   54. 

b.  It  can't  be  helped.  —  I  can't  always  be  right. 
Collinson,  Spoken  English  p.  4. 

No  student  of  Dryden  can  fail  to  mark  the  force  and 
sweep  of  an  intellect  impatient  of  restraint. 

Dennis,  Age  of  Pope. 

That  a  new  tax  should  be  chosen  that  will  seem  to 
convey  such  indications  is  not  what  Mr,  Balfour  can 
desire.  Pilot. 

But  I  don't  quite  see  what  he  can  gain  if  our  Party 
helps  him  through  with  his  Bill  for  the  payment  of 
members.  Patterson,  Stephen  Compton,  p.   245. 

It  is  difficult  to  believe  that  the  novel  can  have  done 
much  to  advance  these  principles.     Boas,  Essays  II,  48. 

659.  A  special  case  of  this  meaning  is  found  in  inter- 
rogative sentences  with  a  strong  stress  on  can  to  express 
astonishment  or  impatience  ^).     Compare  may. 

"VVeli,  Betsy^  who  is  it?" 

"Please,  Miss,  it's  Mr.  Austen,  he  wants  to  speak  to 
Miss  Beatrice  by  herself  for  a  minute ;  so  Eve  shown 
him  into  the  library." 

"How  extraordinary;  what  can  he  want?" 

Sweet,  Element,  no.  ^t^. 

A  great  poet  may  tax  our  brains,  but  he  ougiit  not 
to  puzzle  our  wits.  We  ma}^  often  have  to  ask  with 
humility  'what  does  he  mean?'  but  not  in  despair  'what 
can  he  mean?'  Birrell,   Obiter  Dicta  p.   30. 


1)  The  emphatic  stress  in  the  quotations  is  indicated  in  the  original  texts. 


446  VERBS 

660.  The  preterite  could  is  also  used  to  express  possi- 
bility, in  the  same  two  cases.  The  function  is  that  of  a 
modal  preterite  [a] ;  could  can  also  be  grouped  with  a  per- 
fect stem  {b),  see  580. 

a.  He  looked  round  him  in  every  direction.  "I  could 
swear  that  was  Bellows.  Why  don't  you  show  yourself 
like  a  man,  Bellows.'"'  Wells,   Country  p.   89. 

But  where  could  he  be  at  this  time,  and  on  such  an 
evening,  leaving  his  supper  in  this  stage  of  preparation, 
and  his  door  unfastened  ? 

George  Eliot,  Silas  Marner  ch.  4. 

b.  Mr.  Utterson  thought  he  had  never  seen  that  part 
of  London  so  deserted.  He  could  have  wished  it  other- 
wise; never  in  his  life  had  he  been  conscious  of  so  sharp 
a  wish  to  see  and  touch  his  fellow-creatures. 

Stevenson,  Dr.  Jekyll  p.  Gj , 

He  could  not  have  failed  to  anticipate  —  and  events 
have  proved  that  he  did  not  fail  to  anticipate  —  the 
waylayings  to  which  he  was  subjected. 

Foe,  Selected  Short  Stories  II  p.  94. 

661.  When  followed  by  a  passive  stem  can  is  often 
almost  equivalent  to  may.  In  the  following  quotations  can 
is  used  because  the  writer  thinks  of  the  personal  subject 
which  is  understood.     See  679  on  may. 

Prof.  Gregory  Smith's  proposed  classification  into  pe- 
riods seems  very  reasonable  though  he  shows  himself 
alive  to  the  objections  which  can  be  urged  against  it 
(=  which  we  or  scholars  can  urge  against  it). 

Athenaeum, 

He  maintains  further  that  the  section  now  under  dis- 
cussion, Books  VII. — IX.,  was  the  first  part  of  the  work 
that  Herodotus  wrote,  and  that  when  he  completed  it  by 
adding  the  other  books,  he  made  a  few  slight  changes 
which  can  be  traced  (i.  e.  which  we  can  trace).        ib. 

The  Government  can  be  excused  (i.  e.  we  can  excuse 
the  G.)  for  not  being  persuaded  by  arguments  inspired 
by  such  motives.  Daily  News,  26/10,   ii. 


CAN,    COULD,   TO   BE   ABLE  447 

The  points  of  agreement,  some  of  which  are  on  what 
may  be  called  the  major  questions  for  consideration,  can 
first  be  indicated  (i.  e.  it  is  convenient  first  to  indicate, 
etc.).  Times,  reviewing  the  majority  and  minority  reports 
of  the  Royal  Commission  on  Divorce. 

„      0    ,,       .       662.     In    some    uses    can    and    could   are 
Can,  Could,  and     ,  .  .  .   ,  .    ,       , , 

T    R    ahi        alternatives  oi  lorms  oi  the  group  to  be  able. 

It  is  natural,  therefore,  to  compare  the  two. 
They  chiefly  compete  in  the  meaning  of  652,  but  in  the 
neutral  present  can  is  used  only;  lo  be  able  can  be  sub- 
stituted when  a  definite  time  is  thought  of  («).  It  seems 
even  that  the  preterite  of  to  be  able  is  preferred  as  a  past 
tense,  when  it  is  possible  to  use  the  group  on  account  of 
the  meaning  to  be  expressed,  because  the  preterite  could 
is  tending  to  be  restricted  to  the  modal  use  {b). 

a.  I  regret  that  I  am  not  able  to  lend  you  the  book  i). 
I  shall  not  be  able  to  come  again  to-day. 

I  shall  be  pleased  if  I  am  able  to  be  of  service  to  you. 

b,  " —  Now  relate,  please,  exactly  what  you  have  been 
doing  in  this  sweet  old  realm  of  Edward's.  I  won't  say 
another  word." 

We  were  able  to  relate  a  good  deal,  by  taking  turns, 
and  poured  it  all  out  about  Towse,  .  ,  . 

Cotes,  Cinderella  ch.  6  p.  64. 
But  these  forest  flies,  even  when  they  came  in  legions 
about  me,  were  not  able  to  spoil  my  pleasure. 

Hudson,  Hampshire  Days  ch.   3  p.  66. 

663.     Sometimes   to   be  able   expresses  the  meaning  of 

655  [a),    and   also    possibility  {b);    occasionally   it   is   used 

with   a   passive  stem  in  the  same  sense  as  can  in  661  (c). 

a.  She  never  seemed  able  to  look  out  of  her  window 


1)   To  be  able  as  an  actual  present  is  hardly  used  in  other  than  negative 
sentences. 


448  VERBS 

without    seeing    some    hunchedup    man   or    wrapped-up 
woman  who  was  being  helped  up  a  flight  of  steps. 

Mackenzie,  Rich  Relatives  ch.   ii   p.  268. 

b.  The  discovery  will  enable  science  to  determine  the 
conditions  in  which  the  infection  takes  place,  and  it  is 
expected  that  preventive  measures  will  be  able  to  be 
taken.  Everyman  3/1,    1913. 

c.  Certain  books  only  were  at  the  time  of  the  compi- 
lation   of    this    list    in    print    and  able  to  be  purchased, 

Poutsma  I  p.  94. 

May  and  Might 

664.  May  is  used  as  an  actual  present  to  express  the 
permission  given  by  some  person  («).  It  also  expresses 
what  is  permitted  by,  or  in  accordance  with,  law,  reason, 
rule,  or  morality;  in  this  case  it  is  naturally  a  neutral 
present  {b). 

a.  You  may  go  out  when  you  have  finished  your  work. 
I  am  sure  he  may  go  out  if  he  wants  to. 

b.  The  efforts  required  for  these  protracted  hostilities 
may  be  said  to  have  ruined  both  states. 

Margoliouth,  Mohammedanism  p.    i.    18. 
The  delight  and  affection  which  he  inspired  in  his  own 
day  he  still  inspires  in  ours,  and  will,  one  may  be  sure, 
in  all  that  are  to  follow. 

You  may  well  look  astonished. 

Kingsley  (Poutsma  I  p.  75). 
In  considering  the  equipment  of  the  novelist  there  are 
two  attributes  which  may  always  be  taken  for  granted. 

Eng.  Rev.  July,    1913. 
Of   the    three    Bills    returned    to  the  Lords  this  week 
under    the    Parliament    Act,    it    is  still  possible  that  one 
may  be  passed  with  the  consent  of  both  Houses. 

Nation,   12/7,    13. 

665.  May  can  also  express  the  speaker's  uncertainty 
with  regard  to  an  action,  state,  or  occurrence  {a).    When 


MAY  449 

two  sentences   are  contrasted  there  may  be  a  concessive 
meaning  {b). 

a.  He  may  get  there  in  time  if  he  walks  fast. 

He  may  not  have  done  it  although  appearances  are 
strong  against  him. 

This  may  or  may  not  ^)  be  true. 

b.  It  (i.  e.  Reason)  may  not  be  a  perfect  guide,  but  it 
is  all  we  have,  and  he  (Mr.  Balfour)  will  not  consent  to 
forgo  its  use.  Times  Lit.  7/5,    14. 

666.  A  third  meaning  of  may,  which  is  closely  con- 
nected with  the  preceding,  is  possibility. 

You    may    force    fruit,    but  you  cannot  force  flavour. 

Fools  may  ask  more  questions  than  wise  men  can 
answer. 

A  woman  with  fair  opportunities,  and  without  an  ab- 
solute hump,  may  marry  whom  she  likes. 

This  meaning  is  found  in  affirmative  sentences  only, 
which  is  a  sign  of  its  connection  with  the  meaning  of  665. 
For  negative  sentences,  expressing  as  they  do  the  cer- 
tainty of  the  speaker,  must  take  can. 

667.  We  have  the  same  meaning  as  in  the  preceding 
section  in  interrogative  sentences ;  in  this  case  may  expresses 
wonder  or  curiosity,  although  it  is  in  the  nature  of  a 
•question  to  express  uncertainty  as  well. 

What    may    he    be    doing   there  down  in  the  garden? 
Sisters  and  brothers,  little  maid, 
How  many  may  you  be?  Wordsworth. 

I  wonder  what  I  may  have  done  to  offend  him. 


1)  May  not  is  [mei  nut]  here,  as  not  is  emphatic  owing  to  the  contrast; 
see   18. 

Kruisixga,  Handbook  II.  Accidence  and  Syntax.  1.  29 


450  VERBS 

„,  ,  668.  The  most  important  point  to  be  observed 
with  regard  to  the  form  might  is  that  it  may  indeed 
be  looked  upon  as  a  preterite  of  may,  but  is  used  as  a 
modal  preterite  only;  in  other  words,  that  may  has  no 
corresponding  past  tense.  After  dealing  with  the  functions 
of  might,  therefore,  we  must  consider  why  may  has  no 
past  tense,  and  compare  the  words  that  might  seem 
to  supply  what  is  sometimes  called  a  'deficiency',  just  as 
we  have  done  in  the  case  of  can  (662). 

663.  Modal  might  is  used  to  express  the  meanings 
defined  in  664 />;  it  differs  from  may  in  that  it  expresses 
more  of  uncertainty,  or  the  speaker's  diffidence,  in  making 
the  statement  {a).  Might  can  also  express  the  meanings 
of  665  and  666  (b).  In  all  these  cases  a  simple  and  a, 
perfect  plain  stem  can  be  used. 

a.  The  old  farm,  now  that  the  trees  are  bare,  the  skies 
bleak,  and  the  roads  frost-bound,  is  far  other  than  it  was. 
in  July,  and  a  stranger,  coming  here  for  the  first  time 
might  well  wish,  if  he  could,  to  recall  the  warmth,  the. 
foliage,  and  the  sounds  of  the  summer  season. 

Times  W.   lo/i,   i8. 
At  this  hour  he  should  have  been  working  at  his  book; 
and  the  fact  that  his  idleness  did  not  trouble  him  might; 
well  have  given  him  uneasiness. 

Galsworthy,  Fraternity  ch.  20  p.    164. 

b.  "Do  you  think  I  dislike  your  company,  Sibyl?"  — 
"Well,  no,  not  exactly,  but  you  might  if  I  gave  you  too 
much  of  it." 

Might  it  not  be  well  to  warn  Brian  it  was  not  well  to- 
play  fast  and  loose  with  a  girl's  affections  ? 

Some  leading  hounds  had  fallen  to  rise  no  more; 
others  had  retreated  yelping  to  their  kennels,  to  lie  quiet 
for  a  while,  till  time  might  give  them  courage  for  a  new 
attack.  TroUope,  Three  Clerks  p.  394. 

The    Dynasts    on    the   stage  might,  but  probably  will 


MIGHT  451 

not,    be  a  lesson  to  those  who  divide  works  of  art   into 
classes  ').  Times  Lit.    19/2,   1920. 

Tacitus  was  not  quite  impartial  in  his  account  of  the 
Germans  . . .  But  Tacitus,  though  he  might  have  been  rather 
inclined  to  favour  the  Germans,  was  mainly  a  scientific 
observer.  Ker,  Medieval  English  Literature. 

Peter  might  have  known,  and  very  likely  did,  the  inside 
of  a  pawnbroker's.        Dickens,  Christmas  Carol  st   III 
(p.  88;  compare  also  ib.  p.  99.   5). 

He  was  only  afraid  that  something  might  have  occurred 
to  vex  you. 

670.  When  might  expresses  uncertainty  or  possibility 
two  sentences  may  be  contrasted,  with  the  result  that  the 
might- q\3.\\.'s>&  has  a  concessive  function,  like  a  subordinate 
concessive  adverb  clause. 

Progress  might  be  slow,  but  it  was  sure.  .  .  Dr.  Hall 
might  snort  when  he  heard  of  it,  asking,  with  a  growl, 
what  a  soldier  wanted  with  a  tooth-brush  ;  but  the  good 
work  went  on.     Strachey,   Eminent  Victorians  p.  132  f. 

For  that  indefatigable  disciple  did,  indeed,  never  desert 
her.  He  might  be  impatient,  he  might  be  restless,  but 
he  remained.  ib.  p.    164. 

671.  Occasionally  we  find  might  as  what  seems  to  be  a 
real  past  tense  expressing  permission,  or  what  is  reasonable. 
The  use  is  exclusively  literary,  unless,  indeed,  we  can 
look  upon  the  cases  as  really  indirect  style. 

There  were  three  long  weeks  in  that  large  bed  for 
Dicky  before  he  might  see  the  fields  again  or  feel  the 
touch. 

The  wounds  that  hur<-  are  the  unintended  ones,  the 
side  blows   dealt    by  the  professed  lovers  of  poetry,  by 


4)  The  parallelism  between  might  and  will  shows  very  clearly  that  the 
two  forms  do  not  differ  with  regard  to  time.  The  use  oi might  as  a  secondary 
past  tense  in  indirect  style  is  treated,  as  in  the  other  cases,  in  vol.  3 
{Concord  of  Tense). 


452  VERBS 

the  professed  friends  of  the  poets.  We  may  not  quarrel 
with  these,  for  they  are  genuine  friends;  but  it  would 
be  hard  if  we  might  not  describe  them  to  themselves, 
in  the  hope  of  a  better  understanding. 

Henry  Newbolt,  English  Rev.  April   1914  p.   11. 

,„.,,.  672.     Both    may    and    mtp-hL    in    the 

May  and  Might  in    ^        .  ,     .        .  .        .1  ■, 

„  ,     ,.    ,    ^,  lunctions    dealt   with  until  now,  are  used 

Subordinate  Clauses  ....  ,,  :       , 

in   subordinate   as   well   as  main  clauses. 

But  in  subordinate  clauses  they  are  sometimes  used  when 
the  main  clause  indicates  by  its  verb  that  uncertainty  or 
possibilit}''  are  thought  of.  The  consequence  is  that  may 
and  might  come  to  be  auxiliaries  of  modality  supple- 
mentary to  the  idea  expressed  by  the  main  clause  instead 
of  being  indispensable  elements  of  the  predicate.  In  all 
these  cases  might  is  naturally  a  secondary  past  tense. 

Some  uses  are  rather  literary  than  spoken  English, 
though  all  of  them  are  current.  It  will  be  useful,  there- 
fore, to  deal  with  the  constructions  that  ma}^  be  considered 
the  substitutes  of  the  purely  hterary  ones;  see  680. 

673.  May  and  might  occur  in  a  meaning  that  may  be 
defined  as  uncertainty  or  possibility  in  a  number  of  clauses. 
It  is  often  doubtful  whether  the  case  is  really  different 
from  the  use  in  main  clauses,  and  we  may  frequently 
hesitate  between  defining  the  clause  as  suggesting  uncer- 
tainty or  possibility.     The  two  forms  occur: 

(1)  in  clauses  subordinate  to  a  main  clause  expressing 
wish,  desire,  hope,  fear,  demand. 

We    hope    that    this    may    be  of  some  interest  to  the 
general  reader. 

It    is    hoped    that  this  book  may  be  read  with  profit 
by  the  experimental  as  well  as  the  theoretical  physicist. 
Preface  to  a  recent  scientific  work  by  R.  L.  de  Kronig. 
In  September  1645,  the  blow  fell  that  poor  Ralph  had 


MAY   AND   MIGHT  453 

SO  much  dreaded,  and  which  he  had  hoped  to  the  last  might 
have  been  averted.         Mem.  Verney  Fam.  II  p.  216. 

Sir  Walter  Raleigh  expresses  the  hope  that  voluntary- 
helpers  may  be  found  to  give  their  services. 

Times  Lit.  2/9,   15. 

Of  course  he  hoped  that  his  boy  might  succeed. 

When  Jasper  took  leave  of  Alfred  Yule,  the  latter 
expressed  a  wish  that  they  might  have  a  walk  together 
one  of  these  mornings.     Gissing,  New  Grub  Street  ch.  2. 

I  desired  he  might  come  to  me  into  my  study. 

He    demanded   that  a  large  vessel  might  be  detained. 

I  had  still  my  hopes  that  all  this  folly  would  gradually 
die  away ;  that  the  Lambs  might  move  out  of  the 
neighbourhood;  might  die,  or  might  run  away  with 
attorneys'  apprentices,  and  that  quiet  and  simplicity 
might  be  again  restored  to  the  community. 

Their  father  felt .  .  .  not  a  little  anxious  lest  his  chil- 
dren might  be  going  to  thaw  too. 

(2)  in  clauses  subordinate  to  an  affirmative  main  clause 
expressing  possibility,  and  also,  though  rarely, 
probability  {it  is  possible^  probable,  likely). 

It  is  possible  that  he  may  come  to-morrow. 
It  was  just  possible,  he  thought,  that  the  trick  he  was 
going  to  play,  might  succeed. 

(3)  in  relative  clauses  referring  to  an  antecedent  with 
an  indefinite  meaning. 

A  tactful  teacher  may  get  them  to  take  pleasure  in 
preserving  every  drawing  or  map  which  they  may  make. 

It  was  not  easy  to  find  any  expedient  which  might 
avert  the  danger. 

(4)  in  adverb  clauses: 

a.  of  purpose,  introduced  by  that,  so  that,  lest. 

I  say  all  this  that  you  may  understand  what  I  mean  to  do. 

He  kept  no  copy  of  his  letter,  so  that  he  might  be 
unable  to  show  her  his  very  words  when  she  should  ask 
to  see  them.  TroUope,  Last  Chronicle  ch.  47. 


454  VERBS 

A  ring  was  made,  and  there  was  silence,  so  that  the 
prefects  might  not  be  attracted,  because  fighting  in  the 
Lower  School  was  forbidden. 

Walpole,  Fort.  I  ch.  5  §  3  p.   58. 
She    looked    at    the    clock ;    she  had  a  little  spasm  of 
nervousness    lest    Cyril    might   fail   to  keep  his  word  on 
that  first  day  of  their  new  regular  life  together. 

Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  II  ch.  6  §   1  p.  245. 
In    a    sudden    flutter    of   fear    lest   the  Bigwigs  might 
observe  the  operation,  she  drew  back. 

Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.   8,  p.  94. 
^'I    didn't    know    about  earls",  he  said  rather  hastily, 
lest    Mr.    H.    might    feel   it  impolite  in  him  not  to  have 
wished  to  be  one.  Burnett,  Fauntleroy  ch,  2. 

b.  of  concession. 

Whatever  faults  they  may  have  had,  neither  Tacitus 
nor  Carlyle  was  dull.  Times  Lit.  29/7,   15. 

But  it  was  a  fresh  discovery  for  all  that,  a  new  mode 
of  thought,  whatever  its  source  might  be. 

Ker,  Engl.  Lit.  p.  88. 

,,,.,,  ^  J        674.     It   may  be  useful  finally  to 

May  and  Might  Compared  -^        .        .   ,        .  , 

. ,   n  .  .  J  />      .     ..        compare    may     and    mi^ht   with    a 
with  Related  Constructions  f  .  -^  .  . 

number    01    constructions    that    are 

more  or  less  evidently  and  truly  similar  in  meaning.  We 

shall  deal  with: 

(1)  to  be  allowed; 

(2)  the  adverb  perhaps; 

(3)  can  and  could; 

(4)  the  future  with  shall  and  will. 
On  may  not  and  inust  not,  see  688. 

„         ,  675.     In  comparing  may  and  might  with  to 

_  .     „      ^  be   allowed   it    must    be   remembered  that  the 
To  be  allowed        ,    ,  •  ,     , 

verbal  group  with  be  expresses  two  meanings, 

as    explained    in    the   sections  on  the  participle  (56ff.i:  it 


MAY   AND   TO   BE   ALLOWED  455 

may  express  a  state  but  also  an  occurrence.  It  is  only 
with  to  be  allowed  in  the  former  meaning  that  we  need 
deal  here,  for  it  is  in  that  case  only  that  it  approaches 
the  sense  of  may. 

When  allowed  is  used  as  a  verbal  adjective  it  is  some- 
times called  a  substitute  for  the  'defective'  forms  of  may. 
On  this  term  defective  the  reader  may  consult  651.  But 
to  be  allowed  cannot  be  said  to  form  a  suppletive  system 
with  may  and  might  any  more  than  to  be  able  (or  capable) 
can  be  said  to  form  a  suppletive  system  with  can  and 
could,  as  shown  in  662. 

676.  When  may  expresses  permission  it  is  a  permission 
thought  of  as  existing,  without  any  indication  of  an  action 
or  occurrence  that  has  produced  it.  To  be  allozved,  on 
the  other  hand,  naturally  expresses  the  meaning  of  a 
verbal  adjective  in  id,  i.  e.  it  denotes  the  state  as  the 
result  of  a  precedmg  action  or  occurrence.  Hence  we  must 
use  it  to  express  the  future  or  the  perfect:  /  shall  be 
allowed  to  go,  I  have  been  allowed  to  go.  The  difference 
is  quite  clear  when  we  compare  these  two  sentences: 
/  suppose  you  may  do  that  and  /  suppose  you  will  be 
allowed  to  do  that.  For  the  same  reason  we  do  not  use  may 
in    the   past   tense,  but  say :  /  was  not  allozved  to  go  out. 

Another  consequence  of  the  difference  of  meaning  between 
the  two  constructions  is  that  to  be  allowed  denotes  that 
the  permission  is  given  b}^  another  than  the  speaker  ( You 
will  be  allowed  to  leave  your  room  in  a  day  or  two), 
whereas  may  expresses  the  speaker's  permission  {You 
may  leave  your  room  in  a  day  or  two),  or  the  speaker's 
report  of  a  permission  that  has  been  given. 

It  is  also  natural  that  to  be  allowed  should  be  little  used 
in  the  present  tense,  and  hardly,  if  at  all,  in  the  actual 
present. 


456  VERBS 

,       677.     May    expressing    uncertainty    is    closely 

^   ,  allied   with  perhaps.     The  difference  between  the 

Perhaps  .      ,      ^        ^  ,  ^  .  .    , 

two  IS  that  may  expresses  the  uncertainty  oi  the 

speaker,  perhaps  the  speaker's  idea  that  the  facts  are 
uncertain.  It  is  clear  that  one  form  cannot  always  be 
substituted  for  the  other,  and  even  when  this  is  possible 
it  does  not  mean  that  the  two  forms  express  the  same 
meaning  [a).  We  sometimes  find  the  two  ways  com- 
bined {b). 

a.  What  sort  of  weather  are  we  going  to  have?  — 
It  doesn't  look  very  promising  at  present,  but  you  never 
know!  Perhaps  the  sun  will  come  out  presently. 

Collinson,  Spoken  Engl.  p.   30. 

This  is  a  windy  place  and  no  mistake !  The  windows 
were  rattling  ail  night  and  there  was  an  awful  draught  — 
Perhaps  we  shall  get  on  better  to-night,  the  wind  has 
dropped  considerably.  ib.  p.  36. 

Do  you  take  milk  and  sugar?  —  Just  a  little  milk 
and  two  lumps  of  sugar,  please,  —  Perhaps  you'd  better 
add  the  milk  yourself.  ib.  p.   38. 

Peter  did  not  mind  the  silence  —  it  was  perhaps 
safer  —  and  so  long  as  he  was  home  by  six  o'clock 
he  could  spend  the  day  where  he  pleased. 

Walpole,  Fort.  I  ch.   3   p.  26. 

To  see  life  only  through  books  would  be  perhaps 
worse  than  physical  blindness. 

Baker,  Uses  of  Libr.  p.   5. 

b.  Nowadays  the  line  is  clearly  drawn :  it  is  easy  to 
tell  which  appointments  are  political  and  which  admini- 
strative. Perhaps  such  a  line  may  always  have  existed ; 
he  would  be  a  bold  man  who  tried  to  draw  it  before 
the  reign  of  Edward  II. 

Engl.  Hist.  Rev.  Jan.   1929  p.   130. 

r.         J  ..  678.     It   has    been   stated   that   can   as  well 

Can  and  May  .,  ...      .       ^ 

as   tJiay   can   express  possibihty  m  amrmative 

sentences.    But  the  word  possibility  has  various  meanings: 
can  expresses  the  possibility  that  is  the  result  of  qualities 


CAN    AND   MAY  45/ 

inherent  in  the  subject  of  the  verb,  or  of  circumstances 
concerning  the  subject;  may  expresses  possibility  pro- 
vided by  some  person  other  than  the  subject  of  the 
verb  (i.  e.  permission)  or  by  circumstances  outside  the 
subject. 

The  distinction  can  be  exempHfied  by  the  quotation 
from  Walpole,  in  677  a.  The  boy  could  spend  the  day 
where  he  pleased,  i.  e.  his  hfe  was  arranged  in  such  a 
way;  if  might  had  been  used  it  would  have  meant  that 
somebody  had  told  him  'You  may  spend  the  day  where 
you  please',  which  is  not  the  meaning  intended.  We 
can  say:  You  may  go  and  You  can  go.  But  there  is  a 
difference.  You  may  go  expresses  that  the  speaker  (or 
somebody  else)  gives  the  permission.  You  can  go  ex- 
presses that  there  are  no  conditions  that  prohibit  the 
person's  going.  It  would  be  said  e.  g.  to  a  boy  who  had 
been  informed  that  he  would  have  to  finish  his  work 
before  going  out.  When  he  tells  his  father  that  his  work 
is  finished  the  father  may  answer:  You  can  go  then,  i.e. 
the  circumstances  prohibiting  your  going  have  been  re- 
moved.    See  648. 

Alice,  if  you  have  finished  your  breakfast,  you  can  go. 
Benson,  The  Weaker  Vessel. 

679.  When  no  subject  is  thought  of  and  the  stem 
accompanying  the  auxiliary  is  a  passive  group  it  seems 
indifferent  whether  can  or  may  is  used.     See  661. 

The  "Independent"  can  be  had  of  any  newsagent  in 
the  country  or  may  be  obtained  direct  from  the  offices. 

The  whole  27  Volumes  can  now  be  had  in  uniform 
style  and  binding  for  3  guineas,  or  any  volume  may  be 
had  separately,  price  2/6. 

Sampson  Low,  Marston  &  Co. 

The  lecture  may  be  bought  for  3  pence ;  and  the  slides 
can  be  had  free  of  charge. 


_458  VERBS 

„         ,        680.     In    describing    the    use    of  may    in   sub- 

^.    „  ^       ordinate   clauses    (672  f.)    it   has    been    mentioned 
the  Future    ,         ,  ,  . 

that   there   are   alternative  constructions  in  some 

cases.     One    of  these   is   the   group-future  with  sha/l  and 

wt'll,    which    is   more   frequent   in    the   first   two   cases   of 

673,  than  may. 

He  was  not  in  the  least  afraid  that  she  would  cause 
his  feelings  to  change  tOAvards  Kate. 

Patterson,  Compton. 

I  have  no  fear  that  there  will  be  any  permanent  estrange- 
ment between  the  public  opinion  of  the  two  countries. 

Daily  News. 

The  telegram  which  our  Vienna  correspondent  sends 
us  lends  strength  to  the  hope  that  a  definitive  settlement 
in  the  Balkans  will  be  reached.  Times  W. 

It  is  hoped  that  they  (i.  e.  the  books  of  a  new  series) 
will  appeal  to  teachers  of  English  literature  who  are 
seeking  books  with  a  practical  bias. 

Cambridge  Univ.  Press. 

681.  Instead  of  may  in  the  cases  of  673,  3  and  4  b  current 
English  generally  has  the  predicative  verb  or  verb  group 
without  an  auxiliary. 

Whatever  happens,  it  (viz.  the  effort)  will,  we  are  con- 
vinced, not  be  wasted.        New  Statesman  ii/i,   1919. 

Must 

682.  Must  is  chiefly  used  as  a  present  tense  to  express 
necessity.     This  may  be: 

(1)  a  necessity  imposed  by  circumstances,  including  the 
w^ill  of  a  person.  If  it  is  the  will  of  another  person 
than  the  subject  of  the  sentence,  must  expresses 
an  urgent  command  or  an  insistent  request  [a) ;  if 
it  is  the  will  of  the  subject  of  the  sentence,  must 
expresses  a  firm  determination  {b). 


MUST  459 

a.  I  must  go  home  now ;  father  told  me  to  be  quick. 
Tom,  you  must  go  with  us  to  Mr.  B. 

You  must  obey  nurse,  children. 

You  must  not  expect  me  to  help  you. 

b.  I  must  and  will  have  my  own  way. 

He  is  not  content  with  a  ring  and  a  bracelet,  but  he 
must  have  rings  in  the  ears,  rings  on  the  nose  —  rings 
everywhere.  Wordsworth,  NED.  s.  v.  must,  4. 

<2)  a  necessit}^  imposed  by  circumstances  in  general  {a) 
or  relative  to  some  end  {b). 

a.  All  men  must  die. 

People  who  live  in  an  island  must  be  tolerant  of  the 
sensitiveness  of  races  less  happily  situated,  in  the  matter 
of  their  neighbours  and  their  landmarks. 

Times  Lit.  6/1,  21. 

b.  A  considerable  latitude  must  be  allowed  in  the 
discussion  of  public  affairs,  or  the  liberty  of  the  press 
will  be  no  benefit  to  society. 

The  judges  criticise  Parliament,  and  they  in  their  turn 
must  accept  criticism  upon  their  order. 

The  room,  you  must  know  (i.  e.  in  order  to  understand 
what  I  am  going  to  tell  you),  was  long  and  low  with  a 
raftered  ceiling.  Bar.  Orczy,  Meadowsweet  ch.  I. 

683.     Musi    can    also    be   used  as  a  neutral  present  to 
express  the  inferred  or  presumed  certainty  of  a  fact. 

What's  it  like  out  this  morning?  Bitterly  cold,  the 
temperature  must  be  well  below  freezing-point. 

Collinson,  Spoken  English  p.   30. 

He  must  be  an  old  man.  now. 

Those  who  are  in  the  habit  of  remarking  such  matters 
must  have  noticed  the  passive  quiet  of  an  English  land- 
scape on  Sunday. 

Coleridge  must  have  earned  a  substantial  sum  by  these 
lectures. 

Between  two  and  three  hundred  thousand  written  papers 
of  one  sort  or  another  must  have  passed  under  my  view. 


460  VERBS 

If  he  says  so  it  must  be  true. 

Under  such  conditions  there  must  have  arisen  mixed 
dialects,  mainly  English,  but  containing  many  Danish 
words.  Bradley,   Making  of  English  p.   31. 

684.  Must  is  used,  both  as  a  present  (a)  and  as  a  past 
tense  {b),  to  denote  some  foolish  or  annoying  action  or 
some  untoward  event. 

a.  So  you  must  always  be  meddling,  must  you  ? 
The  goal  was  immensely  far  off.  His  haste  was  as  absurd 

and  as  fine  as  that  of  a  man  who,  starting  to  cross  Europe 
on  foot,  must  needs  run  to  get  out  of  Calais  and  be  fairly 
on  his  way.  Bennett,  Roll-Call,  I  ch.  8  §  3. 

b.  This  fellow  had  no  money,  but  she  must  needs 
become  engaged  to  him  —  a  harum-scarum,  unpractical 
chap,  who   would  get  himself  into  no  end  of  difficulties. 

Galsworthy,  Man  of  Property  I  ch.  2. 
His  ridiculous  pride  must  nevertheless  inquire  whether 
Caroline  had  been  begging  this  for  him. 

Meredith,  Harrington  ch.  39,  p.  404. 
He  had  sketched  these  personages  for  good  or  evil,  in 
his  Lectures,  and  there  he  might  have  left  them  to  the 
judgment  of  posterity.  But  he  must  needs  ask  them  to 
play  their  part  in  the  drama  of  Esmond;  and  it  may  be 
said  that  his  characters  are  never  further  from  reality 
than  when  they  bear  real  names. 

Whibley,  Thackeray  p.   182  f. 

685.  Must  is  used  with  a  perfect  stem  in  the  function 
of  a  modal  preterite.  This  use  is  probably  literary  rather 
than  spoken  English. 

If  he  had  looked,  he  must  have  seen  the  light  of  the 
approaching  train. 

Even  if  Rembrandt  had  not  been  an  artist  of  genius, 
he  must  have  aroused  our  interest  more  than  almost  any 
other  Dutch  painter:  so  rich  and  varied  is  the  work  he 
left  behind  him. 


MUST  461 

Had  he  (i.  e.  Gibbon)  attempted  to  know  the  ultimate 
causes  of  the  decHne  and  fall  of  the  Roman  Empire,  he 
must  have  failed  egregiously,  childishly. 

686.  The  use  of  must  as  a  secondary  past  tense  (past 
tense  of  concord)  will  be  dealt  with  in  vol.  3  {Concord  of 
Tense).  It  is  often  difficult  to  decide  whether  a  form  is 
used  in  this  way  or  in  direct  style  [a) ;  but  the  following 
cases  under  b  can  hardly  be  other  than  illustrations  of 
must  as  a  direct  past  tense. 

a.  Beyond  the  fields  was  a  wood  through  which  he 
must  pass  before  he  reached  Stephen's  farm,  and  as  the 
trees  closed  about  him  and  he  heard  the  rain  driving 
through  the  bare  branches  the  world  seemed  full  of 
chattering  noises.  Waipole,  Fort.,  I  ch.  7  §  2  p.  81. 

When  nobles  entertained  the  King  or  other  noblemen, 
they  must  needs  furnish  the  entertainment  adjudged  at 
Court  as  best.  But  few  kept  a  household  on  the  petty 
royal  scale  of  the  Earl  of  Northumberland.  .  .  So  they 
must  find  other  means  to  provide  singers,  dancers, 
jugglers,  tumblers,  and  actors  as  occasion  required. 

Wallace,   Drama  p.    118  f. 
In  this  case  the  boy  had  a  right  to  the  stage,  and  so 
the  mother  must  stand  in  the  wings. 

Malet,  Calmady,  ch.  6. 
At   last    the    moment    had    arrived    when    Lord    Fane 
must  get  down  to  the  (race)  course. 

Garvice,  Staunch  p.  251. 

b.  The  criticism  which  he  puts  forward  could  not  be 
suppressed,    it    must    find    light    some    time    or  another. 

Times  Lit.   15/1,  20. 
He  laboured  indefatigably,  partly  because  his  life  was 
a  long  struggle  to  keep  the  wolf  from  the  door;   partly 
because  a  man  of  his  temperament  and  active  brain  must 
so  labour,  willy-nilly.  Athenaeum  2/12,    ii. 

The  first  example  under  b  might  possibly  be  inter- 
preted as  a  case  of  684;  the  second  of  683. 


462  VERBS 

687.     Must  not  expresses  a  more  or  less  urgent 
prohibition   (a).     It    has    an    essentially    identical 
meaning  when  used  in  the  first  person  ib). 

a.  In  India,  when  you  leave  your  hotel  and  want  to 
tip  the  sweeper,  you  must  not  hold  out  the  coin,  expecting 
him  to  take  it.  Huxley,  Vulgarity  p.  4. 

This  volume  must  not  be  taken  into  Great  Britain  or 
the  Colonies.  Nelson's  Continental  Library. 

b.  I  can't  —  mustn't  —  depend  on  your  charity  any 
longer  —  it  has  been  too  long  as  it  is. 

Walpole,   Fort.  II  ch.  4  §  3  p.   191. 


„    ^      ^  ««w.     The   difference   between  may  not  and 

Must  not  .        .    •       ,         rr  r    ,  ■  € 

,  .-  ,  must  not  IS  the  eiiect  01  the  meanmg  01  may 

and  May  not  ^         , 

expressmg  permission  (664  a)  and  must  ex- 
pressing necessity.  May  not  consequently  denotes  that 
no  permission  will  be  given,  or  has  been  given,  either  by 
the  speaker  or  by  somebody  else,  according  to  the  situation. 
Must  not  expresses  that  there  are  facts,  rules,  or  circum- 
stances prohibiting  the  action.  This  is  excellently  illustrated 
by  van  der  Gaaf  {Engl.  Studien  62  p.  411):  "It  a  patient 
asked  his  doctor,  'May  I  get  up  now?',  the  answer,  if  it 
had  to  be  in  the  negative,  would  probably  be,  'No,  you 
mustn't  get  up  yet',  i.  e.  it  is  not  advisable,  expedient. 
The  patient's  wife,  however,  might  say,  'My  husband  ma}^ 
not  get  up  yet',  i.  e.  the  doctor  will  not  let  him.  A  mother 
might  sa3'-,  'No,  Jackie,  you  may  not  have  that  apple,  you 
have  been  naughty',  but  not  'You  may  not  pull  pussy's 
tail'." 

These  differences  are  also  illustrated  by  the  story  of 
a  railway-guard  telling  a  traveller:  "You  may  not  smoke 
here,  Sir."  At  the  next  station:  "You  must  not  smoke 
here,  Sir."  At  last,  in  an  angry  tone :  "You  shan't  smoke 
here,  Sir!" 


SHALL  463 

Shall  and  Should 

Shall  has  been  grouped  with  should,  but  it 

will  be  necessary  to  treat  the  forms  separately  in 
most  cases  in  spite  of  their  similarity.  We  must  also  deal 
separately  with  the  uses  that  are  peculiar  to  subordinate 
clauses. 

It  might  seem  reasonable  to  begin  with  the  strong- 
stressed  form.s,  as  in  other  auxiliaries.  But  the  stressed 
uses  of  shall  are  not  the  essential  uses,  being  due  to 
contrasting  stress,  both  with  not  and  without.  For  this 
reason  we  shall  begin  with  weak-stressed  shall  in  the 
cases  when  it  expresses  something  of  an  independent 
meaning. 

690.  Shall  with  weak  stress  is  used  to  express  a  promise, 
warning  or  threat;  the  second  and  third  persons  only  are 
used.  When  the  plain  stem  is  not  repeated,  as  in  the 
last  example,  shall  has  strong  stress. 

Although  the  doctor  says  my  heart  is  wrong,  you 
shall  always  find  it  in  the  right  place. 

Ainger,  Life,  p.  346. 

I  fear  your  master  is  one  who  looks  to  the  sense  more 
than  to  the  grammar !  But  never  mind,  you  and  I  shall 
be  much  together,  and  as  you  are  so  fond  of  Plato  you 
shall  read  him  with  me. 

Shorthouse,  John  Inglesant,  ch.  2,  p.  25. 

Well,  get  to  bed  quickly  and  Ruth  shall  send  up  cups 
of  hot  gruel. 

"You  shall  hear  from  me  before  long,"  shouted  PowelL. 

Conrad,  Chance. 

Then,  Kitty,  let  'yes'  be  the  answer. 

We'll  dance  at  the  'Varsity  Ball, 
And  the  morning  shall  find  you  a  dancer 

In  Christ  Church  or  Trinity  Hall. 
A  Letter,  in  Echoes  from  the  Oxford  Magazine.. 


464  VERBS 

What  think  you  he  said  in  my  hearing,  Andreas? 
That  mine  was  a  dog's  vocation !  Well,  he  shall  find  that 
a  dog  can  bite.        Buchanan,  That  Winter  Nighi  ch.  8. 

"Well,  are  you  ready?"  "I  don't  feel  quite  right." 
•'Oh,  I  see,  your  stirrups  are  too  long;  Alfred  shall 
shorten  them  a  little."    Sweet,  Spoken  English  p.  71. 

Wait  awhile  here  and  watch.  You  shall  see  that  no 
two  men,  women,  or  boys,  nor  two  horses  or  ponies, 
will  go  through  this  performance,  which  seems  so  simple, 
in  the  same  temper  and  style.  His  prophecy  was  exactly 
fulfilled.  Dean  Hole,  Mem.  p.  S^- 

"Let's  make  the  experiment."  "Why  'experiment'? 
Is  it  such  a  difficult  or  dangerous  enterprise?"  "You 
shall  see."  Sweet,  Spoken  English  p    J']  i). 

Mrs.  Liddell  said  one  day :  "Oh,  Mr.  Thackeray,  you 
must  let  Dobbin  marry  Amelia."  "Well,''  he  replied, 
"he  shall,  and  when  he  has  got  her,  he  will  not  find  her 
worth  having."  Whibley,  Thackeray  p.  96. 

691.  Closely  allied  to  the  use  in  the  preceding  section 
is  shall  in  the  first  and  third  persons  in  interrogative 
sentences,  to  inquire  after  the  will  or  wish  of  the  person 
addressed. 

"Shall  I  shut  the  door  Mother?"  —  "Please,  darling." 
Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.    16. 

"Shall  I  turn  on  the  gas?"  she  said. 

Walpole,   Fort.   II  ch.    i   §  3   p.    156. 

To  begin  with,  then,  I  find  th?.t  there  are  many  occa- 
sions when,  strictly  speaking,  I  mea^i  nothing  at  all,  but 
am  using  the  word  2)  merely  to  express  a  dislike  —  as 
a  term  of  abuse,  a  politer  synonym,  shall  we  say,  of 
'bloody'.  Huxley,   Vulgarity  p.  2. 

Shall  John  go  first? 

692.  Strong-stressed   shall  can  express  the  will  of  the 


i)  The  phonetic  transcription  is  [:jiiw  /I  sij], 
2)  i.  e.  vulgar. 


SHALL  465 

speaker  with  regard  to  somebody  else's  action,  experience, 
or  state;  consequently,  it  is  restricted  to  the  use  of  the 
second  and  third  persons.  The  meaning  may  be  that  of  a 
command,  but  also  a  firm  determination  or  promise  on  the 
part  of  the  speaker.  For  the  formal  peculiarities  of  the 
group  shall  not,  see  23. 

You  shan't  have  any;  you  have  been  most  rude. 

The  strong  stress  in  this  use  denotes  the  contrast  that 
is  implied.  In  sentences  that  are  not  negative  the  sug- 
gestion is  that  the  person  addressed  wishes  to  oppose 
the  will  of  the  speaker. 

693.  Weak-stressed  shall  with  a  plain  stem  is  used  in 
declarative  sentences  in  the  first  person  (/  and  we)  to 
express  what  concerns  a  future  time.  When  the  verb  is 
accompanied  by  not,  or  used  without  a  plain  stem  because 
this  can  be  inferred  from  a  preceding  sentence,  shall  has 
strong  stress,  as  usual. 

For  myself,  when  I  see  a  thing  I  hate  I  can't  help 
fighting   against   it.    I    shall   never  be  able  to  help  that. 

Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.   'i^'j. 

We  shall  be  very  late,  Fm  afraid. 

I  want  you  to  post  this  letter  for  me.  I  shall  have 
finished  it  by  the  time  you  are  ready. 

Sweet,  Element,  no.  6j . 

When  we  add  that  the  work  of  Mr.  Thomas  Hardy 
is  barely  touched  on,  we  shall  have  said  enough  to  show 
that  the  Professor's  book  is  not  adequate  for  modern 
lovers  of  poetry.  Athenaeum  31/5,   1913. 

694.  Future  shall  (i.  e.  shall  according  to  693)  may 
naturally  express  a  threat  or  a  promise,  according  to  the 
meaning  of  the  plain  stem  and  the  situation  {a).  It  may 
also  express  a  firm  determination  {b),  especially  in  negative 
sentences  (c). 

KruisingA;  Handbook  IL  Accidence,  and  Syntax.  1.  30 


466  VERBS 

a.  I   shall   punish    you  severely  if  you  do  that  again. 

b.  "They  are  going  to  settle  it,"  Eustace  heard  the 
barrister  who  was  reporting  for  the  Times  say  to  his 
assistant.  "They  always  do  settle  every  case  of  public 
interest,"  grunted  the  long  man  in  answer;  "we  shan't 
see  the  will  now.  Well,  I  shall  get  an  introduction  to 
Miss  Smithers  and  ask  her  to  show  it  to  me." 

Haggard,  Meeson's  Will  ch.   19. 

c.  "Grandmother,"  she  whispered,  "I  shall  not  wait  for 
the  sermon."  Allen,  Mettle  of  the  Pasture. 

There  is  a  little  wayward  word 
That  won't  agree  or  give  or  grant, 
A  negative  too  often  heard  — 
The  female  "shan't!" 
"I  won't!"  a  man  will  flatly  say, 
Or  helplessly  admit  he  can't; 
But  ladies  have  another  way  — 
They  always   "shan't". 

Punch,  Febr.  20,   1907. 
Shopkeepers'  wives  hailed  her  appealingly  — 
"Sha'n't    {sic)   keep   you  half  a  second !    Do  tell  us  !"^ 

Pett  Ridge,  Name  of  Garland. 
"Richard    of  course   is  wearing  a  tail-coat,"  she  mur- 
mured. 

"I  shan't,"  he  i)  whispered,  "when  zve  are  married.  I 
shall  wear  tweeds,  and  you  shall  wear  your  white  frieze 
coat .  .  .  the  one  in  which  I  first  saw  you." 

Mackenzie,  Guy  and  Pauline  p.   'i^Z'^. 

In  the  last  quotation  the  parallelism  of  /  shan't  and 
/  shall  wear  [ai  Jl  wea]  is  evident;  both  express  the 
speaker's  determination. 

695.     In    interrogative    sentences    shall   is    used    as   an 

auxiliary  of  the  group-future  in  the  first  and  second  persons. 

In    pronominal    questions    it   is   v^eak-stressed;  in  other 

1)  i.  e.  Guy. 


SHALL  467 

cases,  including  the  enclitic  questions  of  425  ff.,  the  form 
may  be  [Jsel]  with  a  stronger  stress. 

Shall  I  be  in  time,  do  you  think  ? 
People  get  frightened,  and  think  they,  too,  are  going 
to  die.  Shall  you  be  frightened,  I  wonder? 

B.  Harraden,  Ships  that  Pass  in  the  Night  ch.  15. 
"Shall  you  write  and  say  you're  coming?" 
"Oh,  no !  Just  go  and  take  our  chance  .  .  ." 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  30  p.  320. 
wij    dgampt  ap  an  :sed  'whot  a  pleis !  an  whot  we'ia ! 
ned !  ned!  whot  Jal  wij  duw?' 

Sweet,  Sp.  Engl.  p.  51. 
"When  is  the  funeral?"  —  "Friday".  — 
"Where  shall  you  live  in  the  meantime?" 

Gissing,  A  Lodger  in  Maze  Pond. 

696.  The  quotations  of  695  show  that  interrogative 
shall  you  may  express  a  question  about  the  intention  or 
determination  of  the  person  addressed,  similar  to  declarative 
shall  in  694.  We  have  a  'pure'  future  especially  when 
the  plain  stem  expresses  a  state,  not  an  action. 

Shall  is  also  used  in  what  has  been  called  the  inferential 
future.  This  use  is  another  special  case  of  shall  as  an 
auxiliary  of  the  future  (Fries,  Language  volume  3  p. 
87—96);  as  will  is  used  in  the  same  way,  it  seems  most 
convenient  to  treat  this  use  in  the  sections  in  which  shall 
and  will  are  compared. 

The  use  of  shall  and  will  to  express  the  future  in 
indirect   style    requires   separate  treatment;  see  733  ff 

„.     ,.  697.     Should  is    exclusively    used    as   a  modal 

Should  •     IX      T  •  11  1  ,  r 

preterite  ^).     Its   meanmgs  are  parallel  to  those  01 

shall,  but  not  identical  with  it. 


1)  Apart    from    its  use   as   a    secondary   past   tense   in   indirect  style,  on 
which  see  vol.  3  (Concord  of  Tense). 


468  VERBS 

Should  is  used  in  all  persons,  to  express  an  obligation 
or  duty,  generally  of  a  social  or  moral  nature.  This  use 
is  parallel  to  shall  in  690. 

I  should  call  on  them,  I  know ;  but  I  must  say  I  hate 
calling  on  people  I  have  nothing  to  say  to. 

You  should  not  speak  so  loud ;  it  is  bad  manners. 

As  it  should  do,  the  death  of  Nelson  inspires  Mr.  Hardy; 
and  in  the  part  which  relates  thereto  we  find  his  versi- 
fication at  its  best. 

Should  all  the  legends  of  the  nursery,  of  the  hamlet, 
and  of  the  village  fireside  be  considered  merely  as  an 
amalgam  of  the  superstitions  of  the  uneducated  with  the 
finer  fancies  of  some  poetic  minds? 

A  friendly  dog  lay  among  the  croquet  hoops  on  the 
lawn,  a  pleasant,  silent  dog,  who  wagged  his  tail  when 
I  came  round  the  corner  and  saw  no  reason  why  he 
should  bark  and  sniff.  Eliz.  in  Riigen. 

698.  In  rhetorical  questions  or  exclamations  should 
is  often  used  to  reject  a  suggestion,  or  to  express  surprise 
or  disapproval  of  a  course  of  action. 

"Why  on  earth  should  I  want  to  wear  a  mask?  I've 
got  nothing  to  hide."  Winning  Post  1922  p.  51. 

Why  should  her  husband  spend  so  much  time  in  the 
coffee-shop?  Strand  Magazine   1909  p.   ii. 

How  should  a  man,  still  on  the  right  side  of  25,  not 
be  happy?  ib,   1924  p.  611. 

Why  should  you  stay  in  London  in  this  hot  weather. 

Bibesco  i). 

When  Swithin  approached  his  usual  seat,  who  should  be 
sitting  there  but  Rozsi !       Galsworthy,  Caravan  p.  23. 

Last  Sunday  we  drove  over  to  Dunkeld  to  Church, 
and  whom  should  I  meet  coming  out  but  Sir  John  Millais. 

Ainger,  Life  p.   142. 

1)  These  quotations  have  been  borrowed  from  Engl.  Studies,  Febr.  1929 
Suppl.  p.  4. 


SHOULD  469 

Midas  was  enjoying  himself  in  his  treasure-room  one 
day  as  usual,  when  a  shadow  fell  over  the  heaps  of  gold ; 
and,  looking  suddenly  up,  what  should  he  see  but  the 
figure  of  a  stranger,  standing  in  the  bright  and  narrow 
sunbeam ! 

The  following  quotation  suggests  that  the  rhetorical  use 

is  a  development  of  the  case  of  697. 

Why   should    he    imagine  that  he  was  able  to  write? 
Walpole,   Fortitude  II  ch.    i   §  2,  p.   155. 

699.  We    also    find    shall   in   rhetorical   questions,  but 
this  use  is  exclusively  literary. 

So  the  general  impression  left  by  this  book  is  that 
the  unity  of  Western  civilization  is  still  a  matter  of 
speculation  and  hope.  But  in  mere  faith  there  is  something 
magnificent,  and  who  shall  say  that  it  shall  not  prevail  ? 

Times  Lit.  24/2,   16, 

Mr.  Partington's  book  has  its  shortcomings,  and  yet  who 
shall  dare  to  lower  his  thumbs?  ib.    16/9,   20. 

For  many  months,  the  average  of  deaths  during  these 
voyages  was  74  in  the  thousand ;  the  corpses  were  shot 
out  into  the  waters;  and  who  shall  say  that  they  were 
the  most  unfortunate. 

Lytton  Strachey,  Em.  Vict.  p.   i2S„ 

700.  We    also    find    should  used    to    express    that   an 
occurrence    or  state  is  highly  probable.     Compare  738. 

Providing  that  the  Megantic  meets  with  favourable 
weather  she  should  make  Belle  Isle  to-morrow  night  and 
Liverpool  by  noon  on  Saturday.  Morning  Leader, 

To-day  should  be  an  ideal  one  for  the  London  skaters, 
as  it  is  probable  that  the  ice  in  some  of  the  London 
County  Council  ponds  may  reach  the  official  minimum 
of  three  inches.  Daily  News,  3/2,   12. 

Farmers  in  the  late  districts  are  better  off"  (viz.  than 
in  the  early  districts)  for  even  now,  if  they  can  get 
continuous  sunshine,  they  should  have  a  satisfactory 
harvest;  but  in  the  earher  districts  considerable  damage 


470  VERBS 

has  been  done,  the  rains  being  so  heavy  as  to  beat  the 
corn  to  the  ground.  Daily  Chronicle. 

We  gather  from  Notes  and  Queries  that  a  book  on 
Anonymous  and  Pseudonymous  Literature  is  to  be  ex- 
pected at  the  end  of  the  year  from  Mr.  W.  P.  Courtney. 
A  work  from  so  careful  and  competent  a  hand  should 
be  of  considerable  value.  Athenaeum. 

701.  That  this  is  a  special  development  of  should  ex- 
pressing a  moral  obhgation  seems  to  be  shown  by  the 
following  quotations. 

Compare  a  similar  development  in  ought,  647,  1. 

Sir  Percy  Cox,  the  new  High  Commissioner  for  Me- 
sopotamia, should  reach  Baghdad  this  week,  if  his  move- 
ments are  not  impeded.  The  Mail,  22/9,   1920. 

The  August  number  of  The  Dickensian  should  appeal 
to  the  many  Americans  now  staying  in  this  country, 
for  it  is  devoted  entirely  to  Dickens  and  America. 

Athenaeum. 

As  an  old  pupil  and  assistant  of  Lord  Kelvin,  Prof. 
Gray  is  particularly  fitted  to  write  such  a  book,  which 
should  appeal  to  all  interested  in  the  history  of  physical 
science.  ib. 

702.  Shoidd  is  also  used  to  express  the  determination 
or  promise  of  the  speaker.     Compare  shall  in  692. 

If  the  book  were  in  the  library  it  should  be  at  your 
service. 

You  should  do  it  if  we  could  make  you. 

They  should  have  had  it  if  they  had  asked  for  it. 

703.  Should  with  a  simple  or  complex  plain  stem 
occurs  in  the  main  clause  of  a  hypothetical  compound 
sentence,  in  the  first  person  in  statements,  in  the  first  and 
second  persons  in  questions. 

I  can  only  speculate  about  the  truth  of  any  of  these 
rumours  and  if  I  knew  the  facts  I  should  not  be  allowed 
to  publish  them.  Times  W.  9/1 1,    17. 


SHOULD  47 I 

I  should  have  preferred  to  stop  longer  if  I  had  been 
able  to  afford  the  time. 

"I  thought  Mr.  Fenwick  was  going  to  kiss  me!" 
"Should  you  have  minded  if  he  had?" 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.    14  p.   139. 

cu    14  •    o  u         704.    Should  as  a  modal  preterite  is  fre- 
Should  in  Sub-  ,       t  ,  • 

,.    ^    ^,  quent    in    subordinate   clauses,   in  meaninsrs 

ordinate  Clauses    \  ,  n  1    ,      •  ,    •  • 

that   can   be  paralleled  with  its  use  in  main 

clauses,  but  are  not  always  identical  with  it. 

As   should  is   a  modal  preterite,  its  use  is  independent 

of   the    tense    of   the    main    clause.     In    literary,    perhaps 

rather  archaic,  English  shall  is  sometimes  used  in  the  same 

way;   in   order   to   promote  an  insight  into  the  system  of 

shall  and  should  in  the  mind  of  a  speaker  of  living  English, 

and  its  relations  with  will  and  would,  these  purely  literary 

uses    are    treated    separately,   in   the   chapter   on  Archaic 

English  in  vol.  2. 

705.  Shoidd  as  a  modal  preterite  is  used  in  subor- 
dinate clauses  when  the  main  clause  expresses  an  act  of 
the  will,  or  a  wish;  the  verb  of  the  main  clause  may  be 
in  a  present  {a)  or  in  a  past  [b]  tense.  The  first  three 
quotations  contain  should  in  a  meaning  that  is  similar  to 
the  case  of  697,  and  ought  could  be  substituted,  causing  a 
slight  difference  only.  In  the  other  cases  this  would  be 
perfectly  impossible. 

a.  It  is  generally  unfair  to    demand   that  an   analogy 
should  be  complete  down  to  minute  details. 

Times  Ed.  S.  31/7,   19. 

They    recom.mend    that    classes   in   secondary  schools 
should  be  smaller.  ib.  28/2,   12. 

It    follows,    therefore,    that   the    important  thing  is  to 
secure    that   those   who   teach  history  in  schools  should 
be  qualified  by  their  knowledge  and  special  gifts  to  do  so. 
Prof.  Firth,  History  IV  no.   14  p.  79. 


472  VERBS 

The  proposal  is  that  each  year  the  Board  should 
submit  to  Government  a  budget  estimate  of  the  sums 
required.  Times  Ed.  S.  25/9,   19. 

Do  you  know  what  it  is  to  want  that  something 
should  belong  to  you,  belong  entirely  to  you,  and  to 
no  one  else?  Walpole,  Secret  City  ch.  8  p.  45. 

If  he  is  not  to  come  back  to  me  victorious,  I  should  prefer 
that  he  should  never  comeback.     Times  W.  26/1,  17. 

b.  Before  they  all  retired  it  was  settled  that  the  whole 
party  should  drive  over  on  the  following  day  to  inspect 
the  parsonage.  Trollope,  Barchester. 

It  was  no  wonder  that  Dr.  Grantley  did  not  like  John 
Bold  and  that  his  wife's  suggestion  that  he  should  become 
closely  connected  with  such  a  man  dismayed  him. 

Trollope,  Barchester, 

He  could  not  but  wish  that  Dorothea  should  think  him 
not  less  happy  than  the  world  would  expect  her  success- 
ful suitor  to  be.  Eliot,  Middlemarch  ch.    10,  p.  60. 

Her  maidenliness  had  not  permitted  that  she  should 
show  herself  to  Mr.  Scales. 

Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  I  ch.  6  §  2  p.  116. 

He  had  prayed  that  a  speculation  involving  some 
thousands  of  pounds  should  be  successful. 

Temple  Thurston,   City  I  ch.  2. 

He  reached  for  the  marmalade  and  requested  that  a 
bowl  of  Devonshire  cream  should  be  passed  along. 

Fergus  Hume,  Red  Money  p.   10. 

For  a  short  time  they  walked  in  silence.  It  was  Grace's 
suggestion  that  they  should  walk. 

Hobbes,  Some  Emotions  II  ch.   i. 

It  was  Cynthia's  wish  that  the  engagement  should 
be  kept  secret.  Gaskell,  Wives. 

Michael  had  been  careful  that  all  his  heavy  luggage 
should  be  sent  in  advance.         Sinister  Street  p.  499. 

706.  Very  similar  to  the  preceding  use  is  that  of  should 
in  adverb  clauses  of  purpose  introduced  by  that^  so  that, 
that  . . .  not,  and  also,  in  literary  English,  by  /est. 


SHOULD  473 

She  saw  them  begin  to  mount  the  steps,  those  behind 
raising    their    arms   so   that   the  hurdle  should  be  level. 
Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.  29  p.  367. 
Peter's    father    turned  about  very  sharply  so  that  she 
should  not  see  he  was  fool  enough  to  weep. 

Wells,  Joan  and  Peter  ch.   i   §   i. 
It    is    at    this    period    that    the    Foreign    Office,    with 
praiseworthy    foresight,    appears   to  have  begun  its  pre- 
parations, so  that  when  the  time  came  it  should  not  be 
taken  unawares.  Times  Lit.   13/1,  21. 

She  was  a  great  horny,  overbearing  woman,  was  Mrs. 
Sales  Wilson,  and  Sally  was  frightened  lest  Laetitia 
should  grow  like  her. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.   15  p.   144. 

707.  Should  is  used  in  a  meaning  very  similar  to  the 
one  described  in  703,  in  relative  clauses,  with  an  ante- 
cedent noun  taken  in  a  general  sense.  This  use  is  chiefly 
literary  English. 

He  would  be  a  bold  man  who  should  declare  that  its 
popularity  has  very  materially  diminished  at  the  present 
day.  Ward,  Dickens,  ch.  2.  p.  20. 

He  who  should  (i  e.  if  there  were  such)  pretend  to 
learn  a  language  by  theory  and  rules  would  resemble  a 
person  who  would  (i.e.  should  want  to)  learn  to  walk 
by  the  theory  of  equilibrium. 

It  is  difficult  to  conceive  a  generation  which  should  be 
indifferent  to  the  mellow  charm,  the  rich  rustic  poetry 
of  Blackmore's  'Lorna  Doone'. 

A  traveller  who  should  walk  and  observe  any  of  these 
visitants  as  Venn  observed  them  now  could  feel  himself 
to  be  in  direct  communication  with  regions  unknovi^n 
to  man.  Hardy,  Native  I  ch.   10  p.   104  f. 

708.  In  Spoken  English  should  is  similarly  used: 

(1)  in  adverb  clauses  of  time.  This   use   also   suggests 
shall  as  an  auxiliary  of  the  future. 


474  VERBS 

His  eyes  were  watching  for  the  moment  when  the 
accounts  should  be  finished  and  Stephen  free. 

Walpole,  Fortitude  I  ch.  3  §  2  p.  31. 

He  found  that  when  a  little  practice  should  have  har- 
dened his  palms  against  blistering  he  would  be  able  to 
work  with  ease.  Hardy,  Native  IV  ch.  2.  p.   311. 

(2)  in  adverb  clauses  of  condition  [a)  or  concession  ib). 

a.  If    he   should    come  tell  him  I  shall  be  back  soon. 

Should  it  be  thought  that  a  menace  from  Central 
Asia  is  still  remote,  we  may  point  out  that  the  way  into 
Persia  from  Armenia  and  Transcaucasia  lies  open  and 
ready  for  immediate  use.  Times  W.  29/3,   18. 

b.  He  would  sit  on  a  wet  rock,  with  a  rod  as  large 
and  heavy  as  a  Tartar's  lance,  and  fish  all  day  without 
a  murmur,  even  though  he  should  not  be  encouraged  by 
a  single  nibble.  W.  Irving,  Sketch-Book. 

709.  Should  as  a  modal  preterite  is  also  used  in  a 
meaning  that  may  be  connected  vv^ith  the  preterite  of 
obligation  (697),  but  with  very  much  weakened  force, 
when  the  main  clause  expresses  an  opinion  as  to  the 
correctness  or  justice  of  the  observation  mentioned  in  the 
subordinate  clause.  This  observation  is  presented  as  being 
generally  accepted,  not  peculiar  to  the  subject  of  the  main 
clause. 

It  was  absurd  that  he  should  mind  that  rebuff. 

Walpole,  Fort.  II  ch.  6  §  2  p.  207  f. 
After   what   had    happened  it  was  impossible  that  he 
should    not    doubt    the  honesty  of  Wildeve's  intentions. 

Hardy,  Native  I  ch.  9  p.  96. 
It    was  impossible  that  this  should  continue  for  long. 

Temple  Thurston,  Antagonists  I  ch.   11   p.  85. 
It   seemed   incredible    that  one  so  young  should  have 
done  so  much.  Maxwell,  Gabrielle  (T.)  p.   115. 

It   seemed  almost  incredible  that  the  sound  produced 


SHOULD  47  5 

by    so    small    a   stick    as    a    woodpecker's  beak  striking 
against  a  tree  should  be  audible  at  that  distance. 

Hudson,  Hampshire  Days  ch.   i  p.   ii. 

There  is  not  the  remotest  possibility  of  any  one's 
calling  upon  me,  and  that  I  should  call  upon  any  one 
else  is  a  thing  undreamt  ofi). 

Gissing,  Ryecroft  II  p.  6  f. 

710.  Should  has  a  purely  modal  function  without  ex- 
pressing any  independent  meaning  at  all;  it  emphasizes 
the  personal  character  of  the  feeling  or  opinion  with  regard 
to  the  fact  expressed  in  the  subordinate  clause.  This  use 
is  not  always  to  be  clearly  distinguished  from  the  pre- 
ceding case. 

He  was  surprised  that  she  should  be  so  glad. 

Walpole,  Duchess  of  Wrexe  I  ch.  6. 
It    seemed    almost    dreadful    they    should    be    able    to 
sing  like  that.  Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.  29. 

It  was  very  strange  to  her  that  it  should  so  happen, 
but,  having  happened,  it  did  not  seem  unnatural. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  20,  p.   192. 
Strange    that    he   should   have  rushed  into  his  dream 
with  eyes  open.  Meredith,  Harrington  ch.   18. 

"Oh,  Dick!"  exclaimed  Hilary  in  a  mock  woeful  voice, 
"that  I  should  live  to  hear  you  make  pretty  speeches  2)." 

Sidgwick,  Grasshoppers  ch.  7. 
It  is  an  interesting  record  of  the  pulse  of  the  present 
day  that  'An  Englishwoman's  Love  Letters'  should  have 
taken    Society    by    storm    in   the    way   it  certainly  has. 

M.  Fairless,  Road-Mender. 
It  seems  odd  that  we  should  have  met  again  after  so 
many   years  in  the  very  place  where  we  used  to  go  to 
school  together.  Sweet,  Element,  no.  65. 


1)  Observe   that   the   clause,    though   subordinate,   is  not  dependent  upon 
the  main  clause.  For  the  distinction,  see  vol.  3  on  Sentence-Structure. 

2)  Note   that    the   sentence  is  formally  independent,  except  for  the  intro- 
ductory that. 


476  VERBS 

Moreover,  we  could  not  bear  the  idea  that  she  should 
labour  for  her  keep. 

Blackmore,  Lorna  Doone  ch.  46  p.  318. 

He  well  deserves  that  we  should  say  a  few  words  about 
his  own  work  first.  Athenaeum,   16/11,   12. 

It  is  characteristic  of  Addison  that  a  political  paper 
like  the  Freeholder  should  be  flavoured  with  the  humour 
and  badinage  he  found  so  effective  in  the  Spectator. 

Dennis,  Age  of  Pope  p.   133. 

"I  am  always  glad  to  see  your  countrymen,"  Mr. 
Westgate  pursued.  "I  thought  it  would  be  time  some  of 
you  should  be  coming  along." 

James,  Daisy  Miller  p.   123. 

Unlike  Mr.  Justice  Darling,  we  are  disposed  to  treat 
with  the  utmost  gravity  the  fact  that  such  charges  should 
even  be  possible.  Times  W.  'jI^,   18. 

He  seemed  distressed  that  there  should  be  no  vesta  i) 
in  his  overcoat  pocket. 

de  Morgan,  A  Likely  Story  ch.   i  p.  3. 

She  put  her  finger  on  the  pulse,  but  it  was  hard  to  find. 
The  fever  had  left  him  for  the  time  being,  but  its  work 
was  done.  It  was  wonderful,  though,  that  he  should  have 
so  much  life  in  him  for  speech. 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  24  p.  257, 

Whoever  reads  this  story  carelessly  may  see  little 
excuse  for  her  that  she  should  lose  her  head  at  the 
bedside  of  a  dying  man.  It  was  really  no  matter  for 
surprise  that  she  should  do  so.         ib.  ch.  24  p.  260. 

Pauline  had  been  looking  forward  to  the  entrance  of 
February  with  joyful  remembrance  of  what  last  February 
had  brought  her;  and  that  the  anniversary  of  Guy's 
declaration  of  his  love  should  be  heralded  by  such  a 
discomfiture  of  their  plans  was  a  shock  2), 

Mackenzie,   Guy  and  Pauline  p.   301. 

711.     The  interpretation  of  the  function  of  should  in  the 


DA  kind  of  match. 

2)  See  the  note  to  the  last  quolalion  of  709. 


SHOULD  AND  NO  AUXILIARY  COMPARED       477 

cases  of  709  f.  is  supported  by  the  fact  that  we  also  find 
the  same  kinds  of  clauses  without  this  auxiliary.  In  tins 
construction  the  modal  implications  referred  to  in  709  f.  are 
naturally  absent,  so  that  the  action,  occurrence,  or  state 
is  plainly  mentioned  as  an  undoubted  fact. 

a.  (709). 

It  is  inconceivable  that  Huysmans  —  whatever  he 
may  have  said  —  was  not  ravished  by  the  secret  beauty 
of  his  subjects,  and  did  not  exult  in  it. 

Arnold  Bennett,  in   English  Rev.,  June   1913. 

It  is  impossible  that  he  and  we  can  look  on  this  question 
from  the  same  point  of  view.  Times  W.  2/2,    17. 

b.  (710). 

Be  that  as  it  may,  they  are  not  remembered  in  his 
will.  And  that  being  so,  it  is  not  strange  that  the  Lori- 
mers  came  next  after  his  own  grandchild. 

E.   Everett-Green,  Temptation  of  Mary  Lister 
ch.  9  p.    132. 

Under  these  circumstances  it  is  scarcely  surprising  that 
Mr.  Mason  considers  some  explanation  necessary. 

Everyman,  8/11,    12. 
It  is  really  remarkable  that  so  large  a  field  has  been 
covered  in  one  by  no  means  unmanageable  volume. 

Athenaeum,    16/11,  22. 
It  was  unfortunate  that  Mr.  Mosher  had  completed  his 
work  before  the  appearance  of  Mr.  Herbert's  invaluable 
catalogue.  Mod.  Lang.  Notes,  Nov.   191 2. 

Sophia  was  such  a  woman  as,  by  a  mere  glance  as 
she  utters  an  opinion,  will  make  a  man  say  to  himself, 
half  in  desire  and  half  in  alarm  lest  she  reads  him  too : 
"By  Jove!  she  must  have  been  through  a  thing  or  two. 
She  knows  what  people  are!" 

Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  III  ch.  4  §  i. 
Yet,    even    though    the   work   is   still  not  finished,  we 
cannot  regret  the  time  and  labor  bestowed. 

Wallace,  Evolution  p.  X. 


478  VERBS 

It  was  natural  for  those  who  knew  him  and  his  work 
to  trace  the  influence  of  Hooker  and  Dean  Church. 

Athenaeum,  21/12,   12. 

It  seems  a  great  pity  for  the  Postmaster-General  to 
press  the  Marconi  at  a  critical  moment  in  the  history 
of  wireless  telegraphy.  Nation,   12/5,  13. 

Not  infrequently  a  verb  with  should  is  combined  with 
a  plain  indicative. 

She  wondered  why  this  should  have  been  so,  and  why 
its  strangeness  had  not  impressed  her  before. 

Bennett,  Leonora  ch.  7. 

Have,  Must,  Ought,  and  Shall  Compared 

712.  To  have,  must,  and  shall  agree  in  expressing 
necessity,  so  that  it  is  sometimes  of  little  importance 
which  of  the  three  is  used.  There  is  generally  a  difference, 
however,  and  mostly  a  well-marked  difference. 

Shall  (not  shoidd,  apart  from  indirect  style)  is  usually 
quite  distinctly  different  from  the  other  two,  because  it 
clearly  expresses  the  determination  of  the  speaker.  The 
difference  between  you  (he)  must  and  you  (he)  shall  is 
that  shall  suggests  that  the  person  spoken  to,  or  spoken 
of,  has  given  reasons  to  suppose  that  he  does  not  wish 
to  obey,  or  will  refuse  to  obey,  or  that  he  has  expressed 
this  intention. 

Both  must  and  to  have  may  express  necessity.  But 
necessity,  if  due  to  a  personal  will,  can  only  be  expressed 
by  must.  If  it  is  due  to  circumstances  it  may  be  expressed 
by  must  or  by  to  have.  It  may  be  useful,  therefore,  to 
compare  must  and  to  have  in  so  far  as  they  are  used  to 
express  necessity  due  to  circumstances. 

This  is  expressed  by  must,  not  by  to  have,  if  it  is  the 
result  of  a  logical  inference,  or  of  a  law  of  nature.  In 
these  meanings  the  present  tense  only  is  wanted,  apart  from 
indirect  style. 


SHOULD   AND   OUGHT  4/9 

In  its  other  meanings  necessity  due  to  circumstances 
can  be  expressed  by  either  must  or  to  have.  The  difference, 
if  any,  is  that  must  is  more  emphatic. 

The  statements  of  this  section  are  well  illustrated  by 
the  following  anecdote.  It  is  usual  for  the  whip  of  a  Par- 
liamentary party  to  send  out  notices  to  members  asking 
them  to  be  present  when  a  vote  of  some  importance  will 
be  taken.  The  formula  is:  "The  Honourable  Member 
for  .  .  .  is  earnestly  requested  to  be  in  his  seat  on  Tuesday 
next."  According  to  Notes  and  Queries  (15  June  1895, 
quoted  in  De  Drie  Talen,  32  p.  172)  a  member  observed 
one  day  at  a  meeting,  according  to  a  report:  If  the  cir- 
cular came  without  a  dash  or  stroke  under  the  word 
'earnestly,'  it  meant  that  there  was  some  business  that 
might  come  on.  If  there  were  one  dash  under  'earnestly,' 
that  the  member  ought  to  come.  If  two  dashes,  it  meant 
that  he  should  come.  If  three,  that  he  tnust  come.  If 
four,  it  meant  'Stay  away  at  your  peril.' 

713.  Both  shoidd  and  ought  are  used  as  modal  pre- 
terites, never  as  past  tenses.  The  modal  character  of 
ought,  as  it  is  not  supported  by  a  parallel  form  for  the 
present,  is  much  weaker  than  that  of  shoidd;  in  many 
cases  ought  can  be  considered  a  present  tense. 

The  past  tense  for  the  expression  of  necessity  is  supplied 
by  have. 

The  old  atmosphere  6f  distrust  to  which  at  first  she 
had  been  so  sensitive  seemed  to  have  lifted  and  they 
even  began  to  talk  to  her  a  little.  She  had  to  speak  to 
someone :  even  at  Framlingham  she  had  always  been 
able  to  exchange  a  word  or  two  during  the  day  with 
some  passing  errand-boy  or  tradesman  or  customer,  and 
her  aunt's  voice  was  always  in  her  ears. 

Freeman,  Joseph  ch.   13  p.   112. 

Reuben    Hallard   he    had    written    because  he  had  to 


480  VERBS 

write  it  ^),  these  four  things  he  had  written   because  he 
ought  to  write  them  -)  •  .  .  difference  sufficient. 

Walpole,  Fortitude  II  ch.  7  p.  214. 

Should  and  Might  in  Subordinate  Clauses 

714.  After  words  expressing  an  act  of  the  will  the  use 
of  should  is  really  the  same  as  in  principal  sentences:  it 
expresses  the  determination  of  the  speaker;  but  in  the 
subordinate  clause  the  speaker  is  sometimes  only  vaguely 
referred  to. 

When  might  is  used,  possibihty  only  is  expressed; 
hence  we  specially  find  this  auxiliary  after  verbs  that 
convey  a  milder  expression  of  a  person's  will,  such  as 
wish,  desire.  Note,  however,  that  it  is  possible  to  use 
should  also  after  these  verbs;  hence  we  find  should  in  a 
clause  dependent  upon  a  verb  denying  the  speaker's 
intention  to  impose  his  will: 

I    do   not  desire  that  others  should  go  where  I  went. 
Benson,  Thread  of  Gold,  p.  27. 

The  use  of  would  in  these  clauses  is  less  usual.  In  the 
following  sentence  it  would  be  possible  to  substitute 
might,  not  shoidd. 

She    prayed    that    Daisy    Harland    would    soon  reach 
London.  Mackenzie,  Seven  Ages  of  Woman 

ch.  3  p.   120. 

In  adverb  clauses  of  purpose  should  has  been  explained 
as  related  to  should  expressing  obligation  (706).  May, 
might  in  these  clauses  express  possibihty. 

When  they  are  introduced  b}^  lest  the  auxiliary  should 
expresses  a  deprecated  contingenc}^  of  which  there  is 
danger;  might  expresses  an  unpleasant  possibility. 


1)  An  inner  impulse. 

2)  Outward  impulse:  he  was  trying  to  get  work  as  a  journalist. 


WILL   AND   WOULD  481 

In  adverb  clauses  of  time,  condition,  and  concession 
should  serves  to  express  the  sometimes  very  slight  degree 
of  uncertainty  that  is  inherent  in  all  future  actions,  whereas 
may  and  might  express  possibility  (NED.). 

Will  and  IVoidd 

715.  Will  and  the  past  tense  would  with  strong  stress 
are  used  in  all  persons  to  express  the  will  of  the  subject 
of  the  sentence  with  regard  to  its  own  actions,  experiences, 
or  states. 

"Well,  I  try  to  get  the  people  what  they  want.  It's 
hard  work,"  said  the  young  man. 

"Well,  I  suppose,  if  you  didn't  some  one  else  would. 
They  will  have  it,  won't  they.?" 

"Yes,  they  will  have  it."     H.  James,  Reverberator. 

"Why,  you  unnatural  little  rascal!"  cried  the  justly 
enraged  father,  "do  you  mean  to  defy  me?  I  tell  you 
I  will  have  that  stone!  Give  it  up  this  instant!" 

Anstey,  Vice  Versa  ch.  2. 

A  Britannia  metal  tea-pot  which  would  not  pour  pro- 
perly. Vachell,  Brothers  I  ch.  2. 

The  nation  had  settled  that  it  would  not  have  con- 
scription. 

John  (i.  e.  King  John  Lackland)  believed  that  the  Papal 
protection  would  enable  him  to  rule  as  tyrannically  as 
he  ivotild. 

"Yes,"  twittered  Maria,  "Mr.  Critchlow  would  come  in 
-     to-night.  Nothing  would  do  but  he  must  come  in  to-night." 
Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  IV  ch.  2  §  2  p.  463. 

Will  has  ordinary  stress  in  the  traditional  phrase  Truth 
will  out;  in  imitation  of  this  we  also  find  others,  like  the 
following,  all  without  a  plain  stem. 

The  tendency  to  be  "smart"  is  kept  under  restraint, 
though  epigrams  will  occasionally  out. 

Millar,  Mid-eighteenth  Century  p.  36. 
Kruisinga,  Handbook  II.  Accidence  and  Syntax.  1.  31 


482  VERBS 

I  tremble  here  at  what  I  am  going  to  say  in  this  com- 
pany of  EHzabethan  scholars,  but  my  conviction  will  out. 

G.  Murray,   Essays  III  25. 
Nay,  his  wickedness  will  out  even  in  his  contents  table. 

Times  Lit.   15/10,   14, 
One  of  the  authors  is  French  and  the  other  English  ;^ 
and    in  war  race-characteristics,  like  murder  (and  other 
"atrocities"),  will  out.  ib.  27/4,   16. 

See  722  f. 

716.  Will  with  ordinary  stress  is  used  in  interrogative 
sentences  to  ask  after  the  will  of  the  person  spoken  to. 

The  will  may  be  positive  {wish)  or  negative  {absence 
of  objections). 

Will  you  have  another  cup  of  tea? 

"Will    you  let  me  see  your  face?"  asked  the  lawyer^ 

Stevenson,  Dr.  Jekyll. 
"What  shall  we  do  to  amuse  ourselves?" 
"Will  you  sing  one  of  your  German  songs?" 
"I'll  go  upstairs  and  get  m.y  music." 

Sv/eet,  Element,  no.  63. 

717.  Weak-stressed  ivill  can  also  express  an  intention^ 
both  in  declarative  sentences,  in  the  first  person  {a),  and 
in  interrogative  sentences  in  the  second  person  {b).  In  the 
former  case  the  auxiliary  often  loses  its  initial  sound,  be- 
coming [aial,  W19I]  I'll,  we'll. 

a.  I  will  tell  you  presently  what  I  have  heard. 

We'll  begin  soon,  won't  we.''  , 

But  I  will  not  weary  you  with  more  of  my  experiences 
that  day  and  the  next.  Wells,  Country  p.   164. 

"I'll  be  very  cold  with  him,"  she  i)  decided.  But  her 
coldness  was  tempered  by  sweetness,  and  if  Mr.  Vibart 
had  ever  tasted  a  really  good  ice-cream,  he  might  have 

1)  i.  e.  Jasmine. 


WILL   AND   would"  483 

compared  Jasmine  with  one  when  she  said  good-bye  to 
him  on  the  Spaborough  platform, 

Mackenzie,  Rich  Relatives  ch.   i   p.  2i3' 
b.  When   will   you    be    seeing   your  brother  next  ?  — ■ 
Oh,  some  time  in  the  next  few  days,  I  expect. 

Collinson,  Spoken  English  p.  28. 

718.  In  negative  sentences  with  not,  will  always  has 
some  stress  {a).  In  other  negative  sentences  it  may  be 
weak  [b). 

a.  Nothing  can  be  done,"  returned  Lanyon.  "Ask 
himself." 

"He  will  not  see  me,"  said  the  lawyer. 

Stevenson,  Dr.  Jekyll  p.   57. 

b.  The  Entente  demands  too  much  and  the  Central 
Powers  will  concede  too  little. 

719.  The  preterite  would,  without  strong  stress,  is  used 
in  the  same  meaning  as  a  past  tense  [a)  and  as  a  modal 
preterite  {b). 

a.  At  first  some  of  the  surgeons  would  have  nothing 
to  say  to  her,  and,  though  she  was  welcomed  by  others, 
the  majority  were  hostile  and  suspicious. 

Strachey^  Eminent  Victorians  p.  132. 
He  never  did  much  work,  and  the  garden  was  in  a 
shocking  state  of  neglect,  but  he  told  delightful  stories. 
To~day,  however,  he  was  in  a  bad  temper  and  would 
pay  no  attention  to  Peter  at  all,  and  so  Peter  left  him 
and  went  out  into  the  high  road. 

Walpole,  Fort.  I  ch.  3  §  2  p.  30. 

b.  I  would  exhort  all  students  and  intelligent  readers 
to  make  more  use  of  reference-books. 

Baker,  Uses  of  Libraries  p.  25. 
I  would  not  for  a  moment  desire  to  breed  a  feeling  of 
security  and  complacency  at  home. 

Times  W.   5/4,   18. 
We   would   show  you  how  to  use  books  as  tools  and 
libraries  as  workshops.         Baker,  Uses  of  Libr,  p.  5. 


484  VERBS 

The  very  portraits  on  the  walls,  especially  the  full- 
length  ones,  seemed  to  look  down  with  interest  at  the 
proceedings,  as  if  they  would  say :  "Now  this  is  something 
ive  know  about."         Cotes,  Cinderella  ch.   19  p.  209. 

She  would  have  prolonged  the  journey  indefinitely, 
and  yet  she  intensely  desired  the  jail,  whatever  terrors  it 
might  hold  for  her.       Bennett,  These  Twain  II  ch.  15. 

The  sight  of  the  bloody  work  was  too  much  for  the 
Graeme,  who,  now  that  he  saw  his  enemy  bleeding  at 
his  feet,  would  have  held  back  (viz.  if  he  could  have 
done  so). 

720.  Strong-stressed  will  and  would  are  found  modally 
in  concessive  clauses  opening  with  the  plain  stem; 
see  188  f. 

Say  what  I  will  (would)  to  the  contrary,  he  tells  (told) 
the  story  everywhere. 

We  look  forward  to  seeing  far  greater  liberty  of  thought, 
and  possibly  greater  freedom  in  the  choice  of  form ;  but 
form,    vary    how    it    will,    must   still    be  dramatic  form. 

Academy,  ^jy,   1905. 

721.  Weak-stressed  would  is  also  used  modall}^  in  clauses 
subordinate  to  to  wish,  to  express  a  wish  that  is  unlikely 
to  be  fulfilled. 

I  wish  Sam  would  carry  his  news  to  other  houses  than 
mine.  ^  Hardy,  Native  III  ch.  3. 

An  artist  wishes  that  when  discussing  aesthetics  philo- 
sophers would  argue  with  examples  rather  than  phrases. 

Times  Lit.   23/8,    18. 
He  stood  awkwardly  looking  at  the  purple  vases  and 
wishing  that  something  would  happen. 

Walpole,  Fortitude  I  ch.   12  p.   143. 

As  the  examples  show,  the  wish  may  refer  to  occurrences 
as  well  as  to  actions.  Would  is  not  used  when  the  wish 
concerns   a   state,  as  is  shown  by  the  following  sentence. 


WILL   AND   WOULD  485 

0  how    I    wish    I    was    sure  of  never  loving  you  — . 

Hardy,  Native  III  ch.   5  p.  255. 

Nor  is  would  used  when  there  is  a  preterite  of  another 
auxiliary. 

Peter,  of  course,  did  not  know  these  things,  because 
it  was  very  dark,  but  he  wished  he  had  not  come. 

Walpole,  Fortitude  I  ch.   12  p.   140. 

In  the  following  sentence  the  use  of  would  with  to  be 
might  seem  to  contradict  the  statements  made,  but  we 
must  look  upon  to  be  so  ready  to  think  as  a  single  group 
referring  to  an  action. 

1  wish  people  wouldn't  be  so  ready  to  think  that  there 
is  no   progress  without  uniformity. 

Hardy,  Native  III  ch.   5   p.   254. 

722.  Will  {a)  and  the  past  tense  would  (b)  are  used 
to  express  what  is  generally  or  repeatedly  seen  or  done. 
In  this  meaning  zvould  is  used  in  all  persons;  but  the 
present  tense  ivill  is  not  used  in  the  first  person  singular. 

a.  In  his  most  scholarly  moment,  in  the  Preface  to  the 
Dictionary,  he  (Samuel  Johnson)  will  throw  out  such  a 
remark  as  .  .  .  Bailey,  Johnson,  p.  30. 

He  is  an  Irishman  as  well  as  a  ready  writer  on  lite- 
rature. Ireland,  and  politics  of  one  sort  or  another,  will 
keep  breaking  in.  Times  Lit,   21/6,    18. 

He  was  a  man  between  fifty  and  sixty  years  of  age, 
with  grey  hair,  rather  short,  and  somewhat  corpulent, 
but  still  gifted  with  that  amount  of  personal  comeliness 
which  comfortable  position  and  the  respect  of  others  will 
generally  seem  to  give. 

Trollope,  Last  Chron.  ch.    i   p.   3. 

Yet  several  other  species  come  to  the  end  of  their 
vocal  season  quite  as  early,  or  but  little  later.  If  it  be 
an  extremely  abundant  species,  as  in  the  case  of  the 
willow-wren,  we  will  have  a  score  or  fifty  sing  for  every 
nightingale.        Hudson,  Hampshire  Days  ch.   5  p.  89. 


486  VERBS 

b.  Of  Bosinney  himself  Baines  would  speak  warmly 
with  a  certain  compassion. 

Galsworthy,  Man  of  Property  ch.  8  p.   103. 

I  remember  when  we  were  boys,  I  would  always  be 
asking  my  tutor  for  a  holiday,  which  I  would  pass  very 
likely  swinging  on  a  gate,  or  making  ducks  and  drakes 
over  the  pond.  Sweet. 

I  remember  a  holiday  of  mine  being  completely  ruined 
one  late  autumn  by  our  paying  attention  to  the  weather 
report  of  the  local  newspaper.  "Heavy  showers,  with 
thunderstorms,  may  be  expected  to-day,"  it  would  say 
on  Monday,  and  so  we  would  give  up  our  picnic,  and 
stop  indoors  all  day,  waiting  for  the  rain.  And  people 
would  pass  the  house,  going  off  in  wagonettes  and 
coaches  as  jolly  and  merry  as  could  be,  the  sun  shining 
out,  and  not  a  cloud  to  be  seen. 

Jerome,   Three  Men  in  Boat,   Ch.   V. 

A  certain  change  had  come  over  the  great  and  power- 
ful Marquis  since  we  last  saw  him.  He  looked  thinner 
and  less  stern  and  cold ;  at  times,  in  the  dimly  lighted 
room,  he  would  sigh  heavily  and,  when  the  gout  was 
not  too  rampant,  would  get  up  from  his  chair  and  pace 
the  room.  Garvice,  p.  24. 

Sometimes  I  would  see  Gerald  in  the  Cafe  Royal.  I 
would  be  dining,  with  Hilary  maybe,  and  in  the  distance, 
cut  as  with  a  sharp  knife  in  the  tapestry  of  smoke  and 
grubby  faces,  would  be  Gerald.  .  . 

Arlen,   Green  Hat  ch.  2  §  2  p.   54. 

Many  examples,  both  of  will  and  would  in  Salzman, 
English  Life  in  the  Middle  Ages  p.  37,  54,  etc. 

723.  The  relation  of  ivill  and  woidd  expressing  the 
iterative  aspect  to  the  other  meanings  of  will  is  not  quite 
clear.  It  might  be  a  development  of  its  use  to  form  the 
future;  this  is  also  suggested  by  the  comparison  of  French^ 
where  the  future  is  used  in  this  function  (Brunot  La  Pensee 
et  la  Langue  p.  456).  Note,  however,  that  the  first  person 
takes  woidd  (not  shoidd). 


WILL   AND   WOULD  487 

A  special  case  of  this  meaning  of  will  is  its  use  to 
express  an  action  or  state  that  follows  from  the  nature  of 
the  subject.     See  722. 

The  simple  fact  is  that  Montenegro,  being  a  peasant 
state,  will  not  produce  millionaires.  That  is  why  it  will 
produce  soldiers.  Everyman,   20/12,    12. 

This  last  use  would  seem  to  suggest  that  iterative  will 
is  a  special  case  of  will  expressing  volition.  Perhaps 
both  meanings  of  imll  have  contributed  to  the  growth  of 
iterative  will.  In  living  English,  however,  iterative  imll  is 
not  clearl}^  connected  with  either  of  the  other  uses.    See  715. 

724.  The  use  of  will  expressing  volition  and  the  iterative 
aspect  have  been  treated  in  the  preceding  sections.  The 
last  use  that  must  now  be  dealt  with  is  probably  the  most 
important  of  all :  its  use  to  express  an  action,  etc.  at  a 
future  time,  and  the  uses  that  must  be  considered  a 
development  and  special  case  of  the  'future'  use. 

There  is  much  variety  between  the  different  parts  of 
the  English-speaking  world  with  respect  to  this  use  of  ivill, 
consequently  also,  though  in  a  lesser  degree,  of  shall. 
In  the  following  sections  an  attempt  will  be  made  to 
describe  polite  Southern  English  usage. 

725.  Weak -stressed  will^  often  reduced  to  syllabic  /, 
is"  used  to  express  a  verbal  idea  in  a  future  time  in  the 
second  and  third  persons.  The  accompanying  plain  stem 
may  be  simple  or  complex,  as  usual. 

I  hope  you  will  both  be  able  to  come. 

You  won't  be  in  time  if  you  wait  any  longer. 

The  troops,  broken  and  disorganised,  have  fallen  back 
in  the  direction  of  Constantinople,  where  the  last  scene 
in  the  terrible  tragedy  of  blood  and  war  will  be  enacted. 

Everyman,  8/1 1,   12. 

We    hope   that   a  further  advance  towards  agreement 


488  VERBS 

will    be    made    at    to-day's   adjourned   meeting,  but  the 
difficulties  to  be  overcome  are  serious. 

The  Mail,  22/9,   1920. 

I  suppose  Miss  Kirkpatrick  will  have  returned  from 
France  before  then.  Gaskell,  Wives  II  ch.   i. 

It  is  said  that  the  Great  Powers  have  since  recognised 
their  mistake  in  the  matter,  and  perhaps  by  the  time 
these  lines  appear  they  will  have  formally  conceded  a 
larger  representation.  New  Statesman   1/2,  1919. 

The  object  of  the  essay  is,  first,  to  face  these  diffi- 
culties . .  .  ;  and,  in  the  second  place,  to  communicate  to 
the  English  reader  .  .  .  Whether  the  attempt  succeed  or 
fail,  some  important  general  questions  of  literary  doctrine 
will  have  been  discussed;  and,  in  addition,  at  least  an 
effort  will  have  been  made  to  vindicate  a  great  reputation. 
Lytton  Strachey,  Books  and  Char.  p.   5  f. 

726.  Will  is  also  used  in  both  the  second  and  third 
persons  in  interrogative  sentences.  In  the  second  person, 
however,  the  idea  of  intention  is  often  implied.  Will  is 
naturally  used  in  enclitic  questions,  for  in  this  case  it  only 
repeats  you  will;  see  425  ff. 

How  long  will  you  stay? 

Collinson,  Spoken  English  p.   10. 
How  long  will  you  be  staying  ?i)  ib.  p.    10. 

Will  you  be  at  home  at  tea-time  to-morrow? 

Pinero,  Iris,  I. 
Will  you  want  winter  things? 

Wells,  Britling  II  ch.  4  §  7  p.  313. 
"But  was  it  that  Kensington  Gardens  business  that 
did  the  job?"  asked  Sally ...  "'Did  the  job'"  repeats 
the  bride  on  her  honeymoon  with  some  indignation. 
"Sally  dear,  when  will  you  learn  to  be  more  refined  in 
your  speech.'"'  .  .  . 

de  Morgan,  Somehow  Good  ch.  30  p.  319. 

727.  When  we  find  will  in  the  first  person  in  declarative 


1)  The  author  suggests  the  alteraalive  shall  as  an  equivalent. 


WILL  AND   WOULD  489 

sentences  there  is  often  an  idea  of  intention  implied  {a). 
This  is  not  necessarily  so,  however,  and  least  of  all  when 
the  verb  does  not  express  a  voluntary  action  {b). 

a.  I'll  try  what  I  can  do  for  you. 

Hullo,  Sim!  My  landlady's  out;  I'll  chuck  down  the 
latchkey;  catch;  caught,  sir!  Let  yourself  in,  Sim,  and 
come  straight  up,  first  floor. 

Hutchinson,  (Dne  Increasing  Purpose  I  ch.  21  p.  131. 

b.  "Matilda,  Matilda.  Come  back  to  me  .  .  ." 

"I  can't  come  back,  Mother.  I'll  be  late  for  my  lesson." 

K.  Mansfield,  Bliss  p.   138. 

728.  We  find  ivill  in  the  second  person  to  express 
a  command.  The  speaker  takes  obedience  for  granted  so 
that  he  looks  upon  the  action  as  certain  to  take  place. 
It  is  clearly  a  special  use  of  future  will. 

You  will  see  that  due  precautions  are  taken. 

Johnson  will  repeat  to  me  to-morrow  morning  before 
breakfast,  without  book,  and  from  the  Greek  Testament, 
the  first  chapter  of  the  Epistle  of  Saint  Paul  to  the 
Ephesians.  Dickens. 

Never  mention  this  again  for  your  own  sake  —  you 
will  stay  here  until  I  wish  you  to  go. 

Walpole,   Fort.  I  ch.  9  §  4  p.    109. 

729.  Would  is  used  as  a  modal  preterite  in  the  main 
clause  of  a  hypothetical  statement,  both  in  declarative  {a) 
and  interrogative  {b)  sentences,  in  the  second  and  third 
persons.  Its  use  in  the  first  person  seems  to  be  unusual 
in  Southern  British  English  ic). 

a.  You  would  not  do  it  if  you  knew  how  much  it 
hurts  me. 

I  wonder  what  you  would  do  if  you  were  in  my  place. 

b.  Would  you  have  been  in  time  if  you  had  taken  the 
shorter  route  ? 


490  VERBS 

c.  In  the  conduct  of  political  affairs  the  public  have 
short  memories,  or  we  would  not  so  often  fight  over  again 
the  old  controversies.  Pilot  16/4,  04,  p.  352/2. 

Whoever  is  to  blame  will  have  to  leave  the  Abbey. 
His  lordship  never  overlooks  or  forgives.  Even  I,  who 
have  been  here  since  before  you  were  born,  would  have 
to  go  if  I  caused  such  an  uproar  as  this. 

Garvice,  Staunch  p.  9. 

The  condition  of  a  hypothetical  statement  is  not  always 
expressed.  This  leads  to  the  use  of  would  to  express 
something  in  a  modest  way.  As  should  is  also  used  in 
this  way  the  use  is  best  treated  in  the  sections  on  Shall 
and  Will  Compared,  in  731  fif. 

730.  We  sometimes  find  will  (not  would)  as  a  verb  of 
full  meaning,  with  willed  as  a  preterite  and  participle.  It 
may  seem  that  we  should  have  treated  this  as  the  funda- 
mental meaning,  just  as  has  been  done  in  the  chapter  on 
to  have  and  to  be.  But  in  reality  the  use  of  imll  as  an  inde- 
pendent verb  is  restricted  to  literary  English,  or  even  to  the 
technical  English  of  experts  in  psychological  research.  It  is 
not  generally  used  by  English  speakers,  and  has  had  no 
influence  on  the  generally  current  meanings  of  will  de- 
scribed above. 

We  can  distinguish  zvill  as  a  transitive  verb  (a),  and 
as  a  verb  construed  with  a  subordinate  clause  {b).  The 
technical  use  referred  to  ma}^  also  be  illustrated  (<:). 

a.  As  we  will  the  end,  we  must  will  the  means. 

Times  W.   18/1,   18. 

b.  Constance,  alone,  could  find  nothing  to  do.  She  had 
willed  that  the  walls  should  be  built,  and  they  had  been 
built.  Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  II  ch.  J  %  Z- 

The  Fates  have  so  willed  that  the  present  editor  is 
able  to  include  poems  by  Robert  Browning .  .  . 

Leonard,  A  Book  of  Light  Verse  p.  V. 


FUTURE  SHALL  AND  WILL  COMPARED        49 1 

Ludwig's  (of  Bavaria)  main  interests  were  artistic,  but 
the  irony  of  fate  willed  it  that  he  should  play  an  impor- 
tant part  in  German  politics.  Athenaeum. 

c.  When  I  will  to  move  my  arm  and  the  movement 
takes  place,  I  am  distinctly  conscious  that  the  volition 
was  the  movement's  cause. 

Strong,  Why  the  Mind  has  a  Body. 

Miss  Muriel,  will  you  look  at  the  needle,  and  see  if 
you  can  will  me?  Punch  28/2,    1906. 

Shall  and  Will  Compared 

o,-  «      731.     The    use    of   shall  and  will  to  express 
Future  Shall    ,       ^  ,         ,  ,    ■       ,  ,• 

,  ^.„     the    future    has    been    stated    in   the   preceding 

sections.     From    these    it    follows   that  shall  is 

exclusively   used    in    interrogative    sentences    in    the  first 

person:  shall  /,  shall  we?  On  the  other  hand,  will  is  the 

only    form    that   can    be  used  in  declarative  sentences  for 

the   second   and   third   persons:   yon  will,  he,  she,  it,  they 

will;  also   in   interrogative   sentences  in  the  third  person : 

will  he,  she,  it,  they? 

In  other  cases  the  two  verbs  may  be  said  to  compete: 
we  find  both  /  shall,  I  will,  I'll,  and  the  same  for  we; 
also  both  shall  you  and  will  you  ^). 

From  these  statements  it  seems  evident  that  sliall  has 
a  much  weaker  hold  on  the  expression  of  the  future  than 
ivill,  and  if  it  were  permissible  for  a  grammarian  to  foretell 
the  future  it  would  seem  difficult  to  avoid  the  prediction 
that  shall  will  finally  disappear.  This  would  account  for 
the   concurrent  uses,  and  agree  with  the  observation  that 

1)  It  should  be  clearly  understood  that  the  statements  refer  to  future 
shall  and  will  only.  There  is  nothing  contrary  to  the  statements  in  the 
sections  on  shall  and  on  will  in  the  following  example. 

If  you  receive  this,  we  shall  be  gone  together;  I  ivill  write  to  you  from 
wherever  we  pitch  our  tent,  and,  of  course,  I  shall  write  to  Cicely. 

Galsworthy,  Dark  Flower  II  ch.  19  p.  198. 


492  VERBS 

will  you  seems  to  be  on  the  increase.  The  only  case 
when  will  seems  entirely  impossible  is  its  use  as  an 
alternative  of  shall  I. 

732.  The  statements  about  the  use  of  shall  and  will 
to  express  the  future  must  be  completed  by  a  treatment 
of  indirect  (reported)  style,  and  repetition  of  a  speaker's 
words. 

In  indirect  style  shall  (should)  is  often  used  in  the  third 
person  to  report  /  shall  (should). 

A  well-known  teacher  of  elocution  tells  me  that  she 
thinks  she  shall  be  compelled  to  leave  off  teaching  in 
girls'  schools.  Miss  L.  Soames,  Phonetics. 

Early  on  the  following  morning  Mr.  Slope  was  sum- 
moned to  the  bishop's  dressing-room,  and  went  there 
fully  expecting  that  he  should  find  his  lordship  very 
indignant.  TroUope,  Barchester. 

He  had  chafed  at  every  stoppage,  fumed  at  every 
delay,  and  been  able  to  think  of  nothing  but  whether 
or  no  he  should  catch  the  train. 

Montgomery,  Misunderstood,  ch.  XIII. 

They  foresaw  that  it  could  not  be  long  before  they 
should  be  obliged  to  submit. 

Shorthouse,  Inglesant  ch.   12  p.   129. 

From  the  moment  the  Jesuit  began  to  speak,  Inglesant 
knew  that  he  should  go  i).  ib.  ch.  20  p.  206. 

George  said  he  should  be  all  right,  and  would  2)  rather 
like  it,  but  he  would  advise  Harris  and  me  not  to  think 
of  it,  as  he  felt  sure  we  should  both  be  ill. 

Jerome,  Three  Men  in  a  Boat  ch.   i. 

It  seemed  to  her  as  if  she  should  meet  Osborne  and 
hear  it  all  explained.  Gaskell,  Wives  III  p.   166. 

He    said    he    should    come    again  about  half-past-five. 
Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  IV  ch.  3  §  2. 

i )  Observe  that  should  refers  the  action  to  Inglesant,  not  the  Jesuit. 
2}  See  741  b. 


FUTURE  SHALL  AND  WILL  COMPARED        493 

733.  For  a  similar  reason  will  and  would  are  used  in 
the  first  person  because  they  report  yon  zvill  (would). 

"Let  me  be  promised,"  she  seemed  to  say,  "that  I  will 
never  have  any  trouble  or  sorrow  with  my  son  and  I  will 
love  him  devotedly."     Walpole,  Fort.  Ill  ch.  8.  p.  319. 

I  just  wanted  to  see  you,  Joan.  I'm  told  I'll  be  most 
useful  as  a  gunner  because  of  my  mathematics. 

Wells,  Joan  and  Peter  ch.   13  §  3. 

When  I  came  to  myself  Doctor  C.  was  saying  I  would 
have  to  sleep  there  that  night. 

Hall  Caine,  The  Woman. 

It  was  a  small  and  harmless  joke,  but  it  turned  on 
the  Firm,  and  dire  were  the  consequences  thereof.  The 
loftily  gracious  Mr.  McBIacksmith  froze  suddenly .  .  . 
Jokes  were  permissible,  desirable  at  times;  there  were 
jokes  even  in  the  immortal  works  published  by  McBIack- 
smith —  but  a  joke  at  the  expense  of  the  Firm,  /  zvoidd 
understand  — 

I  understood,  and  I  have  cultivated  gravity  ever  since. 

Pilot  21/5,    1904. 

In  the  follov/ing  case  we  have  essentially  the  same 
case;  the  servant  is  thinking  of  the  desired  testimony  'You 
will  do'. 

"Please,  ma'am,"  said  the  new  parlourmaid,  "will  I  do.?" 
Jerome,  Paul  Kelver  ch.   i  p.   130. 

734.  We  often  find  would  in  the  first  person  [a)  in 
reporting  a  sentence  in  which  wdl  occurred  in  the  sub- 
ordinate clause  (a  doubly  reported  future  as  it  were). 
Would  is  also  the  usual  (or  exclusive)  form  in  the  third 
person,  even  when  the  clauses  are  the  same  {b). 

a.  Lady  Lippington  said  at  once  that  she  hoped  we 
wouldn't  mind  its  not  being  "a  function." 

Cotes,  Cinderella  ch.  8  p.  35. 
He  told  me  that  he  thought  I  would  suit  him  very  well. 

Conrad,  Chance  II,  69. 

b.  And    Constance    had    said    that   she   supposed  she 


494  VERBS 

would   have    to  manage  with  a  charwoman  until  Rose's 
advent.  Bennett,  Old  W.  Tale  IV  ch.  4  §  6. 

735.  Essentially  identical  with  the  use  of  shall  and  will 
in  reported  style  is  the  repetition  of  the  words  of  a  speaker. 

"We'll  come  and  watch  you,"  said  Henry, 
"Oh   no,    you  won't.  At  least  you  won't;  you're  such 
a  critic.  Anna  can  if  she  likes." 

(Roorda,  Dutch  and  English  Compared  no.  793). 

In  appended  questions  shall  and  will  are  not  necessarily 
repeated;  they  are  often  used  according  to  the  general 
rules  that  have  been  stated,  voe  will  in  the  main  clause 
being  followed  by  shall  we,  etc. ;  for  examples  see  425  ff. 
But  repetition  in  the  same  form  will  be  found  illustrated 
in  429  c  (first  and  last  quotation). 

n        ^  736.     It   has   been   shown   (160  f.)  that  future 

Present        .        .  ,  ,        ,  ,, 

,  „  ^  time  IS  expressed  by  the  present  tense  as  well 
and  Future  . 

as  by  the  groups  with -s^a// and  zy///.  The  group - 

future    is    necessary    in    adverb   clauses   when   the  verbal 

idea    is  not  dependent  upon  that  of  the  main  clause;  this 

may  be  illustrated  by  the  following  example. 

Tobacco,  it  is  said,  is  gradually  being  ousted  by  sweets. 
We  fancy,  however,  that  it  will  be  some  little  time 
before  it  will  be  a  common  sight  to  see  men  about  town 
walking  down  Pall  Mall  with  a  sugar  stick  in  the  mouth 
instead  of  a  cigarette.  Punch   15/9^   I9C'9  p.    181. 

When  the  time  is  sufficiently  indicated  the  present  as 
well  as  the  future  may  be  used  in  main  clauses.  The 
difference  may  be  defined  to  be  one  of  style:  the  present 
is  more  colloquial.  The  reason  for  this  seems  to  be  that 
in  using  the  present  tense  the  speaker  does  not  take  the 
trouble  to  realize  the  future  time  as  clearly  distinct  from 
the  present  time.  This  explains  why  the  present  tense 
is  by  no  means  always  possible  even  though  the  future 
time  is  clearly  indicated  (see  163  ff.). 


INFERENTIAL   FUTURE  495 

„    .     ,  -,      .  737.     The  use  of  shall  and  will  for  the 

Derived  Meanings    .  ...  .  ^ 

,  „     ^        ^  ,       luture   cannot   be   strictly  separated  trom 
of  the  Group-future      ,  .  ,  ,         -i,     r   i 

other   meanings,   such   as  the  will  oi  the 

speaker  (threat,  promise,  determination,  etc.),  as  has  been 
shown  in  dealing  with  the  two  verbs  as  auxiliaries  of  the 
future.  All  these  special  functions  are  developments  of 
the  future  use,  and  not  connected  with  the  original  or 
fundamental  meanings  of  shall  as  expressing  the  de- 
termination of  the  speaker,  and  of  will  as  expressing  the 
will  of  the  grammatical  subject  of  the  sentence. 

The  developments  of  the  future  use  that  concern  either 
shall  or  will  have  been  dealt  with  in  the  sections  on  these 
verbs.  There  is  one  case,  however,  that  concerns  the 
two  verbs  equall}^;  this  must  nov/  be  treated. 

,.  .  ^  ,  738.     Shall  (a)   and  zvill  (b)  as  parts  of 

Inferential  Future  _         ^     .  ,  ,  .  ^     .  , 

a    group-iuture    with    a   plain  stem,  either 

simple    or    complex,    are    used    to    express    an    inference 

regarded  as  probable. 

a.  The  missionary  was  not  indeed  unknown  even  in 
early  times;  but  we  shall  probably  be  right  in  saying 
that  when  the  system  was  most  powerful,  organization 
of  missions  was  far  more  commonly  in  the  interest  of 
some  sect  within  Islam  than  in  the  interest  of  Islam  itself. 

Margoliouth,   Mohammedanism  p.  9. 
We    shall    all  agree  with  his  conclusion  that  the  first 
possesses  a  real  educational  value  and  the  second  does  not. 
Firth,  in  History  vol.  4  p.  79. 

b.  As  you  will  already  be  aware,  Germany  has  refused 
Sir  Edward  Grey's  proposal  of  a  four-Power  Conference. 

Times  W.  31/7,  14. 
With  that  he  blew  out  his  candle,  put  on  a  greatcoat 
and  set  forth  in  the  direction  of  Cavendish  Square,  that 
citadel  of  medicine,  where  his  friend,  the  great  Dr. 
Lanyon,  had  his  house  and  received  his  crowding  patients. 
"If  anyone  knows,  it  will  be  Lanyon,"  he  had  thought. 

Stevenson,  Dr.  Jekyll  p.   17. 


496  VERBS 

In  speaking  to  you  of  Jane  Austen,  I  must  assume, 
not  only  that  you  are  familiar  with  her  novels,  but  that, 
like  myself,  you  belong  to  the  faithful .  .  .  And  if  you  do, 
you  will  not  wish  me  to  add  another  to  the  estimates 
of  Jane  Austen's  genius ;  nor,  on  the  other  hand,  will 
you  ask  me  whether  I  have  anything  new  to  say.' 

A.  C.  Bradley  in  Essays  II  p.  7. 

Second  books  are  the  most  surely  foredoomed  crea- 
tures in  all  creation  —  and  there  are  many  excellent 
reasons  for  this.  They  will  assuredly  disappoint  the 
expectation  of  those  who  enjoyed  the  first  work,  and 
the  author  will,  in  all  probability,  have  been  tempted 
by  his  earlier  success  to  try  his  wings  further  than  they 
are,  as  yet,  able  to  carry  him. 

Walpole,  Fort.  Ill  ch.  8  p.  31$. 

739.  In  all  the  quotations  of  the  preceding  sections  the 
idea  of  inference  is  the  most  important,  but  the  idea  of 
futurity  is  not  gone.  The  use  of  the  group-future  to  express 
an  inference  that  refers  exclusively  to  the  present  time 
is  occasionally  found  in  books,  but  it  is  contrary  to  standard 
Southern  usage  ^). 

Tibby  opened  the  door  to  him  and  looked  him  up 
and  down. 

"You'll  be  Mr.  Folyat,"  she  said. 
"That  is  my  name." 

Cannan,  Round  the  Corner,  p.   146. 
"You'll    be    a    college    man,    sir?"  asked  old  Lawrie. 
"Dublin,"  said  Francis. 

ib.  p.   146.  (both  speakers  are  Scottish). 

It'll  be  in  the  walnut  wing. 

Galsworthy,  Freelands  ch.  5  p.  5 1  (a  servant  speaks). 
At    Okehampton   station    a   brisk  young-looking  man 


1)  Sweet  calls  it  Scotch;  it  occurs  in  southern  English  dialects  as  well, 
as  is  shown  by  the  quotation  from  Phillpotts.  The  first  quotation  in  737  b 
may  seem  to  refer  to  the  present  time;  but  it  is  really  future:  as  you 
will  he  aware  when  what  I  am  writing  now  is  read  by  you. 


SHOULD   AND    WOULD  497 

with  a  clean-shaved  face  appeared  before  Ehsabeth. 
"You'll  be  Miss  Densham,  I  reckon,"  he  said  slowly, 
"I  know  most  of  the  people  on  the  platform,  but  you're 
strange.     Be  you  for  South  Zeal?" 

Phillpotts,  Beacon  I  ch.  2  p.   13. 
"Will   you    come  into  the  parlour  and  rest  your  leg-? 
You'll  be  from  college,  perhaps?" 

"We  were,  but  we've  gone  down  now." 
Galsworthy,  Caravan  p.  339.  (The  question  is  asked 
by  a  Welshwoman  married  to  a  Devonshire  farmer). 

740.  The  difference  between  the  quotations  in  738  and 
739  is  very  slight,  but  it  is  real  to  speakers  of  Standard 
Southern  Enghsh;  all  the  more  real  because  the  distinction 
is  too  fine  to  be  a  product  of  school. 

Sometimes  the  construction  seems  to  be  genuine  Southern 
English,  and  perfectly  current  in  Standard  speech,  although 
the  idea  of  futurity  cannot  be  applied  to  it  in  a  natural 
manner.  This  suggests  that  the  above  account,  if  true, 
is  not  the  whole  truth.  The  following  cases,  both  with 
a   complex  stem,  seem  to  require  a  different  explanation. 

And  pray  how  did  you  feel  during  my  absence?  You 
will  have  missed  me  very  much.  — 

It  will  have  cost  a  good  deal,  I  suppose. 

The   following  sentences,  on  the  other  hand,  suggested 
or  quoted  by  van  der  Gaaf  as  specimens  of  real  Southern 
English    {Engl.    Studien    62    p.    403),    hardly  seem   to  be 
correct  Southern  English  to  the  present  author. 
What  time  will  it  be,  d'you  think  ? 
How    old    should    you    say    that   neighbour   will  be? 
Morris,  News  from  Nowhere. 

_,     ,,       ,       741.     The  use  of  should  and  wotdd  in  hypo- 
Should  and     ,     .     ,  ,      ,  .     ,     -^^ 
^    . ,       thetical    statements    leads   to  a  seemmgly  very 

different    use.'   When   the   condition   is  not  ex- 
pressed the  group  comes  to  denote  a  statement  in  a  modest 

Kruisinga,  Handbook  IL  Accidence  and  Syntax.  1.  32 


498  VERBS 

way  {a).  In  this  case  we  often  find  would  in  the  firs 
person,  especially  in  combination  with  like  as  the  plain 
stem  [b). 

» 

a.  I  should  like  to  go  for  a  nice  walk. 

Mr.  O'Connor  follows  'Murray'  in  saying  that  it  is  in 
winter  the  highest  and  the  coldest  garrison  town  in 
France :  but  we  should  have  thought  i)  that  Briancon, 
though  it  is  not  so  high,  would  run  it  close  in  the  matter 
of  cold.  Athenaeum. 

Would  you  mind,  mamma,  sleeping  with  me  to-night? 
Baring-Gould,  in  Swaen  I  p.  5. 

It  looks  as  though  women  in  France  would  have  the 
vote  before  long.  Spectator   14/1,   1928. 

We  are  now  well  in  December,  and  the  Christmas 
book  trade  is  in  full  swing.  I  have  been  inspecting  the 
publishers'  lists,  and  should  say  that  the  output  of  this 
class  of  literature  is  not  only  larger  but  of  finer  quality 
than  ever.  Everyman. 

d.  I  would  like  to  quote  one  more  example.  ib. 

742.  The  same  construction  may  also  come  to  express 
probability;  in  this  case  would  is  used  only,  because  it  is 
restricted  to  the  second  and  third  person,  see  700  and  738  f. 

After  this  it  would  seem  that  they  turned  in  for  the 
night.  Wells,  Country  of  the  Blind,  p.  6^. 

King  Edward  VII  permitted  himself,  or  would  appear 
to  have  permitted  himself,  to  take  that  view  of  his  office. 

Academy. 

At  the  time  he  saw  me  first  I  was  a  youngster  of  1 2 
or  so.     That  would  be  in  the  year  1878. 

A  Church  like  this,  conscious  of  its  own  vigour,  would 
naturally  resent  a  claim  of  foreign  authority  which  treated 
it  as  barbarous.  . .  This  is  exactly  what  happened. 

Wakeman,  Introd.  p.   17. 


1)  i.  e.  if  we  had  not  read  a  different  opinion  in  this  book. 


CAN,   WILL,    USED  499 

That  further  the  young  Shakespeare  would  have  very 
soon  read  all  the  plays  and  romances  he  could  lay  his 
hands  upon,  and  learned  all  he  could  of  the  working  of 
the  theatre,  may  be  regarded  as  certain. 

Seccombe  and  Allen,  Shakespeare  II  61. 

It  is  evident  that  the  Anglo-Saxons  coming  into  a  new 
country  must  have  adopted  in  many  cases  the  native 
names  for  places,  and  even  for  articles  of  use  and  furniture 
which  were  not  familiar  to  them  at  home  and  for  which 
they  had  no  specially  proper  expression;  it  is  also  evident 
that  terms  of  domestic  life  would  be  most  easily  intro- 
duced by  the  persons,  etc. 

Stubbs,  Lect.  Early  Engl.  Hist.  p.  227. 

"He  never  told  you,"  cried  Mr.  Hyde,  with  a  flush 
of  anger.     "I  did  not  think  you  would  have  lied." 

Stevenson,  Dr.  Jekyll,  p.  25. 

Can,   Will,  Used 

743.  Can  and  will,  expressing  what  is  repeatedly  seen, 
can  be  used  both  in  the  present  and  the  preterite;  tised 
always  in  the  preterite  only,  in  the  function  of  a  past  tense. 

The  present  of  can  and  will  in  this  function  is  the 
neutral  present,  not  referring  to  any  definite  time.  The 
grammatical  difference  between  these  two  is,  in  the  first 
place,  that  can  is  found  in  all  persons,  zvill  in  the  third 
chiefly. 

744.  The  general  difference  in  meaning  between  can 
and  will  is  that  can  suggests  that  the  phenomenon  pro- 
ceeds from  the  nature  of  the  subject,  will  from  the  per- 
sonal will  or  desire  of  the  subject.  Can  lays  more  stress 
on  the  occasional  nature  of  the  phenomenon,  will  on  its 
regularity. 

Another  important  difference  between  the  two  auxiliaries 
is  that  can  refers  to  a  single  occurrence  or  a  number  of 
occurrences    as   specimens   of  a  type,  will  and  vtsed  refer 

Kruisinga,  Handbook  IL  Accidence  and  Syntax.  1.  32* 


500  VERBS 

to  them  collectively.  This  is  probably  connected  with 
the  fact  that  can  expresses  the  result  of  psychological 
analysis,  will  the  result  of  observation. 

AH  married  women  know  how  trying  girls  can  be. 

Oh,  then,  he  could  be  cruel  and  I  thought  wicked !  he 
would  exultantly  snatch  the  screen  from  poor  shrinking 
wretches.  Bronte,  Villette  ch.  29. 

Boys  will  be  boys,  and  girls  will  be  girls  for  the  matter 
of  that. 

Every  one  who  has  studied  the  matter  knows  that 
tea  and  meat  were  once  sounded  i)  in  England  as  they 
now  are  by  the  Irish  peasant  . . .  The  Irishman  never  says 
"praste"  iox priest^  "greece"  ior  grace,  still  less  "Profissor," 
or  "thafe,"  or  "bist,"  or  "wake"  (week),  though  he  will 
say  "v/ake"  for  weak.  Athenaeum   1/2,    13. 

Compare  also  the  quotation  from  Meredith  in  656  b. 

745.  Would  and  ttsed  are  not  identical  in  meaning. 
Would  suggests  a  picture  of  the  past;  it  implies  personal 
interest,  which  is  a  consequence  of  its  inherent  meaning. 
Used  is  also  employed  to  contrast  the  past  with  the 
present,  and  does  not  necessarily  express  repetition. 

In  the  following  quotations  would  and  used  could  not 
change  places.  It  would  also  be  impossible  in  the  examples 
of  649. 

Catastrophe  of  any  kind  overwhelmed  him  at  first,  and 
then  his  vitality,  his  recuperative  qualities,  would  come 
to  the  rescue.  Vachell,  Ouinneys'  p.   225. 

The  earliest  inhabitants  of  our  island  had  paid  little 
attention  to  agriculture.  They  ^ved  mainly  by  hunting, 
and  wandered  about  the  country,  settling  down  for  a 
time  where  game  was  plentiful  and  the  conditions  of  life 
bearable.  In  such  a  place  they  would  pitch  the  wigwam 
huts  required  to  shelter  their  family  group,  .  .  .  ;  a  portion 
of  the  surrounding  soil  would  be  broken  up,  .  .  .  etc. 
Salzman,  English  Life  in  the  Middle  Ages,  p.   2)7- 

I)  i.  e.  pronouuceJ. 


CAN,   WILL,    USED  50I 

"Doesn't  he  like  you?" 

"He  used  to  like  me,"  she  answered  mournfully. 

"...  You  say  that  James  used  to  like  you.  Why  has 
he  cooled  off,  hey?"  ib.  p.  253. 

"You  used  to  love  me." 

"Used?"  ib.  p.  268. 

It  was  a  well-remembered  road.  .  .  He  would  walk 
down  the  same  rusty  path,  and  his  heart  would  quicken 
as  it  used  to  quicken  at  the  thought  of  seeing  Dolly. 
Wells,  Joan  and  Peter  ch.  9  §   11. 

746.  Used,  when  expressing  repetition,  is  very  nearly 
related  in  meaning  to  would,  so  that  both  are  often  used 
in  the  same  sentence. 

Sometimes  he  used  to  tell  us  of  his  expeditions  through 
the  woods  and  fields  round  his  home,  and  how  he  explored 
the  solitary  brooks  and  ponds ;  and  then  he  would 
describe  the  curious  animals  and  birds  he  saw. 

Sweet,  Spoken  English  p.  50. 

But  all  through  the  sermon,  to  which  she  never  gave 
the  slightest  attention,  her  mind  would  feel  mute  and 
stilled,  and  she  used  to  come  out  of  church  silent  and 
preoccupied;  returning  unwillingly  to  the  commonplaces 
of  life.  Wells,  Harman  ch.  4  §  2  p.   81. 

But  to  return  to  the  house.  There  was  quite  a  happy 
family  at  that  spot  by  the  back  door  where  the  hornets 
were.  A  numerous  family  of  shrews  were  reared,  and 
the  young,  when  they  began  exploring  the  world,  used 
to  creep  over  the  white  stone  by  the  threshold.  The  girls 
would  pick  them  up  to  feel  their  soft  mole-like  fur :  the 
young  shrew  is  a  gentle  creature  and  does  not  attempt 
to  bite.  Hudson,  Hampshire  Days  ch.   i   p.    10. 

[Would  occurs  passim  in  this  book,  not  used  to). 
In  these  sentences  used  to  might  be  replaced  by  would, 
but  it  would  hardly  be  correct  to  substitute  used  to  for 
the  ivould  of  the  text.  It  should  be  understood  that  the 
substitution,  if  possible,  alwa3^s  modifies  the  meaning  of 
the  sentence. 


502  VERBS 

747.  It  may  be  of  some  use  to  consider  some  ways 
of  expressing  repetition  in  tlie  past  ^) : 

1.  He  went  on  saying. 

2.  He  kept  saying. 

3.  He  would  sa}^ 

4.  He  used  to  say. 

5.  He  always  said. 

6.  He  was  always  saying. 

As  to  no  1  compare  84,  311  ff;  the  aspect  may  be  called 
terminative.  The  second  and  third  form  seem  both  to 
express  the  iterative  aspect,  the  difference  being  that  keep 
suggests  hardly  any  interruption,  whereas  there  is  no  such 
restriction  in  the  case  of  would.  For  the  fourth,  see  745. 
The  fifth  does  not  seem  to  have  such  a  definite  meaning; 
it  could  often  be  used  as  an  alternative  of  both  3  and  4. 
On  the  sixth,  compare  the  sections  on  the  progressive. 

Retrospect  on  the  Auxiliaries 

748.  The  meaning  of  the  term  'auxihary'  has  been 
explained  in  the  introductory  sections  to  this  chapter 
(417 — 420).  Now  that  the  uses  of  the  various  auxiliaries 
have  been  fully  dealt  with,  as  far  as  this  seems  advisable, 
some  details  being  best  left  to  the  dictionary,  the  time 
seems  to  have  come  to  answer  the  question  how  we  can 
classify  the  auxiliaries  most  satisfactorily.  Such  a  classi- 
fication must  help  to  show  what  various  auxiliaries  have 
in  common. 

The  word  auxiliary  has  been  explained  as  referring  to 
verbs  that  form  semantically  subordinate  parts  of  verbal 
groups.     There    are    two    verbs,    however,    that   have   or 


1)  Note  that  2,  3,  5,  and  6  occur  also  in  the  present.  The  first  might 
perhaps  occur  in  the  historic  present.  On  the  expression  of  repetition  in 
general,  see  the  chapter  on  Meaning  in  vol.  3. 


RETROSPECT   ON   THE   AUXILIARIES  503 

may  have  no  independent  meaning,  although  they  are  used 
with  non-verbal  elements :  to  be  and  to  have.  When  to  be 
is  used  without  any  meaning  in  this  way,  as  in  the  writing 
is  very  clear,  it  is  a  link-verb,  traditionally  called  a  copula; 
this  term  may  be  retained,  as  long  as  nothing  is  implied 
of  the  ideas  that  led  to  its  introduction.  But  it  must  be 
remembered  that  to  have  is  frequently  used  in  a  perfectly 
similar  way:  to  have  a  cold,  to  have  a  wash,  to  have  a 
squint,  etc.  M.  As  this  peculiarity  oi  have  and  be  cannot  be 
separated  from  their  auxiUary  functions,  it  is  clear  that 
they  may  be  considered  a  class  by  themselves. 

But  to  have  and  to  be  share  with  to  do  the  quality  of 
being  used  as  verbs  of  full  meaning  as  well.  This  may 
also  be  said  of  to  dare,  and  to  need.  But  the  latter  group 
of  verbs  differs  from  the  first  three  in  a  formal  way :  they 
do  not  use  the  form  in  z  when  members  of  a  verbal  group. 
To  let,  though  showing  no  formal  peculiarities,  has  a  special 
word-order  which  is  clearly  the  result  of  its  subordinate 
position  in  the  verbal  groups;  it  may,  therefore,  be  classi- 
fied with  the  other  two. 

All  the  auxiliaries  treated  in  this  section  until  now  have 
a  full  conjugational  system,  as  far  as  modern  English  can 
be  said  to  possess  such  a  system  at  all.  The  preterites 
ought  and  used,  though  conveying  a  clear  meaning  and  being 
consequently  somewhat  independent  members  of  the  groups 
■in  which  they  occur,  are  used  in  one  single  form  only.  With 
regard  to  used,  it  is  undoubtedly  a  past  tense;  but  the 
function  of  ought  is  less  definite:  it  occurs  as  a  present 
tense  and  as  a  modal  preterite  (not  as  a  past  tense,  however). 
They  resemble  full  verbs  in  that  they  have  an  independent 
meaning,  as  well  as  in  the  use  of  a  stem  with  to. 

All  the  other  auxiliaries :  can,  may,  must,  shall,  and  will, 


\)  Cf.  Mrs.  Vechtman-Velh's  Syntax  of  Living  English  pp.  126  f. 


504  VERBS 

share  one  peculiarity:  they  are  exclusively  used  with  a 
plain  stem.  This  is  not  an  accident,  for  the  plain  stem  is 
practically  the  predicative  verb  in  such  groups,  the  auxiliary 
serving  to  modify  or  specify  the  meaning  of  the  stem.  It 
is  not  chance,  or  historical  accident  either,  that  these  verbs 
have  no  other  form  than  a  stem  used  as  a  present  only, 
and  a  preterite.  This  restriction  is  clearly  the  result  of  the 
meaning  of  the  auxiharies,  as  has  been  pointed  out  when 
dealing  with  each  of  them.  It  is  not  chance  either  that  the 
preterites  of  some  are  chiefly,  or  exclusively,  used  as 
modal  preterites,  not  as  past  tenses  ^).  The  same  applies 
to  the  use  of  these  preterites  in  main  clauses,  whereas 
the  preterites  of  other  verbs  can  be  so  used  in  subordinate 
clauses  only. 

749.     One  point  has  not  been  mentioned  in  the  preceding 

section:  the  weak  stress  of  many  of  the  auxiliaries,   and 

Ihe  peculiar  forms  to  which  this  has  sometimes  led.  There 

is    no    doubt    that    the    weak    stress    of  the  auxiharies  is 

connected    with    their    semantically    subordinate    position. 

But    they    share    this    with    other    verbs:    thus  in  groups 

like    fo   go    and   see.    or    to   go   see,    the   first  element  is 

undoubtedly  weaker  stressed  on  account  of  its  function  in 

the  group.  The  transcriptions  in  Sweet's  Primer  of  Spoken 

English,     and    in    his    Elementarbuch,    will   supply    many 

examples,    from    which    a    couple    may   be   mentioned   as 

specimens. 

sou  ij   :sed  'priti  bij,  :wil  ju  :kam  an  plei  witS  mij?' 

Primer  p,  49. 

nou,    31    masnt    bij    aidi:    ai    mas  :gou  an  plau,  oa  t^a 
wount  brj  -eni  kon  ta  :meik  bred  6v.  ib. 


1)  The  use  of  these  preterites  as  past  tenses  in  indirect  style  is  quite 
independent  of  this,  and  has  consequently  been  treated  in  the  third  volume, 
in  the  sections  on  Concord. 


SUMMARY 

750.  The  completion  of  the  first  volume  of  this  syntax 
calls  for  some  concluding  remarks.  It  is  worth  notice  in 
the  first  place  that  a  whole  volume  is  devoted  to  the 
verb,  one  more  to  all  the  other  parts  of  speech  together. 
This  arrangement  is  not  due  to  the  arbitrary  will  of  the 
writer  of  an  Enghsh  grammar  but  to  the  character  of  the 
language  whose  structure  he  has  to  describe.  The  English 
sentence  is  distinctly  verbal;  it  is  verbal  in  form  even 
when  both  subject  and  predicate  are  nominal  in  their 
meaning. 

What  distinguishes  the  English  verb  from  that  of  most 
other  Indo-Germanic  languages  is  the  almost  complete 
absence  of  special  forms  for  the  predicative  use.  Apart 
from  the  form  in  [(i)z,  s]  there  is  not  a  single  exclusively 
predicative  form,  the  stem  or  the  form  with  the  suffix 
[(i)d,  t]  being  used  in  a  non-predicative  as  well  as  in  a  pre- 
dicative function;  in  all  other  cases  a  verbal  group  is 
used.  It  is  hardly  possible,  consequently,  to  speak  of  a 
'system'  of  conjugation  in  Enghsh,  unless  we  include  all 
the  groups  which  the  verb  can  enter  into.  If  we  do  the 
latter  we  cannot  avoid  enumerating  the  mixed  noun-and- 
verb  groups,  such  as  the  object  with  stem  (plain  or 
with  fo)  and  the  object-with-ing,  as  well  as  the  purely 
verbal  groups.  The  usual  practice  of  enumerating  those 
groups  only  that  have  a  special  name  (such  as  the  perfect, 
or  the  passive)  is  nothing  but  an  attempt  to  assimilate 
the  English  verb  to  the  Latin  or  Greek  verb:  the  arrange- 
ment has  the  effect  of  hiding  the  great  differences  between 
the   English   and  the  older  Indo-Germanic  verbal  system. 


5o6 


VERBS 


If  we  are  to  characterize  the  verb  in  living  English,  its 
most  important  peculiarities  seem  to  be  the  absence  of 
any  division  of  forms  into  predicative  and  non-predicative 
classes,  and  the  scarcity  of  distinctive  forms  v^ith  a  de- 
finite function,  as  v^ell  as  the  extensive  use  of  the  un- 
changed stem. 

Although  there  is  little  of  a  verbal  conjugation  in  living 
English,  it  should  be  remembered  that  the  few  distinctive 
forms  that  do  exist  occur  of  practically  all  verbs,  if  we 
consider  the  irregular  forms,  which  in  spite  of  their 
importance  are,  after  all,  a  small  minority,  as  equivalents 
of  the  regular  or  living  forms.  If  verbs  do  not  form  a 
complete  conjugation,  as  the  auxiliaries,  it  is  the  effect  of 
their  syntactic  uses  and  their  meanings,  not  of  their  mor- 
phological form.  What  there  is  of  a  system  of  conjugation 
may  be  tabulated  in  the  following  way;  the  verb  to  be  is 
included,  in  spite  of  its  isolated  character,  because  its 
frequency  makes  it  so  important  that  a  table  of  verbal 
forms  without  it  would  be  misleading. 


Conjugation  of  the  Verb 

Preterite 

1  called 

( came,      saw         ( 

\  was,  were 

Participle 

\  come,       seen        ( 

'  been 

Ing 

calling 

coming,  seeing 

being 

Present 

1  calls 

3''d  p.s. 

comes,    sees 

is 

I 

'  Pres.  1  p.s.  am 

Stem 

call 

come,      see          < 

—  2  p.  and  pi.  are 
Stem  be 

Number  of 
Forms 


UNIVERSITY  np  c,  r. 

,,  3 ,  i!pi 

/L^ ^2    05504    8648 


KEEP  CARD  IN  POCKET 


Date   Due 


DUE^ 

I^ETURNED 

DUE 

RETURNED 

r^' 

JU      ^ 

if 

t 

t:^-         v^r