A Handbook of the English LanguageLatham, R. G. (Robert Gordon)
History
A Handbook of the English Language
Latham, R. G. (Robert Gordon)
English language -- Grammar; English language -- History
4. To what extent have we in English a dative, an accusative, and
instrumental case? Disprove the doctrine that the genitive in -s (_the
father's son_) is formed out of the combination _father his_.
5. Decline _me_, _thee_, and _ye_.
6. How far is there a true reflective pronoun in English?
7. What were the original powers and forms of _she_, _her_, _it_? What
case is _him_? What is the power and origin of _the_ in such
expressions as _all the more_? Decline _he_ in Anglo-Saxon. Investigate
the forms _these_ and _those_, _whose_, _what_, _whom_, _which_,
_myself_, _himself_, _herself_, _such_, _every_.
8. What is the power (real or supposed) of the -er in _over_, and in
_either_?
9. What words in the present English are explained by the following
forms--_sutiza_ in Mœso-Gothic, and _scearpor_, _neah_, _yldre_, in
Anglo-Saxon? Explain the forms, _better_, _worse_, _more_, _less_.
10. Analyze the words _former_, _next_, _upmost_, _thirty_,
_streamlet_, _sweetheart_, _duckling_.
11. Translate _Ida wæs Eopping_. Analyze the word _Wales_.
12. Exhibit the extent to which the noun partakes of the character of
the verb, and _vice versâ_. What were the Anglo-Saxon forms of, _I can
call_, _I begin to call_?
13. Investigate the forms, _drench_, _raise_, _use_ (the verb),
_clothe_.
14. _Thou speakest_. What is the peculiarity of the form? _We loven_,
_we love_, account for this.
15. _Thou rannest_ = (_tu cucurristi_). Is this an unexceptionable
form? if not, why?
16. What are the _moods_ in English? What the _tenses_? How far is the
division of verbs into weak and strong tenses natural? Account for the
double forms _swam_ and _swum_. Enumerate the other verbs in the same
class. Explain the forms _taught_, _wrought_, _ought_, _did_, (from
_do_ = _facio_), _did_ (from _do_ = _valeo_), _minded_.
17. Define the term _irregular_, so as to raise the number of irregular
verbs, in English, to more than a hundred. Define the same term, so as
to reduce them to none. Explain the form _could_.
18. What is the construction of _meseems_ and _methinks_? Illustrate
the _future_ power of be. _Werden_ in German means _become_--in what
form does the word appear in English?
19. _To err is human_,--_the rising_ in the North. Explain these
constructions. Account for the second -r in _forlorn_; and for the y in
y_cleped_.
20. Explain the difference between _composite_ and _de-composite_
words, _true_ and _improper compounds_. Analyze the word _nightingale_.
21. How far are adverbs inflected? Distinguish between a _preposition_
and a _conjunction_.
22. Explain the forms _there_, _thence_, _yonder_, and _anon_.
23. What part of speech is _mine_?
24. What is the probable origin of the -d in such preterites as
call-ed.
PART V.
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