In a former article our readers have been shewn the fundamental sources of literary inspiration, and the leading prerequisites to expression. It remains to furnish hints concerning expression itself; its forms, customs, and technicalities, in order that the young writer may lose nothing of force or charm in presenting his ideas to the public. Grammar A review of the elements of English grammar would be foreign to the purpose of this department. The subject is one taught in all common schools, and may be presumed to be understood by every aspirant to authorship. It is necessary, however, to caution the beginner to keep a reliable grammar and dictionary always beside him, that he may avoid in his compositions the frequent errors which imperceptibly corrupt even the purest ordinary speech. As a general rule, it is well to give close critical scrutiny to all colloquial phrases and expressions of doubtful parsing, as well as to all words and usages which have a strained or unfamiliar sound. The human memory is not to be trusted too far, and most minds harbour a considerable number of slight linguistic faults and inelegancies picked up from random discourse or from the pages of newspapers, magazines, and popular modern books. Types of Mistakes Most of the mistakes of young authors, aside from those gross violations of syntax which ordinary education corrects, may perhaps be enumerated as follows. (1) Erroneous plurals of nouns, as =vallies= or =echos=. (2) Barbarous compound nouns, as =viewpoint= or =upkeep=. (3) Want of correspondence in number between noun and verb where the two are widely separated or the construction involved. (4) Ambiguous use of pronouns. (5) Erroneous case of pronouns, as =whom= for =who=, and vice versa, or phrases like "between you and =I=," or "Let =we= who are loyal, act promptly." (6) Erroneous use of =shall= and =will=, and of other auxiliary verbs. (7) Use of intransitive for transitive verbs, as "he =was graduated= from college," or vice versa, as "he =ingratiated= with the tyrant." (8) Use of nouns for verbs, as "he =motored= to Boston," or "he =voiced= a protest." (9) Errors in moods and tenses of verbs, as "If I =was= he, I should do otherwise," or "He said the earth =was= round." (10) The split infinitive, as "=to= calmly =glide=." (11) The erroneous perfect infinitive, as "Last week I expected =to have met= you." (12) False verb-forms, as "I =pled= with him." (13) Use of =like= for =as=, as "I strive to write =like= Pope wrote." (14) Misuse of prepositions, as "The gift was bestowed =to= an unworthy object," or "The gold was divided =between= the five men." (15) The superfluous conjunction, as "I wish =for= you to do this."