PREFACE.

THE present work is a reprint in a separate form of the Exercises appended to my recently published 'Shorter English Grammar.' The references to the paragraphs of that work have of course been struck out, and the exercises themselves are so arranged that they may be used with any good text-book of English Grammar, and there are some good works of that kind which have either a scanty apparatus of exercises or none at all. Every effort has been made to render these exercises as serviceable as possible to those who wish to guide their pupils to a real understanding of the structure of English sentences. The learner is taken by easy stages from the simplest English work to the most difficult constructions in the language. Beginning with the simplest elements of a sentence, he learns step by step the functions of the various Parts of Speech, and of their forms and combinations, and acquires by degrees the power of analysing and parsing the most complicated constructions.

In the use of these exercises I strenuously urge upon teachers patient and unflinching compliance with the directions given for guiding the pupil to a thorough understanding of the functions of words and forms. Nothing is more useless and even hurtful than to furnish a learner with any kind of mechanical directions to enable him to tell the Parts of Speech. If he cannot tell that a word is a verb, an adverb or a preposition by recognizing its meaning and function in the sentence, of what possible use can it be for him to give it a name by the application of some empirical

rule relating to its position, or something of the sort? When in this fashion he has managed to say that 'now' is an adverb, or 'against' a preposition, he really knows no more than he did before. He is simply using words without a perception of their meaning. Nay, the matter is worse than this, for he is deluded into the idea that he knows something, while his fancied knowledge is a mere sham, and this delusion is itself a bar to his acquisition of the only kind of knowledge which could be of any use to him. If the pupil is too young to master the proper explanation readily, wait till he is older; if he is too dull, take him patiently over the ground again and again till the difficulties have vanished. None but learners of abnormal stupidity will hold out against this kind of treatment, and they had better devote such intellect as they have to simpler pursuits. The bane of far too much of our ordinary school work is the ignorant impatience of teachers to get their pupils 'over the ground,' that is to say, through a certain number of pages of some text-book. A tolerably long and wide experience justifies me in affirming most strongly that slow and careful teaching pays best even at examinations. The specimens of parsing and analysis that I see yearly in hundreds of instances, show how deplorably time and (not patience, but) impatience have been wasted in going over and over again the same profitless round of mechanical and unintelligent repetition. It is this that renders school lessons' wearisome to the teacher, and dreary and repulsive to the pupil. No matter what the subject may be, learners never find a lesson dull when they feel that they are really learning something.

DUKESELL,

CHRISTCHURCH ROAD, STREATHAM HILL,

January, 1879.

C. P. MASON.

ENGLISH GRAMMAR PRACTICE.

I. Common Nouns and Proper Nouns.

Preliminary Lesson.-Definition of a Noun. Distinction between Common Nouns and Proper Nouns.

Exercise 1. Say (or write) ten common nouns which are the names of each of the following things

I. Animals. 2. Trees and flowers.

:

3. Things that you see in the room. 4. Things to eat, to wear, or to play with. 5. Some stuff or material.

Say (or write) ten proper nouns which are names of

1. Boys or girls.

Dogs or horses.

2. Towns. 3. Countries. 4. Rivers or mountains. 5. 6. Ships. 7. Houses or parks.

Exercise 2. Write the Common Nouns in the following sentences in one list, and the Proper Nouns in another :

John likes school. My brother has a horse called Dobbin. The boys were reading about the battle of Agincourt. Bellerophon rode a winged horse called Pegasus. My uncle is the captain of the 'Bellerophon.' Lie down, Fido. The traveller ascended Helvellyn. March is a cold month. The soldiers had a weary march. She brought me a bunch of may. I like May better than June. King Arthur's sword was called Excalibur. eclipse of the sun. The horse that won the race was Eclipse. swallows are birds. That cow has lost a horn. in the Petrel.'

"O Solitude! where are thy charms?"
"Hence, loathed Melancholy,

We saw an
Petrels and

He sailed round Cape Horn

Of Cerberus and blackest midnight born.
Find out some uncouth cell

Where brooding darkness spreads his jealous wings."

"You may avoid that too with an 'if'" (Shaksp.). "Tellest thou me of ifs?" He wants to know the why and the wherefore of everything.

II. Singular and Plural.

Preliminary Lesson.-Definition of Number. Modes of form

ing the plural.