In Norse, too, at the present moment, all neuters end in -t, skön = pulch-er, skönt = pulchr-um. In the modern High-German this -t becomes -s, M. blind-er, N. blind-es. But it is the Latin -d, in i-d, illu-d, istu-d— and, as such, a very old inflection. And now comes a fact which (whilst it justifies the importance and prominence given to the pronominal inflection, of which, in practice, this neuter in -t has been the characteristic), shows us how, in languages of the same order, a mere alteration in the distribution of certain inflections may effect a great change. There are two types of inflection in the way of Gender-one given by the Substantives, the other by the Pronouns. The Adjectives have none of their own. They take that of the Substantive, or the Pronoun, according to the language. The Latin adjectives (along with the Greek) follow the substantives, the result being cæc-us, cæc-um, like dominus, regn-um. The German follow the pronouns; the result being blind-s, blind-ata, like who, what.

CHAPTER XXIII.

THE TRUE PERSONAL PRONOUNS.

§ 407. THE true Personal Pronouns, as far as inflection is concerned, are in English, ✔m-, √th- and ✔y-. It is not safe to go more minutely into detail than this; though, roughly speaking, we may say that they are me (1st person); thou (2nd person singular); and ye (2nd person plural). They run thus:

§ 408. The exact details of the difference between me and my are obscure. The A. S. gives meh and mec; both Dative and Accusative rather than Possessive. The allied

As far as the form in -k (=h) goes, this looks like Composition rather than Declension, the -k being the -c in hi-c, hæ-c, ho-c.

§ 409. That we, our, and us are etymologically allied, i.e. that they are forms of the same word rather than different words, is shown by the A. S. user = our, and by the Norse vi and vor we and our. The evidence that they are connected with me is not so clear. The affinity, however, between the sounds of m and w, along with other phenomena, account for it.

For the double, or equivocal power of ye and you, as well as for the possibly Nominative power of me, and for mine and thine, see §§ 519, 520.

§ 410. Our-s, your-s (also their-s), are cases of our, your (and their), i. e. each is a case upon a case. We may call them cases of me, you (and their) if we choose. They are, however, no samples of any Pronominal inflection, but, rather, catachrestic substantival forms.

§ 411. A retrospect will show that the separation of her she, and it, from me, thou, and ye was necessary. Το class the names for the persons or things spoken about with the names of the speaker and the person spoken to is, if taken by itself, legitimate. But it is traversed by the differences of form. The importance of the neuter in -t has been indicated. But this is not all. To place they, their, and them among the true personals is to separate them from this and that.

NOTE.

ON THE WORD I.

In the declension of me no notice was taken of I. Nevertheless, in all the previous editions of the present work, as well as elsewhere, I have given it a place among the true personal pronouns. And, doubtless, its place is with me and thee. If I be not a personal pronoun,-a personal pronoun of the first person singular-what is it?

The foregoing chapter, however, treated not of personal pronouns in general, but of their declension, and I is undeclined. Is this a sufficient reason for excluding it,-for, apparently, ignoring its very existence? In the present stage of our language she is undeclined yet she has been treated somewhat fully. To treat I as the nominative case of me would, of course, have been absurd; but why not have said (as up to the present time has been said) that I was defective in the oblique cases, me in the nominative; and that they were complementary to one another? Mutatis mutandis, this is what was said of he and she; the former being defective in the nominative feminine, the latter defective in everything else. A partial answer to this is conveyed in the statement that she had once a declension; but that I never had one. But this is an under-statement. I is, to all appearances, something more than a mere undeclined word in the present stage of the English language. It is something more than a word that has never been declined. It is a word essentially undeclinable. As a pronoun of the first person, it is the name of the speaker, whoever he (or she) may be-the name of a speaker speaking of himself. But such a speaker may be one of two things. He may be the object of some action from without;

or he may be the originator of some action interior to, and proceeding from, himself. In other words, there may be a division of the Pronouns of the first person into two classes—(1) the Subjective; and (2) the Objective; the former being essentially Nominative. Now, in all the languages more especially akin to our own, and known by the name Indo-European, this difference exists: i. e. 1 is never a form of me. On the other hand, in the languages allied to the Fin, or Ugrian, it is always one.

The first of these examples is from the Fin of Finland, the second from the Turkish.

CHAPTER XXIV.

INFLECTION OF SUBSTANTIVES.- -THE PLURAL NUMBERS AND POSSESSIVE CASE IN S.-DETAILS.

§ 412. THE A. S. Possessive Singular ended in -es; as cyning, cyning-es =rex, reg-is. The A. S. Nominative Plural ended in -as, as cyning-as = reg-es. reg-es. The present English ejects the vowel, whether e or a; so reducing the two cases to the same form. It distinguishes them, however, in the spelling; inasmuch as we write kings = reg-es, but king's regis.

§ 413. The Possessive Plural, in A. S., ended in -a; as cyning-a regum. The present English knows nothing of this form. It rarely forms a real Possessive Plural at all. When it does, it does so by adding the -s

ox-ens.

of the Singular to the Nominative Plural; as ox-en But this is only done with those few words where the Nominative Plural does not already end in -s; men, men's; brethren, brethren's; children, children's. This avoids such expressions as the fatherses children, the sisterses brethren, the masterses men. The difference, however, we indicate in writing.

With these preliminaries, and with a knowledge of the five fundamental rules of Euphony,* we shall find that

* These are

(1.) Two mutes, one of which is surd and the other sonant, coming together in the same syllable, cannot be pronounced.

(2.) A surd mute, immediately preceded by a sonant one, is changed into its sonant equivalent.

(3.) A sonant mute, immediately preceded by a surd one, is changed into its sonant equivalent.

(4.) In certain cases, a vowel or a liquid has the same effect upon the surd letters, as a sonant mute.

(5.) When two identical or cognate sounds come together in the same syllable, they must be separated from each other by the insertion of the sound of the e in bed-loss, loss-es; blaze, blaz-es. Here we must remember, not only that z, zh, and sh comport themselves as -s, but that the -ch in church, &c., and -ge in judge, &c., are really tsh and dzh, whence church-es, judg-es, &c. In monarch, &c., the ch is not tsh but k (x); the plural being monarchs.