ENGLISH GRAMMAR FOR COMMON SCHOOLS BY ROBERT C. METCALF SUPERVISOR OF SCHOOLS, BOSTON, MASS. AND THOMAS METCALF OF THE ILLINOIS STATE NORMAL UNIVERSITY DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION NEW YORK.:. CINCINNATI CHICAGO PREFACE. BEFORE beginning the study of grammar, pupils should be carefully trained in the use of language. Correctness and facility in speaking and writing are best gained by practice; but while it is true that habit, rather than a knowledge of syntactical rules, controls a speaker's or writer's use of English, yet, in one who claims to be a scholar, ignorance of the history and structure of his language is no more excusable than ignorance in any other department of knowledge. By the grammar of a language we mean the facts of the ' language. In teaching grammar, we should remember that pupils are to become acquainted with those facts, as far as possible, through their own efforts. Let the child become a discoverer, and let him experience the satisfaction that comes to every discoverer of truth. Grammar should be taught inductively. Pupils should be led, first, in the light of their own experience, to study the simple facts of language, and then to investigate the more difficult matters of construction and inflection until they arrive at the general laws which govern its structure. In other words, pupils should be helped to help themselves. And yet it is next to impossible to present inductive lessons throughout a text-book. Lessons must be prepared for classes of pupils; and no one but the teacher can know to what extent each child needs illustrative exercises, or when he is prepared to take the next step. This book is prepared on a plan somewhat different from that followed in most Grammars for schools. There are certain facts of grammar which must be learned before the mastery of other facts becomes possible. But although it is necessary, for example, to know something of the nature of nouns and verbs before beginning to analyze a sentence, |