66 FOR THE PURPOSE OF LEARNING TO SPEAK AND WRITE THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE, OR ANY LANGUAGE ABOUT WHICH I KNOW ANYTHING, A GRAMMAR OF FIVE-AND-TWENTY PAGES, IN THE HANDS OF A GOOD TEACHER, IS, TILL THE STUDENT IS VERY FAR ADVANCED, QUITE ENOUGH, AND INFINITELY MORE USEFUL THAN A BIGGER ONE." M. E. GRANT-DUFF, M.P., At the Liverpool Institute, Nov. 8th, 1876. 66 THE DESIGN IS, BY EXHIBITING IN CLEAR AND CONCISE SYNTHESIS THE LEADING PRINCIPLES AND FACTS ΤΟ CARRY LEARNERS FORWARD IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION TO THAT STAGE OF PROGRESS FROM WHICH THEY MAY ADVANCE TO WIDER PHILOLOGICAL STUDIES WITHOUT HAVING ANYTHING TO UNLEARN." PUBLIC SCHOOL LATIN PRIMER. THE BEGINNERS' Drill-Book OF ENGLISH GRAMMAR ADAPTED FOR Middle-class and Elementary Schools BY JAMES BURTON FIRST ENGLISH MASTER IN THE HIGH SCHOOL OF THE LIVERPOOL INSTITUTE PREFACE LIKE a good bodily carriage, the facile use of merely one's own speech is the result of much laborious instruction and discipline; and the method of initiation into the subject of grammar, as in all matters of training, is of the greatest importance to the power and extent of future acquirement. The aim of this book is simply to conduct pupils as far as the analysis and parsing of ordinary constructions, at which point the further pursuit of the subject becomes a special study. Up to that point, however, grammar is necessary to every person, because the due analysis of speech lies at the root both of all intelligent reading of others' thoughts, and of any adequate expression of our own. There is no sounder way of leading learners to apprehend grammatical distinctions and relations than, after concise instruction has been given on any point, to enforce and illustrate it by examples from good authors. Hence it has been the writer's aim to put forth a book which should serve as a means of grammatical drill, consisting of a bare framework of instruction, and a large body of really workable exercises. |