^8 'Hieroglyphical Fragments. 



patching ; no after painting.'' On the other hand he is right 

 in protesting *' against the use of what, by some, is called the 

 dash. Who is to know what is intended by the use of these 

 dashes ? .... It is a cover for ignorance as to the use of points ; 

 and it can answer no other purpose." 



In Letter XV, there is a singular conceit with regard to the 

 keeping up a distinction between a and an, where it is insisted 

 that we must not say " a dog, cat, owl, and sparrow/' because 

 owl requires an ; " and that it should be, a dog, a cat, an owl, 

 tind a sparrow ;" which is certainly better, and would be so, even 

 if there were no owl in the question. 



Letter XVII. The criticism on Milton's *' than whom none 

 higher sat," is perfectly correct. TAaw is never a preposition, 

 and is simply a variation from the older then, both in English 

 femd in German. John is better than James means simply 

 John is good first, then James : £r is eher or e'er. Who would 

 sound awkwardly, but would be more grammatical. 



Letter XIX gives a definition of the ellipsis, which would be 

 ^ lesson to Apollonius himself: the compasses, it seems, '' do 

 iiot take their sweep all round, but leave out parts of the area 

 or surface." The objection to Blackstone's language is very 

 questionable. "The \ery scheme and model was settled," 

 may, perhaps, be defended, because scheme and model are con- 

 sidered as one thing, the words being intended to illustrate each 

 other, but not to point out different attributes of the adminis- 

 tration of justice ; and both words may be admitted, as a col- 

 lective term, to govern a singular rather than a plural verb. 

 It seems also to be an error to make with a conjunction rather 

 than a preposition, and to say " The bag, with the guineas and 

 dollars in it were stolen," or " zeal, with discretion, do much." 

 ^ I expected to have seen," is justly noticed as a common 

 ferror for *^ I expected to see." The meaning of an active verb 

 is erroneously confounded with that of a transitive verb, in th6 

 temarks on the word elope, which m^ans to go off, or to run 

 bff, and we should naturally say was gone off, but had run off. 

 The nature of the subjunctive mood is dismissed in the same 

 Letter without better success than has been obtained by former 

 grammarians. An essay was published about thirty years ago 

 in a periodical-work, which brings the subject into a small com- 



