Owen—Interrogative Thought—Means of Its Expression. 403 
are used in asking questions/’ the naked eye can perceive.* 
To rank such words among the pronouns confuses the idea of the 
pronoun, as well as that of the interrogative word. The dis¬ 
tinctive characteristic of a genuine pronoun (and I do not here 
consider any pseudo-pronoun—such, for instance, as the mere 
indefinite) I hold to be the restriction of its symbolizing power 
to the reinstatement (or anticipation) of a part or parts or all 
of a thought, which has been (or will be) expressed by another 
more effective word or combination. In “Yesterday I dined on 
mutton. It was very good,” the pronominal “It” revives in mind 
the waning idea suggested first by “mutton.” In “Yesterday 
I dined on mutton. What will the cook provide to-day?,” the 
interrogative “What,” with an eatable named by “mutton” di¬ 
rectly at hand, neglects it absolutely. In “Though he is ill, Mr. 
Brown is at work,” the “he” prefigures in the vague an idea 
which I inferentially promise to express more distinctly, ful¬ 
filling this promise by the words “M]r. Birown.” In “What 
will the cook provide to-day ?,” I offer no such promise, for the 
excellent reason that I see no hope of fulfilling it.** 
The distinctive feature of interrogation is sometimes said to 
be the “rising inflection.” But this does not belong to questions 
only. If you ask me “Shall you go to the play ?,” I answer with 
rising inflection “I think I shall go;” indeed I may use through¬ 
out precisely the variations of pitch which the cockney uses in 
“To which house shall I go ?” Again the question is not always 
put with rising inflection,. In American Ehglish, although the 
voice is raised at the end of “Are you there ?”, it falls at the 
end of “Where are you ?” 
*That language students universally endorse such definitions, mainly 
offered by Grammar, I do not for a moment suppose. That real in¬ 
vestigators are discontented, many of them ready to revolt, some in¬ 
dependently holding to rational views, and giving them welcome ex¬ 
pression, would seem to be a foregone conclusion. To the opinions of 
such I hope only to bring the merest confirmation. Their opinions are 
not what I mean by Grammar. I mean the body of observations, 
definitions, classifications and explanations, adopted as creed or en¬ 
dured as fashion by teachers and writers, with rare exceptions. 
**The “What” in a sense anticipates the answer; so too in “Lend me 
five dollars!” the “Lend” anticipates your act of lending; but such an¬ 
ticipation is far too different from that of the pronouns, to furnish 
ground for entrance into their category. 
