INTRODUCTION 301. We have learned how to divide a sentence into its subject and predicate. We next try to see how a sentence is built up of words. A word is first a sound, or a group of sounds, as, for example, that which we make in saying black. Then it is a written or printed sign for the sound: for example, the group of five letters that we call black. The word is the sign of an idea, the idea of black. In making statements, we find ourselves wishing to use the idea of black in various ways. We may say: 1. Black is very different from white. 2. A crow is a black bird. 3. But a crow is not a blackbird. 4. Boys black their shoes. In the first sentence we treat the idea of black as if it were a thing. In the second we put black before bird to show what kind of bird a crow is. In the third we fasten black to bird, making one solid word. In the fourth we use black to tell what boys do to their shoes. We have used black as three different "parts of speech": first as a noun, then (twice) as an adjective, then as a verb. The parts of speech are eight classes to which words may be assigned, chiefly according to their use in sentences. The same word is never assigned to all the eight classes, but it may be assigned to two or three. Thus black is a verb, an adjective, or a noun, according to circumstances. 302. The eight parts of speech are: nouns, pronouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions, and interjections. EXAMPLES: Nouns: John, shot-gun, fox, death. Verbs: thinks, tries, expects, succeeds. Interjections: ah! 'rah! hurrah! hello! CHAPTER I VERBS 303. Verb defined. In the strict sense, a verb is a single word which can take a subject; it is the simplest predicate. In this chapter, therefore, verb will always mean а single word, like runs, or ran. Elsewhere in this book we sometimes find it convenient to treat certain whole phrases, like will run, as verbs. In a statement or a question, the subject of an English verb must always be expressed (186, 257). In a command it need not be expressed. The verb can form a whole com mand, as "Go!" (258). 304. The verb makes the speaker responsible. If we say the boy, we utter merely a name. A name expresses no opinion, wish, or command. But the minute we add a verb to the name, as in The boy lies, we are held responsible for a statement. It is true that we can often modify our responsibility by putting certain words with |