said, 'this noun is in the Genitive,' nothing definite is told; for the Genitive case in Latin (as in Greek) is used to express several distinct relations of words, and the same remark may be applied to the other cases. But their respective uses are not sufficiently extensive and precise to express all the relations that may be expressed by prepositions. These particles were therefore used for many purposes in Latin, and for more in Greek, though both these languages are called synthetic.

A language in which separate particles are mostly used instead of inflerions is called analytical.

The general history of the Teutonic Languages is a story of transition from the synthetic form to the analytic; but in High German the process has not been carried to such an extent as in English.

Our modern language is mostly analytic, but retains some inflexions which may be described as saved from the ruin in which others were involved. These vestiges of inflexions are found in the five parts of speech-NOUN, ADJECTIVE, PRONOUN, VERB, and Adverb.

E.I., in several of the uses to which the cases of nouns are applied in Syntax, agrees well with Latin. The NOMINATIVE is the case of the Subject (or the name of the agent). The GENITIVE denotes possession, and has several other uses (as in Latin). The DATIVE answers the question to whom?' and has some other uses. The ACCUSATIVE (or Objective') is the case that in sense immediately follows the verb transitive. Besides these cases E.I. had an INSTRUMENTAL, used to denote the means or the instrument used in action.

Nouns in E.I. and E.II.-Nouns in E.I. may, with respect to their forms of declension, be divided into more than two classes; but all may be viewed as variations of two declensions. These two declensions, found in the Oldest English, are called THE STRONG and THE WEAK. The first (especially as used for masculine nouns) has the greater number of inflexions to denote the various relations in which a noun may stand with other words in a sentence.

The second declension has fewer changes, and is therefore called WEAK, with regard to inflexions. Smið is a masculine noun of the first or strong declension, to which denu (feminine) and word (neuter) also belong. Steorra is a masculine noun of the second or weak declension, in which the three genders agree closely with one another in their inflexions.

It is evident that, in E.I., inflexions did not suffice to make clear all the uses of nouns, as singular and plural, or all the relations that are now indicated by position and by the use of the prepositions of,' 'to,' 'for,' 'by,' 'with,' and others.

In none of the forms above given has the accusative case a distinct inflexion like um in the Latin second declension (masculine). Consequently, prepositions are extensively used in E.I., though not always in the places where they would be used in Modern English. In ten verses taken from the parable of the 'Prodigal Son' (LUKE XV. 11-21), Modern English has twenty-six prepositions, and E.I. has twenty-two. But in the Oldest English, prepositions were followed by several cases-the Accusative, the Dative, and the Genitive. Thus, by the aid of both cases and prepositions, several relations of words for which we have now but one form had clearly distinct forms.

When compared, not with Greek, but with Modern English, E.I. may be called rich in inflexions.

During the long transitional period, when E.II. in many forms was written, the general tendency of transition was to cast away the old inflexions.

In the most important of the dialects (the Midland) we find, as early as the thirteenth century, the grammatical gender of nouns cast aside. Instead of the several forms of the plural, es is the ordinary sign, though en (for the older an) is still used in forming plurals. es is also used as the ordinary suffix of the possessive case. These changes were confirmed in the time of

CHAUCER.

In Modern English the noun retains two inflexions. es for the possessive case (as in smides) is now changed to the contracted form 's. In the days of ADDISON some educated men believed that the possessive 's was a contraction of the adjective his. It was erroneously supposed that, in the Oldest English, men wrote thus, the king his crown,' and then reduced 'his' to the contracted form, seen in the king's crown.'

The grammarians of ADDISON's time never thought of one objection to their etymology of 's. The queen her crown' is not easily contracted into the queen's crown,' if we take the 's for a contraction of the word 'his.'

Of the old endings for the plural, en (a substitute for an) still survives in oxen, as well as in housen,' shoon,' and other words preserved in dialects. The plural suffix en, which became obsolete in the Elizabethan time, did not always represent the an of E.I., but was suffixed to some nouns that in E.I. belonged to the first or strong declension. In E.I. some plurals were formed by vowel-change. Ex.: fôt, fêt. The modern forms feet,' 'geese,' 'men,' 'mice,' 'teeth,' represent E.I. plurals formed by vowel-change.

It is an error to suppose that the plural s was introduced with NormanFrench about the time of the Conquest. The suffix es and its contracted

form, 8, are clearly variations of as, the plural ending in E.I. for masculine nouns of the first declension, of which smith (plural = smiðas) is an example.

The Oldest English had grammatical genders, which were often marked by the endings of nouns, as in the following examples :

MASCULINE.-Nouns ending in a, ere, end, ing (patronymic), m, hâd, dôm, scipe. Ex.: gemâna (community), writere (writer), Hælend (Saviour), Finning (Finn's son), wæstm (fruit), þeowhâd (serfdom), wisdôm (wisdom), freóndscipe (friendship).

FEMININE.-Nouns ending in waru (collective), en (with exceptions), (abstract), ing or ung (abstract), nes (abstract), and u. Ex.: buhrwaru (townsfolk), wylen (female slave), dugað (virtue), sceawung (contemplation), mildheortnes (mercy), denu (dell).

NEUTER.-Nouns ending in ern, lâc, tl, and the diminutive suffixes incle and en. Ex.: dômern (sessions-house), wîflâc (wedlock), setl (seat), scipincle (skiff), cycen (chicken).

In the course of the thirteenth century words formerly masculine or feminine were made neuter; in others a confusion of genders is found.

In the Midland Dialect of the fourteenth century the genders of nouns are mostly defined in accordance with the natural rule of Modern English.

17. NOUNS.-M.E.

Nouns in M.E. have inflexions to denote Gender, Number, and Case.

In Modern English we have no grammatical genders.

In E.I. steorra (a star) is of the masculine gender; denu (a dell,' or narrow valley, still called 'dene' or 'dean' in some names of places) is feminine. These are grammatical genders. The distinction made between them is not founded in nature.

:

Nouns are divided into three classes, called Genders :Masculine, Feminine, and Neuter.

Some nouns have inflexions to distinguish the feminine from the masculine gender.

Nouns used as distinctive names of males are called Masculine.

Names of females are called Feminine.

Names of notions and things are called Neuter.

Distinctions of gender, in Modern English, are mostly founded in nature, and are not borrowed either from First English or from Latin.

When persons are named, sex is often denoted by the use of two different words which, in some instances, belong to one stem.

Different words are used to distinguish some animals

as male and female. Ex. :—

When gender is marked by a change of termination, the suffix denoting the feminine is mostly ess, borrowed from Latin and Norman-French.

The following words, sometimes used, may still be

called foreign :

ine serves as the feminine suffix in 'heroine,' and in such proper names as 'Josephine' and 'Pauline.'

The E.I. feminine ending en remains only in one word -'vixen-and in 'spinster' we have the only example left of ster, another feminine ending in E.I.

The Latin feminine ending trix is seen in the words 'executrix' and 'testatrix.'

In some compounds the second word denotes gender.

In E.I. the words carl (masculine) and cwên (feminine) were sometimes used to denote gender in names of animals. In M.E. such compounds as the following are used :

Masculine buck-rabbit he-goat peacock

Feminine. doe-rabbit

she-goat peahen

Many names of persons are, with respect to gender, Common. The tendency in M.E. is to increase the number of these words, of which the following are examples :