Chapter 3

2. He became angry, saying he positively refused to go.

3. He is a bright boy, although I should not want to trust him with my pocketbook.

4. He had an ambition which was to become the best lawyer in the state by the time he was forty years old.

5. The cable breaks and the elevator starts to drop, when the safety device always operates at once to prevent an accident.

=Subordination Thwarted by _and_=

=16. Do not attach to a main clause by means of _and_, a word, phrase, or clause which you intend shall be subordinate. The presence of _and_ thwarts subordination.=

Wrong: Major went to bed, and leaving the work unfinished.

Right: Major went to bed, leaving the work unfinished.

Wrong: He ran home and with coat tails flying.

Right: He ran home with coat tails flying.

Exercise:

1. They denied my request, and giving no reason for the refusal.

2. He gave me his answer and in few words.

3. The girl stood on the edge of the cliff, and thus showing that she was not afraid.

4. A telegraph line is leased by the Associated Press, and thus giving the newspapers quick service.

5. When the summer passed, the fisherman returned home for the winter, and where he renewed his acquaintance with the villagers.

=The _and which_ construction=

=17. Use _and which_ (or _but which_), _and who_ (or _but who_) only between relative clauses similar in form. Between a main clause and a relative clause, _and_ or _but_ thwarts subordination.=

Wrong: This is an important problem, and which we shall not find easy to solve.

Right: This problem is an important problem, which we shall not find easy to solve.

Right: This problem is one _which_ is important, _and which_ we cannot easily solve.

Wrong: _Les Miserables_ is a novel of great interest and which everybody should read.

Right: _Les Miserables_ is a novel of great interest, and one which everybody should read.

Wrong: Their chief opponent was Winter, a shrewd politician, but who is now less popular than he was.

Right: Their chief opponent was Winter, a shrewd politician, who is now less popular than he was.

Note.--Rule 17 is sometimes briefly stated: "Do not use _and which_ unless you have already used _which_ in the sentence." This statement is generally true, but an exception must be made for sentences like the following: Right: "He told me what countries he had visited, and which ones he liked most."

Exercise:

1. Just outside is a small porch looking out over the street, and which can be used for sleeping purposes.

2. She is a woman of pleasing personality, and who can converse intelligently.

3. It is a difficult task, but which can be accomplished in time.

4. He is a good-looking man, but who is very snobbish.

5. The rule made by the conference of college professors in 1896, and which has been followed ever since, applies to the case we are considering.

=Unity Thwarted by Punctuation=

=The Comma Splice=

=18. Do not splice two independent statements by means of a comma. Write two sentences. Or, if the two statements together form a unit of thought, combine them (1) by a comma plus a conjunction, (2) by a semicolon, or (3) by reducing one of the statements to a phrase or a subordinate clause.=

Wrong: The town has two railroads, it was founded when oil was discovered.

Right: The town has two railroads. It was founded when oil was discovered.

Wrong: The speed of the car seemed slower than it really was, this was due, no doubt, to the absence of all noise. [Here are three commas. The reader cannot quickly discover which one marks the great division of thought.]

Right: The speed of the car seemed slower than it really was. This was due, no doubt, to the absence of all noise.

Wrong: The winters were long and cold, nothing could live without shelter.

Right: The winters were long and cold. Nothing could live without shelter.

Right: The winters were long and cold, and nothing could live without shelter [For the use of the comma, see 91a].

Right: The winters were long and cold; nothing could live without shelter [For the use of the semicolon see 92].

Right: The winters were so long and cold that nothing could live without shelter.

Exception.--Short coördinate clauses which are parallel in structure and leave a unified impression, may be joined by commas, even though the conjunctions be omitted.

Right: All was excitement. The ducks quacked, the pigs squealed, the dogs barked. [The general idea _excitement_ gives the three clauses a certain unity.]

Exercise:

1. The key is turned to the right, this unlocks the door.

2. The author keeps one guessing, there is no hint how the story will end.

3. The farmer is independent, he has no task-master.

4. There has been a change of government, in fact there has been a revolution.

5. Lamb had failed in poetry, in the drama, and in the novel, in the essay, at last, he succeeded.

=19.= EXERCISE IN UNITY OF THOUGHT

=A. The Comma Splice=

Rewrite the following material in sentences each of which is a unit of thought. Most of the statements should be summarily cut apart. If you decide that others taken together have unity of thought, combine them (1) by a comma plus a conjunction, (2) by a semicolon, or (3) by reducing one of the statements to a phrase or a subordinate clause.

1. The canoe is long and narrow, it is made of birch bark.

2. I decided to serve tea, of course cream and sugar would be needed.

3. Some men hunt rabbits for market purposes only, they are the sportsman's enemies.

4. This city furnished many boats for the siege of Calais, when these boats returned they brought the plague with them.

5. The bottom of the box is then put in, it is nailed to the sides.

6. It is not easy to become a good musician, one must practice continually.

7. The Northern and Southern states could not be separate nations, there was no natural boundary between them.

8. The telephone is a great invention, it is very useful to the farmer.

9. Why would no one come to help me, my feet ached and I was thirsty.

10. I know a girl who has a cynical disposition, she is always criticizing.

11. I went into the office hopeless, a dime stood between me and starvation.

12. The construction of the bridge has much to do with the tone of a violin, it should be lower on the side nearest the E string.

13. A private expense account does not require much labor or time, just one hour a week will suffice to keep tract of all expenditures.

14. We offer you sixty dollars a month to start, this is all we can afford to pay at present.

15. He wanted personal success but would not shirk a duty or harm any one in any way to gain that success, at all times he forgot his own personal importance and was ready to do any task set before him.

=B. One Thought in a Sentence=

By dividing, subordinating, or logically combining the following statements, secure unity of thought.

1. She was born in Atlanta, Georgia, on September 30, 1902, where she has lived ever since and is now well known.

2. Franklin was kindly, shrewd, and capable, and was the representative of the United States in France.

3. She said that Mrs. Brown was ill and that she was just caring for the baby, she loved babies anyway, she said.

4. One Sunday afternoon there was an excursion to Beaver and several of us decided to go and take our lunches and return on the eight o'clock car.

5. He gave me the dimensions of the room. The dimensions were ten by twelve feet.

6. Good grades may be obtained in two ways: by honest work, and by cheating; however any one who cheats is doing himself more harm than good.

7. The wall studding is made of two-by-fours. These two-by-fours are placed sixteen inches apart.

8. The returning Crusaders brought with them oriental learning, and found the peasantry impoverished.

9. The articles in this magazine are of high quality. The articles are well written and attractively illustrated.

10. A Japanese woman going abroad at night must carry a lighted lamp and must not speak to any one, women do not have much freedom in Japan.

11. The sugar beets are irrigated by river water. They are irrigated by means of furrows. The furrows run between the rows of beets. The beets are irrigated once a week.

12. The referee asked each captain if his men were ready, after which he blew the whistle, and the game was on, and within five minutes our team scored a touchdown.

13. The ground should be harrowed as soon as possible after it is plowed. It is a good plan to harrow the ground on the same day that it is plowed, or on the day following.

14. Choose the middle of the prepared ground, which is about eighty-five by fifty feet, as your starting point, measure twenty-four feet east and west and set the net posts; then, after marking off the different courts with tape, you are ready for a good game of tennis.

15. There are two places on the island suitable for plays: one in the bungalow and the other down on the sandy point; the latter lends itself to the purpose readily, there are two trees which make a splendid support for wires on which to hang the curtain, and just east of these the ground slopes enough to make a natural amphitheater.

=C. Excessive Coördination=

The ideas in the following sentences are loosely strung together with coördinating conjunctions. Place the important idea in the main clause. Subordinate other ideas by reducing each to a dependent clause, or a phrase, or a word.

1. Chris has a new coat and it is double-breasted.

2. I had a dog, and his name was Scratcher.

3. He gave a laugh but it was forced.

4. The woodcock is so foolish and deliberately walks into a trap.

5. The engineers fastened rafts to the piles, and which were pulled up when the tide rose.

6. Students often sit all doubled up, and raising their feet high on the table.

7. Dunlap is carrying a palette, but without any paint on it.

8. The government has been successful in its suit, and the tobacco trust was dissolved.

9. The British troops had no protection against poisonous gas and the use of gas by the enemy was unexpected.

10. I make it a rule to study one thing at least an hour and no long rest between.

11. The concrete is spread in a layer, and this is about nine inches thick, and the width being ten feet.

12. Rockwell is our postmaster, and is accommodating, but he has a disposition to be curious.

13. At the Gatun Dam there are concrete locks, and the purpose of these is to lift vessels into the lake.

14. They say to tourists that objects are historic but which are not historic at all.

15. I was lying quietly in the hammock, and I happened to look up in the tree, and there was a green bird and eating a cherry.

16. They disputed for a time, and afterward the officer became angry, and whipped out his sword.

17. A mirage is an illusion and the traveler thinks he sees water when there really is none.

=D. Upside-down Subordination=

In the following sentences the important idea is buried in a subordinate clause or phrase. Rescue this main idea, express it in the main clause, and if possible subordinate the rest of the sentence to it.

1. I spoke to her on the street, when she did not answer.

2. She thanked me for my assistance, also asking me to come and visit her the following Sunday.

3. The water froze in the buckets, although they did not burst.

4. The crows cawed angrily and circling around in one place.

5. He is threatened with tuberculosis, although he will not sleep in the open air.

6. We had hacked the bark, the tree dying after a few months.

7. One of the contestants was from Wendover College, who received the prize.

8. You ask a person what a spiral staircase is, when he will go to showing you by motions of his hand.

9. It was about three o'clock, and we decided to return home, which we did.

10. The plumber came, stopping the leak as soon as he arrived.

11. Benton sold stamps, in which business he grew rich.

12. The sun's heat beats down upon the brick tenements, which is terrible.

13. The chemist tested the purity of the water, but which he found unfit to drink.

14. Montaigne wrote an essay on "Solitude," where he pointed out the disadvantages of travel.

15. The house is set close to the edge of the bluff, overlooking a wide bend of the Alleghany River.

16. Things had been going from bad to worse among the Indians, and some Sioux were entertaining a few Chippewas, and murdered them, when the government took a hand in the affair.

17. The slight knowledge of metals and wide-awake observation of an inexperienced miner discovered gold in Arizona.

CLEARNESS OF THOUGHT

Clearness is fundamental. The writer should be content, not when his meaning may be understood, but only when his meaning cannot be misunderstood. He may attain this entire clearness by giving attention to five matters:

Reference (20-23) Coherence (24-28) Parallel Structure (30-31) Consistency (32-35) Use of Connectives (36-38)

REFERENCE

By the use of pronouns, participles, and other dependent words, language becomes flexible and free. But each dependent part must refer without confusion to a word which is reasonably near, and properly expressed. Ordinarily a reader expects a pronoun or a participle to refer to the nearest noun (or pronoun) or to an emphatic noun.

=Divided Reference=

=20. A pronoun should be placed near the word to which it refers, and separated from words to which it might falsely seem to refer. If this method does not secure clearness, discard the pronoun and change the sentence structure.=

Uncertain reference of _which_: He dropped the bundle in the mud which he was carrying to his mother. [The reader for a moment refers the pronoun to the wrong noun. Bring _which_ nearer to its proper antecedent _bundle_.]

Right: He dropped in the mud the bundle which he was carrying to his mother.

Vague reference of _this_: My failure in mathematics was serious. My grades in English, history, and Latin were good enough. But this brought down my average. [_This?_ What _this_? Five nouns intrude between the pronoun _this_ and its proper antecedent _failure_.]

Right: In English, history, and Latin I received fairly good grades. But in mathematics I received a failure. This brought down my average.

Remote reference of _it_: If you want to make a good speech, take your hands out of your pockets, open your mouth wide, and throw yourself into it.

Right: If you want to make a good speech, take your hands out of your pockets, open your mouth wide, and throw yourself into what you are saying. [Or, better] Take your hands out of your pockets, open your mouth wide, and throw yourself into the speech.

Ambiguous reference of _he_: John spoke to the stranger, and he was very surly.

Right: John spoke to the stranger, who was very surly. [Or] John spoke in a surly manner to the stranger.

Note.--The reference of relative and demonstrative pronouns is largely dependent upon their position. The reference of a personal pronoun (_he_, _she_, _they_, etc.) is not so much dependent upon its position, the main consideration being that the antecedent shall be emphatic (See the next article.)

Exercise:

1. He was driving an old mule attached to a cart that was blind in one eye.

2. There is a grimy streak on the wall over the radiator which can be removed only with great difficulty.

3. The feet of Chinese girls were bandaged so tightly when they were babies that they could not grow.

4. He gave me a receipt for the money which he told me to keep.

5. After the pictures have been taken and the film has been removed, they are sent to the developing room where it is developed and dried.

=Weak Reference=

=21. Do not allow a pronoun to refer to a word not likely to be central in the reader's thought; a word, for example, in the possessive case, or in a parenthetical expression, or in a compound, or not expressed at all. Make the pronoun refer to an emphatic word.=

Wrong: When a poor woman came to Jane Addams' famous Hull House, she always gave help. [_Poor woman_ and _Hull House_ are the emphatic words, to which any pronoun used later is instinctively referred by the reader.]

Right: When a poor woman came to Jane Addams' famous Hull House, she always received help. [Or] When a poor woman came to Hull House, Jane Addams always gave help.

Wrong: In biology, which is the study of plants and animals we find that they are made up of unitary structures called cells. [Since the words _plants and animals_ occur only in a parenthetical clause, the reader is surprised to find them used as an antecedent.]

Right: In the study of biology we find that plants and animals are made up of unitary structures called cells.

Wrong: This old scissors-grinder sharpens them for the whole neighborhood. [The center of interest in the reader's mind is a man, not scissors.]

Right: This old scissors-grinder sharpens scissors for the whole neighborhood.

Wrong: I always liked engineers, and I have chosen that as my profession.

Right: I always liked engineering, and I have chosen it as my profession.

Absurd: When the baby is through drinking milk, it should be disconnected and put in boiling water. [The central idea in the reader's mind is _baby_, not _milk-bottle_. The writer may have been thinking about the _bottle_, but he did not make the word emphatic; in fact, he did not express it at all.]

Right: When the baby is through drinking milk, the bottle should be taken apart and put in boiling water.

Note.--Ordinarily, do not refer to the title in the first line of a theme. The reader expects you to assert something, and face forward, not to turn back to what you have said in the title.

Faulty: Color Photography

I am interested in this new development of science. For a long time I ...

Right: Color Photography

Taking pictures in color has long appealed to me as an interesting possibility ...

Exercise:

1. In Shakespeare's play _Othello_ he makes Iago a fiend.

2. The noodle-cutter is a kitchen device which saves time in making this troublesome dish.

3. The life of a forester is interesting, and I intend to follow that profession.

4. He took down his great-grandfather's old sword, who had carried it at Bunker Hill.

5. I was always making experiments in science, and I naturally acquired a liking for periodicals of that nature.

=Broad Reference=

=22. Do not use a pronoun to refer broadly to a general idea. Supply a definite antecedent or abandon the pronoun.=

Wrong: The tapper strikes the gong, which continues as long as the push button is pressed. [The writer intends that _which_ shall refer to the entire preceding clause, but the reference is intercepted by the word _gong_.]

Right [supplying a definite antecedent]: The tapper strikes the gong, a process which continues as long as the push button is pressed. [Or, abandoning the pronoun] The tapper strikes the gong as long as the push button is pressed.

Wrong: Read the directions which are printed on the bottle and it may save you from making a mistake.

Right [supplying a definite antecedent]: Read the directions which are printed on the bottle. This precaution may save you from making a mistake. [Or, abandoning the pronoun] Reading the directions on the bottle may prevent a mistake.

Wrong: The managers told him they would increase his salary if he would represent them in South America. He refused that.

Right: The managers told him they would increase his salary if he would represent them in South America. He refused the offer.

Exception.--It cannot be maintained that a pronoun must _always_ have one definite word for its antecedent. Many of the best English authors occasionally use a pronoun to refer to a clause. But the reference must always be clear.

Note.--Impersonal constructions must be used with caution. "It is raining" is correct, although _it_ has no antecedent. We desire that the antecedent shall be vague, impersonal. But unnecessary use of the indefinite _it_, _you_, or _they_ should be avoided.

Faulty: It says in our history that Columbus was an Italian.

Right: Our history says that Columbus was an Italian.

Not complimentary to the reader: You aren't hanged nowadays for stealing.

Right: No one is hanged nowadays for stealing.

Faulty: They are noted for their tact in France.

Right: The French are noted for their tact.

Exercise:

1. You use little slang in your paper which is commendable.

2. They had no reinforcements which caused them to lose the battle.

3. The carbon must be removed from pig iron to make pure steel, and that is done by terrific heat.

4. Our stenographer spends most of her spare time at a cheap movie theater, which is in itself an index of her character.

5. It says in the new rules that you aren't allowed in the building on Sunday.

=Dangling Participle or Gerund=

=23. A participle, being dependent, must refer to a noun or pronoun. The noun or pronoun should be within the sentence which contains the participle, and should be so conspicuous that the participle will be associated with it instantly and without confusion.=

Wrong: Coming in on the train, the high school building is seen. [Is the building coming in? If not, who is?]

Right: Coming in on the train, one sees the high school building.

A sentence containing a dangling participle may be corrected (1) by giving the word to which the participle refers a conspicuous position in the sentence, or (2) by replacing the participial phrase by some other construction.

Wrong: Having taken our seats, the umpire announced the batteries.

Right: Having taken our seats, we heard the umpire announce the batteries. [Or] When we had taken our seats, the umpire announced the batteries.

Wrong: She was for a long time sick, caused by overwork. [The participle _caused_ should not modify _sick_. A participle is used as an adjective, and should therefore modify a noun.]

Right--using an adjectival modifier:

She had a long sickness, {caused by} overwork. {due to }

Right--using an adverbial modifier:

{because of } She was for a long time sick {owing to } overwork. {on account of}

=When a gerund phrase (_in passing_, _while speaking_ etc.) implies the action of a special agent, indicate what the agent is. Otherwise the phrase will be dangling.=

Faulty: In talking to Mr. Brown the other day, he told me that you intend to buy a car.

Better: In talking to Mr. Brown the other day, I learned that you intend to buy a car.

Faulty: The address was concluded by reciting a passage from Wordsworth.

Better: The speaker concluded his address by reciting a passage from Wordsworth. [Or] The address was concluded by the recitation of a passage from Wordsworth.