MR GRANT AND GRAMMAR.

Evening Star, Issue 3045, 21 November 1872, Page 2

MR GRANT AND GRAMMAR.

To the Editor. SCHOOL SCENE. Como up here, Mr Grant; not you, George. J. G. S., are not you a nice little fellow (o lay such claims to high class education ? What do you mean by saying to “ Onlooker” that you will not deign to take any notice of such a scurrilous effusion, at the same time you go on commenting upon it. Whore is your logic ; and are your comments quite free from scurrility ? In the ame sentence von sav, “ 1 ask him to favor us with his name. " “ Who is the “ I,” and who are the ■■ us” here referred to? Again : “Is there a man , . . in the Colony that— .” Is “that” good grammar? “ As to to the lies, Mr Grant passes them over—r.g., Gaelic is not my native tongue ” Here, in the same breath, you speak of yourself both in the third and the first person. Here also you again contrad-ct yourself. “Mr Grant passes them over ! ’ Oh, no, he do as not : Mr Grant rather adds to them. If Gaelic was not your “native,” where in the name of wonder did you pick up the brogue? Do you consider it an accomplishment ? 1 know Gaelic was your father and mother’s “native,” and that they cannot to this day speak any other tongue. \\ hero, then, did you receive your “native,” and what was it ? You would be degrading your scholarship, and putting yourself “on a par witli the anonymous ignoramus.” You conceited little thing; don’t you think it would be a blessing to yourself if you could put yourself on a par with any one possessing so much common sense. 1 am quite ashamed of you ; and unless you pay more attention to your education in future, will have you turned out of the class. Now sit down, James. Monitor. To the Editor, Sir,--Were J to adopt Mr Grant’s stylo of composition, I would have to begin my letter somewhat in this way ;—“Your correspondent Mr Grant again displays his * flippant ignorance ’ of grammar, and ‘ degrades his scholarship’ by scurrilous abuse.” Ido not care, however, to become an imitator of this “ scholar.” Mr Grant, instead of answering my objections to bis giammar, accuses me of “flippant ignorance”; of being “profoundly ignorant” of the distinction between the pluperfect and the imperfect tense. He states that my letter is a “ seunilous effusion,” and that he cannot parse it. Possibly Mr Grant may not bo able to parse ; that is his loss. I put it to your readers whether Mr Grant’s letter is any answer to my criticism. It is possible that he is correct in saying that bis “scholarship ” would bo “degraded” in defending his inelegant and ungrammatical letter, but I think that a true scholar would not, when discussing the rules of grammar, offer, in defence of bis peculiar use of even an imperfect tense, abuse of an anonymous correspondent. If the use of adjectives could prove that Mr Grant used his verbs properly, then lam undone. Unless, however, be gives me some recognised authority in proof of his assertion, 1 must simply meet bis statements by a denial. 1 would gratify Mr Grant by disclosing my name, if, in matters of grammar, a name could decide a dispute ; but I feel assured that “the only scholar in the southern liounssyliero” would scorn to be bound by even my naur*. I may be pardoned for calling Mr Grant’s attention to some inclcgancies in his last letter. In the second sentence he says, “ I will not deign,”&c. No one but a Scotchman would have used “will” in this sentence. Again, Mr Grant says :—“As to the lies, Mr Grant passes them over; e.g., Gaelic is not my (sic) no.lice tongue.” Js this elegant? 'There is an ambiguity about another sentence: “In a word, 1 deny that any one sentence of my letter is ungrammatical.” 1 suppose there may then be two sentences ungrammatical. Yours, &c., Onlooker. Dunedin, Nov. 20.