IV

1. Write four sentences illustrating the use of the objective case as indirect object; four illustrating its use as the object of a preposition; four illustrating its use as adverbial objective; and four illustrating its use as an appositive.

2. Write a sentence containing a nominative, a possessive, and an objective case.

CHAPTER LXV

THE N.C.-4

For Study and Composition

If you had been in Lisbon, Portugal, during the evening of May 27, 1919, you would have seen a group of excited men and women straining their eyes seaward as if expecting a strange arrival. They are not looking at the sea or beyond it. They are looking at the sky above the sea. "There she is! There she is!" they cry. Against the far western horizon there appears a tiny speck. That speck is a Navy-Curtiss airplane, now known around the world as the N.C.-4. She had left the New World on May 16. After a flight of 1200 miles she had reached the Azores Islands on May 17; here she remained ten days. When she started for the continent of Europe on the morning of May 27, the whole world stood on tiptoe to catch the first news of her arrival in Lisbon. When the eager crowd in the Portuguese capital cried, "There she is! There she is!" one of the age-long dreams of mankind had been realized, and May 27, 1919, became the date of a new Declaration of Independence.

To whom belongs the credit? Shall we ascribe the glory to the American Navy, through whose vision and coöperation the great transatlantic trip was made possible? Shall we award our high

est honors to Lieutenant Commander A. C. Read and his dauntless crew, who brought the N.C.-4 along her perilous way through fog and storm and darkness to her destined haven? Shall we say that the Liberty Motor, the engine that actually drove the huge craft to her goal, should receive first award? Or do our minds travel back to two American country boys, Wilbur and Orville Wright, who in 1903 proved at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, that the dream of an overseas flight would yet be a reality?

To each and to all honor is due. But, to my mind, the power of the human spirit to will a thing and then to do it deserves the laurel over and above any one man or any one group of men. Idealism is the greatest motor power on earth. Steam, electricity, gasoline, radium, - these are but handmaidens in the service of the mind that is lifted and energized by a great ideal. All inventions, all discoveries, all achievements that have served as milestones in human progress, were first wrought out in the brain of a thinker who saw them in vision and toiled patiently and resolutely for their fulfillment. If he failed, the torch was passed on from hand to hand, from century to century, from race to race, and at last from seeming defeat to assured victory. The N.C.-4 is not a deed done; it is an ideal of greater deeds yet to be done. May 27, 1919, is not a vanished day; it is an unending challenge to the human spirit.

EXERCISES

I

Phrase the topic of each of the three paragraphs just read.

II

Find other topics suggested. Perhaps you have read something or can find something about Lieutenant Commander A. C. Read; or Glenn Hammond Curtiss, whose

name is borne by the great N.C.'s; or about the Wright brothers. Perhaps you have seen a picture of one of the N.C.'s.

By the time you read this, other airplanes may have crossed the ocean without stopping at the Azores.

In the first verse of the twenty-first chapter of Revelation, you will find the words': "And there was no more sea." These words were a prophecy. Show how (1) the sailing ship, (2) the steamship, and (3) the airplane have helped to fulfill the prophecy.

Let your imagination dwell on the future triumphs of transoceanic aviation: point out the advantages to commerce; show how disease and famine may be stopped by the quick transportation of medicine and food; you might tell this in a story.

You might give an imaginary sketch of the first flight across the Pacific, or to the North Pole. Measure the distances in your geography and let your imaginary sketch be based on facts as far as you know them.

III

Select your own subject, work out the paragraph topics, hand the outline to your teacher, and, without notes before you, talk for not more than four minutes on the subject chosen.

IV

After talking on your chosen subject, write a composition on it. Use the same paragraph topics, unless your speech has suggested improvements.

CHAPTER LXVI

PERSONAL PRONOUNS

Kinds of Pronouns.

Study the italicized pronouns in these sentences:

1. I told you that he had gone.

2. Who was with him?

3. There was nobody with him except his two servants, who had never left him.

4. I saw one of them, and heard about the other.

Of these, I, you, and he are personal pronouns, I standing for the speaker, you for the person spoken to, and he for the person spoken of; who in sentence 3 is a relative pronoun, referring back to servants and introducing an adjective clause; Who in sentence 2 is an interrogative pronoun used to ask a question; nobody is an indefinite pronoun, standing for no particular person; one and other are adjective pronouns, because they may be followed by nouns as, one man, other engagements - and thus become adjectives.

Personal pronouns are pronouns that have different forms for the person speaking, the person spoken to, and the person or thing spoken of.

A relative pronoun is a pronoun that joins an adjective clause to a preceding noun or pronoun.

Interrogative pronouns are used in asking questions. Indefinite pronouns indicate persons or things vaguely. Adjective pronouns are pronouns that may be used as adjectives.

Declension.

The pronoun of the first person is I; of the second, you or thou; of the third, he, she, it. The compound pronouns myself, ourselves; yourself, yourselves; himself, themselves — are really personal pronouns, but are not used in the possessive case. The pronouns of the three persons are declined thus:

Poss.

Obj.

you

PL.

you

SING.

thou

PL.

ye

your, yours your, yours thy, thine your, yours

The Two Forms of the Possessive.

It will be noticed that all of the personal pronouns except he and it have two forms for the possessive. The forms my, our, your, thy, her, and their are used when a noun follows; mine, ours, yours, thine, hers, and theirs are used when the noun is omitted: