Exercise.
Correct the following sentences:—
1. An ordinary man would neither have incurred the danger of succoring Essex, nor the disgrace of assailing him.—Macaulay.
2. Those ogres will stab about and kill not only strangers, but they will outrage, murder, and chop up their own kin.—Thackeray.
3. In the course of his reading (which was neither pursued with that seriousness or that devout mind which such a study requires) the youth found himself, etc.—Id.
4. I could neither bear walking nor riding in a carriage over its pebbled streets.—Franklin.
5. Some exceptions, that can neither be dissembled nor eluded, render this mode of reasoning as indiscreet as it is superfluous.—Gibbon.
6. They will, too, not merely interest children, but grown-up persons.—Westminster Review.
7. I had even the satisfaction to see her lavish some kind looks upon my unfortunate son, which the other could neither extort by his fortune nor assiduity.—Goldsmith.
8. This was done probably to show that he was neither ashamed of his name or family.—Addison.
Try and for try to.
456. Occasionally there is found the expression try and instead of the better authorized try to; as,—
We will try and avoid personalities altogether.—Thackeray.
Did any of you ever try and read "Blackmore's Poems"?—Id.
Try and avoid the pronoun.—Bain.
We will try and get a clearer notion of them.—Ruskin.
But what.
457. Instead of the subordinate conjunction that, but, or but that, or the negative relative but, we sometimes find the bulky and needless but what. Now, it is possible to use but what when what is a relative pronoun, as, "He never had any money but what he absolutely needed;" but in the following sentences what usurps the place of a conjunction.