V. MISUSE OF RELATIVE PRONOUNS.
Anacoluthic use of which.
418. There is now and then found in the pages of literature a construction which imitates the Latin, but which is usually carefully avoided. It is a use of the relative which so as to make an anacoluthon, or lack of proper connection between the clauses; for example,—
Which, if I had resolved to go on with, I might as well have staid at home.—Defoe
Which if he attempted to do, Mr. Billings vowed that he would follow him to Jerusalem.—Thackeray.
We know not the incantation of the heart that would wake them;—which if they once heard, they would start up to meet us in the power of long ago.—Ruskin.
He delivered the letter, which when Mr. Thornhill had read, he said that all submission was now too late.—Goldsmith.
But still the house affairs would draw her thence;
Which ever as she could with haste dispatch,
She'd come again.
—Shakespeare.
As the sentences stand, which really has no office in the sentence: it should be changed to a demonstrative or a personal pronoun, and this be placed in the proper clause.
Exercise.—Rewrite the above five sentences so as to make the proper grammatical connection in each.
And who, and which, etc.
419. There is another kind of expression which slips into the lines of even standard authors, but which is always regarded as an oversight and a blemish.
The following sentence affords an example: "The rich are now engaged in distributing what remains among the poorer sort, and who are now thrown upon their compassion." The trouble is that such conjunctions as and, but, or, etc., should connect expressions of the same kind: and who makes us look for a preceding who, but none is expressed. There are three ways to remedy the sentence quoted: thus, (1) "Among those who are poor, and who are now," etc.; (2) "Among the poorer sort, who are now thrown," etc.; (3) "Among the poorer sort, now thrown upon their," etc. That is,—
Direction for rewriting.
Express both relatives, or omit the conjunction, or leave out both connective and relative.