1. The hyphen is needed in a compound adjective, if there is any doubt as to the meaning when the hyphen is omitted. “Red-hot iron” may be a different idea from “red hot iron.”
2. Numbers like the following take the hyphen: seventy-three, seventy-third.
3. Many a word once compounded is now written solid, that is, as a single word: railroad, steamboat, anybody, anything, raindrop, forever, schoolboy, schoolhouse, schoolmate, schoolfellow (but school days, school teacher, school district); myself, yourself (but one’s self); childlike, lifelike. All these words but two, it will be seen, have a monosyllable for the first part. When in doubt as to whether or not a hyphen is needed, consult some special manual like Bigelow’s Handbook of Punctuation.
In all your writing, join distinctly syllables that you wish to have go together. Notice the absurd and misleading effect of such careless writing as this: “He was a glass maker and worked down at the glass house; his gal lant moust ache and his loud voice trai ned by blow ing glass mad e him wel come at the harvest home celebrations.”
Possessives.—The possessive singular of a monosyllable ending in s is regularly made by adding ’s, pronounced as an extra syllable. Thus: Jones’s; Briggs’s. For the polysyllable ending in s or the sound of s, merely the apostrophe is usually required, as in the plural. Thus: “Moses’ seat”; “conscience’ sake.”
Singulars and Plurals.—Spell aloud by syllables, and write from dictation the plurals of the following: Analysis, animalcule, antithesis, appendix, bandit, cherub, crisis, ellipsis, focus, fungus, genus, hypothesis, madame, memorandum, monsieur, mother-in-law, mussulman, nebula, oasis, parenthesis, radius, spoonful, synopsis.
What are the singulars—if singulars there are—of data, errata, magi, strata, vertebræ?
Written Exercise.—Below are given the correct form of certain words often misspelled by pupils in the first and second years of a secondary school. Without previous study write each word from dictation. Afterwards spell aloud by syllables each word that you misspelled in writing from dictation. Then write at least twenty times the correct form. The object is to acquire a kind of automatic correctness. In composing, one should have his mind free for thought; one should not have to think much more about spelling than about breathing.
Accompany; advisability; all right; anniversary; appearance; associated; bargained; buried; carriage; catarrh; cemetery; characteristic; commander; commotion; conceive; condescension; confidants; confidence; deceive; describe; descriptions; despair; difficulty; dilapidate; disappointed; disappeared; ecstasy; enemies; enemy; exaggerate; excrescence; existence; fascination; fatiguing; finally; further; grammar; handkerchief; hating; hemorrhage; immature; indispensable; irresistible; lightning; literary; living; loathsome; lose (the money); manœuvre; melancholy; minister; ministry; misshapen; necessary; niece; occurrence; offered; opportunity; outrageous; parallel; paralysis; peaceable; persuade; planned; poniard; primitive; principal (objection); principle (of action); privilege; promenading; pursuit; received; recommend; redoubtable; referred; representatives; rhythm; sacrilegious; secretary; seize; seized; separate; shoeing; siege; simile; stopped; striking; studied; superintendent; supposing; tenants; theatre; their (money); transferred; until; veil (on face); vengeance; very; village; wasn’t; whether; Roger de Coverley; George Eliot; Lord Macaulay; Michigan; Thackeray.