(c) An omission of connective and subject, sometimes also of copula or auxiliary, before a pair of words in opposition to each other and joined by or; as, “Rain or shine, the King rode every day for hours.”—Thackeray. This elliptical expression means “though it might rain or might shine.”
6. The elliptical adverbial clause consisting of a connective and a participial phrase. This may denote various relations,—time, manner, condition, etc., but is so frequent a construction that it seems best to treat it by itself. We have already spoken of this construction in the chapter on participial phrases, where we gave illustrations which might be disposed of without supplying any ellipsis. However, this disposition is not always satisfactory, and some may prefer to expand the clause in all cases of this kind. Illustrations are found in the following sentences:—
(a) Denoting time,—“No amount of hereditary virtue has thus far saved the merely devout communities from deteriorating, when let alone, into comfort and good dinners.”—Higginson.
(b) Denoting manner,—“It blew in enormous sighs, dying away at regular intervals, as if pausing to draw breath.”—Hearn.
(c) Denoting concession,—“Such men, however pressed with business, are always found capable of doing a little more.”
7. The elliptical adverbial clause of degree.—This is so frequent that we seldom find a clause of degree involving a comparison that is not elliptical. We shall take up first the ellipses after the conjunction than.
(a) An omission of the predicate when it is about the same as the predicate of the principal proposition; as, “Alas! books cannot be more than the men who write them (are).”
(b) An omission of both subject and verb when these are readily supplied from the context; as, “In no other spot had sympathy been more fiercely kindled than along that Western border where life was always tense with martial passion.”—J. L. Allen. After than we are to understand the words it had been kindled.
(c) An omission of the subject. This may be the impersonal it; as, “His features were more refined than (it) was usual in Roman faces.”—Froude. Or the subject understood may be the indefinite pronoun what; as, “We have a great deal more kindness than (what) is ever spoken.”—Emerson.
(d) Very much like the last type of sentence is one in which we cannot supply what but must supply those who, with the verb are for the predicate of those; as, “He met more people than could be remembered.” This clause expanded reads, “than those are who can be remembered.” This gives us a restrictive adjective clause within the clause of degree.