“We understand,” said Judge Grammar; “but pray explain why you divide your verbs into these three parts.”
“To show how my verbs change when they have to mark the present, past, or future time. You see, the verb ‘to be’ takes am for the present, was for the past, and adds on will or shall for the future. I am in the present time talking to your lordship. I was in the past time talking to your lordship. I shall be in the future time talking to your lordship.”
“Indeed, I hope not,” cried the Judge, putting his hands to his ears. “Pray do not go on forever talking to me. I have heard quite enough of your voice already. Step back, and allow Mr. Pronoun to take your place, and explain the rest of the conjugation to us.”
“Allow me to say one thing more,” said Dr. Verb. “Please, Mr. Parsing, whenever you see a will or shall, or any other little verb put in to show the time, will you remember that it is only a little helping verb, used to make up the tense of some other verb, and therefore to be counted in with that, and not taken alone.”
“Just give an example of what you mean,” said Serjeant Parsing; “I do not quite understand.”
“I mean to say that when you see ‘he will go,’ you must take will go as part of the verb to go; and when you see am coming, was dancing, has eaten, had fought, you must take them as parts of the verbs to come, to dance, to eat, to fight. The first words, am, was, has, had, are very good and respectable words by themselves, of course; but when they are used with another verb, they are never offended if you just take them as part of that other verb.”
“Thank you. I will remember,” said Serjeant Parsing, laughing. “Now please to stand back, and allow Mr. Pronoun to answer.—Mr. Pronoun, pray why do you use these particular six words, I, thou, he, we, you, and they, to make up Dr. Verb’s tenses?”
“I use I and we,” answered Pronoun, “to stand for the first person; thou and you to stand for the second person; and he and they to stand for the third person.”
“What do you mean by the first person?” asked Serjeant Parsing.
“My lord,” answered Mr. Pronoun, turning to Judge Grammar, “may I ask you who is the first person in Grammar-land?”