The noise was tremendous, and the Judge, finding himself only one against a number, thought he had better turn the subject; and clapping his hands loudly, to call for silence, he called out:
“But if we are all firsts and seconds, pray where is the third person to go?”
“Oh, the third person,” said Pronoun, contemptuously, “is only the one we are talking about. He may not be here, so it cannot matter if we call him only the third person.”
“And what is the use of your having pronouns to stand for all these three persons in Dr. Verb’s tenses?” asked Serjeant Parsing.
“Dr. Verb and I agree together to alter our words according to the person they represent,” said Mr. Pronoun. “When my pronoun is in the first person, Dr. Verb has to make his verb in the first person too. He has to say am when I have put I, and are when I have put we. I is, or we art, would make Dr. Syntax there very angry.”
“And he would be rightly angry,” replied the Judge. “You know that very well.”
“Oh, I am not complaining, my lord,” answered Pronoun; “I was merely stating a fact. Of course I am rather pleased than otherwise that Dr. Verb should have to alter his words to make them agree with mine. My pronouns show the person (that is why, you know, they are called personal pronouns), and then Dr. Verb has to make his words agree with them.”
“Very fine!” remarked Serjeant Parsing, “But tell us, Mr. Pronoun, why, when there are only three different persons, you should have six different pronouns in each tense?”
“Three of them are for the singular number, standing for only one—I, thou, he,” replied Pronoun; “and the other three are for the plural number, standing for as many as you like—we, you, and they.”
“Singular number only one, I, thou, he; plural number more than one, we, you, they;—that is it, is it not, Mr. Pronoun?” asked Serjeant Parsing.