35. We use adjectives for other purposes also. For example, when we say trees, we are not speaking of any particular trees, but of trees in general. But we may add certain adjectives which point out particular trees, as for example: these trees, or those trees, or eight trees or nine trees. These adjectives limit the trees of which we are speaking to the particular trees pointed out. They do not express any particular qualities of the trees like the adjectives tall or beautiful express, but they limit the use of the word trees in its application. So we have our definition of the adjective.

36. An adjective is a word added to a noun to qualify or limit its meaning.

Exercise 1

Underscore all of the adjectives in the following quotation. Notice also the nouns and verbs in this quotation.

Yet fearsome and terrible are all the footsteps of men upon the earth, for they either descend or climb.

They descend from little mounds and high peaks and lofty altitudes, through wide roads and narrow paths, down noble marble stairs and creaky stairs of wood—and some go down to the cellar, and some to the grave, and some down to the pits of shame and infamy, and still some to the glory of an unfathomable abyss where there is nothing but the staring, white, stony eye-balls of Destiny.

They descend and they climb, the fearful footsteps of men, and some limp, some drag, some speed, some trot, some run—they are quiet, slow, noisy, brisk, quick, feverish, mad, and most awful in their cadence to the ears of the one who stands still.

But of all the footsteps of men that either descend or climb, no footsteps are so fearsome and terrible as those that go straight on the dead level of a prison floor, from a yellow stone wall to a red iron gate.—From The Walker. Giovannitti.

WORDS ADDED TO VERBS

37. From our study, you see how our classes of words grew out of man's need of them in expressing his thoughts. And notice also how the many thousands of words in our language can all be grouped under these few classes. We name the things about us; we invent words to tell what these things do; we have another class of words which describe the things which we have named; and now we come to a fourth class of words for which we also find great need.

When we come to tell what things do, we find that we need words which will tell us how or where or when these things are done. Notice the following sentences:

We would have a complete sentence and express a complete thought if we said simply, The men work, but each of these words which we have added, like busily, hard, late, etc., adds something to the meaning of the verb. These words add something to the action which is asserted by the verb, for they show how and when and where and how much the men work.