| prince | princess |
| master | mistress |
| host | hostess |
| count | countess |
| tiger | tigress |
| lion | lioness |
| actor | actress |
| god | goddess |
87. Names of things without sex are, of course, of neither gender, and are called neuter nouns. Neuter means literally neither. Such nouns as mountain, iron, river, chair, are neuter.
Sometimes the feminine is an entirely different word from the masculine. Thus:
| king | queen |
| lord | lady |
| man | woman |
| youth | maiden |
| sir | madam |
| stag | hind |
88. Many nouns that denote living beings apply alike to male and female, and are said to be of common gender. As woman enters more and more into the business world and pursues the same occupations as man, the change in form to denote the feminine is used less frequently, and what we have called the masculine form is used for both sexes, thus:
Poet, waiter, doctor, editor—these nouns are used for both men and women.
POSSESSIVE FORM
89. There is just one more change made in the form of a noun, and that is when we wish to show who or what owns or possesses a thing. Thus we write:
- John's book.
- The boy's hat.
And since this form of the noun denotes possession, it is called the possessive form. Some grammarians call this the possessive case.