It must not be inferred that our grammar is just like the Anglo-Saxon because this is the basis of it. The Anglo-Saxon had many more inflections (case-endings of nouns and pronouns, etc.) than the French, and in the forming of English most of these were dropped, prepositions and auxiliaries coming to be used instead. It was not until about a.d. 1550 that the language had become in the main what it now is. Some words have since been lost, and many have been added, but its grammar has changed very little. Our version of the Bible, published in 1611, shows what English then was (and had been for fifty years or more), and has done much to keep it from further change.
As a rule the most common words—those that chiefly make up the language of childhood and of every-day life—are Saxon; and very many of them are words of one syllable. In the inscription above, every monosyllable is Saxon, with Boston, grateful, and coming; the rest are French or Latin. In the case of pairs of words having the same meaning, one is likely to be Saxon, the other Classical. Thus happiness is Saxon, felicity is French; begin is Saxon, commence is French; freedom is Saxon, liberty is French, etc. The Saxon is often to be preferred, though not always; but, as has been implied above, if a short and simple word conveys our meaning, we should never put it aside for a longer and less familiar one. In such cases the chances are that the former is Saxon, and the latter Classical. Thus above, citizens, sacrificed, preserved, integrity, and erected are all Classical.
THE STORY OF GEORGE WASHINGTON.
BY EDWARD C. CARY.
Chapter III.
Washington spent about nine months with the army around Boston. Several times he was ready to attack the British, and to try and drive them from the city; but his officers were afraid the army was not strong enough. So Washington had to wait and watch—he had a good deal of waiting and watching to do all through the war, for that matter. At last, in March, 1776, the Americans around Boston having gradually pushed closer and closer, the British found that they must either leave or fight. Their General did not feel strong enough to fight, so he put his men on ships and sailed away to Halifax. Of course the Americans were greatly rejoiced. Washington got much praise, and deserved it, for he had shown great good judgment and skill in his management of the army.
Washington knew that the British would soon come back, and thought they would come to New York. So he took nearly all his army, and marched them westward to that city.
Early in July the British came, as Washington had expected, and made their camp on the beautiful hillsides of Staten Island. They brought with them what they called propositions for peace. These were simply offers to pardon the Americans for resisting the British tax laws, if they would now obey them. But this would only have left things exactly as they were in the beginning; it came too late. The Americans had already made up their minds that they would not obey the British laws which taxed them, nor any laws of Great Britain, but that in the future they would make their own laws in such manner as seemed to them most just. This purpose was written out in a long paper called the Declaration of Independence, and was signed on the Fourth of July, 1776, by the members of Congress. General Washington caused the Declaration of Independence to be read to his soldiers. "Now," he said to them, "the peace and safety of our country depend, under God, solely on the success of our arms," and he appealed to "every officer and soldier to act with fidelity and courage."
The year 1776 was a very gloomy one. All efforts to hold New York failed. A hard battle was fought around Brooklyn (August 27), and the Americans were badly beaten. Washington had to give up New York, and content himself with trying to keep the British from going to Philadelphia. Late in the fall he got across the Delaware River, with the British close on his heels. Soon the river filled with ice, as the cold weather came on, and the two armies lay one on one side and the other on the other. The American troops had dwindled away until there were only about three thousand of them.