Page:A handbook of the Cornish language; Chiefly in its latest stages with some account of its history and literature.djvu/189

 170 GRAMMAR is not found at all in Cornish of the latest period (except in a doubtful and muddled form in Keigwin's version of the Commandments), though Lhuyd gives a fragment of it in his Grammar, evidently taken from the earlier Dramas and not from oral tradition, for he takes the g of geffi and gefyth to be a hard g, whereas it is plainly a soft g for a d, as the analogy of tevyth, and of the Breton deveus, devez, etc., shows. Moreover, it is some- times written ieves, which is intended to represent jeves. It will be well, by way of making this form clearer, to give not only the Cornish but also the corresponding Breton. The tenses that are found are as follows : I. THE PRESENT. Singular. CORNISH. BRETON. 1. [;/] am bes [bus, bues, bues. [me] emeuz. 2. [//] ath es (thiies). te e<?h euz. 3. m. [ev an jeves (for deves). hen en deuz or deveuz. 3. f. hy as teves. he e deuz. Plural. 1. y an bes. [ni hon euz. 2. [why] as bes. [c'Aout] hock euz. 3. _y as teves. hi ho deuz or deveuz. This tense is formed on us, eus, es (Breton euz}, one of the forms of the third person singular of the verb substantive. To this is prefixed the verbal particle a t with the letter which is the third form of the personal pro- noun, 'm, Y/2, ', 's, 'n, 's, 's, with the peculiar addition of jev and tev to the third persons and b to the others. The 'tk of the second person singular is found written in this but not always in the other tenses, for it was probably often silent before f by a sort of assimila- tion. Its effect is observable in the initial mutation. Of this tense the first, second, and third persons singular