Page:Hand-book of Volapük (Sprauge, 1888).djvu/63

 ädalogom,being a transitiv verb, should have an object, in the kimifal, of course. We readily find this object in the next word bäledani. This we find to mean an &quot;old-man ,&quot; but even if bäledan were omitted from the vocabulary we could discover its meaning from the root bäled, age, and the ending an (an echo of man), which is applied to persons. ‰dalogom b‰ledani == he perceived an old man. Blegˆl is recognised as a participle qualifying b‰ledani, which it follows. Blegˆn is found to mean to bend. Oki is the reflexiv pronoun ok, -self in the kimifal. Therefore blegˆl oki is bending himself. It might be expressed in one word, blegˆlok. Su staf is readily found to mean on a staff. Taking the phrase together we may translate it &quot;leaning on a staff.&quot; E, and. Kˆmˆl is another participle, from kˆmˆn, to come. Al omi, to him; omi is in the kimifal because al denotes motion toward him. This is not indispensable, for al om would express the same idea. Al, of itself, conveys the idea of direction; so that there is not the same useful distinction as between in and into. In the next sentence, seeking first the verb, we recognise it in ifenoms by the personal ending oms, they and the tense prefix i. I we find in the series a, ‰, e, i, o, u (present, imperfect, perfect, pluperfect, future, future perfect); its English equivalent is &quot;had;&quot; oms is third person, plural, they; therefore we have only to look for the meaning of fen to know what &quot;they had&quot; done. Fen being to weary, ifenoms must be they had wearied. We now look back for the subject which must be plural. Tˆbs has the plural-sign and is in the kimfal. Tˆbs ifenoms == troubles had wearied. But we cannot positivly decide upon this until we examin the words which precede tˆbs, for according to the rules of position the subject must be at the beginning of the sentence. Much depends upon the particle e, for if this is a preposition, töbs, tho' in the kimfal, cannot be the subject. E proves, however, to be the conjunction and, and bäled, the noun, age. Bäled e töbs, age and troubles, form a compound subject to ifenoms. The object omi is at once recognised by its ending. Bäled e töbs ifenoms omi. == age and troubles had wearied him.