Page:The Comic English Grammar.djvu/42

38 That screams whene'er it doesn't snore?

Why, mothers!

Whose pity wipes its piping eyes,

And stills maturer childhood's cries.

Stopping its mouth with cakes and pies?

Oh! mother's!

And whom, when master, fierce and fell,

Dusts truant varlets' jackets well.

Whom do they, roaring, run and tell?

Their mothers!

English Adjective, whatever may be its gender, number, or case, like a rusty weathercock, never varies. Thus we say, "A certain cabinet; certain rogues."

But as a rusty weathercock may vary in being more or less rusty, so an adjective varies in the degrees of comparison.

The degrees of comparison, like the Genders, the Graces, the Fates, the Kings of Cologne, the Weird Sisters, and many other things, are three; the Positive, the Comparative, and the Superlative.

The Positive state simply expresses the quality of an object; as, fat, ugly, foolish.

The Comparative degree increases or lessens the