Page:The grammar of English grammars.djvu/295

 farthermost; near, nearer, nearest or ''next; fore, former, foremost or first; hind, hinder, hindmost or hindermost; in, inner, inmost or innermost; out, outer, or utter, outmost or utmost, outermost or uttermost; up, upper, upmost or uppermost; low, lower, lowest or lowermost; late, later or latter, latest or last''.

II. The following five want the positive: [aft, adv.,] after, aftmost or aftermost; [forth, adv., formerly furth,[180]] further, furthest or furthermost; hither, hithermost; nether, nethermost; under, undermost.

III. The following want the comparative: ''front, frontmost; rear, rearmost; head, headmost; end, endmost; top, topmost; bottom, bottommost; mid or middle, midst,[181] midmost or middlemost; north, northmost; south, southmost; east, eastmost; west, westmost; northern, northernmost; southern, southernmost; eastern, easternmost; western, westernmost''.

OBS. 2.--Many of these irregular words are not always used as adjectives, but oftener as nouns, adverbs, or prepositions. The sense in which they are employed, will show to what class they belong. The terms fore and ''hind, front and rear, right and left, in and out, high and low, top'' and bottom, up and down, upper and under, mid and after, all but the last pair, are in direct contrast with each other. Many of them are often joined in composition with other words; and some, when used as adjectives of place, are rarely separated from their nouns: as, inland, outhouse, mid-sea, after-ages. Practice is here so capricious, I find it difficult to determine whether the compounding of these terms is proper or not. It is a case about which he that inquires most, may perhaps be most in doubt. If the joining of the words prevents the possibility of mistaking the adjective for a preposition, it prevents also the separate classification of the adjective and the noun, and thus in some sense destroys the former by making the whole a noun. Dr. Webster writes thus: "FRONTROOM, n. A room or apartment in the forepart of a house. BACKROOM, n. A room behind the front room, or in the back part of the house."--Octavo Dict. So of many phrases by which people tell of turning things, or changing the position of their parts; as, inside out, outside in; upside down, downside up; wrong end ''foremost, but-end foremost; fore-part back, fore-end aft; hind'' side before, backside before. Here all these contrasted particles seem to be adjectives of place or situation. What grammarians in general would choose to call them, it is hard to say; probably, many would satisfy themselves with calling the whole "an adverbial phrase,"--the common way of disposing of every thing which it is difficult to analyze. These, and the following examples from Scott, are a fair specimen of the uncertainty of present usage:

"The herds without a keeper strayed,   The plough was in mid-furrow staid."--Lady of the Lake.

"The eager huntsman knew his bound,   And in mid chase called off his hound."--Ibidem.

OBS. 3.--For the chief points of the compass, we have so many adjectives, and so many modes of varying or comparing them, that it is difficult to tell their number, or to know which to choose in practice. (1.) ''North, south, east, and west'', are familiarly used both as nouns and as adjectives. From these it seems not improper to form superlatives, as above, by adding most; as, "From Aroar to Nebo, and the wild of southmost Abarim."--Milton. "There are no rivulets or springs in the island of Feror, the westmost of the Canaries."--''White's Nat. Hist.'' (2.) These primitive terms may also be compared, in all three of the degrees, by the adverbs farther and farthest, or further and furthest; as, "Which is yet farther west."--Bacon. (3.) Though we never employ as separate words the comparatives ''norther, souther, easter, wester, we have northerly, southerly, easterly, and westerly'', which seem to have been formed from such comparatives, by adding ly; and these four may be compared by the adverbs more and most, or less and least: as, "These hills give us a view of the most easterly, southerly, and westerly parts of England."--GRAUNT: ''in Joh. Dict.'' (4.) From these supposed comparatives likewise, some authors form the superlatives northermost, southermost, eastermost, and westermost; as, "From the westermost part of Oyster bay."--''Dr. Webster's Hist. U. S.'', p. 126. "And three miles southward of the southermost part of said bay."--''Trumbull's Hist. of Amer.'', Vol. i, p. 88. "Pockanocket was on the westermost line of Plymouth Colony."--Ib., p. 44. "As far as the northermost branch of the said bay or river."--Ib., p. 127. The propriety of these is at least questionable; and, as they are neither very necessary to the language, nor recognized by any of our lexicographers, I forbear to approve them. (5.) From the four primitives we have also a third series of positives, ending in ern; as, ''northern, southern, eastern, western''. These, though they have no comparatives of their own, not only form superlatives by assuming the termination most, but are sometimes compared, perhaps in both degrees, by a separate use of the adverbs: as, "Southernmost, a. Furthest towards the south."--Webster's Dict. "Until it shall intersect the northernmost part of the thirty-first degree of north latitude."--Articles of Peace. "To the north-westernmost head of Connecticut river."--Ib. "Thence through the said lake to the most north-western point thereof."--Ib.

OBS. 4.--It may be remarked of the comparatives former and latter or hinder, upper and under or nether, inner and outer or ''utter, after and hither; as well as of the Latin superior and inferior,