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of Boston spoke against it, as did Messrs. Parish of Springfield, Northrop of Massachusetts, Allen of Pennsylvania, Jones of Roxbury, Allen of Newton, Adams of Boston, and Rev. Mr. Trask of Fitchburg. Mr. Greenleaf of Brooklyn, N. Y., rather favored the introduction of the military element into the school system. Messrs. Sawyer of New Hampshire, Woolworth of New York, and Dr. Lewis of Boston, also opposed the introduction of military education into our schools. Here the subject was laid on the table

by a vote of the Institute. The views presented by Mr. Russell, in his lecture yesterday, were severely handled by the speakers generally. There was a most thorough and unanimous dissent from the notion of introducing military tactics into the public schools. It was urged that the tendency of such an innovation would tend to the essential demoralization of the young.

Resolutions were offered commemorative of the death of President Felton, and of Mr. Kimball of Needham, Mass., members of the Institute. Remarks were made by Thayer, Parish, Wetherell, and Ticknor, and the resolutions were adopted.

At 11 A. M. a lecture on the " Progress of Learning in Europe,” was read by L. W. Grandgent of the Mayhew School of Boston. In tracing the history of the subject, he stated that Ireland was the seat of learned men of Western Europe from the third to the ninth century. Oxford University and Cambridge University were founded subsequently in England. At the beginning of the ninth century, knowledge was revived. Thus the lecturer traced his subject down to the present day.

AFTERNOON SESSION.

progress of

D. N. Camp, in his lecture, spoke of the change and man, under the influences of education. He alluded to the influences of the press in the work of education. "The Teacher, as the Agent in the work of Civilization," was his subject. He spoke of art, science, and literature as the means to be used in the work of education. He sketched the line of teachers down from Adam, through Moses, Joshua, Abraham, the prophets, princes and priests, coming down to the time of Jesus and the apostles; and leaving sacred history he spoke of the teachers of Greece and Rome, including orators, historians, philosophers, poets, and artists; also

of Arabia, Turkey, Spain, England, Ireland, and our own country.

The evening session was, as usual, devoted to brief addresses on the condition of the schools, and state of education in the States represented by teachers at the meeting of the Institute.

UNCOUTH ENGLISH.

WITHIN a few years a neologistic phrase has become more or less frequent in both colloquial and written language, and is used by the educated as well as those who make no pretensions to letters. It is seen in the following quotations, to wit: "The house is being built," "The money is being collected," "Books are being reprinted," "Are being educated," "It was being uttered," etc. Such phrases as these, the distinguished Archbishop Whateley, the learned rhetorician, logician, and scholar, calls " Uncouth English."

Pickbourn, in his Dissertation on the English verb, says, "The propriety of these imperfect passive tenses has been doubted by almost all our grammarians." The North American Review says, "Several other expressions of this sort now and then occur, such as the new-fangled and most uncouth solecism, is being done' for the good old English idiomatic expression, 'is doing,' — an absurd periphrasis, driving out a pointed and pithy term of the English language."

Everett wrote, "The spot where this new and strange tragedy was acting;" Daniel Webster, "An attempt is making," etc.;. Irving, "The fortress is building;" also, "The expedition is fitting out ;" the North American Review, "The church now erecting;' Cooper, "The movement was making;" Bancroft, "While these things were transacting in England;" Bishop Whitehouse, “The money is collecting." Examples like the foregoing might be almost indefinitely multiplied from the best English writers on both sides of the Atlantic; but let these suffice by way of illustrating what is regarded as good English, and also of condemning "Uncouth English," justly so called.

The late Prof. Gibbs of Yale College, and who was a celebrated

philologist, remarked as follows upon this "uncouth solecism,” "The house is being built," "It is liable to several important objections:

"1. It appears formal and pedantic. There is a stiffness about it. The easy and natural expression, is, the house is building.

"2. It is not found in the common English version of the Bible. Then said the Jews, forty and six years was this temple in building;' while the ark was a preparing.' In comparing these and other examples that might be cited from the Bible, there was no occasion to use this participle [being]. Indeed, it is of quite modern origin.

"3. The words being built thus used have a different meaning from what they have in the sentence, the house, being built, will be rented. There is no reason why the same words used as an attribute, and as a predicate, should differ in meaning. There is nothing in the phrase which fits it for this new use. The difficulty, which lies in the nature of the past participle, still remains. "4. It has not, so far as I know, the support of any respectable grammarian."

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Dr. Worcester, in his new Dictionary, condemns such a use of being," as is now common in some newspapers; also in colloquial language.

Goold Brown, in his "Grammar of English Grammars," discusses this solecism at length, and exposes its absurdity with great clearness and force. "Orders are now concerting," "The books are printing," "The books are selling," and many more of a like construction are condemned by some critics, under the notion that the participle in ing must never be passive. Mr. Brown says, "but the usage is unquestionably of far better authority, and, according to my apprehension, in far better taste, than the more complex phraseology which some late writers adopt in its stead; as, "The books are now being sold," "Whiskey shops are being opened." The question, says Mr. Brown, is "Which is the most correct expression, While the bridge was building,'-'While the bridge was a building,' or, While the bridge was being built?' Or are they all wrong? If all wrong, then reject them, and say, 'While they were building the bridge.' Dr. Johnson wrote, 'I am going,' I have been walking,' etc., The grammar is now printing,'

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Grammatica jam nunc chartis imprimitur. The brass is forging,' Era excuduntur. The Doctor preferred, The brass is a forging,' 'The book is a printing,' 'a being properly at and printing and forging verbal nouns.' Mr. Brown objects to this. As to the notion of introducing a new and more complex passive form of conjugation, as The bridge is being built,' 'The bridge was being built,' etc., it is one of the most absurd and monstrous innovations ever thought of. Yet some who delight in huge absurdities, declare that this modern innovation is likely to supersede' the simpler mode of expression. Thus for 'The work is publishing,' they say The work is being published.' This is certainly no better English than The work was being published, has been being published, had been being published, shall or will have been being published, and so on through all the moods and tenses. language shall we have when our verbs are thus conjugated!

What a

A certain Irish critic outdoes these Americanisms, cited above, by repudiating the passive use of the participle in ing, and by denying the passive form of the present tense, "I am smitten," "I am loved," etc., and says the true form is, "I am being smitten," "I am being loved," etc. This author dedicated his grammar to

Common Sense.

The absurdity of using "being" as employed in the following construction, "The house is being built," is obvious; for, the implication is, "The house is existing, built," or "is built," when progression or progressive building is intended. Consider for a moment the synopsis of this construction through the modes and tenses, as, "The house is being built, was being built, has been being built, shall or will be being built, shall or will have been being built; the house may or can be being built, might could would or should be being built, may or can have been being built, might could would or should have been being built; the infinitive "to be being built, to have been being built;" and the participle, "being being built, being been built, having being been built."

If this does not convict any thoughtful student of the monstrous absurdity of this mode of writing, then there is little or no hope of his linguistic reformation. Of such, let it be said as of Ephraim of old, "He is joined to his absurdity, let him alone." Let the good old idiomatic expression, or mode of construction in such

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cases be adhered to, both in writing and in speaking, and let this new-fangled and most uncouth solecism," "is being done," etc., etc., be forever eschewed. Boston Cultivator.

THE SCOTCH MUSIC-MASTER.

A HIGHLAND piper, having a scholar to teach, disdained to crack his brains with the names of semibreves, minims, crotchets, and quavers. Here, Donald," said he, "tak' yer pipes, lad, and gie us a blast. So, verra weel blawn, indeed; but what's a sound, Donald, without sense? You may blaw forever without making a tune o't, if I dinna tell you how the queer things on the paper maun help you. You see that big fellow, wi' a round, open face (pointing to a semibreve between two lines of a bar,) he moves slowly from that line to this, while ye beat ane wi' your fist and gie a long blast; if, now, ye put a leg to him ye mak' twa o' him, and he'll move twice as fast; an, if ye black his face, he 'll run four times faster than the fellow wi' the white face; but if, after blacking his face, ye 'll bend his knee, or tie his leg, he 'll hop eight times faster than the white-faced chap I showed you first. Now, whene'er you blaw your pipes, Donald, remember this— that the tighter those fellow's legs are tied, the faster they 'll run, and the quicker they're sure to dance."

DERRIVAL tells us that the old English word diaper is derived from d'Ipre, a town in Flanders, where clothes were embroidered with rich work. It was a very choice word, as shown in the classic lines

"So works the dainty Spring, When she doth diaper the ground with flowers."

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