First Grammar Lessons: Part IV, Lesson X

First Grammar Lessons: Part IV, Lesson X

Lesson X

You have noticed by now that a sentence is not just what is marked by a full stop, but is the words (few or many) that belong to one verb.

Relative pronouns are rather tiresome for two reasons.

First, they very often bring a new sentence into the middle of one already begun.

“The boy who hurt his sister was very sorry,” is two sentences.

The boy—subject,

Was very sorry—predicate,

is one sentence.

Who—subject,

Hurt his sister—predicate,

is another sentence.

Who is always a subject, and so must always have a predicate for itself.

Who is always used for persons, and because it is a subject, it is in the nominative case.

To be learnt.

“Who” is always the subject of a sentence.

Exercise X

1. Give four sentences such as:

The boy who is cutting the grass lives in the village.

Point out the separate sentences, showing the subjects and predicates.

2. Supply predicates with relative pronouns, in such sentences as:

The boy _____ _____ _____ is the blacksmith’s son.
(Give several predicates for each subject.)

3. Give a sentence with a relative pronoun, and supply the antecedent and predicate, as:

_____ _____ who is kind _____.
(The girl who is kind helps me.)

4. Join statements such as the following with a relative pronoun:

The boy is in the house. The boy saw me.
(The boy who is in the house saw me.)

5. Distinguish between the antecedent and its predicate, and the relative and its predicate, in a page of your book.