All these intransitives form their præterite by a change of vowel, as sink, sank; all the transitives by the addition of dor t, as fell, fell'd.

3. Verbs derived from nouns by a change of accent; as to survéy, from a súrvey. Walker attributes the change of accent to the influence of the participial termination -ing. All words thus affected are of foreign origin.

4. Verbs formed from nouns by changing a final sharp consonant into its corresponding flat one; as

CHAPTER XXIII.

ON THE PERSONS.

§ 379. COMPARED with the Latin, the Greek, the MœsoGothic, and almost all the ancient languages, there is, in English, in respect to the persons of the verbs, but a very slight amount of inflection. This may be seen by comparing the English word call with the Latin voco.

Here the Latins have different forms for each different person, whilst the English have forms for two only; and even of these one (callest) is becoming obsolete. With the forms of voco marked in italics there is, in the current English, nothing correspondent.

In the word am, as compared with are and art, we find a sign of the first person singular.

In the old forms tellen, weren, &c. we have a sign of the plural number.

In the Modern English, the Old English, and the AngloSaxon, the peculiarities of our personal inflections are very great. This may be seen from the following tables of compa

Herein remark; 1. the Anglo-Saxon addition of t in the second person singular; 2. the identity in form of the three persons of the plural number; 3. the change of -ad, into -en in the Old English plural; 4. the total absence of plural forms in the Modern English; 5. the change of the th into s, in loveth and loves.

§ 380. The present state of the personal inflection in English, so different from that of the older languages, has been brought about by two processes.

1. Change of form.—a) The ejection of -es in -mes, as in sókjam and köllum, compared with prennames; b) the ejection of -m, as in the first person singular, almost throughout; c) the change of -s into -r, as in the Norse kallar, compared with the Germanic sókeis; d) the ejection of -d from -nd, as in loven (if this be the true explanation of that form) compared with prennant; e) the ejection of -nd, as in kalla; f) the addition of -t, as

in lufast and lovest. In all these cases we have a change of form.

2. Confusion or extension.-In vulgarisms like I goes, I is, one person is used instead of another. In vulgarisms like I are, we goes, one number is used instead of another. In vulgarisms like I be tired, or if I am tired, one mood is used instead of another. In vulgarisms like I give for I gave, one tense is used for another. In all this there is confusion. There is also extension: since, in the phrase I is, the third person is used instead of the first; in other words, it is used with an extension of its natural meaning. It has the power of the third person that of the first. In the course of time one person may entirely supplant, supersede, or replace another. The application of this is as follows:-—

The only person of the plural number originally ending in is the second; as sókeip, prennat, kalliþ, lufiað; the original ending of the first person being -mes or -m, as prennames, sókjam, köllum. Now, in Anglo-Saxon, the other two persons end in, as lufiað. Has -m, or -mes, changed to, or has the second person superseded the first? The latter alternative seems the likelier.

§ 381. The detail of the persons seems to be as follows:I call, first person singular.-The word call is not one person more than another. It is the simple verb, wholly uninflected. It is very probable that the first person was the one where the characteristic termination was first lost. In the Modern Norse language it is replaced by the second: Jeg taler = I speak, Danish.

Thou callest, second person singular. The final -t appears throughout the Anglo-Saxon, although wanting in Old Saxon. In Old High-German it begins to appear in Otfrid, and is general in Notker. In Middle High-German and New HighGerman it is universal.-Deutsche Grammatik, i. 1041. 857.

He calleth or he calls, third person singular.-The -s in calls is the -th in calleth, changed. The Norse form kallar either derives its-r from the -th by way of change, or else the form is that of the second person replacing the first.

Lufia, Anglo-Saxon, first person plural.-The second person in place of the first. The same in Old Saxon.

Lufia, Anglo-Saxon, third person plural.-Possibly changed from -ND, as in sókjand. Possibly the second person.

Loven, Old English.-For all the persons of the plural. This form may be accounted for in three ways: 1. The -m of the Moso-Gothic and Old High-German became -n; as it is in the Middle and Modern German, where all traces of the original -m are lost. In this case the first person has replaced the other two. 2. The -nd may have become -n; in which case it is the third person that replaces the others. 3. The indicative form loven may have arisen out of a subjunctive one; since there was in Anglo-Saxon the form lufion, or lufian, subjunctive.

§ 382. The person in -T.-Art, wast, wert, shalt, wilt. Here the second person singular ends, not in -st, but in -t. A reason for this (though not wholly satisfactory) we find in the MœsoGothic and the Icelandic.

In those languages the form of the person changes with the tense, and the second singular of the præterite tense of one conjugation is not -s, but -t; as Moso-Gothic, svór I swore, svórt thou swarest, gráip = I griped, gráipt = thou gripedst ; Icelandic, brannt = thou burnest, gaft = thou gavest. In the same languages ten verbs are conjugated like præterites. Of these, in each language, skal is one.

§ 383. Thou spakest, thou brakest, thou sungest.—In these forms there is a slight though natural anomaly. The second singular præterite in A. S. was formed not in -st, but in -e; as þú funde thou foundest, þú sungethou sungest. Hence,