I would say, therefore, that the sentence should have read "The unremitting and rigorous accuracy....."


John W

Well thank you Mr Jazzer, at least for putting the comma after "half-gerund". That clarified things a lot.

Toodle-pip.

Baz

P.S. May I please express my astonishment that you could recognise a Johnny when you saw one?

That's nice Johnny boy. (But we won't enquire about the other Johnnys).

Baz

I suppose that depends whether you were intending to suggest Fowler created the fused participle or merely analysed it.

It is infinitely gratifying that so many Members have over the past few days expressed an interest in the Gerund, although it is saddening to see one at least of them fallen into Fowler's slough. Nevertheless for the edification and enjoyment of them all here is more concerning in particular the case of the Half-Gerund.

In the combination possessive + gerund, as in "I do not like his coming here so often," the oblique case may be substituted for the possessive, so that the gerund becomes a present participle: "I do not like him coming here so often." The difference if any appears to be that in the former construction the logical emphasis is on the possessive, in the latter on the verb. But there seems also to be a tendency to give up the latter construction altogether, as if it were a mere variation of "I do not like him to come here so often." In the following examples we could hardly alter the possessives: "in honour of its being Christmas day," and "when metal came into use, men were able to make their knives much longer, without their being afraid of their breaking." In the last sentence the first "their" could be omitted, but not changed into "them."

So also the genitive in "who told you of your wife's being there?" may be made into the common case - "of your wife being there." In such constructions as "I cannot accept the notion of school-life affecting the poet to this extent" the common case is preferred to the genitive.

Although the ing-form after the objective or common case is formally a participle, we certainly do not feel that "coming" in "I do not like him coming here" modifies "him" in the same way as it does in "I saw him coming": "coming" in the former sentence is, in fact, a Half-Gerund.

As we have seen, we recognize the gerund element in the former sentence by our instinctive tendency to regard "him coming" as a substitute for "his coming." It is important to note that the absence of a distinction between common case and genitive in the plural often makes it impossible in the spoken language to distinguish between gerund and half-gerund, as in "to prevent the ladies leaving us, I generally ordered the table to be removed" (Goldsmith), where the purely orthographic alteration of "ladies" into " ladies' " would make "leaving" into a full gerund. But "leaving" in this sentence could also be made into a full gerund by making it into "from leaving." In "pardon me blushing" we could in the same way either change "me" into "my" or insert "for." Indeed there seems little doubt that the colloquial half-gerunds in such causal constructions as "Clara caught cold sitting on the damp grass" and "Wagner tears his clothes climbing trees" have arisen through the dropping of a preposition. The half-gerund in these last two examples can easily be made into a full participle by a mere change of order, though the result will be a somewhat stilted literary form - "Clara, sitting (or having sat) on the damp grass, caught cold."

In several of the other half-gerund constructions the participle can be substituted by a change of construction. Thus "I enjoy being here" suggests "I feel enjoyment while being here."

The constructions which most resist this change are those which also allow the substitution of a possessive or genitive for the preceding objective or common case, for the change of "I do not like him coming here" into "I do not like him when coming here - when he comes here" involves a distinct change of meaning.

Now that they have read this Members will no longer be able to claim ignorance!

I should have preferred (properly punctuated) the following...

"Now that Members have read this, they shall no longer be able to claim ignorance."

Has (as it seems) Mr Jazzer never considered the difference between "will" and "shall"? (Fowler is very good on this point!)

Baz

Fowler was born in Tonbridge (Kent), and educated at Rugby and Balliol. I can find no connection at all with Slough. Perhaps Mr Jazzer has been having nightmares?

Baz