NEW GRAMMAR OF FRENCH GRAMMARS, COMPRISING THE SUBSTANCE OF ALL THE MOST APPROVED BUT MORE ESPECIALLY OF THE STANDARD WORK "LA GRAMMAIRE DES GRAMMAIRES," SANCTIONED BY THE FRENCH ACADEMY AND THE UNIVERSITY OF PARIS. WITH NUMEROUS EXERCISES AND EXAMPLES, ILLUSTRATIVE For the Use of Schools and Private Students. BY M. DE FIVAS, FRENCH MASTER IN THE HIGH SCHOOL OF EDINBURGH, It lets you see with one cast of the eye the substance of a hundred pages. LONDON: PRINTED FOR THE AUTHOR, AND PUBLISHED BY SIMPKIN, MARSHALL & CO., STATIONERS' COURT; M DCCC XL. [Price Three Shillings and Sixpence bound.] 100. "At once the simplest and most complete Grammar of the French Language. To the Scholar, the effect is almost as if he looked into a map, so well-defined is the course of study as explained by M. De Fivas."-(Scottish Lit. Gazette.) "This Grammar is the most systematic and distinct that we have seen :- the work is simple in its arrangement; clear and precise in its definitions; and the Exercises under each head, most appropriate and useful.-(Edin. Chronicle.) "This Grammar is the cheapest, most concise, philosophical, and satisfactory which has come under our notice."-(Edinburgh Journal.) "The Rules are greatly simplified, and the Exercises judiciously selected. This work might be introduced with advantage into every School where the French Language and Literature are studied."—(Edinburgh Advertiser.) "The distinguishing features of this work are, its embodiment of the latest changes and modifications of the French language. In the writing and arrangement of the work, M. De Fivas has displayed great skill."—( Scotsman.); "This is an excellent book-lucid and comprehensive. It contains the latest improvements made by the French Academicians."-(Gateshead Observer.) "In this work every thing is plain and clear to the most obtuse understanding; the Exercises are excellent, being individually easily understood, and conse cutively so arranged as to carry the pupil step by step to a thorough acquaintance with the language.-One of the best recommendations of this well-written Grammar is, that it is framed on the orthography and practice of the language at the present day, which we do not believe to be the case with 595 out of the 600 at present in use."-(Tyne Mercury.) ENTERED IN STATIONERS' Hall. PREFACE. Presque partout, deux hommes d'esprit, de nation diverse, WE read, in a recent London publication, that there are about six hundred French Grammars for the use of English students. Now, How many of these exhibit the orthography and rules of the language as they are fixed at the present day? The impossibility of satisfactorily answering this question, first suggested to me the idea of producing a work that should embody the latest decisions of the French Academy, with the most lucid and concise rules of the most approved modern French Grammarians. The single fact of the French Academy having lately published a new edition of their Dictionary, generally revised and greatly enlarged, shows in an obvious point of view the call that is made for a new and improved French Grammar. The French Academicians are the first literary body in France; their Dictionary is the regulator of the French language, and in jurisprudence it stands as a law. The preceding edition of this learned work appeared in 1762. When the first Revolution broke out, the Convention seized the copy→ right of it as national property, and appointed the Parisian booksellers, Smith and Maradan, to re-publish the work, which they did in 1798; that edition, however, is not authentic, and was never acknowledged by the Academy. Since 1762, the French language has undergone many changes and modifications. Some words have become obsolete, and some old ones have been revived. The new political institutions have |