A Noun is a word used as the name of a person, place, or thing;

 as, Akbar was a great King. Kolkata is on the Hooghly. The rose smells sweet. The sun shines bright. His courage won him honour. Note: The word thing includes (i) all objects that we can see, hear, taste, touch, or smell; and (ii) something that we can think of, but cannot perceive by the senses.

 THE NOUN: KINDS OF NOUNS

19. A Noun is a word used as the name of a person, place or thing. Note: The word thing is used to mean anything that we can think of.

20. Look at the following sentence: Asoka was a wise king.

The noun Asoka refers to a particular king, but the noun king might be applied to any other king as well as to Asoka. We call Asoka a Proper Noun, and king a Common Noun. Similarly:

Sita is a Proper Noun, while girl is a Common Noun.

Hart is a Proper Noun, while boy is a Common Noun.

Kolkata is a Proper Noun, while city is a Common Noun.

India is a Proper Noun, while country is a Common Noun.

The word girl is a Common Noun, because it is a name common to all girls, while Sita is a Proper Noun because it is the name of a particular girl.

A Verb is a word used lo express an action or state;

as The girl wrote a letter to her cousin. Kolkata is a big city. Iron and copper are useful metals.

Def. - A Common Noun is a name given in common to every person or thing of the same class or kind. [Common here means shared by all.]

Def. - A Proper Noun is the name of some particular person or place, [Proper means one's own. Hence a Proper Name is a person's own name.]

Note 1 - Proper Nouns are always written with a capital letter at the beginning.

Note 2 - Proper Nouns are sometimes used as Common Nouns; as,

1. He was the Lukman (= the wisest man) of his age.

2. Kalidas is often called the Shakespeare (= the greatest dramatist) of India.

Common Nouns include what are called Collective Nouns and Abstract Nouns

21. A Collective Noun is the name of a number (or collection) of persons or things taken together and spoken of as one whole; as, Crowd, mob, team, flock, herd, army, fleet, jury, family, nation, parliament, committee.

A fleet = a collection of ships or vessels.

An army = a collection of soldiers.

A crowd = a collection of people.

The police dispersed the crowd.

The French army was defeated at Waterloo.

The jury found the prisoner guilty.

A herd of cattle is passing

An Abstract Noun is usually the name of a quality, action, or state considered apart from the object to which it belongs; as.

Quality - Goodness, kindness, whiteness, darkness, hardness, brightness, honesty, wisdom, bravery.

Action - Laughter, theft, movement, judgment, hatred.

State - Childhood, boyhood, youth, slavery, sleep, sickness, death, poverty.

The names of the Arts and Science (e.g., grammar, music, chemistry, etc.) are also Abstract Nouns.

Abstract Nouns are formed: (

1) From Adjectives; as, Kindness from kind; honesty from honest. [Most abstract nouns are formed thus.]

(2) From Verbs: as, Obedience from obey; growth from grow.

(3) From Common Nouns; as, Childhood from child; slavery from slave.

24. Another classification of nouns is whether they are “countable” or “uncountable”. Countable nouns (or countables) are the names of objects, people, etc. that we can count, e.g., book, pen, apple, boy, sister, doctor, horse.

Uncountable nouns (or uncountables) are the names of things which we cannot count, e.g., milk, oil, sugar, gold, honesty. They mainly denote substances and abstract things.

Countable nouns have plural forms while uncountable nouns do not. For example, we say “books” but we cannot say “milks”.

THE VERB Transitive and Intransitive Verbs

179; A Verb is a word that tells or asserts something about a person or thing. Verb comes from the Latin verbum, a word. It is so called because it is the most important word in a sentence. A Verb may tell us-

(1) What a person or thing does; as, Hari laughs. The clock strikes.

(2) What is done to a person or thing ; as, Hari is scolded. The window is broken.

(3) What a person or thing is; as, The cat is dead. Glass is brittle. I feel sorry. Def:- A Verb is a word used to tell or assert something about some person or thing.

180. A Verb often consists of more than one word; as, The girls were singing. I have learnt my lesson. The watch has been found.

181. Read these sentences:-

1. The boy kicks the football.

2. The boy laughs loudly.

In sentence 1, the action denoted by the verb kicks passes over from the doer or subject boy to some Object football. The verb kicks is, therefore, called a Transitive Verb. (Transitive means passing over.)

In sentence 2, the action denoted by the verb laughs stops with the doer or Subject boy and does not pass over to an Object, The verb laughs is, therefore, called an Intransitive Verb. (Intransitive means not passing over.)

Def.- A Transitive Verb is a Verb that denotes an action which passes over from the doer or Subject to an object.

Def.- An Intransitive Verb is a Verb that denotes an action which does not pass over to an object, or which expresses a state or being ; as,

He ran a long distance. (Action) The baby sleeps. (State) There is a flaw in this diamond. (Being)

. Most Transitive Verbs take a single object. But such Transitive Verbs as give, ask, offer, promise, tell, etc., take two objects after them - an Indirect Object which denotes the person to whom some thing is given or for whom something is done, and a Direct Object which is usually the name of some thing, as,

His father gave him (Indirect) a watch (Direct).

He told me (Indirect) a secret (Direct).

THE INFINITIVE

253. Read these sentences; I want to go. They tried to find fault with us. The forms to go and to find are "infinitives." The infinitive is the base of a verb, often followed by to. 254. Read the following sentences:-

1. To err is human

. 2. Birds love to sing.

3. To respect our parents is our duty.

4. He refused to obey the orders.

5. Many men desire to make money quickly.

In sentence 1, the Infinitive, like a noun, is the Subject of the verb is.

In sentence 2, the Infinitive, like a noun, is the Object of the verb love.

In sentence 3, the Infinitive, like a noun, is the Subject of the verb is, but, like a verb, it also takes an object.

In sentence 4, the Infinitive, like a noun, is the Object of the verb refused, but, like a verb, it also takes an object.

In sentence 5, the Infinitive, like a noun, is the Object of the verb desire, but, like a verb, it also takes an Object and is modified by an Adverb.

It will be seen that the Infinitive is a kind of noun with certain features of the verb, especially that of taking an object (when the verb is Transitive) and adverbial qualifiers. In short, the Infinitive is a Verb-Noun.

THE PARTICIPLE 260. Read this sentence:- Hearing the noise, the boy woke up. The word hearing qualifies the noun boy as an Adjective does. It is formed from the Verb hear, and governs an object. The word hearing, therefore, partakes of the nature of both a Verb and an Adjective, and is called a Participle. It may be called a Verbal Adjective.

Def. - A participle is that form of the Verb which partakes of the nature both of a Verb and of an Adjective. [Or] A participle is a word which is partly a Verb and partly an adjective.

THE GERUND 274. Read this sentence:- Reading is his favourite pastime. The word reading is formed from the Verb read, by adding ing. We also see that it is here used as the Subject of a verb, and hence does the work of a Noun.

It is, therefore, a Verb-Noun, and is called a Gerund. Further examples of Gerund:-

1. Playing cards is not allowed here.

2. I like reading poetry.

3. He is fond of hoarding money.

In sentence 1, the Gerund, like a noun, is the subject of a verb, but, like a verb, it also takes an object, thus clearly showing that it has also the force of a verb.

In sentence 2, the Gerund, like a noun, is the object of a verb but, like a verb, it also takes an object, thus clearly showing that it has also the force of a verb.

In sentence 3, the Gerund, like a noun, is governed by a preposition, but, like a verb, it also takes an object.

AUXILIARIES AND MODALS 288. The verbs be (am, is, was, etc), have and do, when used with ordinary verbs to make tenses, passive forms, questions and negatives, are called auxiliary verbs or auxiliaries. (Auxiliary = helping)

289. The verbs can, could, may, might, will, would, shall, should, must and ought are called modal verbs or modals. They are used before ordinary verbs and express meanings such as permission, possibility, certainty and necessity. Need and dare can sometimes be used like modal verbs. Modals are often included in the group of auxiliaries. In some grammars they are called “modal auxiliaries”.

290. The modals can, could, may, might, shall, should, will, would, must and ought are termed Defective Verbs, because some parts are wanting in them. They have no -s in the third person singular; they have no infinitve and ing forms. Be

291. The auxiliary be is used (1) In the formation of the continuous tenses; as, He is working. I was writing.