CHAPTER V

THE ADJECTIVE CLAUSE

=Function.=--A common form of the dependent proposition is the adjective clause, so called not because it is equivalent to an adjective, but because it performs the office of an adjective, that is, modifies a substantive. It is true that some adjective clauses may be changed to adjectives, participles, or prepositional phrases, but there are many more whose meaning cannot be conveyed by any adjective, participle, or phrase at our command. For example, in this sentence from Macaulay,--“In climates _where wine is a rarity_, intemperance abounds,” there is no equivalent simpler adjective element into which the clause could be changed.

Moreover, a clause gives more dignity and importance to the thought conveyed by it than a shorter adjective element gives. Often, too, a sentence loses in definiteness by the abridgment of an adjective clause. For example, the sentence,--“The statue that was made of marble pleased me most,” may be changed to,--“The marble statue pleased me most.” But, whereas the first sentence means that the marble statue pleased me more than the other statues, the second may mean either the same or that the statue pleased me more than some other objects, not statues. In other words, it is clear that the clause is restrictive, while in the abridged sentence it is impossible to decide whether _marble_ is used to restrict or to describe.

Another advantage of the clause is, that it does not require to be so near the word that it modifies as does an adjective or a participle. Take the following sentence,--“No act of oppression has ever been imputed to him _which has not a parallel in the annals of the Tudors_.”--_Macaulay._ Here the clause is separated from _act_ by the entire predicate of the principal proposition.

=Classification.=--There are two kinds of adjective clauses, according to the purpose for which they are used in the sentence.

1. The _restrictive_ adjective clause.--This is one which restricts, or narrows, the application of the noun it modifies to some particular individual or class.--“He _who_ _never changed any of his opinions_ never corrected any of his mistakes.”--_Hall._ Here the clause points out the particular individual designated by the pronoun _he_.

A restrictive clause is doubly expressive;--it says one thing directly and another by implication. In the sentence quoted the clause implies that there are people who do change their opinions.

Usually the restrictive clause is near the word it modifies, is not set off by a comma, and is introduced by the relative pronoun _that_, or a conjunctive adverb, or such a phrase as _in which_, _by which_, etc. No adjective clause, however, should be tested by any or even all of these accidents, but rather solely by the purpose for which the author used it.

2. The _unrestrictive_ adjective clause.--This is one that merely adds a thought to some idea already expressed. The additional thought is often valuable, but it is never necessary.--“The window of the little parlor looked down upon the water, which had made friends with its painted ceiling, and bestowed tremulous golden smiles upon it when the sun shone.”--_Howells._ The clause here is evidently not used to point out which water is meant, but to tell something further about the water, something unnecessary to the truth of the sentence, but valuable in giving the reader a beautiful picture. Such a clause is sometimes merely a definition or expansion of a term already used; for example, “Style, _which is the peculiar manner in which a writer expresses his thoughts_, depends to some extent upon the age in which he lives.”

=Introductory Word.=--The adjective clause, being a dependent proposition and modifying a substantive, needs some word to indicate its subordination and join it to its substantive. This word may be several parts of speech.

1. A relative pronoun,--_who_, _which_, _that_. This pronoun, besides serving as a connective, is a necessary element of the clause. It may be--

(_a_) Subject of the verb,--“The nature of his subject compelled him to use many words that would have made Quintilian stare and gasp.”--_Macaulay._

(_b_) Direct object of a verb,--“So I had arrived in Venice, and I had felt the influence of that complex spell _which_ she lays upon the stranger.”--_Howells._

(_c_) Indirect object of a verb,--“We must be as courteous to a man as we are to a picture, _which_ we are willing to give the advantage of a good light.”--_Emerson._

(_d_) Object of a preposition,--“Other men are lenses through _which_ we read our own minds.”--_Emerson._

(_e_) Subjective complement,--“He will never be the hero _that_ his brother was.”

(_f_) Possessive modifier,--“Its members are inflexible men, _whose_ ability has been as frequently manifested as their patriotism.”--_Howells._

NOTE.--To ascertain the use of a relative pronoun in a clause, substitute the antecedent for the pronoun, and observe how the antecedent is used. Sometimes this substitution requires a slight change in the arrangement of the words of the clause. For example, in (_e_) above, the clause _that his brother was_ becomes _his brother was hero_.

_That_, when used as object of a preposition, must precede the preposition; as, “Have you ever heard the Lady--the one _that_ I sit next _to_ at the table--say anything about me?”--_Holmes._

_That_ is frequently omitted when object of a verb or preposition; as, “One of the shop windows he paused before was that of a second-hand book-shop.”--_George Eliot._

_As_ and _but_ are sometimes used as relative pronouns; the former after _such_, _same_, _as many_, and a few other expressions, the latter after an interrogative or negative antecedent, and as an equivalent of the relative _that_ plus _not_; as, “There is nothing born _but_ has to die.”

The relative pronoun _as_ may be--

(a) Subject of a verb,--“I went up from the cabin followed by as many _as_ could mount the gangway.”

(b) Object of a verb,--“Chaucer has left us such a picture of contemporary life _as_ no man ever painted.”--_Lowell._

(c) Object of a preposition,--“He was such a schoolboy _as_ a discerning master delights in.”--_Mrs. Ward._

(d) Subjective complement,--“I shall probably never see just such another day _as_ yesterday was.”--_Burroughs._

NOTES.--1. When _as_ introduces an adjective clause, the verb of the clause is frequently omitted; as, “Their military code bore the same stern features as their other laws (_bore_).”--_Prescott._

2. The use of the relative pronoun _as_ after _as many_ has been extended so that we find it after _as few_, _as much_, _as little_; as, “She was done for and bought for ten pounds by the landlord of the Drummond Arms, Crieff, who had been taking _as much_ money out of her, and putting _as little_ corn into her, _as_ was compatible with life.”--_Dr. John Brown._

3. The word _such_, which usually precedes a noun modified by an as-clause, may follow the noun instead; as, “The walls did not flow or subside to the valley in charming curve-lines, _such as_ I have seen in the wildest passes of the New England mountains.”--_King._ Instead of transposing _such_, which would alter the meaning slightly, we may say that it is a pronominal in apposition with _curve-lines_ and modified by the restrictive adjective clause _as I have seen_, etc.

2. A conjunctive adverb.--This is equivalent to a phrase consisting of a preposition and a relative pronoun, and is used interchangeably with such a phrase. Its function in the clause is the same as that of the phrase, that is, it modifies the verb. The commonest of these adverbs are _when_ (= _in which_ or _on which_), _where_ (= _in which_ or _on which_), _whither_ (= _toward which_), _whence_ (= _from which_). Others less used are _wherein_, _whereon_, _whereof_, _wherethrough_, _wherefrom_, _wherewith_, _whereupon_, _wherefore_, _whereby_, _whereat_. For example,--

Our works are the mirrors _wherein_ the spirit first sees its natural lineaments.--_Carlyle._

Some day you may reach that time _when_ a man lives in greater part for memory and by memory.--_Lushington._

Yet all experience is an arch _wherethrough_ Gleams that untraveled world whose margin fades Forever and forever when I move.--_Tennyson._

3. The subordinating conjunction _that_.--This is often used to introduce restrictive clauses modifying a word denoting time. It is equivalent to a phrase like _in which_; for example, “At last the season comes _that_ the sixtieth minute is due.”

This connective is sometimes used instead of _why_ after the word _reason_. It is frequently omitted; as, “The instant he understood my meaning, he obeyed.”

=What the Adjective Clause modifies.=--The adjective clause may modify a noun used in any relation, a personal pronoun, a pronominal adjective, or any other substantive. Sometimes, instead of modifying any single word, it modifies the thought expressed by the whole of the preceding sentence, or by a portion of it. In such a case the clause is introduced by the relative pronoun _which_. For example, “They had comported themselves with such singular wisdom and propriety that they were never either heard or talked of,--_which, next to being universally applauded, should be the object of ambition of all ages, magistrates, and rulers_.”--_Irving._ Here the clause modifies _that they were never either heard or talked of_. In the sentence,--“His body was of an oblong form, particularly capacious at bottom; _which was wisely ordered by Providence, seeing that he was a man of sedentary habits, and very averse to the idle labor of walking_,” the clause modifies all of the sentence preceding it.

Sometimes in sentences of this kind the thought to be modified by the adjective clause is summed up in one noun which is used as a part of the clause, while the relative pronoun _which_ becomes a relative adjective modifying the noun; as, “In 1835, Longfellow became Professor of Modern Languages and Belles Lettres in Harvard University, _which position_ he held for fourteen years.”

An adjective clause modifying a whole statement is sometimes placed before that statement instead of after it. The clause is then usually introduced by the pronoun _what_; as, “_What was worse_, he every week lost more and more by bad money.”--_Jerrold._

NOTE.--The adjective clause may modify a noun or pronoun in the possessive case; as, “The world is _his who has money to go over it_.”--_Emerson._

=Position of the Adjective Clause.=--Usually it follows closely the word it modifies, but there is a type of sentence in which the clause modifies the subject and yet comes next to the subjective complement. The following sentence is an example,--“It was coffee and not wine that I drank.”--_Howells._ _It_ is here a personal pronoun standing for _beverage_ and modified by the restrictive adjective clause _that I drank_. The sentence means,--The beverage that I drank was coffee and not wine.

Peculiar sentences sometimes arise from this construction; for example, “It is only birds of prey that fear danger from below more than from above.” Here the clause modifies the subject _it_, and the sentence transposed reads, “It that fear danger from below more than from above is only birds of prey.” This sounds ungrammatical, but it is the interpretation of the original sentence.

In regard to the position of the connective, it is commonly the first word in the clause; but when _who_ or _which_ is object of a preposition, the preposition leads, and sometimes the subject of the clause precedes the preposition and the relative; thus, “The largest class of vessels is the full-rigged ship, _the distinctive mark of which_ is that it has three masts, all square-rigged.” This arrangement of words arises from the objection that some authors have to using _whose_ as the possessive of _which_. If _whose_ were substituted for _of which_ in the sentence above, the clause would read, _whose distinctive mark is_, etc.

Sometimes the antecedent of a relative pronoun is omitted, especially if it is a personal pronoun; thus,

“Who drove Planted both feet upon the leaping share To make the furrow deep.”--_E. Arnold._

Exercise 5

Select all adjective clauses in the following sentences. Tell classification of each clause, what it modifies, its introductory word, and use of that word (if any) in the clause.

1. Boy! bring to us the dish the like of which is not found among the viands of kings.

2. How babies will poke those wonderful little fingers of theirs into every hole and crack and crevice they can get at.--_Holmes._

3. Who that sees the meanness of our politics, but inly congratulates Washington that he is long already wrapped in his shroud, and forever safe.--_Emerson._

4. Immediately the small son of Shem ran off into the next room, whence his voice was heard in rapid chat.--_George Eliot._

5. The parts and sails of the foremast and mainmast of a ship bear the same names as those of the brig.

6. I said the other day that he had good solid prejudices, which is true, and I like him none the worse for it.--_Holmes._

7. They habitually ascribed every event to the will of the Great Being, for whose power nothing was too vast, for whose inspection nothing was too minute.--_Macaulay._

8. Such of these holidays as related to the victories and pride of the Republic naturally ended with her fall.--_Howells._

9. I live to learn their story Who suffered for my sake.--_Banks._

10. Tennyson began to write tales and verse from the time that he could use a pen.

11. There was a certain very dry land, the people whereof were in sore need of water.--_Bellamy._

12. They have rights who dare maintain them.--_Lowell._

13. The Greek drama, on the model of which the Samson was written, sprang from the Ode.--_Macaulay._

14. It is hard to realize that our remote ancestors were mere barbarians, who by the force of numbers overran the world.--_Lord._

15. He pretended to pour out some wine, and drank the first glass, after which he poured out another for his guest.

16. There lies before you for your pleasure the spectacle of such singular beauty as no picture can ever show you or book tell you.--_Howells._

17. Who goes that way must take no other horse To ride, but Sleipnir, Odin’s horse, alone.--_M. Arnold._

18. Is there nothing you are acquainted with which they (_clouds_) resemble?--_Tyndall._

19. Is it dark meat or white meat you will be helped to?--_Holmes._

20. Lady Carbery happened to be down at the seaside, whither my letter had been sent after her.--_De Quincey._

21. Several slaves instantly appeared, whom he ordered to set out the table and serve the dinner.

22. The wild thing, Living or dead, is his who fetched it down.--_E. Arnold._

23. Daguerre invented the process of taking daguerreotypes upon metallic plates, which invention soon developed into the process of taking photographs on paper.

24. Not one of us, however busy or hard, but once or twice in our lives has passed an evening with Goldsmith, and undergone the charm of his delightful music.--_Thackeray._

25. It’s faith in something and enthusiasm for something that makes life worth looking at.--_Holmes._

26. Who asks does err, Who answers, errs; say naught.--_E. Arnold._

27. It is those who remain indoors, therefore, who are exposed to the utmost rigor of the winter.--_Howells._

28. Soon Stephen went down from the Hoe, and returned in the direction whence he had come.--_T. Hardy._

29. Many times I have come, bearing flowers such as my garden grew.--_Holmes._

30. What is more remarkable considering his century, he is not by any means consummate or even eminent as a painter in words.--_Saintsbury._