Section 92. A Curious Instrument. V

Charles. “Indeed⁠! and how high can you dart it?”

Father. “I⁠ should be afraid of telling you to what a distance it will reach, lest you should think I am jesting with you.”

George. “Higher than this house, I⁠ suppose?”

Father. “Much higher.”

Charles. “Then⁠, how do you⁠ get it again?”

Father. “It⁠ is easily cast down by a gentle movement that does it no injury.”

George. “But who can do that?”

Father. “The⁠ person whose business it is to take care of it.”

Charles. “Well⁠, I cannot understand you at all; but do⁠ tell us, father, what it is chiefly used for!”

Das wäre!

Say ‘I almost fear to tell you what distances it can reach, that (damit) you may not believe that I am jesting with you’.

‘I suppose’, in interrogative sentences, may be elegantly rendered by the adverb wohl:

You have prepared your lesson well to-day, I suppose? Sie haben Ihre Lektion heute wohl gut studiert?

In elliptic sentences, where the verb is omitted, wohl generally occupies the first place.

The adv. denn must stand after the object es.

The pron. ‘you’, used in a general sense, is mostly rendered by the indef. pron. man.

It — down, Es senkt sich ... leicht wieder nach unten. The place of the words ‘by — injury’ is indicated by the three dots.

Derjenige.

Well = Alas, Ach.

The English ‘do’, in sentences of entreaty, may colloquially be rendered by the adverb doch; as—

Do give me the book, my child! Gieb mir doch das Buch, mein Kind!