letter ; in all the other cases (except dative plurals) they remain unaltered. c. Substantives musculine and neuter ending in any other consonant but I, m, r, form their genitive singular by adding es, and their dative singular by adding the letter e to the nominative. They adopt likewise the letter e, in nominative, genitive, and accusative plural. EXCEPTION. Masculines of more than one syllable, if ending in e, take the letter n instead of 3 and if ending in ft, they take en instead of es. d. Dative plural generally terminates with the letter n. e. The vowels a, o, u, singular number, are generally changed in the plural into their corresponding diphthongs. These rules, however generally admissable, are nevertheless submitted to several exceptions. But considering it more advantageous for the student to learn them by individual experience, their enumeration has been omitted. 2. NOUNS ADJECTIVE. The nouns adjective are declined, if they are preceded by an article or pronoun, or if they are placed before a substantive; in all other cases they are without a declinable termination. Standing before a substantive the adjective adopts the gender of the substantive, and is declined with the following terminations : c. with the indefinite article or a possessive pronoun preceding. PLURAL Neut. for all genders. 231 The comparison of adjectives is generally produced in the German language by the addition of r, or er, in the comparative, and by st, est, in the superlative degree. The vowels a, o, u, are changed into the corresponding diphthongs. Some irregularities are to be learned by practical experience. Ordinal numbers are formed in adding te, to the cardinals from one to twenty, excl., and in adding ste, to the cardinals from twenty-one and all above. Exception. The first and third numbers cardinal are formed as follows: N. Er, he. G. Seiner, of him. D. Ihm, to him. 4. Ihn, him. Plural. e. THIRD PERSONAL. Feminine. fie, she. ihr, to her. Neuter. es, it. fie, her. es, it. d. REFLECTIVE (FOR THE THIRD PERSON.) They have three genders in the singular, analogous to the three genders of the indefinite article: (mein, meine, mein-ein, eine, ein,) and they are declined in the same manner as this article. 3. DEMONSTRATIVE PRONOUNS. The demonstrative, relative, and interrogative pronouns follow in their declension generally that of the definite article in its three genders, der, die, das. The following are the most important : |