mmatical; and, certainly, there are ways enough in which it may be
corrected. First, with the present connective retained, "_were_" ought to
be _was_. Secondly, if _were_ be retained, "_together with_" ought to be
changed to _and_, or _and also_. Thirdly, we may well change both, and say,
"The palace of Pizarro, _as well as_ the houses of several of his
adherents, _was_ pillaged by the soldiers." Again, in Mark, ix, 4th, we
read: "And there appeared _unto them_ Elias, _with_ Moses; and _they_ were
talking with Jesus." If this text meant that _the three disciples_ were
talking with Jesus, it would be right as it stands; but St. Matthew has it,
"And, behold, there appeared unto them _Moses and Elias, talking_ with
him;" and our version in Luke is, "And, behold, there talked with him two
men, which were Moses and Elias."--Chap. ix, 30. By these corresponding
texts, then, we learn, that the pronoun _they_, which our translators
inserted, was meant for "_Elias with Moses_;" but the Greek verb for
"_appeared_," as used by Mark, is _singular_, and agrees only with Elias.
"[Greek: _Kai ophthae autois Aelias sun Mosei, kai haesan syllalountes to
Iaesoy_.]"--"Et _apparuit_ illis Elias cum Mose, et erant colloquentes
Jesu."--_Montanus_. "Et _visus est_ eis Elias cum Mose, qui colloquebantur
cum Jesu."--_Beza_. This is as discrepant as our version, though not so
ambiguous. The French Bible avoids the incongruity: "Et iis virent paroitre
_Moyse et Elie_, qui s'entretenoient avec Jesus." That is, "And there
appeared to them _Moses and Elias_, who were talking with Jesus." Perhaps
the closest and best version of the Greek would be, "And there appeared to
them Elias, with Moses;[397] and _these two_ were talking with Jesus."
There is, in our Bible, an other instance of the construction now in
question; but it has no support from the Septuagint, the Vulgate, or the
French: to wit, "The second [lot came forth] to Gedaliah, _who with_ his
brethren and sons _were_ twelve."--_1 Chron._, xxv, 9. Better: "_and he_,
his brethren, and _his_ sons, were twelve."

OBS. 20.--Cobbett, who, though he wrote several grammars, was but a very
superficial grammarian, seems never to have doubted the propriety of
putting _with_ for _and_; and yet he was confessedly not a little puzzled
to find out when to use a singular, and when a plural verb, after a
nominative with such "a sort of addition made to it." The 246th paragraph
of his English Grammar is a long a