nued success.--SCOTT.

ADVERBS.

[Sidenote: _Position of_ only, even, _etc._]

A very careful writer will so place the modifiers of a verb that the
reader will not mistake the meaning.

The rigid rule in such a case would be, to put the modifier in such a
position that the reader not only can understand the meaning intended,
but _cannot misunderstand_ the thought. Now, when such adverbs as
_only_, _even_, etc., are used, they are usually placed in a strictly
correct position, if they modify single words; but they are often
removed from the exact position, if they modify phrases or clauses:
for example, from Irving, "The site is _only_ to be traced by
fragments of bricks, china, and earthenware." Here _only_ modifies the
phrase _by fragments of bricks_, etc., but it is placed before the
infinitive. This misplacement of the adverb can be detected only by
analysis of the sentence.

Exercise.

Tell what the adverb modifies in each quotation, and see if it is
placed in the proper position:--

1. Only the name of one obscure epigrammatist has been embalmed
for us in the verses of his rival.--PALGRAVE.

2. Do you remember pea shooters? I think we only had them on
going home for holidays.--THACKERAY.

3. Irving could only live very modestly. He could only afford
to keep one old horse.--_Id._

4. The arrangement of this machinery could only be accounted
for by supposing the motive power to have been steam.--WENDELL
PHILLIPS.

5. Such disputes can only be settled by arms.--_Id._

6. I have only noted one or two topics which I thought most
likely to interest an American reader.--N.P. WILLIS.

7. The silence of the first night at the farmhouse,--stillness
broken only by two whippoorwills.--HIGGINSON.

8. My master, to avoid a crowd, would suffer only thirty people
at a time to see me.--SWIFT.

9. In relating these and the following laws, I would only be
understood to mean the original institutions.--_Id._

10. The perfect loveliness of a woman's countenance can only
consist in that majestic peace which is founded in the memory of
happy and useful years.--RUSKIN.

11. In one of those celestial days it seems a poverty that we can
only spend it once.--EMERSON.

12. My lord was only anxious as long as his wife's anxious face
or behavior seemed to upbraid him.--THACKERAY.