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Bechtel, John Hendricks, 1841-

"Slips of Speech : a Helpful Book for Everyone Who Aspires to Correct the Everyday Errors of Speaking"

, the pronoun must not be contracted to
form a combination with the verb. It may be a poor rule, but it will
not work both ways. Let's should therefore be let us.
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124
CHAPTER IV
Possessive Case
Some time ago a shoe merchant called upon the writer to know how to
arrange the points in the wording of a new sign that he was preparing
to place over his door. He made a specialty of shoes for men and boys.
He presented a paper containing the lines:
Men's and Boy's Shoes.
Mens' and Boys' Shoes.
He was politely informed that both were incorrect; that the two words
form their plurals differently, and that the possessive case is,
therefore, formed in a different manner. The plural of man is men,;
the plural of boy is boys. The possessive of man is man's; of men is
men's. The possessive of boy is boy's; of boys is boys'. In the latter
case we are obliged to place the apostrophe after the s in order to
distinguish the possessive plural from the possessive singular. All
nouns that form their plurals by adding s to the singular, form their
possessive case as the word boy does.


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