Part 43

THE BEQUEST.

II.

The father continued: “I leave to my son James my money, amounting to four thousand pounds.” “Ah, father,” said James, of course in great affliction, “may (App. § 34) heaven give you life and health to enjoy the gift yourself.” The father, then addressing the spendthrift, said: “As for you, Dick, you will never come to good; you will never be rich. I leave you a shilling to (S. 19, N. 7) buy a halter.” “Ah, father,” said Dick in a most melancholy voice, “may heaven give you life and health to enjoy the gift yourself!”—ANONYMOUS.

‘money’, here = ready money, +bares Geld+.

to amount to something, +sich ~auf~ etwas belaufen+. See S. 16, N. 4.

+=Das Pfund=+, one pound English money, never takes the sign of the Plural in German, and the same refers to ‘+=die Mark=+’, a German coin corresponding to one shilling English.

said = exclaimed; in = with.

Say ‘Upon this the father addressed himself (+sich wenden+) to (+an+) the spendthrift and said’.

As — Dick, +Was dich betrifft, Richard.+

Introduce this clause by the adverbial conjunction +so+, and see App. § 15; to come to good, +zu etwas Rechtem kommen+.

=The German language, as a rule, requires that the person for whose benefit an action is performed, is clearly indicated. When this is not done by a noun in the dative case, it is generally done by means of the dative of a personal pronoun=; as—

I will buy a hat.

+Ich will ~mir~ einen Hut kaufen.+

We have built a house.

+Wir haben ~uns~ ein Haus gebaut.+

Supply, therefore, the necessary pronoun after the conjunction +um+; a halter = a rope, +Strick+, m.

Render ‘most’ here by ‘+höchst+’.

Section 59.

WHEAT.

Wheat is the most valuable of all grains, because from it, chiefly, we obtain the flour of which bread is made. In order to make flour, the grains of wheat are crushed between stones in a mill. The crushed mass is then separated into two parts,—bran and flour. Bran is the outer husk of the grain, which is used (S. 4, N. 4) for fattening cattle, etc. It does no harm, however, to mix the bran with the flour; the mixture is more nourishing than the pure flour. The bran makes the flour and the bread darker in colour; but this is no disadvantage, for brown bread is both cheaper and more nourishing than white bread. Bread is often artificially whitened by the addition of alum and other injurious substances. Wheat is chiefly grown in France, Germany, Austria, Southern Russia, (S. 46, N. 6) the British Isles, Australia, the United States, Canada, Egypt, and Northern Africa.—NELSON’S READERS.

+wertvoll+; ‘grain’, here +Kornart+, f.

Say ‘because it yields (+liefern+) us chiefly the flour for our bread’.

+bereiten.+

Form a compound noun of ‘wheat’ and ‘grains’ (+Körner+).

+zermahlen.+

+sondern.+

The prep. ‘in’ must be repeated before this and the following noun.

for — cattle, +zur Viehfütterung+.