verb in the potential form, it being considered more polite to say that such and such a thing is able to happen in a person than bluntly to assert that the person did it. Thus: Kaigun daijin ni wa saru mikka kikyo seraretari, "The Minister of Marine returned to Tokyo on the third instant."

b) With a passive verb, ni corresponds to "by," donating as it does the person by whom the action is performed: Taki ni semeraruru, "to be attacked by the enemy."

c) With a causative verb, ni denotes the person who is caused to perform the action; thus: Iin ni koto wo giseshimuru, "to cause the committee to deliberate upon a matter," i.e., "to leave a matter to the committee to deliberate upon."

d) Following the attributive form of a verb at the end of a clause, ni serves to indicate a contrast or difference between two consecutive actions or states, "whereupon" or "on," prefixed to the following clause, is the most literal English rendering, thus: Futa wo toritaru ni hatashite naka no mono arazariki, “I removed the lid whereupon as was expected the contents were missing (were not)." But more frequently ni in such contexts must be rendered by "but," there being hardly any difference between it and wo similarly placed; thus: Kogeki shitaru ni sude ni teki wa nigetari, "(We) attacked but the enemy had already fled."

e) Ni suffixed to nouns sometimes means "and." Ju ni ken "rifle and bayonet," hana ni tsuki, "flowers and moon."

f) Ni sometimes follows a word which according to English ideas should be in the accusative case, as: hito ni au, "to meet a person."

g) Suffixed to the indefinite form of the verb, ni signifies "in order to," "to," tori ni yuku, "to go to fetch."

h) Substituted for the verb naru after certain abstract nouns the expression corresponds to English adverbs; as riko ni, "cleverly." 70. Nite (sometimes corrupted into de). (a) "By means of," "by," "with"; Kore nite shiru-beshi, "It may be hereby known."

The postposition nite must not be confounded with nite, the indefinite form of the verb naru, which signifies "being" (§ 181).

b) "In," "at"; Osaka nite, "at Osaka.”

71. No. (a) "Of," or the possessive case; thus: Tokyo no kinko, "the population of Tokyo"; boku no kangae, "my humble opinion"; kuni wo osamuru no konnan, "the difficulty of governing the country."

b) In examples like the following the word followed by no almost comes to correspond to our nominative or accusative rather than to our possessive case, and must often be turned into the subject of a clause in English. Thus: Waga hai no tsune ni ikan to suru tokoro nari, "It is a thing which we constantly regret." Totsuzen dempo no kitaru ari, "A telegram suddenly came" (lit., "Suddenly there was the coming of a telegram"). Hito no onore wo hyo suru wo kiku, "To hear others talk about myself."

c) While always retaining a trace of its proper meaning of "of," no is used in two other noteworthy idiomatic manners: (1) Between two nouns in apposition: issaku jū-ni nichi no nichiyobi, "The day before yesterday Sunday the twelfth." (2) Either in place of, or suffixed to, the other postpositions, it being a general rule that none of them except no and ga can show the relation between two nouns without the intervention of a verb. Thus a Japanese says: Kono ura ni ike ari, "There is a pond at the back of this." But he must, if the verb be omitted, say: kono ura no ike, "the pond at (lit., of) the back of this." Similarly, kanri no kyūsokujo, "a resting place for the officials; Ei Ro no kankei, "the relations between England and Russia."

d) In the following instance no is suffixed to the other particles or postpositions: Pekin yori no dempō, "a telegram from Peking"; taiyō to chikyū to no kankei, "the relations between the sun and the earth." Similarly when to in the sense of "that" or of quotation marks is followed, not by a verb, but by a noun, no must be inserted after it. Thus: Kitaru to no dempō aritari, "There was a telegram that (he) would come."

e) Not infrequently the words tokoro no (more rarely no alone) are inserted between the attributive and the noun, as in § 41.

f) Sometimes, however, no legitimately represents the English relative, thus: on hanashi no kenken, "the various matters which were mentioned by you" (lit., "the matter-matter of the honorable speaking").

72. Ye, "to," less often "toward," sometimes "at"; Tokyo ye kuru, "to come to Tokyo"; Yokohama ye tochaku suru, "to arrive at Yokohama."

73. Yori, "from," "since," "than"; Beikoku yori, "from America." Hachi-ji yori kaijo, "from eight o'clock open-place." Sakujitsu yori, "since yesterday." Tsuki hana yori utsukushiki wa naki nari, "There is nothing more beautiful than the moon and the flowers." (See also comparison of adjectives, § 103.) Yori always means "since" when it is suffixed to a gerund; thus: Kono tatakai arite yori Nihon wa sekai no kyokoku to nareri, "Since this war Japan has become a worldpower."

Preceded by a negative yori sometimes means "unless," "except by," "without." Ijō no jimbutsu ni arazaru yori wa kakaru jigyo wo kansei suru koto katakaru beshi, "Except by a man of great ability it would be impossible to accomplish such an undertaking." When thus used yori is almost always strengthened by the addition of wa.

THE COMPOUND POSTPOSITION

74. Many of the postpositions can be combined in order to particularize or emphasize the sense, as made ni, "until," "by," or "before," for made, "till"; yori mo, "even than"; ka aruiwa repeated "either or." In such combinations as no wa, no ni, and to wa, an ellipsis must be supplied; thus: Ten to (iu mono) wa, "what is called heaven," "what is meant by the term heaven."

75. There is a large class of compound postpositions formed from nouns by prefixing no (less often ga), and generally suffixing ni. Thus:

76. No kage ni, "behind" (lit., "in the shadow of"). Iwa no kage (ni), "behind the rocks."

77. No kawari ni, "instead of," "in return for," "as compensation for," "on the other hand."

78. No tame ni, "for the sake of," "by." Uma no tame ni keraruru, "to be kicked by a horse."

79. No ue ni, "above" (lit., "on the top of"), "on," "besides," "after," "in relation to." Zanji no ue (ni), "after a short rest."

80. Ga ue ni, "over and above," "besides." Iya ga ue ni, "on the top of one another," "even more and more."

81. After verbs the chief word of these compound postpositions is sometimes used alone, without either no or ni, as: Eien ni tsutõru tame, "in order to hand it down forever."

82. There is a class of compound postpositions formed by ni or wo and a verb, the verb generally appearing as a gerund or else in the indefinite form. The most important postpositions of this class are:

83. Ni oite, "in," "on," "at." This compound postposition often serves to denote what we should call the subject of the sentence (§ 69a).

a) Ni oite wa sometimes signifies "in the event of," or "if," thus: Shina seifu ni oite kore wo shōdaku sezaru ni oite wa, "in the event of the Chinese government not consenting," "if the Chinese government should not consent." (In this sentence the first ni oite serves to mark the word which corresponds to the English nominative, while the second means "if.")

b) Ni oite wo ya at the end of a sentence has a very strong exclamatory force. It is generally preceded by iwan ya at the beginning of the sentence or clause, and should be rendered, according to circumstances, by "how much more" or "how much less"; thus: Kiji ni oite sura sono bi kaku no gotoshi iwan ya jikkei ni oite wa, "If it is so beautiful even in description, how much more so must it be in actual view."

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84. Ni okeru, "in," "position in," "relations with," " pared with"; Ei no Indo ni okeru ga gotoku, "like England's position in India."

85. Ni shite. (a) "Being," "as," "in the capacity of"; Gaikokujin ni shite, "as a foreigner."

b) It is also used in many contexts where it must be translated as an adverb or an adverbial phrase: Saiwai ni shite, "fortunately"; zanji ni shite, "after a little while."

c) It is most common in the sense of "is and"; Tokyo wa nihon no shufu ni shite Tokyo wan ni nozomu, "Tokyo is the capital of Japan and borders on Tokyo Bay."

d) It is also sometimes used like wo shite in a causative construction, see § 91.

86. Ni shite must not be confounded with to shite (§ 89). Ni shite has the idea of long existence in a certain capacity, while to shite is used for "in the special capacity of." Ni shite is general and explanatory, to shite is temporary and limiting.

87. Ni tsuki, "with reference to," "owing to":

tsuki, "with reference to a matter of.

. .”

...

no gi ni

88. Ni yori, ni yotte, "owing to," "because of," "by means of," "according to." Rei ni yori, "according to precedent," "as usual." Kore ni yotte, "on account of this."

89. To shite, "as." Sharei to shite, "as a token of gratitude." (See ni shite, § 86.)

90. Wo motte (lit., "having held"), "through," "by," "with," "by means of," "owing to," "because"; Tegami wo motte, "by letter." Konkai taisen okorishi wo motte, "owing to the occurrence of the recent world-war."

a) Sometimes wo motte sinks into being a mere sign of what we should term the accusative case, as: Saionji ko wo motte Tokuha Zenken Daishi to nashi ....,"appointing Marquis Saionji as Special Envoy Plenipotentiary."