Page:The king's English (IA kingsenglish00fowlrich).pdf/265
But those that remain, the women, the youths, the children, and the elders, work all the harder.–Times.
Japanese advisers are now attached to the departments of the Household, War, Finance, Education, and Police.–Times.
An American, whose patience, tact, and ability in reconciling conflicting interests have won the praise of all nationalities.–Times.
Sometimes enumerations are arranged in pairs; it is then most unpleasant to have the comma after the last pair omitted, as in:
The orange and the lemon, the olive and the walnut elbow each other for a footing in the fat dark earth.–F. M. Crawford.
There is a bastard form of enumeration against which warning is seriously needed. It is taken for, but is not really, a legitimate case of type (a); and a quite unnecessary objection to the repetition of and no doubt supplies the motive. Examples are:
He kept manœuvring upon Neipperg, who counter-manœuvred with vigilance, good judgment, and would not come to action.–Carlyle.
Moltke had recruited, trained, and knew by heart all the men under him.–Times.
Hence loss of time, of money, and sore trial of patience.–R. G. White.
The principle is this: in an enumeration given by means of a comma or commas, the last comma being replaced by or combined with and–our type (a), that is–, there must not be anything that is common to two members (as here, counter-manœuvred with, had, loss) without being common to all. We may say, Moltke had recruited and trained and knew, Moltke had recruited, had trained, and knew, or, Moltke had recruited, trained, and known; but we must not say what the Times says. The third sentence may run, Loss of time and money, and sore trial, or, Loss of time, of money, and of patience; but not as it does.
So much for type (a). Type (b) can be very shortly disposed of. It differs in that the conjunction (and, or, nor, &c.) is expressed every time, instead of being represented except in the last place by a comma. It is logically quite