CAPITAL LETTERS.
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MANY people greatly disfigure their writing, and stamp themselves as illiterate, by the omission or improper use of capital letters.
What do we think of the man who, wishing to place his son in the care of a teacher, wrote a letter, introducing his boy, thus?
"deer sur yeW Bein a man of noleg i Wish tu Put Mi son in yure skull."
Or, of the mother who sends a line by her child to the boot and shoe merchant as follows?
"mister Grean Wunt you let mi Boay hev a Pare ov Esy toad shuz."
Fortunately the rules for using capitals are few, and once acquired, are easily remembered.
Rules for the Use of Capitals.
Begin every paragraph with a capital letter.
Begin every sentence following a period with a capital letter.
Begin each proper name with a capital letter.
Begin the names of places, as Boston, Newport, Niagara, with capital letters.
Begin the words, North, South, East, West, and their compounds and abbreviations, as North-east, S. W., with capital letters, when geographically applied.
Begin the names of the Deity and Heaven, or the pronoun used for the former, as, in His mercy—Thou, Father, etc., with capital letters.
Begin all adjectives formed from the names of places or points of the compass as English, Northern, each with a capital letter.
Begin each line of poetry with a capital letter.
Begin all quotations with a capital letter.
Begin all titles of books, and usually each important word of the title, as Hume's History of England, with capital letters. Begin the name of any historical event, as the French Revolution, with capital letters.
The pronoun I and the interjection O must invariably be capital letters.
Begin names of the month, as June, April, with capital letters. Also the days of the week, as Monday, Tuesday, etc.
Begin all addresses, as Dear Sir—Dear Madam, with capital letters.
Capital letters must never be placed in the middle of a word.
PUNCTUATION.
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While the omission of punctationation may not mar the appearance of writing, as do bad spelling and improper use of capitals, its correct use is, nevertheless, essential to the proper construction of a sentence.
Very ludicrous, and sometimes serious mistakes result from improper punctuation. In the following sentence, the meaning is entirely changed by the location of the semicolon.
"He is an old and experienced hand; in vice and wickedness he is never found; opposing the works of iniquity he takes delight."
"He is an old and experienced hand in vice and wickedness; he is never found opposing the works of iniquity; he takes delight."
Punctuation Marks.
The following are the principal characters or points used in punctuation:
| Comma | , |
| Semicolon | ; |
| Colon | : |
| Period | . |
| Parenthesis | ( ) |
| Exclamation | ! |
| Interrogation | ? |
| Dash | — |
| Ellipsis | . . . . . |
| The Caret | ^ |
| Hyphen | - |
| Apostrophe | ' |
| Quotation Marks | "" |
| Brackets | [ ] |
Rules for Punctuation.
The Comma (,). Wherever occurs a distinct natural division of a sentence; or where two or more words are connecte1, without the connecting word being expressed, the comma is used; as
"Dealer in hats, caps, boots, shoes, etc." "Hedges, trees, groves, houses, and people, all went rushing by." "Towering far above us stood the pines, silent, majestic, and grand." "Verily, verily, I say unto you."
The Semicolon (;) is used where a sentence consists of several members each constituting a distinct proposition, and yet having dependence upon each other; as
