Page:A grammar of the Bohemian or Cech language.djvu/58

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expressing the past tense in Bohemian, the gender being pre- served in the singular ; thus—

dekoval jsem, I have thanked

dekoval jsi, thou hast thanked

dekoval (jest), he has thanked, with a for the feminine and o for the neuter ; And in the plural thus—

děkovali jsme, we have thanked

děkovali jste, ye have thanked

děkovali jsou, they have thanked, with -y for fem. and -a for neuter.

This is now the only past tense in use, the imperfect and aorist having disappeared. The various shades of meaning of the past tense are expressed by the aspects.

5. The suffix of the past participle passive is -n or -/. The form in -/ is more common in the first and second conjugations.

6. The aorist which existed in Old Slavonic and also in Old Bohemian has now completely disappeared.

(2) The Present Stem.

1. The present suffix is -e, which is lost in some verbs.

2. Imperative. The second singular in -zj the second plural like the present; the accent being on the first syllable. The characteristic -i of the imperative singular is lost in the plural (cf. Russian CTaBt); and the i in the plural is shortened or omitted, as viďte, look ye (cf. Russian n03B0jn>Te).

3. The imperfect which existed in Old Cech has completely disappeared in the modern language.

4. Present participle active. The original suffix of this participle was -nt. (Cf. Ger. geňend.) If it is used in its short form t falls out in Auslaul; and n is amalgamated with the preceding vowel, becoming ě, i, or a, ou; if, however, the