§ 171. In addition to the above described features which the infinitive and the ing-form have in common, each of the two ver- bals possesses peculiarities of its own.

The infinitive is generally preceded by the particle to, but. in certain functions it is used without it, and in still other functions the use of the particle is optional. The use or the absence of the

particle will be considered in connection with each of the func- tions of the infinitive.

Note. The infinitive and the particle to may be separated from each other by the insertion of an adverb between them, such as never, ever, fully, really, even. This is called a split infinitive.

e.g. She was the first person to ever understand me, Frank.

I'm sorry, I made a mistake. It was a mistake to even try to help you.

However, split infinitives are very rarely found in English.

If there are two or more infinitives in the same function fol- lowing each other, the particle to is usually used before the first one and need not be repeated before the others.

e.g. Amy admired Lilian because she could do a lot of things — she was said, for instance, to dance and skate very well.

Sometimes, however, the particle to is repeated for emphasis, to make the action of each infinitive more prominent.

e.g. The hero, when the heroine hurts his feelings, is said to feel for a moment a wild desire of the caveman, the longing to seize her, to drag her with him, to give her a good beating.

The infinitive may sometimes be represented by the particle to alone. This happens when the infinitive is easily supplied from the previous context.

e.g. Joe said, "I don't think we are going to catch any fish."

"I never expect to," said Lizzy.

She would have listened if I had called her attention to it but I had already decided not to.

Another peculiarity of the infinitive is that it may be used as part of a phrase introduced by the conjunctive pronouns or ad- verbs what, who, whom, which, when, where, whether, how and how long. As most of them begin with wh-, this kind of infinitive group may be called the wh-phrase ['dablju eic freiz].

e.g- I didn't know what to say.

I couldn't decide whether to speak or not.

§ 172. The ing-form, in its turn, has peculiarities of its own. Unliке the infinitive, it may, in certain functions, be preceded by a preposition.

e.g. For anybody as clever as you are, you're not really good at

deciding things. He told me that we were about to be turned out of our flat

for not paying the rent.

The ing-form has another peculiarity: it may lose its verbal character and become adjectivized. In this case the ing-form be- comes devoid of the idea of action and sometimes its lexical mean- ing is changed as compared with the meaning of the corresponding verb.

e.g. They found his ideas very upsetting.

His erect, rather forbidding figure made him look old-fashi- oned.

In the second example forbidding means 'суровый, неприступ- ный'; it differs from the meaning of the verb to forbid ('запре- щать').

Adjectivized ing-forms, like real adjectives, may be preceded by adverbs of degree, such as very, rather, most, quite., how, so, so ... as, etc.

e.g. She is always so amusing.

The results which he obtained proved to be moat striking.

Note 1. There are a number of ing-forms of this kind that are used only as ad- jectives in present-day English, e.g. interesting, charming, dashing, etc.

Note 2. In English there are a considerable number of nouns in -ing. They may denote concrete things (e.g. landing 'лестничная площадка') or abstract notions, including actions (e.g. beginning 'начало', singing 'пение, reading 'чтение'). These nouns lack the above described properties of the ing-form and, like any other noun, may be associated with the article, definite or indefinite, with pronouns, such as some, any, a lot of, etc, or may be modified by adjectives.

e.g. The drums were silent: the singing stopped.

"My wife had once a vegetarian bulldog," said Mr Smith with pride. "Of course.

it took some training." I admired the dancer and asked if she ever did any real Indian dancing.

"I do a lot of travelling," he said.

She had an attack of violent sobbing.

Nouns in -ing denoting actions are called verbal nouns. They should not be confused with the ing form proper even when they denote actions (e.g. reading writing, walking, etc.).

The Participle