Business English: A Practice Book by Rose Buhlig

fishermen stood on the shore, and they gazed at the wild sea. A storm had arisen, and they could not go out in their boats. =Exercise 201= As in the preceding exercise, rewrite the following, omitting as many words as possible, but no ideas. Use shorter, simpler expressions wherever possible. 1 Uncle Sam now has an aerial navy, but it's a small one, and foundations of it were recently laid. This was done when contracts were signed for the delivery of three aeroplanes and they are the first aeroplanes that the United States bought. These aeroplanes are of the latest development. They are all capable of rising from land or water. They are able also to land on water or on the deck of a ship, and they can carry at least one passenger and are equipped with wireless outfits. Two of them are Curtis machines and the third is a Wright, and they ranged in price from $2,700 to $5,500. 2 The United States produces more steel than any two European countries, and it is continuing to produce more. Moreover, it has the productive capacity to produce more than any other three or four countries put together. This capacity is being still further increased. At the present time, there is one very important steel company. It is very large, and seems to wish to monopolize the entire iron and steel industry. Even at this time it owns half the principal plants that are now producing steel and iron, and controls half the trade of the entire steel and iron industry, and when such a thing happens, it is a matter of international concern. 3 Condense the following into a single sentence, either simple or complex: The iron and steel industry is very important, and it includes a great deal. First, the ore has to be mined, and then the work includes everything up to making the finest wire for musical instruments. Or, to put it another way, you can say from smelting the ore to building a battle ship. This is a very interesting occupation and, as said before, very important. There is hardly anything more interesting or important except agriculture. =Exercise 202--Dangling Expressions= Sometimes a sentence is not clear because it contains a participle which does not modify anything in the sentence. A participle is part _verb_ and part _adjective_. As a verb, it expresses the idea of the verb from which it is derived. As an adjective, it must modify a noun or a pronoun. The important point is that this noun or pronoun must be expressed in the sentence and not lie in the mind of the writer, as it does in the following: Riding from Saugatuck to Holland last year, the country showed unmistakable signs of lack of rain. Here the writer means, _We saw that the country_, etc., but he says that the country rode from Saugatuck to Holland. Again, an expression may be used which is really an incomplete clause. Do not use such a clause, unless the understood subject is the same as the subject expressed in the independent proposition. _Wrong_: When almost exhausted, the camp was reached. _Right_: When almost exhausted, we reached the camp. Recast the following sentences, correcting the dangling expressions: