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loosely connected composite, the sequential clause information is presented rather as an afterthought, an idea
that has come to the mind of the speaker after the completion of the foregoing utterance, which latter, by this
new utterance forming effort, is forcibly made into the clausal fore-part of a composite sentence. This kind of
syntactic connection, the traces of which we saw when treating the syntagmatic bonds of the word, comes under
the heading of cumulation. Its formal sign is often the tone of sentential completion followed by a shorter pause
than an inter-sentential one, which intonational complex is represented in writing by a semi-final punctuation
mark, such as a semicolon, a dash, sometimes a series of periods. Cf.:
It was just the time that my aunt and uncle would be coming home from their daily walk down the town and
I did not like to run the risk of being seen with people whom they would not at all approve of; so I asked them
to go on first, as they would go more quickly than I (S. Maugham).
Cumulation as here presented forms a type of syntactic connection intermediary between clausal connection
and sentential connection. Thus, the very composite sentence (loose composite) formed by it is in fact a unit
intermediary between one polypredicative sentence and a group of separate sentences making up a contextual
sequence.
There is good reason to interpret different parenthetical clauses as specific cumulative constructions,
because the basic semantico-syntactic principle of joining them to the initially planned sentence is the same, i.e.
presenting them as a detached communication, here - of an introductory or commenting-deviational nature.
E.g.:
He was sent for very suddenly this morning, as I have told you already, and he only gave me the barest
details before his horse was saddled and he was gone (D. du Maurier). Unprecedented in scale and lavishly
financed (?.100,000 was collected in 1843 and 9,000,000 leaflets distributed) this agitation had all the
advantages that the railways, cheap newspapers and the penny post could give (A.L. Morton).
If this interpretation is accepted, then the whole domain of cumulation should be divided into two parts:
first, the conttnuative cumulation, placing the cumulated clause in post-position to the expanded predicative
construction; second, the parenthetical cumulation, placing the cumulated clause in inter-position to the
expanded predicative construction. The inter-position may be made even into a preposition as its minor
particular case (here belong mostly constructions introduced by the conjunction as: as we have seen, as I have
said, etc.). This paradox is easily explained by the type of relation between the clauses: the parenthetical clause
(i.e. parenthetically cumulated) only gives a background to the essential information of the expanded original
clause. And, which is very important, it can shift its position in the sentence without causing any change in the
information rendered by the utterance as a whole. Cf.:
He was sent for very suddenly this morning, as I have told you already. > He was sent for, as I have told
you already, very suddenly this morning. > As I have told you already, he was sent for very suddenly this
morning.
§ 9. In the composite sentences hitherto surveyed, the constitutive predicative lines are expressed separately
and explicitly: the described sentence types are formed by minimum two clauses each having a subject and a
predicate of its own. Alongside these "completely" composite sentences, there exist constructions in which one
explicit predicative line is combined with another one, the latter being not explicitly or completely expressed.
To such constructions belong, for instance, sentences with homogeneous predicates, as well as sentences with
verbid complexes. Cf.:
Philip ignored the question and remained silent. I have never before heard her sing. She followed him in,
bending her head under the low door.
That the cited utterances do not represent classical, explicitly constructed composite sentence-models admits
of no argument. At the same time, as we pointed out elsewhere (see Ch. XXIV), they cannot be analysed as
genuine simple sentences, because they contain not one, but more than one predicative lines, though presented
in fusion with one another. This can be demonstrated by explanatory expanding transformations. Cf:.
... > Philip ignored the question, (and) he remained silent. ...
>
I have never before heard how she sings. ...
> As she followed him in, she bent her head under the low door.
The performed test clearly shows that the sentences in question are derived each from two base sentences,
so that the systemic status of the resulting constructions is in fact intermediary between the simple sentence and
the composite sentence. Therefore these predicative constructions should by right be analysed under the
heading of semi-composite sentences.
It is easy to see that functionally semi-composite sentences are directly opposed to composite-cumulative
sentences: while the latter are over-expanded, the former are under-expanded, i.e. they are concisely deployed.
The result of the predicative blend is terseness of expression, which makes semi-composite constructions of
especial preference in colloquial speech.