Inner — — innermost

outer — — outermost/utmost

utter — — uttermost/utmost

hind — — hindmost

rear — — rearmost

top — — top most

upper — — upper most/upmost

old — older — oldest

elder — — eldest

far — farther/further — farthest/furthermost/furthest

Elder/eldest (with no comparative) are used only before a noun to denote members of a family. Compare the way elder/eldest and older/oldest occur in speech: My elder sister is a teacher. — My sister is older than me. She looks older than she really is. My eldest son is 10 years old. — This is the oldest building in the town.

In the case of far, when speaking of real places and distances either farther/farthest or further/furthermost/ furthest can be used while further/furthest are used in the meaning «more», «extra», «additional»: I'm tired. I can't walk much farther/further. What's the farthest/furthest place have you ever been to ? In the furthermost corner of the hall sat a tall thin man. — For further information write to the above address.

Among adjectives with irregular comparative and superlative forms listed above there is also the adjective little which deserves special attention. It is used to describe uncountable nouns while countables are modified by the adjective few: I have very little money to live on. — I have very few chocolates left. There was little food left. — / have few friends.

Both little and few may be used with the indefinite article: a few — in the meaning «a small number, but at least some» whereas a little — in the meaning «a small amount, but at least some». Compare: There are a few eggs and a little milk in the fridge. I have a few friends. We ate a little food.

Note that little/a little may also be used as pronouns and adverbs: There's little I can do for you.— If there's any milk, I'll have a little, (pronouns) I see very little of him. — I'm a little hungry, (adverbs)

Many/much can function both as adjectives whereas many may occur as a pronoun and much — as an adverb: I've got many books on the subject. I've got much work to do. (adjectives) — Not many of the children will pass the exam, (pronoun) — It was much worse than I thought. I don't much like the idea, (adverb)

The comparison of adjectives may be expressed by some other grammatical means, namely double conjunctions. They are: a) not as...as/not so...as used in the negative sentences — My salary is not as high as yours. / My salary is not so high as yours. (=Your salary is higher.) b) as...as (but not so...as), the same, twice as...as, three times as...as, as in positive sentences: Your salary is as high as mine. Your salary is the same as mine. His salary is twice as high as mine.

As it has already been pointed out the morphological category of comparison is generally relevant to the class of qualitative adjectives which are supposed to evaluate the property of a substance in terms of its amount or quantity. The exceptions are adjectives with negative meanings formed by negative suffixes such, as unimportant, disreputable, immoral, irresponsible, etc., and adjectives denoting

colour, size like greenish (to some degree green), darkish (to some degree dark), tallish (to some degree tall).

Note that relative adjectives, which are unable to form the degrees of comparison by definition, may sometimes become evaluative, i.e. qualitative. Consider the following examples, wooden bed, wooden spoon — wooden face, wooden performance (of an actor). In the first two word-combinations wooden is used in its literal, relative meaning — «made of wood» while in the second — it has the qualitative meaning «awkwardly stiff, not lifelike». Consequently, the quality may be measured: The actress gave a rather wooden performance.