to such of the little people as came by

[Couch Tomato]

I wasted some time in futile questionings, conveyed, as well as I was able,to such of the little people as came by. They all failed to understand my gestures; some were simply stolid, some thought it was a jest and laughed at me.
(The Time Machine – H. G. Wells)

(The entire text can be found here on the Project Gutenberg website.)

I don't understand the structure (and the meaning) of the first sentence. What is the significance of the parallel structure as well as I was able... as came by? I understand the meaning of the first part - he conveyed his questionings as best as he could - but what does 'as came by' mean? Does it mean litererally as they were approaching him? Or does it have a different meaning?

Thank you in advance.

 

[entangledbank]

The third 'as' is unrelated to the first two. It belongs with 'such': such of the little people as came by = those of them who came by.

 

[Couch Tomato]

Thank you, entangledbank.

It belongs with 'such': such of the little people as came by = those of them who came by.

But in that case, could I replace 'as' with 'who' like you did in your rewording? '... to such of the little people who came by'?

 

[Biffo]

You have parsed the sentence incorrectly. Leaving out the adverbial phrase we have:


I wasted some time in futile questionings, conveyed to such of the little people as came by.

If we paraphrase this then we get:

I wasted some time in futile questionings, conveyed to those little people who came by.

Or, abbreviating: I questioned the little people who came by.


The adverbial phrase 'as well as I was able' can be paraphrased 'to the best of my ability'.


Does this help?


(Cross-posted with eb)

 

[entangledbank]

No, 'such .. as' is a fixed pair; its equivalent requires replacing both words: 'those .. who'. The 'such .. as' construction is perhaps somewhat old-fashioned or literary now, more common in Wells's time than ours, but still not unusual.

 

[Keith Bradford]

... The 'such .. as' construction is perhaps somewhat old-fashioned or literary now, more common in Wells's time than ours...

... and furthermore "such as" is nowadays a very common phrase meaning "for example" (such as the way I am using it now). So you are best advised, for two reasons, not to use it as Wells does.

 

[Couch Tomato]

Thank you, Biffo, entangledbank and Keith Bradford.