Misuse of the participial phrase

[Molly]

Why is this considered a misuse of the participial phrase?

My farm consisted of about twenty acres of excellent land, having given a hundred pounds for my predecessor's goodwill. —Goldsmith.

[Haihao]

May I ask, Molly, who has given a hundred pounds?

[Molly]

[Haihao]

If so, the misuse should be of the subject 'My farm', which is also considered as the subject of the participial phrase.

[Molly]

[Haihao]

That's where the "misuse" is, Molly.

[Molly]

[Yankee]

Your sentence has what is known as a 'dangling participle', Molly.
http://andromeda.rutgers.edu/~jlynch/Writing/d.html
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[Lost_Soul]

Unfortunatunatelly,in my native language people sometimes make the same mistake (because we have participles as well), and to me it always sounded weird and I could not and still cannot understand how it is possible for a native Russian speaker to make such mistake.

[Yankee]

[Molly]

[MrPedantic]

Baskervill and Sewell, who also quote Goldsmith, and pose a similar question (see here), provide this explanation:

"The trouble is, in the sentences first quoted, that the main subject of the sentence is not the same word that would be the subject of the participle, if this were expanded into a verb."

(I find that separation of "is" and "that" disconcerting.)

MrP

[Lost_Soul]

[Yankee]

Hi Alex

I got a nice little gift from one of my ESL groups, and I liked it, so I decided to make up a new avatar that looked like it. It's a play on words (as I'm sure you already understand).
See definitions 3c and 5 here.
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By the way, I can see your 'signature' in your last post.
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[Molly]