Question

The singular of ‘lice’ is ‘louse’.
A) Yes
B) No

Answer 1

Hint: This question is from the topic of singular and plural nouns. The singular and plural forms of a noun indicate whether the noun is single or multiple in number. It is a very useful tool in English grammar. Plural words can be formed by adding ‘s’ at the end of most English words.

Complete answer:
Singulars and plurals are characteristics of nouns. Singular form indicates that a noun is single, or one in number. A plural form indicates that a noun is multiple, or more than one in number. Generally, we add an ‘s’ to the end of a singular noun to form a plural noun. For example one house – two houses, one car – three cars, one dog – four dogs, one house – five houses, etc.

When nouns end with the letters; s, ch, sh, x, or z, then we add ‘es’ at the end of the singular noun to form the plural noun. For e.g. One bus – two buses, one dish – three dishes, etc.
There are some nouns that have a very irregular plural noun. They do not follow any pattern and neither do they end with ‘s’. For e.g. man – men, radius - radii, woman - women, mouse – mice, tooth – teeth.

Similarly, the words ‘louse’ and ‘lice’ given in the question are a pair of irregular singular and plural nouns, where ‘louse’ is the singular noun and ‘lice’ is the plural noun.

Thus, the correct answer is Option (A) Yes.

Note: When a word ends with ‘o’, two things can happen. Either it can be preceded by a vowel or by a consonant. When it is preceded by a vowel, we simply add an ‘s’ at the end of the word. For e.g. Zoozoos, video – videos, stereo – stereos, etc. When it is preceded by a consonant, we add an ‘es’ at the end of the word. For e.g. Hero – heroes, tomato – tomatoes, echo – echoes, etc.