used very rarely in modern Lithuanian. 2In modern colloquial speech the shorter forms actually retain the -mė- syllable, but remove the final -e (except for reflexive verbs): dirbtumėm, skaitytumėt. 3A shorter form without -mė- does exist, but is used very rarely. This mood is actively used in modern Lithuanian and one of its functions corresponds to the English conditional mood. The conditional mood is used to describe a hypothetical action that could take place if certain conditions were met (hence the name) or a desired action in present or in future: Panaikinus muitus, sumažėtų prekių kainos – Having eliminated customs duties, prices would go down. Conditional mood is used in conditional (if) sentences; this usage requires conditional mood in subordinate and main clauses if both actions are perceived as hypothetical: Visi laimėtų, jeigu priimtumėte šį pasiūlymą. – There would be a win-win situation for everyone if you accepted this offer. Another very important function of conditional mood is the expression of purpose in final clauses (corresponds to Subjunctive mood in English): Dirbu viršvalandžius, kad uždirbčiau daugiau. – I work extra hours so that I earn more. The third function of conditional mood is the expression of politeness: Siūlyčiau panagrinėti šią temą kitu kampu. – I would like to suggest to examine this topic from a different angle. The perfect and inchoative forms are composed of the auxiliary verb būti in its simple conditional form and of an active participle of the main verb, matched according to gender and number of the person: {| class="wikitable" |- ! ! colspan=1| Perfect ! colspan=1| Inchoative |- |align="right"|I |būčiau skaitęs / skaičiusi |būčiau beskaitąs / beskaitainti |- |align="right"|You (singular) |būtum skaitęs / skaičiusi |būtum beskaitąs / beskaitainti |- |align="right"|He/She/It |būtų skaitęs / skaičiusi |būtų beskaitąs / beskaitainti |- |align="right"|We |būtume skaitę / skaičiusios |būtume beskaitą / beskaitainčios |- |align="right"|You (plural) |būtumėte skaitę / skaičiusios |būtumėte beskaitą / beskaitainčios |- |align="right"|They |būtų skaitę / skaičiusios |būtų beskaitą / beskaitančios |} Conditional perfect is actively used in modern Lithuanian. It means a hypothetical action in the past that would have taken place if certain conditions had been met (corresponds to the semantically equivalent form in English): Vadovas būtų pritaręs renginiui, bet niekas nerodė iniciatyvos. – The leader would have approved the event, but nobody showed initiative. Inchoative conditional means an action that could have started in the past and continued until present if certain conditions were