The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1893-10-15
VOLAPUK OF THE EAST.
Pidgin English Of Chinese Ports

A Curious Dialect Spoken by Hun
dreds of Thousands of orientals-In
Use Nearly Century, Nothing is
Known Of It's Origin.
From the Pail Mall Gazette.
When the necessarily superficial, if OBJ
servant, 'globe-trotter," after visit to
the far east, relates his adventures to ad-
miring friends, he is apt to use some very
uncomplimentary expressions about the
! ''jargon" spoken at the Chinese ports
known as pidgin English. That it is de-
| cidedly uncouth to sensitive ears is true
enough, but those who have more than a
! mere passing acquaintance with it's pc
culiarties discover that it is worth some
attention from a pathological point of
! view. How or when it first made it's APP
| pearance is uncertain. 1t was in common
use, at all events, eighty years ago when
the inclosure known as the Factories
at Canton was the only place in China
where foreigners were permitted to re-
side. Even the meaning of the name is a
puzzle. The commonly received explana-
| ion is that it is a Chinese mispronuncia-
tion of the word business" and no bet
ter can be suggested. OF the natural
tendency of language to assimilate words
! from sources foreign to its own origin we
have numerous examples in everyday
| life. Hindustani words have become a
part and parcel of the English spoken in
| Great Britain, while numerous Spanish
| expressions are current III the United
! States. Spanish itself, again has in Uru-
| quay and Paraguay admitted a large
admixture of Guarani, and the con-
| sentative Chinese have, with
! equal facility, adopted many words
! from Manchu and Monaghan. Dialects
are to be found which, beginning under
! similar circumstances, have so lost their
original identity in the process as to have
! become true pathological bastards Such
are the lingua franco of the Mediterra-
mean, and the gitano or gypsy language
! of that tribe, of Hindo origin, found in
in every European country. The most
| recent of these bastard dialects, and
necessarily less perfect in its individ-
uality than those above mentioned, is the
| pidgin English, which at the present day
| is spoken by some hundreds of thousands
| of Chinese upon the seaboard of their
empire, and even now extends to the
coasts of Japan.
AS TO GRAMMATICAL STRUCTURE.
Although only dating back to the early
DAYS of the East India Company, a suf1-
Gent time has elapsed since its origin to
| fix its formation within regular limits
Take, for instance, to begin with, the pro
noun. This occurs only in the forms
my" 'he" and you" which do duty
both as personals and possessives, 'he''
doing duty for 'she' and cit" eve"
and "they" are rendered by ssthisee
mar" 'that man, " the context implying
when they are used in personal rather
than a demonstrative sense. The sen
tence II saw him" thus becomes "may
have see he" while I'VE went out" would
be rendered, Gallo thisee man go out. "
There is not here any analogy between
the Chinese forms resembling our OWN
! and the rude substitutes adopted All
native dialects have l, he, we, YOU
and they, the possessives Tin Mandarin
being regular formed by the addi-
ton of ii, of; thus, wo l; wo-ti, mine,
The article and the conjunction are en-
tirely dispensed with in "pidgin," as
they are colloquially in Chinese, the word
| together being used as a Copulative
only In extreme cases. Verbs are in
pidgin English, corrugated by the use of
such words as hab, by'me-by, etc. Thus,
81 saw him" becomes my hab looksee
he" 81 shall get it" is my by. me by
catchee he" The infinitives of most
words are made to end in ee-likee,
wantsee, walkee. The word belong
or "b'lOng" also does duty as auxiliary,
| u am Chlnaman" being my b'lOng Chi
nee" The subiunctive also is formed by
adding this word belong; "you should go1
being expressed as you b'long go" IF
go" is ''spOsee my go;' and beyond this
there are no means of expressing the
other lenses except by clumsy combina-
tions. If had gone" is "sposee my
have 60" B'lOng, of course, stands for
sly belongs your business to-"
The comparison of adjectives is affected
by pretxing the word more" and too
muchee, " though the ordinary compare
| tive form is often used in conjunction
with the first named; thus good. more
better pronounced bettah), too muchee
good; largee (also pronounced larhee,)
more largee, too mdchee big. The
Chinese form is simple enough. 81 am
better than he is" being Il, that he.
good or, in the superlative, that is
the best" that, than all, exceeding
good" Pidgin English uses our own
handy yes" and mo" in place of the awk-
ward cit is" sit is not" of Chinese.
These examples show that, as regards
grammatical structure, pidgin is, in the
main, an imperfect adaptation of our own
rules. But the general construction of
sentences is essentially Chinese. go to
the postofice and bring me a letter.
would be rendered just as it would be
translated in a native dialect: "You
saVee that postOffice; go looksee have got |
one chit b'long my; sposee have got Won |
makee bling" The absence of a relative |
form necessitates the cutting up of all
TYpEWF