The record-union., 1896-01-28

age of two days. He is Belgian
gentleman, but speaks fair English.
1t is marvellous how generally the
English is spoken on this coast. Al
though the nations that claim the ter
ritory of Africa. use every means to
enforce the use of their own mother
tongues and suppress English, dare
say that there are more natives who
can speak it than there are of all the
other languages combined, except the
native tongues, of course. Beside this
you rarely find a white man who can't
speak a little English, but you find
plenty that can't speak anything else,
although they live under some other
Government
There is no question that English is
to be the Volapuk of commerce. 1t is
almost so now, and each year increases
the demand. This is due, in part, to
the wide range of British trade. but
aside from that it appears to be the
most easily acquired and the most
easily spoken of all languages.
A STUDY IN LANGUAGE.
Tt seems, in some way. that fewer
words suffice to convey the idea than in
any other tongue. 1t has some element
OF merit above others, which we may
not be able to explain, but it is there
and the native takes it up as salt takes
up moisture. He can't tell how or why,
but he absorbs it in some way and re-
tains it. You must know it is very far
from pure, polite English, for the vo-
cabulary is restricted to a few dozen
words, but they have such scope as to
express almost any thought that he has
any occasion to convey.
For example, take the word ''go.' .
which is the one used by them to ex-
press intransitive action of any kind.
To this they couple the proposition
! for" which they pronounce like 'fu, y
and represents all forms of that class of
words. Take one noun-we will say
"ehop''-which means food in this dia-
lect of English, and you will find that a
native can say forty things on this sub
ject. go flu chop" means find food, +"
prepare food, breakfast" dinner. .
or supper is ready" come to break
fast ''to dinner" or "to supper ''he
is eating" carry food" "bring food, =
take fcod,'' "eat food, buy food, and
countless other things.
But add to these the pronouns "me, J"
diAQ QGlI anu we Will give you lOIlN
more ideas. Then add a dozen or so of
nouns and he will astonish you In
crease the list of verbs to six or eight
and he will be master of English, be-
cause he does not need any infiexions of
the verb to convey his meaning Few
adjectives suffice for all purposes, and
the degree is expressed by the word
pass, in this wise, to say dem good,
is to say this, that, these, those, ne,
she, it, they, ETC., ''is'' or f'are good
To use the comparative degree, he viii
say dem pass good" For the superIa-
tive he will say dem pass all fu good
or bad" or big as the case may be.
Eight words of this peculiar speech
are known by nearly every native on
the coast. These words are:
Chop" meaning food and everything
relating to it, such as to eat
Live, as a neuter verb, ito be-" Ito
exist" implying manner, intention, etc.
Co expressing any intransitive ac-
ton, as explained above.
Fit" to express disposition, ability,
ETC.
'savvy," to know, to be acquainted
with or aware Of
Dem" which is a universal pronoun
Of the third person.
Make, to express any intransitive
action.
Dash" to give, pay. etc; limited
properly to a gift or a present.
With this limited vocabulary and
dozen nouns the natives can make
themselves understood better than
some people have met with a vocab-
ulary as big as the Century Dictionary.
1t is a language within itself, and a
stranger really has TO learn it from
them. OF course, this is not the limit
of it, for, as they can, they add to it
until some Of them speak very fairly.
but these eight words are almost uni
versaI-R. L. Garner in New York
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