Birth

IN Nurse Morrison’s private nursing home, Suva, on May 18, twin girls, to Mr. and Mrs. Keith Marlow. (Mrs. Marlow is the only daughter of Mr. and Mrs. H. L. Gerrard, of Fiji.)

niu loa ne fai gutu”—“a long cup with a mouth”.

They knew no covering for the feet. “Boots”, therefore, were bad enough; but “shoes” as well! The former they dubbed “wrapping the sole with a long mouth”, and merely changed “long” to “short” for shoes.

A “shirt”, which many men there prefer to exhibit right to the tail (a sheer waste of good stuff to tuck away!) they call “the garment to be inside of”. It was a thing quite new to them, who wore but a wrapper round their loins —or, still earlier, none at all.

A leaf kept their food off the ground. So there was nothing for it but to align a “plate” with the other essen tial at a meal; so it is “a flat cup”. As to “a frying-pan”, they gave it up as beyond their powers, and made a dash at it in Niuean sounds, namely “panifalai”, which is none too bad.

All their adjectives follow and do not precede their nouns, and their pronouns are never vain, dutifully following and not preceding the verb.

You must walk very warily with some of their words, for a single vowel makes a vast difference. To say “thick” you say “matolu”; to say “you”

you sav “mutolu”; whilst to say “our” you must needs say “mautolu”.

When the missionary started in to turn the Holy Book into Niuean he had no small job on his hands, owing to lack of words. What Niuean had ever heard of corn or gold, the Sabbath or a Cross?

Satan, too, and hell, heaven or syna gogue, a horse or a sheep, mustard seed and silk, all were alike unknown.

Thus, to-day, we have many Greek and Latin, even Hebrew words, in use, for those missionaries were not to be beaten. They largely increased the Niuean vocabulary: and what they said, went. They started to teach; and the poor Niuean was tied up in mental knots, to give names to things. But they suc ceeded. as had their teachers.

“Letters” of the alphabet are “the eyes of writing”. “Ink” was easy—“writing water”, even as “medicine” became “plant water”. In those early days. Mr.

Missionary used a quill pen only; so “a pen” is still a “penefulu” (“feather pen”).

But “a pencil” evidently was something greater in their eyes, for it is “the talk ing pen”; whilst “a slate-pencil” is a “stone pen”.

When steel nibs came first to Niue they disturbed the native minds greatly.

They would not give up the quill idea altogether, so they dubbed them “mata fulu” —“the eye of a feather”.

A button is the same word as the moon, presumably since it was round and white; a blanket the same as a sheep, and with good reason, though the former came to their hands long years before the latter; mustard is “the thing to eat that stings”. Pepper is just “pepa”.

To jutnp is “hopo”, correctly enough, but why should to kick be “holi”?

Time was not easily settled. Noon is “the sun perpendicular”; but as they have no quarter or half, they name the number of minutes either past (“mole”) or before (“keta”), the particular hour.

They have no word for “dad” or “mum”. They have “papa” and “mama”, but alas! “papa” means “a wooden club” and “mama” means “a mouthful”, and

these surely disrespectful words to use to one’s parents. Their words of endearment are very few, whilst father is but “male parent” and ‘ mother female ditto. A boy has to be content with “male child” and a girl is ‘female child”.

They have their ailments and name them adroitly. To be deaf is to have “a frozen ear”; to be blind is “eye-dark ness”; and the parts of the body are as neatly covered. The toes are “the eyes of the feet”, just as the fingers are “the eyes of the hand”. The nails are the ‘ moons” of one’s extremities, whilst tears are strictly apposite: “drops of water from the eyes”.

Whilst they are long-winded as a rule, they beat us handsomely at times. In “I cannot say”, we beat them hollow, for theirs is “Kua nakai maeke au ke pihe atu”. But in “what do you need it for?” they have us, for they cover it in a single word, “moha”.

In Niuean speech every vowel must be clearly and separately sounded —no shirking and slurring as is oft with us.

Try it with “tokaemenaia” (and others which have preceded) and the reader will likely exclaim, with zeal and glad ness its English equivalent, “enough”.