Plenty!

"What's in a Name?"

By Our Mangaia Correspondent RECENT experience inclines this writer to answer Shakespeare’s query with the assurance that though “a rose,” etc., there’s enough in names to warrant a loud demand for their correct rendition, anyway!

Our Islanders, who do not speak much English, have a most curious way of twisting European appellations out of recognition, by refusing to accept a sound not familiar to them and substituting for it one that they do know.

There was once on this isle a white child named Wendy. Now, Sir James Barrie being a total nonentity here, the natives threw “Wendy” aside for a better known sound, and—in spite of many cor rections—made “Wendy” into “Windy!”

This peculiar obstinacy with names is typical of the Mangaian, and often takes grotesque forms.

I was translating, some time ago, a few old Maori documents relating to local history of half a century back. In one of these, the coming to the island of “Miti Baranketi” (pron. “Mee-chee Bran ket”) was listed as a soul-stirring event.

The visitor was, the papers stated, a European “rangatira,” of mighty mans.

Mee-chee was “Mister.” I could see. But “Baranketi” (meaning blanket) beat me entirely. I made extensive inquiries of the elders; but for a long time my re searches went unrewarded, for nobody seemed to know the facts, beyond that “Mister Blanket” had come, seen, and departed, long, long ago.

At last, I looked up an old Govern ment publication, and then I got It. This oddly-appellated “Mr. Blanket” was the (then) Governor of New Zealand. “Meechee Baranketi,” correctly interpreted, became the Mangaian rendering of Lord Plunkett.

A masterpiece was committed at the VE- Day celebrations here. A certain choir had been coached, in their village, to render an armistice thanksgiving chant, in the best local style. That style is sound and fury to Europeans; so an English phrase was interpolated—“ Peace Be Unto You.”

On the day of rejoicing the paean

made an immense impression, and Man gaia-men said the local equivalent of “Whaur’s yer Wullie Shakespeare the noo!” amid great acclaim. To us “papa’as,” it wasn’t so hot. For, in our ears, the choir appeared to be saying “Fish be unto you!” Better, I suppose, than the transatlantic nuces vobiscum; but it wasn’t English, though it may have been Art!