580 



SYSTEMS OP CONSANGUINITY AND AFFINITY 



Quect. 12. Oil tbe mother's death, her property remained with her husband and children, not even 

 excepting her dower-land, which did not revert to her own tribe, as in Fiji. 



Quests. 13, 14, 15. I am unable to answer these questions. 



Quest. 16. The members of 710 subdivision of any Tongan tribe are necessarily akin. 



Quest. IT. Kinsfolk do not salute by the term of kinship. They do not even use the term in 

 speaking to their nearest relations. Thus, a child, in calling his father, will not call " father !" but 

 will bawl out his father's name. 



REMARKS OF MR. FISON ON THE FIJIAN SY'STEM. 



As to the spelling of the Fijian words I hare sometimes been at a loss how to spell them so that 

 the English sound of the letters should represent the sound of the Fijian word. 



Where a is left without the breve, I have intended it to have the sound of a in fame, as vatatheni 

 ^ vaytatheui. 



Where e is left without the breve, I have intended it to have the sound of e in meet, also when 

 have written it e or ee. 



Where i is left without the breve, I have meant it to have the sound of i in light, thus lili = ly-ly. 



Where is written o, it is intended to have the sound of in stone, as nonggu = noh-nggu. 



I regret to see, in looking over the sheets, that I have in many cases relapsed into the Fijian 

 spelling : thus, after spelling the word for wife, watenggu, I write the same word watiqu, nonggu, 

 noqu ; Rawa, Rewa ; alawa, alewa ; tathenggu, tathinggu, &c. &c. I am exceedingly sorry for 

 this, and in order to remedy it as far as possible, I append a list of all the words, written according 

 to the Fijian spelling, which is nearly phonetic ; first explaining the sounds of tbe letters. 



The Fijian alphabet consists of the following letters : — 



abcdefgijklmnopqrstuvwy. 



Of these, f, j, and p arc used only in foreign words. 

 All the consonants are sounded as in English, except 



b c d g q. 



B has the sound of mb. 



C has the sound of th in these, but never of th in thin. 



D has the sound of nd. 



G has the sound of ng in ring. 



Q has the sound o? ng in younger. Sometimes it has the sonnd 0? nk in younker ; thu.?, waga = 

 wanka ; but this sound is not heard in any word which I have employed. 



The vowels have the sound which they have in the French language, only it must be remembered 

 that there are no diphthongs in Fijian, and that, therefore, ai, ei, &c. have not the French sound 



Ai = ah-e, which sounded quickly makes nearly the sound of i in light. 



Ei = eh-e, which makes nearly the long a in fame. 



Ou = 0-00, which makes Au = ah-oo = ow nearly. 



These so-called diphthongs, though sounded quickly, and one vowel slurred as it were into the 

 other, are not diphthongs, for a quick ear can always catch the distinct sound of each vowel. I 

 mark the long vowels ; the short are unmarked. 



