440 Report S.A.A. Advancement of Science. 



Reitz or Melt Brink, in the stories and more ambitious larger works 

 of the Rev. S. J. du Toit, etc., and such as that gentleman uses in 

 his proposed translation of the Bible, etc. etc. 



I shall try tO' show that this language fully deserves study from 

 a linguistic, scientific point of view, and defend it against some re- 

 marks I have heard or read in its dispraise. I intend to discuss its 

 origin, stating what has so far been written about it, and point out 

 some of the problems still to be solved concerning it. 



This latter : the formulating of what is still to be done will, I 

 hope, " set others going," and I hold that he who — prevented by 

 whatever circumstances — cannot himself work at a problem, contri- 

 butes to- its solution by removing obstacles which might prevent 

 others from paying attention to it. 



If, in the course of my remarks, I repeat some text-book truths 

 which are the common property of all who have ever occupied them- 

 selves with scientific study of any language, my excuse must be that 

 in this paper I am probably addressing but few who' are already 

 students of linguistic problems, and chiefly those whom I should 

 like to encourage toward becoming so, by showing them that what 

 they thought was beneath their notice possesses un.suspected value 

 and interests worthy of their best efforts. 



One of the commonest remarks made again and again by those 

 who for the moment I will call the detractors of Cape -Dutch is: 

 " Cape-Dutch is nO' language, it is a mere patois ! " 



It would — so it seems to- me^ — be perfectly fair tO' ask those who 

 utter this platitude with all the weight of ignorance and self-satisfac- 

 tion of imagined superiority, that they should define the terms they 

 so glibly use, and tell us what they mean by a " language " and a 

 " mere patois," and that they who so confidently deny the right of 

 Cape-Dutch to be classed with the one, and condemn it to rank with 

 the other, should clearly state where they draw the line, and the 

 reasons why they assitrn tO' Cape-Dutch a place among the goats rather 

 than among the sheep. 



No linguist has as yet been able to draw that line, no^ one has as 

 yet told us where a " language " begins and a " patois " ends. 



If the aggregate of articulate utterances which serve a com- 

 munity of people to tell one another of their thoughts, their hopes, 

 their beliefs, their best and noblest feelings, their wishes, their loves, 

 their purest affections, to express their joys and their griefs, their 

 hatred and their admiration, if that is a " language," if nO' one 

 hesitates to speak of the " language " of the Kaffir, the Papuan, or 

 the inhabitant of the Tierra del Fuego, just as well as of the lang- 

 uage of England, of France or of Germany, what reasonable argument 

 ran possibly be adduced for denying this title to Cape-Dutch? 



Or is it because in so very many respects it still very closely 

 resembles the tongue of Holland, the language spoken by most, if 

 not all. the first settlers, the language of which the very name of 

 " Cape-Dutch " reminds us ? I hope to show a little later on that 

 Cape-Dutch has developed — allow me to call it for the moment 

 "regularly." "correctly," " leo-;fimatelv."--alon"- a way of its own. a 



