(42 Report S.A.A. Advancement of Science. 



but treats these new words in conformity with the rules he has 

 abstracted from the mass of concrete examples, with which he had 

 at first to struggle as with a rndis indigestaqiie moles. He arranges 

 and classifies, and— when for the sake of others, who are to come 

 after him, and who- may wish to acquire the " patois "' (jr " dialect " 

 or " language," he writes down in some regular order and grouping 

 the facts he has observed, the similarities, the analogies, the rules 

 which the speakers unconsciously follow, then he " writes a Grammar " 

 of that language. He writes it down for the first time, l)ut... he does 

 not make it, he does not create something which did not exist before. 



Iw judging of his work we must then never forget two things : 



ist. His Grammar is only " correct. ' in just as great a degree 

 as he has correctly observed, and correctly stated the facts of the 

 language, as it is spoken by the natives ; and we may in passing 

 observe that he never goes in for the absurd statement which we 

 can so frequently hear from thoughtless schoolmasters of our days: 

 "that people generally SAY this, but that really it OCGHT TO BE 

 that." Whatever the comparatively intellectually advanced, the older, 

 the wiser people, the leaders among them, habitually say, that " is 

 correct " : whatever goes against usage is " incorrect " and if the facts 

 of the language were found to differ from the facts or rules stated 

 in his book, then that would be a great pity for... the book. 



The facts which he classifies and states in some rational or c(jn- 

 venient order and arrangement, these are the authority, and he is 

 merely codifying, and has to obey them. In other words, the lang- 

 uage is the master, and the grammar-book has tO' obey : the language 

 rules the grammar ond the grammar does not rule the language. 



The rule is correct if it is in conformity with usage of the lang- 

 uage, and no native will tell his boy or girl that any expression is 

 " correct," because it is so stated in Mr. X's l>ook, or " incorrect " be- 

 cause ^Jr. X. stated in his book that he, Mr. X., considered some 

 other — may-be older — way of exjjressing the same thought prefer- 

 able. The native leaves such follv to the modern, wiser, "better-in- 

 formed," schoolmaster. 



jndly. The facts and the usage, the regularity of treating similar 

 words in a similar manner under similar circumstances, all these 

 constitute the grammar and all these existed long ere any one ever 

 thought of classifying, arranging and grouping them for facility of 

 imparting a knowledge of them, or out of a spirit (jf philosophical 

 inquiry. In other words the language " HAS A GRAMMAR," quite 

 independently of the question whether anv one has ever attempted 

 to state that Grammar in writing. 



We must now ask once more: What does our detractor me.m 

 when he says: ' Cai>e-Dutch has no grammar'?" 



If he means what he really has no right to call .so. that the facts 



of Cape-Dutch have not yet been codified, that no grammar-BOOK 



has as yet been written, even then his statement is quite incorrect, 



• but... even if it were correct, it would be merelyi a statement that 



something which would be very interesting to do. has not vet been 



