PROCEEDINGS OF THE CANADIAN INSTITUTE. 



41 



Niskwalli word for a stone. The Malay form is batu, the Timuri fattik, the Javanese 

 watii, the Fijian vatu, the Rotuma. hath u, the Maori koivatu. But the I ofchetla, which 

 otherwise might arise between hathu and kowotu, appears in the Biajuk hatro, and, 

 out of place, in the Malagasy vavto. A strange word is the Niskwalli stoduk, a 

 slave. Its original was the Malay hudak, which assumes in Javanese the form abdi, 

 recalling the Semitic ebed and abd. The b, thus made non-initial, dropped out in 

 the Bugis and Macassar ata, and in the Malagasy andavo, at first, probably, after the 

 fashion of the Bouton otuko, a post runner. Some other law of the permutation of 

 letters than that of Grimm must be found to enable the student to trace out Malay- 

 Polynesian derivations in America. The term for nose in Malay, Javanese, Madura, 

 and Lampung is idling, irnng, elong, egong. This is paralled by the Cree of Moose 

 Factory, the Plains, English River, and the East Main, whose relative word for man 

 is ililew, ininew, ithinew, and eyiyew. The derivation of the Niskwalli mtiksn, the 

 nose, from the Malay idung proceeds through the Lampung egong, the Bali kunguh, 

 the Bugis ingok, the Bali ceremonial hungas-iin, and the Samang initk, with the san 

 of the preceding. 



The Malay-Polynesian character of the Niskwalli numerals is incontestable, yet 

 that denoting 5, namely tsahats, which means " the fingers," is utterly unrepresented 

 by the various forms of riiita and lima, which indicate the hand and five. It is 

 probably derived with inversion of parts from the Tambora roma-toha, 5, answering 

 to the Lariki Uma-hatu, finger. Here toha and hata are governing words, and in true 

 Malay- Polynesian, as opposed to Melanesian, order should stand first. The Tongan 

 word corresponding to them is coiv, and coxv-ninia denotes the fingers. Then the 

 Tambora toharoma must by degrees have become toharon or tohalon and afterwards 

 tohalot. In some vocabularies the Tambora word for five is given as kiitelin, which is 

 just an inverted form of the Lariki linui-hatu, with the lima fallen to lin. The Tidore 

 runtoha, 5, exhibits the same phonetic decay, and restored to Malay structure, would 

 be toharun. As lima, 5, becomes lib in one of the dialects of the Caroline Islands, lin 

 might become lit, dental replacing dental in some other dialect. I confess, however, 

 that I have not yet come across an instance of such conversion of lima, the numeral, 

 within the limits of the Malay-Polynesian area. The nearest to it is the lok of the 

 Lampung chiu-lok, the hand. To one conversant with Lower Canadian patois, who 

 has heard omelette ^nd pat ate pronouncedas omelaque and pataqiie, the transition from 

 chiulok to ts-alats will not appear strange. 



The Salishan name is probably derived from that of the inhabitants of the Sooloo, 

 or more correctly the Suluk, Archipelago, between Borneo and the Philippines, who 

 are represented in the vocabulary by twenty-two words. The dialect under consid- 

 eration, namely the Niskwalli, seems to be that of Mysol, which lies between Ceram 

 and the north-western corner of New Guinea. It is represented by seventeen words, 

 many of which closely resemble those of the Niskwalli. These might be largely 

 increased. For instance, the Mysol name for man is mot, which in Salibabo becomes 

 tomata. If, therefore, we find Niskwalli in Mysol, we may be justified in finding two 

 other Salishan tribes, the Shwoyelpi and the Skoyelpi, in the people of the Salibabo 

 Islands, between Gilolo and the Philippines. The mot of Mysol and the tomata of 

 Salibabo furnish a beginning of the Polynesian word for man, as differentiated from 

 the Malay, and that is the original of the Salishan term. The Mysol motni, belly, is 

 probably the original of the Niskwalli smiikha; bit, black, of hitotsa ; kachun, boy, of 

 chachas; wai, child, of bibad ; patoh, cold, of tits; yem, dog, of komai ; gaf, feather, of 

 stokw (in Skoyelpi it is stakapisten, and in Salish proper, skapussel) ; kanin, hand, and 

 kaniuko, finger, of chalesh and shalatshi, by I replacing n ; wamtit, flesh, of beyets ; 

 kasebo, finger-nails, of kohwachi ; gakawatu, root, of aspud ; umblo, soft, of esmetlin ; 

 jiyu, wife, of chugwush ; hi, two, of salew ; fid, four, of has ; and ttt, seven, of tsoko. 

 These 17 words are additional to the 17 of the comparative vocabulary, and thus 



