Thomson. — WJience of the Afaon. 



xlv 



Tonfjan. Malay. 



Future Tense, 

 singular. 

 Teu and Tceu alu — I shall or will go. Ahu mau purgi — I shall, etc. 



DUAL. 



Te or &e ma alu — we two shall or will go. Klta dua mau purgi — we two, etc. 



PLURAL. 



Te or Ibe mau alu — we shall or will go. Kita maupurgi — we shall, etc. 



Imperative Mood, 

 singular. 



Purgi angTcau — go thou. 



DUAL. 



Purgi angTcau dua — go you two. 

 PLURAL. 



Purgi Jcamu — go ye. 



Infinitive Mood. 



Purgi — to go. 



Alu hoe — go thou. 



Alu aJcimoua — ^go you two. 



Alu akimoutolu — go ye. 



Alu or Ice alu — to go. 



Of adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions, and interjections, no remarks are called for 

 further than that there are some words, or nearly similar words, common to both 

 languages. 



General remarks on the above branch vs^ill be better left till near the 



conclusion of this paper. I will therefore proceed to the next step, viz., a 



consideration of the idioms of the Malagasi and Malayan tongues, as follows : — 



IDIOMATIC COMPAEISOJSr. 



Malagasi. EMPHASIS. Malay. 



The emphasis is placed on the penulti- The emphasis is placed on the penulti- 

 mate of dissyllables, and on the anti-penul- mate of dissyllables, as in — 

 timate of trisyllables and polysyllables, as Baivang — onions. 



Voninaliitra — glory. 

 Fanjakana — kingdom. 



Utan — forest. 

 But in the case of tri- and poly-syllables, 

 accent varies with the terminations, as in — 



Sarawak — Serawak 



Perampuan — woman 



Bagian — gift. 



Babeskan — finish. 



Orthography. 



Having no literature, when Roman let- 

 ters are used twenty-one suffice, sixteen of 

 which are consonants and five are vowels, 

 viz. , a, h, d, e, f, g, h, i, j, k, I, m, n, o, p, 

 r, s, t, V, y, z. 



Having no known primitive literature, its 

 alphabet is borrowed from the Arabs, com- 

 posed of thirty-six letters, thirty-two of 

 which are consonants and four of which are 

 vowels ; but when the Roman alphabet is 

 used twenty-three letters suffice, eighteen 

 of which are consonants and five of which 

 are vowels, viz., a, b, t, J, d, r, z, s, f, p, 

 h, k, g, I, m, n-, u, o, w, li (soft), i, e, y. 



Etymology. 



A great portion of the roots of both languages can be traced to monosyllables and 

 dissyllables, as — 



Lo — corrupt. 

 Hataha — request. 



Roots, in general, are nouns, adjectives, 

 or adverbs. When they are common sub- 

 stantives or adjectives they become verbs 

 by adding a vowel or syllable, or by chang- 

 ing the last syllable, as : sotro — drink ; 



JBiiso — rotten. 

 Mintah — ask. 



Roots may be nouns, adjectives, or verbs. 

 When the former they become verbs by 

 prefixing a syllable, and sometimes by suf- 

 fixing a vowel, as : mida — beginning ; nie- 

 mula or mula-i — to commence. When the 



Note. — y in the Malagasi vocabulary, wlien used as a termination to a word, has 

 the same sound aa i on the (Joutinent of Europe or e in English. 



