252 GENERAL’ ACCOUNT OF NEW ZEALAND cuap. x 
Thus much for the manners and customs of these people, 
as far as they have come to my knowledge in the few 
opportunities I had of seeing them. They differ in many 
things, but agree in more, with those of the inhabitants of 
the South Sea Islands. Their language I shall next give a 
short specimen of; it is almost precisely the same, at least 
fundamentally. It is true that they have generally added 
several letters to the words as used by the inhabitants of 
Otahite, etc., but the original plainly appears in the com- 
position. The language of the northern and southern parts 
differs chiefly in this, that the one has added more letters than 
the other; the original words are, however, not less visible 
to the most superficial observer. I shall give a short table 
of each compared with the Otahite, taking care to mention 
as many words as possible as are either of a doubtful or 
different origin; premising, however, two things—first, that 
the words were so much disguised by their manner of pro- 
nouncing them that I found it very difficult to understand 
them until I had written them down; secondly, that Tupia, 
from the very first, understood and conversed with them 
with great facility. 
I must remark that most of the southern language was 
not taken down by myself, and I am inclined to believe 
that the person who did it for me made use of more letters 
in spelling the words than were absolutely necessary. The 
genius of the language, especially in the southern parts, is to 
add some particle—the or a—before a noun as we do; the 
was generally ke or ko. They also often add to the end of 
any word, especially if it is in answer to a question, the word 
oeta, which signifies yes, really, or certainly. This some- 
times led our gentlemen into the most long-winded words, 
one of which I shall mention as an example. In the Bay 
of Islands a very remarkable island was called by the natives 
Motu aro; some of our gentlemen asked the name of this 
from one of the natives, who answered, I suppose, as usual 
Komotu aro; the gentleman not hearing well the word, 
repeated his question, on which the Indian repeated his 
answer, adding oeva to the end of the name, which made it 
