TITLES. 169 



used equally by American Indians and by New Zealanders 

 in addressing the rulers of the civilized. We find it in 

 Africa. Of the various names for the king among the 

 Zulus, father heads the list; and in Dahomey, when the 

 king walked from the throne to the palace, &quot; every inequal 

 ity was pointed out, with finger snappings, lest it might 

 offend the royal toe, and a running accompaniment of 

 Dadda! Dadda! (Grandfather! Grandfather!) and of 

 Decide! Dedde! (softly! softly!) was kept up.&quot; Asia 

 supplies cases in which the titles &quot; Lord Raja and Lord 

 Father &quot; are joined. In Russia, at the present time, father 

 is a name applied to the Czar; and of old in France, under 

 the form sire, it was the common name for potentates of 

 various grades feudal lords and kings ; and ever continued 

 to be a name of address to the throne.* 



More readily than usual, perhaps from its double mean 

 ing, has this title been diffused. Everywhere we find it the 

 name for any kind of superior. Not to the king only among 

 the Zulus is the word &quot; baba,&quot; father, used; but also by in 

 feriors of all ranks to those above them. In Dahomey a 

 slave applies this name to his master, as his master applies it 

 to the king. Livingstone tells us that he was referred to as 

 &quot; our father &quot; by his attendants; as also was Burchell by 

 the Bachassins. It was the same of old in the East ; as when 

 &quot; his servants came near, and spake unto Naaman, and 

 said, My father,&quot; &c. ; and it is the same in the remote 

 East at the present time. A Japanese &quot; apprentice ad 

 dresses his patron as father. ? In Siam &quot; children of the 



* Though the disputes respecting the origins of sire and sifur have ended in 

 the conclusion that they are derived from the same root, meaning originally 

 elder, yet it has become clear that sire was a contracted form in use earlier 

 than sicur (the contracted form of seigneur], and hence acquired a more gen 

 eral meaning, which became equivalent to father. Its applicability to various 

 persons of dignity besides the seigneur, is evidence of its previous evolution 

 and spread ; and that it had a meaning equivalent to father, is shown by the 

 fact that in early French, grant-sire was an equivalent for grand-pere, and also 

 by the fact that sire was not applicable to an unmarried man. 



