130 R. H. MATHEWS. 



sound asja. At the end of a syllable or word, dy or ty is sounded 

 as one letter; thus, in bir-rity, sick, the last syllable can be pro- 

 nounced exactly by adding e to the y, making it rit-ye. Then 

 commence articulating the word, including the y, but stopping 

 short without sounding the final, or added e. Dy at the end of a 

 syllable can be pronounced in the same way, the sound of d being 

 substituted for that of t. In all cases where there is a double 

 consonant, each letter is distinctly enunciated. 



Articles. 

 There are no articles corresponding to our "a" or "the" in any 

 Australian tongue with which I am acquainted. 



Nouns. 

 Number — Nouns have three numbers, the singular, dual, and 

 plural. There are euphonic variations and elisions in the suffixes, 

 according to the termination of the word used : 



(a) Singular An eaglehawk, mulyan 

 Dual A couple of eaglehawks, mulyanbulali 

 Plural Several eaglehawks, mulyanbuloala 



(b) Singular A bandicoot, mundu 

 Dual A couple of bandicoots, mundulali 

 Plural Several bandicoots, munduloala 



Gender — Words for "male" and "female" denote the gender of 

 animals in most cases: Guraura kaualgang, a male opossum; 

 guraura nunganung, a female opossum. 1 The male of birds is 

 bianhung, as jaula bianhung, a cock pheasant, and jaula nunganung 

 a hen. Different words are used to distinguish sex in the human 

 family, as, yuin, a man ; mega or ngurrungal, a woman ; bunbari, 

 a boy; yirrauiang, a girl. 



Case. — The principal cases are the nominative, possessive and 

 objective, the latter including the accusative, dative and ablative 

 forms. 



1. There is a double form of the nominative case. When 

 it is only necessary to name the object under attention, as yuin, a 



1 These words are inflected for number, as stated in dealing with the 

 adjectives. 



