u TJIE PIGMIES, 



M. Montano was unable to procure equally accurate informa- 

 tion with regard to the language of the Mamanuas, or Negritos of 

 Mindanao. But these people could make themselves understood 

 by his guides who spoke to them a kind of corrupted or rather 

 simplified Bisaya, ( l ) There also, no doubt, the primitive language 

 has more or loss died out. 



Has it been the same in the Malay Peninsula ? M. Montano, 

 does not think he can yet answer the question. He easily under- 

 stood his Manthra ( 2 ) guide, when the latter spoke Malay to him ; 

 but he could catch but very few words when the same individual 

 conversed with his wild countrymen. He is satisfied that the 

 Manthras have a peculiar accent which may arise from various 

 causes. Father Pottget, who has lived for a long time in Malacca 

 and visited all the inland tribes, told M. Montano that these wild 

 people had no special language or dialect of their own, and that 

 they spoke a mixture of corrupted Malay and Siamese. However, 

 in his curious work on the Binuas of Johore, ( 3 ) Logan regards it 

 as certain that these people, though evidently more freely crossed 

 with Malay blood than the Manthras, have had, in former times, a 

 language of their own ; and he brings forward numerous argu- 

 ments in support of his opinion. ( 4 ) In the peculiar language, which 

 they speak when searching for camphor trees (5) amid their forests, 

 the same author has detected a certain number of words foreign 

 to Malay. I have compared several of these with words in two 



The Negritos of the Albay province (South-east of Luzon) speak Bicol flu- 

 ently. But they are crossed with Malays. The Bisaya Tagaloc, Bicol, Pam- 

 pango, etc., are but Malay dialects more or less considerably modified. (Mon- 

 tano.) 



(1) M. Montano says: " a kind of PUljin Bisaya." 



( * ) The Manthras are half-breeds of the neighbourhood of Kesang, near 

 Malacca, in the Malay Peninsula. 



( 3 ) The most southerly region of the Malay Peninsula. 



(4) The Orang Binita of Johore. (Journal Indian Archipelago, I, p. 289.^) 



( •-. ) This language is called laasa hajjor (camphor language). Logan 

 found it employed and always the same, by the tribes who search for camphor. 

 These savages are persuaded that it would be impossible to discover camphor 

 trees if any other idiom but the basaa-liapor were spoken while search is 

 bring made for these trees. (Logan, lor. cit., p. 268.) M. Montano also 

 mentions this language in his notes and spells it " baliaxa-hajxmr." 



