258 ON THE ROOTS IN THE MALAY LANGUGE. 
the chief idea or radical meaning is modified to a degree cor- 
responding with the change the 4, is made to undergo. We 
find this letter supplemented by ng, m, ands, in ting, tang, 
toeng ; tim, tam, toem ; tis, tas, toes. Ting signifies the sound 
produced by a small piece of money falling ona stone, and 
tang expresses the same thing of a large one, whereas foeng in- 
dicates the ringing tone of a bell, or the sound proceeding from 
a hollow bamboo-cane when the same is struck with a hard 
weapon. Itis our opinion that the fundamental or leading 
tone suffers no change, the same initial explodent being em- 
ployed in each case, but, the ng indicates prolongation, for the 
tone is not interrupted or brought to sudden conclusion but 
continues to vibrate through the nostrils; we faney we can 
hear a reverberation in ting 2 and tang quite as plaimly as in 
toeng, hence we have ventured to modify the meanings in some 
measure, through replacing the stone by a body possessing 
some vibrative power and capable of emitting a tone; it is true 
that something hard is requisite in these cases, but it should be 
a resonant body, for in the above examples it 1s more lkely to 
be the blow on the stone which it is intended to represent than 
the chinking of the coin. ‘The resonance here implied is, so 
to say, passive and confined to the object; replacing this nasal 
by the labial lquid m there is a further call for the idea, not 
precisely of a puffing, but rather of a humming or blowing 
sound ; it conveys the notion of an expulsion of air in the per- 
formance of which the subject itselfis engaged, so that tam 
and toem, besides indicating a resounding tone, have an extra 
influence in modifying the meaning. The discharge of a can- 
non is termed ftoem, doubtless with the intention — of showing 
that it is accompained by a hollow, booming sound ; tam names 
a flat, heavy body descending on the ground from above as, e. 
g., the falling down of the component parts of a house tumbl- 
ing-in, and the @ in the word marks the presence of a rumbl- 
ing, and crashing noise. ‘The letter s is also concurrent with ¢ 
in such cases : with the word fas we associate the sound of rat- 
tling, snapping, rustling, such as would ensue from the explod- 
ing of a percussion cap, or a rifle-ball entering a board or plank, 
also. the cutting of paper with a pair of scissors; toes is the 
name for a smart, sharp pop or bang, such as one hears on 
