LANGUAGES OF PONAPE AND HAWAII. 425 
In almost the opening sentence on word-making the Hawaiian 
Grammar states, “Every Hawaiian syllable ends in a vowel,” and 
further, “No Hawaiian without a special effort will attempt to 
pronounce two consonants together,” the one following the other. 
As this is a very striking feature of the Polynesian tongue, is 
there any feature in the Ponape corresponding to it? 
In the first place a large part of the two-syllable words in 
Ponape, begin and end with a consonant : 
pit, quick, pit-pit mat, soft, mat-mat 
tik, small, tik-tik mot, to need, mot-mot. 
Now for a Hawaiian to utter these words would be very difficult 
ae. to utter them as they stand, and so would it also be for a 
Ponapean. But the language delights in soft sounds, and the 
Ponapean delights in the legato. For him to say tik tik, mot-mot, 
mat-mat, with the full hiatus between the syllables would be almost 
impossible, and he never attempts it. But skilfully throwing out 
a string piece, a stretcher, as it were, or euphonic vowel, as tikitik, 
motomot, matamat, he glides from point to point with the utmost 
ease. Every Ponape word does not end in a vowel, as is seen in 
some of those given above, but many Ponape words end in con- 
sonants, which are largely semi-vowel, a great help to any vowel- 
istic speaking people. From this we see how easy in a compara- 
tive sense the Malayo-Micronesian dialects can be made to adapt 
themselves to such organs of speech as the Hawaiian possesses, 
and how near, too, the languages are in this ability to enunciate 
them 
§ 5. “O EmpHaric. 
The Hawaiian Grammar opens the subject of etymology by a 
description of the “O emphatic.” Its position in the sentence is 
unique. Untranslateable as a particle, it is yet indispensable to 
the language. Thus : 
Make o kahekili ma Oahu. Kahekili died at Oahu. 
Holo aku la o Lono. Lono sailed away. 
Alaila malu o Maui. Then Maui will be at peace. 
