THE KI SAW AH ILL 



443 



and initial changes present to one accustomed 

 only to the terminal. 



The minor characteristics of the Kisawahili 

 are the peculiarities of the negative system in sub- 

 stantives and adjectives, pronouns, adnouns, and 

 verbs; for instance, Asie, he or she who is not, 

 Isie, it which is not. Secondly, are the broad 

 lines of distinction drawn between words de- 

 noting the rational and the irrational, and in 

 a minor degree the rational-animate (as man), 

 and the rational-inanimate (as ass). In most 

 cases the rational-animate affixes "W a as a plural 

 sign : the irrational-animate Ma. TJmbu, a 

 sister, properly makes Waumbu, sisters : the 

 ignorant, however, and the Islanders often say 

 Maumbu (sisters) like Map'hunda (asses). Thus 

 personality supplies the place of gender, a phe- 

 nomenon that already dawns in the Persian and 

 in other Indo-European tongues. Next is the 

 artful and intricated system of irregular plurals, 

 and last, not least, the characteristic alliteration, 

 an assonance apparently the debris of many an- 

 cient dialects based upon an euphonious concord 

 not always appreciable by us, and therefore not 

 yet subjected by our writers to rule. We under- 

 stand, for instance, that an alliterative sj>eaker 

 should say Mtu mema (a good man), and Watu 



