474 
THE KILIMA NJARO EXPEDITION 
guage in review, we may be better able to fix its 
position and relationships among other African lin¬ 
guistic groups. 
In the recognition of sexual gender it resembles 
the Semitic, Hamitic, and Hottentot tongues; but, as 
I have tried to show, this generic distinction is some¬ 
what hazy and seems to have originated rather in 
differentiating the strong, big things from the small 
and weak. The three classes in Masai, viz. strong or 
masculine, neuter or common, feminine or weak, seem 
to occupy a somewhat intermediate position between 
the many arbitrary classes in the Fula and Bantu 
languages, and the two genders of nouns—male and 
female—in the Semitic and Hamitic families. The 
“ feminine ” consonant in Masai is n. In the Hotten¬ 
tot, 9 Hamitic, and Semitic languages it is generally t 
(9 (th), s, h). 
In the question of construction the primal roots of 
the Masai language seem to have been monosyllabic— 
in this differing from the Bantu and Hamitic (wherein 
they were probably dissyllabic) and the Semitic (in 
which they were trisyllabic and triliteral). The 
manner of forming the plural by adding an affix to the 
root resembles the plan adopted in certain Hamitic or 
Ethiopic tongues, particularly in Galla, where the few 
plurals that exist are made by adding -n, -ni, -da to the 
singular form of the noun; The secondary and rarer 
mode of giving a plural signification to a root (chiefly 
in pronouns and adjectives, and in Bari in certain 
nouns) by changing the prefix to im (Bari, ho), reminds 
one of the prefix-governed families of African tongues. 
The mode of forming derivative verbs by affixing 
9 The Hottentot, like the Masai, has three classes, masc., fem., and 
common. 
