LINGUISTICS IN THE WESTERN PACIFIC. 159 
Binandere, an extremely difficult non-Melanesian language spoken on 
the Mamba River. Mr. King has stated recently that on the coast of 
German New Guinea both Melanesian and non-Melanesian languages 
occur. Both types also occur in the sphere of the London Missionary 
Society. 
Melanesian languages are spoken in Fiji, Rotuma, the Loyalties, New 
Caledonia, New Hebrides, Banks, Torres, Santa Cruz, Swallow Group, 
Solomons, New Britain and New Ireland, Admiralties, in the islands 
lying off New Guinea to the eastward, and in New Guinea itself. With 
the single exception of Savo in the Solomons, all of the Melanesian 
languages are practically of the same type and the grammars of all of 
them may be made up on the same framework. Santa Cruz contains 
the greatest number of exceptions to the regular type and is confessedly 
the most difficult of the Melanesian languages. Savo is regarded by 
Dr. Codrington as Melanesian, but of a more archaic type than the rest, 
as is shown by the absence of prepositions in it and by its failure to 
distinguish between parts of speech and also by its use of demonstra- 
tives as both pronouns and adverbs. 
PROMINENT LINGUISTIC PECULIARITIES. 
It will be of use to summarize here the most pfominent linguistic 
peculiarities common both to Melanesian and Polynesian languages 
and to add further some special marks whereby the differences between 
these two types of the Oceanic languages may be readily recognized. 
1. POSSESSIVES. 
Possession is shown in the Melanesian languages by suffxing pro- 
nominal forms in ku, mu, na, to the noun: Mota qgatuk, my head; Sa‘a 
nimemu, thy hand; Florida tinana, his mother; and also to radicals no 
(na), mo, thus forming an expression answering to my, thy, his, in 
English, while another pair of radicals ga, ma, with the pronouns 
suffixed, represent, respectively, a thing belonging more closely to a 
person, and a thing for a person to drink. 
In Melanesia these pronominal forms are suffixed only to nouns of 
a certain class; those, namely, which signify parts of the body and 
degrees of relationship or a man’s belongings. In Malay these pro- 
nouns are suffixed to nouns without any distinction of class, while in 
Maori they appear added to the vowels 0 and a or to these vowels sup- 
plemented by n or m: no, na, mo, ma, and are used preceding the noun. 
In Maori the differences in meaning of these possessives are shown by 
the changes between a and 0, a signifying that the thing referred to 1s 
regarded as acted upon by the person with whom it is in relation, o that 
the action is from the thing on the person. ‘‘What the Polynesians do 
by the changes of a and o the Melanesians do by the use of four dis- 
tinct words, and in these it is the consonant and not the vowel which 
