168 LINGUISTICS “IN "THE? WESTERN *PACIFIC. 
or as augad, which meant totem. One translation in New Guinea has 
adopted the word god, but has disguised it as “kot.”” In Nguna, 
New Hebrides, the word used for god is suge, which in the Banks 
Islands is the well-known secret society. When the stories about Qat 
in Mota first became known, it was supposed that the peoples of that 
part of the Banks Islands regarded Qat as creator and god. ‘The 
Polynesian atua is given as meaning god in the dictionaries of the 
eastern Pacific, and Hazelwood gives god for kalou in Fijian, and doubt- 
less suge and t-mat are rendered as god in the dictionaries of the New 
Hebrides. Even if the suge of the New Hebrides (Codrington, Mel. 
Anthrop., p. 102) has no connection with the suge club of the Banks 
Group, yet the meaning is at any rate spirit rather than god. The 
Melanesian Mission, following the lead of Bishop Patteson, has used 
everywhere the English word god and has written it in its ordinary 
English spelling. 
In every case where nothing is found akin to the idea required, and 
in consequence an English word is introduced, it seems better to intro- 
duce a foreign word whose meaning is above suspicion; the spelling of 
such word is a matter of lesser moment; but where such varieties of 
pronunciation prevail, and among such qaiele different languages, it 
seems better to write the word in its original form and then let each 
set of people pronounce it in their own way. 
There is no need to make a concession to the peculiarities of the 
native alphabet in each place, for it will generally be found that the 
peoples can make a sufhciently good attempt at the new sound to 
justify the retention of the old spelling, and God, e. g., to our eyes at 
least, looks better than Kot, and sheep than sipu. Once a concession 
is made to native orthography in such matters, the missionary finds 
himself writing, ¢. g., in Florida in the Solomons Guilikokusi for Wilcox, 
and Pulaneti for Plant. Santa Cruz is actually the only place in the 
sphere of the Melanesian Mission where the people find a real difficulty 
in pronouncing certain letters foreign to their alphabet. 
The possession of the two forms of the personal pronoun, first person 
plural or dual, the inclusive and the exclusive, enables some finer 
shades of meaning to be set forth with greater clearness than is possible 
in languages which have not those forms. ‘Thus in St. Luke 7, 5, the 
difference between the two words our and us which is understood only in 
English, is clearly expressed in Melanesian, the inclusive form being 
used in the first case, since He to whom they spoke was also a Jew, and 
the exclusive in the second case, since the synagogue had been built 
for themselves, the people of Capernaum. A similar case occurs in 
St. Luke 24, 20, where the word “our” applies to the people of Judea 
only, the two speakers evidently regarding Him to whom they were 
speaking as a stranger. 
