Page:An Australian language as spoken by the Awabakal.djvu/186

 98 AN AUSTEALIAN LANGUAOE.

hence the variety o£ the forms of verbs ' to be ' ; for instance, natiin bag means 'I see'; na korien bag, 'I see not'; nakulla bag, 'I saw'; na pa korien bag, '1 saw not.' This* last cannot be written n a k u 1 1 a k o r i e n bag, 'I saw not,' because the -k u 1 1 a would afRrm that the agent actually of his own power did whatsoever the root affirms ; and the root-form n a implies that the thing is actually seen, while the -k ull a added makes the meaning to be that it presents itself before you, and you must see it, unless you are blind or do not exercise the faculty of sight ; hence the privative affix, p a, must be used instead, to show that, although the object spoken of was there, I could not see it, because it was not presented to my sight.

Ex. — Tanoa, na-mai-ga yikora. This is a peculiar but common phi'aseology throughout all verbs, and is hardly translate- able into English; the nearest phrase would be ' do not be seeing and yet perceive not,' or ' do not in your manner be looking with- out causing yourself to exercise your faculty of sight.' In this there is an affirmation of the abstract action performed by the agent, but a suspension of effect ; the whole is something similar to the phrase ' you look but you will not see', that is, 'you are determined not to see.' But, on the other hand, yanoa, naki yikora means 'do not look'; yanoa, nakilli-ban yikora, ' do not thou be looking'; and yari bi nanun, 'thou must not look'; -niin is the sign of the future tense, for prohibition re- quires the future.

G-an ke unnoa kuri? 'who is that man'? to this, gannug? is the answer, if you do not know the person; lit., 'whom'? a question in reply. To express 'I do not know,' would be gurra korien bag; but this would really mean 'I do not know what is said,' or ' I do not perceive by the ear what is spoken.' To know personally anyone is gimilli; thus, gimilli bon bag, 'I know him personally'; keawaran bag nurun gimilli korien, 'I personally know you not.' To deny that you have the knowledge of a person whom you really do know is expressed by the peculiar form gan? 'who'? thus gan-bulliko means 'to be who-ing' interrogatively, that is, asking who the person is when he is already known, with the intention of denying a knowledge of the person. Wonto ba niuwoa gan-bullinun tia emmoug mikan-ta kuri-ka, gan-bullinun wal bon mikan-ta agelo-ka Eloi-koba-ka ; 'whereas he who will be 'who-ing' of me in the presence of men, certainly I will be 'who-ing' of him in the ])resence of angels belonging to Eloi,' i.e.., God ; this is an aboriginal translation of the words " But he that denieth me before men, shall be denied before the angels of God." Emmoug means 'concerning me,' whilst tia means 'me,' the object; the passive form of the English verb is always expressed by the active form of the Australian.

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