Page:An Australian language as spoken by the Awabakal.djvu/57

 i>7rEODUCTio:s'. slvii

rich in verb-forms. As an illustration of this, let ns take from the "Wiradhari dialect the root verb banga, of which the original meaning is that of 'breaking,' 'dividing,' 'separating.' From that root are formed — bang-ana, 'to break' (intrans.), bang- lira, 'to bi'eak ' (trans.), banga-mara, 'to (make to) break,' and, with various other adaptations of the root-meaning, banga-bira, banga-dira, banga-nira, banga-naringa, banga-dara, banga- gainbira, banga-dambira, banga-durmanbira, bang-al-gara. It is true that these varying formativea resolve themselves into a few simple elements, but they certainly convey different shades of meaning ; else, why should they exist in the language 1 Nor is the root banga the only one on Avhich such changes are made; for the Wiradhari vocabulary contains numerous instances of similar formations.

Then the modes of a verb are also usually abundant and precise. In the Indicative mood, the Awabakal dialect has oiine different tenses, and the Wiradhari has one more, the future perfect. Our Australian verb thus rivals and excels the Greek and the San- skrit, for it thus has four futures, and, for time past, it has three forms, marking the past time as instant, proximate, and remote. Corresponding to these tenses, there are nine participles, each of which may be used as a finite verb. Besides an Imperative mood and a Subjunctive mood, there are reflexive and reciprocal forms, forms of negation, forms to express continuance, iteration, immi- nence, and contemporary circumstances. Now, as the Australian language is agglutinative, not inflexional, the verb acquires all these modifications by adding on to its root-form various independ- ent particles, which, if we could trace them to their source, would be found to be nouns or verbs originally, and to contain the various shades of meaning expressed by these modes of the verb. The Fijian verb — in a Melanesian region — is also rich in forms ; for it has verbs intransitive, transitive, passive, and, with prefixes, intensive, causative, reciprocal, and reciprocal-causative. And among the mountains of the Dekkan of India — also a black region — the verb, as used by the Tudas and Gonds, is much richer than that of the Tamil, the most cultivated dialect of the same race.

And, in A.ustralian, this copiousness of diction is not confined to the verbs ; it shows itself also in the building up of other words. On page 102 of this volume, a sample is given of the manner in which common nouns may be formed by the adding on of particles. Mr. Hale, whom I have already named, gives other instances, doubtless derived from his converse with Mr. Tlirelkeld at Lake Macquarie, and, although some of the words he quotes are used for ideas quite unknown to a blackfellow in his native state, yet they are a proof of the facility of expression which is inherent in the language. I quote Mr. Hale's examples : —

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