Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 18, 1907.djvu/273

Rh should be followed out on the lines indicated by M. Van Gennep.

Mr. Dennett evidently has a thorough knowledge of the Chivili language—otherwise the Loango dialect of Kongo (Fiote)—and here I am somewhat at a disadvantage in following him, as many of the words given by him are not to be found in the late Mr. Holman Bentley's Dictionary of the Kongo Language. This is, I think, not so much from any fundamental difference in the two dialects (since, where we can trace cognate forms, they are not very far apart) as from the fact that many of Mr. Dennett's words relate to matters which did not come within the scope of Mr. Bentley's inquiries—perhaps, in the case of the more archaic, to traditions already lost in Sao Salvador. He does not, for instance, give any words for "north" and "south," nor any names for the different winds, which play so large a part in the Bavili philosophy; whence, perhaps, we may infer that the Bakongo were not in the habit of paying much attention to the cardinal points, the fixed directions of sunrise and sunset being sufficient for all practical purposes. Many of the Chivili sentences quoted by Mr. Dennett are undoubtedly very ancient, and would be unintelligible unless explained by a native—as is often the case with proverbs, songs, and other traditional matter. Thus, "the valley of the fly and the mosquito hand in hand" (pp. 12, 118), is rather a gloss than a translation of Bulu Zimbu Chikoko (Bulu=valley; chikoko is evidently an adverbial form derived from koko=hand; zimbu, plural of mbu=a mosquito). This is probably also the case with the native explanations of the symbols on pp. 71-73.

It might not be fair to demand from every student of any given language a knowledge of comparative philology; but a little acquaintance with some other Bantu languages would have shown Mr. Dennett that some, at least, of his etymologies are scarcely