A grammar and dictionary of the Malay language : with a preliminary ...

DISSERTATION. cclxxv
a native word is " one/' but this is also the case with several
other rude languages. In other respects the system is
tolerably perfect, with the exception that the Malagasi has
rejected the affix bias or walas, which with the units represent
the numbers between ten and twenty in the Malayan system.
It clumsily uses in its stead a copulative conjunction and an
article, saying, for example, " ten and the one,'' " ten and the
two," for the sablas, "eleven," and duablas, "twelve," of the
Malay. A similar practice is followed with the odd numbers
between even tens from 20 to 100. Most of the numerals, it will
be seen, belong to the Javanese and not to the IMalay form of
them. The two highest numbers, notwithstanding the discrepancy
of orthography, I have ventured to mark as Sanskrit. They
certainly correspond in sense with the ^Malayan numerals, includ-
ing even the mistake made by the Malayan nations in adopting
the first of them. Aliua seems to be formed from laksa, chiefly
by substituting a nasal for the sequent ks, a sound which a native
of Madagascar could not pronounce. The turning of kat'i into
hetsi is more obvious. Here the guttural is converted into an
aspirate, as is frequently done with other Malay words, as kala,
" a scorpion," for example, into hala ; and then, the INTadagascar
consonant ts is substituted for the palatal t of the Malayan, a
letter which is not found in the IMalagasi.
What benefit, then, it may be asked, did the natives of Ma-
dagascar derive from their communication with the jNIalayan
nations ? I think a good deal must be inferred from the examina-
tion now made. They certainly derived more advantage from
the connexion than the Polynesian tribes from the same inter-
course. The Malayan nations, probably, instructed them in the
knowledge of making malleable iron. There is every appearance
of their having introduced into the island the cultivation of rice
and of the coconut. They either introduced or taught the culture
of the yam. It is not improbable but that it was they who introduced
the arts of weaving and sewing. But the Malayan
nations introduced no domesticated animal, and taught the
natives of jNIadagascar neither letters, law, or religion. If it be
true that the Hovas, or ruling race of the island, are the mixed
descendants of the jNIalayan immigrants, another benefit must