A grammar of the Malayan language, with an introduction and praxis..

A
GRAMMAR
OF THE
3IALAYAN LANGUAGE.
^PREVIOUSLY to treating of words, which are the proper subject of
Grammar, it is necessaiy to describe the characters or letters, in
respect to their form and sound, by which the words are expressed in
writing.
The Malays have for this purpose adopted the alphabet of the
Arabians, whose literature has in all countries accompanied the intro-
duction of the Mahometan religion ; but many of its peculiar sounds,
and especially the gutturals, being little suited to the soft pronunciation
of the East-insular languages, they are never to be found in the ortho-
graphy of indigenous Malayan words, and even to those Arabic terms
which the Malays have borrowed from their instructors they give a
smoothness of utterance that nearly prevents their being recognised by an
Arabian ear. On the other hand there existed in these languages several
nasal and other sounds, for Avhicli the alphabet, in its original state, had
no corresponding letters, and to remedy this defect they were under the
necessity of making additions to it ; not indeed by the invention of new
B forms.