A Person Who Acted As Interpreter To Sir George Cathcart
Actually Told His Excellency That The Language Of The Basutos
Was not capable of expressing the substance of a chief's diplomatic paper,
while every one acquainted with Moshesh, the chief
Who sent it,
well knows that he could in his own tongue have expressed it without study
all over again in three or four different ways. The interpreter
could scarcely have done as much in English.
This language both rich and poor speak correctly; there is no vulgar style;
but children have a `patois' of their own, using many words in their play
which men would scorn to repeat. The Bamapela have adopted a click
into their dialect, and a large infusion of the ringing "ny",
which seems to have been for the purpose of preventing others
from understanding them.
The fact of the complete translation of the Bible at a station
seven hundred miles inland from the Cape naturally suggests the question
whether it is likely to be permanently useful, and whether Christianity,
as planted by modern missions, is likely to retain its vitality
without constant supplies of foreign teaching? It would certainly
be no cause for congratulation if the Bechuana Bible seemed at all likely
to meet the fate of Elliot's Choctaw version, a specimen of which
may be seen in the library of one of the American colleges -
as God's word in a language which no living tongue can articulate,
nor living mortal understand; but a better destiny seems in store for this,
for the Sichuana language has been introduced into the new country
beyond Lake Ngami.
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