Evening Post. SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 10,1934. "GOD SAVE 'UM KING!"

Evening Post, Volume CXVIII, Issue 114, 10 November 1934, Page 8

Evening Post. SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 10,1934. "GOD SAVE 'UM KING!"

♦ The most famous achievement of pidgin English in literature is the translation of Longfellow's "Excelsior" under the title "Top-side Galow," which was included in Lelan'd's "Pidgin English in SingSong" in 1876, but had been previously published in "Macmillan's Magazine."^ But pidgin English may be said to have achieved a higher honour as the language of a momentous official document which has received judicial notice. 'Early Jin i the World War the Bismarck Archipelago, which^then belonged to Germany, -was taken by Australian forces, r and in a case which came before the Prize Court in London on April 23, 1917, it was necessary to prove the change of sovereignty. The claim was for the condemnation of 'a German vessel which was seized in r Tekeriki in the New IrelancT group fii the archipelago. The proclamation on which Sir Samuel Evans made a decree for the condemnation of the vessel and its cargo was in pidgin English. The draftsman of this proclamation had given so free a rein to his eloquence that it is impossible to 1 quote it all. The essential parts are as'follows: — AH boys belongina one place; you savvy big master he come now, he now feller master, he^ strong feller too much, yon look, him all ship stop place; he small feller ship belongina him. Plenty more big feller he stop place belongina him, now he come hero to take all place. He look out good you feller. Now he look you feller look out gooa alonga him. -Suppose you other feller master,1 he b«ea, speak you, "You no w.ork alonga new feller master," he,gammon. Suppose you work good with this new feller master he look out good alonga you, he_ look out you get plenty good feller kai-kai; he no fighting, black boy alonga nothing. , ~ ' You" look <*im new feller flag, you navvy him.. He belonga British (English); ho more,better than other feller., .%-, . British '(English) new feller master he likp^him black,feller man too;much.' He'like'him all same you picianitt* «longa: him. 'You get black feller aiMter belongina j you he all same-police master., You look out place «Jong'a with him he look out place alonga" with yout You no fight other feller, black man other feller place you no,ltai-k»l num. You no steal Mary belongina'other feller black man. He finish talk donga with yon soon. Bye-and-by* <ship belongina new feller master he come and look out place belongina'you.' You look out him now belongina place belongina you you' speak him all" the same. Me been talk with you now, now yon give -three good feller cheers belongina new feller master—No more 'urn Kaiser. God save 'urn King. Two incidental points in this memorable document are worth a passing note.. The official term "British* needed- ' interpretation by the bracketed word "English" to which the natives were used. It was not pidgin British: that they had learnt to talk. ,The other point is that, even though they were under German rule it was pidgin German. The ''new feller master" left all Btaac dlo talkee-talkee because it was really his own. "No more 'urn Kaiser. - God save 'urn King." That was the only change. The penultimate stanza of "Excelsior" in the original is i A traveller ''by the faithful .hound 1 Half-buried in the snow was found, ' Still grasping in his hand of ice That banner with the strange device Excelsior! This stanza is rendered as follows in the pidgin English version: That young man die. One large dog see;. •> ' - Too muchee bobbely findee ■ he. He hand blong colo —all same ice, Hab got he-flag with chop so nice, • ' Top-side galow! Tha word "jtajow," with its variants, "galaw, piah, gola, glow," is described by Leland as "a word without meaning, used as an interjection, like 'halt' ftl South German." The strong presumption that the word cannot be entirely otiose v is, however, confirmed by Mr. 0. "M. Green's, statement in his article on "Pidgin English" in the September "Fortnightly" that it is "used at the end of,a sentence to intensify its force." It would thus serve as an-appropri-ate rendering of the note of admiration after "Excelsior" in the original. If Mr. Greeii is right in his belief that "galow" is only heard in Canton, which '■ he describes as "the classic home of pidgin English,'! the South Chinese habitat increases by a happy coincidence the aptitude of Leland's South. German parallel. But a far greater interest attaches to the word for trouble in the second line of the stanza we have quoted: Too muchee bobbely findee he. j On the face of it "bobbely" is the English word "bobbery" modified

That young man die. One large dog

see; •> - Too muchee bobbely findee he. He hand blong colo —all same ice, Hab got he-flag with chop so nice,

Top-side galow! The, word *!ga^low," with its variants, "galaw, plan, gola, glow," is described by Leland as "a word without meaning, used as an interjection, like 'halt' ftl South German." The strong presumption that the word cannot be entirely otiose is, however, confirmed by Mr. O. M. Green's statement in his article on "Pidgin English" in the September "Fortnightly" that it is "used at the end of a sentence to intensify its force." It would thus serve as an-appropri-ate rendering of the note of admiration after "Excelsior" in the original. If Mr. Green is right in his belief that "galow" is only heard in Canton, which' he describes as "the classic home of pidgin English," the South Chinese habitat increases by a happy coincidence the aptitude of Leland's South German parallel. But a far greater interest attaches to the word for trouble in the second line of the stanza we have quoted: Too muchee bobbely findee he. j On the face of it "bobbely" is the English word "bobbery" modified

by the Chinese inability to pronounce the letter "r." In his "Pidgin English Vocabulary" Leland deals with the word as follows:— Bobbery (pron. "bbbbely"), the English, slang word, but .extended, in pidgin English 4o signify every kind of noise;; disorder, quarrel, disagreement, fuss, and trouble.. "This my flin [friend], he "wantchee makee one littee pidgin long-side you. S'poscy you cheatum, my makee big bobbely wit' you." "Bobbery" has long been familiar English slang, and the fact that the smaller Oxford Dictionaries, though not the big one, have re--1 fused to stigmatise it as slang or even as colloquial may be taken to indicate that its vogue is at least as great as ever. But its origin is certainly Indian, and it seems to be just possible that it may have passed direct from that country into pidgin English. Yet while both in the English language and in. the pidgin variety the word stands firmly as ever it did, in the land of its birth the word has acquired a new mean; ing, and in its original ( meaning seems to be, on the verge of extinction. In the big Oxford- Dictionary Colonel Yule's etymology of "bobbery", as "an Anglo-Indian representation of Hindi 'Bap re!' (0 father!), a common exclamation of surprise or,grief" is quoted without dissent, and the .date 'of the first quotation is 1816. ' But the "A-B" Volume of the dictionary appeared in' 1888, and in 1933 the Extra Volume noted an Anglo-Indian use of the word as an adjective in an entirely different sense, and with a query suggesting the possibility of a different derivation: —"Of a pack of hounds: Miscellaneous" in breed or quality. Also more widely: Poor, of indifferent quality, 'scratch.'". And the, very latest authority on the subject carries the strange evolutionary process a step further. In ""Some Notes on* Indian English" in "S.P.E. (Society for Pure English) Tract No. 41" Mr. R. C. Goffin writes: "Actually the word is scarcely used by AngloIndia, except in the phrase 'bobbery pack,' where 'bobbery' is an adjective, bearing,the derived meaning 'mixed,' 'mongrel,*; i.e., not composed of-fox-hounds, etc.; also, occasionally (equal to fidgety), of a horss or infant." x ' J