A COSMOPOLIATAN VOLUME.

Waipawa Mail, Volume XXXVI, Issue 7749, 15 July 1916, Page 4 (Supplement)

A COSMOPOLIATAN VOLUME.

On the continent of Africa alone the New Testament, or parts of it, have been translated into 148 languages and dialects. The two latest additions are Dabida —a language of British East Africa —and Limba —the language of a tribe in the hinterland of Sierra Leone. Parts cf the New Testament have actually been translated into pidgin English, that strange lingo, half baby-talk and half slang, which is the chief means of communication through all the East. The difficulties presented in translating the New Testament into this barbarous hotch-potch must have been tremendous, but they have been surmounted Another language of the same sort is Chinook. This consists of about two-fifths Chinook, twofifths Red Indian tilogues, and the rest English and Canadian-French. It is the tongue of barter on the Pacific Coast of Alaska and the Dominion. At least 50,000 Indians speak it, and lately £t. John’s Gospel has been issued in this jargon for their special benefit. There is also a version of the Scriptures translated into the primitive language of the headhunters of Borneo. It was made by German missionaries, printed in South Africa, paid for with British money, and circulated in Papua.