Verbs have only one form, generally from the French infinitive or past participle, which in most cases would fall together (manzé = manger, mangé; kuri = courir, couru); this serves for all persons in both numbers and all moods. But tenses are indicated by means of auxiliary words: va for the future, té (from été) for the ordinary past, and fine for the perfect: mo manzé I eat, mo va manzé I shall eat, mo té manzé I ate, mo fine manzé I have eaten, mo fine fini I have finished. Further, there is a curious use of aprè to express what in English are called the progressive or expanded tenses: mo aprè manzé I am eating, mo té aprè manzé I was eating, and of pour to express the immediate future: mo pour manzé I am going to eat, and finally an immediate past may be expressed by fék: mo fék manzé I have just been eating (je ne fais que de manger). As these may be combined in various ways (mo va fine manzé I shall have eaten, even mo té va fék manzé I should have eaten a moment ago, etc.), the language has really succeeded in building up a very fine and rich verbal system with the simplest possible means and with perfect regularity.
The French separate negatives have been combined into one word each: napa not (there is not), narien nothing, and similarly nék only.
In many cases the same form is used for a substantive or adjective and for a verb: mo soif, mo faim I am thirsty and hungry; li content so madame he is fond of his wife.
Côte (or à côte) is a preposition ‘by the side of, near,’ but also means ‘where’: la case àcote li resté ‘the house in which he lives’; cf. Pidgin side.
In all this, as will easily be seen, there is very little French grammar; this will be especially evident when we compare the French verbal system with its many intricacies: difference according to person, number, tense and mood with their endings, changes of root-vowels and stress-place, etc., with the unchanged verbal root and the invariable auxiliary syllables of the Creole. But there is really as little in the Creole dialect of Malagasy grammar, as I have ascertained by looking through G. W. Parker’s Grammar (London, 1883): both nations in forming this means of communication have, as it were, stripped themselves of all their previous grammatical habits and have spoken as if their minds were just as innocent of grammar as those of very small babies, whether French or Malagasy. Thus, and thus only, can it be explained that the grammar of this variety of French is for all practical purposes identical with the grammar of those two varieties of English which we have previously examined in this chapter.
No one can read Baissac’s collection of folk-tales from Mauritius without being often struck with the felicity and even force of this language, in spite of its inevitable naïveté and of the childlike simplicity of its constructions. If it were left to itself it might develop into a really fine idiom without abandoning any of its characteristic traits. But as it is, it seems to be constantly changing through the influence of real French, which is more and more taught to and imitated by the islanders, and the day may come when most of the features described in this rapid sketch will have given place to something which is less original, but will be more readily understood by Parisian globe-trotters who may happen to visit the distant island.
XII.—§ 8. Chinook Jargon.
The view here advanced may be further put to the test if we examine a totally different language developed in another part of the world, viz. in Oregon. I give its history in an abridged form from Hale.[51] When the first British and American trading ships appeared on the north-west coast of America, towards the end of the eighteenth century, they found a great number of distinct languages, the Nootka, Nisqually, Chinook, Chihailish and others, all of them harsh in pronunciation, complex in structure, and each spoken over a very limited space. The traders learnt a few Nootka words and the Indians a few English words. Afterwards the traders began to frequent the Columbia River, and naturally attempted to communicate with the natives there by means of the words which they had found intelligible at Nootka. The Chinooks soon acquired these words, both Nootka and English. When later the white traders made permanent establishments in Oregon, a real language was required; and it was formed by drawing upon the Chinook for such words as were requisite, numerals, pronouns, and some adverbs and other words. Thus enriched, ‘the Jargon,’ as it now began to be styled, became of great service as a means of general intercourse. Now, French Canadians in the service of the fur companies were brought more closely into contact with the Indians, hunted with them, and lived with them on terms of familiarity. The consequence was that several French words were added to the slender stock of the Jargon, including the names of various articles of food and clothing, implements, several names of the parts of the body, and the verbs to run, sing and dance, also one conjunction, puis, reduced to pi.
“The origin of some of the words is rather whimsical. The Americans, British and French are distinguished by the terms Boston, Kinchotsh (King George), and pasaiuks, which is presumed to be the word Français (as neither f, r nor the nasal n can be pronounced by the Indians) with the Chinook plural termination uks added.... ‘Foolish’ is expressed by pelton or pilton, derived from the name of a deranged person, one Archibald Pelton, whom the Indians saw at Astoria; his strange appearance and actions made such an impression upon them, that thenceforward anyone behaving in an absurd or irrational manner” was termed pelton.