The jungle folk of Africa

by Robert H. Milligan

To “find” a thing is to search for it, though one may not find it at all; and a man will say: “I find him, find him, long time and never look him.”

There is a great dearth of prepositions in the African languages; and in Kru language the word “for” serves all prepositional uses. It seldom uses more than one demonstrative, and the word “them” is forced to do this reluctant service.

I ask: “What for them man Weariness he no work to-day?” and perhaps get the answer: “He live for sick. He live close for die.”

There are certain stock phrases that one hears all the time: “You sabey Englis mouf?” “I hear him small, small.” “Massa, I no sabey them palaver.” “Them man he make me trouble too much.” “I go one time” (“one time” is “at once”), or “I go come one time.”

Kruboys are not the only Africans who speak Kru English. It is spoken by thousands along the coast who have no knowledge of any other European language. Even Frenchmen, and especially Germans, in their own colonies, sometimes have to learn Kru English in order to converse with their boat-boys. White men are often proud of speaking it well, and I have sometimes seen men standing at the head of the gangway and shouting down to the boys in a boat below, apparently for no other reason than to display their linguistic talent, as one might be vain of a knowledge of French or German. I have not used it as much as some; for, in the Congo Français where I spent most of my time, very little English, good or bad, is spoken; and in the interior one does not hear it at all. But I am very familiar with it. I have preached in it and have even prayed in it. This would have been impossible if any person had been present who could speak good English. Humour is peculiarly a social enjoyment. It takes at least two persons to enjoy a joke. Often in the native towns I have witnessed the most amusing incongruities without being in the least amused, until I thought of it afterwards, sometimes long afterwards, when talking with some one else who would appreciate the humour and see the incongruity with me. So, I say, I have preached in the Kru English, and, reverently, I believe—at least without any consciousness of incongruity; but if an English-speaking person had entered the church I could scarcely have proceeded to the end of the sentence.

Shortly before leaving Africa I was visiting a coast town in a tribe whose own language I did not know. But they understood Kru English, and I preached to them in that dialect, on the parable of the Lost Sheep. It will not be fully appreciated without the African accent, tone, and gesture. I related the parable to them about as follows:

S’pose one man he have hunderd sheep and one sheep go loss for bush, what you think them man he go do? Well he go lef’ all them other sheep and he go find them sheep he live for bush. He go find him, find him, and no tire till he look him. S’pose he find him four or three days and never look him, well, he no tire; and s’pose he find him seven or six days and never look him he no tire; ten or nine days and never look him, he no tire; he go find him, find him, find him, all time till he look him. And s’pose he look him, well, he take them sheep on him shoulder, so⸺ He carry him for house and give him plenty chop, and he be glad too much. Then he go call all him friends, plenty man, plenty wife, and small piccaninny, and he say to them: “Say, you sabey them sheep that done loss for bush? Well, this day I look him. Then all people they make palaver and be happy too much. So, s’pose man go lef’ all him sins and do God-fashion; well, all them people, what live for top, they make fine palaver, and be happy too much.”

There may be inaccuracies in this, but it is tolerably correct; and I am sure that my African audience understood it. There is Kru English and Kru-er English, and Kru-est English. In the latter, “that” and “them” become “dat” and “dem.” But even if many natives use this form they perfectly understand the white man when he uses the correct form; and it is execrably bad taste to exaggerate either the pronunciation or the idiom, and to outdo the native himself in departing from the correct form. It also seems to me to be bad taste for white people to use Kru English when it is not necessary, as some do. And when a white woman deliberately adopts in her own household the word “chop,” and other such words, she puts a strain upon my respect.

Once when I was living at Gaboon, a north-coast man from Accra called on me, with whom I conversed in Kru English. That evening I received a letter from him which I kept for a long time as one of my souvenirs of Gaboon. I venture to reproduce it from memory: