138. Primitive dialects. The cebus azarae, a monkey of Paraguay, makes six distinct sounds when excited, which causes its comrades to emit similar sounds.[256] The island Caribs have two distinct vocabularies, one of which is used by men and by women when speaking to each other, and by men when repeating, in oratio obliqua, some saying of the women. Their councils of war are held in a secret jargon into which women are never initiated.[257] The men and women have separate languages, a custom which is noted also amongst the Guycurus and other peoples of Brazil.[258] Amongst the Arawaks the difference between the languages of the sexes is not in regard to the use of words only, but also in regard to their inflection.[259] The two languages are sometimes differentiated by a constant change, e.g. where in the man's language two vowels come together the woman's language intercalates a k.[260] The Arawaks have words which only men may speak, and others which only women may speak.[261] Dialectical variations are illustrated for us by facts which come under observation and report. Christian[262] mentions an American negro castaway, who settled on Raven's Island with a native wife and children and a few relatives and servants. In forty years they had produced "a new and peculiar dialect of their own, broadening the softer vowels and substituting th or f for the original t sound in the parent ponapeian." Martius mentions that native boatmen in Brazil, who had grown up together, had each some little peculiarity of pronunciation. Such a difference would produce a dialect in case of isolation. On the other hand, the ecclesiastics adopted the Tupi language and made it a general language for the province of Gram Para, so that it was used in the pulpit until 1757 and is now necessary for intercourse in the interior.[263] The Gauchos of central Uruguay speak Spanish with harsh rough accents. They change y and ll into the French j.[264] Whitney and Waitz thought that all American languages proceeded from a single original one. Powell thought that they were "many languages, belonging to distinct families, which have no apparent unity of origin."[265] Evidence is adduced, however, that "the same aboriginal peoples who named the waters of North America coined also the prehistoric geographical titles in South America."[266] The Finns and Samoyeds are, from the standpoint of language, practically the same race. The two tongues present the highest development of the agglutinative process of the Ural-Altaic languages.[267]
139. Taking up and dropping languages. The way in which languages are taken up or dropped is also perplexing. Keane[268] gives a list of peoples who have dropped one language and taken up another; he also gives a list of those who have changed physical type but have retained the same language. Holub[269] mentions the Makololo, who have almost entirely disappeared, but their language has passed to their conquerors. It became necessary to the latter from the spread of their dominion and from their closer intercourse with the peoples south of the Zambesi, on account of which, "without any intentional interference by the rulers, a common and easily understood language showed itself indispensable." Almost every village in New Guinea has its own language, and it is said that in New Britain people who live thirty miles apart cannot understand each other.[270]
140. Pigeon dialects. The Germans find themselves at a disadvantage in dealing with aborigines because they have no dialect like pigeon English or the Coast Malay used by the Dutch.[271] Many examples are given, from the Baltic region, of peasant dialects made in sport by subjecting all words to the same modification.[272] Our own children often do this to English in order to make a secret language.
141. How languages grow. What we see in these cases is that, if we suppose men to have joined in coöperative effort with only the sounds used by apes and monkeys, the requirement of their interests would push them on to develop languages such as we now know. The isolating, agglutinative, incorporative, and inflectional languages can be put in a series according to the convenience and correctness of the logical processes which they embody and teach. The Semitic languages evidently teach a logic different from that of the Indo-European. It is a different way of thinking which is inculcated in each great family of languages. They represent stages in the evolution of thought or ways of thinking. The instance is one of those which best show us how folkways are built up and how they are pulled down. The agglutination of words and forms sometimes seems like a steady building process; again, the process will not go forward at all. "In the agglutinative languages speech is berry jam. In the inflectional languages each word is like a soldier in his place with his outfit."[273] The "gooing" of a baby is a case of the poetic power in its blossoming exuberance. The accidental errors of pronunciation which are due to very slight individual variations in the form of the vocal organs are cases of individual contribution to the development of language. The baby words and individual mispronunciations which are taken up by a family and its friends, but never get further, show us how dialects grow. There are changes in language which are, "in their inception, inaccuracies of speech. They attest the influence of that immense numerical majority among the speakers of English who do not take sufficient pains to speak correctly, but whose blunders become finally the norm of the language."[274] In analogy things which are alike are embraced in a single term; in metaphor two or more things which seem alike, but may not be so, are grouped together and are embraced in a single term. All these modes of change in language attest the work of individuals on language. Sometimes there is extension of influence to a group. Sometimes the influence is only temporary and is rejected again. Sometimes it falls in with a drift of taste or habit, when it is taken up and colors the pronunciation or usage of the population of a great district, and becomes fixed in the language. All this is true also on the negative side, since usage of words, accent, timbre of the voice, and pronunciation (drawling, nasal tones) expel older usages. Language therefore illustrates well all the great changes of folkways under the heads of coöperation and antagonism. We have an excellent chance to study the operation in the case of slang. A people who are prosperous and happy, optimistic and progressive, will produce much slang. It is a case of play. They amuse themselves with the language. We may think the new words and phrases vulgar and in bad taste, or senseless and ridiculous. We may reject them, but the masses will decide whether they shall be permanently rejected or not. The vote is informal. The most confirmed purist will by and by utter a new slang word when he needs it. One's objections are broken down. One's taste is spoiled by what he hears. We are right in the midst of the operation of making folkways and can perceive it close at hand.
142. Money. Money is another primitive device which is produced in the folkways. Money was not called into existence by any need universally experienced and which all tried to satisfy as well as they could. It was produced by developing other devices, due to other motives, until money was reached as a result. Property can be traced to portable objects which were amulets, trophies, and ornaments all at once. These could be accumulated, and if they were thought to be the abodes of powerful spirits, they were gifts which were eagerly sought, or valuable objects for exchange. They led to hoarding (since the owner did not like to part with them), and they served as marks of personal distinction.[275] The interplay of vanity and religion with the love of property demands attention. Religion also caused the aborigines of the northwest provinces of South America to go to the rivers for gold only in sufficient amount to buy what they needed. Any surplus they returned to the stream. "They say that if they borrow more than they really need the river-god will not lend them any more."[276] In later times and higher civilization coins have been used as amulets to ward off or to cure disease.[277] The Greenland Eskimo laughed when they were offered gold and silver coins. They wanted objects of steel, for which they would give anything which they had and which was desired.[278] The Tarahumari of Sonora do not care for silver money. Their Crœsus raises three hundred or four hundred bushels of corn per annum. The largest herd of cattle contains thirty or forty head. They generally prefer cotton cloth to dollars.[279] "A Dyak has no conception of the use of a circulating medium. He may be seen wandering in the Bazaar with a ball of bee's wax in his hand for days together, because he cannot find anybody willing to take it for the exact article which he requires."[280] We meet with a case in which people have gold but live on a system of barter. It is a people in Laos, north of Siam. They weigh gold alone in scales against seeds of grain.[281] In the British Museum (Case F, Ireland) may be seen bronze rings, to be sewn on garments as armor or to be used as money, or both. The people along the west coast of Hindostan, from the Persian Gulf to Ceylon, used as money the fishhook which was their most important tool. It became degraded into a piece of doubled wire of silver or bronze. If the degradation had gone on, doubtless it would have resulted in a lump of metal, just as the Siamese silver coins are the result of doubling up silver rings.[282] The play of custom and convention is well shown by the use of the Macedonian coins in England. The coins of Philip bore on the obverse a head with a wreath, and on the reverse a chariot driver drawn by two horses. In Britain this coin became a sign of value and lost its reference to the sovereign. It is possible to show the order of the reigns of the kings by the successive omissions of parts of the figures, until only the wreath was left and four perpendicular strokes and two circles for the legs of one horse and two chariot wheels. Each change was a mark of value and then it was further changed to save trouble.[283] On the Palau Islands there were seven grades of money, determined by the size. Only three or four pieces exist of the first grade. The second grade is of jasper. The third consists of agate cylinders. These three grades are used only by nobles. They have the same rank as gems amongst us. The people think of the money as coming from an island where it lives a divine life, the lower ranks serving the upper. They have myths of the coming of the money to Palau.[284] These examples show to what a great extent other ideas than those of value come into play in money.
143. Intergroup and intragroup money. When money is used to overcome the difficulties of barter two cases are to be distinguished,—the intergroup and the intragroup uses, which are primarily distinguished by a space relation. The intragroup use is here, in the we-group, close at hand. The intergroup use is between our group and some out-group. It will be found that all money problems include these two cases. "At least we shall find that the current commonplace of the economists about the succession of natural economy, money economy, and credit economy, is not even remotely apt to the real problems."[285] What is true is that, on a money economy, it is found that there is, or may be, a constant exchange of money for goods and goods for money, from which gain or loss may result; and furthermore that the risk (aleatory element) in this exchange is intensified, if time is allowed to intervene. Inside the we-group the first need for money is for fees, fines, amercements, and bride price. In Melanesia pigs are not called money and there is shell, feather, and mat money, but pigs are paid for fines, penalties, contributions to feasts, fees in the secret society, pay for wives, and in other societal relations. What is needed is a mobile form of wealth, with which social dues can be paid. This is the function of money which the paper-money projectors have in mind when they propose to issue paper which the state shall take for taxes. It is evident that it is to be distinguished from the economic function of money as a circulating medium. The intragroup money needs to be especially a measure and store of value, while the intergroup money needs to be a medium of exchange. In the former case barter is easy; in the latter case it is regular. In the former case a multiple standard is available; in the latter case what is needed to discharge balances is a commodity of universal demand. When credit is introduced its sphere is intragroup. The debtors would like the money to be what every one can get. The creditors would like it to be what every one wants.
144. Various predominant wares. In the northeastern horn of Africa the units of value which are used as money are salt, metal, skins, cotton, glass, tobacco, wax, coffee beans, and korarima. Cattle and slaves are also used as units of value from time to time amongst the Oromo. Salt is used as money in prismatic pieces, twenty-two centimeters long and three centimeters to five millimeters broad at the bottom, which weigh from seven hundred and fifty grams to one and one half kilograms each. It is carried in bundles of twenty to thirty pieces, wound in leaves.[286] The Galla use rods of iron six to twelve centimeters long, somewhat thicker in the middle, well available for lance ends, one hundred and thirty of which are worth one thaler in Schoa; also pieces of copper, tin, and zinc; calf-skins; black, printed, and unprinted cotton cloth; pieces of cloth; coarse red cotton yarn (for knitting); and strings of beads. The universal and intergroup money is the Maria Theresa thaler weighing 571.5 to 576 English grains.[287] Cameron mentions the exchange of intergroup money for intragroup money at a fair at Kawile, on the eastern shore of Lake Tanganyika. At the opening of the fair the money changers gave out the local money of bugle beads, which they took in again when the fair closed.[288] On the French Congo the boatmen were paid with paper bons, which were superseded by metal ones in 1887. When the recipient takes his bon to the station he obtains at first a number of nails, beads, or other articles for it, which he can then exchange for what he wants. Tokens of copper are issued at Franceville, stamped "F," of different shapes and sizes, but always of the same shape and size for the same value in French money.[289] At Grand Bassam in West Africa the manilla (bracelet) serves as money. For six months the natives give oil for these bracelets of metal mixed of copper, lead, zinc, antimony, and iron, which can be closed around the arm or leg of a slave by a blow of the hammer. Then for six months they exchange the bracelets for the European goods which they want.[290] These bracelets were a store of wealth for the black men.[291] The Kru have few cattle, which pass from one to another in bride purchases, since these can be made with nothing else. It is impossible to have wives and cattle too until one's daughters grow up.[292] Since the seventeenth century cylindrical (bugle) green-blue beads have been money on the ivory and gold coasts. They come from an ancient cemetery on the Bokabo Mountains and are of Egyptian origin. They were buried with the dead.[293] A local money of stone is reported also from Avetime in Ehveland. It is said to have been used as ornament. Pieces of quartz and sandstone, rudely square but with broken corners, from four to five centimeters in diameter and one and a half to two centimeters thick, rubbed down by friction, have been found.[294]
145. Intragroup money from property; intergroup money from trade. These cases already show us the distinction between intragroup money and intergroup money. The effect of trade is to develop one or more predominant wares. In the intragroup exchanges this is an object of high desire to individuals for use. It may be an amulet ornament, or a thing of great use in the struggle for existence, e.g. cattle, or a thing of universal acceptance by which anything can be obtained. In intergroup trade it is the chief object of export, the thing for which the trade is carried on, e.g. salt, metal, fur. If this commodity is not easily divisible, the money is something which can be given "to boot," e.g. tobacco, sugar, opium, tea, betel.[295] That is money which will "pass." This does not mean that which can be forced to pass ("legal tender"), but that which will go without force. Amulet ornaments may be either a whim which does not take, or fashion may seize upon something of this kind and make it a tribe mark. Then it becomes group money, because it is universally desired. The articles admit of accumulation, and ostentation is a new joy; they also admit of change and variety. They are available for gifts to the medicine man (to satisfy ghosts, get rain, or thwart disease). They may be used to buy a wife, or to buy a step in the secret society of the men, or to pay a fine or penalty to the chief. The differentiation of goods starts emotion on the line of least resistance, and the predominant goods are the ones of widest demand. Often the predominant ware has a gain from taboo, probably on account of relation to the dead.[296] A thing which is rare and hard to get may become intragroup money. In Fiji the teeth of the spermaceti whale are taken as a measure of value and sign of peace. In German New Guinea the bent tusks of a boar are used as money. In California red birds' heads are used in the same way. Trophy skulls of birds and beasts become a store of wealth, and money with which trade can be carried on with neighbors.[297] The first step seems to be to use the predominant article as the third term of reference in barter. Intergroup money is really a ware and so remains, as gold is now; but groups widen as communication improves, and group money gets a very wide range. In intergroup affairs, therefore, the relations sooner become impersonal and mechanical. The things which are best for this purpose become mobile. Some are better as stores of value, others as means of power, others as measures of value. The last are on the way to become money. The others are more like gems. Thus group money arose from property; intergroup money from trade.
146. Shell and beads. Shells had very great convenience for money and their value was increased by the fact that ghosts dwelt in them. Cowries were early used as money, 2200 of them equaling in value one franc.[298] They are now losing currency. On Fernando Po bits of achatectonia shells are made into belts and used as currency.[299] A far less widespread shell of a sea snail was used in northern Transvaal.[300] Other cases of the use of shells will be given below. A dress pattern of cotton cloth, seven ells, called a "tobe," is a unit of monetary reference through the Sudan.[301] Another money in the same region is the iron spade, with which tribute is paid to the petty rulers of eastern Equatoria. The spades are made of native iron and are used upon occasion to cut down the grass.[302] Expeditions into the Niam Niam territories always have a smith with them whose duty it is to make rings of copper and iron wire, with a square section, for minor purchases.[303] The currency of beads has greatly lessened wherever more useful objects of European manufacture have become known.[304] Forms of the lance head are used to buy a wife, who costs twenty or thirty of them.[305] Further south von Götzen found brass wire, in pieces fifteen to thirty-five centimeters long, in use as money, not being an article of use, but a real money used to store value, to buy what is wanted, and to pay taxes for protection against one's forest neighbors.[306] Formerly, when beads were still used as money, each district had its own preferred size, shape, and color. Travelers found that the fashion in a district had changed since the information was obtained, relying on which they had provided themselves. This is, however, evidently a part of the operation of differentiating the predominant ware.[307]
147. Token money. Token money demands treatment by itself, as a special development of the money-producing movement. If different groups adopt different kinds of amulet ornaments as money, such intragroup money may be token money. If one such group conquers another, the conquerors may throw the money of the conquered out of use (whites and Indians as to wampum). In Burma Chinese gambling counters are used as money.[308] Guttapercha tokens issued by street-car companies in South America are said to be used in the same way. Postage stamps, milk tickets, etc., have been so used by us. In Massachusetts, in the eighteenth century, pieces of paper were circulated which had no redemption whatever. They bore the names of coins of silver which did not exist, but which had a definition in a certain amount of silver of a certain fineness. At Carthage pieces of leather which inclosed an unknown object, probably one of the holy moneys, were circulated.[309] The same is reported of bits of leather cut, like samples, from a skin and circulated in place of it. The device succeeded for the in-group money, but it led to the attempt to put copper tokens in the place of silver coins, which resulted in disaster.[310] The cacao beans of Mexico were wares, if of good quality. Larger ones of poorer quality were money. A part of the value was imaginary. Cloth was formerly money in Bohemia. A loosely woven variety of cloth was used for this purpose, the cloth utilities as a textile fabric and as money being separated. On the west coast of Africa little mats were used as money. They were stamped by the Portuguese government. Mat money was also used on the New Hebrides, especially to buy grades in the great secret society. The mats are long and narrow and are more esteemed when they are old and black from the smoke of the huts. They are kept in little houses where they are smoked. "When they hang with soot they are particularly valued."[311] Useless broken rice is used as money in Burma and elsewhere in the East.[312] The use of token money, in which a part of the value is imaginary, always implies the inclosure of a group and the exclusion of foreign trade. Then, within the group, the value may be said to be real and not imaginary. It depends on the monopoly law of value and varies with the quantity but not proportionately to the quantity. Kublai-Khan, using a Chinese device, got possession of all the gold and silver and issued paper. His empire was so great that all trade was intragroup trade, and his power made his paper money pass.[313] The Andamanese made inferior pots to be used as a medium in barter.[314] They have very little trade; are on a stage of mutual gift making.[315] Token money is an aberration of the folkways, due to misapprehension of the peculiarity of group money. At the same time it has been used with advantage for subsidiary silver coinage.