[90] Said by young girls to those whose advances are disagreeable. Khè lanmou pas ka sauté (“heart-of-love does not yet leap”) would be the more polite response of a Martinique girl.

[91] The West Indian calalou is made almost precisely like our gombo-soup. The word is of African origin according to Turiault.

[92] In the Martinique dialect it is: C’est soulié qui save si bas tini trou. In the Trinidad patois: Cé soulier tout-sél qui save si bas tini trou (Thomas). In Louisiana Creole: C’est soulier nek connin si bas gagnin trou. “Nek,” compound from French ne ... que—“only.”

[93] Said to those who relate improbable stories of woe.

[94] Just so high as you jump, so great the fall. The higher our ambition, the greater the peril of failure.

[95] This is one of several instances of the Creole adoption of English words. The name “carrion-crow” has been applied to the buzzard in Louisiana from an early period of its American history.

[96] “Don’t halloo till you’re out of the wood!”

[97] In the Creole of Guyana this proverb exists in a very curious form: Ago pa guéri maleng.—“the excuse doesn’t cure the hurt.” M. Alfred de Saint-Quentin in his work upon this remarkably fantastic and melodious Creole dialect, says that Ago is the only word of purely African origin he has been able to find in the Guyana patois. On the Gold coast ago! is a warning cry: “Take care!—clear the way!” The Guyana slaves retained the word in a different sense. The negro who accidentally jostles anybody, still exclaims Ago!—but it now means “Beg pardon,” or “Excuse me!”

[98] Talking too freely about our projects helps our enemies to thwart our hopes.

[99] Literally: “Word too strong, jaw swelled up.” Seems to imply the indirect rather than the direct consequence of using violent language—viz., a severe beating from the person abused.

[100] That is to say that the worst results of folly do not always manifest themselves when expected.

[101] All Creole mothers are careful to keep their children from reckless play in the sun, which is peculiarly treacherous in those latitudes where the dialect is spoken. Hence the proverb, applicable to any circumstance in which good advice is reluctantly received.

[102] In the Martinique dialect: Toutt mangé, toutt paaule pas bon pou di.—[Turiault.]

[103] The sound of the French eu is rarely preserved in Creole. L’heure becomes lhère; peu, becomes pè. The Creole-speaking negro says, Yonne, dé, tois, quate, nèf, instead of “un, deux, trois, quatre, neuf.”

[104] Like the old country saying: “Big horse, big feed.” The cocoa-nut shell was formerly the slave’s drinking cup in Mauritius.

[105] This saying has quite a variety of curious applications. The last time I heard it, a Creole negress was informing me that the master of the house in which she worked was lying at the point of death: “pauve diabe!” I asked after the health of her mistress. “Ah! Madame se porte bien; mais . . . quand bois tombé cabri monté,” she replied, half in French, half in her own patois; signifying that after the husband’s death, wife and children would find themselves reduced to destitution.

[106] Literally “feathers”—“plimm,” plumes. Adopted from a Creole version of one of Lafontaine’s fables.

[107] The words pè, pé, in Creole are distinguishable only by their accentuation. Peur (fear); peu (a little); paix (peace, or “hush”); peut (can), all take the form pè or pé in various Creole dialects. Ipas ni pè sépent: “he is not afraid of snakes.” Sometimes one can guess the meaning only by the context, as in the Martinique saying: Pè bef pè caca bef. “Few oxen, little ox-dung;” i.e. “little money, little trouble.” The use of “pè” for père (father), reminds us of a curious note in the Creole studies of the brothers Saint-Quentin (See Bibliography). In the forests of Guiana there is a bird whose song much resembles that of our Louisiana mocking-bird, but which is far more sonorous and solemn. The Creole negroes call it ZOZO MONPÉ (l’oiseau mon-père), lit., “The my-father bird.” Now monpè is the Creole name for a priest; as if we should say “a my-father” instead of “a priest.” The bird’s song, powerful, solemn, far-echoing through the great aisles of the woods by night, suggested the chant of a monpè, a “ghostly father;” and its name might be freely translated by “the priest-bird.”

[108] “Watched pot never boils.” The canari was a clay pot as the following Creole refrain testifies:

[“There’s no soup for you, my gossipping friend; the pot’s broken in the fire; the soup is spilled in the fire,” etc.]

[109] A wooden chest or trunk is the first desideratum of the negro housewife. As soon as the family is able to purchase a clothes-press, or (as we call it in Louisiana) “armoire,” it is considered quite a prosperous household by Mauritian colored folk. The chest, Baissac tells us, is the clothes-press of the poor. “After the bed comes the chest, and next the accordeon!”

[110] It is needless to undertake what we have not ability to carry out.

[111] Said to those who talk hopefully of impossibilities.

[112] Refers to obstinacy. A man may be compelled to move his feet, but not to change his resolve.

[113] This differs a little from the spelling adopted by Gottschalk in his Bamboula—“Quand patate-la couite ma va mangé li.” The proverb is used in the sense of our saying: “Strike the iron while it’s hot.”

[114] Like our saying about killing the goose that laid the golden eggs.

[115] Wit, that is, “mother-wit”—common-sense.

[116] There is a Portuguese proverb to the same effect: “Shipwrecks have never deterred navigation.”

[117] The author of Les Bambous mentions the bèlè, caleinda, guiouba and biguine, slave-dances of Martinique. Dansé yon caleinda marré (to dance the calinda or caleinda tied up) meant to receive a whipping.

[118] This proverb is certainly of West Indian origin, though I first obtained it from a Louisianian. In consequence of the depredations committed by rats in the West-Indian cane-fields, it is customary after the crop has been taken off, to fire the dry cane tops and leaves. The blaze, spreading over the fields, destroys many rats, but also a variety of harmless lizards and other creatures.

[119] I find this proverb in every dialect I have been able to study. In Martinique Creole the words vary slightly: “Douvant poule ravett pas ni raison.”

[120] This is another example of double-punning, of which we have already had a specimen in Prov. 163.

[121] Fonté (for effronté) has quite an extensive meaning in Creole. It may refer to the impudence of a badly-brought-up child, or to the over-familiarity on the part of an adult; but it may also refer to high spirit, pluck, independence of manner. A colored mother once told me I should be surprised to see how fonté her son had become since he had been going to school. She meant, of course, that the lad was growing “smart,” active, plucky.

[122] Similarity of habits and of experience is necessary to guarantee the trustworthiness or testimony regarding those we do not know.

[123] “If walls had ears,” etc.

[124] Moussa is a word used in Martinique for hominy, or a sort of corn-mush which is used to thicken gombo-soup. In Louisiana boiled rice is similarly used.