1 0 LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE
however, is that which springs from the fabric of
society, considered in a political view. This peculiarity
of the language runs to so great an extent,
that speech is in fact divided into two dialects, the
ordinary language, and one invented to express
deference. and respect. This distinction by no
means implies a court or polished language, opposed
to a vulgar or popular one, for both are
equally polite and cultivated, and all depends on
the relations in which the speakers stand to each
other, as they happen to be inferiors or superiors.
A servant addresses his master in the language
of deference, a child his parent, a wife her
husband, if there be much disparity in their ages,
and the courtier his prince. The superior replies
in the ordinary dialect, the language still affording
modifications and distinctions, according to the
rank of the person he addresses, until that rank
rises to equality, when, if no intimacy subsists between
the parties, the language of deference is
adopted by both, or when, if there does, ceremony
is thrown aside, and the ordinary language becomes
the only medium of conversation. An extensive
acquaintance with the language of deference is
held a mark of education and good-breeding.
With persons who frequent a court, or are in habits
of intercourse with the great, the phraseology
is refined and copious; but of the ordinary peasant,
it may be well believed that the vocabulary is
meagre and confined.
In the formation of the Javanese language of deference,
the aim is to avoid what is ordinary or familiar,
as equivalent to what is not respectful. In
a few words of rare occurrence, and not familiar
by use, no change is effected. Recourse, in other
cases, is had to the recondite language of literature,
which is equivalent to the Sanskrit; thus estri,
putro, suryo, chondro, are the respectful terms
for a woman, a child, the sun, and the moon.
When it happens, however, that, by frequent use,
a Sanskrit word melts into the common idiom, a
new proceeding is followed. Thus we have Jean-
chono, gold, converted into janne, the yellow object,
and sdloJeo, silver, into pettaJean, or the white
object.
Sometimes the word used in the language of deference
is an entire synonym differing in sound
and orthography, as, for game, to do, damal; for
turon, to sleep, save or tilam ; for watu, a stone,
selo ; for dalan, a road, mdrgi ; and for ball, to
return, wangsul.
The most frequent mode of all is, by effecting a
slight orthographical change in words of the ordinary
language. These changes are not wanton or
capricious, but subject to a fixed principle, capable
of being reduced to rule. A termination in s, in
ng, and in tan, is respectful, and it is respectful