CHAPTER II.

GRAMMAR AND PHRASE BOOK.

JA AND NEEN.--WILL YOU BITE?--THE PURCHASE OF THE BOOKS.--A LITERARY FIND.--A PLENTIFUL HARVEST.--HURDLES.--THE VERB OF THE SEASON.--THE TWELVE SIGNS OF THE ZODIAC.--THREE PRINCIPLES.--A WARNING NOTE.

"Well", said O'Neill with a kind of sickly smile, "I didn't get so very much time, you see, either for the Literature or for the Language. Of course there was much sight-seeing, and--I spent a good deal of time over the pictures, which----"

The Philosopher shut his eyes, heaved an audible sigh, but said nothing.

"And", continued Jack hastily without seeming to notice the interruption, "my efforts to speak Dutch were not always appreciated".

"Really?" said the First Year's man, with sudden interest.

"Go on", said the Professor, "now you're started".

"You soon left your hotel for lodgings?" I added enquiringly.

"Well, you see," he resumed, "I was afraid I'd never pick up the language. There is no chance of practice unless you get away from everybody that speaks English. That was not too easy, I tell you. But Enderby helped me, and we searched about the Hague for two whole days. At last we found perfectly charming rooms opposite a canal; the landlady didn't know a word of English. She knew Dutch, though, all right. Fluent, did you say? I should think she was. A perfect marvel. No need of the dictionary, you know.--Verbs all in their proper places--and plenty of them!

Enderby told her all I required, and then went away. It was like being thrown into the sea, as you may guess; but I imagined I should soon learn to swim. There's nothing like being cast completely on your own resources, they say. Still it was a bit awkward at coffee-time, when the landlady came up and talked. She poured forth a rapid and resistless stream of friendly Dutch upon me, while I nodded in the intervals and tried to think. It was a very one-sided business. I was very hungry, too, and wanted luncheon. Now there was abundance of this unequal kind of conversation, but no lunch in sight, so I--(remember I knew only ja and neen, and was not very sure of them, either)--I just pointed gracefully to my lips to indicate that I needed food. That produced an immediate effect--a torrent of eloquence forcibly delivered and ending with some enquiry about _biting_!

I shook my head and said "Neen, neen! You put it too crudely--luncheon--eat--eat."

"O ja," she replied, "best. Eten--eten om vijf uur--vijf." And she held out one hand with the fingers spread. It seemed to me she was swearing there was enough food in the house to satisfy a hungry Irishman.

"Good--so far," I returned. "Ja, ja!"

"En mynheer wil niet ontbijten?" she rejoined. This was the _biting_ again, so I said decidedly, "Neen; niet bijte". She seemed surprised and a little hurt, but she said nothing and went away. And of course I had to fast until five o'clock.

This would never do, I felt; and that evening I bought the first grammar and dictionary I could lay my hands on at a second-hand bookstall in the Binnenhof.

They were antique looking volumes, most of them there; and my books had a remarkably ancient aspect. But I was glad to find that I had completed the purchase of them without using one word of English. How? Oh, the method's very simple. You pick out some big book you don't want, and hold it up interrogatively.

You _can_ hold up a book interrogatively, you know, with a little practice. Well, you lift some rubbishy, bulky volume that you wouldn't be paid to put in your library, and you give it a sort of enquiring wave in front of the vendor of these second-hand goods, and the vendor immediately understands your picturesque query to be "How much?" He answers promptly, and you as promptly drop the rubbishy fat volume, as if it was a scorpion: you sigh resignedly, raise your eyebrows and walk away disgusted.

That is the first step. That is to give him respect for your intelligence and to indicate your willingness to negociate on reasonable terms.

The next step is different. You linger with an air of disdain at the tail-end of the bookstall; and, as an after-thought--just as you are moving off--you halt a moment and flick the particular work you do happen to want, with a careless forefinger or the point of your walking-stick. At once the man talks, and you say "Nee".

He talks more. You say, "Neen, neen" and shake your head sadly. He talks still more, and gesticulates excitedly with the book in his hand. You wait till he stops for breath, then suddenly interject, "Ja; best," taking care to put down a large silver coin,--and the article is yours! The negotiation is over; and all you have to do is to gather up your purchase and a quantity of small silver and copper coins that you get as change. Then with a little patience at home and some arithmetic you can count out--approximately--how much the things have cost you. That's the way you buy second-hand books."

"I had no idea, Jack, you had such a genius for diplomacy," I murmured, as O'Neill evidently expected us to say something.

"Or for finance," added the First Year's Man.

"Did your medieval purchases do all for you that you expected?" enquired the Philosopher.

"Well, hardly," said Jack.

"After my first success I somewhat underestimated the difficulties of the idiom. But I worked hard at the grammar."

"Ah! a Grammar?" interrupted the Professor. "Did you say you acquired a Grammar? I am interested. Could you manage to describe those volumes now, if it's not too great a strain?"

"Oh, the books!" resumed O'Neill. "Well--there was a little fat Dictionary, closely printed, with Dutch into English and English into Dutch; and there was a handsome new Phrase-book in brilliant colours, containing conversations on the most unlikely topics. But I admit the Grammar Exercise-book was the gem of the collection. It was printed on a kind of dusky paper, something like blot-sheet, and it bore the date 1807. It had six hundred and thirty-one exercises, double ones, Dutch into English and English into Dutch--and contained many idioms, hints, exceptions, and explanations. In warnings, foot-notes, and asterisks it was particularly rich. Not a few pages were ornamented with _Nota Bene's_ of various brands, with hands, large and small, drawing attention to them. The English of this manual was very odd, and by and by I got the impression that the Dutch was rather shaky too. Not that I guessed this at first, you may be sure; but it gradually dawned upon me.

I took a certain pride in my treasures, and set about studying them with zeal. No doubt it was disappointing just at the beginning to read: _Nota Bene--No one but a Dutchman can emit this sound_; or this: "N. B. *.*.*. _This sound must be heard._ It is _something like U_ but cannot be otherwise described. It cannot be represented by any known letters. Foreigners need not try it."

But I skipped over these obstacles, mastered the verbs 'to be' and 'to have', in their elements, got an idea of the way to construct plurals and diminutives, and went to sleep content.

Next morning after breakfast--which by the bye came up all right, without any special effort on my part--, remembering that I needed pens and ink I determined to go out and buy them myself.

{ _Have you pens?_ { _Give me pens, please._ { _Thank you._

That is all I seemed to require.

_Have you?_ Well; that is not so simple as it looks. I consulted the Grammar and was appalled to see the amazing variety of choice afforded to any one in Holland who contemplated asking this innocent question.

{ hebt gij { hebt U Hebt gij(lieden) { hebt ge { heeft U { heb je { heeft UEdele { heb jij { heeft Ue { heeft Uès

I looked carefully at this curious form. Yes, wherever it occurred, there were marks of parenthesis tied round the (lieden). How was I to pronounce those brackets? The vowels and the usual consonants I had learnt already were very trying. But what about those marks? Did they denote a cough, or a sneeze or gentlemanly tap of your foot on the ground? On the whole I thought I should best represent them by two graceful waves of the hand--one for each bracket.

{ hebt gij(lieden) with brackets carefully fenced { round the(lieden) { hebt jullie { heb jelui

I counted them over. There are twelve ways of saying _Have you_ in Dutch. That was distinctly suggestive, it seemed to me at the first brush, of the twelve months of the year. You could begin in January with Hebt gij, in February you would have Hebt ge, and so you could work on through the months, keeping your grammar and your chronology going, side by side, through the seasons till you would emerge safely near Christmas with Heb jelui. This theory was not without its attractions. But what would happen in passing, say, from June to July, if you forgot what day of the month it was? If it was July the first and you imagined it was June the thirtieth, you would be talking bad grammar! No: that would never do. My brilliant conjecture had soon to be abandoned as fanciful, and I was very sorry.

But the facts of the case were dead against the obvious chronological arrangement, though they were by no means easily grasped. There were asterisks and foot-notes to all these zodiacal forms; and a great deal of solid reading had to be gone through before you got at the relative force of any particular term. The erudition was distracting, and the warnings were positively alarming, but after much painstaking investigation I seemed to perceive three grand principles emerging."

"Yes?" we all said together, as O'Neill paused for breath. "And these were?--"

"In the first place," resumed Jack deliberately, checking off the principles upon his fingers.

I. "Never say je or jij to a man unless you mean to insult him."

II. In the second place, je and jij may be freely used on all occasions, if you only know how.

"But", said the First Year's Man, "you just said that..."

"And," continued O'Neill firmly, not heeding the interruption, "and you may use the Third Person of the verb for the Second and the Second for the Third; and you may use a Plural for a Singular and a Singular for a Plural; and you may use U for UE, and UE for UEdele; you use jij for je, and je for ge, and ge for gij, and you use jullie for gy(lieden) with brackets round the lieden; but no one now ever does say gy(lieden) with brackets round the lieden, except in poetry; and nobody in any circumstances ever uses UEdele except when dining with members of the Royal Family. Then you are allowed to utter this vocable once, and must maintain a discreet silence during the rest of the repast."

"Where do you get all that rubbish?" I asked in disgust.

"Boyton and Brandnetel", he answered glibly, "page 52."

"At least", he added, "it was something like that. That gives you a good general idea of the thing."

"When you are quite done with Boyton," said the Professor slowly, "when your education's finished, you know, I'll make you a reasonably high offer for that book. Boyton would relieve the tedium of my philological studies, I can see."

"Perhaps," interposed the First Year Incorrigible, "perhaps Mr. O'Neill's accuracy was all used up in his Artistic Studies. That would leave none for the grammar."

"That's a nice way to put it," said the Philosopher. "Please curb your imagination, O'Neill; stick as near to probability as you can--without too great pain to yourself--and we'll not be hard upon you. Wasn't there a third clear principle that emerged in the course of your investigations?"

"Oh, yes", said O'Neill with some show of caution. "As nearly as I can remember, it was this:

III. Never say jou; and avoid UE except in correspondence. You are warned against any approach to familiarity in the use of pronouns. The courteous form is UEdele. Gij more respectful than jij. Je is a term of endearment."

"But," objected the First Year's Man, "it doesn't seem to hang together, for you said just now--"

"No debating allowed," growled the Philosopher.

"Hurry up, O'Neill, with those general principles."

"Oh, that's all of them," said Jack, "all at present." "Well, to resume my story, I picked out the most harmless of the _have you's_, and was proceeding to work out the formula for 'Have you pens,' when to my consternation my eye fell on a dreadful warning, a kind of threat.

_N.B. Important!--The foreigner is distinctly given to understand that he must commit to memory some polite phrases before engaging in conversation (see page 201) and study the chief sentences of a good phrase book. All pronouns savouring of familiarity are to be carefully avoided._