335. Vous napas va montré vié zaco fère grimaces. (Vous ne montrerez pas à un vieux singe à faire des grimaces.)
"You can't teach an old monkey how to make faces."[142]--[_Mauritius._]
336. Voyé chein, chein voyé lakhe li. (Envoyez le chien, et le chien envoie sa queue.)
"Send dog, and dog sends his tail."--Refers to those who obey orders only by proxy.--[_Trinidad._]
337. Yo ka quimbé[143] chritiens pa langue yo, bef pa còne yo. (On prend les Chrétiens par la langue, les b[oe]ufs par les cornes.)
"Christians are known by their tongues, oxen by their horns." (Literally, are taken by or caught by.)--[_Martinique._]
[143] _Quimbé_ is a verb of African origin. It survives in Louisiana Creole as _tchombé_ or _chombo_:
_Caroline, zolie femme, Chombo moin dans collet._
["Caroline, pretty woman; put your arm about my neck!"--lit.: "take me by the neck."]
There are other African words used by the older colored women, such as _macayé_, meaning to eat at all hours; and _Ouendé_, of which the sense is dubious. But the Congo verb _fifa_, to kiss; and the verbs _souyé_, to flatter; _pougalé_, to abuse violently; and such nouns as _saff_ (glutton), _yche_ or _iche_ (baby), which are preserved in other Creole dialects, are apparently unknown in Louisiana to-day.
In Chas. Jeannest's work, _Quatre Années au Congo_ [Paris: Charpentier, 1883], I find a scanty vocabulary of words in the Fiot dialect, the native dialect of many slaves imported into Louisiana and the West Indies. In this vocabulary the word _ouenda_ is translated by "partir pour." I fancy it also signifies "to be absent," and that it is synonymous with our Louisiana African-Creole _ouendé_, preserved in the song:
_Ouendé, ouendé, macaya_; Mo pas, 'barassé, _macaya_! _Ouendé, ouendé, macaya_; Mo bois bon divin, _macaya_! _Ouendé, ouendé, macaya_; Mo mangé bon poulé, _macaya_! _Ouendé, ouendé, macaya_;..etc.
This is one of the very few songs with a purely African refrain still sung in New Orleans. The theme seems to be that, the master and mistress of a house being absent, some slave is encouraging a slave-friend to eat excessively, to "stuff himself" with wine, chicken, etc. "They are gone, friend: eat, fill yourself; _I'm_ not a bit ashamed; stuff yourself!--I'm drinking good wine; stuff yourself!--I'm eating good chicken; gorge yourself," etc. Here _ouendé_ seems to mean "they are out; they are gone away,"--therefore there is no danger.