EDITORIAL NOTE The present volume includes two papers by Mr. Winston and Dr. Dalby read at the 1964-5 Seminar of the Department of Africa, which was devoted to the problems of classification and linguistic comparison. The authors wish to thank their colleagues for their valuable comments and criticisms, which have enabled several useful additions and amendments to be made to the original versions of these papers. The authors are nevertheless solely responsible for the views expressed. CORRECTION The following note has been received from N. A. Snoxall. ‘ I should like to make a correction of the derivation of the word 'ndiizabawulu appearing on p. 29 of African Language Studies, VI, 1965. The true derivation of this word is not from kti-lya ‘ to eat ’ but from kh-lira ‘ to cry ’. This was obscured by the old system of Luganda orthography in which the word was recorded and I am grateful to my friend Mr. Michael Nsimbi, one of the best known Luganda authors and authorities on the language, for his explanation of the correct derivation. Mr. Nsimbi explains that the units of this particular plantain grow so closely on the stem that it needs a woman’s expertise to get them off and to prepare them for cooking and so the word means ‘ causes bachelors to cry ’. The correct spelling of the word is therefore : 'ndizabawuulu. vii