In issuing this Handbook I cherish the hope it may lead many to study the language and not to use Kitchen Kaffir. Kitchen Kaffir is a hodge podge of many dialects, without grammatical structure and very limited as to vocabulary. It is largely used by Europeans throughout South Africa, and it is a proof of the inteligence of the native people that they frequently understand what in reality is the most arrant nonsense.

The Ila language, a Bantu language, is spoken by the Baila, or, as they are commonly called, the Mashukulumbwe, a people living in North-West Rhodesia on either side of the middle Kafue. They number about 25,000. The grammar offers chapters on phonology, nominal and verbal morphology, and several chapters on syntax. It concludes with a 230 pages vocabulary English-Ila and Ila-English (Re-edition; originally published 1907 in London; written in English).