INDICATIVE, PRESENT, POSITIVE.

Singular.Plural.
N’dahoala, I love,n’dahoalaneen, we love,
k’dahoala, thou—k’dahoalohhimo, you—
w’dahoala,}
or ahoaleu }		he—ahoalewak, they—

Now for the personal forms in the same tense.

FIRST PERSONAL FORM.
I.

Singular.Plural.
K’dahoatell, I love thee,K’dahoalohhumo, I love you,
n’dahoala, I love him or her.n’dahoalawak,—them.

SECOND PERSONAL FORM.
THOU.

Singular.Plural.
K’dahoali, thou lovest me,k’dahoalineen, thou lovest us,
k’dahoala,—him or her.k’dahoalawak,—them.

THIRD PERSONAL FORM.
HE, (or SHE.)

Singular.Plural.
N’dahoaluk, he loves me,w’dahoalguna, he loves us,
k’dahoaluk,—thee,w’dahoalguwa,—you,
w’dahoalawall—him.w’dahoalawak,—them.

FOURTH PERSONAL FORM.
WE.

Singular.Plural.
K’dahoalenneen, we love thee,k’dahoalohummena, we love you,
n’dahoalawuna,—him.n’dahoalowawuna,—them.

FIFTH PERSONAL FORM.
YOU.

Singular.Plural.
K’dahoalihhimo, you love me,k’dahoalihhena, you love us.
k’dahoalanewo,—him.k’dahoalawawak,—them.

SIXTH PERSONAL FORM.
THEY.

Singular.Plural.
N’dahoalgenewo, they love me,n’dahoalgehhena, they love us.
k’dahoalgenewo,—thee,k’dahoalgehhimo,—you.
w’dahoalanewo,—him.w’dahoalawawak,—them.

In this manner verbs are conjugated through all their moods and tenses, and through all their negative, causative, and various other forms, with fewer irregularities than any other language that I know of.

These conjugations, no doubt, you have found, or will find in Mr. Zeisberger’s grammar, but the few examples that I have above put together, are necessary to understand the explanation which I am about to give.

The words you quote are: “getannitowit n’quitayala,” I fear God, or rather, according to the Indian inversion, God I fear. Your observation is that the inflection or case of the noun substantive God, is carried to the verb. This is true; but if you enquire for the reason or the manner in which it takes place, you will find that ala is the inflection of the second or last person of the verb, in the first personal form; thus as you have seen that n’dahoala means I love him, so n’quitayala, in the same form and person means I fear him; it is therefore the same as if you said God I fear him. This is not meant in the least to doubt or dispute the correctness of your position, but to shew in what manner the combination of ideas is formed that has led to this result. You have now, I believe, a wider field for your metaphysical disquisitions.

I pass on to the other parts of your letter. I believe with you that Professor Vater is mistaken in his assertion that the language of the Chippeways is deficient in grammatical forms. I am not skilled in the Chippeway idiom, but while in Upper Canada, I have often met with French Canadians and English traders who understood and spoke it very well. I endeavoured to obtain information from them respecting that language, and found that it much resembled that of the Lenape. The differences that I observed were little more than some variations in sound, as b for p, and i for u. Thus, in the Delaware, wapachquiwan means a blanket, in the Chippeway it is wabewian; gischuch is Delaware for a star, the Chippeways say gischis; wape in Delaware white; in the Chippeway, wabe. Both nations have the word Mannitto for God, or the Great Spirit, a word which is common to all the nations and tribes of the Lenape stock.

There is no doubt that the Chippeways, like the Mahicanni, Naticks, Wampanos, Nanticokes, and many other nations, are a branch of the great family of the Lenni Lenape, therefore I cannot believe that there is so great a difference in the forms of their languages from those of the mother tongue. I shall, however, write on the subject to one of our Missionaries who resides in Canada, and speaks the Chippeway idiom, and doubt not that in a short time I shall receive from him a full and satisfactory answer.

On the subject of the numerals, I have had occasion to observe that they sometimes differ very much in languages derived from the same stock. Even the Minsi, a tribe of the Lenape or Delaware nation, have not all their numerals like those of the Unami tribe, which is the principal among them. I shall give you an opportunity of comparing them.

Numerals of the Minsi.Numerals of the Unami.
1.Gutti.1.N’gutti.
2.Nischa.2.Nischa.
3.Nacha.3.Nacha.
4.Newa.4.Newo.
5.Nalan, (algonk. narau.)5.Palenach.
6.Guttasch.6.Guttasch.
7.Nischoasch, (algonk. nissouassou.)7.Nischasch.
8.Chaasch.8.Chasch.
9.Nolewi.9.Peschkonk.
10.Wimbat.10.Tellen.

You will easily observe that the numbers five and ten in the Minsi dialect, resemble more the Algonkin, as given by La Hontan, than the pure Delaware. I cannot give you the reason of this difference. To this you will add the numerous errors committed by those who attempt to write down the words of the Indian languages, and who either in their own have not alphabetical signs adequate to the true expression of the sounds, or want an Indian ear to distinguish them. I could write a volume on the subject of their ridiculous mistakes. I am, &c.

LETTER XI.
FROM MR. HECKEWELDER.

Bethlehem, 24th June, 1816.

Dear Sir.—I now proceed to answer the several queries contained in your letter of the 13th inst.

1. The double consonants are used in writing the words of the Delaware language, for the sole purpose of indicating that the vowel which immediately precedes them is short, as in the German words immer, nimmer, schimmer, and the English fellow, terrible, ill, butter, &c. The consonant is not to be articulated twice.

2. The apostrophe which sometimes follows the letters n and k, is intended to denote the contraction of a vowel, as n’pommauchsi, for ni pommauchsi, n’dappiwi, for ni dappiwi, &c. If Mr. Zeisberger has placed the apostrophe in any case before the consonant, he must have done it through mistake.

3. There is a difference in pronunciation between ke and que; the latter is pronounced like kue or kwe. In a verb, the termination ke indicates the first person of the plural, and que the second.

4. The word wenn, employed in the German translation of the tenses of the conjunctive mood of the Delaware verbs, means both when, and if, and is taken in either sense according to the content of the phrase in which the word is used. Examples: Ili gachtingetsch pommauchsiane, “If I live until the next year”—Payane Philadelphia, “When I come to Philadelphia.”

5. Sometimes the letters c or g, are used in writing the Delaware language instead of k, to shew that this consonant is not pronounced too hard; but in general c and g have been used as substitutes for k, because our printers had not a sufficient supply of types for that character.

6. Where words are written with ij, both the letters are to be articulated; the latter like the English y before a vowel. For this reason in writing Delaware words I often employ the y instead of j, which Mr. Zeisberger and the German Missionaries always make use of. Thus Elsija is to be pronounced like Elsiya.

7. Answered in part above, No. 5. The double vowels are merely intended to express length of sound, as in the German.

8. Ch, answers to the X of the Greeks, and ch of the Germans. Hh, like all other duplicated consonants, indicates only the short sound of the preceding vowels.

I am, &c.

LETTER XII.
TO MR. HECKEWELDER.

Philadelp , 13th July, 1816.

Dear Sir.—I have received your kind letters of the 20th and 24th ult. It is impossible to be more clear, precise, and accurate, than you are in your answers to my various questions. The information which your letters contain is of the highest interest to me, and I doubt not will prove so to the Committee, by whose orders I have engaged in this Correspondence, on a subject entirely new to me, but with which I hope in time and with your able assistance, to become better acquainted.

M. de Volney has said somewhere in his excellent Descriptive View of the United States, that it were to be wished that five or six eminent linguists should be constantly employed at the public expense to compile Indian Grammars and Dictionaries. I cannot suppose that the Count meant literally what he said, as he must have been sensible of the difficulties attending on the execution of such a plan, but at any rate, here is a noble display of enthusiasm for our favourite science, and a sufficient encouragement for us to pursue our philological enquiries. Alas! if the beauties of the Lenni Lenape language were found in the ancient Coptic, or in some ante-diluvian Babylonish dialect, how would the learned of Europe be at work to display them in a variety of shapes and raise a thousand fanciful theories on that foundation! What superior wisdom, talents and knowledge would they not ascribe to nations whose idioms were formed with so much skill and method! But who cares for the poor American Indians? They are savages and barbarians and live in the woods; must not their languages be savage and barbarous like them?

Thus reason those pretended philosophers who court fame by writing huge volumes on the origin of human language, without knowing, perhaps, any language but their own, and the little Latin and Greek that they have been taught at College. You would think, when you read their works, that they had lived in the first ages of the creation and had been intimately acquainted with the family of our first parents. They know exactly what words were first uttered when men began to communicate their ideas to each other by means of articulated sounds; they can tell you how the various parts of speech, in perfect regular order, were successively formed, and with a little encouragement, they would, I have no doubt, compile a Grammar and Dictionary of the primitive language, as one Psalmanazar did once in England of a supposed Formosan tongue. It is a pity, indeed, that the Delawares, the Wyandots and the Potowatamies, with languages formed on a construction which had not been before thought of, come to destroy their beautiful theories. What then? are we to suppress the languages of our good Indians, or to misrepresent them, that the existing systems on Universal Grammar and the origin of language may be preserved? No, my friend, we shall on the contrary, I hope, labour with all our might to make them known, and provide, at least, additional facts for future theorists.

I have been led into this chain of ideas by reading the ponderous work of a Scotch Lord named Monboddo, who has dreamt of languages more than any other writer that I know. On the authority of a Father Sagard, (a French Missionary) he represents the language of the Hurons as the most incoherent and unsystematical heap of vocables that can possibly be conceived. Their words have no regular formation or derivation, no roots or radical syllables, there is no analogy whatever in the construction or arrangement of this language. He says, for instance, that there is a word for “two years” entirely different from those which signify one, three, four or ten years; that “hut,” “my hut,” and “in my hut,” are severally expressed by words entirely different from each other. He adduces several other examples of the same kind, with which I shall not trouble you, and concludes with saying, that “the Huron language is the most imperfect of any that has been yet discovered.” (Orig. of Lang., Vol. I., p. 478.)

Before we proceed further, let us suppose that a Huron or a Delaware is writing a treatise on the origin of language, and in the pride of pompous ignorance attempts to make similar observations on the English idiom. Following Lord Monboddo’s course of reasoning, he will say: “The English is the most imperfect language upon earth, for its words have no kind of analogy to each other. They say, for instance, ‘a house,’ and the things that belong to a house they call ‘domestic.’ They say ‘a year,’ and ‘an annual payment,’ for a sum of money payable every year. That is not all; if the payment is to be made in two years, it is then called biennial, in which you find no trace of either the word two or the word ‘year,’ of which in a regular language it should be compounded. What belongs to a King is royal; to a woman, feminine; to ship, naval; to a town, urban; to the country, rural. Such another irregular, unmethodical dialect never existed, I believe, on the back of the great tortoise!!”

Such would be the language of our Huron philosopher, and he would be about as right as Lord Monboddo. I have read this work of Father Sagard, of which there is a copy in the Congress library. It appears to me that the good Father was an honest, well meaning, but most ignorant friar, of one of the mendicant orders. His residence among the Hurons was very short, not more than a twelve-month; he was, I know not for what reason, called home by his superiors, and left America with great regret. He has collected a number of words and phrases of the Huron language in the form of a vocabulary, which he improperly calls a dictionary. I have had it copied and shall shew it to you when you come to town. You will be satisfied when you see it, that the good man not only never analysed the language of the Hurons, but was incapable of doing it. He was perfectly bewildered in the variety of its forms, and drew the very common conclusion that what he could not comprehend was necessarily barbarous and irregular. From an attentive perusal of his “dictionary,” I am inclined to draw the opposite conclusion from that which he has drawn. There appears to me to be in it sufficient internal evidence to shew that the Huron language is rich in grammatical forms, and that it is constructed much on the same plan with the Delaware. I shall be very glad to have your opinion on it, with such information as you are able and willing to give. I beg particularly that you will let me know whether there are roots and derivations in the Indian languages, analogous to those of our own?

I am, &c.

LETTER XIII.
TO MR. HECKEWELDER.

Philadelphia, 18th July, 1816.

Dear Sir.—In your letter of the 27th of May you have said that you believed the Delaware nation were those whom the Baron La Hontan meant to designate by the name of Algonkins. In a subsequent letter, (June 20th,) you seem to consider them as distinct nations, but nearly allied to each other; you say you are not well acquainted with their language, which is not the same with that of the Lenape, though there is a considerable affinity between them. Upon the whole I suppose that you have meant to apply the denomination Algonkins, not only to the Delawares proper, but to all the nations and tribes of the same family.

This has led me to consider who those Algonkins might be that La Hontan speaks of, and upon the best investigation that I have been able to make of the subject, I am inclined to believe that La Hontan’s Algonkins are properly those whom we call Chippeways, a family or branch of the Delawares, but not the Delawares themselves. I first turned to Dr. Barton’s “New Views of the Origin of the Nations and Tribes of America,” in which I found that he considered the Delawares and Chippeways as two distinct people; but when I came to the specimens which he gives of their languages in his Vocabularies, I found no difference whatever in the idioms of the two nations. Pursuing the enquiry further, I compared the Vocabulary of the Chippeway language given by Carver in his travels, and that of the Algonkin by La Hontan, and was much astonished to find the words in each language exactly alike, without any difference but what arises from the French and English orthography. The words explained by the two authors, happen also to be precisely the same, and are arranged in the same alphabetical order. So that either Carver is a gross plagiarist, who has pretended to give a list of Chippeway words and has only copied the Algonkin words given by La Hontan, or the Chippeways and Algonkins are one and the same people. I shall be very glad to have your opinion on this subject.

I find in Zeisberger’s Grammar something that I cannot well comprehend. It is the verb “n’dellauchsi” which he translates “I live, move about,” or “I so live that I move about.” Pray, is this the only verb in the Delaware language, which signifies “to live,” and have the Indians no idea of “life,” but when connected with “locomotion”?

Is the W in the Delaware, as your Missionaries write it, to be pronounced like the same letter in German, or like the English W and the French ou? If this letter has the German sound, then it is exactly the same as that of our V; in that case I am astonished that the Delawares cannot pronounce the F, the two sounds being so nearly alike.

I am, &c.

LETTER XIV.
FROM MR. HECKEWELDER.

Bethlehem, 22d July, 1816.

Dear Sir.—I received at the same time your two letters of the 13th and 18th inst., the last by our friend Dr. Wistar. I think you are wrong to complain of the little importance attached by the learned of Europe to the study of Indian languages and of the false ideas which some of them have conceived respecting them. The truth is that sufficient pains have not been taken in this country to make them known. Our Missionaries have, indeed, compiled grammars and dictionaries of those idioms, but more with a view to practical use and to aid their fellow-labourers in the great work of the conversion of the Indians to Christianity, than in order to promote the study of the philosophy of language. They have neither sought fame nor profit, and therefore their compositions have remained unknown except in the very limited circle of our religious society. It belongs to the literary associations of America to pursue or encourage those studies in a more extended point of view, and I shall be happy to aid to the utmost of my power the learned researches of the American Philosophical Society.

Your remarks on Lord Monboddo’s opinion respecting the Indian languages, and on Father Sagard’s work, on which that opinion is founded, I believe to be correct. I am not acquainted with the language of the Hurons, which I have always understood to be a dialect of that of the Iroquois, or at least to be derived from the same stock, and I cannot conceive why it should be so poor and so imperfect as the good Father describes it, while its kindred idiom, the Iroquois, is directly the reverse. At least, it was so considered by Mr. Zeisberger, who was very well acquainted with it. Sir William Johnson thought the same, and I believe you will find his opinion on the subject in one of the Volumes of the Transactions of the Royal Society of London.[279] Colden, in his History of the Five Nations, says “that the verbs of that language are varied, but in a manner so different from the Greek and Latin, that his informant could not discover by what rule it was done.”[280] I suspect his informant had not yet acquired a very profound knowledge of the Iroquois; but from his imperfect description of their verbs, I am very nearly convinced that they are formed on the same model with those of the Lenni Lenape, which Mr. Zeisberger has well described in his Grammar of that language. Colden praises this idiom in other respects; he says that “the Six Nations compound their words without end, whereby their language becomes sufficiently copious.” This is true also of the Delawares.

The Hurons are the same people whom we call Wyandots; the Delawares call them Delamattenos. I am inclined to believe that the tribe whom we call Naudowessies, and the French Sioux, who are said to live to the west or north-west of Lake Superior, are a branch of the Hurons; for the rivers which we call Huron, (of which there are three)[281] are called by the Chippeways, Naduwewi, or Naudowessie Sipi. But of this I cannot be sure; though I would rather conclude that Naudowessie is the Chippeway name for all the Wyandots or Hurons. It is a fact which, I think, deserves to be ascertained. It is a very common error to make several Indian nations out of one, by means of the different names by which it is known.

I proceed to answer the questions contained in your letter of the 18th.

As it seems to me probable that the Naudowessies and Hurons, though called by different names, are the same people; so it may be the case with the Chippeways and the Algonkins, although I have no greater certainty of this hypothesis than of the former. I have no doubt, however, of their being both derived from the same stock, which is that of the Lenni Lenape: that their languages are strikingly similar is evident from the two vocabularies that you mention, and I had rather believe that they both speak the same language, than that Captain Carver was a plagiarist. The accounts which he gives of the Indians I have found in general correct; which is the more remarkable, that from his own account, it appears that he did not reside very long among them. He must have been, therefore, a very attentive and accurate observer.

It is very probable that I did not express myself with sufficient precision in the passages of my letters of the 27th of May and 20th of June to which you refer. The Lenni Lenape, or Delawares, are the head of a great family of Indian nations who are known among themselves by the generic name of Wapanachki, or “Men of the East.” The same language is spread among them all in various dialects, of which I conceive the purest is that of the chief nation, the Lenape, at whose residence the grand national councils meet, and whom the others, by way of respect, style grandfather. The Algonkins are a branch of that family, but are not, in my opinion, entitled to the pre-eminence which the Baron La Hontan ascribes to them. He applied the name “Algonkin,” in a more extensive sense than it deserves, and said that the Algonkin language was the finest and most universally spread of any on the continent; a praise to which I think the Lenni Lenape idiom alone is entitled. In this sense only I meant to say that the Baron included the Delawares in the general descriptive name of “Algonkins.”

I have yet to answer your questions respecting the language, which I shall do in a subsequent letter.

I am, &c.

LETTER XV.
FROM THE SAME.

Bethlehem, 24th July, 1816.

Dear Sir.—I have now to answer your question on the subject of the Delaware verb, n’dellauchsi, which Zeisberger translates by “I live, or move about,” or “I so live that I move about.” You ask whether this is the only verb in the language which expresses “to live,” and whether the Indians have an idea of life, otherwise than as connected with locomotion?

Surely they have; and I do not see that the contrary follows from Mr. Zeisberger’s having chosen this particular verb as an example of the first conjugation. I perceive you have not yet an adequate idea of the copiousness of the Indian languages, which possess an immense number of comprehensive words, expressive of almost every possible combination of ideas. Thus the proper word for “to live” is in the pure Unami dialect lehaleheen. An Unami meeting an aged acquaintance, whom he has not seen for a length of time, will address him thus: “Ili k’lehelleya?”[282] which means, “are you yet alive?” The other will answer “Ili n’papomissi,”[283] “I am yet able to walk about.” The verb n’dellauchsin, which Mr. Zeisberger quotes, is more generally employed in a spiritual sense, “n’dellauchsin Patamawos wulelendam,” “I live up, act up to the glory of God.” This verb, like pommauchsin, implies action or motion, connected with life, which is still the principal idea. I do not know of any thing analogous in the English language, except, perhaps, when we say “To walk humbly before God;” but here the word walk contains properly no idea in itself but that of locomotion, and is not coupled with the idea of life, as in the Indian verb which I have cited. The idea intended to be conveyed arises in English entirely from the figurative sense of the word, in the Delaware from the proper sense.

I should never have done, were I to endeavour to explain to you in all their details the various modes which the Indians have of expressing ideas, shades of ideas, and combinations of ideas; for which purpose the various parts of speech are successively called to their aid. In the conjugations of the verbs, in Zeisberger’s Grammar, you will find but three tenses, present, past, and future; but you will be much mistaken if you believe that there are no other modes of expressing actions and passions in the verbal form as connected with the idea of time. It would have been an endless work to have given all those explanations in an elementary grammar intended for the use of young Missionaries, who stood in need only of the principal forms, which they were to perfect afterwards by practice. Let me now try to give you a faint idea of what I mean by a few examples in the Delaware language.

N’mitzi, I eat.[284] N’mamitzi, I am eating, or am in the act of eating. N’mitzihump, I have eaten. Metschi n’gischi mitzi, I am come from eating. N’dappi mitzi, I am returned from eating.

The first two n’mitzi and n’mamitzi, both mean I eat, but the one is used in the indefinite, and the other in the definite sense, and a good speaker will never employ the one instead of the other. The three last expressions are all past tenses of the verb “I eat,” and all mean, “I have eaten,” but a person just risen from table, will not say, “n’dappi mitzi;” this expression can only be used after leaving the place where he has been eating, in answer to a person who asks him “where he comes from.” The word “n’dappi” is connected with the verb apatschin, to return. There is another distinction, proper to be mentioned here. If the place where the person comes from is near, he says “n’dappi,” if distant “n’dappa.” Thus:

N’dappi pihm, I am come from sweating (or from the sweat oven.)
N’dappihackiheen, I am come from planting.
N’dappi wickheen, I am come from building a house.
N’dappimanschasqueen, I am come from mowing grass.
N’dappi notamæsin, I am come from striking fish with a spear.
N’dappallauwin, I am come (returned) from hunting.
N’dappachtopalin, I am come (returned) from making war.

In the future tense I could shew similar distinctions, but it would lead me too far.

I must now take notice of what Father Sagard says, as you have mentioned in your letter of the 13th inst., that the Indian languages have “no roots, and that there is no regularity in the formation of their words.” It is certain that the manner in which the Indians in general form their words is different from that of the Europeans, but I can easily prove to you that they understand the manner of forming them from “roots.” I take, for instance, the word wulit, good, proper, right, from which are derived:

Wulik, the good. Wulaha, better. Wulisso, fine, pretty. Wulamoewagan, truth. Wulatenamuwi, happy. Wulatenamoagan, happiness. Wulapensowagan, blessing. Wulapan, fine morning. Wuliechen, it is good, or well done. Wulittol, they are good. Wuliken, it grows well, thrives. Wuliechsin, to speak well. Wulelendam, to rejoice. Wulamallsin, to be well, happy.

Wulandeu,} Wuligischgu,}a fine day.

You will naturally observe that the words derived from the root Wulit, imply in general the idea of what is good, handsome, proper, decent, just, well, and so pursuing the same general object to happiness and its derivatives; happiness being considered as a good and pleasant feeling, or situation of the mind, and a person who is happy, as being well. This does not, as you might suppose, make the language ambiguous; for the Indians speak and understand each other with great precision and clearness.

I have yet to answer your question about the f and w. There are in the Delaware language no such consonants as the German w, or English v, f, or r. Where w in this language is placed before a vowel, it sounds the same as in English; before a consonant, it represents a whistled sound of which I cannot well give you an idea on paper, but which I shall easily make you understand by uttering it before you when we meet.

I am, &c.

LETTER XVI.
TO MR. HECKEWELDER.

Philadelphia 31st July, 1816.

Dear Sir.—I have received with the geatest pleasure your two favours of the 24th and 26th inst.; the last, particularly, has opened to me a very wide field for reflection. I am pursuing with ardour the study of the Indian languages (I mean of their grammatical forms) in all the authors that I can find that have treated of the subject, and am astonished at the great similarity which I find between those different idioms from Greenland even to Chili. They all appear to me to be compounded on a model peculiar to themselves, and of which I had not before an idea. Those personal forms of the verbs, for instance, which you mention in your letter of the 20th of June, I find generally existing in the American languages. The Spanish-Mexican Grammarians call them transitions, but they are not all equally happy in their modes of explaining their nature and use. The word “transition,” however, I think extremely well chosen, as it gives at once an idea of the passage of the verb from the pronoun that governs to that which is governed, from “I love” to “I love you.” The forms of the Indian verbs are so numerous, that a proper technical term is very much wanted to distinguish this particular class, and I adopt with pleasure this appropriate Spanish name, at least, until a better one can be found.

I am sufficiently satisfied from the examples in your last letter that the Indians have in their languages “roots,” or radical words from which many others are derived; indeed, I never doubted it before, and only meant to shew you by the instances of Father Sagard, and Lord Monboddo, what false ideas the Europeans have conceived on this subject. The various meanings of the word “wulit” and its derivatives, obtained, as you have shewn, by easy or natural transitions from one kindred idea to another, are nothing new in language. The Greek has the word “kalos,” which in its various meanings is very analogous to “wulit.” Instances of similar “transitions” from different European idioms might be cited without end. There is one in the French which strikes me at this moment with peculiar force. In that language, an honest man is “just” in his dealings and a judge in his judgments; but a pair of shoes is so likewise, when made exactly to fit the foot, and by a natural transition, when the shoes are too tight, they are said to be too just (trop justes). A foreigner in France is reported to have said to his shoemaker, complaining of the tightness of a pair of new made shoes: “Monsieur, ces souliers sont trop équitables.” I remember also an English song, beginning with the words “Just like love,” where you see the word “just” is employed without at all implying the idea of equity or justice. But justice is strict, exact, correct, precise, and therefore the word just is employed for the purpose of expressing these and other ideas connected with that to which it was first applied.

I have made these trite observations, because I am well aware that many a priori reasoners would not fail to find in so many words of different meanings derived from the same root, a proof of the poverty of the Indian languages. They would say that they are poor, because they have but few radical words, a conclusion which they would infallibly make without taking the pains of ascertaining the fact. If they were told that the Greek (the copiousness of which is universally acknowledged) has itself but a comparatively small number of roots, they would not be at a loss to find some other reason in support of their pre-conceived opinion. I have read somewhere (I cannot recollect in what book), that there was not a greater proof of the barbarism of the Indian languages, than the comprehensiveness of their locutions. The author reasoned thus: Analysis, he said, is the most difficult operation of the human mind; it is the last which man learns to perform. Savage nations, therefore, express many ideas in a single word, because they have not yet acquired the necessary skill to separate them from each other by the process of analysis, and to express them simply.

If this position were true, it would follow that all the languages of savage nations have been in the origin formed on the same model with those of the American Indians, and that simple forms have been gradually introduced into them by the progress of civilisation. But if we take the trouble of enquiring into facts, they will by no means lead us to this conclusion. It is not many centuries since the Scandinavian languages of the North of Europe were spoken by barbarous and savage nations, but we do not find that in ancient times they were more comprehensive in their grammatical forms than they are at present, when certainly they are the least so, perhaps, of any of the European idioms; on the other hand, the Latin and Greek were sufficiently so by means of the various moods and tenses of their verbs, all expressed in one single word, without the use of auxiliaries; and yet these two nations had attained a very high degree, at least, of civilisation. I do not, therefore, see as yet, that there is a necessary connexion between the greater or lesser degree of civilisation of a people, and the organisation of their language. These general conclusions from insulated facts ought constantly to be guarded against; they are the most fruitful sources of error in the moral as well as in the natural sciences. Facts ought to be collected and observations multiplied long before we venture to indulge in theoretical inferences; for unobserved facts seem to lie in ambush, to start up at once in the face of finespun theories, and put philosophers in the wrong.

I wish very much that some able linguist would undertake to make a good classification of the different languages of the world (as far as they are known) in respect to their grammatical forms. It was once attempted in the French Encyclopedia, but without success, because the author had only in view the Latin and Greek, and those of the modern languages which he was acquainted with. His division, if I remember right, was formed between those idioms in which inversions are allowed, and those in which they are not. Of course, it was the Latin and Greek on the one side, and the French, Italian, &c., on the other. This meagre classification has not been generally adopted, nor does it, in my opinion, deserve to be. A greater range of observation ought to be taken.

I do not pretend to possess talents adequate to carrying into execution the plan which I here suggest; but I beg you will permit me to draw a brief sketch of what I have in view.

I observe, in the first place, in the eastern parts of Asia, a class of languages formed on the same model, of which I take that which is spoken in the empire of China, as it stood before its conquest by the Tartars, to be the type. In this language, there is but a very small number of words, all monosyllables. As far as I am able to judge from the excellent grammars of this idiom of which we are in possession, the words convey to the mind only the principal or leading ideas of the discourse, unconnected with many of those accessory ideas that are so necessary to give precision to language, and the hearer is left to apply and arrange the whole together as well as he can. It has but few or no grammatical forms, and is very deficient in what we call the connecting parts of speech. Hence it is said that the words spoken are not immediately understood by those to whom they are addressed, and that auxiliary modes of explanation, others than oral communication, are sometimes resorted to, when ambiguities occur. As I am no Sinologist, I will not undertake to say that the description which I have attempted to give of this language, from the mere reading of grammars and dictionaries, is very accurate, but I venture to assert that it differs so much from all others that we know, that with its kindred idioms, it deserves to form a genus in a general classification of the various modes of speech. From its great deficiency of grammatical forms, I would give to this genus the name asyntactic.

My second class of languages would consist of those which possess, indeed, grammatical forms, sufficient to express and connect together every idea to be communicated by means of speech, but in which those forms are so organized, that almost every distinct idea has a single word to convey or express it. Such are the Icelandic, Danish, Swedish, and even the German and English. Those forms of the nouns and verbs which are generally called declensions and conjugations, are in these languages the result of an analytical process of the mind, which has given to every single idea, and sometimes to a shade of an idea, a single word to express it. Thus, when we say “of the man,” here are three ideas, which, in the Latin, are expressed by one single word “hominis.” In the locution “I will not,” or “I am not willing,” and in the verbal form “I will go,” three or four ideas are separately expressed in English, which, in Latin, are conveyed together by single words “nolo,” “ibo.” From this peculiar quality of sufficiently, yet separately, expressing all the necessary ideas, I would denominate this class of languages analytical, or analytic.

The third class would, of course, be that in which the principal parts of speech are formed by a synthetical operation of the mind, and in which several ideas are frequently expressed by one word. Such are what are called the Oriental languages, with the Latin, Greek, Slavonic, and others of the same description. These I would call synthetic.

The French, Italian, Spanish, and Portuguese, with their various dialects, in which conquest has in a great degree intermingled the modes of speech of the second and third class, would together form a fourth, which I would call “mixed.”

In these various classes I have not found a place for the Indian languages, which richly deserve to form one by themselves. They are “synthetic” in their forms, but to such a degree as is not equalled by any of the idioms which I have so denominated, and which are only such in comparison with others where analytic forms prevail. That they deserve to make a class by themselves cannot be doubted. They are the very opposite of the Chinese, of all languages the poorest in words, as well as in grammatical forms, while these are the richest in both. In fact, a great variety of forms, necessarily implies a great multiplicity of words; I mean, complex forms, like those of the Indians; compound words in which many ideas are included together, and are made to strike the mind in various ways by the simple addition or subtraction of a letter or syllable. In the Chinese much is understood or guessed at, little is expressed; in the Indian, on the contrary, the mind is awakened to each idea meant to be conveyed, by some one or other of the component parts of the word spoken. These two languages, therefore, as far as relates to their organisation, stand in direct opposition to each other; they are the top and bottom of the idiomatic scale, and as I have given to the Chinese, and its kindred dialects, the name of asyntactic, the opposite name, syntactic, appears to me that which is best suited to the languages of the American Indians. I find that instead of asking you questions, as I ought to do, I am wandering again in the field of metaphysical disquisitions. I shall try to be more careful in my next letter.

I am, &c.

LETTER XVII.
TO THE SAME.

Philadelphia, 3d August, 1816.

Dear Sir.—I now return to my proper station of a scholar asking questions of his master. In your letter of the 24th ult., you have fully satisfied me that the Indians have a great number of words derived from “roots,” much in the same manner as in the languages of Europe, but you have said at the same time “that the manner in which the Indians in general form their words, is different from that of the Europeans.” I am very anxious to have this manner[287] explained, and I shall be very much obliged to you for all the information that you can give me on the subject.

I have told you already that I thought I had reason to believe that all the American languages were formed on the same general plan. If I am correct in my supposition, I think I have found in the language of Greenland, the identical manner of compounding words which I am now calling upon you to explain. You will tell me whether I have judged right, and you will at once destroy or confirm my favourite hypothesis. According to the venerable Egede, words are formed in the Greenland language by taking and joining together a part of each of the radical words, the ideas of which are to be combined together in one compound locution. One or more syllables of each simple word are generally chosen for that purpose and combined together, often leaving out the harsh consonants for the sake of euphony. Thus from “agglekpok,” he writes, “pekipok,” he mends or does better, and “pinniarpok,” he endeavours, is formed the compound word “agglekiniaret,” which means, “endeavour to write better.” The first syllable “agl,” is taken from “aglekpok,” the second “ek” from the same word, and also from the first syllable of “pekipok,” leaving out the p to avoid harshness, and the third “inniar” from “Pinniarpok,” also leaving out the initial consonant for the same reason. It seems to me that I find something like it in the Delaware language. According to Zeisberger, wetoochwink signifies “father.” Now taking the second syllable ooch, and placing n before it, you have “nooch,” my father. To be sure, it is not the first syllable that is borrowed, as in the above example from the Greenlandish, but the principle appears, nevertheless, to be the same in both languages.

On the subject of this word “father” I observe a strange contradiction between two eminent writers on Indian languages, evidently derived from the stock of the Lenni Lenape or Delaware. One of them, Roger Williams, in his Key to the Language of the New England Indians, says “osh” (meaning probably och or ooch, as the English cannot pronounce the guttural ch) father; “nosh” my father; “kosh” thy father, &c. On the other hand, the Rev. Jonathan Edwards, in his observations on the language of the Muhhekanew (Mohican) Indians, speaks as follows: “A considerable part of the appellations is never used without a pronoun affixed. The Mohegans say, my father, ‘nogh’ (again noch or nooch) thy father ‘kogh,’ &c., but they cannot say absolutely 'father.’ There is no such word in their language. If you were to say ‘ogh,’ you would make a Mohegan both stare and smile.” (page 13.)

Which of these two professors is right? It seems that either Rogers invented the word osh for “father,” from analogy, or that Edwards is not correct when he says that ogh or ooch singly, mean nothing in the Indian language. Is he not mistaken when he says that there is no word whatever answering to “father,” or “the father,” in an abstract sense; and if an Indian would stare and smile when a white man says ooch, would he smile in the same manner if he said wetoochwink? Is it possible to suppose that this respectable author had only a partial knowledge of the language on which he wrote, and that he was not acquainted with the radical word from which nooch and kooch had been formed? Or is there no such radical word, and has Zeisberger himself committed a mistake?

I beg leave to submit to you also another observation that I have made. It appears from the work of the late Dr. Barton, who quotes your authority for it, that the name of the Lenni Lenape, means “the original people,” and that “Lenno” in the Delaware language signifies “man,” in the general sense, (Mensch.) Now, it appears that in the language of the Micmacs (a tribe of Nova Scotia,) they call an Indian “Illenoh,” and in that of the Canadian mountaineers (whom some believe to be the Algonkins proper) they say “Illenou.” (Mass. Histor. Coll. for the year 1799, pp. 18, 19.) I am apt to believe that those names are the same with “Lenno,” and that it is from them that the French have formed the name “Illinois,” which extends even beyond the Mississippi. In the speech of the Indian chief Garangula, to the Governor of Canada, related by La Hontan, the warrior says: “You must know, Onontio, that we have robbed no Frenchmen, but those who supplied the ‘Illinois,’ and the 'Oumamis,’ our enemies, with powder and ball.” I am inclined to believe that Garangula when he spoke of the Illinois meant the Lenni Lenape, and by the name of Oumamis, intended to describe their chief tribe, the Unamis. Of this, however, I leave you to judge. But I strongly suspect that “Lenno,” “Lenni,” “Illenoh,” “Illenou,” “Illinois,” are the same name, and all apply to that great nation whom the Baron La Hontan takes to be the Algonkins, who, it would seem, are only called so by way of discrimination, but consider themselves as a branch of the great family of the “Illenou.” If I am correct in this, how do you make out that Lenni Lenape means “original people”?

The Greenlanders, according to Egede, call themselves Innuit, which in their language also signifies men. It appears to me to be very much akin to Illenoh, Illeun. Could the Greenlanders be in any way connected with the Lenni Lenape?

Pray tell me from what languages are derived the words squaw, sachem, tomahawk, calumet, wampum, papoose, which are so much in use among us? Are they of the Delaware or the Iroquois stock?

I am, &c.

LETTER XVIII.
FROM MR. HECKEWELDER.

Bethlehem 12th August, 1816.

Dear Sir.—I have duly received your two letters of the 31st of July and 3d of August last. I am much pleased with your metaphysical disquisitions, as you call them, and I beg you will indulge in them with perfect freedom, whenever you shall feel so disposed. I agree with you that a proper classification of human languages would be a very desirable object; but I fear the task is too hard ever to be accomplished with the limited knowledge of man. There are, no doubt, many varieties in language yet to be discovered.

As you wish to be acquainted with the manner in which our North American Indians compound their words, I shall endeavour to satisfy you as well as I am able. The process is much the same as that which Egede has described with respect to the Greenland language, and this strongly corroborates your opinion respecting the similarity of forms of at least of those of North America. In the Delaware and other languages that I am acquainted with, parts or parcels of different words, sometimes a single sound or letter, are compounded together, in an artificial manner, so as to avoid the meeting of harsh or disagreeable sounds, and make the whole word fall in a pleasant manner upon the ear. You will easily conceive that words may thus be compounded and multiplied without end, and hence the peculiar richness of the American languages. Of this I can give you numerous examples. In the first place, the word “nadholincen.” It is a simple short word, but means a great deal. The ideas that are conveyed by it are these: “Come with the canoe and take us across the river or stream.” Its component parts are as follows: The first syllable “nad” is derived from the verb “naten,” to fetch; the second, “hol,” from “amochol,” a canoe or boat; “ineen” is the verbal termination for “us,” as in milineen, “give us;”—the simple ideas, therefore, contained in this word, are “fetch canoe us,” but in its usual and common acceptation it means, “come and fetch us across the river with a canoe.” I need not say that this verb is conjugated through all its moods and tenses. Nadholawall is the form of the third person of the singular of the indicative present, and means “He is fetched over the river with a canoe,” or simply, “He is fetched over the river.”

From wunipach, a leaf, nach, a hand, and quim, a nut growing on a tree (for there is a peculiar word to express nuts of this description and distinguish them from other nuts) is formed wunachquim, an acorn, and the ideas which by this name are intended to be conveyed are these: “The nut of the tree the leaves of which resemble a hand, or have upon them the form of a hand.” If you will take the trouble to examine the leaves of an oak tree, you will find on them the form of a hand with outspread fingers. On the same principle are formed

M’sim, hickory nut. Ptucquim, walnut. Wapim, chestnut. Schauwemin, beech nut, and many others.

The tree which we call “Spanish oak,” remarkable for the largeness of its leaves, they call “Amanganaschquiminschi,” “the tree which has the largest leaves shaped like a hand.” If I were to imitate the composition of this word in English and apply it to our language, I would say Largehandleafnuttree, and softening the sounds after the Indian manner, it would perhaps make Larjandliffentree, or Larjandlennuttree, or something like it. Of course, in framing the word, an English ear should be consulted. The last syllable of that which I have last cited, is not taken from the proper name for tree, which is hittuck; but from “achpansi,”[288] which means the “stock, trunk or body of a tree” (in German “der stamm”). The last syllable of this word, “si,” is in its compound converted into schi, probably for the sake of euphony, of which an Indian ear in this case is the best judge.

Again, “nanayunges,” in Delaware means “a horse.” It is formed from awesis, a beast, from which the last syllable es is taken, and nayundam, to carry a burden on the back or shoulders; for when something is carried in the hands or arms, the proper verb is “gelenummen.” The word which signifies “horse,” therefore, literally means, “the beast which carries on its back,” or in other words, “a beast of burden.” Were asses or camels known to the Indians, distinctive appellations for them would soon and easily be formed.

Thus much for the names of natural substances, and words which relate to visible objects. Let us now turn to the expression of ideas which affect the moral sense.

You will remember that I have told you before that “wulik” or “wulit” signifies “good,” and in the various derivations which flow from it means almost every thing that is good, just, proper, decent, pleasing or agreeable. When an Indian wishes to express that he is pleased with something that you have told him, he will say in his metaphorical language: “You have spoken good words.” Now let us see how this compound idea is expressed. “Kolamoe” is one of the forms of the past tense of a verb which means “to speak the truth,” and properly translated signifies “thou hast spoken the truth,” or “thou hast spoken good words.” K, from ki, expresses the second person, “ola” is derived from wulit and conveys the idea of good; the rest of the word implies the action of speaking.

In the third person, “wulamoe” means “he has spoken the truth;” from which is formed the noun substantive wulamoewagan, “the truth:” wagan or woagan (as our German Missionaries sometimes write it to express the sound of the English w) being a termination which answers to that of “ness” in English, and “heit” or “keit” in German. Pursuing further the same chain of ideas, wulistamoewagan or wulamhittamoewagan, means “faith” or “belief,” the belief of what a man has seen or heard; for glistam is a verb which signifies “to hear, hearken, listen;” hence “wulista,” believe it, wulistam, he believes; wulisto, believe ye, &c. The Indians say klistawi! hear me! nolsittammen, I believe it; ammen or tammen abridged from hittammen, where they are employed as terminations, mean “to do, perform, adopt.” See what a number of ideas are connected together in single words, and with what regularity they are compounded, with proper terminations indicating the part of speech, form, mood, tense, number and person, that they respectively belong to! The various shades of thought that those different modes of speech discriminate are almost innumerable; for instance, wulistammen means simply to believe; wulamsittammen to believe with full conviction. I would never have done, if I were to point out to you all the derivatives from this source, or connected with the idea of belief, which word I bring forward merely by way of example, there being many others equally fruitful. There is wulamoinaquot, credible, worthy of belief (sometimes used as an impersonal verb, “it is credible, it deserves to be believed”); welsittawot, a believer; welsittank, a believer in the religious sense, &c.

The syllable pal or pel prefixed to some words, implies denial, and also frequently denotes wrong and is taken in a bad sense. Hence palsittamoewagan, unbelief; palsittammen, to disbelieve; pelsittank, an unbeliever; pelsittangik, unbelievers. Again, palliwi, otherwise; palliton, to spoil, to do something wrong; palhiken, to make a bad shot, to miss the mark in shooting; palhitechen, to aim a stroke and miss it; pallahammen, to miss in shooting at game; pallilissin, to do something amiss or wrong.

M. de Volney has very justly observed on the Miami language, which is a dialect of the Lenape, that m at the beginning of a word implies in general something bad or ugly. It is certainly so in the Delaware, though not without exceptions, for mannitto, a spirit, by which name God himself, the great and good Spirit is called, begins with that ill-omened letter. Nevertheless the words “machit,” bad, and “medhick,” evil, have produced many derivatives, or words beginning with the syllables med, mach, mat, mui, me, mas, &c., all of which imply something bad, and are taken in a bad sense. For instance, mekih and melih, corruption; machtando, the devil; machtageen, to fight, kill; machtapan, a bad, unpleasant morning; machtapeek, bad time, time of war; machtonquam, to have a bad dream, &c. I mention this merely to do justice to the sagacity of M. Volney, whose few observations upon the Indians induce us to regret that he was not in a situation to make more.

I begin to feel fatigued, and therefore shall take leave of you for the present and reserve the remainder of my answer for my next letter.

I am, &c.

LETTER XIX.
FROM THE SAME.

Bethlehem, 15th August, 1816.

Dear Sir.—I sit down to conclude my answer to your letter of the 3d inst.

Before I begin this task, let me give you some examples that now occur to me to shew the regularity of the formation of Indian words.

1. The names of reptiles generally end in gook or gookses.

Achgook, a snake. Suckachgook, a black snake (from suck or suckeu, black.) Mamalachgook, spotted snake. Asgaskachgook, green snake.

2. The names of fishes in meek (Namæs, a fish.)

Maschilameek, a trout (spotted fish.) Wisameek, cat-fish (the fat fish.) Suckameek, black fish. Lennameek, chub fish.

3. The names of other animals, have in the same manner regular terminations, ap, or ape, for walking in an erect posture; hence lenape, man; chum, for four-legged animals, and wehelleu, for the winged tribes. I need not swell this letter with examples, which would add nothing to your knowledge of the principle which I have sufficiently explained.

I now proceed to answer your letter.

Notwithstanding Mr. Edwards’s observation (for whom I feel the highest respect), I cannot help being of opinion, that the monosyllable ooch, is the proper word for father, abstractedly considered, and that it is as proper to say ooch, father, and nooch, my father, as dallemons, beast, and n’dallemons, my beast; or nitschan, child, or a child, and n’nitschan, my child. It is certain, however, that there are few occasions for using these words in their abstract sense, as there are so many ways of associating them with other ideas. Wetoochwink and wetochemuxit both mean “the father,” in a more definite sense, and wetochemelenk is used in the vocative sense, and means “thou our father.” I once heard Captain Pipe, a celebrated Indian chief, address the British commandant at Detroit, and he said nooch! my father!

The shades of difference between these several expressions are so nice and delicate, that I feel great difficulty in endeavouring to explain them. Wetochemuxit, I conceive to be more properly applicable to the heavenly Father, than to an earthly one. It implies an idea of power and authority over his children, superior to that of mere procreation, therefore I think it fittest to be used in prayer and worship. Wetoochwink, on the contrary, by the syllable we or wet, prefixed to it, implies progeny and ownership over it;[289] and wink or ink conveys the idea of the actual existence of that progeny. Yet Mr. Zeisberger, who well understood the language, has used wetoochwink in the spiritual sense. Thus, in his Delaware Hymn Book,[290] you find, page 15, Pennamook Wetoochwink milquenk! which is in English “Behold what the Father has given us!” Again, in the same book, page 32, we read, “Hallewiwi wetochemuxit;” which means “The Father of Eternity.” Upon the whole I believe that ooch is a proper word for “father” or “a father,” but wetoochwink may also be used in the same sense, notwithstanding its more definite general acceptation. There is little occasion, however, to use either with this abstract indefinite meaning.

I agree with you that lenni, lenno, illenoh, illenou, illinois, appear to have all the same derivation, and to be connected with the idea of man, nation, or people. Lenno, in the Delaware language, signifies man, and so does Lenape, in a more extended sense. In the name of the Lenni Lenape, it signifies people; but the word lenni, which precedes it, has a different signification and means original, and sometimes common, plain, pure, unmixed. Under this general description the Indians comprehend all that they believe to have been first created in the origin of things. To all such things they prefix the word lenni; as, for instance, when they speak of high lands, they say lenni hacki (original lands), but they do not apply the same epithet to low lands, which being generally formed by the overflowing or washing of rivers, cannot, therefore, be called original. Trees which grow on high lands are also called lenni hittuck, original trees. In the same manner they designate Indian corn, pumpkins, squashes, beans, tobacco, &c., all which they think were given by the Great Spirit for their use, from the beginning. Thus, they call Indian corn[291] lenchasqueem, from lenni and chasqueem; beans, lenalachksital, from lenni and malachksital; tobacco, lenkschatey, from lenni and kschatey; which is the same as if they said original corn, original beans, original tobacco. They call the linden tree lennikby, from lenni and wikby; the last word by itself meaning “the tree whose bark peels freely,” as the bark of that tree peels off easily all the year round. This bark is made use of as a rope for tying and also for building their huts, the roof and sides of which are made of it. A house thus built is called lennikgawon, “original house or hut,” from lennikby, original, or linden tree, wikheen, to build, and jagawon or yagawon, a house with a flat roof. It is as if they said “a house built of original materials.”

Lennasqual, in the Minsi dialect, means a kind of grass which is supposed to have grown on the land from the beginning. English grasses, as timothy, &c., they call schwannockasquall, or white men’s grass. The chub fish they call lennameek, because, say they, this fish is in all fresh water or streams, whereas other fish are confined to certain particular waters or climates.

They also say lenni m’bi, “pure water;” leneyachkhican, a fowling piece, as distinguished from a rifle, because it was the first fire-arm they ever saw; a rifle they call tetupalachgat. They say, lenachsinnall, “common stones,” because stones are found every where, lenachpoan, “common bread,” (achpoan means “bread”); lenachgook, a common snake, such as is seen every where (from achgook, a snake); lenchum, the original, common dog, not one of the species brought into the country by the white people. I think I have sufficiently explained the name “Lenni Lenape.”

As I do not know the Greenland language, I cannot say how far the word “innuit” is connected with lenni or lenno, or any of the words or names derived from them.

The words squaw, sachem, tomahawk, and wigwam, are words of Delaware stock, somewhat corrupted by the English. Ochqueu, woman; sakima, chief; tamahican, hatchet;[292] wickwam (both syllables long, as in English weekwawm), a house. Hence, nik, my house; kik, thy house; wikit, his house; wikichtit, their houses; wikia, at my house; wiquahemink, in the house; again, wickheen, to build a house; wikhitschik, the builders of a house; wikheu, he is building a house; wikhetamok, let us build a house; wikheek (imperative), build a house; wikhattoak, they are building (a house or houses).

Calumet is not an Indian word; M. Volney thinks it is an English word for a tobacco pipe; it is certainly not proper English, but I have always thought that it was first used by the English or the French. The Delaware for a tobacco pipe is Poakan (two syllables).

Wampum is an Iroquois word, and means a marine shell.

Papoose, I do not know; it is not a word of the Delaware language, yet it is possible that it may be used by some Indian nations, from whom we may have borrowed it. I have been told that the Mahicanni of New England made use of this word for a child. I am, &c.

LETTER XX.
TO MR. HECKEWELDER.

Philadelphia, 21st August, 1816.

Dear Sir.—I have read with the greatest pleasure your two interesting letters of the 12th and 15th. I need not tell you how pleased the Historical Committee are with your correspondence, which is laid before them from time to time. I am instructed to do all in my power to induce you to persevere in giving to your country the so much wanted information concerning the Indians and their languages. The Committee are convinced that the first duty of an American Scientific Association is to occupy themselves with the objects that relate to our own country. It is on these subjects that the world has a right to expect instruction from us.

I am busily employed in studying and translating the excellent Delaware Grammar of Mr. Zeisberger; I hope the Historical Committee will publish it in due time. The more I become acquainted with this extraordinary language, the more I am delighted with its copiousness and with the beauty of its forms. Those which the Hispano-Mexican Grammarians call transitions are really admirable. If this language was cultivated and polished as those of Europe have been, and if the Delawares had a Homer or Virgil among them, it is impossible to say with such an instrument how far the art could be carried. The Greek is admired for its compounds; but what are they to those of the Indians? How many ideas they can combine and express together in one single locution, and that too by a regular series of grammatical forms, by innumerably varied inflexions of the same radical word, with the help of pronominal affixes! All this, my dear sir, is combined with the most exquisite skill, in a perfectly regular order and method, and with fewer exceptions or anomalies than I have found in any other language. This is what really astonishes me, and it is with the greatest difficulty that I can guard myself against enthusiastic feelings. The verb, among the Indians, is truly the word by way of excellence. It combines itself with the pronoun, with the adjective, with the adverb; in short, with almost every part of speech. There are forms both positive and negative which include the two pronouns, the governing and the governed; ktahoatell,[293] “I love thee;” ktahoalowi, “I do not love thee.” The adverb “not,” is comprised both actively and passively in the negative forms, n’dahoalawi, “I do not love;” n’dahoalgussiwi, “I am not loved;” and other adverbs are combined in a similar manner. From schingi, “unwillingly,” is formed schingattam, “to be unwilling,” schingoochwen, “to go somewhere unwillingly,” schingimikemossin, “to work unwillingly;” from wingi, “willingly,” we have wingsittam, “to hear willingly,” wingachpin, “to be willingly somewhere,” wingilauchsin, “to live willingly in a particular manner;” from the adverb gunich,[294] “long,” comes gunelendam, “to think one takes long to do something;” gunagen, “to stay out long;” and so are formed all the rest of the numerous class of adverbial verbs. The adjective verbs are produced in the same way, by a combination of adjective nouns with the verbal form. Does guneu mean “long” in the adjective sense, you have guneep, it was long, guneuchtschi, it will be long, &c.; from kschiechek, “clean,” is formed kschiecheep, “it was clean;” from machkeu, “red,” machkeep, “it was red;” and so on through the whole class of words. Prepositions are combined in the same manner, but that is common also to other languages. What extent and variety displays itself in those Indian verbs, and what language, in this respect, can be compared to our savage idioms?

Nor are the participles less rich or less copious. Every verb has a long series of participles, which when necessary can be declined and used as adjectives. Let me be permitted to instance a few from the causative verb wulamalessohen, “to make happy.” I take them from Zeisberger.

Wulamalessohaluwed, he who makes happy. Wulamalessohalid, he who makes me happy. Wulamalessohalquon, he who makes thee happy, Wulamalessohalat, he who makes him happy. Wulamalessohalquenk, he who makes us happy. Wulamalessohalqueek, he who makes you happy. Wulamalessohalquichtit, he who makes them happy.

Now comes another participial-pronominal-vocative form; which may in the same manner be conjugated through all the objective persons. Wulamalessohalian! THOU WHO MAKEST ME HAPPY!

I will not proceed further; but permit me to ask you, my dear sir, what would Tibullus or Sappho have given to have had at their command a word at once so tender and so expressive? How delighted would be Moore, the poet of the loves and graces, if his language, instead of five or six tedious words slowly following in the rear of each other, had furnished him with an expression like this, in which the lover, the object beloved, and the delicious sentiment which their mutual passion inspires, are blended, are fused together in one comprehensive appellative term? And it is in the languages of savages that these beautiful forms are found! What a subject for reflection, and how little do we know, as yet, of the astonishing things that the world contains!

In the course of my reading, I have often seen the question discussed which of the two classes of languages, the analytical or the synthetical (as I call them), is the most perfect or is preferable to the other. Formerly there seemed to be but one sentiment on the subject, for who cannot perceive the superiority of the Latin and Greek, over the modern mixed dialects which at present prevail in Europe? But we live in the age of paradoxes, and there is no opinion, however extraordinary, that does not find supporters. To me it would appear that the perfection of language consists in being able to express much in a few words; to raise at once in the mind by a few magic sounds, whole masses of thoughts which strike by a kind of instantaneous intuition. Such in its effects must be the medium by which immortal spirits communicate with each other; such, I should think, were I disposed to indulge in fanciful theories, must have been the language first taught to mankind by the great author of all perfection.

All this would probably be admitted if the Latin and Greek were only in question: for their supremacy seems to stand on an ancient legitimate title not easy to be shaken, and there is still a strong prepossession in the minds of the learned in favour of the languages in which Homer and Virgil sang. But since it has been discovered that the barbarous dialects of savage nations are formed on the same principle with the classical idioms, and that the application of this principle is even carried in them to a still greater extent, it has been found easier to ascribe the beautiful organisation of these languages to stupidity and barbarism, than to acknowledge our ignorance of the manner in which it has been produced. Philosophers have therefore set themselves to work in order to prove that those admirable combinations of ideas in the form of words, which in the ancient languages of Europe used to be considered as some of the greatest efforts of the human mind, proceed in the savage idioms from the absence or weakness of mental powers in those who originally framed them.

Among those philosophers the celebrated Dr. Adam Smith stands pre-eminent. In an elegant treatise on the origin and formation of language, he has endeavoured to shew that synthetical forms of speech were the first rude attempts which men made to communicate their ideas, and that they employed comprehensive and generic terms, because their minds had not yet acquired the powers of analysis and were not capable of discriminating between different objects. Hence, he says every river among primitive men was the river, every mountain the mountain, and it was very long before they learned to distinguish them by particular names. On the same principle, he continues, men said in one word pluit (it rains,) before they could so separate their confused ideas as to say the rain or the water is falling. Such is the sense and spirit of his positions, which I quote from memory.

This theory is certainly very ingenious; it is only unfortunate that it does not accord with facts, as far as our observations can trace them. You have shown that the comprehensive compounds of the Delaware idiom are formed out of other words expressive of single ideas; these simple words, therefore, must have been invented before they were compounded into others, and thus analysis presided over the first formation of the language. So far, at least, Dr. Smith’s theory falls to the ground; nor does he appear to be better supported in his supposition of the pre-existence of generic terms. For Dr. Wistar has told me, and quotes your authority for it, that such are seldom in use among the Indians, and that when a stranger pointing to an object asks how it is called, he will not be told a tree, a river, a mountain, but an ash, an oak, a beech; the Delaware, the Mississippi, the Allegheny. If this fact is correctly stated, it is clear that among those original people every tree is not the tree, and every mountain the mountain, but that, on the contrary, everything is in preference distinguished by its specific name.

It is no argument, therefore, against the synthetical forms of language, that they are in use among savage nations. However barbarous may be the people by whom they are employed, I acknowledge that I can see nothing barbarous in them, but think, on the contrary, that they add much to the beauty of speech. This is neither the time nor the place to enter into an elaborate discussion of this subject, but I beg leave to be allowed to illustrate and support my opinion by a lively example taken from the Latin tongue.

Suetonius relates that the Roman Emperor Claudius (one of the most barbarous tyrants that ever existed,) once gave to his courtiers the spectacle of a naval combat on the Fucine lake, to be seriously performed by gladiators. When the poor fellows saw the Emperor approaching, they hailed him with “Ave, Imperator, MORITURI te salutant!” In English this means, “Hail, Cæsar! THOSE WHO ARE GOING TO DIE salute thee!” The tyrant was so moved, or rather struck with this unexpected address, that before he had time to reflect he returned the salutation Avete vos! “Fare ye well!” This gracious reply, from the mouth of an Emperor, amounted to a pardon, and the gladiators, in consequence, refused to fight. But the monster soon returned to his natural ferocity, and after hesitating for a while whether he would destroy them all by fire and sword, he rose from his seat, and ran staggering along the banks of the lake, in the most disgusting agitation, and at last, partly by exhortations and partly by threats, compelled them to fight.[295] Thus far Suetonius.

Now, my dear sir, I put the question to you; if the gladiators, instead of morituri, had said in English those who are about or going to die; would the Emperor even have hesitated for a moment, and would he not at once have ordered those men to fight on? In the word morituri, he was struck at the first moment with the terrible idea of death placed in full front by means of the syllable MOR; while the future termination ITURI with the accessory ideas that it involves was calculated to produce a feeling of tender compassion on his already powerfully agitated mind, and in fact did produce it, though it lasted only a short time. But if, instead of this rapid succession of strong images, he had been assailed at first with five insignificant words Those—who—are—going—to, foreseeing what was about to follow, he would have had time to make up his mind before the sentence had been quite pronounced, and I doubt much whether the gladiators would have been allowed time to finish it. In German, Diejenigen welche am sterben sind, would have produced much the same effect, from the length of the words diejenigen and welche, which have no definite meaning, and could in no manner have affected the feelings of the tyrant Claudius. Ceux qui vont mourir, in French, is somewhat shorter, but in none of the modern languages do I find anything that operates on my mind like the terrible and pathetic morituri. May we not exclaim here with the great Gœthe: O, eine Nation ist zu beneiden, die so feine Schattirungen in einem Worte auszudruecken weiss! “O, how a nation is to be envied, that can express such delicate shades of thought in one single word!”[296]

I hope, indeed I do not doubt, that there is a similar word in the Delaware language; if so, please to give it to me with a full explanation of its construction and meaning.

I thank you very much for the valuable information you have given on the subject of the word “father;” the distinction between wetochemuxit, and wetoochwink, appears to me beautiful, and Zeisberger seems to have perfectly understood it. When he makes use of the first of these words, he displays the “Father of Eternity” in all his glory; but when he says, “Behold what the Father has given us!” he employs the word wetoochwink, which conveys the idea of a natural father, the better to express the paternal tenderness of God for his children. These elegant shades of expression shew in a very forcible manner the beauty and copiousness of the Indian languages, and the extent and the force of that natural logic, of those powers of feeling and discrimination, and of that innate sense of order, regularity and method which is possessed even by savage nations, and has produced such an admirable variety of modes of conveying human thoughts by means of the different organs and senses with which the Almighty has provided us.

Will you be so good as to inform me whether the Delaware language admits of inversions similar or analogous to those of the Latin tongue; and in what order words are in general placed before or after each other? Do you say “bread give me,” or “give me bread”?

I am, &c.

LETTER XXI.
FROM MR. HECKEWELDER.

Bethlehem, 26th August, 1816.

Dear Sir.—Your letter of the 21st inst. has done me the greatest pleasure. I see that you enter the spirit of our Indian languages, and that your mind is struck with the beauty of their grammatical forms. I am not surprised to find that you admire so much wulamalessohalian, it is really a fine expressive word; but you must not think that it stands alone; there are many others equally beautiful and equally expressive, and which are at the same time so formed as to please the ear. Such is eluwiwulik, a name which the Indians apply to Almighty God, and signifies “the most blessed, the most holy, the most excellent, the most precious.” It is compounded of allowiwi, which signifies “more” and wulik, the meaning of which has been fully explained in former letters. It is, as it were allowiwi wulik; the vowel a, in the first word being changed into e. By thus compounding this word allowiwi with others the Delawares have formed a great number of denominations, by which they address or designate the Supreme Being, such are:

Eliwulek,[297] } Allowilen,[298]}He who is above every thing.[299]

I have no doubt you will admire these expressions; our Missionaries found them of great use, and considered them as adding much to the solemnity of divine service, and calculated to promote and keep alive a deep sense of devotion to the Supreme Being. I entirely agree with you in your opinion of the superior beauty of compound terms; the Indians understand very well how to make use of them, and a great part of the force and energy of their speeches is derived from that source: it is very difficult, I may even say impossible, to convey either in German or English, the whole impressiveness of their discourses; I have often attempted it without success.

The word “morituri” which you cite from the Latin, affords a very good argument in support of the position which you have taken. It is really very affecting, and I am not astonished at the effect which it produced upon the mind of the cruel emperor. We have a similar word in the Delaware language, “Elumiangellatschik,” “those who are on the point of dying, or who are about to die.” The first part of it, elumi, is derived from the verb n’dallemi, which means “I am going about” (something). N’dallemi mikemosi, “I am going to work,” or “about to work.” N’dallemi wickheen, “I am going to build.” N’dallemi angeln, “I am about dying,” or “going to die.” The second member of the word, that is to say angel, comes from angeln, “to die;” angloagan, “death,” angellopannik, “they are all dead.” The remainder is a grammatical form; atsch, indicates the future tense; the last syllable ik, conveys the idea of the personal pronoun “they.” Thus elumiangellatschik, like the Latin morituri, expresses in one word “they or those who are going or about to die,” and in German “Diejenigen welche am sterben sind.”

I am pleased to hear that you discover every day new beauties as you proceed with the study of the Indian languages, and the translation of Mr. Zeisberger’s Grammar. You have, no doubt, taken notice of the reciprocal verb exemplified in the fifth conjugation, in the positive and negative forms by “ahoaltin,” “to love each other.” Permit me to point out to you the regularity of its structure, by merely conjugating one tense of it in the two forms.