INTRODUCTORY NOTE.
Sault Ste. Marie, May 31, 1823.
Sir: In order to answer your inquiries, I have improved my leisure hours, during the part of the summer following our arrival here (6th July last), and the entire winter and spring, in examining the words and forms of expression of the Chippewa, or (as the Indians pronounce it) Odjibwa, tongue. I have found, as I anticipated, my most efficient aid, in this inquiry, in Mr. Johnston, and the several members of his intelligent family; my public interpreter being too unprecise and profoundly ignorant of the rules of grammar to be of much use in the investigation. Mr. Johnston, as you are aware, perhaps, came from the north of Ireland, where his connections are highly respectable, during the first term of General Washington's administration. He brought letters from high sources to the Governor-General of Canada; but having, while at Montreal, fallen in with Don Andrew Tod, a countryman, who had the monopoly of the fur trade of Louisiana, in a spirit of enterprise and adventure, he threw himself into that, at the time, fascinating pursuit, and visited Michilimackinac. Circumstances determined him to fix his residence at St. Mary's, where he has resided, making frequent visits to Montreal and Great Britain, about thirty years. His children have been carefully instructed in the English language and literature, and the whole family are familiar with the Indian. Without such proficient aid, I should have labored against serious impediments at every step; and, with them, I have found the inquiry, in a philological point of view, involved in many, and some of them insuperable difficulties. The results I communicate to you, rather as an earnest of what may be hereafter done in this matter, than as completely fulfilling inquiries which it would require Horne Tooke himself, with the aid of the Bodleian library, to unravel.
With respect, &c.,
HENRY R. SCHOOLCRAFT.
His Excellency Gov. Lewis Cass.
EXAMINATION OF THE ODJIBWA.
1, 2. Simple Sounds.—The language is one of easy enunciation. It has sixteen simple consonental and five vowel sounds. Of these, two are labials, b and p; five dentals, d, t, s, z, j, and g soft; two nasals, m and n; and four gutturals, k, q, c, and g hard. There is a peculiar nasal combination in ng, and a peculiar terminal sound of g, which may be represented by gk. Of the mixed dipthongal and consonental sounds, those most difficult to English organs are the sounds in aiw and auw.
3. Letters not used.—The language is wholly wanting in the sound of th. It drops the sound of v entirely, substituting b, in attempts to pronounce foreign words. The sound of l is sometimes heard in their necromantic chants; but, although it appears to have been known to the old Algonquin, it is supplied, in the Odjibwa of this day, exclusively by n. It also eschews the sounds of f, r, and x, leaving its simple consonental powers of utterance, as above denoted, at sixteen. In attempts to pronounce English words having the sound of f, they substitute p, as in the case of v. The sound of r is either dropped, or takes the sound of au. Of the letter x they make no use; the nearest approach I have succeeded in getting from them is ek-is, showing that it is essentially a foreign sound to them. The aspirate h begins very few words, not exceeding five in fifteen hundred, but it is a very frequent sound in terminals, always following the slender or Latin sound of a, but never its broad sound in au, or its peculiarly English sound as heard in the a of may, pay, day. The terminal syllable of the tribal name (Odjibwa), offers a good evidence of this rule, this syllable being never sounded by the natives either wah or wau, but always wa. These rules of utterance appear to be constant and imperative, and the natives have evidently a nice ear to discriminate sounds.
Rule of Euphony.—In the construction of words, it is required that a consonant should precede or follow a vowel. In dissyllables wherein two consonants are sounded in juxtaposition, it happens from the joining of two syllables, the first of which ends and the last begins with a consonant, as muk-kuk, a box, and os-sin, a stone; the utterance in these cases being confluent. But in longer compounds this juxtaposition is generally avoided by throwing in a vowel for the sake of euphony, as in the term assinebwoin, the e in which is a mere connective, and has no meaning by itself. Nor is it allowable for vowels to follow each other in syllabication, except in the restricted instances where the being or existence of a thing or person is affirmed, as in the vowel-words i-e-e and i-e-a, the animate and inanimate forms of this declaration. In these cases, there is a distinct accent on each vowel.
4. Accent.—The accent generally falls on full or broad vowels, and never on short vowels; such accented vowels are always significant, and if they are repeated in a compound word, the accents are also repeated, the only difference being that there are primary and secondary accents. Thus, in the long descriptive name for a horse, Pa-bá-zhik-ó-ga-zhé, which is compounded of a numeral term and two nouns, meaning, the animal with solid hoofs; there are three accents, the first of which is primary, while the others succeed each other with decreased intensity. By a table of words which I have constructed, and had carefully pronounced over by the natives, it is denoted that dissyllables are generally accented on the final syllable, trisyllables on the second, and words of four syllables on the second and fourth. But these indications may not be constant or universal, as it is perceived that the accents vary agreeably to the distribution of the full and significant vowels.