CHAPTER IX.
LANGUAGES.
In all the North American territories bounded to the north and east by the Atlantic ocean, and to the south and west by the river Mississippi, and the possessions of the English Hudson’s Bay company, there appears to be but four principal languages, branching out, it is true, into various dialects, but all derived from one or the other of the four mother tongues, some of which extend even beyond the Mississippi, and perhaps, as far as the Rocky Mountains. These four languages are:
I. The Karalit.
This language is spoken by the inhabitants of Greenland and on the Continent by the Eskimaux Indians of the coast of Labrador. Its forms and principles are sufficiently known by means of the Grammar and Dictionary of the venerable Egede,[121] and the works of Bartholinus, Wœldike, Thornhallesen,[122] Cranz[123] and others. It is much cultivated by the Missionaries of the Society of the United Brethren, by whom we may expect to see its principles still further elucidated. It is in Greenland that begin those comprehensive grammatical forms which are said to characterise the languages of the vast American continent, as far as they are known, and are the more remarkable when contrasted with the simplicity of construction of the idioms spoken on the opposite European shores, in Iceland, Denmark, Sweden and other countries. It appears evident from this single circumstance, that America did not receive its original population from Europe.
II. The Iroquois.
This language in various dialects is spoken by the Mengwe or Six Nations, the Wyandots or Hurons, the Naudowessies, the Assinipoetuk, called by the French Assiniboils, Assinipoils, or Sioux, and by other tribes, particularly beyond the St. Lawrence. Father La Hontan distinguishes this class of languages by the name of the Huron, probably because that nation was better known to the French, whose allies they were, than the Iroquois, who were in alliance with the English.[124] All these languages, however they may be called in a general sense, are dialects of the same mother tongue, and have considerable affinity with each other. Mr. Carver is mistaken when he describes the Naudowessie as belonging to a class different from the Iroquois.[125] It is sufficient to compare the vocabularies that we have of these two idioms, to see the great similitude that subsists between them. We do not, unfortunately, possess a single grammar of any of these dialects; we have nothing, in fact, besides the fragment of Zeisberger’s Dictionary, which I have already mentioned, but a large vocabulary of the Huron,[126] composed by Father Sagard, a good and pious French Missionary, but of very limited abilities, and who also resided too short a time among that nation to be able to give a correct account of their language. He represents it in his preface, as poor, imperfect, anomalous, and inadequate to the clear expression of ideas, in which he is contradicted by others whom we have reason to believe better informed. Zeisberger considered the Iroquois (of which the Huron is a dialect,) as a rich and comprehensive idiom. It is to be regretted that a grammar which he had composed of it, and the best part of his Dictionary, are irretrievably lost. Sir William Johnson speaks highly of the powers of this language;[127] Colden,[128] though he did not know it himself, speaks in the same manner from the information of others. Indeed, Father Sagard’s Dictionary itself, when attentively read by a person acquainted with the forms of Indian languages, affords sufficient intrinsic evidence of the mistakes of the good father who composed it.
III. The Lenape.
This is the most widely extended language of any of those that are spoken on this side of the Mississippi. It prevails in the extensive regions of Canada, from the coast of Labrador to the mouth of Albany river which falls into the southernmost part of Hudson’s bay, and from thence to the Lake of the Woods, which forms the north-western boundary of the United States. It appears to be the language of all the Indians of that extensive country, except those of the Iroquois stock, which are by far the least numerous. Farther to the north-west, in the territories of the Hudson’s Bay Company, other Indian nations have been discovered, such as the Blackfoot Indians, Sussee Indians, Snake Indians, and others, whose languages are said to be different from the Iroquois and the Lenape, but we are not able to form a very correct judgment respecting those idioms from the scanty vocabularies which have been given us by Mackenzie, Umfreville and other travellers. We must wait for further light before we decide.