Such our sketch of the details. They give us more affinities than the current statements concerning the glossarial differences between the languages of the New World suggest. It is also to be added that they scarcely confirm the equally common doctrine respecting their grammatical likeness. Doing this, they encourage criticism, and invite research.
There is a considerable amount of affinity: but it is often of that miscellaneous character which baffles rather than promotes classification.
There is a considerable amount of affinity; but it does not, always, shew itself on the surface. I will give an instance.
One of the first series of words to which philologues who have only vocabularies to deal with have recourse, contains the numerals; which are, in many cases, the first of words that the philological collector makes it his business to bring home with him from rude countries. So generally is this case that it may safely be said that if we are without the numerals of a language we are, in nine cases out of ten, without any sample at all of it. Their value as samples for philological purposes has been noticed in more than one paper of the present writer's here and elsewhere; their value in the way of materials for a history of Arithmetic being evident—evidently high.
But the ordinary way in which the comparisons are made between the numerals gives us, very often, little or nothing but broad differences and strong contrasts. Take for instance the following tables.
| English. | Eskimo. | Aleutian. | Kamskadale. |
|---|---|---|---|
| one | atamek | attakon | kemmis. |
| two | malgok | alluk | nittanu. |
| three | pinajut | kankun | tshushquat. |
| four | istamat | thitshin | tshashcha. |
| five | tatlimat | sshang | koomdas. |
No wonder that the tongues thus represented seem unlike.
But let us go farther—in the first place remembering that, in most cases, it is only as far as five that the ruder languages have distinct numerals; in other words that from six onwards they count upon the same principle as we do after ten, i. e. they join together some two, or more, of the previous numerals; even as we, by adding seven and ten, make seven-teen. The exact details, of course, differ; the general principle, however, is the same viz.: that after five the numerals become, more or less, compound, just as, with us, they become so after ten.