Page:Archæologia Americana—volume 2, 1836.djvu/201

 SECT. VI.] INDIAN LANGUAGES. 165 America appears to be a universal tendency to express in the same word, not only all that modifies or relates to the same object, or action, but both the action and the object ; thus con- centrating in a single expression a complex idea, or several ideas among which there is a natural connexion. All the other features of the language seem to be subordinate to that general principle. The object in view has been attained by various means of the same tendency and often blended together: a multitude of inflections properly so called ; a still greater num- ber of compound words, sometimes formed by the coalescence of primitive words not materially altered, more generally by the union of many such words in a remarkably abbreviated form ; and numerous particles, either significative, or the original meaning of which has been lost, prefixed, added as termina- tions, or inserted in the body of the word. The modern languages of Europe generally, and none more than the English, have substituted, for the inflections of the ancient languages, auxiliary verbs and separable prepositions ; and the inflections or compounded words, in the classical lan- guages, bear no proportion in point of number to the multiplied forms and combinations exhibited by those of the Indians. Notwithstanding this great apparent complexness, all these various forms, either of inflected or compounded words, must necessarily have their foundation in analogy, modified by eupho- ny : but they render a competent acquirement of the language extremely difficult to a foreigner ; and even after this object has been attained, more by routine than in any other way, it must be no easy task for the student, to analyze the words, to reduce them to their proper elements, to class them in conformity with the genius of the language, and to convey to others his knowl- edge with method and sufficient perspicuity. This remains to be done for almost every Indian language ; and we can, in the mean while, only try to give some imperfect notions of the most general features which appear to have been ascertained. Number and Gender'. There is a great variety in the Indian languages with respect to Genders and Number. Like all others, they have various distinct words, expressive of the differences of sex in the human species, in reference