Page:Archæologia Americana—volume 2, 1836.djvu/284

 248 A SYNOPSIS OF THE INDIAN TRIBES. [iNTROD. presses existence simply, and cannot be associated with another word, so as to express mode of existence. The English I am, is so constantly associated with a noun or adjective expressing what I am, that he, who, through an interpreter, would attempt to find it in the Cherokee language, would almost invariably frame a sentence, which, in the translation, would exclude it; and would be likely to form the opinion that it is not to be found. Yet the verb of existence is to be found, and that in per- petual use. It may be so with other Indian languages, where it is said there is no verb of existence. I know not. The verb ge-ha is also used in connexion with adverbs or nouns of place, to denote where a person or thing is habitually, and then, in regard to persons may be rendered to dwell, as ga- lung-la-ti e-ha, ( he dwells above.' There is also another verb, ge-sung-gi, used only in the past and future tenses and in the sense of the imperative mode, which corresponds to the verb to be as an impersonal verb and as connected with an attributive. Tsi-sJca-ya, I (am) a man. Tsi-s~ka~ya ge-sungrgi, I was a man. Tsi-ska-ya ge-se-sti, I shall be a man, or, (with a little va- riation of intonation) let me be a man. U-ne-gung ge-sung-gi, he was white. U-ni-ne-gung ge-sung-gi, they were white. The changes of person and number belong to the words in connexion, and not to the verb ge-sung-gi, ' it was,' which is strictly impersonal. Instances of the use of this verb and of a verbal noun derived from it, viz. ge-sung-i, ' the being so/ occur in the translation of the Lord's Prayer, which see. This verb occurs less frequently than it otherwise would, on account of the peculiarity of the language, in which the place of adjectives which in other languages are used to express al- most all attributes, is supplied in great part by verbs ; as Tsi- nu-waw-ga, c I am cold' ; a-gi-tlung-ga, 1 1 am sick,' &c. 12. In what particulars, exclusive of those above alluded to, does the dialect differ from the English or other languages fa- miliar to us ? Ans. The most striking peculiarity of the language is what Mr. Du Ponceau has called its poly 'synthetic character. This it possesses in the highest degree. This feature is the occasion