Page:IJAL vol 1.djvu/66

 INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF AMERICAN LINGUISTICS

��VOL. I

��A PASSAMAQUODDY TOBACCO FAMINE By J. DYNELEY PRINCE

��THE following curious tale was related to me at St. Andrew's, New Brunswick, by Bennett N. Francis of the Passamaquoddy tribe of Pleasant Point (Me.) Reservation (Sibdyik). The story is interesting, in that it indicates how precious a commodity the Indian tobacco was in the sparsely settled districts. The dramatis persona are the usual magically endowed hero and a companion, in this case his little brother (osimi'z'l), and the mysterious old woman who forms the staffage around which the exploits of the hero are grouped. Like so many eastern Algonquin tales, it runs along in jerky conversational style, and has no particular ending. The hero obtains his tobacco from the demon, while flying; and then the story rambles on, de- scribing his escape from her vengeance, with no account of what actually happened. Lin- guistically, the tale is in very pure Passama- quoddy with some highly idiomatic combina- tions, indicated in the following commentary.

The Passamaquoddies live about four hun- dred strong at Pleasant Point, Me., and about one hundred and fifty persons near Princeton, Me. They show no signs of diminishing numerically, and retain their language with great persistence. The small children all speak in Indian much better than in English, a certain evidence that their idiom is not going to perish with the present generation. These people are linguistically identical with the Maliseet, or St. John's River Indians, whose headquarters are near Fredericton, N. B. As there are nearly five hundred of these, it is safe to estimate that about a thou- sand persons still speak Passamaquoddy.

Students interested in this highly character- istic eastern Algonquin language will find material published by me as follows:

��Morphology of the Passamaquoddy Language of Maine (Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, 53: 92-117), a fairly full grammatical sketch, with paradigms and discussion.

Kuloskap the Master (Funk & Wagnalls, 1902), folk-lore.

American Anthropologist, 9: 310-316; n: No. 4.

Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 1 1 : 369-377; 13: 381-386.

Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, 36: 479-498; 38: 181-189.

Compare also Hastings, Dictionary of Religions, sub- ject "Algonquins," on the religion of these people.

I intend to publish shortly a complete chrestomathy of Passamaquoddy tales, with dictionary and grammatical sketch, as the oral "literature" of this race has been much neglected.

W'ma'tagwe'sso (The Man with the Rabbit)

Wut-a'gw nelcwt 1 w'ski'jin* yu'tau'tcmike'sic 3 Once upon a time an Indian scared up (from

the tall grass)

ma'tagwe'sul. 4 w'tazowita"kozi'nul. 6 ma'- a rabbit. He throws it over (his He

shoulder).

1 wul-a'gw nekwt: wut THAT+demonstrative -agw; nekwt= ONCE, THAT ONCE (cf. note 2, p. 60).

1 w'ski'jin the usual word for INDIAN.

'yu'tau'tomike'sso HE STARTED HIM UP (the words FROM THE TALL GRASS are an addition of the narrator's) : yu'ta HERE+w'tomike'sso (from temg TRAMPLE, seen in k'temgago'kech THEY WILL TRAMPLE YOU, k'temgibi'Ikon

HE WILL TRAMPLE THEE, w'temgite'km'n HE STUMBLES OVER IT).

t ma"tagwes RABBIT; with the obviative -ul (see w'ma'tagwe'sso, note 25, p. 59).

6 w'tazowita"kozi'nul; from ake BEND, THROW; the form may be analyzed: a>'=3d per.-H- infix +a'zowi OVER-H- infix+a'kos THROW OVER+- inul verb-ending = IT (animate). With a'zowi, cf. azos ON TOP, seen in a'soswu'n HAT, a'snumelo'k LAP (see below), ot-asho'nel BED-CLOTHES = COVERINGS, etc. With a'kos, cf. the same stem in tesa'giu OVER, ACROSS, kwuska'phin SET ME OVER. The idea SHOULDER is not expressed.

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