Page:Archæologia Americana—volume 2, 1836.djvu/204

16S A SYNOPSIS OF THE INDIAN TRIBES. [iNTROD. usage. Zeisberger seems to confine the use of the Delaware animate termination ak to substantives without the prefixed pronoun. Adjectives, when susceptible of a plural form, are subject to a similar variation of inflection, according as the noun, with which they are connected, is of the animate or inanimate class. Numerals and demonstrative pronouns appear to follow the same rule as adjectives. The distinction seems to be wanted in the personal and possessive pronoun of the third person ; or, at least, it has not, if it does exist, been distinctly pointed out. But the inflection of the verb varies in reference to the nature of the noun it governs. Thus, in the Massachusetts; 'I keep him,' Noowadchan; 'I keep it,' Noowadchanumun: in the Delaware; ' I see a man,' Lenno newau; 1 1 see a house,' Wi- quam nemen: in the Chippeway ; e I see a man,' rfwabima; 'J see a house,' rtwabindan. We are not however informed, whether the terminations or inflections of the verb, which dis- tinguish, whether its regimen belongs to the animate or inani- mate class, are always the same, or, if they vary, whether the variations are due to euphony, or usage, or may be traced to some other principle ? It appears also that there are some cases, where the termination of the noun governed by the verb is altered on account of the class to which it belongs. According to Eliot, " there seemeth to be one cadency of the form animate, which endeth in oh, uh, ah, when an animate noun followeth a verb transitive. Thus anogqs, i a star,' (which by the Indians is considered as animate) in the plural is anogqsog, * stars.' But in the sentence, ' He made stars,' this last word must be anogqsoh, because it followeth (is governed by) the verb agim, 1 he made.' " This it would seem, if I have not mistaken Mr. Schoolcraft's meaning, is confined to the case when the verb is in the third person. There is in that person no distinction between the singular and the plural ; and its termination, oh, ah in the Massachusetts, un, in, he. in the Chippeway, is given not only to the verb, but to the regimen when this belongs to the animate class. It appears, that, in the Chippeway, that termina- tion (un, in, &c.) is also that of the plural of inanimate things ; but why these are not, in all the languages of that family, sub- ject to the same rule as animate beings, does not appear ; and all that relates to regimen, with respect both to nouns and pro- nouns of the third person, requires further investigation and explanation.