70 ARCHAEOLOGY OF THE UNITED STATES. 



cable in all its details, it is probably a correct analysis of tbe most prominent 

 dialects of the United States. Speaking of tbe practice of agglutination, or syn- 

 thesis, be says : 



" If we searcb for the distinguishing traits of our American languages, we shall 

 find tbe synthetic character pervading them all, and establishing their rules. The 

 American does not separate the component parts of the proposition which he 

 utters; he never analyzes his expressions; his thoughts rush forth in a troop. His 

 speech is as a kindling cloud, not as radiant points of light. This absence of all 

 reflective consciousness, and of all logical analysis of ideas, is the great peculiarity 

 of American speech. Every complex idea is expressed in a group. Synthesis 

 governs every form; it pervades all the dialects of the Iroquois and tbe Algonkin, 

 and equally stamps tbe character of the language of the Cherokee." 



" It has been asked if our Indians were not the wrecks of more civilized 

 nations? Their language refutes tbe hypothesis; every one of its forms is a wit- 

 ness that their ancestors were, like themselves, not yet disenthralled from nature. 

 The character of each Indian language is one continued, universal, all-pervading 

 synthesis. They to whom these languages were the mother tongue, were still in 

 that earliest stage of intellectual culture where reflection has not begun." 1 



Mr. Schoolcraft, in his Essay on the grammatical structure of the Algonkin lan- 

 guage, one of the most extensive of Indian forms of speech, has intimated an opinion 

 that it was built up from monosyllabic roots. 2 It is very probable that the same 

 may have been the case with all American dialects; and, while they exhibit dif- 

 ferent degrees of advancement from that primitive condition (the Otomis, a rude 

 and inferior tribe, retaining most of the original form) to whatever stage of refine- 

 ment they may have attained, the system of progression has been determined by 

 the laws of intellectual and physical organization peculiar to the race; hence the 

 radical unity observable throughout the continent. 3 It may be, therefore, that tbe 

 philosophy of American speech, the phenomena constituting its genius, will not be 

 fully comprehended until the metaphysical, physiological, and possibly phreno- 

 logical traits of the aborigines are accurately determined. The acuteness of tbe 

 senses, especially that of hearing, exerts a material influence on the structure of. 

 language. Many compounded words of the Indians require a delicate articu- 

 lation, and a very nice discrimination of tone, assisted by signs addressed to the 

 eye. The predominance of certain 'faculties of mind, and the absence or inac- 

 tivity of others, by which different families of men are distinguished, a prevailing 

 temperament, and purely physical habits, all combine to constitute the mould in 

 which the forms of speech are modelled; and where these attributes are the same, 

 a similar linguistic system will be generated. 



It is by no means improbable that the aspect of the question concerning the 



1 See also Mr. Prescott's "Conquest of Mexico," III, 393, el seq. 

 * Gov. Cass, N. A. Rev., XXVI, before referred to, makes a similar suggestion. 

 3 The supposed grammatical isolation of the Otomi language has beeu questioned by Dr. Latham, 

 "Varieties of Man," p. 408. 



