[chambers] the philology OF THE OUANANICHE 137 



Montutriiais name for saimon — the .salmon of tlie soa — is not onanan at all 

 but oucJtarJtouiiKic or oa-sha-sJiu nxik, and this name is still often ap])lie<l 

 by the Indians to particularly dark-coloured and extra large specimens of 

 the ouananiche found in certain northern lakes. To their ordinary fresh 

 water Sainton they applied a s])eci tic name, calling- it " ouanans " or the 

 abbreviated "unans" — each pronounced '• wannan " or " whonnan." 



(Jriginally. •' ouanans," oddly enough, signified locality, especially 

 the place where tish are found, according to some authorities. According 

 to others it is a corru])tion of ouen-a ? (pronounced "when-na") — a 

 Montagnais interrogative. Used in the sense of '• What is that ? " it is not 

 difficult to imagine how ouen-a f or ouan-a f uttered by Montagnais 

 fishermen as they pointed to large tish seen feeding upon the flies on the 

 scum-covered pools, came in time to be cmplo3'ed for the name of that 

 particular variety which, more than any other in the territory in which 

 it is found, is fond of disporting itself upon the surface of the water. The 

 Rev. Père Arnaud, the missionary to the Montagnais, suggests further to 

 me that the particular locality known as " ounans " or '' unans." to the 

 Montagnais, is the eddying water in the pools at the foot of rapid 

 currents. In just such water as this the oiumaniche are often seen saihng 

 around with their dorsal tins protruding above their native element. It 

 requires no stretch of imagination on the part of those acquainted with 

 the Indians and their manners and the evolutions of their language, to 

 admit the possibility of either ouanans or unans having been the original 

 r ot of ouananiche. 



Either is much more probable than the suggestion of Mr. Creighton 

 at page 82 of Shield's American Ganie Fishes, that the name of the 

 fish •• is probably derived from the Crée root wan.' to lose or mistake, 

 applied either to the fish having lost itself or being taken for a salmon."' 



The diminutive form of the word '•ouanans" is now almost univers- 

 ally employed in speaking of the fish, perhaps because the latter offers no 

 exception to the angler s general experiences that the big fish are few 

 and far between. Or can it be that there is an element of truth in the 

 Indian reports of the deterioration in size of their fresh- water salmon, 

 and that in former ages these fish were so much larger, that all their 

 descendants of the present day must be classed as little ouanans f French- 

 Canadian fishermen, settlers and guides in the land of the ouananiche 

 call it le saumon (the salmon) perhaps ofteuer than they employ the 

 Indian name, and from their petit saumon (little salmon), and the know- 

 ledge that the Montagnais affix iche is a diminutive, may have originated 

 the fashionable error of jumping to the conclusion that '' oiuxnaniche " is 

 an Indian equivalent for "little salmon.'' Were it indeed so, the con- 

 structors of the word would simply have builded better than they knew. 



And now that the original form, after an existence in French- 

 Canadian literature of over two and a half centuries, has obtained such 



