XVI ROYAL SOCIETY OF CANADA. 
special feature of its Transactions. The polished language of cultured France, though here trans- 
ferred to a region beyond the Atlantic, is kept en rapport with the Parisian centre of refinement, and 
fed from the perennial fount of French literature. But here also are the peasants of Normandy and 
Brittany, transplanted to “la Nouvelle France,” under the old regime, bringing with them to their 
new home a provincial patois, embodying elements peculiar to those scenes of Scandinavian coloniza- 
tion and Celtic institutions. Here, unaffected by revolutions that have so largely influenced the more 
recent history of France and of Europe, they have dwelt for generations, intermingling to some 
extent with the aborigines, and brought into novel relations with other intrusive races of the New 
World. To the modern Frenchman, they cannot fail to present in many ways a singularly attractive 
study; but it is in their philological aspect that the widest value lies; and the changes already 
noticeable in idiom and vocabulary, have awakened an intelligent interest among many students of 
language. The cultivated Frenchman not only brought with him to his new home, a written 
language, and a literature rich and varied in its attractions, but the intervening ocean has scarcely 
impeded his enjoyment of its latest triumphs. But the habitant has stood in very different relations 
to the language. It was to him from the first an unwritten local dialect; and now illustrates, in 
some singularly striking aspects, the beginning anew of a process of evolution akin to that to which 
we owe the whole Romance languages. This is a branch of comparative philology, of interest to all 
Canadians, and which has a special claim on the attention of Section I. 
But a wider interest pertains to the native languages, and to the indigenous races of this continent. 
Their approximation in physical characteristics to the Asiatic Mongol renders all the more remark- 
* able the wide diversity of speech between the two continents. On both, indeed, an agglutinate char- 
acter predominates in large groups of languages; but beyond this, any affinities thus far traced out 
are remote and uncertain. Here, therefore, is a problem in comparative philology, of which a solution 
may not unreasonably be looked for from us. In this direction unquestionably lies the determination 
of questions relating to the origin of the American race; the ethnographic key to the earliest 
migrations ; the prehistoric chronicle of this western hemisphere; the interpretation, it may be, of 
the venerable myth of the lost Atlantis, which vainly excited the interest of the disciples of Socrates, 
as even then a tradition from old times before that era to which they belonged, when the world was 
two thousand three hundred years younger than it is now. 
Looking to the subject in its narrowest aspect, the native Janguages of this continent are deserv- 
ing of careful study; and those of our own Dominion have a claim on our attention, as a Society, 
which we cannot ignore without discredit to ourselves. We owe not a little of the knowledge of them, 
thus far secured, as one—and not the least valuable—of the results due to the devoted labours of 
French missionaries for upwards of two centuries among the Indians of Canada and the Northwest. 
The Huron version of the Lord’s Prayer, reproduced in the second volume of the Society’s Trans- 
actions, was derived from a MS. of the seventeenth century, ascribed to the Rev. Father Chaumonot ; 
and is of value as an example of the language of that race, when first brought into intimate 
intercourse with Europeans. The vocabulary of the language, prepared by the same zealous Jesuit 
missionary, is still in existence; but its present custodian, M. Paul Picard, son of the late Huron 
Chief, Tahourenche, has hitherto repelled all applications for its purchase, and even for permission to 
have it printed. Its genuineness is placed beyond dispute by the date of the water-mark on the 
paper, and its interest and value are unquestionable. Our earliest knowledge of the native vocabu- 
lary of the Province of Quebec is derived from the two brief lists furnished by Cartier as the result 
of his visit in 1535; and a comparison of them with the Huron vocabulary leaves no doubt of their 
affinity. We have also the dictionary of the Recollet Father, Gabriel Sagard, printed at Paris in 
1632. But the recovery of the vocabulary of Father Chaumonot, and its printing by the Royal 
Socicty, will furnish an important addition for the study of the language of a people interestingly 
associated with the early history of Canada, and will be a creditable work for either of the Literary 
Sections. I regret that my own efforts to obtain access to the MS., with a view to laying it before 
the Section of English Literature and of History, have thus far failed. 
