18 JOIIlSr EBADB ON THE LTTERAEY FACULTY 



as if these languages could uot tell us c[\iite as much of the growth of the human mind 

 as Chinese or Hebrew or Sanscrit." No one, I think, need wait for a more forcible 

 incentive to the scientific study of our native American languages than what we find in 

 this distinct aA'Owal of their worth from one of the greatest philologists of our day. It is 

 still more to the purpose of this paper that the author of " Prehistoric Man " describes the 

 tongues of the New "World as " languages of consistent grammatical structure, involving 

 agglutinate processes of a complexity unknown before and capable of being employed in 

 an effective native oratory and even as vehicles of the sacred and profane literatures of 

 the ancient world." 



The judgments just quoted apply to the whole range of American speech. But it is 

 almost needless to say that language on this continent is not one but manifold. How 

 perplexing the variety is, may be imagined from the fact that Mr. Hubert Bancroft has 

 enumerated nearly six hundred languages or dialects between northern Alaska and the 

 Isthmus of Panama on the western side of the continent. " An exhaustive classification 

 of the American languages," says Professor "Whitney, " is at present impossible. . . There 

 are many great groups and a host of lesser knots of idioms or dialects, isolated or i\nclas- 

 sified. The Eskimos line the whole northern coast and the north-eastern down to New- 

 foundland. The Athabascan or Tinné occupies a gn-eat region in the far north-west (the 

 Apache and the Navajo in the south also belonging to it), and is flanked on the west by the 

 Selish and other smaller groups. The Algonquin had in possession the north-eastern 

 and middle United States and stretched westward to the Eocky Mountains ; within its 

 territory was included that of the Iroquois. The Dakota (Sioux) is the largest of the families 

 occupying the great prairies and plains of the far west. The Muskokee group filled the 

 States of the south-east. In Colorado and Utah commence the towns of the settled and 

 comparatively civilized Pueblo Indians, rising to the more advanced culture of the 

 Mexican peoples, attaining its height in the Maya of Central America, and continued in 

 the empire of the Incas of Peru. The Quichua of the latter, with the related Aymara, 

 are still the native dialects of a considerable part of South America ; with the Tupi- 

 Gruarani also on the east, in the valley of the Amazons and its tribixtaries. The condition 

 of the American languages is thus an epitome of that of the languages of the world in 

 general. Great and wide-spread families, limited groups, isolated and perishing dialects, 

 touch and jostle one another." — (The Life and Growth of Language, pp. 263, 264). 



Having followed Profesor Whitney in his hasty course from north to south, it may 

 be worth while to consider briefly the characteristics of the more important languages of 

 the region traversed. "We may do so in inverse order, which is also, generally speaking, 

 the order of their merit. Prescott tells us of the prudent despotism, not without its 

 imitators in modern times, which substituted for the well-nigh countless and trouble- 

 some A'ariety of tongues spoken by the inhabitants of Peru the rich and beautiful Quichua. 

 This language is said by those who have studied it to bear resemblance to the dialects of 

 Central America. The Tupi or Gruarani now serves the same purpose of a lingoa geral, 

 according to a writer quoted in the Revue du Monde Latin (Senhor Bautista Caetano), from 

 Gruiana to Patagonia. The same writer saj'S that all the languages of Soiith America 

 may be reduced to five. Of the languages of Central America the Tzendal was once looked 

 upon as the most ancient, but it has lately been recognized as a branch of the Maya, now 

 spoken in Yucatan, and the mother tongue of most of the languages of the central region. 



