LANGUAGE. 53 



I have already alluded to the softness and har- 

 mony of the Cree language. It differs in construc- 

 tion from the Eskimo tongue, in the personal 

 pronouns being prefixes, not suffixes, and in other 

 particulars ; but both have the polysynthetic cha- 

 racter of the other American idioms. The sounds 

 of the English / and v do not occur in the Cree ; 

 I and r are also wanting in the pure Cree of the 

 plains. Other Algic tribes substitute ?/, ?i, or I for 

 the Cree th, and instead of k, the inhabitants of 

 East Maine use the sound of tch. The Chippeway 

 is distinguished from the Cree by the frequent 

 omission of s before k and t, and the insertion of m 

 before b, and of n before d and g. The permu- 

 tations of the Cree and its cognate dialects chiefly 

 affect the Unguals ; but the Mohawk and Huron 

 languages have none of the labials, neither b, p, /, 

 v, nor m. When conversing, the teeth of these 

 people are always visible ; the auxiliary office 

 usually performed by the lips being by them trans- 

 ferred, or superadded, to that of the tongue and 

 throat.* Of the grammar of the 'Tinne I know 

 little, but the nouns seem to be much more fre- 

 quently monosyllabic than in the Algonkin dialects. 

 The Appendix contains some portions of a Cree 

 vocabulary, which I formed in 1819-20. 



* Mr. Howse, from whose grammar much of this paragraph 

 has been borrowed. 



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