LANGUAGES OF THE AMERICAN INDIANS 5^3 



show, furthermore, that person in the verb is expressed by prefixes, in- 

 stead of by independent words, as in English, or by endings, as in 

 Latin ; and that tense is denoted by sufRxes, as in most other languages. 

 In other words, we have derived from these examples a partial idea of 

 that most difficult element in all grammars, the conjugation of the verb. 



It is, however, not always as plain sailing as this. The average 

 Indian, even if he has been an official interpreter, has been accustomed 

 to give only the gist or substance of what he has to translate. He has 

 never been troubled with the finer distinctions of tense, mode, number 

 and case, some of which are quite abstract. He is very apt to slur these 

 distinctions over, and to give an approximate instead of an exact trans- 

 lation; so that it is usually necessary to obtain a great number of ex- 

 amples, and patiently compare them, before any positive deductions 

 can be made with safety. In many tribes even the best interpreter's 

 power of expressing himself accurately in English is quite limited, even 

 though he may understand an ordinary conversation perfectly well. 

 If his own language makes no distinction between singular and plural, 

 as not infrequently happens, he uses the English plural and singular 

 indiscriminately. Many Indian languages lack gender and express 

 " he " and " she " by the same pronoun. Most Indians, unless they 

 have gone to school for some time, fail to observe this distinction, and 

 even the school graduate in his unguarded moments is apt to relapse 

 into the habit of calling a woman " he." When " he," " she," " him," 

 "her," "it," "they" and "them" are all expressed by the one gen- 

 eral pronoun " him," the investigator has met a serious difficulty. 



His only recourse in such an event is to desist from the attempt 

 to obtain exact translations of individual phrases or detached sentences, 

 and to write down from dictation narratives or other continuous texts, 

 of some length, subsequently getting these translated as nearly as may 

 be word for word. Even if the translations are inaccurate in detail, 

 they will be enough to give the drift of the story. Then, by knowing 

 the context, the student is often able to correct the faulty expression of 

 his interpreter. By the context he will know whether the pronoun 

 refers to a man or a woman, to one person or several, and whether it is 

 in the subjective or objective case. A single narrative or description 

 may be of but little aid, but when a considerable series has been ob- 

 tained, and has been carefully analyzed, he has in hand sufficient ma- 

 terial to determine almost any point, provided he gives it proper time 

 and consideration. It is for this reason that the collecting of texts in 

 Indian languages has been carried on to so great an extent of recent 

 years, and is justly looked upon as a basis of all analysis of Indian lan- 

 guages that pretends to any thoroughness or completeness. 



vor.Lxxviii.— 35 



