OF THE HUMAN FAMILY. 221 



unknown among them, the father's sister being a mother. This is also the case 

 among some other nations. Secondly. My father's brother and my mother's sister 

 are my " little father," and my " little mother," to distinguish them from my own 

 father and mother. This form is restricted to the eastern Algonkins, and is not 

 universal among them. It seems probable that it was engrafted at a later period, 

 upon the common system under influences similar to those which led them as well 

 as the Great Lake nations to substitute the step-relationships in place of the full 

 or primary. Thirdly and lastly, the children of a brother and sister are step- 

 brothers and step-sisters to each other, instead of being placed in some more remote 

 relationship, than that between the children of two or more brothers, and two or 

 more sisters, as required by the principles of the system. This is a very great 

 deviation from uniformity, and is the fourth and last form in which it is found. It 

 is also a retrograde movement, since it invades the spirit if not the substance of 

 the system. How to explain this divergence is not readily seen. When placed 

 in the same relationships as the children of brothers and the children of sisters the 

 effect of the classification in the last two cases is weakened. It seems probable 

 that previously to the introduction of the step-relationships that the children of 

 brothers were brothers and sisters to each other, and that the children of sisters 

 were the same, whilst the children of a brother and sister were either uncle and 

 nephew, mother and daughter, as among the Shawnees, or son and father, daughter 

 and mother, as among the Creeks ; and that the change was a modern refine- 

 ment to distinguish each and all of them from own brothers and sisters. By the 

 use of the step-relationships a singular incongruity was removed from the system, 

 although the manner of its removal introduced even a greater blemish. In any 

 view that may be taken of the Delaware system, it is in this one respect a deterio- 

 rated form. 



A sufficient number of the radical characteristics of the common system are 

 found in the Delaware to establish its identity with that of the other Algonkin 

 nations, and to sustain their right of admission with all the nations previously 

 named, into the Ganowanian family. These deviations are much less surprising than 

 that a system so complicated should have maintained itself through so many ages, 

 and amongst so many widely separated nations, and still be found coincident in so 

 many of its minute details. 



2. Munsees. The Munsee dialect affiliates closely with the Delaware. The two 

 are probably immediate subdivisions of the same people. A few of the Munsees 

 are now in Kansas, and the remainder in Wisconsin. They number but two hun- 

 dred souls. Their system of relationship is, in the main, nearest to the Delaware. 



First Indicative Feature. My brother's son and daughter, Ego a male, are my 

 son and daughter. With Ego a female, they are the same. The females have 

 neither nephews nor nieces. 



Second. My sister's son and daughter, Ego a male, are my nephew and niece. 

 With Ego a female, they are my son and daughter. 



Third. My father's brother is my little father. 



Fourth. My father's brother's son and daughter are my brother and sister, elder 

 or younger. 



