134 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [bull. 40 



§ S2. Tenses ami Modes 



While the time, reality, and definiteness of the act or condition may 

 be expressed by means of suffixes and variations in the root, the same 

 distinctions of meaning are drawn from the form of the complete verb. 

 Without taking into account the suffixes, the following tense or mode 

 forms exist: present indefinite, imperative, impotential, customary, 

 present definite, and past definite. The first four of these are clearly 

 marked off from the last two, in meaning, by the fact that they do not 

 refer to a single definite act. They difi'er in form, in most cases, in 

 the root and in the sign of the first person singular. 



The name of present indefinite has been chosen to distinguish the 

 present of wider use and of less discrimination as to the time of the 

 action, from the present definite, which affirms a single act as just com- 

 pleted. The former is used of acts in progress but not completed, 

 when such acts consume appreciable time, or of acts desired or intended. 



The real imperative forms, the second person singular and plural, 

 are identical with those of the indefinite present, while the forms of 

 the third person, expressing the wish that some person be compelled 

 to perform the act, are different from those of the indefinite present. 



The impotential deals with future negative acts in a sweeping way, 

 implying that it is impossible that they should take place. Part of 

 this force is given the form by doxolin^ which precedes the verb, mean- 

 ing IT IS NOT. The form of the verb itself in this mode-tense is not 

 different from the present indefinite, except that it often has a longer 

 or stronger form of the root. 



The customary differs from the present indefinite in the presence of 

 an element (consisting of a single vowel, probably -e-) which stands 

 before the signs of person and number, and sometimes in form of the 

 root. Its meaning, as the name implies, is that the act is habitual, or at 

 least several times performed. It is used almost entirely of past acts. 



The definite present and past differ from each other only in the form 

 and length of the root. The past has the longer and stronger form 

 of the root, if it be variable at all. The accent seems to rest on the 

 root in the past, and on the syllable before the root in the present. 

 They refer to individual, completed acts,— the present as just com- 

 pleted; and the past, of more remote time. On the forms of the 

 present definite by means of suffixes, the future, future conditional, 

 and other tenses and modes are built. 



§52 



