200 BUREAU OP AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [bull. 40 



the negative future and imperative constructions lies in such peri- 

 phrastic sentences as : 



Remove (all thought from your mind) that I (inferentially) go 



(i. e., I shall not go) 

 Remove (all thought from your mind) that you might, would 



go (i. e., do not go!) 



The inferential,^ as we have seen above (see § 59), is used primarily 

 to indicate that the action is not directly known tlu-ough personal 

 experience. An excellent example of how such a shade of meaning 

 can be imparted even to a form of the first person singular was given 

 in §70; s'H^-k'we'^xi ulum waiYanda^ they woke me up while i 

 WAS sleeping! 74.5 In the myth from which this sentence is taken,. 

 Coyote is represented as suffering death in the attempt to carry out 

 one of his foolish pranks. Ants, however, sting him back into life; 

 whereupon Coyote, instead of being duly grateful, angrily exclaims 

 as above, assuming, to save his self-esteem, that he has really only 

 been taking an intentional nap. The inferential form walk'anda^ 

 is used in preference to the matter-of-fact aorist wayant'e^da^ i 

 sleeping, because of the implied inference, i wasn't dead, after all, 



else how could they wake me? I WAS REALLY SLEEPING, MUST 



HAVE BEEN SLEEPING. Closcly akin to this primary use of the 

 inferential is its frequent use in rhetorical questions of anger, sur- 

 prise, wonder, and discovery of fact after ignorance of it for some 

 time. Examples from the myths, where the context gives them 

 the necessary psychological setting, are: 



geme'^di (1) f/I* (2) wayauxagwaf (3) yu'Va^ (4) how (1) should 



I (2) be (4) daughter-in-lawed (3) (i. e., how do I come to have 



any daugher-in-law?) 56.10 I didn't know that you, my son, 



were married! 

 gl^ (1) di" (2) Jia'miH'han (3) do^'mVa' (4) did I (1) kill (4) your 



father (3) ? (2) 158.2 

 s'-gwi dl' (1) le'mk.'iauV (2) where (1) have they all gone (2), 



any way? 90.25, 27 says Coyote, looking in vain for help 

 o-f-(l) m^* (2) di' (3) s'amgia'uV (4) Oh! (1) has it gotten to 



be summer (4) already (2) ? (3) says Coyote, after a winter's 



sleep in a tree- trunk 92.9 

 ga (1) di' (2) xefV (3) ga (4) di' (5) gu^xde'l\ (6) gal¥ (7) 



so it is those (1) that did it (3) ? (2) those. (4) that ate (7) 



my wife (6) ? (5) 142.18 



1 «•£- merely marks the Coyote (see footnote, § 2). 



§ 72 



