xx buekau of american ethnology 



Work in Philology 



Toward tlie end of the fiscal year the Director made progress 

 in systematizing the rich linguistic collections in the archives 

 of the Bureau, with a view to formulating plans for further 

 research concerning the aboriginal tongues of America; the 

 results are to be made ready for another pai't of this report. 



Mr J. N. B. Hewitt continued the collection of Iroquoiau 

 material, both linguistic and mythologic, and made satisfac- 

 tory progress in preparing it for publication. His studies 

 illustrate the importance of combining inquiries concerning 

 primitive myths with linguistic inquiries. Thus, certain puz- 

 zling inflections introduced in various terms eluded the best 

 efforts toward analysis throughout the earlier portion of the 

 year; but, on studying the creation myths with the aid of 

 native informants in the course of his field ojjerations, he ascer- 

 tained that these obscure inflections connote a characteristically 

 primitive notion concerning individual activity or power; for 

 example, the shaman is supposed to work mag'ic Ijy the sound 

 of his rattle or drum, and the witch to work her evil charms 

 by the action of singing, both acquiring their mystical powers 

 only by and through the supposedly mystical exercise of func- 

 tion in producing the sound, and it is the purpose of some of 

 the obscure linguistic inflections to denote the mystical states 

 recognized in the mythology. It is well known that the 

 aboriginal languages possess inflections for normal states, such 

 as sitting, standing, reclining, and moving; l)ut the recent 

 researches show that there are inflections also for mystical 

 states, and that some of these quite significantly correspond 

 with the inflections for singing or dancing. A preliminary 

 announcement of results has been made, and formal publica- 

 tion will follow so soon as the inquiry can be considered 

 complete 



Dr Albert S. Gatschet continued the preparation of the com- 

 parative vocabulary of the Algonquian stock, and at the same 

 time, according to custom, compiled linguistic mateiialfor use 

 in reply to numerous inquiries from correspondents for abo- 

 riginal terms to be applied to parks, vessels, villages, etc., and 



