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333 



Mr, PicJceringonthe Orthography of the 



The first fruits of these inquiries ia the Uaited States havi 

 been the able and philosophical investigations of Mr. Du Ponceau 



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guages ; several specimens of which were accordingly furnished. But what %vill 

 most surprise the reader will be, to learn that the Empress herself actually began 

 the labour of this comparison of languages. In a letter to the celebrated Zim- 

 merman, dated Maj 9, irSJ, she sajs— « Your letter drew me from the retire- 

 ment in which I had kept myself for almost nine months, and which it was diffi- 

 cult for me to relinquish. You will hardly suspect what I was employed about 

 in my solitude. I made a list of between two and three hundred radical word^ 

 of the Russian language, and had them tj-auslated into every tongue and jargon 

 that f could hear of j the number of which already exceeds two hundred. Every 

 day I took one of these words and wrote it down in all the languages i had been 

 able to collect I grew tired of this hobby, as soon as the book upon Soli- 

 read through. But as I felt some regret at committing to the flames 



tude 



was 



my great mass of papers, and the long hall, which I occupied in ray hermitage, 

 was quite warm enough, I requested Professor Pallas to attend me, and after a 

 full confession of this sin of mine, it was agreed between us that these transla- 

 tions should be printed, and thus made of some use to those person^ who migiit be 

 willing to occupy themselves with the idle labours of others. We are now (.nly 



waiting, with that view,/or some specimens of the dialects of Eastern Siberia. 

 Whether the reader shall or shall not fxnd in the work, striking facts of various 

 kinds, will depend upon the feelings with which he enters upon the subject, and 

 is a matter of little concern to me,"— p. 40. Professor Pallas accordingly in- 

 formed the public of Her Majesty's intentions j stating (among other things) 

 that '^ she had herself made a selection of such woids a? were the most essential, 

 and generally in use even among the best civilized nations In that selec- 

 tion the preference was given to substantives and adjectives of the first necessity, 



the most barbarous of languages, or which serve to 

 trace the progress of agriculture or of any a. fs or elementary knowledge from one 

 people to another. The pronouns, adverbs, and some verbs and numerals, whose 

 great utility in the comparison of languages is acknowledged, wtre also admitted 



into the collection, m order to render this Glossary more complete and more in- 

 structive." 



and 



common to 



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