2 INTRODUCTION TO I'lll-: DICTIONARY. 



But aside from these minor discrepancies of spocch, it would bo wrong 

 to suppose that the language of the Klamath Lake Indians, or that of the 

 Modoc Indians is entirely homogeneous witliin itself Every class or cluster, 

 band or settlement of Indians has a lew terms peculiar to itself, or some 

 words used in other acceptations than observed among its neighbors ; one 

 band may use a derivative of some radix or base in a certain sense, and 

 the nearest settlement may use another derivative of the same origin in- 

 stead, or pronounce i+ in a different manner. Should, therefore, a traveler 

 ])assing through the uplands bordering the lakes of the Klamath River 

 basin not be able to identify at once some of the words given below, 

 tliis would by no means prove that such words do or did not exist in the 

 language. Besides the terms extracted from the foi'egoing Texts, there is 

 })erhaps not a single word in this voluminous Dictionary that has not been 

 repeatedly verified through Indian informants, and what could not stand 

 this test has been scrupulously eliminated. 



Narratives and other texts, correctly worded, yield the most important 

 con'ributions to a word-collector, and are in every way preferable to the 

 gathering of disconnected terms from an unknown language. I have there- 

 fore availed myself fully of the lexical treasures stored iip in the historic, 

 ethnologic and poetic specimens obtained from the natives ; but, since their 

 interlinear translation cannot, in the narrow space allotted, give in every 

 instance the full import of a term or phrase, a thorough understanding of 

 my Klamath Texts, especially of the songs, implies the unremitting use of 

 the Dictionary. To illustrate clearly and thoroughly the special functions 

 of words, passages from the Texts contained in Part First of this work 

 are adduced as evidence, with their quotation numbers giving the page 

 and line where they occur. Quotation figures separated by commas refer 

 to tho Texts in prose ; figures separated by semicolons, to the Poetic Texts. 

 The Notes explaining portions of the Texts will, in many instances, supple- 

 ment the definitions of the words as given in the Dictionary. 



Before tracing the plan followed in composing this Dictionary, a re- 

 mark of a more general import may be inserted to illustrate the phonetic 

 character of the language. 



The fact that languages of rude and primitive tribes are built up 



