214 



and is constant in the words, or if it is merely in an embryo 

 state. The present Labrador and Greenhmdic dialects do not 

 seem to have adopted it to so great an extent as the Itaffin 

 dialect. The same usage appears to be especially prevalent in 

 the northwestern corner of Greenland (Smith Sound). — The 

 first feature {dj, tj) binds the Baffin language to the Labrador 

 language and separates it from the Greenlandic language *). 

 Other diff"erences: 

 [w — g] Bf. oqautiva — Gr. oqauti^a- he tells it (to him), meu- 



tions it 

 [t — /] » ingertune — » i^ii'erkune he singing 



» majoartune — • » majuarkune he coming (going) up 

 \q' — **^| » niaqong — » marXuk two 



Still more dialectal differences would perhaps be detected 

 on closer acquaintance with the Baffin dialect. But all in all 

 the difference between the two languages on the opposite sides 

 of the water does not seem to be much greater than tlie 

 differences between several of the dialects within the coasts of 

 Greenland itself. 



With respect to the language in the northern part of 

 Baffin Land , and around the Gulf of Boothia , Fox Basin, 

 Hudson Bay**) or the sounds around King William Island, in 



*) A Greenlandic school-master who had an opportunity in 1.S89 to talk 

 ■with some Eskimo from Baffin Land, who had come over to Greenland 

 ■with an English ship (Perseverance), writes thus about their language 

 in the Greenlandic periodical: "When I heard them speak. 1 did not 

 understand a single word at first; I could hear that they spoke with a 

 high voice and it sounded well; one of them said something to me, 

 but what I did not understand of it was more than what I understood. 

 Since they stayed here long, I gradually became accustomed to their 

 language and began to be able to speak with them about various sub- 

 jects. The reason why one cannot understand them at first is that they 

 pronounce s almost like j and do not make it distinct." Atuagagdiiutit 

 1890, No. 1, p. 2—3. 

 "*) W. H. Dall's specimens of the language of two Eskimos from Repulse 

 Bay, whom Capt. Hall had brought with him to Washington 1869, are 

 too uncritical to be of anv value here. 



