Hale,] 1 6 {March 2, 
sonant at the commencement of a word is rare. It perhaps only occurs 
in the combination t¢ (tsh) and in contractions, as ksdibat, nine, for 
kasankat. 
It is doubtful if the sonants b, d and g occur, except as variants of the 
surd consonants p, ¢ énd &; yet in certain words sonants were pretty con- 
stantly used. Thus in the pronouns mifyitowe, mine, yingitowe, thine, 
iijitowe, his, the gy was almost always sounded. 
The J and n were oceasionally interchanged, as in léné and nani, three, 
letci and netqi, tongue. In general, however, the two elements seemed to 
be distinct. The aspirate was somewhat stronger than the English h, 
and frequently assumed the force of the German ch or the Spanish j (rep- 
resented in our alphabet by g). Whether there were really two distinct 
sounds or not, could not be positively ascertained. The same word was 
written at one time with /, and at another with q. 
The nasal % is properly a modification of the preceding vowel, and would 
have been more adequately rendered by a mark above or below the vowel 
itself; but it has seemed desirable to avoid the multiplication of such dia- 
critical marks, This nasal is not to be confounded with the sound of ng 
in ving, Which is a distinct consonantal element, and in the Polynesian 
dialects often commences a word. In the Tutelo this latter sound only 
occurs before a & or hard g, and is then represented by %. It is, in fact, 
in this position, merely the French nasal sound, modified by the palatal 
consonant. The nasal % is also modified by the labials 6 and p, before 
which it assumes the sound of m. Thus the Tutelo word for day, nahambt, 
or (in the construct form) nahdmp, is properly a modification of nahanbé 
or nahanp. In all words in which it occurs, the nasal sound was at times 
very faintly heard, and was occasionally so little audible that it was not 
noted, while at other times an was heard in its place. The word for knife 
was written at different times maséii and masédi; that for sky, maton, matat, 
mantoi, and mantot; that for day, nahambi, nahamp, nahanp, and nahap ; 
that for winter, wané, winéni, and wanéi; that for one, nds and nons, and 
soon, Whether this indistinctness of the nasal sound belongs to the lan- 
guage, or was a peculiarity of the individuals from whom the speech was 
learned, could not be satisfactorily determined. 
The tendency of the language, as has been said, is to terminate every 
word with a vowel sound. When a monosyllable or dissyllable ends with 
a consonant, it is usually in a construct form, and is followed by another 
word grammatically related to it. Thus, Aisépi, axe, hisép miigitowe, my 
axe; monti, a bear, mont nosd, one bear ; tcongo (or tgdnkt), dog, tconk 
episel, good dog ; nahdmbi, day, nahadmp lani, three days. 
The following brief comparative list, extracted from the more extensive 
vocabulary hereafter given, will show the forms which similar words take 
in the allied dialects, Tutelo, Dakota (or Sioux proper) and Hidatsa (or 
Minnetaree) : 
