IN ITS LINGUISTIC AND ETHNOLOGICAL RELATIONS. 



429 



worthy of note. An example will illustrate it ; illi is father, plural iUinaU ; wattinaii is our father, not our fathers, 

 as the form would seem to signify. In other words, singular nouns used with plural pronouns, or construed with 

 several other nouns, take a plural form. I'cfms Johannes mutii vjihuUa, the mother of Peter and John. 



Genders. A peculiarity, which the Arawaek shares with the Iroquois * and other aboriginal languages of the 

 Western continent, is that it only has two genders, and these not the masculine and feminine, as in French, but the 

 masculine and neuter. Man or nothing was the motto of these barbarians. Regarded as am index of their mental 

 and social condition, this is an ominous fact. It hints how utterly destitute they arc of these high, chivalrie feelings, 

 which with us centre around woman. 



The termination of the masculine is a, of the neuter U, and, as I have already observed, a permutation of the 

 semi-vowels I and r takes place, the letter becoming I in the masculine, r in the neuter. A slight difference in many 

 words is noticeable when pronounced by women or hymen. The former would say keratin, to marry .; the latter 

 kerejun. 'Hie gender also appears by more than one of these changes : ipilUn, groat, strong, masculine; ipirrun, 

 feminine and neuter. 



There is no article, either definite or indefinite,, and no- declension of nouns. 



PB0N0UN8. 

 'I'lic demonstrative and possessive personal pronouns are alike in form, and, as in other American languages, are 

 Intimately incorporated with the words with which they are construed. A single letter is the root of each : d I, mine, 

 J thou, thine, Hie, his, t she, her, it, its, w we, our, h you, your, n they, their; to these radical letters the indefinite 

 pronoun UlckiialiM, somebody, is added, and by abbreviation the following forms are obtained, which arc those usually 

 current : 



dakia, daf, *• 



bokkia, bid, ttl0U - 



likia, ]l °- 



turrehai, sh(5 > ' lt 



wakia, wai ; , w0 - 



hukia, hui, y«»- 



nakia, nai,. they. 



Except the third person, singular, they are of both genders. In speaking, the abbreviated form is used, except where 

 lor emphasis the longer is chosen. 



In composition they usually retain their first vowel, but this is entirely a question, of euphony. The methods of 

 their employment with nouns will be seen in the following examples : 

 UisiquaTiU, 



dfissiqua,. 

 bussiqua, 



lUssiqua, 



tussiqua, 

 w&ssiqua, 



hussiqua, 

 nassiqua, 



'iiju, 



da.iju, 



buju, 



a house. 



my house. 



thy house. 



his house. 



her, its house. 

 our house. 



your house, 

 their house. 



mother, 

 my mother, 

 thy mother. 



.: Btudet PMiologiqtm mr qmlquee Lmffuei Sawayts ''■' VAmeriqite, \>. 87 (Montreal, 1806). 

 AMERI. PHILOSO. SOO. — VOL. XIV. — 108- 



