145 



of the Pareni Indians *, whom I think I have 

 heard from the natives, lived originally on the 

 banks of the Mataveni-f-. The Abbe Gili con- 

 siders the Pareni as a simple dialect of the May- 

 pure. This question cannot be solved by a com- 

 parison of the roots merely. Being totally igno- 

 rant of the grammatical structure of the Pareni, 

 I can raise but feeble doubts against the opinion 

 of the Italian missionary. The Pareni is perhaps 

 a mixture of two tongues, that belong to differ- 

 ent families ; like the Maquiritari, which is com- 

 posed of the Maypure and the Caribbee ; or, 

 to cite an example better known, the modern 

 Persian, which is allied at the same time to the 

 Sanscrit and to the Semitic tongues. The fol- 

 lowing are Pareni words, which I carefully com- 

 pared with Maypure words ^. 



* Or Parenas, who must not be confounded either with the 

 Paravenes of the Rio Caura (Caulin, p. 68), or with thePare- 

 cas,, whose language belongs to the great family of the Ta- 

 manack tongues. A young Indian of Maypures, who called 

 himself a Paragini, answered my questions, almost in the 

 same words that Mr. Bonpland heard from a Pareni, and 

 which I have given in the text. I have thought it necessary 

 to indicate the differences in the table, p. 147. 



t To the south of the Rio Zama. We slept in the open 

 air near the mouth of the Mataveni on the 28th of May, in 

 our return from the Rio Negro. 



X The words of the Maypure language have been taken 

 from the works of Gili and Hervas. I collected the words 

 placed between two parentheses from a young Maco Indian, 

 who understood the Maypure language. 

 VOL. V. L 



