EATT11AL OF GARCITA. 
293 
derived from one another, sometimes furnish words utterly 
different for the most common and most important things.'* 
But in discussions on mother-tongues ana derivative lan- 
guages, it is not the sounds, the roots only, that are 
decisive ; but rather the interior structure and grammatical 
forms. In the American idioms, which are notwithstanding 
rich, the moon is commonly enough called the sun of night 
or even the sun of leep ; but the moon and snn very rarel 
bear the same name, as among the Macos. I know onl, 
a few examples in the most northerly part of America, 
among the Woccons, the Ojibbeways, the Muskogulges, 
;Uid the Hohawks.f Our missionary asserted that jama , 
1,1 Maco, indicated at the same time the Supreme Being, 
«ud the great orbs of night and day; while many other 
American tongues, for instance the Tamanac, and the 
'-aribbec, have distinct words to denote God, the Moon, 
a ud the Sun. We shall soon see how anxious the mission- 
a £ies of the Orinoco are not to employ, in their translations 
the prayers of the church, the native words which denote 
Divinity, the Creator (Amanmc), the Great Spirit who 
Animates all nature. They choose rather to Indianize the 
Spanish word Dios, converting it, according to the differ- 
ences of pronunciation, and the genius of the different 
dialects, into Dioso, Tiosu, or Diosu. 
. When we again embarked on the Orinoco, we found the 
^ T er free from shoals. After a few hours we passed the 
«iudal of Garcita, the rapids of which are easy of ascent, 
yien the waters are high. To the eastward is seen a small 
yiaiu of mountains called the chain of Cmnadaminari, con- 
isting of gneiss, and not of stratified granite. We were 
I l ' lJc k with a succession of great holes at more than one 
Q U, . l dred and eighty feet above the present level of the 
o/n. 000 ’ T efc notwithstanding, appear to he the effects 
the erosion of the waters. We shall see hereafter, that 
Phenomenon occurs again nearly at the same height, 
a b ] 'u the rocks that border the cataracts of Maypures, 
c fifty leagues to the east, near the mouth of the Bio Jao. 
the great family of the Esthonian (or Tschoutli) languages, and of 
+ * moied <> languages, affords numerous examples of these differences, 
to ^‘Pw-fosathwa in the Shawinese (the idiom of Canada), from nivti, 
Elee P> and kisathwa, the snn. 
