S26 
ARRIVAL AT SAX FERNANDO. 
by thick forests. ¥e passed the mouths of the Ucata, the 
Arapa, and the Caranaveni. About four in the afternoon 
we landed at tho Conucos de Siquita, the Indian plantations 
of the mission of San Fernando. The good people wished 
to detain us among them, but we continued to go up against 
the current, which ran at the rate of five feet a second, 
according to a measurement I made by observing the time 
that a floating body took to go down a given distance. We 
entered the mouth of the Guaviare on a dark night, passed 
the point where the Eio Atabapo joins tbe Guaviare, and 
arrived at the mission after midnight. We were lodged as 
usual at the Convent, that is, in the house of the missionary, 
who, though much surprised at our unexpected visit, never- 
theless received us with tbe kindest hospitality. 
NOTE. 
If, in the philosophical study of the structure of languages, the analogy 
of a few roots acquires value only when they can be geographically con- 
nected together, neither is the want of resemblance in roots any very 
strong proof against the common origin of nations. In the different 
dialects of the Totonac language (that of one of the most ancient tribes of 
Mexico) the sun and the moon have names which custom has rendered 
entirely different. This difference is found among the Caribs between the 
language of men and women ; a phenomenon that probably arises from 
the circumstance that, among prisoners, men were oftener put to death 
than women. Females introduced by degrees words of a foreign language 
into the Caribbee; and, as the girls followed the occupations of the 
women much more than the boys, a language was formed peculiar to the 
women. I shall record in this note the names of the sun and moon in a 
great number of American and Asiatic idioms, again reminding the reader 
of the uncertainty of all judgments founded merely on the comparison <’* 
solitary words. 
IN THE NEW WORLD. 
Sun. 
Moon. 
Eastern Esquimaux 
Ajut, kaumat, saka- 
Anningat, kaumei. 
(Greenland) 
nach 
tatcok 
Western Esquimaux 
Tschingugak, mad- 
Igaluk, tangeik 
(Kadjak) 
schak 
