102 
VOCABULARIES OP NORTH AMERICAN LANGUAGES. 
Anderson, who passed from Sonora to California in 1828, found them, as near as he could 
reckon from his notes, about the place we are now encamped in.” Their present position, as 
already mentioned, is in a village on the northern hank of the Gila, a few miles west of that of 
the Pimas, in about west longitude 112°. 
In describing them Colonel Emory says : “ They live in cordial amity with the Pimos, and 
their habits, agriculture, religion, and manufactures are the same. In stature they are taller, 
their noses are more aquiline, and they have a much readier manner of speaking and acting. 
I noticed that most of the interpreters of the Pimos were of this tribe, and also the men we met 
with in the spy-guard.” He hears the same testimony to their honesty that Lieutenant Whip¬ 
ple does to that of their brethren of the Colorado. A very complete and graphic account of 
these interesting people, and their neighbors, the Pimas, their characters, habits, various 
branches of industry, &c., is found in the second volume of Bartlett’s Personal Narrative. 
A comparison of their language with that of the Colorado tribes shows that the early 
accounts, which represent them, then as now, as at deadly feud with the Yumas, yet speaking 
essentially the same language, are correct. The only vocabulary heretofore published is one 
of twenty words communicated by Colonel Emory to Mr. Gallatin, and printed in the second 
volume of the American Ethnological Society’s Transactions. That of Mr. Whipple, which, 
though incomplete, is much more extensive, agrees well with it, as far as the two coincide in 
the choice of words. 
Mojaves (called by themselves A-moc-hd-ve). — Mr. Bartlett says : “At Fort Yuma we heard 
of a tribe called Mohavi, who occupy the country watered by a river of the same name, which 
empties into the Colorado about 150 miles above the fort. They are said to be a fine, athletic 
people, exceedingly warlike, and superior to the other tribes along the river.” This tribe was 
met with by Mr. Whipple on the east of the Colorado, above Bill Williams’s Fork. They are 
described by him as muscular and well-proportioned, tall and erect, with a step as light as a 
deer’s. From the abundance of grain and vegetables with which they supplied the party, they 
appear to be industrious tillers of the soil. The vocabulary, obtained from one of the tribe, is 
the first ever published. In it the vowel i has the sound of ec in the others of this table. 
Diegenos ( Diegeenos , Llegeenos). —These Indians are so called from the chief place near which 
they are found. Mr. Bartlett says they are the same who were known to the first settlers as 
the Comeya tribe; but Mr. Whipple asserts that the tribe of the desert called Como-yei, or Que- 
maya, speak a different language. They are said to occupy the coast for some fifty miles above, 
and about the same distance below San Diego, and to extend about a hundred miles into the 
interior. The effect of their connexion with the Spanish missions seems to have been the reverse 
of improvement. Mr. Bartlett describes some of them as “a filthy-looking set, half-clad, and 
apparently half-starved, who spend ten times as much labor in collecting the roots, seeds, and 
other wretched food they live on, as would be necessary, by cultivating the soil, to produce 
bread, fruits, and meats in abundance.” Yet, says Whipple, “ they possess the greatest reve¬ 
rence for the church of Rome, and, glorying in a Christian’s name, look with disdain upon 
their Indian neighbors of the desert and the Rio Colorado, calling them miserable gentiles. 
According to the statement of their chief, the tribe numbers about 8,800 persons.” 
A vocabulary of their language, furnished by Doctor Coulter, was published in the eleventh 
volume of the Royal Geographical Society’s Journal. That of Lieutenant Whipple, obtained 
from their chief, Tomaso, and which is also very brief, has appeared in the same publica¬ 
tions as the Cuchan. Where the choice of words in the two coincide, which is but rarely, 
they agree tolerably well. As to the numerals, it will be perceived that Mr. Whipple gives 
only the five first. He, however, adds in a note, “According to Tomaso (chief of the Diege¬ 
nos), the Diegeenos have hut five numerals; although others of the tribe hesitatingly gave 
me ten, apparently erroneously taken from the Yumas.” That this suspicion, however, is 
not correct, will appear from the following comparison of the numerals thus obtained with 
those given by Doctor Coulter. See especially numbers Jive and ten. Mr. Whipple had no 
