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Show 62 INTRODUCTION TO THE STUDY OF INDIAN LANGUAGES. I can find no less objectionable form of expression, though this conveys only half the truth. Strictly regarded, the Indian noun is not separable, as apart of speech, from the verb. Every name is not merely descriptive but predicative- hot as in Indo- European languages by implication or suggestion, or by reason of remote derivation from a predicative root, but it retains the verb form unchanged; is varied by conjugation, not by declension; has tenses, not cases; may become active, passive, reciprocal, frequentative, like other verbs. In short, every Indian name is in fact a verb- is formed as a participial immediately from a verb, or contains within itself a verb. Without pursuing this branch of the subject further at present or multiplying examples, I repeat that, in view of the fundamental differences in grammatical structure and in plan of thought between the American and the Indo- European languages, it is nearly impossible to find an Indian name or verb which admits of exact translation by an English name or verb. But the standard vocabularies which have been most largely used in the collection and exhibition of materials are framed on the hypothesis that such translation is generally possible. They assume that equivalents of English generic names may be found among Indian specific and individual names; that English analysis may be adequately represented, word for word, by Indian synthesis. Such vocabularies, as has been remarked, have their uses, but to linguistic science or to comparative philology they contribute nothing which is worth the cost of obtaining. When a collector or an editor has acquired a thorough knowledge of the grammatical structure of a language and has learned how to resolve synthesis by analysis, he may undertake the arrangement of his materials in the form of a vocabulary with some probability of imparting to the result real and permanent value. Without such preparation for his work- no matter how cautiously or with what ability he prosecutes it- he must not hope for great success. It is easier to discover the defects in the old method than to point out a new and a better one. The details of such a method could not be discussed without exceeding the limits of this paper, nor is such discussion called for. The way to a more thorough and exact knowledge of the Indian languages is not unknown or untried. There are laborers already in the field who have not only proved that higher results than the compilation of brief vocabularies are attainable, but have shown how to attain them; and for the study of a considerable number of languages and dialects of the North, the South, the valleys of the Mississippi and Missouri, and the far West, scholars are no longer restricted in materials to quasi translations of lists of untranslatable English words. The suggestions I shall offer have to some extent been anticipated by the drift of the foregoing remarks. The first is- That a constant aim of the student of any of the American languages should be tlie resolution of synthesis by analysis. What the Indian has so skillfully put together- " agglutinated" or " incorporated"- must be carefully taken to pieces, and the materials of the structure be examined separately. Every Indian cluster- word is a sentence- a description, definition, or affirmation. Mere translation will not exhibit its construction or afford a trustworthy basis of comparison with word- groups in other languages. Something is gained, it is true, by exact translation; but this cannot be had if the translation must be shaped to the requirements of an English vocabulary. A single chapter of the Bible or a dozen sentences of familiar conversation accurately translated into |