that great caution is necessary in their application, lest exaggerated estimates be formed of the number of these communities.

The general geographical divisions, into which the tribes are separated, in the 'Survey' of Adelung, evince an ignorance of the features of the country, and of the situation of the Indians. The southern tribes, the Creeks, Choctaws, and others, are arranged with the Iroquois; while the Northwestern Indians are connected with those of the Eastern and middle Atlantic coast; the general divisions thus crossing each other.

But the most important errors are found in the names of the tribes, and in the affinities of their dialects. The author has apparently proceeded, with the narrative of every traveller through the Indian country in his hand, and recorded the names as he found them; adjusting their connexion by their residence, by meagre vocabularies, or by the slight notices given of them. The same tribe, by these means, has different names and different associations; and a distinct appellation and peculiar dialect are given to every little local band. It is easy to conceive, that by this process, the number of the American languages may be swelled to twelve hundred and fourteen,' and, in fact, to any other which the pride of discovery may require.*

In the principal division (D,) subdivision (a,) and minor subdivision (4,) the Twightwees, or Miamies, are placed at the head of a family, which is divided into Ouyatonons and Illinois.

But the Miamies and Ouyatonons, properly Weweatanon, and now called Weas, are bands of the same tribe, without any perceptible difference in their dialects. The Illinois tribes are not now, nor were they ever, branches of the Miami family. There is reason to think, that at a remote period, the Miamies were nearly connected with some of these tribes. But it is difficult to ascertain with precision, who were included in the general designation of Illinois Indians. The name was given them at an early day, but it was rather descriptive of the country, which they occupied,

*For that part of Adelung's Survey, relating to the American languages, and referred to in the present remarks, see North American Review, for January, 1822. Vol. xiv. p. 135.

than of any natural association or political confederacy among its inhabitants. The Illinois tribes were sta ed by Char evoix to be the Moingonas, the Peorias, the Tamarorias, the Coaquias, and the Kaskaskias. But Bossu considers the Peorias, as allies only of the Illinois. Adelung includes in the Illinois family the Kaskaskias, the Cahokias, the Piorias, the Kasquias,' (but another name for the Kaskaskias) 'the Mitchigamies, the Piankashaws, the Kikapoos, the Poteouatamies, Pottawatameh, or Pattawottomi, the Outaouas, and the Chaû

nis.'

Now the Kikapoos, written Kickapoos, and the Chaûnis, written Shawanos, Sawanno, Shawnee, an identity of which the author appears wholly ignorant, had already formed his second and third subdivisions, and preceded the Miamies in this general division. But they are here classed as tribes of one of the families of that nation.

The most unpardonable negligence alone could arrange the Kickapoos, the Potawatamies, the Ottawas, and the Shawnese, as members of the Illinois confederacy. Their separate existence, as independent communities, is coeval with our earliest knowledge of the Indians, and they are all well known and important tribes. And what is still worse, the Potawatamies, written Poüteoüatami, are, (in division D. c. 1. d. ee,) placed as a branch of the Algonquin family. The Ouyatanons, already classed with the Miamies, are reintroduced under the name Ojatinon, (ff) as a separate tribe. And the Miamies themselves again make their appearance, under the name Oumami (a a) in a very subordinate situation.

In the subdivision, to which we have last alluded, the Outagamies, (c c) the Malomimis, (d d) and the Sakis, (g g) are classed with the others as affiliated tribes. But they had been before arranged, in the preceding general division, (B. c.) with slight orthographical variations. They are there called Sakies, or Saukis, Ottogamies, and Menomenes, or Folle Avoine.

erroneous.

This association is, in any analysis of the Indian languages, The language of the Menomonies cannot be understood by the Sacs and Foxes, (Saukies and Ottogamies.) Whether the former speak an Algonquin dialect, or a primitive language, is a question not yet settled. But the fact is

certain, that in their intercourse with one another, they are not understood by the adjacent tribes.

In the general division (D. c. 2. &.) the Ottawas, whom we have already seen enumerated as one of the Illinois tribes, under the name Outaonas, are again introduced in the same relation to the Chippewas. The word is here written Ottoways, Ottawas, and Wtawas. This last is the orthography of Mr Heckewelder, and we confess our inability to pronounce it.

The Erigas, or Eries, and the Makontens, properly Mascontens, are enumerated as existing tribes; but they have disappeared for ages, and of the Eries little was ever known, except from the relations of the other Indians.

The Osages and the Pawnees, whose languages are radi-. cally different, are classed together; and the Jowas, Ottoes, Missouries, and Winebagoes, are detached from the Sioux, with whom they are closely connected by dialect, and attached to the Osages.

The Stone Indians, (Assiniboins,) are arranged in one place with the Chippewas, and in another with the Sioux; and the Crees are enumerated as a branch of the Chippewa family, (D. c. 2. §.) and immediately afterwards, (D. c. 3.) under the names Knistenaux, Chinisteneaux, Christeneaux, Clisteno, they form an independent division, composed of four branches.

The Nanticokes, (C. e. 8.) a well known tribe of the Delaware stock, are assigned to the Iroquois, and constitute the eighth member of that family, which occupies a prominent station in division C. But, (in D. c. 1. ε.) four tribes of the Iroquois confederacy, with their orthography slightly changed, are once more introduced; and, strange to tell, as speaking Algonquin dialects.

We have not time to analyse the arrangement of the Sioux family. Those, who are at all acquainted with the subject, will perceive what little confidence is to be placed in this classification, when they learn, that the Mahas are a tribe of the Naudowessies of the Plain,' that the Shians and Shianes, (both being the Cheyennes,) constitute the fifth and sixth divisions, and that the Tetongs and Sussitongs, two of the great families of the Sioux, appear as subordinate branches of the Yankton band.

These are but a part of the errors, which our limited personal knowledge of the different tribes, has enabled us to detect in the Survey of Adelung. But they satisfactorily prove, that with our present materials, we should confine our exertions to the collecting of facts, and not bewilder ourselves in attempts to discover new dialects, or to class those already known.

In the present state of our knowledge, the Wyandot, and its cognate dialects, appear to form a class of primitive languages; the Algonquin or Chippewa, another; the southern languages, a third; the Sioux, a fourth; and the Pawnee, and kindred tribes of that family, a fifth. But we speak with much doubt, and are in fact not unwilling to hazard the conjecture, that future and more extensive inquiries may possibly prove, that all these languages are affiliated, and de-. scended from a common stock. We are certainly destitute at present of any etymological proofs of this fact, but when vocabularies are formed upon a common plan, and their orthographical principles invariably established, and when the effect produced by habits of enunciation more or less guttural, by the frequent use of certain letters and the rejection of others, by the difference of accentuation in strength and in position, by the slowness or rapidity of utterance, and by other causes, shall be fully understood and appreciated, we shall not be surprised, if affinities are discovered in all our Indian languages, for which we have not yet been prepared.

In stature, color, form of the face, high cheek bones, hazel eye, dark hair, thinness of the beard, and in their prevailing personal appearance, there is a strong resemblance among all the Indians; varied, no doubt, by certain physiognomical characteristics among different tribes, more easily perceived than described. In manners, customs, habits, opinions, traditions, religious notions, systems of education, and in their own appellations for one another, they are essentially the same people. The forms of their languages are almost iden- / tical. The same principles of regimen and concord, the same arrangement of words in sentences, the same polysyllabic combinations, and in fact every essential rule, whether anomalous or general, whether it agrees with the transatlantic languages, or differs fromp them, are common to all these, as far as we have been able to examine them. The deductions

from these facts we relinquish to others, contenting ourselves with the conjecture already advanced.

The Wyandots, and the various tribes of the Six Nations, speak dialects having a general affinity; but they require interpreters in their intercourse with one another. The Chippewa, or Algonquin language, is spoken by the Chippewas, Ottawas, Potawatamies, Sacs and Foxes, Shawnese, Kickapoos, Menomonies, Miamies, and Delawares; and these dialects approximate one another in the order of arrangement, the Chippewa being the standard dialect, and the Delaware the most remote. For the three first, no interpreter is required; for the three next, one is convenient, but not necessary; and the three last are too imperfectly understood by any of the others, to enable them to converse without

assistance.

There is no doubt that, at the era of the discovery, a knowledge of the Chippewa, or Algonquin tongue, for they are the same, would have enabled a traveller to communicate with all the Indians, except the Wyandots and their kindred tribes, from the Penobscot to the Chesapeake, and from the Ocean to Lake Superior.

The Trans-Mississippi languages are divided into two great families. At the head of one we may place the Sioux, and of the other the Pawnee. The Sioux language is to the nations west of the Mississippi, what the Chippewa is to those east of it. That river is the boundary between these great families; for the Winebagoes, who live upon the Fox, Ouisconsin, and Rock Rivers, are evidently intruders there. Their hereditary country was in the south west. Perhaps some branches of the Illinois family lived at a remote period upon the Des Moines. But the exceptions to the general statement are too few, to require a specific enumeration. Interpreters are convenient, and in some of these dialects are necessary, for any communication; but we believe unerring traces of the Sioux language will be found in all the dialects, except those of the Pawnee family, extending from the Mississippi to the Indians, who roam through the country at the heads of the Missouri and Arkansas, and occupy the passes of the Rocky Mountains.

If the Sioux be assumed as the parent language, then the affinities of the dialects of that family will be exhibited in the following tabular form.