Mr. Johnston returned me "Walsh's Appeal," which he had read at my request, and expressed himself gratified at the ability with which the subject is handled. Captain Clarke, an industrious reader on local and general subjects, had come in a short time before. Conversation became general and animated. European politics, Greece, Turkey, and Russia, the state of Ireland, radicalism in England, the unhappy variance between the king and queen, Charles Fox, &c., were successively the subjects of remark. We adjourned to Mr. Johnston's.
In the evening I went into my office and wrote to Mr. Calhoun, the Secretary of War, recommending Captain H.'s son William, for the appointment of a cadet in the Military Academy.[28]
[28] The appointment was made.
31st. Devoted the day to the Indian language. It scarcely seems possible that any two languages should be more unlike, or have fewer points of resemblance, than the English and Ojibwa. If an individual from one of the nomadic tribes of farther Asia were suddenly set down in London, he could hardly be more struck with the difference in buildings, dress, manners, and customs, than with the utter discrepance in the sounds of words, and the grammatical structure of sentences. The Ojibwa has this advantage, considered as the material of future improvement; it is entirely homogeneous, and admits of philosophical principles being carried out, with very few, if any, of those exceptions which so disfigure English grammar, and present such appalling obstacles to foreigners in learning the language.
On going to dine at the usual hour, I found company invited, among whom were some gentlemen from Upper Canada. Conversation rolled on smoothly, and embraced a wide range of topics. Some of the dark doings of the North West Company, in their struggle for exclusive power in the Indian country, were mentioned. Nobody appeared to utter a word in malice or ill will. Dark and bright traits of individual character and conduct floated along the stream of conversation, without being ruffled with a breeze. In the evening I attended a party at the quarters of one of the officers in the fort. Dancing was introduced. The evening passed off agreeably till the hour of separation, which was a few minutes before twelve. And thus closed the year eighteen hundred and twenty-two.
CHAPTER XV.
New Year's day among the descendants of the Norman French--Anti-philosophic speculations of Brydone--Schlegel on language--A peculiar native expression evincing delicacy--Graywacke in the basin of Lake Superior--Temperature--Snow shoes--Translation of Gen. i. 3--Historical reminiscences--Morals of visiting--Ojibwa numerals--Harmon's travels--Mackenzie's vocabularies--Criticism--Mungo Park.
January 1st. This is a day of hilarity here, as in New York. Gayety and good humor appear on every countenance. Visiting from house to house is the order. The humblest individual is expected to make his appearance in the routine, and "has his claims allowed." The French custom of salutation prevails. The Indians are not the last to remember the day. To them, it is a season of privileges, although, alas! it is only the privilege to beg. Standing in an official relation to them, I was occupied in receiving their visits from eight o'clock till three. I read, however, at intervals, Dr. Johnson's Lives of Rochester, Roscommon, Otway, Phillips, and Walsh.
2d. Brydone, the traveler, says, on the authority of Recupero, a priest, that in sinking a pit near Iaci in the region of Mount Etna, they pierced through seven distinct formations of lava, with parallel beds of earth interposed between each stratum. He estimates that two thousand years were required to decompose the lava and form it into soil, and consequently that fourteen thousand years were needed for the whole series of formations. A little further on, he however furnishes data, showing to every candid mind on what very vague estimates he had before relied. He says the fertile district of Hybla was suddenly turned to barrenness by an eruption of lava, and soon after restored to fertility by a shower of ashes. The change which he had required two thousand years to produce was here accomplished suddenly, and the whole argument by which he had arrayed himself against the Mosaical chronology overturned. Of such materials is a good deal of modern pseudo-philosophy constructed.
I received, this morning, a number of mineralogical specimens from Mr. Johnston, which had been collected by him at various times in the vicinity. Among them were specimens of copper pyrites in quartz, sulphate of strontian, foliated gypsum, and numerous calcareous petrifactions. He also presented me a fine antler of the Caribo, or American reindeer, a species which is found to inhabit this region. This animal is called Addik by the Ojibwas. Ik is a termination in the Ojibwa denoting some hard substance.
3d. Forster, in his "History of Northern Voyages," mentions some facts which appear to be adverse to Mr. Hayden's theory of a north-western current. The height of islands observed by Fox, in the arctic regions, was found to be greatest on their eastern sides, and they were depressed towards the west. "This observation," he says, "seems to me to prove that, when the sea burst impetuously into Hudson's Bay, and tore away these islands from the main land, it must have come rushing from the east and south-east, and have washed away the earth towards the west--a circumstance which has occasioned their present low position."
4th. I read the review of Schlegel's "Treatise on the Sanscrit Language." How far the languages of America may furnish coincidences in their grammatical forms, is a deeply interesting inquiry. But thus insulated, as I am, without books, the labor of comparison is, indeed, almost hopeless! I must content myself, for the present, with furnishing examples for others.
The Indians still continue their New Year's visits. Fresh parties or families, who come in from the woods, and were not able to come on the day, consider themselves privileged to present their claims. It should not be an object of disappointment to find that the Indians do not, in their ordinary intercourse, evince those striking traits of exalted and disinterested character which we are naturally accustomed to expect from reading books. Books are, after all, but men's holiday opinions. It requires observation on real life to be able to set a true estimate upon things. The instances in which an Indian is enabled to give proofs of a noble or heroic spirit cannot be expected to occur frequently. In all the history of the seaboard tribes there was but one Pocahontas, one Uncas, and one Philip. Whereas, everyday is calling for the exercise of less splendid, but more generally useful virtues. To spare the life of a prisoner, or to relieve a friend from imminent peril, may give applause, and carry a name down to posterity. But it is the constant practice of every day virtues and duties, domestic diligence, and common sense, that renders life comfortable, and society prosperous and happy. How much of this everyday stamina the Indians possess, it would be presumptuous in me, with so short an opportunity of observation, to decide. But I am inclined to the opinion that their defect of character lies here.
Our express for Detroit, via Michilimackinack, set out at three o'clock this morning, carrying some few short of a hundred letters. This, with our actual numbers, is the best commentary on our insulated situation. We divert ourselves by writing, and cling with a death-grasp, as it were, to our friends and correspondents.
5th. Gitche ie nay gow ge ait che gah, "they have put the sand over him" is a common expression among the Indians to indicate that a man is dead and buried. Another mode, delicate and refined in its character, is to suffix the inflection for perfect past tense, bun, to a man's name. Thus Washington e bun would indicate that Washington is no more.
I read the Life of Pope. It is strange that so great a poet should have been so great a lover of wealth; mammon and the muses are not often conjointly worshiped. Pope did not excel in familiar conversation, and few sallies of wit, or pointed observation, are preserved. The following is recorded: "When an objection raised against his inscription for Shakspeare was defended by the authority of Patrick, he replied, 'horresco referens,' that he would allow the publisher of a dictionary to know the meaning of a single word, but not of two words put together."
In the evening I read a number of the