_On the Language of Central America._
In Yucatan the structure and details of the language are sufficiently
known, and so are the ethnological affinities of the tribes who speak
it. This language is the Maya tongue, and its immediate relations are
with the dialects of Guatemala. It is also allied to the Huasteca
spoken so far N. as the Texian frontier, and separated from the other
Maya tongues by dialects of the Totonaca and Mexican. This remarkable
relationship was known to the writers of the Mithridates.
In South America the language begins to be known when we reach the
equator; _e. g._ at Quito the Inca language of the Peruvian begins, and
extends as far south as the frontier of Chili.
So much for the extreme points; between which the whole, intermediate
space is very nearly a _terra incognita_.
In Honduras, according to Colonel Galindo, the Indians are extinct; and
as no specimen of their language has been preserved from the time of
their existence as a people, that state is a blank in philology.
So also are San Salvador, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica; in all of which
there are native Indians, but native Indians who speak Spanish. Whether
this implies the absolute extinction of the native tongue is uncertain:
it is only certain that no specimens of it are known.
The Indian of the Moskito coast _is_ known; and that through
both vocabularies and grammars. It is a remarkably unaffiliated
language--more so than any one that I have ever compared. Still, it has
a few miscellaneous affinities; just enough to save it from absolute
isolation. When we remember that the dialects with which it was
conterminous are lost, this is not remarkable. Probably it represents
a large class, _i. e._ that which comprised the languages of Central
America _not_ allied to the Maya, and the languages of New Grenada.
Between the Moskito country and Quito there are only two vocabularies
in the Mithridates, neither of which extends far beyond the numerals.
One is that of the dialects of Veragua called Darien, and collected
by Wafer; the other the numerals of the famous Muysca language of
the plateau of Santa Fé de Bogota. With these exceptions, the whole
philology of New Grenada is unknown, although the old missionaries
counted the mutually unintelligible tongues by the dozen or score. More
than one modern author--the present writer amongst others--has gone
so far as to state that all the Indian languages of New Grenada are
extinct.
Such is not the case. The following vocabulary, which in any other
part of the world would be a scanty one, is for the parts in question
of more than average value. It is one with which I have been kindly
favoured by Dr. Cullen, and which represents the language of the Cholo
Indians inhabiting part of the Isthmus of Darien, east of the river
Chuquanaqua, which is watered by the river Paya and its branches in and
about lat. 8° 15´ N., and long. 77° 20´ W.:--