5. That, if the statement of Hervas be correct, the Zapoteca, the
Mazateca, the Chinansteca, and the Mixe are in the same category.
The Tlapaneka according to Humboldt is a peculiar language.--_Ludwig in
voc._
I have done, however, little or nothing, in the way of first hand work
with the languages to the South of Sinaloa and the West of Texas. I
therefore leave them--leave them with a reference to Ludwig's valuable
Bibliotheca Glottica, for a correction of my statement respecting the
non-existence of any Indian forms of speech in New Grenada. The notices
under _v. v._ ANDAQUIES, COCONUCOS, CORREQUAJES, GUAQUES, INGANOS,
will shew that this is far from being the case.
The present paper has gone over so large a portion of North America
that it is a pity not to go over the remainder. The ethnology of the
Canada, and the British possessions akin to Canada contains little
which is neither Eskimo or Algonkin, Iroquois or Athabaskan. Of new
forms of speech like those of which Oregon and California have given
so many instances it exhibits none. Everything belongs to one of the
four above-named classes. The Bethuck of Newfoundland was Algonkin,
and so were the Blackfoot, the Shyenne and Arrapaho. Indeed, as has
been already stated, the Eskimo and Athabaskan stretch across the
Continent. The Blackfoot touches the Rocky Mountains. Of the Sioux
class the British possessions shew a sample. The Red River district is
Assineboin; the Assineboins being Sioux. So are a few other British
tribes.
Upon the whole, however, five well-known families give us all that
belong to British America to the East of the Rocky Mountains. As the
present paper is less upon the Algonkin, Sioux and like classes than
upon the distribution of languages over the different areas of North
America this is as much as need be said upon the subject.
For the Northern two-thirds of the United States, _East of the
Mississippi_, the same rule applies. The Sioux area begins in the
West. The Algonkin class, of which the most Northern branch belongs to
Labrador, where it is conterminous with the Eskimo, and which on the
west contains the Blackfoot reaches as far south as South Carolina--the
Nottoways being Algonkin. The enormous extent of this area has been
sufficiently enlarged on. Meanwhile, like islands in an Ocean, two
Iroquois district shew themselves. To the north the Iroquois, Hurons
and others touch the Lakes and the Canadians frontier, entirely
separated from the Tuscaroras who give a separate and isolated area
in California. Whether the Iroquois area, once continuous, has been
broken-up by Algonkin encroachments, or whether the Iroquois &c. have
been projected into the Algonkin area from the South, or, whether _vice
versa_, the Tuscaroras are to be considered as offsets from the North
is a matter for investigation. The present writer believes that south
of N. L. 45. (there or there about) the Algonkins are intrusive.
N. L. 35. cuts the Cherokee, the Woccoon, the Catawba, and the Chocta
area--to the west of which lies of the Mississippi.
Between the frontier of Texas, the aforesaid parallel, and the Ocean we
have Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana.
Now here the displacement has been considerable. The part played by the
Algonkins, Iroquois, and (it may be added) the Sioux is here played
by the Cherokees, the Choctahs, and the Creeks. Whatever is other than
Creek, Choctah, and Cherokee is in a fragmentary form. The details of
what we know through vocabularies are as follows:--