186 A SYNOPSIS OF THE INDIAN TRIBES. [iNTROD. express by ' I am,' and to all those, such as, ' I sleep,' ' sunnusse ' ; ' 1 die,' { .s'/dle ' ; in which the person appears to be the object of the action, rather than an active agent.* But when action is implied in the intransitive verb, the pronoun is put in the nominative case : ' I sing,' ' taloaZ/e; ' ' I came,' ' minU/Zetokok.' If we now turn to the numerous paradigms of the simple conjugations in Zeisberger's Grammar of the Delaware, amongst those anomalies, which compelled him to class the verb into eight conjugations, and many other even in verbs of the same conjugation, we find upon the whole a great uniformity and regularity, and also sufficient evidence that the inflections belong to the pronoun. The initial characteristics of the three per- sons, which precede the root of the verb, are generally pre- served in the indicative mood ; the principal exception being found in the frequent omission of the characteristic of the third person, sometimes accompanied by a change of the termination into u, or eu. The plural termination of the first person eneen, or hena, is derived from that of the possessive pronoun ena, or of the separable una, both allied to the Chippeway termination inan. The plural termination of the third person, wak, or ewo, is likewise derived from that of the separable pronoun wa. But the connexion between the separable pronoun and its termina- tion when united with the verb is lost in the second person plural, which in the last case ends always in himo, or humo. Referring to the tables in the Appendix for details, the follow- ing examples of the present tense of the indicative will be suffi- cient to explain what precedes. To eat. To be happy. To hear. Infinitive. mitzin, wulamulsin, pendamen, /, n'mitzi, n'ulamalsi, n'pendamen, thou, k'mitzi, k'ulamalsi, k'pendamen, he, mitzu, w'ulamalsi, pendamen, we, n'mitzi neen, n'ulamalsi hena, n'pendamen een, ye. k'mitzi himo, k'ulamalsi himo, k'pendam ohumo, they, mitzo wak, w'ulamalso wak, pendamen ewo. But, if we pass to the transitions, we find a multitude of varied terminations, for which it appears extremely difficult to find any general rules. There is however one respecting the initial characteristic, which at once strikes the eye. It has
- The same principle is found in the passive form of Latin deponent
(neuter) verbs.
