Gleanings from Samuel Parker's "Journal of an Exploring Tour"

[David Robertson]

Howdy,

As well as presenting neat lists of vocabulary items from Klickitat,
Kalapuya, and Chinook Jargon, Sam'l. Parker has these scattered about in
his text:

p. 136	"This place is ten miles above the falls of the Columbia, which
	the Indians call the tum tum; the same expression they use for the
	beating of the heart."
139	"Nor does the Indian tradition, that the Great Wolf made this,
	together with all the scenery that delighted my eye as I passed
	down the river, relieve the mind of its irrepressible curiosity."
	[ref. Coyote, wigna?]
150	"In the afternoon, I went on shore for exercise, taking with me a
	kanaka, that is, a Sandwich Islander, for assistance in any
	danger."
153	"Then he added, "well, Tie*, I suppose we shall not see each other
	again, can you see me go away without a clean blanket, which would
	make me a full dress.  [footnote:]  *Chief, or gentleman."
159	"...on account of sudden changes of weather, which are common at
	this season of the year, I did not think best to cross the wide
	bay, but took four Chenook Indians, and a half breed named Thos.
	Pish Kiplin, who could speak English, and went in a large canoe
	down to Clatsop and Point Adams, nine miles from the fort."
166	"...all hastened to kindle a fire in a thatched building, which
	was constructed by some Kanakas for the accomodation of the May
	Dacre."
171	"The name Multnomah, is given to a small section of this river ...
	to the branch which flows down the southern side of the Wa^ppatoo
	Island."
198	"[The Indians] have some words in common with Latin, Greek, and
	Hebrew, but these are used in an entirely different sense from
	that in which they are used in those languages.  As far as it
	respects language, the proof of a Jewish, or even of a common
	origin, is not only doubtful but highly improbable."
214	"...the superintendent of Fort Vancouver told me, that when the
	company abandoned their business, they stored many barrels of rum
	at his fort.  My information was not wholly derived from those who
	had been in the employment of that company, and gentlemen of the
	Hudson Bay Company, but in part from the Indians, who often spoke
	to me upon this subject by way of praise.  They would say, 'close,
	hias lum,' signifying, good, plenty of rum."
221	"The wa^ppatoo, is the common sagittaria, or arrow head, and is
	found only [sic] in the valley of the Columbia below the
	Cascades."
273	"As soon as we were encamped, the Indians, who are here in great
	numbers preparing for fishing, came around us and their first
	enquiry was for pi pi, (tobacco.)"  [What is the origin of this
	word?]
274	"[Above the Dalles] I rambled into a little village in the
	neighborhood, and called at a lodge, whose inmates consisted of
	an aged woman, a younger one, and four little girls.  I addressed
	them in the Chenook [sic] language, but they did not understand
	me.  Being tolerably familiar with the language of signs, I
	enquired whose were those children.  The younger woman signified
	that three of them were hers, but the eldest was an orphan, whom
	she had adopted for her own; and in the most pathetic manner she
	proceeded to relate her history, but little of which was intelli-
	gible [this being spoken in Old Chinook, perhaps]."
291	"[At the Spokane River]...two women came to the river, and with
	uncommonly pleasant voices, together with the language of signs,
	the latter of which only I could understand, informed us that the
	ferryman was gone upon a short hunt, would return in the evening,
	and the next morning at sun two hours high, he would come and
	take us over."

Parker also adjudges Ross Cox' accounts of wilderness perils in the
Spokane neighborhood to contain far more fiction than truth.

Dave




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