18th.  It has been said that the Indian languages possess no monosyllables.  This remark is not borne out with regard to the Chippewa.  Marked as it is with polysyllables, there are a considerable number of exceptions. Koan is snow, ais a shell, mong a loon, kaug a porcupine, &c.  The number of dissyllables is numerous, and of trisyllables still more so.  The Chippewa has no auxiliary verbs.  The Chippewa primitive pronouns are, Neen, Keen, and Ween (I, Thou, He or She).  They are rendered plural in wind and wau.  They are also declined for tense, and thus, in the conjugation of verbs, take the place of our auxiliary verbs.

19th.  Resumed the perusal of Holmes on “Revelations.”  He establishes a dictionary of symbols, which are universally interpreted.  In this system, a day signifies a natural year; a week seven years; a month thirty years; a year a period of 360 years.  The air means “church and state;” waters, “peoples, multitudes, tongues;” seven, the number of perfection; twelve, totality or all; hail storms, armies of northern invaders.  If the work were divested of its controversial character, it would produce more effect.  Agreeably to this author, the downfall of Popery will take place about the year 1866.

20th.  I read “Esprella’s Letters on England,” a work attributed to Southey, whose object appears to have been to render English manners and customs familiar in Spain, at a time when the intercourse between the two countries had very much augmented, and their sympathies were drawn together by the common struggle against Napoleon Bonaparte.

21st.  I commenced “Valerius, a Roman Story.”  In the evening the commanding officer (Col.  L.) gave a party, in honor of Washington’s birthday.  That the time might not be wholly anticipated, dancing was introduced to give it wings, and continued until two o’clock of the morning of (the actual birthday) the twenty-second.

22d.  Finished “Valerius.”  This is an interesting novel on the Waverley plan, and must certainly be considered a successful attempt to familiarize the class of novel-readers with Roman history and Roman domestic manners.  The story turns on the persecution of the Christians under Trajan.  The expression “of a truth,” which is so abundantly used in the narrative, is a Scripture phrase, and is very properly put into the mouth of a converted Roman.  I cannot say as much for the word “alongst” used for along.  There are also some false epithets, as “drop,” for run or flow, and “guesses” for conjectures.  The only defect in the plot, which occurs to me, is, that Valerius, after his escape with Athanasia from Ostium, should have been landed safely in Britain, and thus completed the happiness of a disconsolate and affectionate mother, whom he left there, and who is never afterwards mentioned.