(TABLE OF EXAMPLES TO ILLUSTRATE THIS DIFFERENCE OF DIALECTS.)

From these examples it will be seen that the King George’s Sound dialect is the simplest of the two; and indeed I am inclined to believe that the dialect there spoken is more simple than that in use at any other portion of the continent.

If we now proceed to Adelaide in South Australia we still find the same language spoken, but the dialect here is considerably softened; the hard g of Perth is exchanged for k, and b becomes p and w.  Many of the nouns take -anga as a termination, and the verbs take -andi and -endi.  This addition of soft terminations and a general sweetness of sound appear to be the peculiar characteristics of the Adelaide dialect.  No large vocabulary of this language has yet been published, but one-eighth of the words known as belonging to the Perth dialect have been found also in that of Adelaide; we may therefore fairly conclude that when the latter language is better known a still greater degree of identity will be found to exist.

Natives from several parts of the Murray and Murrumbidgee and from Port Phillip have been brought into communication with natives from King George’s Sound, scanty vocabularies from some of these points are also extant, and the amount of evidence thus gained clearly establishes that the several dialects are all derived from a common root.

The labours of Mr. Threlkeld in the vicinity of Hunter’s River and Lake Macquarie enable us to compare the language of that portion of Australia with those of the other points which we have just considered, and the result of this comparison also shows that the languages are radically the same.

TABLES OF EXAMPLES.

The following Tables will give a sufficient number of words common to those four dialects to show the degree of similarity which exists among them.

(TABLE OF SUBSTANTIVES.

TABLE OF VERBS.)

VARIATIONS OF DIALECT.

Now before proceeding farther and thus entering upon ground which is very little known, there are several important circumstances worthy of consideration.  In the vast extent of country which is comprised between the points embraced in these tables it was to have been expected that very great variations of dialect would have been found.  If we only reflect upon the differences of dialect existing between the several counties of England, so limited in extent, how much greater were the variations to have been reasonably anticipated in a country between two and three thousand miles across, where an unwritten language is in use, and where no communication whatever takes place between the inhabitants of distant portions:  moreover in this great extent the vegetation becomes totally different; birds, reptiles, and quadrupeds inhabit one portion of the continent which are unknown in another, and external nature altogether changes.