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[Page 409]

305.
Some account of New Holland

them from the very winds which in the Islands they exposd themselves to.

[Margin note]  Language
Of their Language I can say very little  our acquaintance with them was of so short a duration that none of us attempted to use a single word of it to them  consequently the list of words I have given could be got no other manner than by signs enquiring of them what in their Language signified such a thing  a method obnoxious to many mistakes  for instance a man holds in his hand a stone & asks the name of the Indian may return him for answer either the real name of a stone one of the properties of it as hardness, roughness, smoothness &c, one of its uses or the name peculiar to some particular species of stone  which name the enquirer immediately sets down as that of a stone  To avoid however as much as Possible this inconvenience Myself & 2 or 3 more got from them as many words as we could & having noted down to each those which we though from circumstances we were not mistaken in we compard our lists  those in which all the lists agreed, or rather were contradicted by none  we thought our selves moraly certain not to be mistaken in  of these my list cheefly

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