Series 03: Joseph Banks - Endeavour journal, 25 August 1768 - 12 July 1771 (vol. 2) - No. 0409
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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