Note 742 — Chapter X
Reading edition
“The Chinook language is spoken by all the nations from the mouth of the Columbia to the Falls. It is hard and difficult to pronounce for strangers, being full of gutturals like the Gaelic. The combinations thl or tl are as frequent in the Chinook as in the Mexican.”—Franchère, Narrative of a Voy. to N. W. Coast of N. Am., p. 262. Swan, speaking of the Chinook, says: “The peculiar clucking sound is produced by pressing the tongue against the roof of the mouth, and pronouncing the word ending with tl as if it were the letter k at the end of the tl; but it is impossible in any form or method of spelling that I know of, to convey the proper guttural clucking sound. Sometimes they will, as if for amusement, end all their words in tl; and the effect is ludicrous to hear three or four talking at the same time with this singular sound, like so many sitting-hens.”—North West Coast, p. 315.