Jasper Republican, Volume 2, Number 15, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 24 December 1875 — A Nut for Ethnologists to Crack. [ARTICLE]

A Nut for Ethnologists to Crack.

A strange story is told by a Wichita exchange. Andreas Eisinger, a native of Switzerland, and lately of the Sixth United States Cavalry, is now in Wichita, under orders to report to department headquarters at Leavenworth. Mr. Eisinger is a young man of about twenty-two years of age, born in Canton Thurgau, and was educated in the Grison, or Canton Graubunden, which lies in the Tyrolean Alps, on the Austrian frontier. The inhabitants of this canton speak a dialect termed Pomelos by the Germans and Rome-pa-va by the natives. It is said to be the ancien Roman; it may be a corruption of that language. However, whatever it is, Eisinger speaks it readily. In the spring of 1873 he came to the United States, enlisted in the service and was sent to Fort Dodge. In October, 1874, he was with Gen. Miles’ command, which captured a portion of the Cheyenne band of Indians, then on the war-path. One of the parties capturdl consisted of three warriors and a squaw, who, supposing that none of their captors understood their language, conversed freely with one another, laying plans to escape. Eisinger was astonished to hear the aborigines speaking a language familiar to his ears, the Rome-pa-va, or old Roman dialect. He reported this discovery to his commanding officer, who investigated the matter and found it to be as stated by the Swiss boy. He was discharged from the army and appointed interpreter, which position he now holds. The identity of the tongue is not perfect, but analogous to the broken talk of the German-speaking English. It is the same with the Comanche and Arapahoe dialects. If this is not merely a tale for marines, and we have no reason to doubt the honesty or veracity of the young man, the matter is of sufficient moment to engage the attention of some linguistic savant. An identity of the language would indicate an identity of origin.— Denver (Col.) Newt.

The superiority of plug over fine-cut chewing tobacco was illustrated in the case of Mr. Tryon, of Wapping, Conn., the other night. He seized a masked burglar who was operating in his workshop and was stabbed and knocked sense* less by an accomplice, but the knife fortunately struck a plug of tobacco, which prevented its inflicting a mortal wound. —T. D. Perkins narrowly escaped death in the tube-trunk, six feet in diameter, at Mr. Cone’s new works at Housatonic, Mass, He was seventy feet from the entrance when a boy told him that the gates at the head of the flume were raised, and a race for life brought Mr. Perkins out just as the water caught him.—