Notes

588, 24. This word “hduze” means to take or hold one’s own; and is most commonly applied to a man’s taking a wife, or a woman a husband. Here it may mean either that one who starts in a wicked course consorts with others “more wicked than himself,” or that he himself grows in the bad and takes hold of the greater forms of evil—marries himself to the wicked one.

It will be noted from this specimen of Dakota that there are some particles in the language which cannot be represented in a translation. The “do” used at the end of phrases or sentences is only for emphasis and to round up a period. It belongs mainly to the language of young men. “Wo” and “po” are the signs of the imperative.