HO Conjectures re/petting the 



refufe to give cryftals. This excefs may be remedied by 

 throwing a little chalk into the mixture, after being heated, 

 and then filtrating it to feparate the fulphate of lime which 

 has been formed. With a little practice it will be eafy to 

 fix the point at which the fulphuric acid is nearly faturated, 

 in order that the citric acid may not be neutralized alfo. 



XX. Conjeclures refpetling the Origin of the American 

 Nations *. 



WHETHER America, called alfo the Weft Indies 

 and the New World, was known to the antients, is a quef- 

 tion which, after long being an object of refearch, has never 

 yet been decided. The Egyptian priefts, as we are told by 

 Plato, gave an account to Solon, the Athenian legiflator, of 

 a certain ifland called Atlantis, which was fituated at the 

 diftance of a few days fail from Spain beyond the (trait of 

 Gibraltar. This ifland, according to the information given 

 by thefe priefts, was greater than Libya and all Afia, pro- 

 perly fo called, taken together; and fo powerful, that it 

 had reduced under its dominion all Libya as far as the 

 Tufcan fea, till it was at length fwallowed up by a flood and 

 violent earthquake, which continued twenty-four hours. 

 Diodorus Siculus alfo fpeaks of a large ifland to which the 

 Phoenicians were driven while cruizing along the eaftern 

 coaft of the Atlantic. He fays alfo that the Tufcans, who 

 at that time were powerful at fea, were defirous of fending 

 thither a colony, but were prevented by the Carthaginians, 

 •who wifhed to preferve this ifland to themfelves as a place of 

 refuge in cafe of neceflity, and for that reafon endeavoured 

 to conceal it from the whole world. 



Had the large Atlantic ifland been mentioned by no other 

 writer befides Plato, the whole account might have been con- 

 sidered as a fabrication or, an allegory ; but the testimony of 

 Solon, or at leaft of the Egyptian priefts, gives it a certain 

 air of authenticity. ' In regard to Diodorus Siculus, his in- 



* From Neue Nordifcbe Beytrage, by profeflbr Pallas, vol. iii. Re- 

 fpe£ting the author profeflbr Pallas adds the following note : — " I have 

 thought it neceflary to publifh this almoft forgotten and not unimportant 

 eflay of the late profeflbr H. Fifcher, of the Peterfburgh Academy, which 

 was firft made known in the St. Peterfburgh Hijiorical Calendar, becaufe 

 it has been mifapplicd by a writer, who has been guilty of other plagia- 

 rifms from hi* works, without mentioning the real author, to whom he has 

 been indebted for many of the observations he has given out as his own. 

 It is hardly neceflary to fay, that this paper of profeflbr Fifcher, which was 

 firft publifhed in 1771, forms the foundation of Scheerer's work on the 

 Peopling of Amenca, publifhed in the French language. 



formation, 



