VOYAGE TO THE PACIFIC OCEAN. 69 



" with the triumph of superiority; and are pleased 

 " to mark the steps by which we have been raised 

 " from rudeness to elegance; and our reflections on 

 " this subject are accompanied with a conscious pride, 

 " arising, in a great measure, from a tacit comparison 

 " of the infinite disproportion between the feeble 

 " efforts of remote ages, and our present improve- 

 " ments in knowledge. In the mean time, the man- 

 " ners, monuments, customs, practices, and opinions 

 " of antiquity, by forming so strong a contrast with 

 " those of our own times, and by exhibiting human 

 " nature and human inventions in new lights, in un- 

 " expected appearances, and in various forms, are 

 " objects which forcibly strike a feeling imagination. 

 " Nor does this spectacle afford nothing more than a 

 " fruitless gratification to the fancy. It teaches us to 

 " set a just estimation on our own acquisitions, and 

 encourages us to cherish that cultivation which is 

 so closely connected with the existence and the ex- 

 " ercise of every social virtue." We need not here 

 observe, that the manners, monuments, customs, prac- 

 tices, and opinions of the present inhabitants of the 

 Pacific Ocean, or of the West side of North America, 

 form the strongest contrast with those of our own time 

 in enlightened Europe; and that a feeling imagination 

 will probably be more struck with the narration of the 

 ceremonies of a Naiche at Tongataboo, than of a 

 Gothic tournament at London ; with the contempla- 

 tion of the colossuses of Easter Island, than of the 

 mysterious remains of Stonehenge. 



Many singularities respecting what may be called 

 the natural history of the human species, in different 

 climates, will, on the authority of our late navigators, 

 open abundant sources for philosophical discussion. 

 One question of this sort, in particular, which had 

 formerly divided the opinions of the inquisitive, as to 

 the existence, if not of " giants on the earth," at 

 least of a race (inhabiting a district bordering on the 

 north side of the strait of Magalhaens), whose stature 





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