THE PEOPLING OF AMERICA. 311 



refuted. Adding liis personal researches to those of his prede- 

 cessors, Hale first drew up the map of Polynesian migrations. 

 Twenty years afterward I was able to complete the work of the 

 learned American by the aid of documents collected after the 

 appearance of that, the fundamental study. Now, as has been 

 said by our lamented Gaussin, so competent for all that relates 

 to Oceania, the peopling of Polynesia by migrations starting 

 from the Indian Archipelago is as clearly demonstrated as the 

 invasion of Europe by barbarians in the middle ages. 



Like Polynesia, America was peopled by colonists from the 

 Old World. Their point of departure is to be found and their 

 tracks are to be followed. The labor will indeed be more diffi- 

 cult and longer upon the continent than in Oceania, principally 

 because the migrations were more numerous and go back to a 

 higher antiquity. The first Indonesian pioneers, who, departing 

 from the island of Bouro, landed in the Samoan and Tongan 

 Archipelagoes, probably made the passage toward the end of the 

 fifth century, or near the time of the conversion of Clovis. The 

 peopling of New Zealand by emigrants from the Manaias goes 

 back, at most, to the earlier years of the fifteenth century. Thus, 

 the peopling of Polynesia was all accomplished during our mid- 

 dle ages, while the first migrations to America date from geologi- 

 cal times. 



Two investigators to whom we owe some valuable discoveries, 

 MM. Ameghino and "Whitney, have traced the existence of Ameri- 

 can man back to the Tertiary age. But this opinion, as you know, 

 has been contested by men of equal repute, and I believe that the 

 view of the latter is confirmed by the comparison of the fossil 

 faunas of the pampas, Brazil, and the Calif ornian gravels. Hence, 

 judging by the little that we know, man reached Lombardy and 

 the Cantal when he had not yet penetrated to America. It is 

 undoubtedly necessary at this point to make the most formal re- 

 serves with reference to the future ; but, if the fact is confirmed, 

 it seems to me to admit of easy explanation. Everything leads 

 me to think that America and Asia were separated previous to 

 the Quaternary age as they are now. Had it been otherwise, the 

 species of mammalia common to the north of both continents 

 would surely have been more numerous. The men and the land 

 animals of the shores of Bering's Sea would have been stopped 

 there. But when the great geological winter rapidly brought in 

 a polar temperature in place of a mild climate like that of our 

 California, the ancient Tertiary tribes were forced to migrate in 

 every direction. A certain number of them embarked upon the 

 bridge of ice which the cold had cast between the two shores, and 

 arrived in America with the reindeer, as their Western congeners 

 arrived in France with the same animal. 



