On some Quadrupeds supposed to be extinct. 359 



the beds of those in Asia change in a wonderful manner. — (See 

 Rennell, p. 255.) 



A skeleton of an elephant or mastodon, for it is not known 

 which, was found in a tomb in Mexico, which had evidently 

 been built on purpose. — (Clavigero^ vol. i., p. 84.) No autho- 

 rity whatever dates the foundation of Mexico earlier than a. d. 

 1324. The Aztecs advanced from Culiacan, when they took 

 possession of the marshes, and founded Mexico : other Aztecs 

 had preceded them who had arrived by land ; but the writer 

 hazarded a theory * that Montezuma's ancestors had, like those 

 of the Natchez and of the Incas, arrived in America by sea 

 with elephants, under Mango Capac ; and he has had the satis- 

 faction to find a confirmation of his conjectures in a decade 

 written by Peter Martyr, the Milanese, (employed by Fer- 

 dinand v.. King of Castile and Arragon, and who died in the 

 year 1526,) addressed to Adrian VI., who had been co-regent 

 of Spain with Cardinal Ximenes. " Montezuma spoke thus 

 to Cortez : — ^We have heard by our ancestors that we are 

 strangers. A certain great prince, in ships, before the memory 

 of all men living, brought our ancestors unto these coasts; 

 whether voluntarily or driven by tempest it is not manifest ; 

 who, leaving his companions, departed into his country, and, 

 at length returning, would have had them to have gone back 

 again. But they had built houses, and joining themselves 

 with the women of the country had begotten children, and 

 had settled. Wherefore our ancestors, having chosen a senate 

 and princes to govern the people, refused to go, and he de- 

 parted with threatening speeches. Never any appeared unto 

 this time who denied the right of that captain and commander. 

 We think, therefore, that the king who sent you derived his 

 descent from him, and all the kingdoms which we possess are 

 yours f." It is impossible to know clearly what the allusions 

 to the return of the great commander may mean, but whatever 

 it be, it does not change the date. As the Mexicans con- 

 sidered Cortez to be a child of the sun, the great prince must 

 have been a descendant from Genghis Khan ; and thence the 



* Conquest of Mexico and Peru, p. 288-301. 

 t Hakluyt, vol. iv., p. 558; and Conquest of Peru and Mexico, 

 ch. vii. 



