A Brief Cfuipter on Sacrificial 3founds. 71 



distinguish the ancient people of ]\Iexico and Central America, not- 

 "witlistunding the minor differences which belong to a separate develop- 

 ment in arts springing from a common source. 



In conclusion, we may say, that while the problem of ancient Amer- 

 ican civilization is yet without solution, there is reason to hope that 

 the growing interest in the subject may develop results commensurate 

 with its importance. The question : Who were the Mound-Builders? is 

 yet unanswered. There is abundant internal evidence in their remains 

 that they were closely identified with races inhabiting the tropical re- 

 gions of America, and, perhaps, for considering their settlements in 

 the great basins of the Mississi])pi and Ohio as colonies emanating 

 from Mexico at a very ancient period. But whether the ancient 

 Mexicans and kindred nations are to be regarded in the light of in- 

 digenous races, or as immigrants from Asiatic countries, is a question 

 difhcult of solution. Wliiie Baron Humboldt, whose researches entitle 

 his conclusions to great weight, regards the Tolcecs, and the other more 

 ancient tribes whose names are preserved in Central American tradi- 

 tion, as northern iuviiders of the vale of Anahuac, Mr. Squier, whose 

 opportunities were perhaps equally good, believes they emanated from 

 regions still further south. Both may be right; and if we conceive of a 

 race and civilization existing at a more remote period than Humboldt 

 takes into account, extending their settlements through Texas and up the 

 Mississippi and its tributaries, and afterward dispossessed and driven 

 out by a great wave of invasion from the north, of which the Toltecs, 

 Olmecs, and other tribes, led the van, many of the difficulties attend- 

 ing the inquiry are removed. We are then remanded to Mexico and 

 Central America, whose monuments and inscriptions have thus far 

 bafiiyd interpretation, as the fountain-head of the Mound-Builders 

 civilization. Although the unsettled political condition of those coun- 

 tries has for years rendered investigations of their ruins precarious 

 and unsatisfactory, we may at least hope that this condition of things 

 will cease, and permit a more thorough and extended examination, in 

 methods developed by the experience of recent years in other coun- 

 tries. 



When the impression, so pi-evalent among European scholars — that 

 the pre-historic races of America were rude savages, destitute of cul- 

 ture, aud without remains worthy of study — shall be removed, and the 

 magnificent ruins of Central America, with their sculptured inscrip- 

 tions subjected to the critical examination of men "learned in the 

 learning of the Egyptians," it is highly probable that these interesting 

 problems will receive solution, and the Mound-Builders assigned at 

 least a relative position in history. 



