~>1^ TME ADVENT OF MAN IN AMEKICA. 



It is HOW kJlu^\ 11 liDW ('om])letely .such assertions have beeii oontra- 

 (licted. Adding- his pevsonal i-esearches to those of his predecessors. 

 Hale Urst drew a mai) of Polynesian migrations. Twenty years later, 

 aided by the documents subsequently (■ollected, I Mas able to com 

 plete the work of the learned American. Xow, as has l)een said by 

 the lamented (laussin (so competent to speak in all that relates to 

 Oceauica), the peoi>ling 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 peojiled by colonies of emigrants from 

 the Old World. Their point of departure is to be discovered and 

 their tracks to be followed. The labor will indeed be more difficult 

 and longer upon the Continent than in Oceauica, ])rincipally because 

 the migrations were more numerous and go back to a higher antiquity. 

 The flrst Indonesian pioneers who, departing from the Island of 

 Bouro, landed in the Samoan and Tongan archipelagos, prol)ably 

 made tlie passage near the end of the fifth century, or about the time 

 of the conversion of Clevis. The peopling of New Zealand by emi- 

 grants from the Manaias goes back at most to the early years of the 

 fifteenth century. Thus tlie peoiiling of Polynesia! was all accom- 

 plished during our Middle Ages, while the first migrations to America 

 date from geological times. Two savants, to whom we owe precious 

 discoveries, Ameghino and Whitney, have traced the existence of man 

 in America ba<'k to the Tertiary age. It is true tliat this opinion has 

 been contested by men of equal re])Ute; but I believe that the view of 

 these men is confirmed by a comparison of tlie fossil faunas of the 

 pampas of Brazil and the California gravels. 



Judging by what little we know, man reached Lombardy and tlie 

 Cantal before he had penetiated to America. It is necessary here, 

 without doul)t, to'make the most fi)rma] reserves in fiivor of future dis- 

 coveries; but if the fact is confirmed, it would seem to admit of easy 

 explanation. Everything leads me to believe that the separation be- 

 tween America and Asia as now existing took ])lace before tlie (j)uar- 

 ternary epoch. If it was otherwise the species of mammalia common 

 to the north of both continents would have been more numerous. The 

 men and land animals on the shore of the Bering Sea and Strait have 

 been stopped there. But when the great geologic winter substituted 

 the polar temperature for a climate similar to that of California, the 

 ancient Tertiary tribes were forced to migrate in every direction. A 

 certain number of them may have embarked upon the ice extending 

 between the two shores, and thus have arrived in America with the 

 reindeer, as did their western congeners in France with the same 

 animal. From that time the era of immigration was opened for 

 America: it has never been closed since. Each year the winter re- 

 builds the bridge which unites East Cape with the Cape Prince of 

 Wales; each year a road — relatively easy for the hardy pedestrians, 



