ANTIQUITIES IN VERA CRUZ. 375 



altars, good level roads with a foundation of mortar. Most of these 

 monuments have good preserved steps leading to the top. In some 

 very small jjots of burned clay are found filled with ashes. 



Between the simple mounds of loose stone and earth and the last- 

 mentioned monuments we may easily discern two classes of people — one 

 semi^barbarous and the other tolerably advanced in civilization — living 

 continually at war with each other, imjoeding on that account a higher 

 grade of civilization than that found at the arrival of Cortez with his 

 Spaniards. 



Civilization in all countries has been very gradual and must always 

 have commenced in warm climates. It was in Asia, in Africa, in the 

 tropical parts of China, Syria, Egypt, «&c., where we find the oldest 

 monuments, where the people as far as 3,000 years back had made some 

 l)rogress. The inhabitants of colder countries were, up to that time, in 

 a barbarous state, and only received civilization by contact with the 

 others or by conquest. This may be accounted for in the following man- 

 ner: The first knowledge we have of man is in a tropical climate. It is 

 there where vegetation the whole year round is luxuriant ; where fruits 

 of all kinds are abundant, furnishing him with food without exertion ; 

 where a hot climate dispenses with all covering against cold 5 where the 

 first necessities once satisfied he had leisure, if endowed with a lively 

 imagination, which is natural to people of hot countries, to set his wits 

 to work in order to better his condition. One step followed another, 

 creating daily new necessities. Those of a strong arm imposed on the 

 weaker, and obliged them to work for them or for the community. In 

 this way civilization gradually advanced. 



jS^ow let us transfer ourselves to a cold country. Its primitive inhab- 

 itants had to guard against the weather in winter, which obliged them 

 to become hunters in order to slay the wild beasts wbich were to 

 serve them as clothing as also to allay the cravings of hunger. Wild 

 fruits could only be gathered in summer and autumn, and were much 

 less abundant than in the tropics, so that their whole time was occupied 

 in attending to the necessities of their existence, or in guarding against 

 the cold of winter, being continually slaves to their wants, leaving them 

 no leisure to better their condition. History has shown that such has 

 been the case throughout all cold countries, and that civilization made 

 very little progress there until the inhabitants came in contact with 

 more southern nations. The same has happened in America. Where 

 do we find the traces of higher civilization on this continent? Is it in 

 British America, in New England, iu Oregon, or in Patagonia? No! 

 In tropical America. The same causes have created the same effect. 

 Peru, Ecuador, Yucatan, and Mexico, all countries between the tropics, 

 have taken the first steps toward advancement. The yet existing monu- 

 ments speak for themselves. 



From Palenque, in Yucatan, and Quito, in Ecuador, as centers, civil- 

 ization spread north and south, but found much greater resistance by 



