14 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. 102 



Chapter VII 



Continuing the Preceding Subject, and How Those Peoples Crossed 

 to Settle the Indies, and the Animals Living in Them. 



33. If they vi^ent overland in search of new countries, it is certain 

 that when the Flood had recently abated, the earth was more closely 

 joined together and united, because the sea had not penetrated so far 

 into it; and since in the neighborhood of the Poles the mainland of 

 the New World borders so close on that of the Old (and well-known) 

 World, there is no doubt that with the continued encroachment of 

 the seas upon the land, and their currents in the straits, plus the 

 world-wide earthquakes which have occurred over the earth, the seas 

 themselves have expanded and penetrated deeper into the land, and 

 in conjunction with the long passage of time, which alters everything, 

 they have separated and split up the land. 



34. This is considered certain, since with the passage of so many 

 centuries and the events recorded in them, we know that toward the 

 N. the country of Labrador runs to the Rio Nevado (Snowy River), 

 and keeps on farther, without our knowing where it ends or how far 

 it extends, since it lies beneath the Pole ; and in any event, as has 

 been said, the territories of the New World are near neighbors to 

 the known Old World, if indeed they are not really connected and 

 united in that quarter. Over the Strait of Anian the mainland of 

 Tartary is in sight of tliat of the New World, at the northernmost 

 point of New Mexico and the Kingdom of Quivira, beyond Cape 

 Mendocino ; the Strait separates the two worlds by a distance of 6 

 leagues. 



35. From Cape Blanco, or Cape St. Augustine, between the River 

 Marafion and Brazil, it is no more than 350 leagues at present to 

 Cape Verde, which is over E. on the African continent, where the 

 River Niger (likewise called the Great River) empties by many 

 mouths into the ocean. It is certain that in the beginning the two con- 

 tinents were not so far apart and the ocean had not eaten so far into 

 them, expanding and penetrating into them, as for many centuries it 

 has done for the reasons mentioned ; that has been aided by the power- 

 ful currents of great rivers, putting out from land ; and this does 

 not contradict the statement of the Psalm : "Thou hast set a bound 

 that they may not pass over ; that they turn not again to cover the 

 earth." 



36. Near the Strait of Magellan is what is called Tierra del Fuego, 

 which is still not well known or explored, and there are numerous 

 other quarters where the mainland of the New World could have 



