l8 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. I02 



At the same time or somewhat later, in imitation of him, others could 

 have sailed across that section of the S., for it is certain that then 

 the mainlands were not so far apart one from the other, and in some 

 quarters they would have lain so close and near at hand that people 

 could have crossed on foot, colonizing step by step ; and what rivers 

 or small arms of the sea there may have been, they could have crossed 

 in boats or rafts, according as necessity taught them. 



45. Or, since the confusion in the building of the Tower of Babel 

 was in Gabaea near the banks of the Nile, they could from there 

 have gone and settled over all that part of Africa to the Kingdom of 

 Cape Verde, and from there by a short voyage pass over to the 

 region of Brazil and Cape St. Augustine, since the distance even 

 today from the one country to the other is only 350 leagues, and in 

 this way they could have continued settling over all that country and 

 the Spanish Main of the New Kingdom of Granada, thus colonizing 

 these and various other parts of the New World just as the Old 

 World had been peopled. 



46. Then I would state, besides what has been mentioned, that by 

 virtue of certain hints and conjectures which would point out the 

 least dubious course, and certain passages of Holy Writ which ap- 

 pear to indicate it, the first colonizers of the Indies sprang from the 

 best nationality existing at that time in the world, namely, the Ten 

 Tribes of Israel, when King Shalmaneser drove them out and trans- 

 planted them to territories which were uninhabited, as will be told in 

 due course ; and in especial, the Tribe of Issachar, as seems to be 

 established from Genesis, chapter XLIX, w^lien, after having con- 

 ferred his blessing upon his sons, the holy Patriarch Jacob, being at 

 the point of death, prophesied to them what was to take place and 

 happen to them and their descendants. After having conferred his 

 blessing on the older sons, to wit, Reuben, Simeon, Levi, and Judah, 

 he conferred it upon Issachar, and it seems that the entire prophecy 

 and the characteristics which the holy Patriarch foretold in it for 

 his son Issachar, have been inherited and kept in toto by the Indians. 



47. The words of the prophecy are as follows : "Issachar, a strong 

 ass, crouching between boundaries, saw rest, that it was good, and 

 the land, that it was excellent; and he bowed his shoulder to bear, 

 and became a servant unto tribute." 



48. He called him a strong ass because, just as donkeys bear their 

 load, and often blows as well, without turning against those who 

 load and abuse them, the Indians likewise resemble strong donkeys 

 in carrying heavy burdens many leagues, and it is astounding and 

 disconcerting that carrying these heavy burdens, they can travel 



