EARTHWORKS ON HARPETH RIVERS. 89 



shores of Lake Erie to the borders of the present State of Georgia, are sad but 

 unimpeachable witnesses of the fact that tlie fertile valleys of Ohio, Kentucky, and 

 Tennessee were once filled with a numerous population ; and the earthworks by 

 which the mounds and graves are surrounded, bear testimony to the fierce and 

 continued struggles in which these people were engaged with the more barbarous 

 tribes ; and the question arises, as we view these extensive graveyards, by what 

 pestilence or calamity were they peopled ? 



In the absence of all written records, and when even the name of the people 

 whose bones fill these rude sarcophagi is a subject of inquiry, the discussion of 

 this question assumes such proportions as to embrace the consideration of the 

 causes which led to the rapid diminution of the aborigines of America, not only 

 after, but also before its discovery by Columbus. Considered in a comprehensive 

 light, this subject should command the attention of the statesman, the philanthro- 

 pist, and the ethnologist. 



The agencies which have, at various times, destroyed vast numbers of the abori- 

 ginal inhabitants of America, were pestilence, Matlazahuatl, malarial fevers, 

 smallpox, syphilis, ardent spirits, war, and slavery. Smallpox and ardent spirits 

 committed their ravages after the discovery of America by Columbus. The cala- 

 mities of war and slavery were greatly extended and intensified by the presence 

 and active agency of the Europeans. That immense numbers of the human race 

 have perished in North and South America, and in the West Indies, as a conse- 

 quence of the introduction of Europeans, no one at all conversant with the records 

 of history will deny, however much historians may difi"er as to the original popula- 

 tion to be assigned to the dift'crent nations of this continent. 



Pestilence desolated the cities of the Toltecs in the eleventh century, forced them 

 to abandon Mexico, and to continue their emigrations towards the south, west, 

 and northwest. It invaded the populous cities of Central America, and committed 

 great ravages amongst the tribes which occupied the country between the moun- 

 tains and the Atlantic Coast, a few years before the landing of the Pilgrim Fathers. 

 The Matlazahuatl, a disease peculiar to the Indian race, seldom appears more 

 than once in a century. It raged in the eleventh century amongst the Toltecs, and 

 also made great ravages among the Mexicans in 1545, 1576, 1736, 1737, 1761, 

 and 1762, and amongst the Indians of the Atlantic coast in 1618 and 1619. 



Humboldt has recorded in his " Political Essay on New Spain," the following 

 facts and conjectures with reference to the Matlazahuatl. 



" As the latest epidemic took place at a time when medicine was not considered 

 a science even in the capital of Mexico, there are no exact data as to the Matlaza- 

 huatl. It certainly bears some analogy to the yellow fever, or black vomit ; but 

 it never attacks white people, whether Europeans or natives of the country; 

 while, on the other hand, the yellow fever or black vomit very seldom attacks the 

 Mexican Indians. The principal site of the i-omito 2^rieto is the maritime region, 

 of which the climate is excessively warm and humid; but the Matlazahuatl carries 

 terror and destruction into the very interior of the country, to the central table- 

 land, and the coldest and most arid regions of INIexico. Long before the arrival 

 of Cortez, this epidemical disease had prevailed almost periodically in New Spain, 



12 May, 1876. 



