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Americas, can be traced with tolerable accuracy, by means of the 

 names inscribed upon the map. In the Spanish Main, and all 

 along the shores of the Gulf of Mexico, Spanish names will be 

 found to predominate. . . . Santa Cruz, and Vera Cruz severally 

 mark the spot where the Spaniards erected the Holy Cross and the 

 True Cross, preparatory to the Conquest of Mexico, and eventually 

 to that of Peru. AVould that more of the true Spirit of Him, of 

 whom the Cross is the symbol, had animated their breasts, rather 

 than that insatiable thirst for gold which left a trail of cruelty and 

 violence and blood upon their track, happily unparalleled even in 

 the annals of conquest. There would have been one foul stain 

 the fewer inscribed in the pages of the so-called civilization of the 

 age. For more than two thousand miles along the Brazilian coast, 

 the map is studded with names of Portuguese origin ; while on the 

 opposite, or Pacific coast, Spanish names again preponderate. 

 Some commemorate the Saint Days on which the particular places 

 were discovered, as Santiago or St. James, &c. ; others are of the 

 descriptive class, as Valparaiso, i.e. the Vale of Paradise; several 

 are corruptions of the aboriginal names, and a few are of English 

 origin. In short, the names laid down upon a modern map of the 

 new world, may be compared to a kind of irregular mosaic work, 

 pregnant with interest to those who can spell out the history of 

 each separate piece. First there is a pavement of primitive setting 

 represented by aboriginal names. Some of these are descriptive 

 of the great natural features of the country, such as mountains, 

 rivers, lakes, &c.; others are derived from the names of the tribes 

 who once owned the soil, but have now wholly disappeared ; a 

 third class are commemorative of some remarkable events in the 

 history of those tribes. . . . Around the whole coast, and 

 occasionally intruding inland, along the courses of rivers, there is 

 a secondary setting, consisting of names imposed by the early 

 discoverers, conquerors, and setders. These names are derived 

 from the language of every maritime nation in Europe ; each has 

 a history of its own, too. The tertiary is composed of names 

 bestowed in recent times, and serve to mark the progress made by 

 the white man in settling the wide domain of prairie and forest, 



