132 Transactions of the Royal Canadian Institute [vol. x. 



I. 



To return to the Babel which has been unwittingly built up by 

 the students of the fascinating question of the Indians' origin. In- 

 congruous as are the component parts of that edifice, if we study 

 them closely, we may properly reduce them to a certain number of 

 classes. There is, in the first place, the theory of the Jewish origin of 

 our Indians, a theory which has captivated many minds and according 

 to which the natives of this continent are none others than the lost 

 tribes of Israel. Though rather ancient, the tribe of those who embraced 

 that opinion is neither lost nor extinct. It counted ardent and able 

 advocates such as Thomas Thorowgood, Kingsborough, Garcia, Mrs. 

 Simon, James Adair, Israel Worsley, E. Howitt, Dr. Boudinot, Lafitau 

 as regards the Hurons and, in our own days. Father E. Petitot, who 

 seems in this connection of such undoubting faith that he has gone to 

 the length of altering the national name of the stock called Athapaskan 

 by the Smithsonian Institution from D6n6, its true designation, into 

 Danite, after one of the Jewish tribes. 



This opinion is combatted by James Kennedy, who closes an able 

 paper on the "Question of the supposed Lost Tribes of Israel" by 

 declaring that "the supposition of there being any people now existing 

 as a separate people representing the ten tribes is a groundless halluci- 

 nation, unworthy of the times in which it has obtained so extensive a 

 credence." 



Then there is the Chinese theory, which had earnest defenders in 

 De Guigues, Foster, Du Pratz and the great Humboldt. 



The former hypothesis rests mostly on the customs of the American 

 aborigines — especially those of their women ; the latter, on their physical 

 appearance as well as on minute fragments of Asiatic history. 



A third opinion, which is chiefly based on the same physical analogies, 

 and also on well-authenticated arrivals in America due to the action of 

 the sea currents, would fain see at least in the northwestern Coast 

 tribes relics from the land of Nippon. De Quatrefages, a Mr. Brooks, 

 Viollet-le-Duc and others have perhaps been its ablest exponents. 



The Tatars have also been referred to by many as the progenitors 

 of our Indians, in commxon with the Egyptians and the Tyrians of old. 

 George Jones has been the foremost supporter of the claims of the last 

 named nation in his History of Ancient America,'^ but this opinion has 

 been shared by Ledyard and many others. Alexandre Lenoir compares 

 the ancient monuments of the Mexicans with those of Egypt, India, 

 and the rest of the world. 



' London, 1843. 



