492 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1923 



sume that, having reached a physical and cultural status practically 

 identical with the later prehistoric European, and having spread 

 over about as much territory. as he would have covered in coming 

 from Europe or Asia Minor, and that really in the face of greater 

 obstacles, his advent in the northeastern limits of the Asiatic conti- 

 nent could not have been any earlier than it would have been had 

 he started from the west and passed over the great central steppes. 

 The assumption, therefore, of a separate origin of the north Asiatic 

 and consequently the American man from that of the European, 

 would not make the Indian any more ancient. 



Thus, from whatsoever aspect we take the question, the when of 

 the peopling of America does not yield to answer except in terms of 

 moderate antiquity corresponding in all probability with that of the 

 late Paleolithic to Neolithic Europeans. 6 



It remains for us to give thought to the mode or modes of man's 

 advent into the New World and his subsequent spread and multipli- 

 cation on this continent. 



Here it is necessary, in the first place, to free ourselves from all 

 notion of mass migration. The northeastern portions of the Asiatic 

 Continent were never fit within man's time either to harbor or to 

 permit the migration of any large number of human beings at one 

 time. 



The only rational conclusion in this connection seems to be the 

 following : The northeastern Asiatic man in relatively small nomadic 

 or seminomadic groups hunted and fished along the rivers and sea- 

 coast, living in proximity. As game diminished through this hunt- 

 ing or from other causes, he followed it, not southward, where other 

 tribes were doubtless already established, but farther northward and 

 eastward, in the direction of least resistance and of greater abun- 

 dance, until he reached the Kuriles, Kamchatka, and finally the 

 northeastern extremity of Asia. Before arriving at the limits of the 

 mainland he was doubtless already well provided with and expert 

 in the use of boats capable under favorable circumstances of making 

 prolonged sea voyages. Some party then may have struck out or 

 was driven eastward, reaching the Aleutian chain. Once discovered, 

 these islands would serve as a natural bridge, over which in the 

 course of time groups of Siberian natives could reach Alaska and 

 the American Continent. Or a party first crossed by way of Bering 

 Strait, or possibly by the still more northerly land connection, 

 if it existed. Doubtless in the course of time the Asiatic native 

 utilized all the practicable means of ingress to the New World. 

 Once on the American Continent, of better climate, full of game, and 



c Compare writer's "The l'eopling of Asia." I*roc. Am. Philos. Sot-., 1921, LX, 535, 

 at seij. 



