ANALOGY OF RACES AND HABITS. 49 



offered to them by their country and its climate, so consonant with the habits 

 and nature of the animal. Any theory, therefore, that might be based upon the 

 disappearance of the Reindeer from southern latitudes, in connexion with the 

 migration northward in remote ages of the past of the Esquimaux and other 

 northern tribes, ought, I submit, to be very cautiously entertained. Nor would 

 it be prudent, I think, to found too much upon the similarity of implements now, 

 or recently, in use among divers barbarous nations, and the interesting relics 

 which have been discovered in Dordogne. I will not call this an accidental 

 similarity ; for there is in this, as in all other mundane things, a deeper influencing 

 cause than that which men call "accident." The same Power which endows the 

 inferior animals with the perceptions necessary to the conservation of life, and 

 which in them we call instinct, prompts Man likewise in his primitive state with 

 certain innate conceptions in regard to the elementary objects necessary to the 

 same end. Thus I believe that under similar circumstances and conditions of 

 things, isolated branches of the human race will arrive, in simple matters of 

 domestic or offensive art, at nearly similar conclusions, each independently of the 

 other. I say this without reference to that transmission of example which has 

 of course gone on from age to age, and which has extended necessarily with the 

 human race in its various ramifications, no longer traceable, save by deduction, 

 through the dim and mysterious vista of the past. It is with the slow and partial 

 advance of civilization, modified by conditions of climate and other influences, 

 that the genius of nations, and the broad deviations in manufactures from a 

 common and primeval type, are tardily developed. 



I wrote a few years ago at the request of a scientific friend a few notes 

 regarding the Indian tribes of America. These, falling under the notice of the 

 Historical Society of New York, were afterwards printed by them, and some copies 

 sent to me. I find that I have still two or three remaining, and send you one 

 herewith. These notes bear, if at all, very remotely on the subject of your 

 communication ; but they may possibly contain something that may be suggestive 

 to your antiquarian friends, interested in tracing the spread of races. It is, 

 however, time that I should conclude ; and I do so with a renewed expression of 

 the warm interest I feel in the progress of your present undertaking important, 

 in more senses than one, to all reflecting persons. I need not say that I shall 

 cheerfully contribute, if in my power, to promote the end in view by answering 

 any further queries you may find it expedient to put ; and I shall in any case 

 trust to hear from you, however briefly, in reference to the subject and the 

 progress you have made in your investigations. I should like, too, to learn in 



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