76 DISAPPEARANCE OP RACES. 



dinamarca and Peru, we find pure theocracies. Fortified 

 towns, highways and large edifices of stone, an extraordinary 

 development ol the feudal system, the separation of castes, 

 convents of men and women, religious congregations regu- 

 lated by discipline more or less severe, complicated divisions 

 ol time connected with the calendars, the zodiacs, and the 

 astrology of the enlightened nations of Asia, all these phe- 

 nomena, in America, belong to one region only, the long 

 and narrow Alpine band extending from the thirtieth degree 

 of north latitude to the twenty-fifth degree of south. The 

 migration oi nations in the ancient world was from east to 

 west ; the Basques or Iberians, the Celts, the Germans, and 

 the Pelasgi, appeared in succession. In the New World 

 similar migrations flowed from north to south. Among the 

 nations that inhabit the two hemispheres, the direction of 

 this movement followed that of the mountains; but, in the 

 torrid zone, the temperate table-lands of the Cordilleras had 

 greater influence on the destiny of mankind, than the 

 mountains of Asia and central Europe. As, properly speak- 

 ing, only civilized nations have a history, the history of the 

 Americans is necessarily no more than that of a small por- 

 tion of the inhabitants of the mountains. Profound ob- 

 scurity envelops the vast country which stretches from the 

 eastern slope of the Cordilleras towards the Atlantic ; and 

 for this very reason, whatever in that country relates to the 

 preponderance of one nation over others, to distant migra- 

 tions, to the physiognomical features which denote a foreign 

 race, excite our deepest interest. 



Amidst the plains of North America, some powerful 

 nation, which has disappeared, constructed circular, square, 

 and octagonal fortifications ; walls six thousand toises in 

 length ; tumuli from seven to eight hundred feet in diameter, 

 and one hundred and forty feet in height, sometimes round, 

 sometimes with several stories, and containing thousands of 

 skeletons. These skeletons are the remains of men less 

 slender, and more squat, than the present inhabitants of 

 those countries. Other bones wrapped in fabrics resembling 

 those of the Sandwich and Feejee Islands, are found in the 

 natural grottoes of Kentucky. "What is become ot those 

 nations of Louisiana anterior to the Lenni-Lenapes, the 

 Shawanese, and pernaps even to the Sioux (Nadowessei, 



