82 SUPPOSED RESEMBLANCES. 



parallel with the isthmus of Panama, and supposed by some 

 geographers to join the peninsula of Florida to the north- 

 east extremity of South America. It is the eastern shore 

 of an inland sea, which may be considered as a basin with 

 several outlets. This peculiar configuration of the land has 

 served to support the different systems of migration, by 

 which it has been attempted to explain the settlement of 

 the nations of the Carib race in the islands and on the 

 neighbouring continent. The Caribs of the continent admit 

 that the small West India Islands were anciently inhabited 

 by the Arowaks,* a warlike nation, the great mass of which 

 still inhabit the insalubrious shores of Surinam and Berbice. 

 They assert that the Arowaks, with the exception of the 

 women, were all exterminated by Caribs, who came from the 

 mouths of the Orinoco. In support of this tradition, 

 they refer to the traces of analogy existing between the lan- 

 guage of the Arowaks and that of the Carib women ; but it 

 must be recollected that the Arowaks, though the enemies 

 of the Caribs, belonged to the same branch of people ; and 

 that the same analogy exists between the Arowak and Carib 

 languages, as between the Greek and the Persian, the Ger- 

 man and the Sanscrit. According to another tradition, the 

 Caribs of the islands came from the south, not as conquerors, 

 but because they were expelled from Guiana by the Arowaks, 

 who originally ruled over all the neighbouring nations. 

 Finally, a third tradition, much more general and more pro- 

 bable, represents the Caribs as having come from Florida, 

 in North America. Mr. Bristock, a traveller who has col- 

 lected every particular relating to these migrations from 

 north to south, asserts, that a tribe of Confachites (Con- 

 fachiqui)f had long waged war against the Apalachites ; that 

 the latter, having yielded to that tribe the fertile district of 

 Amana, called their new confederates "Caribes" (that is, 



belong to history, but simply to denote that we are ignorant of the 

 " autocthoni " having been preceded by any other people. 



* Arouaques. The missionary Quandt (Nachricht von Surinam, 1807, 

 p. 47) calls them Arawackes. 



^ The province of Confachiqui, which in 1541 became subject to a 

 woman, is celebrated by the expedition of Hernando de Soto to Florida. 

 Among the nations of the Huron tongue, and the Attakapas, the supreme 

 authority was also often exercised by women. 



