NATURAL HISTORY OF CREATION. 219 



seems to me decidedly favourable to the idea of a single 

 origin. 



Assuming that the human race is one^ we are next 

 called upon to inquire in what part of the earth it ma};- 

 most probably be supposed to have originated. One 

 obvious mode of approximating to a solution of this ques- 

 tion is to trace backward the lines in wdiicli the principal 

 tribes appear to have migrated, and to see if these 

 converge nearly to a point. It is very remarkable that 

 the lines do converge, and are concentrated about the 

 region of Hindostan. The language, religion, modes of 

 reckoning time, and some other peculiar ideas of the 

 Americans, are now believed to refer their origin to 

 North-Eastern Asia. Trace them farther back in the 

 same direction, and we come to the north of India. 

 The history of the Celts and Teutones represents them as 

 coming from the east, the one after the other, successive 

 waves of a tide of population flowing towards the north- 

 west of Europe : this line being also traced back, rests 

 finally at the same place. So does the line of Iranian 

 population, which has peopled the east and south shores 

 of the Mediterranean, Syria, Arabia and Egypt. The 

 Malay variety, again, rests its limit in one direction on 

 the borders of India. Standing on that point, it is easy 

 to see how the human family, originating there, might 

 spread out in different directions, passing into varieties of 

 aspect and of language as they spread, the J\Ialay variety 

 proceeding towards the Oceanic region, the IMongolians 

 to the east and north, and sending off the red men as a 

 sub-variety, the European population going off to the 

 north-westward, and the Syrian, Arabian, and Egyptian, 

 towards the countries which they are known to have so 

 long occupied. The Negro alone is here unaccounted 

 for ; and of that race it may fairly be said, that it is the 



