132 
than have existed since the conquest or do exist to-day. The 
material prosperity of the country was far in advance of what 
it is now. ‘There were greater facilities of intercourse, a wider 
agriculture, more manufactures, less pauperism and vice, and 
—shall I say it ?—a purer and more useful religion.” Truly 
a home-thrust for us Christians ! 
Kven in Patagonia, which we think entirely barbarous, 
traces of higher civilisation are found—of a golden age. 
We read in Captain Muster’s At Home amongst the 
Patagonians,” * that ‘ancient bolas (lasso-stones) are not 
unfrequently found. These are highly valued by the Indians, 
and differ from those in present use by having grooves cut 
round them, and by their larger size and greater weight.” 
Here again is deterioration. Also, he adds, ‘‘Casemiro informed 
me that formerly the old men were in the habit of singing the 
traditions of the tribe, and also some sort of prayer.”+ Now 
they have forgotten these. This does not look lke improving. 
Without writing and depending cnly upon oral tradition, man 
must deteriorate. 
In the Yenissei Province, in Siberia, is the district of Mi- 
sinsk, most interesting to ethnologists on account of the 
numerous mementos it offers of primitive inhabitants, 
altogether different from those of the present day.t ‘That 
people, almost entirely unknown as yet, were the T’chonds, 
and the numerous objects of sculpture and inscriptions on the 
enormous blocks of stone, of which their tumulus-monuments 
had been composed, are proofs of a certain culture where all 
is now uncivilised. They were probably driven out of their 
original country ; other inscriptions are found on the banks of 
the Yenissei and Traba. 
The sacred books of-the Hindoos speak of powerful states 
existing in remote antiquity, where the British merchant- 
pioneers only found savage chieftains. The voyages of the 
ancient Javanese, Japanese, and Malays, also, appear to have 
extended in former ages to far greater ‘distances than their 
modern descendants attempt. 
These remarkable facts seem to endorse the opinion of the 
ancient poets, who, since the world began, have sung of golden, 
silvern, and leaden ages, and have attributed to the past the 
brightest passages in the history of mankind. 
* P. 166. te los 
t See The Land of the Czar, by O. W. Wahl. Chapman & Hall, 1875. 
Pp. 183-4. 
