64 JOURNAL AND PROCEEDINGS 



numbering io8 souls, each depicted by a different object, with a 

 series of units simple as those on the Rosetta stone, denoting the 

 numbers of each family, and as intelligible, it is said, to the Indian 

 Agent, as our figures and writing. The object chosen to distinguish 

 a family bears a strange similarity to the crests and heraldic devices 

 of civilized nations. 



Humboldt assigns one of the traces of the Asiatic origin of the 

 early races of America, to the connecting link in the symbolic char- 

 acter of their numerals. The four symbols of the seasons among 

 the Aztecs, corresponded precisely with those of the Chinese, 

 Japanese and other Asiatic nations. The Peruvians transmitted to 

 future generations a record of events on a cord of different colored 

 strings, to which others were attached of various colors ; yellow, de- 

 noting gold and all its allied ideas ; white, silver or peace ; red, war 

 or soldiers ; green, agriculture, and so on. These strings were called 

 a Quipu, and a corresponding link to this is to-day to be found 

 among the Indians, in the form of the Wampum belt, used by them 

 for registering their events, and given and received at their treaties 

 as the seal of friendship. 



Time will not permit us to dwell longer on ethnological con- 

 necting links, and we will now pass on to those of matter, or to speak 

 more plainly, natural history. 



It was a remark of Linnaeus, that nature takes no leaps, she 

 proceeds by insensible transitions. Mr. Bennett, a rising naturalist, 

 in England, in an article in the Popular Science Review, says : 

 " Classification is now but a human contrivance for tabulating the 

 links in the endless chain which connects all living things." The 

 lines on the chessboard have disappeared and have given place to the 

 imperceptible gradations of the colors of the rainbow. While 

 we can still define red and yellow and distinguish one from the 

 other, we must admit a wide debatable borderland of orange. 

 Even the division of animate nature into the two kingdoms of 

 animal and vegetable life is no longer unfchallenged. The last 

 refuge of those who still maintained the essential distinction of the 

 two kingdoms, viz : that the food of animals is organic, whilst 

 that of plants is inorganic, must now be abandoned, and carnivorous 

 or insect-devouring plants hold the position of the connecting link 

 which has hitherto been considered wanting. These plants alluded 

 to in Dr. Hooker's inaugural address before the British Association 



