INTRODUCTION. 85 



the flesh of their enemies. Among the inhabits, ts of the eastern 

 isles, a singular custom is the necessity for every persor, some 

 time in his life, to shed human blood ; and generally no person can 

 marry till he can show the skull of a human victim. The Austra- 

 lians are supposed to belong to this group ; they resemble, in the 

 form of their skulls, the Tasmaniana ; they are a lean and balf- 

 qtarved race, with disproportioned size of head and limbs, if the 

 representations taken from the atlas ofM. d'Urville are correct. 



The American nations show characters which are common to all, 

 and exhibit strong proofs of a community of origin, and of very 

 ancient relationship. As they probably existed rate depart- 



ment from the earliest ages of the world, we cannot expect to find 

 proofs of their derivation from any tribes of the old World. 

 Though they have been called " Red Men," there are tribes equally 

 red, he says, in Africa and Polynesia. Anatomists have described 

 an American form of the skull, which he thinks incorrect, and 

 foui led on the study of a few well-marked tribes. The hah 

 these nations are equally difS rent ; some are hunters, some fisher- 

 men, some nomadic, others cultivators of the earth In lure the arrival 



of Europeans. The most decisive evidence of their relationship is 

 in the characteristic structure of their languages. Says Humboldt, 

 11 In Lmerica, from the country of the Esquimaux to the banks of 



the Orinoko, and again, from these torrid banks to the frozen cli- 

 mate of the straits of Magellan, mother tongues entirely different 

 with regard to their routs, have the same physiognomy." This 

 remark of Humboldt has been confirmed by Mr. Gallatin, who says 



thai all the languages of the native inhabitants of America, from the 

 Arctic Ocean to (ape Horn, have a distinct character common to 

 all, ami differing from any of those of the other continent with 

 which we are most familiar. Du Ponceau includes even the 

 Esquimaux among the American languag 



Remarkable mural and social trans distinguish the American race 

 from the races of the Old World. Dr. .Martins believes that the 

 can nations are not living in the primitive simplicity of 

 nature, but that tiny arc the remains of a people once in a high state 

 of civilization and mental improvement, and now in a state of decline 

 and degradation ; this he infers from the remains of ancient institu- 

 tions of government, of religion, and social refinements. 



It is probable that the Mexican tribes, Toltecs and Aztecs, were 

 one race, and that they ascended the central plain of Anahuae, in 

 the seventh century, from countries lying to the north, by su 

 sive arrivals for a long period. These nations were highly 

 cultivated in the arts, though their moral condition seems to have 



