Aboriginal Race of America. 1 19 



alone, the most important of them all, remained comparatively 

 neglected and unknown; and of the various authors who have at- 

 tempted its exposition during the past and present centuries, too 

 many have been content with closet theories, in which facts are 

 perverted to sustain some baseless conjecture. Hence it has been 

 aptly remarked that Asia is the country of fables, Africa of monsters, 

 and America of systems, to those who prefer hypothesis to truth. 



The intellectual genius of antiquity justly excites our admiration 

 and homage ; but in vain we search its records for the physical 

 traits of some of the most celebrated nations of past time. It is 

 even yet gravely disputed whether the ancient Egyptians belonged 

 to the Caucasian race or to the Negro ; and was it not for the light 

 which now dawns upon us from their monuments and their tombs, 

 this question might remain for ever undecided. The present age, 

 however, is marked by a noble zeal for these inquiries, which are 

 daily making man more conversant with the organic structure, the 

 mental character, and the national affinities of the various and widely 

 scattered tribes of the human family. 



Among these the aboriginal inhabitants of America claim our 

 especial attention. This vast theatre has been thronged, from im- 

 memorial time, by numberless tribes which lived only to destroy 

 and be in turn destroyed, without leaving a trace of their sojourn 

 on the face of the earth. Contrasted with these were a few civi- 

 lized communities, whose monuments awaken our surprise without 

 unfolding their history ; and he who would unravel their mysteries 

 may be compared, in the language of the poets, to a man standing 

 by the stream of time, and striving to rescue from its waters the 

 wrecked and shattered fragments which float onward to oblivion. 



It is not my present intention even to enumerate the many theo- 

 ries which have been advanced in reference to the origin of the 

 American nations ; although I may, in the sequel, inquire whether 

 their genealogy can be traced to the Polynesians or Mongolians, 

 Hindoos, Jews or Egyptians. Nor shall I attempt to analyse the 

 views of certain philosophers who imagine that they have found not 

 only a variety of races, but several species of men among the abori- 

 gines of this continent. It is chiefly my intention to produce a few 

 of the more strikingly characteristic traits of these people to sustain 



