151 



that they had examined this tablet, which the 

 Chevalier Beauharnois, then governor of Ca- 

 nada, had sent to M. de Maurepas in France. 

 We cannot but deeply regret having no farther 

 knowledge of a monument, so interesting to 

 the history of man. But were there any per- 

 sons residing at Quebec capable of judging of 

 the character -of an alphabet? and if this pre- 

 tended inscription had been really recognized 

 in France as a Tartarian inscription, is it pro- 

 bable, that an enlightened minister, a protec- 

 tor of the arts, would not have ordered it to be 

 published ? 



The Anglo-American antiquaries have made 

 known an inscription, which is supposed to be 

 Phoenician, and which is engraved on the rocks 

 of Dighton, in Narraganset bay, near the banks 

 of Taunton river, twelve leagues south of Bos- 

 ton. Drawings of this inscription have been 

 repeatedly published, from the end of the 17th 

 century down to the present time by Danforth, 

 Mather, Greenwood, and Sewell ; but so dis- 

 similar, that it is difficult to recognize them 

 as copies of the same original. The natives who 

 inhabited these countries, at the time of the 

 first European settlements, preserved an anci- 

 ent tradition, according to which, strangers in 

 wooden houses had sailed up Taunton river, 

 formerly called Assoonet. These strangers, 

 after having conquered the red men, had en- 



