THE GEORGE CATLIN INDIAN GALLERY. 757 



perishable monuments record the truth that such a race then and there existed, as 

 well as the physiological traits of its present population prove that the Mexicans are 

 remains of the Toltec race. 



The history, which establishes beyond a doubt the migration of the Toltecs and 

 Aztecs from the mountains of the northwest into Mexico and Yucatan, is extremely 

 vague as to time, and from the similarity of their monuments, it seems probable that 

 they were portions of the same race, who have taken different names from the differ. * 

 ent periods of their emigrations, or from the positions to which they respectively 

 went, the word Toltec (or Toh-tec) being still applied by some of the northern Mexi- 

 cans to the people of the mountains (mountaineers), and the word Aztec (or Ah-tec), 

 to the people of the low countries (lowlanders), and Ah-na-tec to the people beyond 

 the lowlanders (the white people). 



Subsequent to the second cataclysm, which destroyed the Aztecs and deluged their 

 stupendous monuments, the Toltecs built the city of Mexico in a high and sterile 

 region, from fear of a similar fate to that of their neighbors^ the Aztecs. 



In the second cataclysm the summits of the mountains in the West Indies, then 

 forming a part of the mainland of the continent, protected a portion of their inhab- 

 itants, who, from the fear of another calamity (and later from the cruelty of the Span- 

 ish invaders, since the discovery of America), have emigrated in vast numbers to the 

 coast of Venezuela, Guiana, and Yucatan ; such are the Caribbes ; and from the north 

 and the west of Guatemala and Mexico the Maya and other tribes have migrated to 

 the east, spreading over the promontory of Yucatan, Honduras, &c. 



Amongst all of these tribes, as well as amongst the present Mexicans and the nu- 

 merous tribes to the north, even to the Kiowas and the Comanches, I have found dis- 

 tinct traditions of three successive cataclysms — two by water and one by fire. And 

 in the rocks and mountains, both in the West India Islands and on the Mexican 

 coast, as well as in Yucatan and its ruins, I have found, from chemical and geological 

 tests, undeniable evidences of the same catastrophies. 



Nothing is more certain than that the second cataclysm in those regions was pro- 

 duced by the volcanic actions underneath, causing a subsidence of a large tract of 

 country, including the whole range of the Greater and Lesser Antilles, the promontory 

 of Yucatan, the eastern and lower parts of Mexico and Honduras, and even extending 

 to the coast of Venezuela. 



At a later period (perhaps some thousands of years) this subsided country, or a 

 great proportion of it, has, from an opposite action of similar causes, risen to a suf_ 

 ficient extent towards its ancient elevation to show, in the granite and volcanic tops 

 of the Antilles which have reappeared above the ocean, the continuation of the Cor- 

 dillera, and also to expose to view the Aztec ruins of Guatemala and Yucatan ; lead- 

 ing us to the rational and unavoidable conclusions that a people so far advanced in 

 civilization and the arts as to build such populous and magnificent cities as Palenque, 

 Uxmal, and Copan were never confined to three cities, but that other cities of equal 

 or greater extent were spread over the plains, which in the days of the Aztecs, extended 

 from the ruins of Yucatan to the base of the West India mountains, and which lost 

 cities may now be said to be ruins under the sea. 



What is now the Caribbean Sea and the Gulf of Mexico were in the days of Uxmal 

 and Palenque vast and fertile plains, through which the Rio Grande del Norte and 

 the Mississippi wended their long and serpentine ways, and, uniting their waters near 

 the base of the mountains, debouched into the ocean between Cuba and the Bahama 

 Islands. 



This vast space, in area much larger than the kingdoms of France and England 

 together, teeming with luxuries the most inviting to man, with the richest soil and 

 the most salubrious climate of the world, would consequently have had its portion of 

 the Aztec race, and probably the ruins of millions and millions are there still em- 

 bedded under the sea.* 



*Forthe young readers of this book, who have long lives before them, these are but suggestions, 

 pointing to proofs that they will sooner or later read on these interesting topics. 



