AFFINITIES OF MANUFACTURES. * 79 



bronze crowbar, or long-handled chisel, from an ancient mine of silver 

 in Peru. An exact analysis has been delayed, but of from ten to twelve 

 per cent, of tin are understood to be combined with the copper. 



This alloy is employed for casting of bell-metal and cannon, for the 

 touch-hole of muskets, mirrors, or specula, for astronomical observations, 

 musical instruments, and formerly for coats of impenetrable armor. 



These affinities in the manufactures of* the Egyptians, Assyrians, and 

 ancient Peruvians, offer some suggestions of very remote intercommuni- 

 cation between portions of civilized Asia and the natives of the Andes, 

 further elucidated by reference to other similarities in their mode of agri- 

 culture by irrigation, and the employment of manures ; the construc- 

 tion and suspension of bridges; their causeways and aqueducts; the 

 working of mines, knitting, netting, spinning, weaving, and dyeing; their 

 roads, posts, inns, and grain aries, arms and armor. 



The order, system, and policy of their morals ; the arrangement of 

 public records; their duties; the worship of the sun, the moon, the 

 planets, and natural elements, distinctly and strictly forbidden in Hebrew 

 laws, because such practices had existed before the Exodus, and, there- 

 fore, were objected to in the reformed code. 



Indeed, the resemblance in the manners and customs of the Peruvians, 

 before the Spanish conquests, to those of oriental nations of the most re- 

 mote antiquity, has been frequently referred to by historians best ac- 

 quainted with the peculiarities of each. 



The revolutions of the civilized nations of ancient Asia are repeatedly 

 referred to in biblical history to instruct the people in the causes which 

 led to proposed reformations in their moral laws. 



To obtain relief from oppressive superstitions, famine, diseases, and 

 wars, or to find means fully to express the wonderful movements of mental 

 action, ancient revolutions may have driven numerous colonies, in long 

 forgotten ages, to seek refuge in most distant lands as now. 



That such emigrations were made by land occasionally, a curious 

 proof exists in the interior of China. A town is inhabited by descend- 

 ants of people from the neighborhood of the Mediterranean, bearing- 

 manuscripts of Hebrew laws, written upon rolls of skins or parchment, in 

 the peculiar characters of that people, and s.till remain as evidence of 

 their original descent, although the present inhabitants have become so 

 assimilated with the Chinese, that no one among them can read or com- 

 prehend the language of those ancient commandments. 



If the modern knowledge of the winds and currents of the ocean per- 

 mit, the writer will attempt to show, that sea-going vessels, well managed 

 by Phoenicians, Tyrians, or Carthaginians, equal, at least, to those in 



