HISTORY OF MEXICO. 



109 



teenth century, and called by them the Straits of 

 Anian(g). 



With refpect to the other nations of America, as there 

 is no tradition among them concerning the way by which 

 their anceftors came to the new world, we can fay no- 

 thing of them. It is poffible, that they all paffed by the 

 fame way in which the anceftors of the Mexicans paffed ; 

 and yet perhaps they may have paffed by fome other 

 very different route. We conjecture, that the anceftors 

 of the nations which peopled South America went there 

 by the way in which the animals proper to hot countries 

 paffed, and that the anceftors of thofe nations inhabit- 

 ing all the countries which lie between Florida and the 

 mod northern part of America, paffed there from the 

 north of Europe. The difference of character which is 

 difcoverable in the three above mentioned claffes of Ame- 

 ricans, and the lituation of the countries which they oc- 

 cupied, make us fufpect that they hacf different origins, 

 and that their anceftors came there by different routes ; 

 but ftill this is a mere fufpicion and conjecture. 



Some authors aflign another part for the paffage of 

 the firft peoplers, which is the ifland Atlantida; the 

 exiftence of which, contradicted by Acofta, was main- 

 tained by Siguenza, by what appears from the account 

 of Gemelli, and lately fupported with great fhew of 

 erudition by the celebrated author of the American Let- 

 ters. If there were not fo many fables mixed with the 

 account of that ifland which Plato gives in Timeus, the 

 authority of fo grave a philofopher might induce us to 



affent 



(g) In the charts of America publiflied in the laft century, the ftrait of 

 Anian was ufually defcribed, though with much difference in the reprefenta- 

 tion of it. For fome years paft it has been omitted, from an opinion that the 

 account of it was fabulous ; but fince the difcovery of the Ruffians fome geo- 

 graphers have begun again to give it a place. 



