HISTORY OF MEXICO. 



121 



fome diftemper. Perhaps they never did pafs there. 

 Some, fuch as elephants and rhinocerofes, the multipli- 

 cation of which is flow, flopped in the fouthern parts of 

 Afia and Africa, becaufe they found a climate agreeable 

 and fuitable to their natures, and had not occafion 

 therefore to go further for paftures or food. It is true, 

 that many authors are perfuaded that the great bones 

 dug up near the river Ohio, and other places of Ameri- 

 ca, have belonged to elephants, which would argue their 

 ancient exigence in that continent ; but as modern zoo- 

 logies are not agreed with refpecl: to the fpecies of qua- 

 druped to which fuch bones may have belonged, no ar- 

 gument from them can be deduced againfl. us (/). Laftly, 

 other hearts did not pafs to the new world, perhaps be- 

 caufe men detained them. But however the matter may 

 be, the paflage of fome beads and not of others proves 

 nothing againfl our fyflem. 



With refpecl: to the calculation above mentioned, of 

 what time the floth would require to move from Ame- 

 rica to Brazil, it raifes no inconvenience ; for if it had 

 occafion for more than a thoufand years, on the fuppo- 

 fition we made of the union of the two continents con- 

 tinuing all that time, it might arrive there at laft. The 

 count de BufFon declares, that authors have exaggerat- 

 ed the flownefs of the floth ; and Mr. Aubenton ac- 

 knowledges, that it was not fo flow as the turtle. Be- 

 fides, it being a harmlefs animal, it may have been tran- 

 fported by men. 



Vol. III. R DISSERTATION 



(/) Muller faid, that thofe bones belonged to certain large quadrupeds, 

 which he called Mammouts. The count de Buffon, trailing too much to him, 

 computed that thofe quadrupeds were feven times larger than elephants. Some 

 have believed that thofe bones belonged to the fea-horfes, fome to other fea- 

 animals ; and, ladly, fome have thought they belonged to fome unknown qua- 

 drupeds that are now extinct : but they may, from what appears, have belong- 

 ed to giants of the human as well as of any other race. 



