34 
toner's address. 
dwelling in the same region, at the same time, as well 
as at subsequent periods, and the change which cH- 
mate and subsistence are capable in time of producing 
in the modes of life and intellectual powers must not 
be lost sight of Although the cave ruins and those of 
the mound-builders are not conclusive, they neverthe- 
less point out significantly the former existence upon 
this continent of two different but now extinct races. 
Sufficient data are not yet available (though rapidly 
accumulating) for a profitable presentation of this the- 
ory of the question of the former inhabitants of North 
America. 
The character of food has doubtless much to do 
with physical development as well as with courage and 
mental characteristics.^ Observation has fully estab- 
It is probable that the early inhabitants of North America, partic- 
ularly those dwelling along the sea-coast and large rivers, derived, 
for many generations, most of their food from shell-fish. This hypoth- 
esis is strengthened by the numerous great shell-heaps found all 
along the Atlantic coast, and frequently referred to by the early ex- 
plorers and settlers. Dr. Brickell, in his Natural History of North 
Carolina, published 1737, page 289, says; 
" It is very strange to see in all the places where they [the Indians] 
have been formerly settled, or had their towns near the salt waters, 
what vast quantities of oyster-shells are to be met with on the banks of 
the rivers, in such heaps that it is surprising to behold them. One 
might reasonably imagine, by such great quantities as are there, that 
they scarce lived upon anything else, or that they must have been 
settled many hundred years in one place, which is not common 
amongst them, being a people always shifting from one place to an- 
other, as their fancies led them." Vast shell-heaps in the State of 
New York were noticed by Father Isaac Jacques (see his "Description 
of New Netherland," written in i642-'43). 
Sir Charles Lyell describes the great shell-mounds on St. Simon's- 
Island, near the mouth cf the Altamaha River, Georgia. 
Shell-heaps are also found on the Tennessee River, at the town of 
