H2 
SUPPOSED DESUMRUANCEB. 
parallel with the isthinus of Panama, and supposed by some 
geographers to join the peninsula of Florida to the north- 
east extremity of South America. It is the eastern shore 
of an inland sea, which may be considered as a basin with 
several outlets. This peculiar configuration of the land has 
served to support the different systems of migration, by 
which it has been attempted to explain the settlement of 
the nations of the Carib race in the islands and on the 
neighbouring continent. The Caribs of the continent admit 
that the small West India Islands were anciently inhabited 
by the Arowaks,* a warlike nation, the great Vnass of which 
still inhabit the insalubrious shores of Surinam and Berbice. 
They assert that the Arowaks, witli the exception of the 
women, were all exterminated by Caribs, who came from the 
mouths of the Orinoco. In support of this tradition, 
they refer to the ti-aces of analogy existing between the Ian- ■ 
guage of the Arowaks and that of the Carib women ; but it 
must be recollected that the Arowaks, though the enemies 
of the Caribs, belonged to the same branch of people ; and 
that the same analogy exists between the Arowak and Carib 
languages, as between the Oreek and the Persian, the Ger- 
man and the Sanscrit. According to opother tradition, the 
Caribs of the islands came from the south, not as conquerors, 
but because they were expelled from Guiana by the Arowaks, 
who origmally ruled over all the neighbouring nations. 
Finally, a third tradition, much more general and more pro- 
bable, represents the Caribs as having come from Florida, 
in Xorth America. Mr. Bristock, a traveller who has col- 
lected every particular relating to these migrations from 
north to south, asserts, that a tribe of Confachites (Con- 
facliiqiii)t had long waged war against the Apalachites ; that 
the latter, having yielded to that tribe the fertile district of ! 
Amana, called their new confederates “Caribes” (that is, 
belong to history, but simply to denote that we are ignorant of the ^ ( 
“ autocthoni ” having been preceded by any other people. * i 
* Arokaques. The missionary Quandt (Nacbricht von Surinam, 1807, ^ 
p. 47) calls them Arawackes. ~ 
+ The province of Confachiqui, which in 1511 became subject to a 
w oman, is celebrated by the expedition of Hernando da Soto to Florida. 
Among the nations of the Huron tongue, .and the Attakapas, the supreme ' 
mtliority was also often exercised by women. 
