199 VIEWS OF LOUISIANA., 
the American tribes and the Jews,; Lapiteau shews the existence 
of a still greater number common to the Greeks and Romans, thq 
result to the philosophic mind is no more than this, that the A- 
merican tribes belong to the human race, and that men, without 
any intercourse with each other, will, in innumerable instances, 
fall upon the same mode of acting. The wonder would be, that 
they should not shew a resemblance. Man is every where found 
in societies, under governments, addicted to war, hunting, or ag¬ 
riculture, and fond of dances, shows, and distinction. Perhaps 
tht first employment of a numerous population when not en¬ 
gaged in war, would be in heaping up piles of earth, the rudest 
and most common species of human labor. We find these 
mounds in every part of the globe ; in the north of Europe, and 
in Great Britain, they are numerous, and much resemble ours, 
but less considerable. The pyramids of Egypt are perhaps the 
oldest monuments of human labor in that country, so favorable 
to the production of a numerous population. The pyramids of 
Mexico, which are but little known, and yet scarcely less con¬ 
siderable, like tiiose ot Egypt have there origin hid in the night 
of oblivion. Humboldt is of opinion, that a these edifices must 
be classed with the pyramidal monuments of Asia, of which 
traces were found even in Arcadia; for the conical mausoleum 
of Caliistus was a true tumulus, covered with fruit trees, and 
served for a base to a small temple consecrated to Diana.” The 
Greeks, who were successful in the chariot races at tne Olym¬ 
pic games, to shew their gratitude to their horses, gave them 
an honorable burial, and even erected pyramids over their graves. 
The great.altar of Jupiter,, at Olympia, was nothing more than a 
huge mound of-earth, with stone steps to ascend. Humboldt* re¬ 
marks with astonishment, the striking similarity of the Asiatic 
and Egyptian pyramids, to those of Mexico, The similarity of 
those which he describes, to the mounds or pyramids on the Mis!) 
sissippi, is still more striking, but not a matter of so much won¬ 
der. The only difference is, that a few of the Mexican pyramids 
are larger, and some appear to have been faced with stone or 
See Appendix, No. I. 
