[223] See Appendix, No. XLVI. (vol. II.)
[224] "In both Americas it is a matter of inquiry what was the intention of the natives when they raised so many artificial hills, several of which appear to have served neither as mounds, nor watch-towers, nor the base of a temple. A custom established in Eastern Asia may throw some light on this important question. Two thousand three hundred years before our era, sacrifices were offered in China to the Supreme Being, Chan-Ty, on four great mountains called the Four Yo. The sovereigns, finding it inconvenient to go thither in person, caused eminences representing these mountains to be erected by the hands of men near their habitations."—Voyage of Lord Macartney, vol. i., p. 58; Hager, Monument of Yu, p. 10, 1802.
[225] Mr. Flint asserts, "that the greatest population clearly has been in those positions where the most dense future population will be."—P. 166.
[226] "The bones of animals and snakes have sometimes been found mixed with human bones in these tumuli, and out of one near Cincinnati were dug two large marine shells, one of which was the Cassis cornulus of the Asiatic islands, the other the Fulgur perversus of the coast of Georgia and East Florida; and this is an additional argument used in favor of the alleged intercourse existing anciently between the Indians of this part of North America and the inhabitants of Asia, and between them and those of the Atlantic. Many circumstances still existing give probability to the popular belief that the American Indians had their origin in Asia. In their persons, color, and reserved disposition, they have a strong resemblance to the Malays of the Oriental Archipelago—that is to say, to some of the Tartar tribes of Upper Asia; and it is a remarkable circumstance, that, like those, they shave the head, leaving only a single lock of hair. The picture language of the Mexicans, as corresponding with the ancient picture language of China, and the quipos of Peru with the knotted and party-colored cords which the Chinese history informs us were in use in the early period of the empire, may also be adduced as corroborative evidence. The high cheek bones and the elongated eye of the two people, besides other personal resemblances, suggest the probability of a common origin."—Quarterly Review, No. LVII., p. 13.
"The Iroquois and Hurons made hieroglyphic paintings on wood, which bear a striking resemblance to those of the Mexicans."—Lafitau, vol. ii., p. 43, 225; La Houtan, p. 193.
"A long struggle between two religious sects, the Brahmans and the Buddhists, terminated by the emigration of the Chamans to Thibet. Mongolia, China, and Japan. If tribes of the Tartar race have passed over to the northwest coast of America, and thence to the south and the east, toward the banks of Gila, and those of the Missouri, as etymological researches serve to indicate, we should be less surprised at finding among the semi-barbarous nations of the New Continent idols and monuments of architecture, a hieroglyphical writing, and exact knowledge of the duration of the year, and traditions respecting the first state of the world, recalling to our minds the arts, the sciences, and religious opinions of the Asiatic nations."—Humboldt's Researches.
In his description of a Mexican painting, Humboldt observes, "The slave on the left is like the figure of those saints which we see frequently in Hindoo paintings, and which the navigator Roblet found on the northwest coast of America, among the hieroglyphical paintings of the natives of Cox's Channel."—Merchant's Voyage, vol. i., p. 312.
"It is probably by philosophical and antiquarian researches in Tartary that the history of those civilized nations of North America, of whose great works only the wreck remains, will alone be elucidated."—See Bancroft's History of the United States, vol. iii., chap. xxii.; and Stephens's Central America, vol. i., p. 96; vol. ii., chap, xxvi., p. 186, 357, 413, 433. Sec Appendix, No. XLVII.
[227] "The five nations were the Mohawks, the Oneidas, the Cayugas, the Onondagas, and the Senecas. The Dutch called them Maquas, the French Iroquois; their appellation at home was the Mingoes, and sometimes the Aganuschion, or United People."—Governor Clinton's Discourse before New York Historical Society, 1811.
The Iroquois have often, among Europeans, been termed the Romans of the West. "Le nom d'Iroquois est purement françois, et a été forme du terme Hiro, qui signifie, J'ai dit, par lequel ces sauvages finissent tout leur discours, comme les Latins faisaient autrefois par leur Dixi; et de Koué, qui est un cri, tantôt de tristesse, lorsqu' on le prononce en traînant, et tantôt de joie, lorsqu'on le prononce plus court. Leur nom propre est Agonnonsionni, qui veut dire, Faiseurs de Cabannes; parcequ'ils les bâtissent beaucoup plus solides, que la plupart des autres sauvages."—Charlevoix, tom. i., p. 421.
Lafitau gives the Iroquois the same name of Agonnonsionni; they used to say of themselves that the five nations of which they were composed formed but one "Cabane."
[228] "Le Père Brebeuf comptoit environ trente mille âmes de vrais Hurons, distribués en vingt villages de la nation. Il y avoit outre cela, douze nations sédentaires et nombreuses, qui parloient leur langue. La plupart de ces nations ne subsistent plus, les Iroquois ces ont detruites. Les vrais Hurons sont réduits aujourd'hui à la petite mission de Lorette, qui est près de Quebec, où l'on voit le Christianisme fleurir avec l'édification de tous les Français, à la nation des Tionnontatès qui sont établis au Détroit, et à une autre nation qui s'est refugiée à la Carolina."—Charlevoix, 1721.
"The Tionnontatès mentioned above now bear the name of Wyandots, and are a striking exception to the degeneracy which usually attends the intercourse of Indians with Europeans. The Wyandots have all the energy of the savage warrior, with the intelligence and docility of civilized troops. They are Christians, and remarkable for orderly and inoffensive conduct; but as enemies, they are among the most dreadful of their race. They were all mounted (in the war of 1812–13), fearless, active, enterprising; to contend with them in the forest was hopeless, and to avoid their pursuit, impossible.
"It is worthy of remark, that the Wyandots are the only part of the Huron nation who ever joined in alliance with the English. The mass of the Hurons were always the faithful friends of the French during the times of the early settlement of Canada."—Quarterly Review.
[229] The extremes of heat and cold are as unfavorable to intellectual as to physical superiority,[230] a fact which may be easily traced throughout the vast and varied extent of the two Americas. "As far as the parallel of 53°, the temperature of the northwest coast