of Good Hope answers our purpose. Osteologically, they are as distinct
from each other as the skull of a fossil hyena is from that of a
prairie wolf; at the same time that each human cranium is emphatically
typical of the race to which it appertains.
But, if comparison of an antique American cranium (Pig. 198)
with the skull of a modern Bushman (Pig. 200), evolves instantane-»
ously such palpable contrasts, still more extraordinary and startling
are those which resile when we* compare either or both with one of
the primeval “ kumbe-kephalic,” or boat-shaped skulls (Figs. 201, 202),
Pie. 202.
Fig . 201.
exhumed from the pre-Celtic cairns of Scotland.376 pan anything
human be more diverse than the osteológica! conformation of the most
ancient type of man known in America from that of the primordial
Briton ? Be it duly noted, too, that while, on the American continent,
the earliest cranium resulting from Squier’s researches is every
way identical (as we shall demonstrate hereinafter) with crania of the
Creeks, and other Indian nations of our own generation, men of this
kumbe-kephalic type occupied the British Isles long prior to the advent
of those brachy-kephalic races, who were precursors of the old
Celts; themselves, in Britain, antedating all history! Of this fact
W il so n ’s Archceology of Scotland furnishes exuberant evidences; to
be enlarged upon by us in dealing with “ Comparative Anatomy.”
Hamilton Smith and Morton have contended that no test is
known1 by which fossil human are distinguishable from other fossil
bones of extinct species.377 The question, to say the least, is an open
one; although none can aver that, there are not human fossils as old
as those of the mastodon and other extinct animals. The following
extract from Morton’s memoir is interesting, táken in connection
with the American type: —
“ It is necessary to advert to the discoveries of Dr. Lund, among the bone-caves of Minas
Gerdas, in Brazil. This distinguished traveller has found the remains of man in these
caverns associated with those of extinct genera and species of animals; and the attendant
circumstances lead to the reasonable conclusion that they were contemporaneous inhabitants
of the region in which they were found. Yet, even here, the form of the skull differs
in nothing from the acknowledged type, unless it be in the still greater depression of the
forehead and a peculiarity of form in the teeth. With respect, to the latter, Dr. Lund
describes the incisors as having an oval surface, of which the axis is antero-posterior, in
place of the sharp and chisel-like edge of ordinary teeth of the same class. He assures us,
that he found it equally in the young and the aged, and is confident it is not the result of
attrition, as is manifestly the case in those Egyptian heads in which Professor Blumenbach
noticed an analogous peculiarity. I am not prepared to question an opinion which I have
not been able to test by personal observation; but it is obvious that, if such differences
exist independently of art or accident, they are at least specific, and consequently of the
highest interest in ethnology.
“ The head of the celebrated Guadeloupe skeleton forms no exception to the type of the
race. The skeleton itself, which is in a semi-fossil state, is preserved in the British Museum
but wants the cranium, which, however, is supposed to be recovered in the one
found by M. L’Himinier, in Guadaloupe, and brought by him to Charleston, South Carolina.
Dr. Moultrie, who has described this very interesting relic, makes the following observations
: > Compared with the cranium of a Peruvian presented to Professor Holbrook,
by Dr. Morton, in the Museum of the State of South Carolina, the craniological similarity
manifested between them is too striking to permit us to question their national identity,
There is in both the same coronal elevation, occipital compression, and lateral protuberance,
accompanied with frontal depression, which mark the American variety in
general. ’ ”
It seems clear, tbattbe Indians of America are indigenous to tbe
soil; but it does not follow, that in ancient times there might not
have been some occasional or accidental immigrations from the Old
World, though too small to aifect materially the language or the type
of the aborigines. There are several quite recent examples recorded,
where boats with persons in them have been blown, from the Pacific
islands' and other distant parts, to the shores of America; and in this
way may be explained certain facts, connected with language, which
have been adduced as evidence of Asiatic origin for our Indians.
But we protest, in the name of science, against the notion that any
of these ancient possihilities have yet entered into the category of
ascertained facts. On the contrary, all known anatomical, archaeological,
and monumental proofs oppose such hypothesis.
Possible, also, is it that the Northmen discovered this country
several hundred years before Columbus, and held intercourse with it
as far as Labrador; yet they have left no trace of tongue nor vestige
of art.
Agriculture is acknowledged on all hands to have incited the first
steps toward civilization, and, for some most curious facts on this head,
the reader is referred to Mr. Gallatin’s paper.378 Was the agriculture
found in America by the Whites, introduced at an early epoch from
abroad, or was it of domestic origin? This question has excited