his posterity rebelled against the religion of Noah and Shem, and the other patriarchs, under the rule of the terrible Nimrod, the grandson of Ham and son of Cush — Nimrod being the black king of Babel, who was the first sovereign and tyrant of the age, as well as the abettor of idolatry. On this account, it is not likely that the descendants of Ham, nor Ham himself, would visit Noah, as they remembered the curse, and their doom to servitude to be accomplished sooner or later.
In accordance with this conjecture, founded on Jewish tradition, namely, that Nimrod headed the great rebellion of his time against Noah and Shem's religion, we relate the following: The Hottentot negroes of Africa, who, as contended by Barrows, page 281, are the descendants of the ancient Egyptians, and who (see Cook's Voyages, page 103) refuse to worship the greatest of the gods, whom they call Goun-ya Taquoa, or the God of gods, because, as they allege, he cursed their parents for a certain very great sin. In this reason of theirs, for not worshiping that great God, is there not a direct and plain traditionary allusion to the curse of Noah, and in that curse the decree of God against Ham and the negro race, which took place in the affair of Ham's seeing his father in his repose. That the Hottentots are descended from the negroes of Egypt and Canaan, is evident from their great veneration of a certain fly, or bug, which is of a bright gold color, and which they worship in ecstasies as a god. Baalzabub, or a certain fly, of old Canaan, was worshiped by the Canaanites, and is the same so often alluded to in the Bible.
