Conquest of Mexico
Page 398 (3).—"Thus the Toltecs who escaped fled to the coasts of the Sea of the South and of the North, settling in Huatimala, Tecuantepec, Cuauhzacualco, Campechy, Tecolotlan, and on the islands and shores of one sea and the other, where afterwards they multiplied."—Ixtlilxocbitl, Relaciones, MS., No. 5.
Page 398 (4).—Herrera, Hist. General, dec. 4, lib. 10, cap. 1-4.—Cogolludo, Hist. de Yucatan, lib. 4, cap. 5.—Pet. Martyr, De Insulis, nuper Inventis, pp. 334-340. M. Waldeck comes to just the opposite inference, namely, that the inhabitants of Yucatan were the true sources of the Toltec and Aztec civilisation. (Voyage en Yucatan, p. 72.) "Doubt must be our lot in everything," exclaims the honest Captain Dupaix,—"the true faith always excepted."—Antiquités Mexicaines, tom. i. p. 21.
Page 398 (5).—"Not one of all those writers makes it plain who were the builders; wherein fate is just, which has decreed that the authors of such vainglorious works should be forgotten."— Pliny, Hist. Nat., lib. 36, cap. 17.
Page 398 (6).—Ante, vol. i. p. 104.
Page 399 (1).—At least, this is true of the etymology of these languages, and, as such, was adduced by Mr. Edward Everett, in his Lectures on the aboriginal civilisation of America, forming part of a course delivered some years since by that acute and highly accomplished scholar.
Page 399 (2).—The mixed breed, from the buffalo and the European stock, was known formerly in the north-western counties of Virginia, says Mr. Gallatin (Synopsis, sec. 5); who is, however, mistaken in asserting, that "the bison is not known to have ever been domesticated by the Indians." (Ubi supra.) Gomara speaks of a nation, dwelling in about the 40th degree north latitude, on the north-western borders of New Spain, whose chief wealth was in droves of these cattle (buyes con una giba sobre la cruz, " oxen with a hump on the shoulders"), from which they got their clothing, food, and drink, which last, however, appears to have been only the blood of the animal.—Historia de las Indias, cap. 214, ap. Barcia, tom. ii.
Page 399 (3).—The people of parts of China, for example, and, above all, of Cochin China, who never milk their cows, according to Macartney, cited by Humboldt, Essai Politique, tom. iii. p. 58, note.—See also, p. 118.
Page 399 (4).—The native regions of the buffalo were the vast prairies of the Missouri, and they wandered over the long reach of country east of the Rocky Mountains, from 55° north, to the head-waters of the streams between the Mississippi and the Rio del Norte. The Columbia plains, says Gallatin, were as naked of game as of trees. (Synopsis, sec. 5.) That the bison was sometimes found, also, on the other side of the mountains, is plain from Gomara's statement. (Hist. de las Ind., cap. 214, ap. Barcia, tom. ii.) See, also, Laet, who traces their southern wanderings to the river Vaquimi (?), in the province of Cinaloa, on the Californian Gulf.-—Novus Orbis (Lug. Bat. 1633), p. 286.
Page 400 (1).—Ante, vol. i. p. 91. Thus Lucretius, "The use of bronze was known before that of iron, since its nature is more ductile, and it occurs in greater plenty. With bronze alone they laboured the fields, and with bronze they aroused the billows of war."— De Rerum, Natura, lib. 5. According to Carli, the Chinese were acquainted with iron 3000 years before Christ. (Lettres Améric, tom. .ii. p. 63.) Sir J. C. Wilkinson, in an elaborate inquiry into its first appearance among the people of Europe and Western Asia, finds no traces of it earlier than the sixteenth century before the Christian era. (Ancient Egyptians, vol. iii. pp. 241-246.) The origin of the most useful arts is lost in darkness. Their very utility is one cause of this from the rapidity with which they are diffused among distant nations. Another cause is, that in the first ages of the discovery, men are more occupied with availing themselves of it than with recording its history; until time turns history into fiction. Instances are familiar to every schoolboy.
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