NORTH AMERICAN INDIANS.              75

aged; and lastly, to see that they never quarrelled among
themselves with those indecent expressions, and the oaths
and curses so common among the whites. All these are
proofs of good sense, and a great command of temper.
  -The Indians have been frequently misrepresented by
writers, who have been either prejudiced against them from
some impure motives, or who had been too transiently resi-
dent amongt them, to ascertain with any accuracy the real
character of -the Indians ; for the Indians are not communi-
cative in relation to their national peculiarities, or original
descent. It requires, therefore, a good deal of familiar, at-
.tentive,'and unsuspecting observation to obtain any knowl-
edge respecting them, as they have neither records nor oral
tradition to throw any degree of satisfactory light on their
character and descent.
a The speculative opinions of several historians who wrote
concerning the religion of the Indian tribes of America, and
the question, whence America might have been peopled,
led to many misrepresentations of the religious rites, lan-
guage, and customs of its original inhabitants. They dis-
covered affinities which existed no where, but in the fanci-
ful invention of the discoverers. Gomara, Lerius, and Les-
carbot inferred, from some resemblance of this kind, that
America had been peopled -by the Canaanites, when they
were expelled by Joshua. The celebrated Grotius, adopt-
ing the opinion of Martyr, imagined that Yucatan, a pro-
vince of New Spain, was first colonized by the Ethiopians,
and that those Ethiopians were Christians. The human
mind derives pleasure from paradox, for the same reason
that it delights in wit. Both produce new and surprising
combinations of thought, and the judgment being overa
powered by the fervours of imagination, becomes for a time
insensible to their extravagance.
   The opinion extensively prevails, that the North Ameri-
can Indians are descendants of the tribes of Israel. This
so possessed the mind of Adair, that, although he had the
grq4est opportunity of obtaining knowledge, his book is
comparatively of little use. We are constantly led to SUs-
pevt the fidelity of his statements, because his judgment