NORTH AMERICAN INDIANS



307



ment in some of the arts than our present race of red
men. *But as we have not undertaken to illustrate this
subject, we shall leave it in the hands of those who claim
it as their peculiar province.



  In finishing this inquiry concerninz the original of the
North American Indians, we beg leave to conclude with
a few observations fr-om the learned disquisition of Ro-
bertson in his History of South America, on this same
subject
  "From considering the animals with which America
is stored," says the learned author, "we may conclude
that the nearest point of contact between the old and new
continents is-towards the northern extremity of both, and
that there the communication was opened, and the in-
tercourse carried on between them. All the extensive
countries in America which lie within the tropics, or ap-
proach near to them are filled with indigenous animals
of various kinds, entirely different from those in the cor-
responding regions of the ancient continent. But the
northern provinces of the new world abound with many
of the wild animals which are common in such parts of
our hemisphere as lie in a similar situation. The bear,
£1a



the wolt the fbx, the hare, the
and several other species, freqi
America, no less than those in



Asia. - It seet
nents approac
united, or so .
pass from the
  " The lctu



ns to b
th each
nearly
one to
al viciri



e evident,
other in t
adjacent ti
the other.
LJtv of the



deer, th
tent th



e roebuck, the elk,
e forests of North



. the north of Europe and
, then, that the two conti.
his quarter, and are either
hat these animals might

tw~o continents is SO clear-



ly established by modern discoveries, that the chief dif-
ficulty with respect to the peopling of America is remov-
ed.  While those immense regions which stretch east-
ward from the river Oby to the sea of Kamschatka wele
unknown or imperfectly explored, the north-east extremi-
ties of our hemisphere were supposed to be so far distant
from any part of the new world, that it was not easy to