countries as cold and gloomy, from which they again turned towards the
South.

Without committing himself to a theory, M. de Bourbourg supposes that
one race--the Quiche--has passed through the whole North American
continent, erecting at different stages of its civilization those
gigantic and mysterious pyramids, the _tumuli_ of the Mississippi
Valley,--of whose origin the present Northern Indian tribes have
preserved no trace, and for whose erection no single American tribe
now would have the wealth or the superfluous labor. This race was
continually driven towards the South by more savage tribes, and it at
length reached its favorite seats and the height of its civilization in
Central America. In comparing the similar monuments of Southern Siberia,
and the dates of the immigration to the Aztec plateau, with those of
the first movements of the Huns and the great revolutions in Asia, an
indication is given, worthy of being followed up by the ethnologist,
of the Asiatic origin of the Central American tribes. The traditions,
monuments, customs, mythology, and astronomic systems all point to a
similar source.

The thorough study of the aboriginal races reveals the fact, that the
whole continent, from the Arctic regions to the Southern Pole, was
divided irregularly between two distinct families;--one nomadic
and savage, the other agricultural and semi-civilized; one with no
institutions or polity or organized religion, the other with regular
forms of government and hierarchical and religious systems. Though
differing so widely, and little associated with each other, they
possessed an analogous physical constitution, analogous customs, idioms,
and grammatical forms, many of which were entirely different from those
of the Old World.