evident by his account of the complexion of those he found in the
harbor of the great bay in latitude 41 Degrees 40", who are
described as essentially different and the finest looking tribe they
had seen, being "of a very white complexion, some inclining more to
white, and others to a yellow color" (di colore bianchissimo; alcuni
pendano piu in bianchezza, altri in colore flavo). The difference
between the inhabitants of the two sections of country, in respect
to color, is thus drawn in actual contrast.

This is unfounded in fact. No black aborigines have ever been found
within the entire limits of North America, except in California
where some are said to exist. The Indians of the Atlantic coast were
uniformly of a tawny or yellowish brown color, made more conspicuous
by age and exposure and being almost white in infancy. The first
voyagers and early European settlers universally concur in assigning
them this complexion. Reference need here be to such testimony only
as relates to the two parts of the country where the distinction is
pretended to have existed. The earliest mention of the inhabitants
of the more southerly portion is when the vessels of Ayllon and
Matienzo carried off sixty of the Indians from the neighborhood of
the Santee, called the Jordan, in 1521, and took them to St.
Domingo. One of them went to Spain with Ayllon. They are described
by Peter Martyr, from sight, as semifuscos uti nostri sunt agricolae
sole adusti aestivo, half brown, like our husbandmen, burnt by the
summer sun. [Footnote: Dec. VII, 2.] Barlowe, in his account of the
first expedition of Raleigh, which entered Pamlico sound, within the
region now under consideration, describes the Indians whom he found
there as of a "colour yellowish." [Footnote: Hakluyt, III. 248.]
Captain John Smith, speaking of those of the Chesapeake, remarks,
that they "are of a color brown when they are of age, but they are