He has obtained a rich

ceived a precious gem from you. feather. May our Lord be praised, since he has happily preserved you from danger, and from the warfare which you fought with death at the time of your delivery. Perhaps the days of the babe to which you have just given birth, will outnumber yours; perhaps it may be the will of the Lord that he shall live; perhaps He that made him will come and take him from us unto himself; perhaps He will pass him momentarily before the eyes of His Kingdom and Majesty, and deprive us of him, turning us into shame because of our sins, because we are unworthy of enjoying him.1 O let the will of the Lord be done! Let him do what seemeth good unto him. In Him let us place our hope."

"Here in your presence, the babe of our Lord is born, which is like unto a precious gem, or rich feather, on whose face you have already fixed your eyes. The child is indeed a plant set by his sires: he is as it were a fragment of a jewel cut by the ancients, who are long since no more. Our Lord has given this child to us, but we cannot tell whether he will live, or be like a vision seen in a dream. Our eyes now contemplate the infant which has been born; that which I am at liberty to declare, is, that our Lord Quetzalcoatl, who is the Creator, has placed a precious stone, and one of His rich feathers in the dust before us, and in this poor canebuilt lodge, and I may likewise add, that He has ornamented

1 "It is evident from the concluding part of this salutation, that the Mexican religion, enjoined resignation and submission to the divine will and hope in God, which after all, is not an article in any particular creed, but a consolation which was poured into the cup of misfortune when first presented to man to taste, &c. We cannot omit carefully to point out here the phrase 'your mother the godess Ciocoatliquilachtli,' since it is perfectly analogous to that of our Mother Eve, she being the Eve of the New World, who as the Mexicans believed, brought sin into the world, and entailed death upon her posterity, as is distinctly stated in the 63rd chapter of the 6th vol. of Sahagun. This goddess is more frequently named simply Ciocoatli or Quilachtli. She is also named Suchiquecal, or Xochequecal, and in the same manner as the first seems to refer to her temptation by the serpent, so the last seems to allude to her having plucked the forbidden fruit, or roses in Xochitlicacan, or the garden of Eden." Ibid.

your neck and wrists with costly jems and rich feathers, such as are difficult to be obtained even for a price, and further, that He has placed in your hands a handful of rich feathers called Quetzalli, of perfect form and colour. In return for so signal an act of grace, it is meet that you should address yourself with tears, and prayers, and vows to our Lord, whose presence is every where; sigh and mourn until you know whether it be His will, that this precious stone and rich feather, of which we are speaking like persons in a dream, shall live. We know not whether he will grow and arrive at maturity, or whether his term of life will be a few days or years, or whether he will be the image, and glory, and renown of the elders, (who have already passed away) from whom he descends. We know not whether peradventure, he will resuscitate the fortunes, and raise the heads of his forefathers."

"The concluding sentence of this passage is very remarkable; proceeding from the lips of the Mexicans, it is enigmatical and unintelligible; since, if we reflect for a moment that the Mexican Empire was, according to the testimony of all historians at the height of its greatness in the reign of Montezuma, the wish here expressed must appear alike devoid of meaning and application, except Mexican History was something very different from what historians have represented it to be; but in the month of a Hebrew the allusion would be plain, and would strikingly illustrate the truth of a remark previously made in p. 385, that the Jews, wherever residing, and however well off in their temporal concerns, have been accustomed to indulge in a tone of complaint ever since the fall of their Kingdom. It has also a tincture of Hebrew rhetoric, since children are in many

1 "The Mexicans considered the Messiah, as regarded his godhead, the Father of the everlasting age; and as regarded his human nature, the Son, to be born of their race."

parts of Scripture, named the ornaments of their parents, and Christ is called the image of the Father's glory."

Her restored tribes are moreover called the ornaments with which Jerusalem shall attire herself anew, as a bride doth.

The Honourable Elias Boudinot mentions an Indian1 tradition, which intimates that nine parts of their people out of ten went over the river, but the remainder staid behind.

Sir Alexander M'Kenzie says of the Chippawayian tribe,

1 'As the Indian nations have not the assistance afforded by the means of writing and reading, they are obliged to have recourse to tradition, as Du Pratz, 2 vol. 169, has justly observed, to preserve the remembrance of remarkable transactions or historical facts; and this tradition cannot be preserved but by frequent repetitions; consequently many of their young men are often employed in hearkening to the old beloved men, narrating the history of their ancestors, which is thus transmitted from generation to generation. In order to preserve them pure and incorrupt, they are careful not to deliver them indifferently to all their young people, but only to those young men of whom they have the best opinion. They hold it as a certain fact, as delivered down from their ancestors, that their forefathers, in very remote ages, came from a far distant country, by the way of the west, where all the people were of one colour, and that in process of time they moved eastward to their present settlements.

This tradition is corroborated by a current report among them, related by the old Chickkasah Indians to our traders, that now about one hundred years ago, there came from Mexico some of the old Chickkasah nation, or as the Spaniards call them, Chichemicas, in quest of their brethren, as far north as the Aquahpah nation, above one hundred and thirty miles above the Natchez, on the south-east side of the Mississippi river; but through French policy they were either killed or sent back, so as to prevent their opening a brotherly intercourse with them, as they had proposed. It is also said, that the Nauatalcas believe that they dwelt in another region before they settled in Mexico. That their forefathers wandered eighty years in search of it, through a strict obedience to the commands of the Great Spirit; who ordered them to go in quest of new lands, that had such particular marks as were made known to them, and they punctually obeyed the divine mandate, and by that means found out and settled that fertile country of Mexico.

'Our southern Indians have also a tradition among them which they firmly believe, that of old time, their ancestors lived beyond a great river. That nine parts of their nation, out of ten, passed over the river, but the remainder refused, and staid behind. That they had a king when they lived far to the west, who left two sons. That one of them, with a number of his people, travelled a great way for many years, till they came to Delaware river, and settled there. That many years the king of the country from which they had emigrated, sent a party in search of them, but they have never been heard of since.

'It is said among their principal or beloved men, that they have it handed down from their ancestors, that the book which the white people have was once theirs. That while they had it they prospered exceedingly; but that the white people bought it of them, and learnt many things from it; while the Indians lost their credit, offended the Great Spirit, and suffered exceedingly from the neigh

far to the north west. They have a tradition among them, that they came from another country, and had traversed a great water, which was in one place narrow and full of islands, where they had suffered great misery, it being always winter there, with ice and deep snows. At the copper-mine river, where they first made land, the ground was covered with copper, over which a body of earth has since been collected."

bouring nations. That the Great Spirit took pity on them and directed them to this country. That on their way they came to a great river, which they could not pass, when God dried up the waters, and they passed over dry-shod. They also say that their forefathers were possessed of an extraordinary Divine Spirit, by which they foretold future events, and controlled the common course of nature, and this they transmitted to their offspring, on condition of their obeying the sacred laws. That they did by these means, bring down showers of plenty on the beloved people. But that this power, for a long time past, had entirely ceased.

'Can any man read this short account of Indian traditions, drawn from tribes of various nations, from the west to the east, and from the south to the north, wholly separated from each other, written by different authors of the best characters, both for knowledge and integrity, possessing the best means of infor mation, at various and distant times, without any possible communication with each other, and from ocular and sensible demonstration; written on the spot in several instances, with the relators before them; and yet suppose that all this is either the effect of chance, accident, or design, from a love of the marvellous or a premeditated intention of deceiving, and thereby ruining their own well established reputations?

'Charlevoix was a clergyman of character, who was with the Indians some years, and travelled from Canada to the Mississippi, in that early day.

'Adair lived forty years entirely domesticated with the southern Indians, and was a man of learning and great observation. Just before the revolutionary war he brought his manuscript to Elizabeth-Town, in New-Jersey, to William Livingston, Esq. (a neighbour of the writer) to have it examined and corrected, which was prevented by troubles of a political nature, just breaking out. The Rev. Mr. Brainerd was a man of remarkable piety, and a missionary with the Crosweek Indians to his death. Doctor Edwards was eminent for his worth and learning, and was intimately acquainted with the Indians from his youth. Doctor Beatty was a clergymen of note, and established character. Bertram was a man well known to the writer, and travelled the country of the southern Indians as a botanist, and was a man of considerable discernment, and had great means of knowledge; and M'Kenzie, in the employment of the north west company, was an old trader, and the first adventurous explorer of the country, from the lake of the woods to the ocean, &c.

'The Indian tradition says, that their forefathers, in very remote ages, came from a far distant country, where all the people were of one colour, and that in process of time, they moved eastward to their present settlements.

'This tradition is corroborated by a current report of the old Chickkasah Indians to our traders, about forty years since, (this was written in the year 1775).

193

THE TOLTICS OR TULIANS.

"A NORTHERN, but very polished nation, the Toltics, appears in the mountains of Anahuac, on the east gulph of California; declares itself expelled from a country lying north-west of Rio Gila, and called Hue-hue-Tlapallan; and brings with it paintings indicating year by year the events of its migration," &c.

It is very remarkable moreover, that the names which the Toltics bestowed on the cities they built, were those of the countries which they had been compelled to abandon; from this circumstance, the origin of the Toltics, the Chermecks, the Acolhuan, and the Aztics, who spoke the same language, &c. will be known if we ever discover in the North of America, or in Asia, a people acquainted with the names1 of Hue-hue-Tlapallan,-Aztlan,-TEO-colhuacan,Amaquemacan,-Tehuago and Cozulla.'-Humboldt, p. 179.

"The Toltecas," who were great artists, and who excelled in working jewellery, probably recollected the words of David-"If I forget thee, O Jerusalem!" and it is a

The Mexicans and several other nations, it is to be recollected, had fallen into the disuse of many alphabetic sounds which distinguish the Hebrew language. The substitution of for r, of c for m, &c. must necessarily disguise the pronunciation of Hebrew terms: to which cause of obscurity may be added the termination of tzin, atl, can, itli, and others. Thus we arrive at the knowledge of the identity of the name of the virgin of Tula, not by the sound, but by observing that Miriam, the sister of Moses and Aaron, who was excluded certain days from the camp or congregation for contending with her brother, has the same name as that by which they designate the virgin of Tula, viz.* Chemalman. Thus also we discover Mox or Moxic is by another nation pronounced Cozes, as they substitute x for j, and sometimes c for m.

* Chiribrias is another appellative-that of the, Chiapanese.