was to perform the man eating required by public authority. The last of their cannibal feasts was on the body of a white man, of Kentucky, about forty years ago. The appointment of the committee to eat human flesh, has since that time, gradually become obsolete; but the oldest and last member of this cannibal society is well remembered, and died only a few years ago.

A very circumstantial description of a cannibal feast, where a soup was made of the body of an Englishman, at Michilimackinack, about the year 1760, is given by Alexander Henry, Esq., in his book of travels through Canada and the indian, territories. In that work it is stated that man eating was then, and always had been, practised among the Indian nations, on returning from war, or on overcoming their enemies, for the purpose of giving them courage to attack, and resolution to die."-Medical Repository, vol. 14, pp. 261, 262.

As extraordinary as this may appear, we are informed by Baron Humboldt, in his personal narrative, that "in Egypt, in the 13th century, five or six hundred years ago, the habit of eating human flesh pervaded all classes of society. Extraordinary snares were spread, for physicians in particular. They were called to attend persons who pretended to be sick, but who were only hungry, and it was not in order to be consulted, but devoured.”

Situated west, northwest and southwest of North America, in the Pacific Ocean, are a vast number of islands, scattered over all that immense body of water, extending in groups quite across to China, along the whole Asiatic coast. The general character of these islanders is similar, though somewhat diversified in language, in complexion are much the same, which is copper, with the exception only of now and then people of the African descent, and those of the Japan islands, who are white.

By examining Morse, we find them in the practice of scarificing human beings, and also of devouring them, as we find the savages of America were accustomed to do from time immemorial; having but recently suspended the appalling custom.

From this similarity, an account of which, however, might be extended in detail to a vast amount, existing between these islanders, and the disinterred remains of the exterminated race, who, as it is supposed, built most of the works of the west, it is inferred they are the same. Their complexion and manners agree, at the

present time, with the people of these islands; we mean those of the Malay race, yet remaining in South America, in their native state of Society.

Also the natives of the Caribbean islands, in the Caribbean sea, which is the same with the Gulf of Mexico, only this sea is at the southern extremity of the Gulf, are of the same race, who, in their migrations from the Pacific Ocean, have peopled many parts of the South and North American continent, the remains of whom are found on those islands, as well as among the unsubdued nations in the woods of South America.

It is doubtless a fact, that the earliest tribes who separated from the immediate regions about Ararat, passed onward to the east, across the countries now called Persia, Bucharia, and the Chinese empire, till they reached the sea, or Pacific Ocean, opposite the American continent.

From thence, in process of time, on account of an increase of population, they left the main continent, in search of the islands, and passing from one group to another, till all those islands became peopled, and until they reached even the western coast of not only South but North America.

At the same time, tribes from the same region of Ararat, travelled westward, passing over all Europe and southward, filling the regions of Africa, and the islands in the Atlantic Ocean opposite the coasts of South and North America, till they also reached the main land, meeting their fellows, after having each of them circumambulated half of the earth.

And having started from the regions of Ararat and the tower of Babel, with languages differing one from another, and having also in process of time, acquired habits arising from differences of circumstances, mostly dissimilar one from the other, wars for the mastery the most dreadful must have ensued, each viewing the others as intruders, from whence they knew not. This is evident from the traditions of the inhabitants of the two Americas; some tribes pointing to the east, others to the west, and others again to the north, as the way from whence their ancestors came.

According to Clavigero, the naturalist, the ancestors of the nations which peopled Anahuac, now called New-Spain, might have passed from the northern countries of Europe, (as Norway,) to the northern parts of America, on the coast of Labrador, which is called

British America and Canada; also from the most eastern parts of Asia to the most western parts of America. This conclusion is founded on the constant and general tradition of those nations, which unanimously say, that their ancestors came into Anahuac, or New-Spain, from the countries of the north and north west. This tradition is confirmed by the remains of many ancient edifices, built by those people in their migrations. In a journey made by the Spaniards in 1606, more than two hundred years since, from New-Mexico to the river which they call Tizan, six hundred miles from Anahuac towards the northwest, they found there some large edifices, and met with some Indians who spoke the Mexican language, and who told them that a few days' journey from that river towards the north, was the kingdom of Tolan, and many other inhabited places, from whence the Mexicans migrated. In fact, the whole population of Anahuac have usually affirmed, that towards the north were the kingdoms and provinces of Tolan, Aztalan, Capallan, and several others, which are all Mexican names, now so designated; but were we to trace these names to their origin, they would be found to be of Mongol or Mogul origin, from Asia. Boturini, or Bouterone, a learned antiquarian of Paris, of the 17th century, says, that in the ancient paintings of the Taltecas, a nation of Mexico, or more anciently called Anahuac, was represented the migrations of their ancestors through Asia, and the northern countries of America, until they established themselves in the country of Tolan. Morse, p. 618.

This river Tizan is, unquestionably, the river Columbia, which belongs to the territory owned by the United States, bordering on the coast of the Pacific, in latitude 47 degrees north; which from Anahuac, in Mexico, is just about that distance (600 miles; and this river being the only one of much size emptying into the sea on that side of the Rocky mountains, between the latitude of Mexico and the latitude of the mouth of the Columbia, is the reason why that river may, almost with certainty, be supposed the very Indian Tizan. But still farther north, several days' journey, were the kingdoms and provinces of Tolan, Aztalan, and Capallan, which were probably in the latitude with the northern parts of the United States's lands west of the Rocky mountains, and filling all the regions east as far as the head waters of the great western rivers; thence down those streams, peopling the vast alluvials in Indiana,

Missouri, Illinois, Northwestern Territory, Ohio, Kentucky, Mississippi, and so on to the Gulf of Mexico.

Although those kingdoms and provinces spoken of by the natives of Tizan, to these Spanish adventurers, had many hundred years before been vacated of their population and grandeur; yet it was natural for them to retain the tradition of their numbers and extent: and to speak of them as then existing, which, as to latitude and location, was true, although in a state of ruin, like the edifices at the Tizan, or Columbia.

In an address delivered at New-York, before the College of Physicians, by Dr. Mitchell, which relates to the migrations of Malays, Tartars and Scandinavians, we have the following:

"A late German writer, Prof. Vater, has published, at Leipsig, a book on the population of America. He lays great stress on the tongues spoken by the aborigines, and dwells considerably upon the unity pervading the whole of them, from Chili to the remotest district of North America, whether of Greenland, Chippewa, Delaware, Natick, Totuaka, Cora or Mexico. Though ever so singular and diversified, nevertheless the same peculiarity obtains among them all, which cannot be accidental, viz: the whole sagacity of that people from whom the construction of the American languages and the gradual invention of their grammatical forms is derived, has, as it were, selected one object, and over this diffused such an abundance of forms, that one is astonished; while only the most able philologist, or grammarian of languages, by assiduous study, can obtain a general view thereof.

"In substance, the author (Prof. Vater) says, that through various times and circumstances, this peculiar character is preserved. Such unity, such direction, or tendency, compels us to place the origin in a remote period, when one original tribe or people existed, whose ingenuity and judgment enabled them to excogitate or invent such intricate formations of language as could not be effaced by thousands of years, nor by the influence of zones and climates.

"Mr. Vater has published a large work, entitled Mithridates, in which he has given an extensive comparison of all the Asiatic, African and American languages, to a much greater extent than was done by our distinguished fellow citizen, Dr. Barton, of Philadelphia, Professor of Natural History. Mr. Vater concludes by expressing his desire to unravel the mysteries which relate to the new

and old continents; at least to contribute the contents of his volume towards the commencement of a structure, which, out of the ruins of dilacerated human tribes, seeks materials for an union of the whole human race in one origin; which some have disputed, notwithstanding the plain statement of the Bible on that subject, which is a book entitled to the term antiquity, paramount to all other records now in existence on the earth.

"What this original and radical language was, has very lately been the subject of inquiry by the learned Mr. Mathieu, of Nancy, in France. The Chevalier Valentine, of the order of St. Michael, renewed by Louis XVIII; informs me that this gentleman has examined Mr. Winthrop's description of the curious characters inscribed upon the rock at Dighton, Massachusetts, as published in the Transactions of the Boston Academy of Arts and Sciences. He thinks them hieroglyphics, which he can interpret and explain. and ascribes them to the inhabitants of the ancient Atlantic island of Plato, called by him Atalantis. Mr. Mathieu not only professes to give the sense of the inscription, but also to prove that the tongues spoken by the Mexicans, Peruvians, and other occidental or western people, as well as the Greek itself, with all its dialects, and ramifications, were but derivations from the language of the primitive Atalantians of the island of Plato."-See page 80, &c.

ANCIENT LANGUAGES OF THE FIRST INHABITANTS OF AMERICA.

First Letter to Mr. Champollion, on the Graphic Systems of America, and the Glyphs of Otolum or Palenque, in Central America. By C. S. RAFINESQUE.

You have become celebrated by decyphering, at last, the glyphs and characters of the ancient Egyptians, which all your learned predecessors had deemed a riddle, and pronounced impossible to read. You first announced your discovery in a letter. I am going to follow your footsteps on another continent, and a theme equally obscure; to none but yourself can I address with more propriety,