We may reasonably suppose that man existed here for a long time before he discovered the litness of maize for food, and for a much longer period before he began its cultivation; and then it must have required centuries to introduce it to general cultivation over nearly a hundred degrees of latitude in the two continents. It is well known that plants change their character very slowly; but maize, tobacco and cotton had so long been subjected to the transforming influences of cultivation as to have lost all resemblance to their original forms, so that they could no longer be identified with the wild species. The force of this consideration is heightened when we remember that, in this transformation, these plants became entirely dependent upon cultivation for their existence.

In some portions of the continent the great antiquity of man is proven by the remains of his structures still existing ; but as none of these were found in this section, the subject need not be considered here.

Closely connected with the question of the time of man's existence here is that of his origin. How came he here? The question has received much consideration. The attempts to designate particular nations as the original peoplers of the American continent, whether they were the Lost Tribes of Israel the Phwnicians or the Chinese, have so utterly failed to convince inquirers, that they have been generally abandoned. The autochthonic theory, the theory of indigenous origin, has had many strong arguments produced in its favor. Some of its advocates suppose that the Creator placed an original pair of human beings here, as Holy Scripture teaches that He did in the Eastern Hemisphere. But these arguments come short of conviction. The advocates of the theory of development that would find the ancestor of man in the monkey, have abandoned all idea of