pied by native tribes who find no difficulty in passing from island to island in their baidars. The climate of the country in the vicinity of the straits appears to have been an insuperable obstacle to the existence of civilization, and the inhabitants generally have reached the lowest stage of humanity. For a vast distance along the shores, quite into the interior of both continents, we find no vestiges of a cultivated people; and though by this route barbarous tribes may have passed into America, it seems beyond the range of all probability, that civilized nations should have found their way from Central Asia to Central America through these cold and remote regions.

From the difficulties attendant upon the supposition of a migration by Behring's straits, refuge has been taken in two theories, originated many years since, maintaining the former existence of large bodies of land in the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, connecting our continent, on either hand, with Europe and Asia. Of these conjectures, the one possessing the greatest probability, and justified in some degree by ancient traditions, relates to the island Atlantis. In the dialogues of Plato entitled Timous, the voyage of Solon to Egypt is referred to, and certain conversations recited, which took place between him, and the priests of an ancient temple in the Delta. Alluding to some old Egyptian records, they related to the Athenian lawgiver, that many deeds of his countrymen, there recorded, were truly admirable,--but one surpassed all others in magnitude and excellence. For the writings mentioned, that a great power, proceeding out of the Atlantic ocean and spreading itself over Europe and Asia, was checked by the arms of the Athenians.

* Coxe, pp. 75, 103.

It came from the island Atlantis, lying in the ocean, before the straits, called by the Greeks the Pillars of Hercules. This Atlantis was larger than Lybia and Asia together, and from it there was a passage to other islands, and from these to a continent beyond. The combined power of the kings of Atlantis was mighty and wonderful. Having conquered all that, and many other islands, and parts of the continent, Lybia as far as Egypt, and Europe as far as Tyrrhenia, they undertook to subdue Greece, Egypt, and all the country within the straits. Athens then became eminent for her valor and strength, and, though deserted by the other states, met the approaching enemy, overturned their trophies, saved the free from impending slavery, and restored freedom to those already subdued. But in after times, floods and earthquakes taking place, in one dreadful night and day, the island Atlantis sunk into the sea, and disappeared; and, for many ages, the ocean there could not be navigated, owing to the numerous rocks and shoals with which it abounded. In the Critias, and various other portions of Plato, this lost island is again alluded to, and frequent references are made to it in subsequent classic authors. From a consideration also of the ancient mythology, according to which, Atlas was descended from the Ocean, and married Hesperis or the West, from which union proceeded the Atlantides, it will be perceived this tradition is more ancient than Plato, being interwoven with the religious fables of the Greeks. Homer's Atlas coincides with this tradition, having its lofty pillars reaching from heaven to earth, and its foundations laid in the depths of the The garden of the Hesperides, synonymous, according to Diodorus, with the Atlantides, was in the neighborhood of Atlas, and the Elysian fields are described as an enchanting

ocean.

country situate far to the westward, beyond the sea. Hesiod speaks of Atlas in a similar style, and as a neighbor to the Hesperian nymphs. Antæus, the son of Atlas, who founded Tangier on the African shore of the straits of Gibraltar, is related to have defended himself against the attacks of Hercules with great vigor, and having sent abroad for assistance, it is said that he received new strength from his parent, as often as he touched the ground. The language of this fable seems manifestly to refer to aid derived by maritime armaments from Atlas, which became effective only when they had reached his shores. The Cabiri also, according to Sanchoniatho, have recorded that Atlas was buried alive by his brothers, a story alluding, perhaps, to that sudden submersion so minutely described by Plato.

It has been maintained, and with much learning and ingenuity, that the peak of Teneriffe was the original Mount Atlas, and that the Greeks, inferior to the Phenicians in maritime skill, probably never saw the Canaries, and in their ignorance, sought for Mount Atlas on the western coast of Africa. This error, if it be one, is as remote as Herodotus, and was adopted by Strabo and Ptolemy, who in their turn transmitted it to the modern world. That the Canary islands were inhabited at a very early period, appears from the testimony of Pliny, who states that vestiges of an ancient population still existed there in the ruins of edifices. The well known facility with which names were transferred, in ancient geography, from one country to another, in consequence of the migration of its inhabitants, may perhaps authorize the supposition that after the disappearance of the Atlantic island, its name was appropriated or confined to those islands nearer the shores of Europe, and thence

was carried into Africa by subsequent emigration. The Guanches, the aboriginal population of the Canaries, in their customs, the habit of embalming the dead, and their language, exhibit striking affinities to some nations of Africa. Herodotus describes the Atlantes, a nation living in the vicinity of Mount Atlas, and the Berbers, their modern descendants, are strongly distinguished from the surrounding tribes, by their physical appearance, reddish complexion, and language analogous to that of the Guanches.*

It may be conjectured then, that the traditions narrated in Plato, were obtained from these islands, or perhaps from the tribes in Africa we have alluded to, and thus communicated to the Egyptians and Greeks, and incorporated in their mythology; an opinion which the following quotation from Proclus seems to favor. In his commentary† upon the passage cited from Plato, he says, "That such, and so great an island, form

* Pritchard's Eastern Origin of the Celtic Nations, p. 190. That a migration from the west to the east, at so early a period, is not improbable, cannot be better illustrated than by the following passage: "Among the strange nations with which Ulysses became acquainted in his wanderings, the Phæacians deserve a moment's attention. It appears that they were much more refined and industrious than the Greeks, that they were better informed in the arts, more skilful navigators, and were addicted to commerce. They inhabited the island of Scheria, supposed to be the same as Corcyra, having been forced to leave their former abode in Hyperia, from the troublesome neighborhood of the Cyclops. This mention of a retrograde movement from west to east, and of a people more cultivated than the Greeks, is extremely remarkable at so early an age.-Cooley's Hist. Mar. and Inland Dis., vol. i. p. 17.

† Proclus, in Timæus, Cory's Fragments, p. 233.

erly existed, is recorded by some of the historians, who have treated of the concerns of the outward sea. For they say that in their times, there were seven islands, situated in that sea, which were sacred to Persephone, and three others of an immense magnitude, one of which was consecrated to Pluto, another to Ammon, and that which was situated between them to Poseidon; the size of this last was no less than a thousand stadia. The inhabitants of this island preserved a tradition, handed down from their ancestors, concerning the existence of the Atlantic island, of a prodigious magnitude, which had really existed in those seas; and which during a long period of time governed all the islands in the Atlantic ocean. Such is the relation of Marcellus in his Ethiopian history."* This celebrated legend has been variously interpreted, and some of the later authors gave it an allegorical meaning. But this opinion can scarcely be supported, for Plato seems to have implicit belief in the facts he narrates, and records them as matter of history. It appears also that this philosopher conceived the extent of the earth to be much greater than was usually received at that period, and that the latter Platonists were convinced that the earth contained two quarters, in an opposite direction to Europe and Asia. The traditions in relation to Atlas present another curious fact, which would indicate some connection in the ancient mythology between the story of Atlantis, and the former

* According to the Hindoos, the earth was divided by Prigauratta into seven Dwipas or islands; he at first intended to share his dominions among his ten sons, but three of these retired from the world. Afterwards all the Dwipas, but one, were destroyed by a deluge.— Cooley's Mar. Hist., vol. i. p. 149.

Taylor's Plato, vol. ii. p. 434.