Narrative of the surveying voyages of his majesty's ships Adventure and Beagle (vol.2): between the years 1826 and 1836 : describing their examination of the southern shores of South America, and the Beagles's circumnavigation of the globe

650 EARLY MIGRATION there, and first began to improve the condition of tlieir people, but we are not told whence those men came. No one, however, can read about those countries, as well as Tartary, Japan, and Polynesia, without being struck by the traces of Hebrew cere- monies and rites, by the evidences of the worship of Baal, or by remains of Arkite observances, scattered through the more populous, if not through all the nations upon earth. That man could have been first created in an infant, or a savage state, appears to my apprehension impossible ; (for a moment taking a view of the case, unaided by Scripture ;) be- cause — if an infant — who nursed, who fed, who protected him till able to subsist alone ? and, if a savage, he would have been utterly helpless. Destitute of the instinct possessed by brutes, wth organs inexperienced (however perfect), and \vith a mind absolutely vacant ; neither his eye, his ear, his hand, nor his foot would have been available, and after a few hours of apathetic existence he must have perished. The only idea I can reconcile to reason is that man was created perfect in body, perfect in mind, and knowing by inspiration enough for the part he had to perform ; — such a being it would be worse than folly to call savage. Have we a shadow of ground for thinking that wild animals or plants have improved since their creation ? Can any rea- sonable man believe that the first of a race, species, or kind, was the most inferior ? Then how for a moment could false philosophers, and those who have been led away by their writ- ings, imagine that there were separate beginnings of savage races, at different times, and in different places ? Yet I may answer this question myself; for until I had thought much on the subject, and had seen nearly every variety of the human race, I had no reason to give in opposition to doubts excited by such sceptical works, except a conviction that the Bible was true, that in all ages men had erred, and that sooner or later the truth of every statement contained in that record would be proved. To return to the lines and means of communication : Following the various routes of population into the Indian