New Orleans daily crescent. [volume] ([New Orleans, La.]) 1851-1866, 1860-07-16
A Eess World.

The mast quarter'sg century disinterriHg front
the isst of ages the hidden secrets of generations
so long. gone hs ta1t the very names Of many Of
the nations who ence figured so conspicuously in
the worlds Annals, have persisted with them, has
Developed many strange facts with regard to an
Gent America 1t would be strange, after all, ii
instead OF having mo past, mo antiquity, IS
has been alleged by her ietractors, the continent
discovered by Columbus should prove to be the
older of tic two Throughout its entire length and
breadth, traces have been discovered OF race. or
rather world of people, who performed their part
in the GREAT ifedraIna at SO eafly an epoch, that
nearly every yestige of their existence must have
disappeared centuries before the discoveries OF
ColuEbps.
Tie hardy Mortimer who visited the Atlantic
coasts as early as the fourth or hfth centuries,
found them occupied by hostile races in such nam
hers as to repel every attempt to penetrate the in
tesior: the Mortimer who made the first authenti-
ested discoveries in the Western Hemisphere, in
spite of the fact that Columbus has always re-
ceired that honor, and who must still have been
preceded by others, whose accounts of the strange
lands they had visited and the wonders they had
seen, in the absence Of corrohoration, were re.
eeivea as fables by their countrymen. Had there
been in those days such things as newspapers, the
whole world would have learned of the existence
of another conuneat. 1t would have been inter
esting in a historical point OF view, as it would
have developed the existence, and, perhaps have
preserved the records of a number of nations of
which the last yestiges are now fading from the
earth.
Whatever may nave 5been the origin OF our a Boz
rhymes, it is certain that large portions of what
now the United States and Of countries farther
South were inhabited By numerous people, wear
ing comfortable clothing, and being somewhat adj
vanced in the arts. Some of them, as those of
Mexico and Central America, have left behind them
vast ruins, proving that the cities which they
founded were not unworthy of being ranked with
the proudest of olden time. Throughout the North
ern country numerous traces OF a vanished people
have been from time to time discovered but fainter
and less absolutely defined than those Of the
Aztecs-showing conciHsiveiy the great antiquity
of the northerners. The mound builders, indca-
tons of whose industry and engineering skill have
been found by the archeologist Squiers, scattered
over the Middle and Northern States, must have
ened people who have sunpplanted them, yet they
have vanished SO entirely from the scene of their
earthly labors, that, unless we adopt the theory
5of retrpgressiOn and accept the North American
Indians and the Southern Aztecs the lost repre-
sentatiyes Of ancient America, we have not the
slightest clue to them.
The most remarkable circumstance in connection
with these peoples is that they left behind them
no utensils other implements, and that, in cases
where records have been discovered, they were in
an alphabet so unlike anything before known (the
tablets of CepaHa and Palenque for Hstancel as to
defy an research Traces there are of customs
similar to those of the Asiacs-tyaees of an jden-
fly Of language, but all too vague and uncertain
as yet, to base a theory upon. It seems though,
at some far gone period of the worlds history, Al
mighty Providence as a punishment for its sins
had blotted at once from existence an entire world
whose very monuments mock the proud and vain
glorious spirit which led to their erection. But
there will, drubtless, arise persons competent to
the task. who, from their knowledge of dialects
and hieroglyphic writing may yet succeed in clear
ing up this most wonderful and impressive ofmodern
mysteries