Ancient works of the Peruvians.

165

Chap. 18.]

ganization of these continents took place. In those remote ages, then,during which the country was occupied by a numerous and civilized peo-ple, wells must have been very common; and as they are not, like struc-tures erected on the surface, subject to decay, or obnoxious to destruction,the discovery and examination of some of them is greatly to be desired.Who can teil what Stores of treasure are buried in them ; what specimens ofart; what means for tracing the history, and also the revolutions, throughwhich the ancient people of America have passed; their origin, progress,and disappearance 1 If Palenque and its sister cities were destroyea bywar, then it is almost certain that the inhabitants would have recourse towells for the secretion of their treasures, both public and private; a prac-tice that has been followed in all ages and by all people.

Relics of former ages, which have been found (more or less numerous)over both continents, incontestibly prove that civilized people flourishedhere in former ages ; and that. they and their progeny have disappeared,as if by some general and sudden calamity they had been swept off thestage of life, to a man. It would seem too, as if a long period of deathlikestillness had succeeded, (like that after the deluge) so that all knowledgeof them had perished, when another race appeared and took possessionof the soil. These were the ancestors of the present Indians, who, intheir turn are rapidly becoming extinct, without our being able to teil whothey were, whence they came, or when they first made their appearance.We see no reason to doubt their tradition respecting the great Megalonyxand Mastodon of the Western prairies, havingbeen Contemporary with theirforefathers, since the discovery of the bones of these animals corroborate insome degree the truth of it. Nor is it at all improbable that their ac-counts of the voracious and enormous Piasd, ‘ the bird that devours men,’is fabulous; a figure of which is cut on the face of a smooth and perpen-dicular rock, at an elevation which no human art can now reach; near themouth of a small stream, named the Piasa, which enters the Mississippi between Alton and the mouth of the Illinois . See Familv Mae;. 1837,Vol. iv, 101.

ON THE HYDRAULIC AND OTHER WORKS OF THE ANCIENT PERUVIANS.

Molina, in his ‘ Natural and civil History of Chili' observes that previousto the invasion of the Spaniards, the natives practised artificial irrigation, byconveying water from the higher grounds in canals to their fields. Herrerasays, many of the vales were exceedingly populous and well cultivated,‘ having trenches of water.’ The Peruvians carried the System to a greatextent. “ How must we admire (says Humboldt ) the industry and activitydisplayed by the ancient Mexicans and Peruvians in the irrigation of aridlands ! In the maritime parts of Peru , I have seen the remains of walls,along which water was conducted for a space of from 5 to 6000 metres,from the foot of the Codilleras to the coast. The conquerors of the 16thCentury destroyed these aqueducts, and that part of Peru has become,like Persia , a desart, destitute of Vegetation. Such is the civilization car-ried by the Europeans among a people, whom they are pleased to callbarbarous.” a These people had laws for the protection of water, verysimilar to those of Greece, Rome, Egypt , and all the older nations ; forthose who conveyed water from the canals to their own land before theirturn, were liable to arbitrary punishment. Several of the ancient Amer-ican customs respecting water, were identical with those of the oldest

a New Spain, Black’s Trans. Vol. ii, 46, and Frezier’s Voyage to the South Seas, 213.