westerly wind and excessive cold are synony mous terms. Even in the most sultry weather, the moment that the wind veers to that quarter, its penetrating influence is felt in a transition from heat to cold, no less violent than sudden. To this powerful cause may be ascribed the extraordinary dominion of cold, and its violent inroads into the southern provinces in that part of the globe.

After contemplating those permanent and cha acteristic qualities of the American continent, which arise from the peculiarity of its situation and the disposition of its parts, the next object that merits attention is its condition when first disco→ vered, as far as that depended on the industry and operations of man. The effects of human ingenuity and labour are more extensive and considerable than even our own vanity is apt at first to imagine. When we survey the face of the habitable globe, no small part of that fertility and beauty which we ascribe to the hand of nature is the work of man. His efforts, when continued though a succession of ages, change the appearance, and improve the qualities of the earth. As a great part of the antient continent has long been Occupied by nations far advanced in arts and indastry, our eye is accustomed to view the earth in that form which it assumes when rendered fit to be the residence of a numerous race of men, and to supply them with nourishment. But in the New World the state of mankind was ruder, and the aspect of nature extremely different. Immense forests covered a great part of the uncultivated earth; and as the hand of industry had not taught the rivers to run in a proper channel, or drained off the stagnating water, many of the most fertile plains were overflowed, or converted into marshes,

marshes. When the English began to settle America, they termed the countries of which the took possession The Wilderness. Nothing but ti eager expectation of finding mines of gold coul have induced the Spaniards to penetrate throug the woods and marshes of America, where, every step, they observed the extreme differen between the uncultivated face of nature, and th which it acquires under the hand of industry.

The labour and operations of man not only im prove and embellish the earth, but render it mor wholesome and friendly to life. All the province of America when first discovered were found to b extremely unhealthy. Great numbers of the fir settlers were cut off by the unknown and viole diseases with which they were infected. Such survived the rage of malady, were not exempte from the noxious influence of the climate. The returned to Europe feeble and emaciated, wit complexions that indicated the unwholesome tem perature of the countries where they had resided.

The uncultivated state of the New World at fected also the qualities of its productions. Th principle of life seems to have been less active an vigorous there than in the antient continent. Th different species of animals are much fewer America than those of the other hemisphere. I the islands there were only four kinds of quadru peds known; the largest of which did not exce the size of a rabbit. Of two hundred differe kinds of animals spread over the face of the eart only about one third existed in America at the tin of its discovery. The same causes which checke the growth and the vigour of the more noble a mals, were friendly to the propagation and increa of reptiles and insects: the active principle of l::

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seems to waste its force in productions of the inferior form. The air is often darkened with clouds of insects, and the ground covered with shocking and noxious reptiles. The country around Porto Bello swarms with toads, in such multitudes as hide the surface of the earth. At Guyaquil, snakes and vipers are hardly less numerous. Carthagena is infested with numerous flocks of bats which annoy both man and beast. In the islands, legions of ants have at different times consumed every vegetable production, and left the earth entirely bare, as if it had been burnt with fire.

The birds of the New World are not distinguished by qualities so conspicuous as those which we have observed in its quadrupeds. Birds are more independent of man, and less affected by the changes which his industry and labour make upon the face of the earth. They have a greater propensity to migrate from one country to another, and can gratify this instinct of their nature without difficulty or danger. Hence the number of birds common to both continents is much greater than that of quadrupeds; and even such as are peculiar to America nearly resemble those with which mankind were acquainted in similar regions of the antient hemisphere. The American birds of the torrid zone, like those of the climate of Asia and Africa, are deckt in plumage which dazzles the eye with the beauty of its colours, but nature, satisfied with clothing them in this gay dress, has denied most of them that melody of sound and variety of notes which catch and delight the ear. The birds of the temperate climate there are less splendid in their appearance, but they have voices of greater compass, and more melodious. In some districts of America the unwholesome temperature

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of the air seems to be unfavourable even to this part of the creation. America however produces the Condor, which is entitled to preeminence over all the flying tribe, in bulk, in strength, and in

courage.

The soil in America must of course be extremely various, but the cold and moisture which prevail there have considerable influence over it. If we wish to rear in America the productions which abound in any particular district of the antient world, we must advance several degrees nearer to the line than in the other hemisphere, as it requires such an increase of heat to counterbalance the natural frigidity of the soil and climate. At the Cape of Good Hope, several of the plants and fruits peculiar to the countries within the tropics are cultivated with success; whereas in Florida and South Carolina, though considerably nearer the line, they cannot be brought to thrive with equal certainty. But if allowance be made for this diversity in the degree of heat, the soil of America is naturally as rich and fertile as that in any part of the earth. As the country was thinly inhabited, the earth was not exhausted by consumption. The vegetable productions to which the fertility of the soil gave birth, being suffered to corrupt on its surface, returned with increase into its bosom. As trees and plants derive a great part of their nourishment from air and water; if they were not destroyed, they would render to the earth more, perhaps, than they take from it, and feed rather than impoverish it. The vast number, as well as enormous size of the trees in America, indicate the extraordinary vigour of the soil in its native state. When the Europeans first began to cultivate the New World, they were astonished at the luxuriant power of vegetation in

its virgin mould; and in several places the ingenuity of the planter is still employed in diminishing its superfluous fertility, to bring it down to a state fit for profitable culture.

We are now to enquire how America was peopled? The theories and speculations of ingenious men with respect to this subject would fill many volumes. Some have imagined that the people of America were not the offspring of the same common parent with the rest of mankind: others contend that they are descended from some remnant of the antediluvian inhabitants of the earth who survived the deluge, and accordingly suppose the uncivilized tribes to be the most antient race of people on the earth. There is hardly any nation from the north to the south pole to which some antiquary, in the extravagance of conjecture, has not ascribed the honour of peopling of America. Without entering at large upon this elaborate disquisition, we may observe that, from the contiguity, it is possible that America may have received its first inhabitants from our continent, either by the north-west of Europe or the north-east of Asia. There seems, however, good reason for supposing that the progenitors of all the American nations, from Cape Horn to the southern confines of Labrador, migrated from the latter rather than from the former. The Esquimaux are the only people in America who, in their aspect or character, bear any resemblance to the northern Europeans. They are manifestly a race of men distinct from all the other nations of the American continent, in language, disposition, and in habits of life. Their original then may warrantably be traced up to the north of Europe. But among the other inhabitants of America there is such a striking similitude in

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