The Dawn of Canadian History | Page 9

and German peoples, which came from another
common stock, the Teutonic. But even the Teutonic and the Romance
languages are not entirely different. The similarity in both groups of old
root words, like the numbers from one to ten, point again to a common
origin still more remote. In this way we may trace a whole family of

languages, and with it a kinship of descent, from Hindustan to Ireland.
Similarly, another great group of tongues--Arabic, Hebrew, etc.--shows
a branch of the human family spread out from Palestine and Egypt to
Morocco.
Now when we come to inquire into the languages of the American
Indians for evidence of their relationship to other peoples we are struck
with this fact: we cannot connect the languages of America with those
of any other part of the world. This is a very notable circumstance. The
languages of Europe and Asia are, as it were, dovetailed together, and
run far and wide into Africa. From Asia eastward, through the Malay
tongues, a connection may be traced even with the speech of the Maori
of New Zealand, and with that of the remotest islanders of the Pacific.
But similar attempts to connect American languages with the outside
world break down. There are found in North America, from the Arctic
to Mexico, some fifty-five groups of languages still existing or recently
extinct. Throughout these we may trace the same affinities and
relationships that run through the languages of Europe and Asia. We
can also easily connect the speech of the natives of North America with
that of natives of Central and of South America. Even if we had not the
similarities of physical appearance, of tribal customs, and of general
manners to argue from, we should be able to say with certainty that the
various families of American Indians all belonged to one race. The
Eskimos of Northern Canada are not Indians, and are perhaps an
exception; it is possible that a connection may be traced between them
and the prehistoric cave-men of Northern Europe. But the Indians
belong to one great race, and show no connection in language or
customs with the outside world. They belong to the American continent,
it has been said, as strictly as its opossums and its armadillos, its maize
and its golden rod, or any other of its aboriginal animals and plants.
But, here again, we must not conclude too much from the fact that the
languages of America have no relation to those of Europe and Asia.
This does not show that men originated separately on this continent.
For even in Europe and Asia, where no one supposes that different
races sprung from wholly separate beginnings, we find languages
isolated in the same way. The speech of the Basques in the Pyrenees

has nothing in common with the European families of languages.
We may, however, regard the natives of America as an aboriginal race,
if any portion of mankind can be viewed as such. So far as we know,
they are not an offshoot, or a migration, from any people of what is
called the Old World, although they are, like the people of the other
continents, the descendants of a primitive human stock.
We may turn to geology to find how long mankind has lived on this
continent. In a number of places in North and South America are found
traces of human beings and their work so old that in comparison the
beginning of the world's written history becomes a thing of yesterday.
Perhaps there were men in Canada long before the shores of its lakes
had assumed their present form; long before nature had begun to
hollow out the great gorge of the Niagara river or to lay down the
outline of the present Lake Ontario. Let us look at some of the notable
evidence in respect to the age of man in America. In Nicaragua, in
Central America, the imprints of human feet have been found, deeply
buried over twenty feet below the present surface of the soil, under
repeated deposits of volcanic rock. These impressions must have been
made in soft muddy soil which was then covered by some geological
convulsion occurring long ages ago. Even more striking discoveries
have been made along the Pacific coast of South America. Near the
mouth of the Esmeraldas river in Ecuador, over a stretch of some sixty
miles, the surface soil of the coast covers a bed of marine clay. This
clay is about eight feet thick. Underneath it is a stratum of sand and
loam such as might once have itself been surface soil. In this lower bed
there are found rude implements of stone, ornaments made of gold, and
bits of broken pottery. Again, if we turn to the northern part of the
continent we find remains