that a few centuries before, they had been a wild tribe on the high
country of the Rio Grande and Colorado, in New Mexico. The access
from the Pacific up the Colorado would agree well with the hypothesis
that the chief sources of the aboriginal inhabitants of America were
Mongolian, and that from parties of Mongols landing from the Pacific
Isles on the American coast, the population was derived. At any rate
the Aztecs stated that before they invaded Mexico from their original
home, they were preceded by a civilized race, well acquainted with the
arts and science, knowing more art and astronomy in particular than
they. They stated that they had exterminated this race known as

THE TOLTECS.

The main features of the story seem correct. The Toltecs seem to have
been allied to the Peruvians. Their skulls seem of the Brachycephalic
type. The Toltecs were agriculturists, were mechanical, industrial,
and constructive. In Mexico, and further south in Nicaragua, as well
as northward, large mounds remain which are traced to them. According
to the Aztec story the Toltecans spread in Mexico from the seventh to
the twelfth century at which latter day they were swept away. My
theory is that it was this race--which must have been very
numerous--which either came from Peru in South America, capturing
Mexico and then flowing northward; or perhaps came from New Mexico,
the American Scythia of that day, and sending one branch down into
Mexico, sent another down the Rio Grande, which then spread up the
Mississippi and its tributaries The mounds mark the course of this
race migration. They are found on the Mississippi. One part of the
race seems to have ascended the Ohio to the great lakes and the St.
Lawrence, another went up the Missouri, while another ascended the
Mississippi proper and gained communication from its head waters with