Besides this of language there are two traits in the history of the red
man without parallel in that of any other variety of our species which
has achieved any notable progress in civilization.
The one is his _isolation_. Cut off time out of mind from the rest of
the world, he never underwent those crossings of blood and culture which
so modified and on the whole promoted the growth of the old world
nationalities. In his own way he worked out his own destiny, and what he
won was his with a more than ordinary right of ownership. For all those
old dreams of the advent of the Ten Lost Tribes, of Buddhist priests, of
Welsh princes, or of Phenician merchants on American soil, and there
exerting a permanent influence, have been consigned to the dustbin by
every unbiased student, and when we see such men as Mr. Schoolcraft and
the Abbe E. C. Brasseur essaying to resuscitate them, we regretfully
look upon it in the light of a literary anachronism.
The second trait is the entire absence of the herdsman's life with its
softening associations.
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