[781] Le Conte, Elements of Geology, pp. 145–149.
[782] Baldwin’s Ancient America, Appendix C, pp. 288–293.
[783] Man and His Migrations, pp. 129–30.
[784] Kennon in Leland’s Fusang, p. 68.
[785] “From the result of the most accurate scientific observation, it is evident that the voyage from China to America can be made without being out of sight of land more than a few hours at a time. To a landsman, unfamiliar with long voyages, the mere idea of being ‘alone on the wide, wide sea’ with nothing but water visible, even for an hour, conveys a strange sense of desolation, of daring and adventure. But in truth it is regarded as a mere trifle, not only by regular seafaring men, but even by the rudest races in all parts of the world; and I have no doubt that from the remotest ages, and on all shores, fishermen in open boats, canoes, or even coracles, guided simply by the stars and currents, have not hesitated to go far out of sight of land. At the present day, natives of the South Pacific islands undertake, without a compass, and successfully, long voyages which astonish even a regular Jack-tar, who is not often astonished at anything.”—Kennon in Leland’s Fusang, pp. 71–2.
[786] See Bancroft, Native Races, vol. v, pp. 51–54, where the paper of the Japanese Consul, Mr. Brooks, read before the Californian Academy of Sciences in March, 1875, is cited, detailing forty-one instances in which Japanese junks were cast upon our coast since 1782. Mr. Brooks states that he has a record of over one hundred similar disasters. Whymper, in his Alaska (N. Y. 1869), p. 250, refers to other Japanese wrecks, and especially to one which, after drifting ten months, reached the Sandwich Islands. The Hawaiians, on seeing the crew, said, “It is plain now, we came from Asia.” See also M. de Roquefeuil, Journal d’un Voyage autour du Monde, pendant les annes, 1816–1819; Smith’s Human Species, p. 238.
[787] Physical Geography, p. 41, cited by Lyell, Antiquity of Man, p. 367.
[788] Antiquity of Man, p. 367.
[789] “There is as much reason to believe that America was peopled from Asia, as that the primitive races of Europe and Africa should derive their origin from an Eastern source.”—Macfie, Vancouver Island and British Columbia. London, 1865.
[790] “The weather is, it is true, cold at Behring’s Straits, even in summer, but not one-fourth as cold as at Matsumai, Japan, in winter.”—Col. Kennon in Leland’s Fusang, p. 74.