Indiana's State Motto: The Crossroads of America - adopted in 1937
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Aboriginal America (American History, Vol. I)
by
Jacob Abbott
New York: Sheldon & Company. Boston: Gould & Lincoln. 1860
Preface
It is the design of this work to narrate, in a clear, simple,
and intelligible manner, the leading events connected with the
history of our country, from the earliest periods, down, as
nearly as practicable, to the present time. The several volumes
will be illustrated with all necessary maps and with numerous
engravings, and the work is intended to comprise, in a distinct
and connected narrative, all that it is essential for the general
reader to understand in respect to the subject of it, while for
those who have time for more extended studies, it may serve as an
introduction to other and more copious sources of information.
The author hopes also that the work may be found useful to the
young, in awakening in their minds an interest in the history of
their country, and a desire for further instruction in respect to it. While
it
is doubtless true that such a subject can be really grasped only
by minds in some degree mature, still the author believes that
many young persons, especially such as are intelligent and
thoughtful in disposition and character, may derive both
entertainment and instruction from a perusal of these pages.
Chapter 1 -- Types of Life in America.
Subject of the Volume
The first step to be taken in studying the history of our country
is to form some clear and proper conception of the
characteristics and condition of the territory which is now
occupied by the American people, as it existed when first
discovered and explored by Europeans. The aboriginal condition of
the country, therefore, anterior to its occupation by white men,
and the character and condition of the native tribes which then
inhabited it, will be the subject of this volume.
Origin of Vegetable and Animal Life in America
When the new world was first discovered it was found to be, like
the old, well stocked with plants and animals, and inhabited by a
great many tribes and nations of men; and yet the plants and
animals, if not the men, were all essentially different from those known
in the old world. This was unexpected; it was thought to be quite
remarkable, and it added greatly to the difficulty of deciding
the question, which, of course, at once arose, in respect to the
origin of these plants and animals and men, and to the manner in
which they came in possession of a continent thus cut off
apparently from all intercourse and connection with the rest of
the world.
For the American continent is entirely separated from the old.
The nearest approach which it makes to it in any part is at
Behring's Straits, on the north-west, where it is divided form
the Asiatic continent by a channel about forty miles wide.
Means of Communication With the Old World
Some animals and perhaps some plants, and most certainly man, may
be supposed to have been transported across such a channel of
water as this of Behring's Straits, either by boats made by the
savages living on the coasts, or possibly by means of ice, either
upon moving fields driven by the wind, or upon the solid surface,
at some time when the whole channel was entirely frozen over.
There is also at some distance south of Behring's Straits a
remarkable chain of islands, called the Aleutian Islands, which
extend in a regular and continuous
line from the American to the Asiatic shore. These islands are
nearly all inhabited, and the natives navigate the seas around
them in boats made of a frame-work of wood or bone, covered
externally with seal skins.
These islands are volcanic. They contain now numerous volcanoes,
some active and some extinct, and also hot springs and other
indications of subterranean fire. They bear no trees, but they
produce a great variety of animals. They look, upon the map, like
a row of stepping stones, placed on purpose to enable men and
animals from the old world to make their way to the new.
It is perhaps possible to imagine also that a company of men
might have been forced accidentally to sea in some large canoe
from the coast of Africa, or on the other side from some of the
islands of the Pacific, and so driven across the intervening
water, and landed upon the American shores. It is true that it
would be exceedingly improbable that any such combination of
circumstances would occur as could lead to such a result. The
canoe or boat must have been very large, the stock of provisions
very great, and the wind, while it must not have been violent
enough to engulf the boat, must still have blown very long.
and very steadily to have carried a company of men so far before
they all perished of hunger and thirst. All this would have been
very improbable. Still it would be difficult to show that it
could not occur. From the hundreds and perhaps thousands of boats
full of savages that have been blown off to sea from the coasts
of Africa, or from the South Sea Islands, it would be impossible
to prove positively that there could never have been one that by
any chance could have reached the American shores.
There is still another mode by which we can imagine the animal
and vegetable life of America to have been communicated to it
from other regions, and that is, by supposing that there was in
former ages some direct connection between the two continents by
a tract of land which has since become submerged. It is well
known now that the crust of the earth is not in a stable
condition. It is subject to changes and movements of various
kinds, which are now going forward all the time, and have
probably always been going forward. In some places the land is
slowly rising; in others it is slowly subsiding. There are many
places in the world where towns and cities which formerly stood
high and dry on the land are now under water. The land has slowly
subsided, so that the sea at the present time flows over it,
and people passing in boats now
look down and see the old foundations, and fragments of the
fallen walls and columns, at the bottom.
The rising and sinking of the land in this way can only be
directly and positively proved in places which lie along the sea
shore, for nowhere else is there any exact standard of comparison
by which the rising or falling may be measured. But it is now
generally believed by geologists and philosophers that a state of
gradual motion, rising in some places and sinking in others, is
the natural and constant condition, or, as it is more
scientifically expressed, the normal condition of the
strata which form the crust of the globe. Of the causes which
lead to this state of things it would be out of place to speak
here, but there is no doubt of the fact; and this action is in no
part of the world going on so actively and with so sensible an
effect as on some of the coasts of America.
Now, although these changes of level proceed in an extremely
gradual manner, so that the inhabitants that dwell upon the
territory thus slowly rising or falling are, in most cases,
wholly unconscious of the motion, still the effect might be
sufficient, in the course of forty or fifty centuries, to
submerge a very extensive tract of land, which
in remote ages may have formed a connection between the American
continent and other lands lying to the eastward or westward of
it.
These and various other similar theories were devised in former
times in endeavors to contrive some way of bringing plants and
animals from other countries to America; but they have been
generally considered unsatisfactory, since on coming fully to
examine the plants and animals living here, they were found to
be, as it seemed, essentially different from those found
in other countries, so different as to render it very improbable,
according to the ideas on this subject that have hitherto
generally prevailed, that they could ever be descended from the
same stock, at least by ordinary generation. The fauna and
the flora were both found to be in general essentially
dissimilar.
We say in general, for there are some animals, such as birds,
that might easily fly across the ocean, and sea-weeds, that might
drift across, and polar animals, such as bears, seals, foxes and
dogs, and the like, which go and come as they will, all over the
Arctic seas, that were found common to both worlds. With a
moderate number of exceptions
such as these, however, the plants and animals found in America
proved on examination to be entirely new.
By the fauna of a country is meant the system of animals
that inhabit it. The flora is its system of plants. Now,
inasmuch as both the fauna and the flora of America were so
essentially different from those of the old world, that, so far as
could be judged from all that was known of the propagation of
plants and animals, and of the changes which they may undergo
from the influence of climate and soil, and other conditions, the
one system, in the opinion of naturalists, could not have been
produced from the other, it seemed to be wholly useless to
attempt to contrive means by which the progenitors of the present
races in America could have been wafted across the ocean, or
could have migrated by means of countries and territories which
once existed, but are now submerged.
Man Admitted to be an Exception
This reasoning, however, applied only to plants and to inferior
animals, but not to man; for the races of men found upon this
continent were deemed by naturalists to be of the same species
with all the other races now existing in the world: that is, too
difference between the different races of men were judged to be
not specific differences, that is, not such as to preclude
the possibility of their all being deduced from one original
pair. This has always been the general opinion among naturalists,
and in their systems of classification all the various races of
men are classed as one species. Man, therefore, it has always
been admitted, may have been brought to America over the ice at
Behring's Straits, or by boats blown off from the coast of
Africa, or from the islands in the Pacific; but the general
stocking of the country with its countless thousands of species,
both of animals and vegetable life, it was thought could not be
thus explained.
What is a Species?
The degree of probability that the present plants and animals of
America could not have been derived, within a modern period, and
by direct descent, from those of the old world, depends, of
course, upon the degree of difference there is between
them, because there is a certain degree of difference, and that
not small, which changes of climate and soil, and of other
conditions of that kind will account for; but the difference in
question was found to be very great indeed. It is a specific
difference, that is, a difference in the species.
A species of plants or animals, as the term has been generally
used by naturalists, comprises all such individuals as are so
similar to each other that we may suppose them all to have
proceeded from one common parentage, and so dissimilar from all
others that they could not have been reproduced from the others,
nor the others produced from them, by ordinary generation.
Whether there be or not some extraordinary mode by which at rare
and distant intervals, and under conditions seldom occurring, and
which have not occurred under the observation of men, by which a
new species can arise, having its origin, in some way or
other, in a former species, in the same sense as now a new
individual, of the same species, has it origin in a former
individual of the same species, by the production of a seed or an
egg, for example; or whether it may not be possible that in an
exceedingly great length of time, and by means of a very long-continued
accumulation of minute and almost imperceptible
changes, one species should be transformed into another, or, by
branching, give origin to several others, adapted to new and
peculiar circumstances arising in the world's history, are
questions which are now greatly agitated among the learned, and
may not soon be settled. All we know is, that the plants and
animals throughout the world exist in species, each one of which stands
at present distinct and isolated wholly apart from all the rest,
and one cannot be transformed into another by ordinary
generation, through changes of soil and climate, or any other
causes whatever known to man, within so short a period as six
thousand years.
The apple, for instance, is one species, and the pear is another.
In many respects they are similar to each other, and each may be
changed by cultivation and by the operation of other causes a
great deal, but by no possibility can one be derived from the
other. By different modes of cultivation, by different selections
of seeds, by changes in soil, and by other such means, a
horticulturist may vary the character of his apples very much. He
may produce large apples and small apples, sweet apples and sour
apples, apples with a skin red, green, yellow, or brown, but he
can never produce a pear. The apple, under all it modifications,
will remain an apple still. It is a species by itself, separated
from all other species whatever by a fixed and permanent bound,
which it is impossible, as has always been supposed, that it can
ever pass.
It is the same with animals. Each one is subject to a great many
modifications in respect to its form, its size, its color, and
even it faculties, but
through all these changes each on remains entirely within its own
bounds, as it were. The distinguishing characteristics of the
species remain distinguishing characteristics of the species
remain unchanged. Take for instance, any species of the dog. We
may, perhaps, by means of differences of treatment, of food, of
climate, or of immediate parentage, procure big dogs and little
dogs, weak dogs and strong dogs, gentle dogs and fierce dogs,
all proceeding from the same original stock, but we can have no
cats, nor anything that shall bear the least specific
resemblance to a cat.
The Distinction of Species Very Permanent
It may, perhaps, be said that although in the comparatively short
periods of time that have been covered by the experiments and
observations which have been made by man, the transformation of
one species into another may have been impossible, still such
changes may have been effected in longer periods, and that the
various forms of animal and vegetable life which now exist upon
the earth may have proceeded from some common origin, or at least
from some moderate number of original types existing in former
ages. And, indeed, this may possibly be so. But there seems to
be quite satisfactory evidence to prove that the distinction of
species is as permanent in respect to the past
and the future, at least for very long periods, as it is
decisive at the present time.
Evidence of Ancient Records
In the first place, we have in Egyptian and Assyrian monuments,
which go back with their records several thousand years--much
more than half the time, according to the usually received
opinion, since the earth was stocked with the present races of
animals--many drawings and other representations of plants and
animals as they existed then, and even seeds, in some cases,
found in the wrappings of Egyptian mummies, all of which show
that these plants and animals, and even the races of men, were
specifically the same then as now. There have been no changes
whatever that encroach at all upon the limits and bounds by which
the different species are separated from each other at the
present day, or confuse the lines of demarcation in any degree.
There is no approach of one type toward another, nor any tendency
to such an approach. Now, is a change could be effected in the
specific character of a plant or of an animal, in any limited
series of generations, we should be very likely to find evidences
of it in a period of three or four thousand years, especially in
the case of such animals as arrive at maturity in a short time,
and thus in any given period reckon as many generations as years.
Between the bird carved upon an Egyptian or Assyrian slab, and
its representative at the present day, probably three thousand
generations may have intervened, and yet the present living
specimen is specifically identical with the delineation of its
ancestor. The great comparative anatomist Cuvier examined the
mummy of an ibis, from three to four thousand years old,
comparing it minutely with a living bird of the present day, and
found the two specimens in all respects identically the same.
There is also a bass-relief from the ruins of Babylon, with a
dog represented upon it, which is found by naturalists to be
identical with a species of the dog existing in Asia at the
present day.
Evidence of Fossil Remains
But we have still more conclusive evidence than this derived from
ancient monuments of the very great permanence of the
characteristics by which different species of plants and animals
are distinguished from each other, in the fossil remains
which exist in the strata of the earth. By means of these our
observations upon the forms of vegetable and animal life which
have existed upon our
globe may be carried back to an immense antiquity, and extended
over so vast a number and variety of species as to furnish us, as
it has always been supposed, with all the means of information on
this subject that can be desired. It has been thought to be fully
proved by these observations that every species which exists upon
the earth remains unchanged so long as it exists. When at length
its period has expired, it disappears from the field, while new
ones are continually arising to take the place of those that are
gone. But no one passes, by gradations, into any other; and the
lines of distinction by which each is separated from all the rest
remain sharp and well-defined from the beginning to the end.
Opinions of Naturalists and Philosophers
At least, this has been hitherto the view which naturalists and
philosophers have almost unanimously taken of this subject,
though there have not been wanting writers who have maintained
the contrary opinion. Notwithstanding the evidence furnished by
the appearance of fossil remains, that the lines of demarcation
separating the different species are absolutely and forever
impassable, there have been some advocates of the theory that all
the present races of animals may have been derived
by insensible gradations from a few primordial types. This theory
has very recently been brought forward anew in a form to attract
general attention. Still, so unanimous and so decisive has been
the testimony of geologists in respect to the evidence furnished
by the fossil remains, and so inconsistent is it with the
development theory, as it is called, that very great changes must
take place in the opinion of naturalists in respect to the true
import of the geological records before this opinion can be
generally received.
But however the great question in respect to the absolute and
perpetual permanence of the distinction of species may be
ultimately decided, there is no doubt that all naturalists fully
concur in the opinion that this permanence is, at all events, so
great as entirely to preclude the possibility that the American
species of plants and animals can have descended from the stocks
of the old world within so short a period as six thousand years.
Some other supposition must, therefore, be made than that the
forms of life existing here could have been derived, within that
period, by ordinary generation from those prevailing in other
portions of the world. Some of the principal suppositions which
have been made will be presently alluded to.
Examples of Diversity
Some of the American plants and animals attracted great attention
in Europe when they were first made known there, being recognized
as entirely new, and found to be quite peculiar in character. The
potato was one; the turkey was another. No turkey was ever known
to exist in Europe, Asia, or Africa before that time, and no
fossil remains of such an animal have ever been discovered
there. The tobacco plant was another species that was originally
first found in America, though it has since become extensively
diffused throughout the world. A more particular account of some
of these plants and animals will be given in future chapter. They
are only mentioned here as illustrations of the great truth, that
when this country was first explored by European visitors an
entirely new series of forms of vegetable and animal life was
found to prevail here, and such as could not have resulted from
any of the forms that prevail in the old world, within the period
of six thousand years, through the operation of any laws that are
known to us, in respect to the relation of parent and offspring.
The General Types the Same
And yet, though the plants and animals that are found in America
are all different, and seem to
be essentially different, so far as relates to derivation
from the same parentage within any moderate period, form those of
the old world, it is a very curious and a very significant fact,
that there is a very close analogy between the two great
stocks--an analogy so close as to furnish very strong reason to
believe that they must have had a common origin, or at least have
derived their existence from some common law. All, or nearly
all, the great types of animal and vegetable life which
are known in the old world, have their representatives in the
new, and yet no particular species are so represented.
While there is a generic similarity, there is also a
specific difference. We scarcely knew which excites most
our wonder and curiosity, the analogy in the great types, or the
total, or almost total diversity in individual species. We say
almost total, for, in addition to the exceptions already referred
to, by the time that the fauna and flora of America came to be
fully examined, great numbers of animals had been brought over,
either by accident or design, from Europe, and mingled with the
animals in America; and there are many plants which are now found
growing wild in various parts of the country, and seem to be
natives, but which are identical in species with those growing in
Europe. It is inferred in such cases that
the seeds were originally brought from the old world, though
perhaps it cannot in all cases be positively proved that they
were. It may however be said with certainty, that, as a general
rule, of the hundreds and thousands of plants and animals,
natives of America, that have been examined and described, all
or nearly all are essentially different from those of
corresponding type produced by the old world.
The accompanying engravings, which represent
the gigantic vultures which inhabit the mountain summits
respectively of the new world and the old, strikingly illustrated
this principle. While they are generically similar, both in
their structure and in their habits, still, in respect to what
the naturalists call specific characters, they are entirely
distinct.
The Mystery General
The mystery which attends the origin of these different and
peculiar species of plants and animals
inhabiting the new continent, has been found, since America was
discovered, to be general, for it is now known that not merely
America, but also every part of the globe, so far as the
different zones and districts of the earth are separated from
each other by seas, or mountains, or other great natural
boundaries, has each its own fauna and flora different from those
of every other region. These differences of species, too, exist
not in space only, but in time. From the evidence that an
examination of the strata of the earth affords, we find that
every different period of the earth's history, going back to very
remote ages, had its own system of plants and animals, so that
thousands of species that existed once do not exist now, and
those which exist now did not exist then. Thus it is established
by evidence that seems to be conclusive, that just as in the
history of any one species, there is a succession of individuals,
each of which is born, grows, flourishes, declines, and dies, to
be succeeded by others which rise into being, and come forward to
maturity, while their predecessors decline; in the same manner,
in the history of the world, there has been a succession
of species. each of which has come into being in its own
time, increased in numbers, become widely extended, and then has
gradually diminished and finally.
disappeared, to be succeeded by other species that arise in the
same manner, and go through in the same manner the successive
periods of youth, maturity, and decay. Thus it would appear that,
of the vast congeries of animal and vegetable creations which the
history of the globe presents to view, each separate period of
its existence, and also every different district on its surface,
has received its own peculiar and exclusive forms. There are
several different opinions in regard to the proper explanation of
this remarkable fact. Of these opinions only two are now
seriously entertained by naturalists and philosophers, and the
question between these two is, at the present time, a subject of
earnest discussion throughout the whole scientific world.
The Two Principal Theories
The first opinion is, that each species is, in its essential
nature, and has been throughout its whole history, entirely
distinct from every other one, and that it was called into being
in its own appointed time, either by a special act of creation
exerted for this end, or else by the operation of some general
laws to us wholly unknown, by which, when certain conditions are
combined, a new species is derived in some mysterious way from
one or more
other species existing before it, just as individuals of
any given species are known to proceed from other individuals of
the same. This opinion has been hitherto a prevailing one among
naturalists and philosophers, and a great desire has been felt
to discover the general conditions and laws, if such there are
within the reach of human observation, under which new species
arise.
The second opinion is, that life, in all its manifestations,
throughout the whole vegetable and animal world, is one,
and that all organizations that now exist, or have ever existed,
have been produced, by a succession of exceedingly gradual and
long-continued changes, from one, or at most a very few,
primordial forms.
These changes, it is supposed, result from a constitution of
vegetable and animal life such that very slight modifications of
structure occur in all cases in the descent from parent to
offspring; that these modifications, which are insignificant, and
sometimes scarcely perceptible in the first generation, become
very great by being accumulated in a long series of years, and
that changes thus resulting, branching off in different
directions, as it were, according as the conditions and
influences to which different races are exposed, vary, in
different places and time, and acting through immensely
long periods of time, have given rise to all the countless forms
of animal and vegetable life with which the world now teems.
Inquiries Into This Subject Right and Proper
This is not the place to discuss, nor even to explain these
opinions. They are only briefly alluded to here, on account of
the bearing of this general question on the origin of life in
America. Some persons feel a degree of hesitation in following the
guidance of naturalists in their inquiries in respect to the
laws of life, as if the object of those engages in these studies
was to discover some way of accounting for the works of creation
without acknowledging the hand of a creator. But this is not so.
Scientific inquiries into the causes of what we see are not
attempts to dispense with a divine agency in nature, but to
discover the manner in which this agency is exercised, and the
laws by which it regulates it action. When Franklin, and the
other philosophers of his time, made known to the world that they
had discovered the cause which produced thunder and lightning,
many people thought it was impious for them to pretend to have
done so. For the philosophers to attribute a phenomenon which had
always been regarded as produced directly by the power of God to
petty secondary
causes, which they had themselves discovered, was, in the opinion
of these persons, atheistical and profane.
But it is now universally admitted that such a discovery does not
limit or control the power of God at all. It only enables us to
see somewhat further into his ways. No one detracts from the
honor due to an engineer for any grand result that he produces,
by explaining the mystery of the secret mechanism that he has
contrived by which to produce it.
It is so with all the works of nature. We may push our inquiries
in every direction with the utmost diligence and vigor, and carry
them to any extent, without the least fear of ever making any
discoveries which will tend in the smallest degree to supersede
the agency of a supreme and all-pervading power, either in the
original constitution of nature, or in the constant control of
all that takes place under the operation of its laws.
The Testimony of Scriptures
There is another source of apprehension, of a religious nature,
by which the mind is sometimes restricted and hampered in
studying the laws of nature and the past history of the globe,
and that is the fear that something will be found which may
conflict, or at least appear to conflict, with the testimony of
Scripture, and thus shake the foundation of our Christian faith.
But we must consider that the book of revelation is intended to
instruct us solely in moral and spiritual truths, while the book
of nature has been opened before us to teach us science and
philosophy. They are both equally from God. In one as much as in
the other, it is his voice that we hear, and his instructions
that we receive; and we must not allow our ears to be closed, or
our reason to be trammeled, in respect to what he teaches us
directly in one, by too literal interpretations of what is said
incidentally and indirectly in the other. Since the great mistake
which was made in the time of Galileo, when it was attempted to
shut out from mankind the evidences presented by mathematics and
astronomy, in respect to the laws of the solar system, by
inferences ignorantly drawn form incidental allusions in the
Scriptures to the motions of the heavenly bodies, all wise and
good men have come to the conclusion that we must look to the
word of God for instruction in moral and religious truth alone,
while for science and philosophy we must go to that other
volume--the great system of creation and providence--which
the same infallible teacher has spread open before us. Each comes
from the same
hand, and each in its own sphere it, in a certain sense, equally,
for us, the word of God.
Means of Transportation for Animals and Plants
A great many very curious modes by which plants and animals may
be transported from one country to another, even across wide and
deep seas, have recently been brought to light, which very much
diminish the difficulty of supposing that America might have
been stocked from the old--provided always, we grant that
plants and animals are subject to extensive modifications in the
course of long periods of time, by which the species is finally
changed, and new forms adapted to new situations and conditions
are developed.
In the first place, the sea, instead of lying motionless, except
so far as it is agitated by winds, as is often supposed, is
subject to a great number and variety of currents, flowing in all
directions, many of them at the rate of from twenty to sixty
miles a day. These currents convey fields of ice, masses of drift
wood, branches of trees with nuts, fruits, or other capsules
containing seeds attached to them, and the bodies of dead birds,
with seeds in their crops. There are many savage nations, living
in countries that produce no trees, that depend on drift wood
altogether for all the material of this
sort that they use in making utensils and weapons, and even
sometimes for building and for fuel. Now, the trunk of a single
tree might contain the seeds and eggs of a hundred different
species of minute plants and animals, and though great numbers
would doubtless perish, many would probably be preserved.
Experiments have recently been made to ascertain how long seeds
can remain submerged in sea water without losing their power of
germination, and it was found that out of many hundreds subjected
to the trial quite a large number grew after being in the water
from twenty to ninety days. This would give them time to be
conveyed a great distance by a current of the sea flowing at the
rate even of twenty-five miles a day.
A certain philosopher wishing to ascertain how far aquatic birds
might convey seeds from one lake or pond of fresh water to
another, in the mud adhering to their feet, took out a portion of
such mud, in order to ascertain how far it might be supplied with
the germs of vegetable life. The quantity which he took was about
a tea-cup full. This mud he placed in a situation to allow the
seeds which it contained to germinate, and as fast as little
plants appeared he pulled them out and counted them. He obtained
from this single tea-cup
full of soil more than two hundred living plants ! Thus
great numbers of transfers of plants from one region to another
are doubtless made, merely by the feet of aquatic birds.
In a somewhat similar manner the young of many small animals are
conveyed from lake to lake and from river to river, by attaching
themselves to the feet and legs of birds, floating or wading in
the water.
A great many other curious examples like these of the manner in
which nature has provided for the wide dissemination of the
minuter forms of animal and vegetable life might be given if time
and space would allow.
Glacial Action
Whenever the temperature of a country, either from its great
elevation or from its high latitude, is such that the summer
cannot thaw the snow and ice which the winter produces, what are
called glaciers are formed. These glaciers are beds of
solid ice, of many hundred feet in thickness, which are formed in
valleys or upon broad slopes of land, and which all the time
slowly move down the descent upon which they lie, as if there
were a certain slight and imperfect fluidity in the constitution
of the ice. When such a glacier has it lower termination
in a valley it sometimes ploughs up the ground before it, and
deposits stones, which it has brought down upon its surface, in a
particular way, and produces other curious effect, the results of
the glacial action, by which the geologists feel confident that
they can determine, upon a proper examination of any district or
valley, whether or not a glacier has ever been at work there.
When these glaciers terminate upon the shore of the sea, the
lower edge is forced out over the water by the pressure of a mass
above and behind, until the projecting mass, sometimes many
hundred feet in thickness, is broken off, falls over, and is
borne away by the current or the wind, This is the way in which
the immense icebergs that are seen floating about even in the
middle of the ocean are formed.
The Glacial Period of North America
It is alleged by geologists that there are abundant evidences of
former glacial action throughout all the northern and central
parts of North America, and also of Europe and Asia, indicating
that at some remote period the climate in all the northern
latitudes was very much colder than it is now. Indeed, some
astronomical arguments have recently been advanced showing that
the earth, by the laws of its motion round the sun, which lead to
a change in the position of its axis in relation to the sun, is
subject to certain grand oscillations of temperature, in which
the regions of the north and of the south poles are alternately
made warmer and colder, and that at the present time the
condition of the north pole is intermediate between the two
extremes. However this may be, there are undoubted geological
proofs that in former ages the northern countries, both of the
old continent and the new, have been at one period much colder,
and at another much warmer, than at present. When the climate was
colder the reign of ice in all the northern regions, and the
influence of it in connecting continents and transporting animals
and men, would be of course greatly increased. If now we suppose
that at such a time great numbers of the then existing species of
animals were transported across the intervening seas, and then
gradually spread themselves southward, undergoing slow
modifications as they advance, to fit them for the new conditions
to which the changes of the climate or their own changes of
habitation exposed them, we should have very nearly the result
which is now observed to exist.
These ideas, however, are, after all, at present only the
speculations of naturalists and philosophers, ingenious and
interesting as they are.
This information is the research of many people across the United States and may contain errors. It is presented as the best information to date. Like all of those whose work I have incorporated herein, my research is a work in progress and subject to change without notice. A special thanks to Marlene Ricci of CA, Dwayne Meyer of CA, Jacqueline Bean of TX, Debbie Dick of IN, Milus Miller of IL, Carol Hendricks Miller of IN, Clarence Miller of IN, and Harold Glen Miller of IN. There are numerous others too; many of which are unknown, but their findings and stories are still much appreciated. Much of this would not have been possible with out their information. Also this website includes historical facts gathered from Washington County History, Indiana History, Rowan County and Salisbury North Carolina Historical sources and other US Historical sources.
James A. Miller- Great -Great -Great -Great Grandson of Adam Miller and Hannah Sheets.
©2007 The Millers of Washington County
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Last Updated 01/22/07 07:11:03 AM -0800