The Native Races [of the Pacific states], Volume 5, Primitive History. Hubert Howe Bancroft

Hindu goddess; haylli was the burden of every verse of the songs composed in praise of the Sun and the Incas. "Ogus, Ghengis' ancestor, at one year of age, miraculously pronounced the word Allah! Allah! which was the immediate work of God, who was pleased that his name should be glorified by the mouth of this tender infant."105 Thus Mr Ranking thinks "it is highly probable that this (haylli) is the same as the well-known Hallelujah." Resemblances are found to exist between the Peruvian feast of the sun, and other similar Asiatic festivals. In Peru, hunters formed a circle round the quarry, in the country of Genghis they did the same. The organization of the army was much the same in Peru as in the country of the Khans; the weapons and musical instruments were also very similar. In the city of Cuzco, not far from the hill where the citadel stood, was a portion of land called colcampata, which none were permitted to cultivate except those of royal blood. At certain seasons the Incas turned up the sod here, amid much rejoicing and many ceremonies. "A great festival is solemnized every year, in all the cities of China, on the day that the sun enters the fifteenth degree of Aquarius. The emperor, according to the custom of the ancient founders of the Chinese monarchy, goes himself in a solemn manner to plough a few ridges of land. Twelve illustrious persons attend and plough after him."106 In Peruvian as in Chinese architecture, it is noticeable that great care is taken to render the joints between the stones as nearly imperceptible as possible. A similarity is also said to exist between the decorations on the palaces of the Incas and those of the Khans. The cycle of sixty years was in use among most of the nations of eastern Asia, and among the Muyscas of the elevated plains of Bogota. The quipu, or knotted reckoning cord was in use in Peru, as in China. Some other analogies might be cited, but these are sufficient to show upon what foundation this theory rests. I may mention here that the Incas possessed a cross of fine marble, or jasper, highly polished, and all of one piece. It was three fourths of an ell in length and three fingers in thickness, and was kept in a sacred chamber of the palace and held in great veneration. The Spaniards enriched this cross with gold and jewels and placed it in the cathedral at Cuzco; had it been of plain wood they would probably have burnt it with curses on the emblem of 'devil-worship.' To account for this discovery, Mr Ranking says: There were many Nestorians in the thirteenth century in the service of the Mongols. The conqueror of the king of eastern Bengal, A.D. 1272, was a Christian. The Mongols, who were deists, treated all religions with respect, till they became Mohammedans. It is very probable that a part of the military sent to conquer Japan, were commanded by Nestorian officers. The mother of the Grand Khan Mangu, who was brother to Kublai, and possibly uncle to Manco Capac, the first Inca, was a Christian, and had in her service William Bouchier, a goldsmith, and Basilicus, the son of an Englishman born in Hungary. It is therefore highly probable that this cross accompanied Manco Capac.107

PERUVIAN GIANTS

      I have stated above that the Peruvians preserved no record of having come originally from China. They had a tradition, however, concerning certain foreigners who came by sea to their country, which may be worth repeating; Garcilasso de la Vega gives this tradition as he himself heard it in Peru. They affirm, he says, in all Peru, that certain giants came by sea to the cape now called St Helen's, in large barks made of rushes. These giants were so enormously tall that ordinary men reached no higher than their knees; their long, disheveled hair covered their shoulders; their eyes were as big as saucers, and the other parts of their bodies were of correspondingly colossal proportions. They were beardless; some of them were naked, others were clothed in the skins of wild beasts; there were no women with them. Having landed at the cape, they established themselves at a spot in the desert, and dug deep wells in the rock, which at this day continue to afford excellent water. They lived by rapine, and soon desolated the whole country. Their appetites and gluttony were such that it is said one of them would eat as much as fifty ordinary persons. They massacred the men of the neighboring parts without mercy, and killed the women by their brutal violations. At last, after having for a long time tyrannized over the country and committed all manner of enormities, they were suddenly destroyed by fire from heaven, and an angel armed with a flaming sword. As an eternal monument of divine vengeance, their bones remained unconsumed, and may be seen at the present day. As for the rest, it is not known from what place they came, nor by what route they arrived.108

      There is also a native account of the arrival of Manco Capac, in which he figures simply a culture-hero. The story closely resembles those told of the appearance and acts of the apostles Cukulcan, Wixepecocha, and others, and need not be repeated here.109

THE CHINESE FROM PERU

      Mr Charles Wolcott Brooks, Japanese consul in San Francisco, a most learned gentleman, and especially well versed in Oriental lore, has kindly presented me with a MS. prepared by himself, in which are condensed the results of twenty-five years' study of the history of the eastern Asiatic nations, and their possible communication with American continent.110 He recognizes many striking analogies between the Chinese and the Peruvians, but arrives at a conclusion respecting the relation between the two nations, the exact reverse of that discussed in the preceding paragraphs. His theory is that the Chinese came originally from Peru, and not the Peruvians from China. He uses, to support his argument, many of the resemblances in customs, etc., of which Ranking and others have availed themselves to prove an exactly opposite theory, and adds that, as in those early times the passage of the Pacific could only have been made under the most favorable circumstances and with the assistance of fair winds, it would be impossible, owing to the action of the SE. and NE. trade-winds for such a passage to have been made, either intentionally or accidentally, from China to Peru, while on the other hand, if a large craft were placed before the wind and set adrift from the Peruvian coast, there is a strong probability that it would drive straight on to the southern coast of China.111

JAPANESE WRECKS ON THE AMERICAN COAST

      A Japanese origin or at least a strong infusion of Japanese blood, has been attributed to the tribes of the north-west coasts. There is nothing improbable in this; indeed, there is every reason to believe that on various occasions small parties of Japanese have reached the American continent, have married the women of the country, and necessarily left the impress of their ideas and physical peculiarities upon their descendants. Probably these visits were all, without exception, accidental; but that they have occurred in great numbers is certain. There have been a great many instances of Japanese junks drifting upon the American coast, many of them after having floated helplessly about for many months. Mr Brooks gives forty-one particular instances of such wrecks, beginning in 1782, twenty-eight of which date since 1850.112 Only twelve of the whole number were deserted. In a majority of cases the survivors remained permanently at the place where the waves had brought them. There is no record in existence of a Japanese woman having been saved from a wreck. A great many Japanese words are to be found in the Chinook jargon, but in all cases abbreviated, as if coming from a foreign source, while the construction of the two languages is dissimilar.113 The reasons for the presence of Japanese and the absence of Chinese junks are simple. There is a current of cold water setting from the Arctic ocean south along the east coast of Asia, which drives all the Chinese wrecks south. The Kuro Siwo, or 'black stream,' commonly known as the Japan current, runs northwards past the eastern coast of the Japan islands, then curves round to the east and south, sweeping the whole west coast of North America, a branch, or eddy, moving towards the Sandwich Islands. A drifting wreck would be carried towards the American coast at an average rate of ten miles a day by this current. To explain the frequent occurrence of these wrecks Mr Brooks refers to an old Japanese law. About the year 1630, the Japanese government adopted its deliberate policy of exclusion of foreigners and seclusion of its own people. To keep the latter from visiting foreign countries, and to confine their voyages to smooth water and the coasting trade, a law was passed ordering all junks to be built with open sterns and large square rudders unfit to stand any heavy sea. The January monsoons from the north-east are apt to blow any unlucky coaster which happens to be out straight into the Kuro Siwo, the huge rudders are soon washed away, and the vessels, falling into the trough of the sea, roll their

105

Quoted by Ranking, Hist. Researches, p. 183, from Abul Ghazi Bahadur, History of the Turks, Moguls, and Tartars, vol. i., p. 11.

106

Du Halde, Empire of China, vol. i., p. 275. Quoted by Ranking, Hist. Researches, p. 197-8.

107

Concerning the Mongolian origin of the Peruvians, see: Ranking's Hist. Researches. Almost all other writers who have touched on this subject, are indebted to Mr Ranking for their information and ideas. See also Humboldt, Exam. Crit., tom. ii., p. 67, et seq.; Malte-Brun, Précis de la Géog., tom. vi., pp. 293-4; Forster's Voyage Round the World. Grotius thinks that the Peruvians must be distinct from other American people, since they are so acute, and believes them, therefore, to be descended from the Chinese. Wrecks of Chinese junks have been found on the coast. Both adore the sun, and call the king the 'son of the sun.' Both use hieroglyphics which are read from above downwards. Manco Capac was a Chinaman who gave these settlers a government founded on the Chinese system. Montanus, Nieuwe Weereld, pp. 32-3. De Laet, replying to these arguments, considers that the acuteness of the Peruvians does not approach that of the Chinese. Nowhere in Peru have the cunning and artistic works of Chinese artificers been seen. The Chinese junks were too frail to withstand a storm that could drive them across the Pacific. And if the voyage were intentional they would have sought nearer land than the coasts of Mexico or Peru. The religion of the two countries differs materially; so does their writing. Manco Capac was a native Peruvian who ruled four hundred years before the coming of the Spaniards. Novus Orbis, in Id., pp. 33-4. Mr Cronise, in his Natural Wealth of California, p. 28, et seq., is more positive on this subject than any writer I have yet encountered. I am at a loss to know why this should be, because I have before me the works that he consulted, and I certainly find nothing to warrant his very strong assertions. I quote a few passages from his work. 'The investigations of ethnologists and philologists who have studied the Hindoo, Chinese, and Japanese annals during the present century, have brought to light such a chain of evidence as to place beyond doubt that the inhabitants of Mexico and California, discovered by the Spaniards, were of Mongolian origin.' Hindoo, Chinese, and Japanese annals all agree that the fleet of Kublai Khan, son of Genghis Khan, was wrecked on the coast of America. 'There are proofs clear and certain, that Mango Capac, the founder of the Peruvian nation, was the son of Kublai Khan … and that the ancestors of Montezuma, of Mexico, who were from Assam, arrived about the same time… Every custom of the Mexicans, described by their Spanish conquerors, proves their Asiatic origin… The strange hieroglyphics found in so many places in Mexico, and from California to Canada, are all of Mongolian origin'… 'Humboldt, many years ago, conjectured that these hieroglyphics were of Tartar origin. It is now positively known that they are… The armor belonging to Montezuma, which was obtained by Cortez and is now in the museum at Madrid, is known to be of Asiatic manufacture, and to have belonged to one of Kublai Khan's generals.' It is unnecessary to multiply quotations, or to further criticise a work so grossly misleading. The following unique assertion is a fair specimen of Mr Cronise's vagaries when treading on unfamiliar ground: '"Alta," the prefix which distinguishes Upper from Lower California, is a word of Mongolian origin, signifying "gold."' The most superficial knowledge of Spanish or of the history of California, would have told Mr Cronise that 'alta' simply means 'high,' or 'upper,' and that the name was applied to what was originally termed 'New' California, in contradistinction to 'Baja' or 'Lower' California.

108

This relation, says Ranking, 'has naturally enough been considered by Robertson and others as a ridiculous fable; and any reader would be inclined to treat it as such, were it not accounted for by the invasion of Japan, and the very numerous and convincing proofs of the identity of the Mongols and the Incas.' Hist. Researches, p. 55. He thinks that the giants were the Mongolian invaders, mounted upon the elephants which they brought with them. 'The elephants,' he says, 'would, no doubt, be defended by their usual armor on such an extraordinary occasion, and the space for the eyes would appear monstrous. The remark about the beards, &c., shows that the man and the elephant were considered as one person. It is a new and curious folio edition of the Centaurs and Lapithæ; and we cannot wonder that, on such a novel occasion, Cape St. Helen's did not produce an American Theseus.' Id., pp. 53-4.

109

See Ranking's Hist. Researches, p. 56, et seq.; Warden, Recherches, pp. 187-9.

110

Origin of the Japanese Race, and their Relation to the American Continent, MS.

111

See report of a lecture read by Charles Wolcott Brooks before the California Academy of Science, in Daily Alta California, May 4, 1875; San Francisco Evening Bulletin, same date.

112

See report of paper submitted by Mr Brooks to the California Academy of Sciences, in San Francisco Evening Bulletin, March 2, 1875. In this report the details and date of each wreck are given. The author of the paper assures me that he has records of over one hundred such disasters. Every one of these wrecks, when examined, proved to be Japanese, and not one Chinese. See also Irving's Bonneville's Adven., p. 427; Smith's Human Species, p. 239; Roquefeuil, in Nouvelles Annales des Voy., 1823, tom. xviii., pp. 248-9; Anderson, in Hist. Mag., vol. vii., pp. 80-1; Lassepas, Baja Cal., pp. 45-6.

113

Id. Lord's Nat., vol. ii., pp. 216-7. 'Looking only at the forms and endings of the words, their ring and sounds when uttered, we could not but notice the striking similarity, in these respects, between the proper names as found on the map of Japan, and many of the names given to places, rivers, etc., in this country.' (America.) Rockwell, in Hist. Mag., n. s., vol. iii., p. 141.