The Israelites were but forty years in the wilderness, and would not have renewed the painful act of circumcision, only that Joshua inforced it: and by the necessary fatigues and difficulties, to which as already hinted, the primitive Americans must be exposed at their first arrival in this waste and extensive wilderness, it is likely they forbore circumcision, upon the divine principle extended to their supposed predecessors in the wilderness, of not accepting sacrifice at the expence of mercy. This might soothe them afterwards wholly to reject it as a needless duty, especially if any of the eastern heathens accompanied them in their travels in quest of freedom. And as it is probable, that by the time they reached America, they had worn out their knives and every other sharp instrument fit for the occasion; so had they performed the operation with flint-stones, or sharp splinters, there is no doubt that each of the mothers would have likewise said, “This day, thou art to me a bloody husband[XXIX].” However, from the contemptible idea the Americans fix to castration, &c. it seems very probable the more religious among them used circumcision in former ages. Footnote XXIX: Exod. iv. 25, 26. Under this argument, I must observe that _Ai-ú-be_ signifies “the thigh” of any animal; and _E-ee-pattáh Tekále_, “the lower part of the thigh,” or literally, “the hanging of the foot.” And when in the woods, the Indians cut a small piece out of the lower part of the thighs of the deer they kill, length-ways and pretty deep. Among the great number of venison-hams they bring to our trading houses, I do not remember to {137} have observed one without it; from which I conjecture, that as every ancient custom was designed to convey, either a typical, or literal instructive lesson of some useful thing; and as no usage of the old heathen world resembled this custom; it seems strongly to point at Jacob’s wrestling with an angel, and obtaining for himself and his posterity, the name, ישר-אל, (perhaps, _Yosher-ale_) “divine guide,” or “one who prevails with the omnipotent,” and to the children of Israel not eating the sinew of the thigh of any animal, to perpetuate the memory of their ancestor’s sinew being shrunk, which was to obtain the blessing.