XIX. As to what regards Africa, we should consider, that it gave birth to a Cyprianus, and a Tertullian, and what is still more, to an Augustin; and that the Africans were at one time, as much superior to the Spaniards in military skill, as the Spaniards at this day are to the Africans; and that there was a time, when the conquest of all Spain cost the Africans less blood, than it has since cost Spain to conquer a few spots in Mauritania. The soil and the climate of Africa, are the same now they were formerly, and consequently capable of producing equal geniuses; and the fault of not cultivating them, should not be imputed to the soil or the climate, but to the want of opportunities of instruction, or to the neglect of application; but with all this, they are perhaps not so uncultivated as is commonly thought. Father Buttier, in his little treatise, intituled _An Examination of Vulgar Prejudices_, gives us the copy of a speech, which the ambassador from Morocco made to Louis the Fourteenth, which was as eloquent and as much to the purpose, as if it had been composed by a learned European. SECT. VI. XX. The conceit, which upon the first discovery of America was entertained of its inhabitants, and which still subsists among the generality of people, is, that they are not so much directed by reason as by instinct; as if some Circe, in her peregrinations through that vast country, had transformed all their men into beasts. But with all this, there are abundant testimonies, that their capacities are in no wise inferior to ours. The illustrious Palafox, is not contented with allowing them to be equal to us in natural talents, but in the memorial he presented to the King in their favour, entitled _A Natural Display of the Indies_, declares they excel us. He there gives a relation of an Indian, whose person he knew, and who went by the name of _The Man of Six Trades_, from his understanding, and being able to work well at that number; and of another, who learned to build organs in an amazing short time; and of another, who in an amazing short time also, learned to play the organ. He there likewise gives an account of the exquisite address, with which an Indian recovered a horse that had been purloined from him by a Spaniard. The Indian, commenced a prosecution against the Spaniard for his horse, and when the trial came on, the beast was brought into court, where the Spaniard alledged that he had bought him, and had had him in his possession for several years, which he brought witnesses to confirm. The Indian, who had no evidence to prove his property in the horse, finding himself hard pressed, instantly threw his cloak over the horse’s head, and requested that the Spaniard who insisted that he had been owner of the horse for so long a time, might tell of which eye he was blind; the Spaniard, who was taken by surprise, and much confounded with the question, answered at random, the right; upon which the Indian