When America was first discovered, it was found to be inhabited by a race of men different from any already known. They were called INDIANS, from the West Indies, where they were first seen, and which Columbus, according to the common opinion of that age, supposed to be a part of the East Indies. On exploring the coasts and the interior of the vast continent, the same singular people, in different varieties, were everywhere discovered. Their general conformation and features, character, habits, and customs were too evidently alike not to render it proper to class them under the same common name; and yet there were sufficient diversities, in these respects, to allow of grouping them in minor divisions, as families or tribes. These frequently took their names from the parts of the country where they lived. The differences just mentioned were, indeed, no greater than might have been expected from the varieties of climate, modes of life, and degree of improvement which existed among them. Sometimes the Indians were found gathered in large numbers along the banks of rivers or lakes, or in the dense forest, their hunting-grounds; and not unfrequently also, scattered in little collections over the extended face of the country. As they were often engaged in wars with each other, a powerful tribe would occasionally subject to its sway numerous other lesser ones, whom it held as its vassals. No accurate account can be given of their numbers. Some have estimated the whole amount in North and South America, at the time of the discovery of the continent, even as high as one hundred or one hundred and fifty millions. This estimate is unquestionably much too large. A more probable one would be from fifteen or twenty to twenty-five millions. But they have greatly diminished, and of all the ancient race not more than four or five millions, if so many, now remain. Pestilence, wars, hardships, and sufferings of various kinds have been their lot for nearly four hundred years; and they have melted away at the approach of the white man; so that even a lone Indian is now scarcely found beside the grave of his fathers, where once the war-whoop might have called a thousand or more valiant men to go forth to engage in the deadly fray. With them have perished, in many instances, their ancient traditions; and as they had no other means of handing down the records of their deeds, their history is lost, except here and there a fragment, which has been treasured up by some white man more curious than his fellows, in studying their present or former fates. Monuments, indeed, exist, widely scattered over the countries they once occupied; some rude and inartificial, marked by no skill or taste; and others evidently reared at not a little expense of time and labor, and characterized by all the indications of a people far in advance of their neighbours in the arts and in civilization.