This singular intermingling of the Basques and Celts in the Spanish Peninsula has been a source of many conflicting opinions among the learned, on the question which of these two races were the first inhabitants, and which were the invaders of Spain? The enigma, I conceive, will be most satisfactorily solved by the rejection of the opinion that that country was in the first instance wholly occupied by either! Both may have arrived almost simultaneously, too weak in numbers wholly to engross the new territory on which they thus entered. Each may have thrown out into the most distant provinces weak colonies, consisting of a few nomade families, which afterwards became the foci of powerful Septs. This explanation completely harmonises with the instructive facts which have been developed relative to the North American Indian Tribes, who are still in the “hunter state,” as the first colonists of Europe must have been. The languages of a great portion of the North American Indian Tribes have been shown to consist of mere dialects of a few Parent Tongues. But the Septs thus proved to be nearly related are not always contiguous, but often separated by tribes speaking dialects of a different class, a necessary consequence of the roving habits and the imperfect occupation of territory incident to the “hunter state.” An interesting example of the influence of the causes which lead to these results occurs in Mr. Catlin’s allusion to a North American Indian Tribe, the Assinneboins, of whom he says: “The Assinneboins are a part of the Dahcotas, or Sioux, undoubtedly; for their personal appearance, as well as their language, is very similar. “At what time, or in what manner, these two parts of a nation got strayed away from each other is a mystery; yet such cases have often occurred, of which I shall say more in future. Large parties who are straying off in pursuit of game, or in the occupation of war, are oftentimes intercepted by their enemy, and being prevented from returning, are run off to a distant region, where they take up their residence and establish themselves as a nation.” (Catlin on the North American Indians, p. 53.) The evidence furnished by their languages is not unfavorable to the supposition that the Basques and Celts may have been of African origin.