In connexion with this subject it may be added, that M. Berthelot, a learned traveller, states that there exists a striking affinity between the names of places and of men in the ancient language of the Canaries and certain Carib words.[9] The contiguity of the Canaries to the African continent is such, that we can readily suppose their ancient inhabitants to have had communication with it, whereby the Libyan language became known to them. A new field of enquiry is thus opened to philologists, and we may here seek for the means to unravel one of the most difficult questions connected with the origin of the American race, and the means by which they reached this continent, for we never have been among those who believed that America derived the mass of her population, her men and animals, from Asia, by the way of Behring's Straits. The author of a late work on California, New Mexico, &c., brings to our notice a tribe of Indians known as the Munchies (Mawkeys) or white Indians.[10] "This remarkable nation occupies a valley among the _Sierra de los Mimbros_ chain of mountains, upon one of the affluents of the river Gila, in the extreme northwestern part of the province of Sonora. They number about eight hundred persons. Their country is surrounded by lofty mountains at nearly every point, is well watered and very fertile. Their dwellings are excavated in the hill-sides, and frequently cut in the solid rock. They subsist by agriculture, and raise great numbers of horses, cattle and sheep. Among them are many of the arts and comforts of civilized life. They spin and weave, and make butter and cheese, with many of the luxuries known to more enlightened nations. Their government is after the patriarchal order, and is purely republican in its character. In morals they are represented as honest and virtuous. In religion they differ but little from other Indians. Their features correspond with those of Europeans, with a fair complexion and a form equally if not more graceful. In regard to their origin, they have lost all knowledge or even tradition; neither do their characters, manners, customs, arts or government savor of modern Europe." Another tribe of Indians called the Navijos, of whom we know but little, except that they have long had a place on the maps, is noticed by the same author. They occupy the country between the Del Norte and the Sierra Anahuac, in the province of Sonora, and have never succumbed to Spanish domination. "They possess a civilization of their own. Most of them live in houses built of stone, and cultivate the ground--raising vegetables and grain for a subsistence. They also raise large numbers of horses, cattle and sheep--make butter and cheese, and spin and weave."