God has set the mark of his displeasure on the Lamanites, whom he has cursed, because of the iniquities of their fathers, with a darkened skin, uncomely features, and straight, black, coarse hair. In the beginning it was not so with either Judah or Manasseh. In confirmation of the testimony of the Book of Mormon, that the inhabitants of this continent were once a white and beautiful people, it may be stated that when very ancient burial places in North and South America have been opened, the remains of two races--one dark and the other fair--have been exhumed. The question may arise: How could this be told, when the skin had long rotted off the bones, and left only the skeleton behind, which fell in powder as soon as it was exposed to the action of the air? In this way: The dry, gravelly soil in which some of these bodies were buried, had so little affected the mummy, that portions of the hair still remained in good preservation, and in numerous instances it was such as is only found on heads of light races. We will cite a few examples given by different inquirers in this field of research. One writer, speaking of the ancient mummies found in Peru, says: The hair in general is of a lightish brown, and of a fineness of texture which equals that of the Anglo-Saxon race. Again: The ancient Peruvians appear, from numerous examples of hair found in their tombs, to have been an auburn-haired race. Another gentleman, a Mr. Haywood, has described the discovery, early in the present century, of three mummies, in a cave near the Cumberland river, in Tennessee; and the color of their skin was said to be fine and white, and their hair auburn and of a fine texture. The same investigator mentions several other cases where mummies were found in the limestone and saltpetre caves of Kentucky and Tennessee, with light yellowish hair. One scientist, to account for this peculiarity, suggests that it is possible that the light color was due to the action of the lime and saltpetre; but this suggestion will not affect those buried in other formations of rock, nor will it account for the fineness of the texture of the hair. Reasoning from other data, other writers have concluded that the cities whose ruins still stand in Yucatan and Central America were the work of two races, a light and a dark-skinned race respectively.