When, shortly after, this section of the Nephite people escaped from their Lamanite task-masters and returned to Zarahemla, the twenty-four golden plates were presented to king Mosiah, the younger, and he being a seer, translated them by the aid of the Urim and Thummim. These plates were found to contain the history of the world from the creation to the time of the building of the Tower of Babel, and of the race whose remains had been found by the people of Limhi scattered on the land northward. This was, however, not the first intimation that the Nephites had of the existence of this extinct people; for in the days of the elder Mosiah a large engraved stone was brought to him that had been discovered by the people of Zarahemla. It gave a very brief account of this same race, known to us as the Jaredites, but more particularly referred to its last ruler, named Coriantumr; who had himself been known to the Zarahemlaites; for he had, previous to his death, resided in their midst for nine months. The history that we have of this remarkable people, as given in the Book of Mormon, is Moroni's abridgment of the record contained on the twenty-four plates of gold. It commences with the dispersion of the human family at Babel. Interspersed with the narrative are many interpolations of Moroni's, in the shape of reflections, prophecies and explanatory remarks. As these additions or notes are inserted in the body of the work, and not as foot notes, the reader of this abridgment has to use care in its perusal, or his ideas may become confused; and he is troubled to account for statements which grow perfectly plain when it is understood they were written nearly four hundred years after the advent of the Savior. The history of the Jaredites is called the Book of Ether, because the twenty-four plates from which it is taken were hidden by a Jaredite prophet of that name, in the place where they were afterwards discovered by the people of Limhi. The ancestors of the Jaredites were engaged in the attempt to build the Tower of Babel. It is probable they were of the family of Shem, as they were worshipers of the true God, and he conferred upon them his priesthood. How far they had wandered from the tower, if at all, when the Lord commenced the revelation of his will to them, is not apparent from the sacred text. They were commanded by him to go "_down_ into the valley which is northward," and as the expressions up and down, when they occur in the Book of Mormon in connection with geographical locality, are always used with great exactitude, we may venture two surmises: that Jared and his friends had already wandered into some not far distant hilly region, or that the valley into which they were commanded to descend sloped towards the north, the flow of its waters, if any, being in that direction.