Lake Superior we find old mines where copper has been taken out in large quantities a great many years ago. Large trees have grown over the rubbish that fill these mines, and this shows that a long time has passed since the miners were at work. Whence these clever-and industrious people came we do not know, but it is thought they were originally from the south of Asia.
3. North American Indians.—The “Mound Builders” were followed by a fiercer and ruder people that cared for little except hunting and fishing, making war and roaming the forests. Very little interest was taken by them in tilling the soil, a few tribes growing small quantities of maize or indian corn in clearings in the dense forests which covered most of the country. The principal tribes were the Algonquins, inhabiting the region from the Atlantic to Lake Superior; the Hurons, principally found in the Georgian Bay District, and the Five Nation Indians or Iroquois, occupying the middle and western part of the State of New York. These tribes were much alike in their appearance, manners and customs. Tall, simewy, copper-colored, with straight black hair, black eyes, high cheek bones—they were keen of sight and hearing, swift of foot, fond of war, cruel to their enemies and generally true to their friends. The Algonquins lived almost entirely by fishing and hunting, dwelt in wretched tents called wigwams, and were often on the verge of starvation. The Hurons and Iroquois tilled the soil to some extent, and laid up stores of corn for the seasons when game was scarce. They often lived in villages, in large bark houses occupied by several families, and were much more comfortable and prosperous than the Algonquins. Indian women did all the work and drudgery; the men when not hunting, fishing, or fighting, lived a lazy life, and spent their spare hours sleeping, gambling, and story-telling. Such were the people the first European settlers found in the greater part of North America.
4. Discovery of America.—Little was known of, America, until Christopher Columbus, a native of Genoa in Italy, persuaded Isabella, the Queen of Castile in Spain, to give him ships to find his way to India, by sailing westward instead of round the Cape of Good Hope, This was in 1492, A.D. Long before this, in the tenth century, the people of Iceland had made their way to the north-eastern coast of America, and seemed to have sailed south as
