Page:Narrative of the Discoveries on the North Coast of America.djvu/218

 all parts of America before the settlement of the whites, and is still among a tribe far to the westward of Fort Norman, who only descend for a short time from their mountains every second or third year, and have therefore not become humanized by intercourse with the establishments. Yet why should we judge harshly of these poor people? Let the philanthropist weigh the following passage in Gibbon, before the savages of the New World are pronounced a reproach to the human species: "The exposition of children was the prevailing and stubborn vice of antiquity. It was sometimes proscribed, often permitted, almost always practised with impunty by the nations who never entertained the Roman ideas of paternal power; and the dramatic poets, who appeal to the human heart, represent with indifference a popular custom which was palliated by the motives of œconomy and compassion." And immediately afterwards: "The