Page:The future of Africa.djvu/347

Rh When the Israelites entered the promised land, they broke up the political establishment of the Canaanites, destroyed large numbers of them, and drove many of them out of the land. These latter went northward, and at first settled in the country called Phœnicia; and from this they received the name Phœnicians. And here it was that the Canaanites gave evidence of being a wonderfully active, enterprising, ingenious, and intellectual people—as much, if not more so, than any people of ancient times. They were a maritime nation, and their adventurous spirit led to the far regions of the North, and southward around the Cape of Good Hope, which they doubled, traversing thence the countries bordering on the Indian Ocean. They had commercial intercourse all through the Mediterranean Sea. Their ships and trade reached all along the coast of Europe, even beyond the pillars of Hercules, to Britain and Ireland. In many of these places they planted colonies, on both sides of the Mediterranean; carrying with them arts, letters, commerce, and civilization, to people yet rude and uncultivated. It appears to be an established fact that one of their colonies was planted on the coasts of both Spain and Ireland; and thus some of the Celts of the present day may now have some of the blood of the Canaanites flowing through their veins.

"The establishment of a Canaanitish colony on the coast of Africa is no more evidence that the