were nations who were either quite ignorant of fire, or had but just
learned its nature and effects. These authorities are strengthened by
what has been related of people discovered in modern times. Thus the
inhabitants of the Marian or Ladrone Islands, and also of the Philippine
and Canaries, are said to have been without this knowledge, at the time
of their discovery. We are told besides of several nations in America
and Africa being in the same state of ignorance. As to these, however,
it is but fair to apprize the reader, that the authorities adduced by
the President are not such as can be implicitly relied on--a remark,
perhaps, which some readers will not fail to apply to certain of the
writers formerly mentioned. The Egyptians owed their knowledge of fire
to thunder and lightning; the Phoenicians to the effect of the wind on
woods and forests; volcanos, burning earth, (as in a province of Persia)
and boiling wells (frequent in several countries), gave rise to this
knowledge amongst other people. "We may form very probable conjectures
about the methods which men at first used to procure fire, when they had
occasion for it, from ancient traditions, and from the present practices
of the savages. They could not be long in discovering, that by striking
two flints each against other, there went sparks from them:" "They
remarked, that by rubbing two pieces of hard wood very strongly against
each other, they raised sparks; nay, that by rubbing for some time two
pieces of wood, they raised flame." "The Chinese say that one of their
first kings taught them this latter method; and the Greeks had nearly
the same tradition." This method, we learn from Lawson, was in use
amongst the natives of Carolina, before they became acquainted, with the
use of steel and flints. "They got their fire," says he, "with sticks,
which by vehement collision, or rubbing together, take fire." "You are
to understand," he adds, "that the two sticks they use to strike fire
withal, are never of one sort of wood, but always differ from each
other." Indeed it is probable that this method has been very generally
practised. Seneca makes mention of it in the 2d book, chap. 22. of his
Nat. Quaest., and he specifies some of the kinds of wood known by the
shepherds to be fit for the purpose, "_sicut lauris, hederae, et alia in
hunc usum nota pastoribus_." This is noticed by Mr Jones, who gives it
as his opinion that the _lauris_, here spoken of, is the bay-tre