We have seen them settling, in the earliest ages, in Ireland.  They also formed the base of the dark-haired population of England and Scotland.  They seem to have race affinities with the Berbers, on the Mediterranean coast of Africa.

Dr. Bodichon, for fifteen years a surgeon in Algiers, says: 

“Persons who have inhabited Brittany, and then go to Algeria, are struck with the resemblance between the ancient Armoricans (the Bretons) and the Cabyles (of Algiers).  In fact, the moral and physical character is identical.  The Breton of pure blood has a long head, light yellow complexion of bistre tinge, eyes black or brown, stature short, and the black hair of the Cabyle.  Like him, he instinctively hates strangers; in both are the same perverseness and obstinacy, same endurance of fatigue, same love of independence, same inflexion of the voice, same expression of feelings.  Listen to a Cabyle speaking his native tongue, and you will think you bear a Breton talking Celtic.”

The Bretons, he tells us, form a strong contrast to the people around them, who are “Celts of tall stature, with blue eyes, white skins, and blond hair:  they are communicative, impetuous, versatile; they pass rapidly from courage to despair.  The Bretons are entirely different:  they are taciturn, hold strongly to their ideas and usages, are persevering and melancholic; in a word, both in morale and physique they present the type of a southern race—­of the Atlanteans.”

By Atlanteans Dr. Bodichon refers to the inhabitants of the Barbary States—­that being one of the names by which they were known to the Greeks and Romans.  He adds: 

“The Atlanteans, among the ancients, passed for the favorite children of Neptune; they made known the worship of this god to other nations-to the Egyptians, for example.  In other words, the Atlanteans were the first known navigators.  Like all navigators, they must have planted colonies at a distance.  The Bretons, in our opinion, sprung from one of them.”

Neptune was Poseidon, according to Plato, founder of Atlantis.

I could multiply proofs of the close relationship between the people of the Bronze Age of Europe and the ancient inhabitants of Northern Africa, which should be read remembering that “connecting ridge” which, according to the deep-sea soundings, united Africa and Atlantis.

CHAPTER V.

The Peruvian colony.

If we look at the map of Atlantis, as revealed by the deep sea soundings, we will find that it approaches at one point, by its connecting ridge, quite closely to the shore of South.  America, above the mouth of the Amazon, and that probably it was originally connected with it.

If the population of Atlantis expanded westwardly, it naturally found its way in its ships up the magnificent valley of the Amazon and its tributaries; and, passing by the low and fever-stricken lands of Brazil, it rested not until it had reached the high, fertile, beautiful, and healthful regions of Bolivia, from which it would eventually cross the mountains into Peru.