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Whence? the Giants 175

"When we reflect, that the Scythian nations between the Danube & the Tanais, as late as within one century of the Christian era, were of a size which astonished the southern inhabitants of Europe & Asia; that they scalped their enemy; that they buried the dead in heaps of earth thrown over them, with such articles as were deemed by the deceased most valuable in his lifetime; and that these tumuli, or barrows, are yet to be seen in the plains towards the upper part of unclear - Iritish? & the unclear, and from the banks of the Wolga to the Lake Baikal; we cannot refrain from the conclusion, that this skeleton [the one described as found 10 miles from Sparta, White County p196] belonged to a human body of the same race, education and notions? with those who lived on the Volga, Tanais, & Obey. The same unknown cause which, in the course of 2000 years, has reduced the size of the ancient Scythians & their tribes, the Gauls, and Germans, and Sarmatians, has produced the same effects here. The descendants of these giants, both in the old & new world, agree with each other in bulk, as their ancestors did with each other, which proves a uniform cause operating equally both in the old & new world. The decrease in bulk seems to have kept pace every where with the increase of warm temperature, and with the abbreviation of longevity. The giants of Hebron & Gath, and those of Laconia & Italy, whose large skeletons to this day attest that there they formerly dwelt, compared with those now found in West Tennessee, demonstrate that a change of climate, or of some other cause, has worked