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Show Where Was Civilization's Cradle Rocked? j AND now comes an Italian, Professor Masso, ' with a book on "Mediterranean Civilization," Civiliza-tion," in which he averrs that the civiliza- ' tlon of Europe came, not from Asia, but from ! Africa, and makes even the Phoenician and ' Etruscans imitators rather than pioneers and creators. The work of the archeolor;ist supplies him with his material. The book will renew the interest in the legends le-gends of the past, and the conclusions of some modern men, like Le Plongeon, for instance, who have insisted that all the civilisation of the old , world was originally borrowed from this western west-ern continent, that Atlantis was no myth, that it "" really was in part the bridge over which the men of Mexico passed when in their explorations they moved eastward; that they were seamen as t well as landsmen; that at tho easternmost point of land they built boats and started out on the I sea before them and found or were blown through the Pillars of Hercules; that they founded found-ed colonies along the north shores of Africa until un-til at last they entered the Nile and pushed the'r boats up that river until the full majority of the ! great valley was opened before them, and there ', they built their central seat. How long ago that : I was, who will ever estimate? That there they began to build their temples and fasten upon ' them their hieroglyphics. In them is the evidence on which the explor- l ers found their belief, for they nro exact copies of thoso found today on the crumbling ruins In southern Mexico. Meanwhile, the civilization on m this side either woro itself out or somo tremond-ous tremond-ous cataclysm destroyed the people, and tit last communication between the oast and the wost ceased; as the ages rolled on forgotfulnoas drew Its winding sheet over all that past; there was progression In Egypt, decay on this sldo, and our worn-out continent was loft for tho centuries to recuperate, that it might again becomo a fit place on which to plant now races. It Is a fascinating story; it should bo a fascinating fas-cinating work for thoso men, who from burled letters and symbols nnd instruments that fell from tho hands of tollers tigr ago would seek from tho data material out of hluh to write tho history of a past that is so far back in tho annals an-nals of time that all memory of It has been forgotten; for-gotten; so far back that tho first names of men whom wo have been taught that history dates from, seem like modern witnesses by comparison. compari-son. "Moses was learned In all tho wisdom of tho Egyptians," we are told, but from whence did the Egyptians entail that wisdom? When the war ceases In Mexico, there should be new explorations made there. |