*50 It is
remarkable that this important institution should have been known
to both the Mexicans and the Peruvians without any correspondence
with one another; and that it should have been found among two
barbarian nations of the New World, long before it was introduced
among the civilized nations of Europe. *51
[Footnote 50: Sarmiento, Relacion, Ms., cap. 18. - Dec. de la
Aud. Real., Ms.
If we may trust Montesinos, the royal table was served with fish,
taken a hundred leagues from the capital, in twenty-four hours
after it was drawn from the ocean! (Men. Antiguas, Ms., lib. 2,
cap. 7.) This is rather too expeditious for any thing but
rail-cars.]
[Footnote 51: The institution of the Peruvian posts seems to have
made a great impression on the minds of the Spaniards who first
visited the country; and ample notices of it may be found in
Sarmiento, Relacion, Ms., cap. 15. - Dec. de la Aud. Real., Ms. -
Fernandez, Hist. del Peru, Parte 2, lib. 3, cap. 5. - Conq. i
Pob. del Piru, Ms., et auct. plurimis.
The establishment of posts is of old date among the Chinese, and,
probably, still older among the Persians. (See Herodotus, Hist.,
Urania, sec. 98.) It is singular, that an invention designed for
the uses of a despotic government should have received its full
application only under a free one. For in it we have the germ of
that beautiful system of intercommunication, which binds all the
nations of Christendom together as one vast commonwealth.
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