Salt Lake City Nov 11, 21

My Dear Friend and Brother:

I have given considerable time and study to the questions you forwarded to me concerning the Book of Mormon. The man who framed them was certainly some student, but if he had been a real critical reader of the Book of Mormon text, he could have raised questions much more difficult to answer.

Question 1 regarding languages: Hubert Howe Bancroft in his Native Races, Vol 3 page 553 Says: "First that a relationship exists among all the tongues of the northern and southern continents; and that while certain characteristics are found in common throughout all the languages of America, these languages are as a whole sufficiently peculiar to be distinguished from all the other languages of the world****** Nowhere on the globe are uniformities of speech carried over vast areas and through innumerable and diversified races with such persistency as in America; nowhere are tongues so dissimilar, and yet so alike as here".

As to the rapidity with which languages will change among people. I was astounded some years ago to learn that the modern Italian, and the modern Greek tongues bear no resemblance to the Latin and Greek of classic days. These latter are dead languages in every sense of the word.

Bancroft <?> in another volume gives a great array of evidence of the Hebrew origin of the American Indians. Whitney characterises these American languages "The most changeful forms of human speech", basing his opinion on the changes observed since the advent of Europeans.

As evidence of Hebrew origin, Bancroft quoting other authors points out the flood myth, circumcision, the ark of the covenant which the tribes of Honduras had, the conception of trinity, certain distinctions of animals clean and unclean, the doctrine of resurrection, anointing with oil, etc., etc. Lord Kingsborough spent his life and his fortune to prove that the American Indians were the ten lost tribes of Israel. Native Races Vol 5 page 84.

2nd

With regard to the horse recent geological research shows that the original home of the horse was in America. The new Encyclopedia Americana Vol 14, page 3<97> we read: "In the early part of the age of men or quarternary period, wild species of horse were to be found on every continent, except Australia. Remains of these true native horses have been found buried in strata of this age in all parts of the United States, in Alaska, in Mexico, in Ecuador, in Brazil, and Argentina".

Apparently the horse was abundantly represented in American fauna in quarternary times, and I can see no good reason for his extinction, although the spaniards have so far as I know said nothing about the matter. It may easily be that they took it for granted, and thought comment unnecessary.

3rd, The term steel seems to be an entirely modern term. I find no mention of it in the bible nor any ancient history. We must remember though that the translation of the Book of Mormon was in this modern time, and that steel is only a modified form of iron, and any modification of that metal could find only this modern word in our vocabulary to express it. That Iron of a superior quality was in use at a very early date is proven by the fact that an iron crosscut saw made in either Babylonia or Egypt a thousand years before Christ is preserved in the British Museum. Julius Caesar was said to have a sword made from iron procured from a fallen meteor.

4th The scimeter, although a weapon used much by the Mohamedan peoples, was also a weapon common to all eastern peoples. The highest types of the scimeter were made at Damascus, a city not far from Jerusalem.

That the word does not occur anywhere in the bible may be due to the fact that it is a type of sword, and the term sword may be the generic name which includes all varieties of that weapon. As to the date of the genesis of the scimeter among the Arabs and other eastern tribes I can find nothing definite.

5th,

The facts about silk culture seem to be: Hawae-Nan-tze in his Silk Classic states that Se-ling-shi queen of Hwang-te, a province of China in the year 2640 B.C. was the first to rear silk worms, and the emperor Hwang-te was induced to make robes and garments from that circumstance.

The Chinese seem to have kept the matter of the silk worm a profound secret for centuries, but to furnish western people with manufactured silk which sold at fabulous prices, sometimes for its weight in gold. The bible frequently speaks of silk at a very early date, but in no way to indicate that the Israelites knew anything about the secret of its production.

The secret of the silk worm was kept absolute with the Chinese until the sixth century A. D. when two Nestorian monks, who had been engaged in missionary work in China solved the mystery by bringing to Constantinople a small quantity of silk worm eggs concealed in their palmer staves. The missionaries had observed in China the various processes connected with the rearing of silk worms, the leaves on which they fed and the process of reeling off the silk fibre. Justinian gave every encouragement to the silk industry and it soon spread to the peoples of the western parts of Europe.

There are a number of different species of moth which produce silk cocoons. Several north and south American species yield silk which has not become commercially important because of the superiority of the (Bombyx textor), the particular specie that seems to yield the finest quality of silk.

It would be quite in the possibilities that the peoples of America would learn independently to reel silk from their native cocoons, and manufacture silk. I give the suggestion for what it is worth.

My dear friend I have given your letter considerable study, both because I would like to accommodate my friend, and because I have a peculiar liking for prying into such things and weighing them up in cold blooded logic.

With kindest personal regards to you I am

Your friend and brother,

Geo W. Middleton