Modern research inclines to the view that immigration from Asia across the Pacific ocean and Islands in the south, and the Bering Strait in the north, furnished America with a mixed population thousands of years ago, and that a lively commerce was carried on between North and South America many centuries before the discovery by Columbus and subsequent adventurers. (See the Preface to "The Ayar Incas" by Dr. Miles Poindexter.) The evidence in favor of this opinion is also a testimony to the authenticity of the record in the Book of Mormon of the voyage of Lehi, and the information that "The Lord did bring Mulek into the land North" (Hel. 6:10), and this further revelation that the Lord has, from time to time, led colonies of Israelites from their main home to distant parts of the world.