ANCIENT MOUNDS.



IN nearly every part of the United States are to be found traces of those primitive inhabitants of America, the mound-builders. 

Among the relics which have been discovered are quite a variety of implements of war, curiously fashioned pottery, hatchets, knives, pipes, costly ornaments, etc., which show their individual skill. But the result of their united labor is seen in the deserted mines of gold, silver, and copper, and in the huge embankments of earth known as mounds, the latter being by far the most interesting as well as the most wonderful.

These mounds are found in various parts of the country; they differ in several respects, and were evidently built for different purposes. Some were probably designed for sacrificial mounds, some for sepulchers, others for mounds of observation, while a great number were erected for defensive purposes.

The sepulchral mounds consist of a knoll or group of knolls, not very large, and without definite arrangement. They are to be found near Chicago, Dubuque, and other places. Many of these have been opened; they rarely contain more than one skeleton, yet in some have been found the remains of many persons profusely decked with ornaments common to that day.

The sacrificial mounds are always found enclosed within an embankment, and contain altars of burned clay or stone, on which are deposited various remains, that have in all cases been more or less subjected to the action of fire. These mounds are more abundant in the Scioto Valley than elsewhere. From the remains found, it is supposed that these were used as places on which to burn the bodies of the dead.

The mounds of observation are those on which it is thought that signal fires were lighted, by which in a short time news could be transmitted to a great distance. Near Chillicothe, Ohio, is a mound nearly six hundred feet high, built, as is supposed, for this purpose. A fire upon it is visible fifteen miles.

Temple mounds are quite large and symmetrical. On the top of these were probably built temples of some perishable material.

A good degree of artistic skill was displayed in the construction of some of those ancient mounds. They were made to represent almost all kinds of birds and animals. One mound in Adams' Co., O., has the appearance of a huge serpent one thousand feet in length. The State of Ohio is supposed to contain at least ten thousand of these curiosities. While in the State last winter the writer visited many of them. Those at Newark are intensely interesting, as they are the most complicated of any in the United States.

These relics of the past fill one with awe wonder, and admiration for a people whose works remain as a monument of their greatness, but whose history is lost.





W. E. CORNELL