ANCIENT COPPER MINES. 259 



on one of the mounds of earth thrown out of an ancient mine. 

 Mr. Foster also notes the great size and age of a pine stump, 

 which must have grown, nourished and died since the works 

 were deserted ; and Mr. C. Whittesley not only refers to living 

 trees upwards of three hundred years old, now nourishing in 

 the gathered soil of the abandoned trenches, but adds, ' On 

 the same spot there are the decayed trunks of a preceding 

 generation or generations of trees that have arrived at matur- 

 ity, and fallen down from old age.' According to the same 

 writer, in a communication made to the American Association, 

 at the Montreal meeting in 1857, these ancient works extend 

 over a tract from 100 to 150 miles in length, along the 

 southern shore of the lake." 



In another excavation was found a detached mass of native 

 copper, weighing upwards of six tons. It rested on an arti- 

 ficial cradle of black oak, partly preserved by immersion in 

 water. Various implements and tools of the same metal were 

 found with it. The commonest of these are the stone mauls 

 or hammers, of which from one place ten cart-loads were 

 obtained. With these were " stone axes of large size, made 

 of greenstone, and shaped to receive withe -handles. Some 

 large round greenstone masses, that had apparently been used 

 for sledges, were also found/' 



Wooden implements are so perishable that we could not 

 expect many of them to have been found. Two or three 

 wooden bowls, a trough, and some shovels with long handles, 

 are all that appear to be recorded. 



It has often been stated that the Indians possessed some 

 method, at present unknown, by which they were enabled to 

 harden the copper. This, however, from examinations insti- 

 tuted by Professor AVilson, seems to be an error. Some copper 

 implements, which he submitted to Professor Crofts, were 

 found to be no harder than the native copper from Lake 

 * Prof. W. W. Mather in a letter to Mr. Squier, 1. c. p. 184. 



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