Cnshiiig.] Obo I ^^y 6_ 



red numerous piles ot various lengths, all, however, comparatively short, 

 blunt-pointed at their lower ends, and either squared or else rudely 

 notched at their upper ends — some of them slantingly bored down the 

 sides — and there occurred also many stakes and timbers ; as though these 

 benches had been built to serve actuality as piers or the foundations for 

 long, pile-supported quays or scatfolds ; upon which, I concluded — from 

 the character of many lesser remains that we continually found — had 

 been constructed, side by side all around the court, comparatively long, 

 narrow, and low, thatched and latticed houses. At any rate it was over 

 and around these benches that the principal finds, inclusive of numerous 

 household articles, were made. 



The surface deposit throughout the entire court consisted of a stratum 

 of spongy black or dark brown muck, permeated by both rotting and 

 living rootlets. It was, as shown in section on Plate XXXI, thin at the 

 margins, but eighteen or twenty inches thick throughout the middle. 

 Below this was a somewhat thicker stratum of brownish gray peaty marl, 

 soft, tremulous, exceedingly foul-smelling, and rich in the best preserved 

 relics we discovered. This stratum directly overlaid and surrounded the 

 benches I have described. Finally underneath it, between the benches 

 and throughout the middle of the court, was a less well-defined laj'cr of 

 less peaty marl, intermixed with shells and other debris, and also with 

 abundant ancient remains — which, indeed, we continued to encounter 

 even in the underlying, comparatively firm shell and claj'-marl bottom. 

 This, however, although nearly a foot and a half thick, we could not 

 venture to excavate, since the slightest opening made through it into 

 the sandy reef below let in a steady stream of water from the sea. 



The objects found by us in these deposits were in various conditions 

 of preservation, from such as looked fresh and almost new, to such as 

 could scarcely be traced through or distinguished from the briny peat 

 mire in which they were embedded. They consisted of wood, cordage 

 and like perishable materials associated with implements and ornaments 

 of more enduring substances, such as shell, bone and horn — for only a 

 few shaped of stone were encountered during the entire search. 



Articles of wood far outnumbered all others. I was astounded to soon 

 find that many of these had been painted with black, white, gray-blue, 

 and brownish-red pigments ; and that while the wood itself was so 

 decayed and soft that in many cases it was ditflcult to distinguish the 

 fibre of even large objects of it, either by sight or by touch, from the 

 muck and peat in which they were unequally distributed, but now more 

 or le«s integrated ; yet when discoverable in time to be cautiously uncov- 

 ered and washed off" by the splashing or trickling of water over them 

 from a sponge, their for.ns appeared not 'only almost perfect, but also 

 deceptively well preserved, so that I at first thought we might, Avith 

 sufficient care, recover nearly all of them uninjured. This was especi- 

 ally true of such as had been decorated with the pigments ; for owing to 

 the presence in these pigments of a gum-like and comparatively insolu- 



