Gushing.] 441 [Xov. 6, 



like unto these, their later vessels in clay. For, by critically examin- 

 ing the peculiarly involuted and concentric designs on so many of them, 

 such as were recognized by Prof. Holmes as analogous to Caribbean 

 decorations, I find that they were undoubtedly derived from the natural 

 markings of the curly- or crooked-grained wood of which these ancient 

 peoples had earlier made their principal vessels — that is, before they 

 became makers of pottery vessels at all. 



Again, what lends plausibility to this supposition, is the fact that in 

 much of the pottery under consideration the surface-decoration resem- 

 bles a hachuring — so to call it, — the origin of which is as unmistakably 

 traceable to the surface markings of wooden objects carved with shark- 

 tooth blades ; and is simply the reproductive or imitative perpetuation, 

 in clay materials, of such markings as were unavoidable in vessels thus 

 made of the wood materials that preceded the use of, and served as the 

 models for, these vessels so differently made of potter}^ materials. All 

 this would, to my mind, indicate that these forms of decoration, — An- 

 tillean as well as Floridian — owed their origin to a similar condition and 

 environment, — and thus very probably were derived from some com- 

 mon source. 



I failed, it now appears, to consider sufficiently these and many other 

 points which have been so appropriately brought forward and empha- 

 sized by Dr. Putnam as well as by Dr. Brinton, because, as I early 

 stated, it seemed necessary for me, in order the better to exhibit and 

 explain the large number of lantern slides (there were sixty-seven of 

 them) to abandon my manuscript notes. From the scientific stand- 

 point I ought not, in justice to my subject, to have done this, and I now 

 regret that I did ; for in the outline or syllabus of the address which I 

 furnished to both Dr. Brinton and Dr. Putnam these points were at 

 least indicated ; and in my manuscript, as will appear when it is fully 

 published, nearly all of them were fairly set forth. 



If, then, you will permit me to restate my conclusions on one or two 

 only, of the more general of these points, which seem to me to include 

 or imply so many of the others, I will not detain you longer. 



I cannot express too strongly my belief that there was a large " 3Iusk- 

 hogian " (or Maskokian) element among the ancient inhabitants of 

 western Florida — so large, in fact, that I think we may justifiably map 

 the whole western half of Florida, to as far south as the very end of 

 the peninsula, as Maskokian. Now the Maskokians were mound build- 

 ers, and therefore, according to my theory, must long have been dwel- 

 lers in the land. Whether they had themselves come from the South, 

 or whether they came thither from the North, or whether, as has seemed 

 to me more probable, they resulted from an intermingling here of stocks 

 from both directions, these questions still remain, I think, to be deter- 

 mined principally by further archteologic researches of precisely the 

 kind of wliich I have given you some account this evening, — although 

 much more extended, for I have but entered the borderland, as it were, of 



