378 ETHNOLOGY. 



line, as if there were an intention on the part of the builders to make 

 these terminal points for the group. 



The first or northernmost large mound was almost entirely cut away 

 some time ago in constructing the Peninsular Railway, which runs 

 directly through it ; and the third large one was nearly half cut away 

 by the wagon-road, whose track here runs below the base of the mound. 

 The next has been partially leveled and a farm house built on its 

 truncated base. There are no depressions in the surrounding surface, 

 showing that the materials, which in some are sand and others surface- 

 loam, have been brought to the place from some other point. 



Proceeding eastward to the bank of the creek, we find another mound, 

 (No. 6,) which has been leveled to a terrace-form abont 4 feet high, on 

 which Mr. Flanigan's house stands ; and directly north, across an arm 

 of the ravine, was another, (No. 7,) whose site is occupied by the house 

 of Allen Cummings. Across the creek, nearly east of this, is a very 

 large round tumulus, (No. 8,) which is about 15 feet high, with a base 

 of about 100 feet. One hundred feet north of this is another double 

 mound, (No. 9 ;) the smaller one of the group is in the yard of a church, 

 and the larger one just in rear of it. 



I could find no traces of fortifications, and there are no other mounds 

 in the immediate vicinity, but I was informed that a large group exists 

 on a rolling prairie about two miles east, of which a very large one was 

 leveled several years ago. This is, perhaps, the same group examined 

 by Dr. Higday, of La Porte, some years since. 



My informant also states that about a mile south of Union Mills is a 

 burial-place of the modern Indians, still known as " Indian Fields," 

 from which bones, medals, kettles, guns, &c., have been obtained, while 

 a half mile farther south, on a prairie overlooking the Kankakee, is 

 another group of seven or eight mounds. These different burial-places 

 would, undoubtedly, prove of interest to the ethnologist, for a compari- 

 son of the remains of the two races who practiced such different modes 

 of burial. 



The greatest interest in these prehistoric remains centers in the fact that 

 the crania of the mound-builder, as found in these tumuli, differ widely 

 from those of any known race, approaching the Neanderthal skull in type, 

 and being, perhaps, lower in development. The frontal bone recedes 

 backward from a prominent superciliary ridge, leaving no forehead, or 

 rather the eye looks out from under the edge of a frontal plate, which 

 reminds me of a turtle-shell and is scarcely more elevated. My speci- 

 men is lower than the Stimpson-mound skull, and even than the Nean- 

 derthal, if we can judge correctly between the actual and the pictured 

 skull. None have yet been found here with the skull or bones entire. 



In my examination of the group I concluded that the road cut through 

 No. 3 had passed a little south of the center of the mound, and selecting 

 the sloping bank of the roadway as the easiest point to excavate with 

 favorable results, I was rewarded, after a few minutes' work with pick 



