COMPOSITION OF ANCIENT POTTERY. 349 



as I thrust the spade into one of them my suspicions were confirmed 

 that they were not ancient, and my interest in them correspondingly de- 

 creased. I knew that I was on the old camping-ground of Black Elawk, 

 and alter examining the principal one rather critically 1 left the laborers, 

 with instructions to them to open one of the smaller ones, and made a 

 visit to the home of Mr. James .Jordan, an old Indian trader, who lives 

 two miles below on the same farm he has occupied for nearly half a cen- 

 tury. Mr. Jordan was intimately acquainted with Black Hawk; was 

 his chosen friend and companion, and from that distinguished chieftain 

 learned that these mounds were the burial places of the slain Omahas, 

 whom he (Black Hawk) had surprised and defeated in battle soon after 

 his expulsion from Illinois. I particularly inquired of Mr. Jordan if he 

 had ever talked with Black Hawk and other Indians about the mounds 

 on the hills. He told me that he had, and that they bad no knowledge 

 of them; that they regarded them with awe and tuperstition and as 

 having been made by people long ago and beyond airy of their tradi- 

 tions. Investigations of hill mounds made the next day after talking 

 with Mr. Jordan convinced me more fully of the antiquity of these 

 works and with the idea that they were not made by any modern tribe 

 of Indians, In returning to Ottumwa I stopped at Clifdand, a sta- 

 tion on the Des Moiues Valley Railroad, six miles distant from this city. 

 On the highest point, and in view of the Village Creek mounds, on the 

 opposite side of the Des Moines River, I discovered three mounds about 

 forty yards apart lying in a range east and west. The eastern mound 

 I excavated, discovering that it was composed of nearly the same mate- 

 rial as the Village Creek mounds, viz, ashes and clay intermingled. 

 These mounds are 50 feet in diameter and nearly 4 feet high. I found 

 in the eastern mound several small stones of magnesian limestone, yeh 

 low and red sandstone, a few pieces of flint, and all showing unmistak- 

 able evidences of having been exposed to considerable heat. There 

 were no bones, but indistinct traces of bone material reduced to a gray 

 pulpy mass. It is a noteworthy fact that after digging down one foot 1 

 found the interior material dry, very hard, and compact ; so dry was the 

 material that it seemed there was not a particle of moisture. Beneath 

 this and at the bottom of the mound, and where the surface should have 

 been, I found no traces of soil, but wet clay which seemingly had never 

 been disturbed. 



COMPOSITION OF ANCIENT POTTKKY POUND NEAR THE MOUTH OF CHEQUEST 

 CREEK, AT PITTSBURGH, ON Till: DES MOINES RIVER. 



By Robert N. amt> Charles L. Dahlberg. 



The pieces of pottery found are composed of clay and sand mixed 



with small pebbles, forming a cement which appears t<> !><• baked rather 



than burned. The most of the pieces found show thai the heal applied 



in its construction was not suflicieut to melt the sand or pebbles, or in 



