422 ETHNOLOGY. 



a mica mirror, and the only gold beads ever met with — n.-.tive gold 

 being found in the neighborhood. This mound is 88 feet high, and a 

 few rods from it is a circular one Co feet higli, which twenty years ago 

 had a parapet on top 5 feet high. The remainder are small and only 

 about 20 feet high. There are two excavations an acre square, as deep 

 as the moat, from which earth was probably obtained to raise the 

 mounds. 



The valley and country for twenty miles westward and northward is 

 very fertile, and exhibits evidence everywhere of having- been densely 

 peopled by the mound-builders. 



At the falls of Little Eiver, near the Alabama line, on the crest of the 

 fall, are three chambers hewed out of the solid sandstone, and at Na- 

 coochee the crest, of a conical hill is cut off at about 50 feet, so .as to 

 embrace an acre and a half; on two sides this is quite i)recipitous, and 

 on another a ditch and wall, which formerlj' was feet high, inclosing 

 20 acres, used by De Soto in the battle he had with the Cherokees in 

 1540, which is proved by the relics found. 



At Macon are stupendous remains, as also in Campbell County on 

 the Chattahoochee. Among these is the Yond Mountain, 4,000 feet 

 high, of solid granite; it is a cone crested with trees, nearly perpendicular 

 on all sides except at one place, which was walled with stone : Also 

 tbe Stone Mountain, which is without vegetation — 2,3G0 feet high — a 

 cone, and accessible on one side only. This was walled with stone. 

 All defensible mountains in this country were fortified. Neither the 

 Cherokees, Creeks, nor Seminoles had any tradition of the extinct race, 

 which is proved to have been a powerful nation, from the extent of 

 their territory and the stupendous character of their fortifications and 

 cemeteries. 



MOUNDS I IV GEORGIA. 

 By William McKixley, Millkdgevillk, Ga. 



There are many groups of mounds in Georgia, an account of which 

 would be of importance to the archceologist to have permanently re- 

 corded. With this view, I send you an account of mounds on Sapelo 

 Island, Mcintosh County. 



South of High Point there are three mound-circles, having plain areas. 

 Xo. 1 is 240 feet wide; 9 feet high; base, 30 feet; no gateway; built of 

 earth and shells, densely overgrown with live oak, palmetto, myrtle, 

 grape-vines, which perfectly mask it; western .' ide built along the very 

 edge of the table-land, so as to front a salt i:; rsh and Mud River as 

 a wall 20 feet high ; on the north, skirting a iiesh-water flag and bul- 

 rush marsh or stream, 150 feet wide, se])arating it from circle No. 2, 

 which is 210 feet wide, in an open field long cultivated; mound now 

 rising 3 feet on 20-feet base, composed of shells iind earth ; area plain. 

 Circle No. 3 is 150 feet wide, just like No. 2. 



