1867.] 243 [Curtis. 



of special interest had long since been removed. His ob- 

 object at this time was to discover what traces remained of 

 man's agency in their construction. In eleven of them only 

 chips of flint could be found here and there ; and in tlie 

 other two, and especially in one of them, large numbers of 

 these were picked up, in all about five pounds. One or two 

 complete arrow-heads and a few fragments were noticed ; 

 in contradistinction to the mounds of Florida, no bones of 

 animals were discovered, and but very little pottery. 



Mr. Horace Mann stated that in Concord, on the Concord 

 River, there was a bluff fifteen feet high, filled with shells of 

 mussels ( Unionidce), in which split bones and the upper arm 

 of the beaver, together with considerable pottery and arrow- 

 heads had been found by Mr. Thoreau. 



Dr. Samuel Kneeland read the following letter from Mr. 

 Josiah Curtis of Knoxville, Tenn. : — 



" I send you enclosed a photograph of an image, or marble statue, 

 said to have been recently found in a cave about twenty miles, a little 

 north of east, from this city- The following is about all I can say of 

 it. Some workmen building a railroad bridge over the Holston River, 

 at Strawberry Plains, some sixteen miles from here, on the East Ten- 

 nessee and Virginia railroad, are credibly reported to have visited a 

 cave long known to exist, some four miles from the scene of their la- 

 bors. Curiosity led them to an apartment Avhich apparently had not 

 been visited for an unknown period. In that apartment they found 

 the ' Image ' evidently cut from the solid rock, as it was still firmly 

 attached thereto by a pedicle some two or three inches In diameter 

 and twelve Inches long, extending from the back of the head In a sort 

 of ' chignon.' The men broke it from its position and sent It to this 

 city- I took It to the Artists' Gallery and had a few photographs 

 made. The statue Is of solid marble, and Is twenty inches high, seven 

 inches deep at the base, and three and one-half Inches Avide. I hope 

 soon to visit the cave and verify what seems unquestionable. I hope 

 also soon to be able to secure some bones, which are said to be human 

 bones. They are reported to have been washed up by the late floods 

 on the Pigeon River, some twenty-five miles south-east of this place 

 towards the Great Smoky Mountains." 



Dr. C. T. Jackson mentioned that he had recently returned 

 from the gold regions of Vermont. The great Appalachian 



