MISCELLANEOUS PAPEES RELATING TO ANTHROPOLOGY. 549 



ANTIQUITIES OF FOX RIVER VALLEY, LA SALLE COUNTY, 



ILLINOIS. 



By W. Hector Gale, of TVedron, III. 



Having recently had the pleasure of examining a portion of the Fox 

 River Valley, about 8 miles from Ottowa, the capital of La Salle County, 

 Illinois, the author gives below the results of his investigations. The 

 valley abounds in picturesque scenery of rocky bluffs and wide, fertile 

 fields. The surface rocks are the Saint Peter's sandstone and Trenton 

 limestone of the Lower Silurian. The drift in many places is 40 feet in 

 thickness, consisting of a bluish clay, very hard, which, when under- 

 mined, breaks into blocks with the regularity of stratified rocks. 



The Fox River j)asses along the eastern side of the valley in this 

 locality', and is, in ordinary times, very shallow and rapid. The stream 

 has, in the remote past, covered the entire valley, about one-half a mile 

 in width. The ground is eminently historical as being the region which 

 was explored by those intrepid voyagenrs, La Salle, Tonti, Marquette, and 

 Joliet, also the scene of the almost romantic extermination of the Illini 

 Indians by the Iroquois. Within a radius of a few miles, and especially 

 within this immediate locality, were enacted some of the most sanguin- 

 ary scenes of the Black Hawk war. 



But relics of a still older people are unmistakably visible here. It 

 may be well to add that the course of the river here is from north to 

 south. Perpendicular bluffs, of Saint Peter's sandstone, rise along the 

 eastern shore, which are washed by the waters of the Fox, even at low 

 water, while along the western side of the valley are sloping bluffs from 

 20 to GO feet above the river. My experience during the late war teaches 

 me that, were an enemy expected from the south, this locality, on ac- 

 count of its natural advantages, would be fortified and made a very 

 strong place. It would seem that this fact was not lost sight of by the 

 prehistoric inhabitants. On the west side of the valley, on a point of 

 the bluff highest above the valley, I find an earthwork commanding the 

 surrounding country, and facing toward the east and south. The blnffs 

 are divided from those south by the Indian Creek, which enters the Fox 

 about one-quarter of a mile distant, coming from the west, and has cut 

 out a valley from that direction. The general shai)e of the fortification 

 may be seen by an examination of Fig. 1. The large mound at the cor- 

 ner is highest, rising some 5 feet above the natural surface of the ground. 

 Some time since, an excavation was made in the center of the mound, 

 and a few bones found, but they had perished to such a degree that it 

 would be impossible to describe any of its characteristics in an intelligi- 

 ble manner. On either side of the mound referred to is a smaller one, 

 about 2 feet in advance of the main line, giving a passageway, gate, oi 

 entrance on either side, yet not leaving space entirely open and unpro- 

 tected. In '':he rear of the fort. Fig. 1, is a thick second growth of oak 



