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MISCELLANEOUS PAPERS RELATING TO ANTHROPOLOGY. 683 



111 tlie vicinity of Nelson Ledges, Portage County, Ohio. These ledges 

 iuc uutL'i'opsof the conglomerate, and their cavities had furnished shelter 

 for the ancient people. In the talus and on the higher level are found 

 areas of dark soil, rich in relics of various kinds, and among these only 

 occur the lumps of manganese. This mineral crops out in places at 

 Bainbridge, twenty miles away, and no nearer. Pottery fragments, 

 showing black spots of tlie manganese, and lumps having a polished 

 surface, have been picked up. Mr. Luther also speaks of a great mortar 

 which appears to have been used in crushing quartz. 



McLean, John J., while transmitting a meteorological report from 

 Sitka Castle, Alaska, notes the " fish-dance," performed in lionor of the 

 arrival of the shoals of herring. " The herring are so ijlentiful that an 

 Indian with his nail-studded thin board could catch a canoe full in an 

 hour. The Sitka Indians built fires at the mouth of Indian Elver, and 

 sang and danced their national airs every night for more than a week. 

 I witnessed several of the dances at the arrival of the fish. None but 

 the men participated, the women sitting around the fire and keeping 

 up a shrill monotonous chorus. The dancing movement consisted in a 

 step from one foot to the other and stamping to emphasize the music, 

 the body more or less stooped, and the head jerked from one side to 

 the other in rapid movement. The melodies were extremely simple, 

 containing three or four notes. The time was now slow and stately, 

 like a funeral dirge, again quick and lively. There were numerous 

 pauses, each ushering a slight modification of the melody and time. On 

 the whole the tune was not inharmonious, having a barbaric fitness to 

 the people and the occasion. They seem to have an api)reciation of 

 the picturesque, for they had chosen one of the prettiest spots in the 

 whole neighborhood for their festivities. The dark snow-capped mount- 

 ain for a back-ground and the broad waters of the beautiful bay, lit 

 up by the full moon. The subject of the songs was a description of 

 hunting and fishing. Their costume consisted of blankets with tin tags, 

 sewn on, jingling with each movement of the body, wigs made of oakum 

 and eagles' feathers, and blackened faces striped with vermilion. The 

 sports were kept up each night until a late hour. 



MacLean, J. P., describes aiul figures in his letter of December 10th 

 two circular inclosures in Sycamore Township, Hamilton County, Ohio. 



He also found on Blennerhasset Island numerous antiquities, among 

 them a shell heap, 100 feet long. He reports that Dr. G. O. Hildreth, 

 in sinking a cistern a little west of the Graded Way, Marietta, Ohio, 

 came upon a cave containing human and animal bones. The cistern 

 was commenced 15 feet below the plain, on a side hill. Six feet below 

 the surface the diggers came upon a solid mass of concrete, composed 

 chiefly of quartz pebbles. Below this was a cavern one foot in height, 

 on the floor of which were the bones above mentioned. There was no 

 outlet to the cave, and it is to be supposed that by the filling up of the 



