252 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, lf>0l. 



streams, springs, and the deep cenotes, or natural wells, to appease 

 the gods believed to dwell therein. 



Perhaps the most important fact connected with the finds at Afton 

 is that we have here, for the first time, a large assortment of stone 

 implements and other objects identified fully with a particular tribe 

 and period. We have, as it were, recovered a notable chapter directly 

 out of the prehistory of the primitive buffalo-hunting tribes of the 

 ( ireat Plains. 



A second advantage of these over other deposits or caches of imple- 

 ments in the great Mississippi Valley region is that the exact motives of 

 the makers of the offerings are made known to us. The story of the old 

 Osage medicine man agrees in every respect with ideas formulated by 

 ethnologists as a result of studies in other regions and among distinct 

 peoples. It is a remarkable fact that the practice of sacrificing to the 

 spirits of springs is almost universal amongst primitive men. 



The association of human relics with the remains of extinct animals 

 is always a matter of much scientific interest, but it appears that in 

 this case the association has little significance. The fossil bones belong 

 to the early geological formations of the region, while the human 

 relics are of recent introduction into the spring. 



The course of events witnessed by the fleeting ages in the region of 

 the Neosho Valley may be outlined somewhat as follows: About the 

 close of Pliocene times, or in the earlier part of the Pleistocene, the 

 great plains of the interior of the continent were overrun by vast herds 

 of elephants, horses, bison, and other strange creatures, which slaked 

 their thirst at the bubbling springs, if these then existed, or otherwise 

 in the streams and lakes of that time, leaving their carcasses to rot 

 there. Then the Ice Age supervened, and vast changes came over the 

 region and its life. The glacial chill drove the herds to the south or 

 destroyed them, and the glacial floods buried their remains in deposits 

 of sand and gravel. Then there arrived, from no one knows where, 

 the buffalo, the elk, and the deer, with attendant swarms of carnivora 

 and minor beasts. With these, or following them, came the Indian, 

 with spear and bow and arrow, and the era of the chase began. Afton 

 Springs were flowing, as they had been no doubt for ages, and the 

 beds of muck received the bodies of the dying herds as before. But 

 with the coming of man a new element was introduced — the springs, 

 abounding in bones of unknown monsters, became places of venera- 

 tion and were peopled with spirits of the savage pantheon, and to these 

 sacrifices were made, the most precious possessions of the hunter peo- 

 ples finding a resting place in the sulphurous shrine. The last, the 

 present episode in A f ton's history, witnessed the disappearance of the 

 buffalo and the red hunter and the coming of new cattle and a strange 

 people. Then followed the keeping of herds on the plains about, the 

 building of towns, the construction of railways, and finally the clean- 

 ing out of the springs and the discovery of its interesting treasures. 



