156 



ANCIENT MONUMENTS. 



5th. A quantity of pearl beads ; an article resembling the cover of a small 

 vessel, carved from stone ; also some fragments of copper, in thin narrow slips. 



There were no relics of any kind found amongst the charcoal. The layer of this 

 material was not far from six feet square. It had been heaped over while burning. 



Fig. 44 is a section of a large mound, No. 5, in the same enclosure. In tiiis 

 instance the altar was covered with stones ; and instead of the usual sand stratum, 

 there was found a layer of large flat stones, corresponding to it. The altar, A, was 

 composed of earth elevated two and a half feet above the original level of the soil, 

 and was five feet long by three feet four inches broad, the sides sloping at an angle 

 of nearly thirty degrees. It was faced on the top and on the sides with slabs of 

 stone, quite regular in form and thickness, and which, although not cut by any instru- 

 ment, were closely fitted together, as shown in the supplementary section of 

 the altar, A. The stone is the Waverley sandstone, underlying the coal series, thin 

 strata of which cap the hills bordering these valleys. The altar bore the marks of 

 fire ; and a few fragments of the mound-builders' ornaments, a few pearl beads, 

 etc., were found on and around it. The original deposit had probably been removed 

 by the modern Indians, who had opened the mound and buried one of their dead 

 on the slope of the altar. The stones composing the layer corresponding to the 

 sand stratum were two or three deep, presenting the appearance of a wall which 

 had fallen inwards. 



In the centre of the large enclosure, Plate XIX, is a solitary mound, of which a 

 section is here presented. Fig. 45. It is now, after many years of cultivation, 

 about five feet high by forty feet base. Like that last described, it has some 

 novel features, although its purposes can hardly admit of a doubt. It has the 

 casing of pebbles and gravel which characterize the altar-mounds, but has no sand 

 layer, except a thin stratum resting immediately on the deposit contained in the 

 altar. This altar is entirely peculiar. It seems to have been formed, at diflferent 

 intervals of time, as follows : first, a circular space, thirteen feet in diameter and 

 eight inches in depth, was excavated in the original level of the plain ; this was 

 filled with fine sand, carefully levelled, and compacted to the utmost degree. Upon 

 the level thus formed, which was perfectly horizontal, offerings by fire were made ; 

 at any rate a continuous heat was kept up, and fatty matter of some sort burned, 

 for the sand to the depth of two inches is discolored, and to the depth of one inch 

 is burned hard and black and cemented together. The ashes, etc., resulting from 



