CHAPTER XV, 



SCULPTURES FROM THE MOUNDS. 



Many of the carvings in stone, already noticed, display no inconsiderable 

 degree of taste and skill. There is, however, a large class of remains, comprising 

 sculptural tablets, and heads and figures of animals, which belongs to a higher grade 

 of art. Many of these exhibit a close observance of nature and a minute attention 

 to details, such as we could only expect to find among a people considerably 

 advanced in the minor arts, and to which the elaborate and laborious, but usually 

 clumsy and ungraceful, not to say unmeaning, productions of the savage can claim 

 but a slight approach. Savage taste in sculpture is generally exhibited in mon- 

 strosities, — caricatures of things rather than faithful copies. The dawn of art is 

 marked by a purer taste ; the result of an appreciation of the beauties of nature 

 which only follows their close observance. The aim of the neophyte is to imitate, 

 rather than distort, the objects which he sees before him. It is in this view that 

 the sculptures taken from the mounds seem most remarkable ; they exhibit not only 

 the general form and features of the objects sought to be represented, but frequently, 

 and to a surprising degree, their characteristic attitudes and expression. 



It will, of course, be understood that nothing of the imposing character of many 

 of the sculptured relics of Central America is found in the mounds. Aside from 

 the stupendous earth structures, which deserve to be classed with the most won- 

 derful remains of ancient power and greatness, there is nothing imposing in the 

 monuments of the Mississippi valley. We have no sculptured facades of temples 

 and palaces, invested with a symbolic meaning or commemorative of the exploits 

 of chiefs and conquerors, nor have we ponderous statues of divinities and heroes, 

 — nothing beyond the simplest form of stone structures. We must therefore esti- 

 mate the minor sculptures which we discover here by other standards than 

 those of Mexico and Peru, with which, from certain resemblances in other monu- 

 ments, a comparison would be most likely to be suggested. They are simple in 

 form as in design, and, as works of art, beyond a faithful observance of nature 

 and great delicacy of execution, little can be claimed for thein. In these respects 

 they are certainly remarkable, and will be the more admired, the more closely they 

 are inspected. 



Some of these sculptures have a value, so far as ethnological research is con- 

 cerned, much higher than they can claim as mere works of art. This value is 

 derived from the fact that they faithfully represent animals and birds peculiar to 

 other latitudes, thus establishing a migration, a very extensive intercommunication, 

 or a contemporaneous existence of the same race over a vast extent of country. 



