200 



had been employed from an early hour on the day of meeting. The 

 mound, which measured about 60 yards in length by 17 in extreme 

 width, was seen to be constructed of angular masses of stone, heaped 

 together without any order or regularity, amongst which were scattered 

 blocks of considerable size and weight. 



The excavators had opened a trench about 100 feet in length, in a 

 direction due East and West by compass. The western extremity was 

 the broadest, the mound gradually diminishing in width to the opposite 

 end. The workmen had struck upon the entrance, which, when exposed, 

 shewed a chamber formed of five large unhewn stones, two on each side 

 and one placed transversely, the dimensions of which were 4 feet in 

 wibth dy 8 feet 6 inches in length. There was no covering-stone, but 

 the entrance was flanked on either side by a wall of dry masonry, very 

 neatly fitted, forming a segment of a circle, which, if completed, would 

 have enclosed a well-like chamber in front of the entrance to the Tumulus. 

 This wall had been abiaiptly broken ofi"; but there were amongst those 

 present some who thought they detected signs of its having been at one 

 time continuous. It was evident that the whole sti-ucture had been 

 thoroughly ransacked and broken up by former explorers; and so com. 

 pletely had the work of devastation been accomplished, that hardly one 

 stone was left upon another. The chambers, with the one exception 

 already noted, had been entirely demolished, and but a few bones 

 scattered throughout the Tumulus remained, all more or less in a frag- 

 mentary condition. These fragments comprised one fully developed 

 frontal bone, male ; portions of two male lower jaws, and portions of 

 two female skulls; several thigh-bones, and bones of the leg and foot, 

 including the remains of children, but all much broken. There were 

 found the remains of six individuals at the least, viz., two men, two 

 women, and two children, the latter between six and eight years of age. 

 There were several bones of cattle and calves; teeth of horse and ox; a 

 portion of the bones of the foreleg of a dog; several boar's teeth, tusks, 

 and grinders, and parts of jaw-bones; a bone "scoojd," formed of a shank 

 bone of a horse; and a large quantity of a black unctuous substance, 

 having the appearance of wood or animal charcoal; but no burnt bones. 

 A small portion of a flint-flake was detected in the black paste. Besides 

 the organic remains above enumerated, some pieces of rude pottery were 

 found, which, with a Roman brass coin of the Emperor Germanicus, 

 completes the list of objects yielded by the exploration of this large 

 sepulchral mound, which, in consequence of the violence it had undergone 

 at the hands of foimer explorers, afi'orded but little to compensate the 

 Club for the trouble and expense of opening it. 



