ARCHEOLOGICAL INVESTIGATION'S IN MISSOURI 117 



by the trunk and roots of the elm tiee already mentioned that struc- 

 tural details were obscured. It is uncertain in what order the walls 

 were laid up, but, excepting the diagonal ties, it was noted that the 

 east and west walls abutted the north, while that on the south was 

 apparently built up against the west, and the south and east walls 

 merely came together. 



The largest stones, measuring up to 36 by 12 by 6 inches, were those 

 at the base of the east wall and in the wings flanking the passage. 

 Two large slabs, one on each side of the doorway, formed the lower- 

 most course of the east wall. The passage, 33 inches wide by about 

 45 inches long, was not centered, since its inner end divided the east 

 chamber wall into a 24- and a 32-inch section. An apron of rocks 

 and slabs, evidently piled up by the original builders, closed the 

 outer end. 



There is reason to believe that a shallow pit was dug on the spot 

 before the tomb was laid up. Our profiles show that the floor of the 

 chamber lay at least 12 inches below the normal top of subsoil, if the 

 latter be projected through the mound. The presumed pit must have 

 been large enough to allow for at least the wall, since this went down 

 to the bottom of the burial area. Since permission to check this point 

 by breaking down the buttressing rocks outside the coursed walls 

 was refused, we were unable to corroborate it by direct observations. 



A single poorly preserved skeleton, too fragmentary to be col- 

 lected for measurements, was found on the floor of the enclosure. 

 Evidently buried in the flesh, this lay extended at full length and 

 prone, with the feet a few inches from the doorway and the head to- 

 ward the west. A badly broken skull, the long bones, and traces of 

 vertebrae were all that remained. Over the distal end of the left 

 femur lay a burnt stone. From this bits of charcoal were scattered 

 northward to the right femur, which was fire-blackened. From this 

 it would appear likely that a small fire had been built over the pelvic 

 region of the corpse before it was covered with earth. Hansen states 

 that a second skeleton, also extended at full length, was found in that 

 portion of the chamber dug by him, but he was unable to supply 

 further details as to its exact position. 



No artifacts were found by us, nor does Hansen report any from 

 his digging. Aside from the features already noted, we may mention 

 fragments of a charred pole 12 inches long by 3 inches in diameter, 

 which lay on the floor near the southwest corner of the enclosure. 



Nolan B. — East and slightly north of the preceding, on a lower 

 eminence about 150 yards distant, was a larger mound (fig. 12, 7), 

 which had been more extensively looted. Our measurements do not 

 reliably indicate its former size, owing to the fact that field stones 

 from the surrounding tillable ground had for years been piled here 



