118 BULLETIN 183, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



out of the way. An area about 25 feet across and 2 feet high was 

 covered with stones, loose and in situ, brush, weeds, and young bass- 

 wood trees. An irregularly oblong area at the highest part showed 

 fewer stones but no definite wall outlines. 



Excavation disclosed a subrectangular chamber measuring approxi- 

 mately 78 by 87 inches, with the greater dimension along the north- 

 south axis. The entire northwest corner and adjacent walls had been 

 torn out by vandals who apparently cut a trench from the edge of the 

 moUnd well into the chamber and to a distance of several inches below 

 floor level. Where not wrecked in consequence of this recent work, 

 the walls had been carefully laid up in four or five courses to a height 

 of about 24 inches. Burnt rocks were noted in the upper walls and 

 along the crest, but always as isolated examples surrounded by others 

 untouched by fires. 



Details relating to wall construction were gathered by carefully 

 cleaning out the earlier trench. It was found that the carefully laid 

 inner wall of the enclosure was backed by a second but lower series 

 of slabs lying horizontally, or nearly so. Against these were piled 

 heavy blocks and leaning slabs, until the base of the wall had reached 

 a thickness of about 5 feet. The outermost slabs slanted at an angle 

 often exceeding 50'^ from the horizontal and in instances were nearly 

 vertical. The ground area covered at this stage did not exceed 16 

 or 17 feet in diameter. About the base of this thick rock wall, earth 

 had been piled to a depth of 12 to 18 inches, and this in turn was 

 covered with a mantle of much smaller stones sloping evenly down- 

 ward on all sides of the structure to cover an area, at present, about 

 25 feet across. 



The passage, opening in a direction south by east was about 30 

 inches wide at the inner end, 24 inches wide at the outer, and 4 feet 

 6 inches long. As with other mounds in the Pear! Branch group, the 

 passage could be traced easily through the main wall, although the 

 superficial layer of small rocks extended about 3 feet beyond its outer 

 end. 



Contents of this tomb were rather disappointing. Parallel to, and 

 about 9 inches from, the east wall were the legs and an incomplete 

 innominate bone of a badly burned skeleton interred in a supine ex- 

 tended position. Bones of the left foot were 15 inches from the south 

 wall, with the proximal end of the femur 36 inches from the north 

 wall near which the skull must once have lain. The right femur had 

 been destroyed by the pothunter's trench. All these bones lay 12 

 inches above the floor and may not have formed part of the original 

 remains buried within the chamber. Burnt stones and clay were found 

 at this level and in the overlying fill but were absent from the fill 

 below. At a lower level, on the vault floor in the southwest corner, 



