PALMER ON UTAH MOUNDS. 171 



and ten feet wide, with the walls varying from ten to twelve inches in 

 thickness. The smaller rooms are about ten feet long and eight feet 

 wide, with the walls ten inches thick. The width of the passage between 

 the rooms is two feet and ten inches. These measurements indicate the 

 average size of the dwellings in the Payson group of mounds. The walls 

 were constructed of what may be appropriately called sun-dried mud 

 brick. Close by each mound, or pile of ruined houses, is a depression in 

 which the bricks for building were made, and near it the ancient canal 

 Avhich supplied them with water. A close examination shows that while 

 the clay was soft it was taken up by the hand and laid in the wall, and 

 another similar lot laid over this, and the upper surface and sides smooth- 

 ed with the hand. This is shown by finger marks still remaining on the 

 interior but obliterated from the exterior surfaces. The joints between 

 the various layers were very irregular. If the men, who inhabited Utah 

 in early times, disliked work as much as the present Indians do, then the 

 females were the house builders and their own architects. 



That these people were destitute of cutting tools is shown, not only by 

 the entire absence of such tools, byt by the fact that the remains of wood^ 

 with few exceptions, have been found. The small, narrow rooms requir- 

 ed only short poles to be laid across and covered with mud, to form a roof 

 sufficient in the climate of Utah, where it rains so seldom. 



It may be asked, " Who were the Ancient People of Utah ?" From the 

 evidence left behind in their ruined dwellings, they appear to belong to 

 the same class of Indians as the.Moquis of Arizona, a people simple in 

 all their wants and habits, yet plain Indians. This is evident by the ma- 

 terials taken out of their ruined dwellings, consisting of stone mortars 

 in which to grind their corn and the seeds of native plants. Large flat 

 stones for baking bread, pottery, bone awls, arrow points, a few beads 

 and square pieces of bone that were probably used for gambling, 

 were the most important articles found, as all perishable substances had 

 decayed. A highly enlightened people would have left a far different 

 collection. Since this people were driven across the Colorado river 

 to Ai'izona they have attained to their present advanced condition, 

 having larger and better houses and an increase in everything required 

 for domestic purposes. This change has been caused by the incessant 

 wars that have been waged upon them by their numerous enemies, driv- 

 ing them across the Colorado river. Selecting elevations that afforded 

 abundance of stone, they erected their present large three story houses, 

 the roofs of w^hich afford ample opportunity for defence against their en- 

 emies, being secure places of retreat when they had drawn up their lad- 

 ders, which afforded the only means of entrance and intercourse be- 

 tween the numerous apartments in the different stories. After having 

 been brought together in communities by force of circumstances, many 

 changes of habits were made to suit their altered condition. Yet after 

 the lapse of so many years we find them making pottery, as well as other 

 articles, that are identical in their characteristics with those found in the 

 ruins of their ancestral dwellings in Utah. 



In reviewing Miss Wirt's letters to the Davenport Academy of Sciences 



