132 PROCEEDINGS OF THE INDIANA ACADEMY OF SCIENCE, 



feet are quite distinct and from their position seem to indicate that the animal 

 was allied to the Batraehians, and progressed like a frog, by jumps, while 

 on the other hand the five digits on either foot relate it to the Salamanders." 

 At the present time, reptiles and batraehians are classified as belonging to 

 very distinct orders. The giving of a scientific name to an animal of which 

 no trace is left except its "footprints on the sands of time," brings to mind 

 Rafinesque and the scientific names he gave to seven varieties of thunder and 

 lightning. 



Under LaAvrenee County, Collett describes briefly Shiloh, Dry, Grin- 

 staff's, Connelly's, Hamers and Donnelson's caves, and mentions one blind 

 fish, five crustaceans and four insects as inhabiting them. He states that 

 "many wells in this region are fed by the underground brooks, and from these 

 it is not unusual to draw up eyeless fish and crustaceans, inliabitants of the 

 adjoining caves." 



Since Orange and Lawrence Counties are at present coming rapidly to 

 the front as one of the leading apple growing districts of the State, the follow- 

 ing paragraph, written by Collett forty-three years ago, is of more than passing 

 interest. "Advantage is taken by tlie enterprising citizens of the equaliza- 

 tion of temperature found to exist on the summit of the surrounding sharp 

 hills, which are 200 to 250 feet high, to plant extensive orchards, which 

 produce highly remunerative crops of excellent fruit. It has been frequently 

 observed here that in cold weather ice of considerable thickness forms in the 

 valley, when no frost has fallen upon the hills just above. This arises from 

 the fact that cold air is heavier than warm air, and in obedience to gravi- 

 tation descends, and may fill the valley, leaving the peaks above bathed in 

 warmth. Such facts invite the attention of fruit growers." 



Under Knox County there is in this report a full page lithograph plate 

 of the "P.yramid Mound" near Vincenncs, with descriptions of it and other 

 mounds, and of the kitchen middens or shell heaps near Edwardsport and 

 Vincennes. Collett, who was a man of \ivid imagination and fluent powers 

 of description, says of the kitchen middens: "They signify the permanent 

 residence of a people relying on agriculture and aquatic life for sustenance; 

 hence we infer, that the people whose existence is indicated by these shell heaps, 

 were not related to our savages. Again, stone cists and vaults containing 

 the bones of many persons of all ages and sexes, irregularly mingled with 

 remains of funeral fish food, are often found, sometimes as intrusive sepul- 

 chres on sides or tops of the mounds; we conclude that these are the remains 

 of the conquerers of the most ancient people who wt;re afterwards themselves 

 dispossessed by the Indians— An internKnliate littoral 'Race of Fishermen,' 

 who to some extent adopted the habits, usages and even religion of the con- 

 quered." 



Of the mound builders he continues: "More ancient than these shell 

 heaps, dating back beyond the thousand years noted by the annual growth of 

 our forests, are numerous monumental remains of which the past is silent. 

 'Not entirely voiceless,' they tell us of a people who once possessed the valley 



