30 REPORT OF THE SECRETARY. 
Indian village site on the Choptank River, 2 miles below Cambridge,was examined. 
An ancient community of oyster dredgers had been established on a bluff about 20 feet 
above tide level. Subsequently this site was buried by wind-driven sand to the 
depth of 20 feet, and. more recently the waves have encroached upon the land, expos- 
ing a section of the bluff and its buried village site. The most important feature of 
this exposure was the section of an ossuary or burial pit 12 feet in diameter and 5 
feet deep, which had been dug upon the village site and filled with a mass of dis- 
connected human bones, all of which were in an advanced state of decay. They 
were not accompanied by objects of art. 
In April Mr. Holmes made a journey to Bartow County, Ga., and to Coahoma 
County, Miss., to make necessary observations of the great groups of mounds at 
these points. The principal Bartow County mound belongs to the group known as 
the Etowah group, and is a splendid example of the work of the unidentified build- 
ers. The shape of the great mound is that of a four-sided truncated pyramid but is 
not wholly symmetric. It is 63 feet high and measures about 175 feet across the 
nearly level top. The measurements of the four sides of the base are 380, 330, 360, 
and 350 feet. The slopes are steep, reaching in places 45°, and are broken by two 
decided eccentricities of configuration. On the south is a terrace from 40 to 50 feet 
wide, sloping to the base level of the mound at the east and ending 1m anearly level 
platform about 45 feet square at the west end. This platform is about 20 feet lower 
than the mound and does not appear to have had means of communication with its 
summit. This irregular terrace has been called a roadway, but it has more the 
character of an addition to the great mound in process of construction. The other 
eccentricity alluded to is a graded way extending out to the east from the summit 
of the mound, and which to all appearances is the real roadway to the summit. 
This way is 20 0r more feet in width, though somewhat broken down by erosion, 
and has a slope of only 21°. There can be little doubt that this mound was the 
stronghold of the village and that its top was inclosed by a stockade. 
The Carson mounds in Coahoma County, Miss., form a group of unusual interest. 
There are four mounds of large size, two of them being oblong and with thin summits. 
The highest has an elevation of 25 feet. Scattered about these large mounds are 
nearly a hundred smaller ones from 1 to 6 feet in height and from 10 to 200 feet in 
diameter, most of which, as refuse indicates, represent house sites. The house floors 
have been of clay well smoothed on the upper surface and the walls and possibly the 
coverings have been of clay supported by a framework of canes. The clay has in 
many cases been basked, but whether from design in building or through the de- 
struction of the structure by fire, is not easily determined. There are numerous 
large pits about the border of the site from which the earth used in building the 
mounds has been obtained. The area covered by the village is three-fourths of a 
mile long by half a mile wide. 
In the spring of 1891 Mr. Holmes began the systematic exploration of the tide- 
water regions of Maryland and Virginia, which included a study of the art remains 
and of the phenomena of shell banks and village sites, as well as the mapping of all 
sites which have interest to the historian and the archzologist. In this work he was 
as ssited by Mr. William Dinwiddie and for a short period by Mr. Gerard Fowke. 
Through documentary evidence it is known that the tide-water region was oceu- 
pied by tribes of Algonquian stock belonging to the Powhatan Confederacy. So 
thoroughly have they occupied this country that along the water courses nearly 
every available site bears evidence of occupation, and in the salt and brackish sec- 
tions of the water courses shell banks—the kitchen-middens of this people—coyer the 
shores in almost continuous lines. So numerous were the sites that a careful study 
of all was found to be impracticable, and it was determined to select for detailed 
examination a small number of those that are typical. On the Potomac the follow- 
ing localities have been chosen for a special study: The vicinity of the Little Falls, 
at the head of tide water; the site of Smith’s town of ‘‘ Nacotchtank,” now Anacos- 
