Indian Mounds and Earthworks. 99 
Winnebagos, are retiring before the power and the intelligence 
of the white man of the old world, as the Sauks and Fox Indians 
had previously retreated from the Winnebagos, and ata still 
earlier period, the Illinois Indians were nearly exterminated by 
the Sauks and Foxes.* But who were they who have left almost 
imperishable memorials on the soil, attesting the superiority of 
their race? Nation and tribe and family succeed each other, and 
for a while occupy the land. They vanish in succession, and 
leave few or no traces. Yet of this unknown people, thousands 
and tens of thousands of monuments remain, which will scarcely 
be obliterated so long as the earth retains its present form. 
The result of a recent examination, by a friend of the writer, 
of the interior of many of the Fox river mounds, shews satisfac- 
torily that the animal shaped earthworks contain human bones 
equally with the round tumuli. These bones were found in a 
very brittle and decomposed state, having roots and fibres grow- 
ing through them, and were distributed, commonly, through 
every part of the mounds. These researches also threw some 
light on the mode adopted in the construction of these monu- 
ments; for it became evident that the bones or bodies of the de- 
ceased were originally laid wpon the surface of the ground, and 
the earth was then heaped upon them. No appearances occur of 
graves being dug beneath the surface, in the first instance.t 
Upon the summits of many of the original tumuli it is evident 
that the remains of other deceased persons have been subse- 
quently placed; and a new heaping up of soil thereon contri- 
buted to augment its former height. Finally, the wa 
Menominee or Winnebago, the last Indian occupant of the prairie, 
excavates a grave upon the summit, places the body therein, in a 
ma or reclining position, and strongly defends it with pickets. 
- That the more ancient form of burial upon the surface, and of 
sumulating the soil over the remains of the dead, was not uni- 
versal among the Indian tribes of North America, appears from 
the examination of M. Rhea{ of some antiquities in Tennessee, 
* McKenney’s History of the Indian Tribes. 
t One of the animal monaments lately opened by Cot Petitval near the Red 
Bank, in the vicinity of j fty feet long. The exca- 
vation was carried along the entire length, that is, from one extremity to the other, 
and bones were found abundantly. The number of individuals buried in some 
of these earthworks must ae been very great. Perhaps they each formed the 
cemetery of a family in those 
» $ Made public by Prof. icin in 1832. 
