72 History of Hingham. 



the surface indicated the ancient graves of the Indian. The 

 writer will confess to a feeling somewhat repulsive as we com- 

 menced digging open the resting-places of the dead and exposing 

 their remains to the rude gaze of the alien race that had sup- 

 planted them in the land the}- loved. This feeling did not how- 

 ever last long, after finding that there were but few human remains 

 to be disturbed ; for nearly all that had composed their corporeal 

 forms in life, the flesh, the sinews, and the bones, had alike been, 

 for a long period perhaps, resolved into their original elements, 

 leaving but few traces behind. There was not found in the first 

 grave opened a single relic of humanity. Much more care was 

 taken in opening the second, the earth being very thinly scraped 

 away as excavation was made downwards, every ounce being 

 closely examined. 



In this one, strange to say, a part of the occiput of a skull was 

 soon disinterred, which, however, was t >o far gone for preserva- 

 tion, and some inches below, teeth of the body that had been 

 placed here ; but not another bone or part of a bone of the whole 

 skeleton. All had disappeared. The burial posture of the dead 

 had been a sitting one, as shown by the fact that at a proper dis- 

 tance from the surface there was found a collection of shells, all 

 of which had been undoubtedly placed about the person in the 

 posture stated. 



The investigators had indeed come upon the resting-place, with- 

 out doubt, of such as had lived and died before, and perhaps long 

 before, the foot of the white man impressed itself upon the soil. 



In swampy land brought under cultivation by Mr. John R. Brewer 

 on the margin of Weir River a pair of deer's antlers and several 

 rib bones were dug up. The corrugation on the antlers and the 

 basal ring is perfect; the antlers measure in circumference 2| 

 inches, and though the tips and prongs are broken off, their 

 length on the outside curve is 11 inches. 



At another locality on Mr. Brewer's land not far from the foot 

 of Martin's Lane, there was dug from low mendow-hmd, formerly 

 a swamp, a pair of antlers attached to a part of the skull. 



A pine cone and several stone implements were found in the 

 same ground not far distant. 



The writer has thought it well to state what little he has con- 

 cerning the North American Indian in Hingham, confining himself 

 simply to the fact of his existence upon these shores in the modern 

 era, at a somewhat remote period before the occupancy of the 

 white man, and incidentally mentioning some of the implements 

 used by him in obtaining sustenance, as well as some of the ani- 

 mals that were contemporary with him. What else relates to him. 

 his life in war and in peace, what his association with our fathers, 

 and through what causes he disappeared from the land, — all this 

 belongs to the historian of human events, and it is hoped that he 

 will be able to glean from records of the past much that yet re- 

 mains unknown. 



