177 



outcroppings. Therefore, in igneous regions, or localities where 

 stratified rocks were not easily obtainable, the remains are generally 

 found to consist of adobe, and are, as a rule, mound-shaped. The 

 hardening of the clay around bones or pottery, etc., tended to pre- 

 serve them, aud consequently adobe ruins often yield perfect skele- 

 tons and other valuable relics; while amid remains of stone struc- 

 tures only a few frail fragments of pottery and bone are exhumed 

 to repay long and patient labor. 



But there may be other reasons why more perfect skeletons are 

 found in one place than in another. Different customs of separate 

 communities must be taken into consideration. Dwellers in easily- 

 constructed adobe houses, upon the death of a member of the 

 family, might have placed the corpse in a position prescribed by 

 the priesthood, Avith jars of provision for the use of the departed 

 soul on its silent journey to the mysterious land, and barricading 

 the doors and windows, to prevent tlie entrance of the always- 

 hungry wolf, migrated a short distance and erected a new abode, 

 the old one being left undisturbed. The body, then, in such a dry 

 and sheltered spot, would slowly wither and decay, and before the 

 building crumbled upon it the bones would receive additional 

 protection from the hard, shrivelled remains of the flesh. 



But a family would not be so Avilling to leave a house of stone, 

 that had cost them a vast amount of labor. They would look 

 about them for some more agreeable method of disposing of the 

 corpse. They would select a certain spot for a burying-ground, 

 where they would either dig a grave or arrange the body in some 

 way on the surface. They could not leave it on top of the ground, 

 unless some method was devised for protecting it from the carnivora 

 of the neighborhood. Without such protection, it would soon be 

 scattered over the whole vicinity. Therefore, some curious sar- 

 cophagi that I examined in Southern Utah, a mile or two from a 

 valley that contained innumerable remains of stone villages, were 

 possibly placed just below the surface, though most of them were 

 covered by several feet of sand, drifted by the winds to the spot. 

 A small creek had cut away a large portion of the bank and ex- 

 posed a fine section. 



BUL. BUr. SOC. NAT. ?CI. (23) FEBRUART, 1877. 



