Some Considerations on the Mound Builders. 73 



any cause, it fades out, it contracts upon the centre. 

 Now, the vast stone temples and palaces of Central 

 America are, at least, as old as the mounds of the 

 United States. Central America was, then, relatively 

 the birthplace and centre of aboriginal American civil- 

 ization. The influence spread northward to the Mis- 

 sissippi and Ohio valleys. 



So the Mound Builders appear to have receded from 

 the lakes to the South. The Ohio Valley, when first 

 discovered, was uninhabited. In the latter part of the 

 seventeenth century, the entire region from Lake Erie 

 to the Tennessee river was an unpeopled solitude. 

 The ancient inhabitants may have died out from pesti- 

 lence, or natural decay, or partly from some such custom 

 as prevailed among the Natchez, of killing all the at- 

 tendants of a chief upon his death. But it is more 

 probable they were driven away. 



The existing remains show they had, north of the 

 Ohio river, a strong line of fortresses, along the Great 

 Miami from its mouth to Piqua, with advanced works 

 near Oxford and Eaton, and with a massive v^ork in rear 

 of this line, on the Little Miami, at Fort Ancient. 

 There was another line crossing the Scioto Valley at 

 Chillicothe, and extending west up the valley of Paint 

 Creek. These seem to have constituted a line of per- 

 manent defense. 



The situations were well chosen, were naturally very 

 strong, and were fortified with great labor and some 

 skill. Such works, if defended, could not have been 

 taken by assault by any means tile natives possessed, and 

 they were so constructed as to contain a supply of water. 



