1(38 A NATURE WOOINO. 



The soil at present overlying the whole mound is a 

 rich, black, vegetable loam, ranging from eight inches 

 to one foot in thickness. That outside the limits of 

 the mound is thin, being but an inch or two in thick- 

 ness above r the prevailing whitish sand of the vicinity. 

 The greater part of the surface of the mound was 

 probably cleared and cultivated by the Spaniards in 

 the early part of the eighteenth century. The re- 

 mains of the mortar and coquina rock of their houses 

 are found in two or three places on the highest points 

 of the mound. Cabbage palmettos fifty to sixty feet 

 high, and great pines two and a half feet in diameter 

 and eighty to one hundred feet in height, at present 

 cover its crest and slopes. Live oaks of large size 

 are also scattered here and there among the pines and 

 palmettos. One of these, a great spreading giant of 

 its kind, growing on the eastern slope near the mid- 

 dle of the mound, is 115 inches in circumference, two 

 feet above the ground. The size of this tree and the 

 thickness of the soil on the crest are excellent wit- 

 nesses as to the many years which have elapsed since 

 the last bowl of Donax soup was brewed and the 

 shells dumped on this kitchen-midden by an ancient 

 people. 



Representatives of twenty-eight species of mollusks 

 were found in the mound.* Of these nineteen are of 

 marine origin ; eight occur only in fresh water, while 



"This includes six species taken by Prof. C. H. Hitchcock in a subse- 

 quent investigation. 



