FOWKE] ANTIQUITIES OF MISSOURI 17 
hold them together until they were laid on the corpse (or skeleton) 
previously placed on the ground. 
It appears, then, from the foregoing that at this stage of the exca- 
vation the fragments of separate skulls brought to light gave evi- 
dence of not fewer than seventeen burials, including the cremated 
remains, and there may have been a greater number. 
On the north side the bones extended beneath some large stones; 
the latter may have fallen from the top of the wall, as may other 
stones at the east and west ends. 
When fully cleared out, the vault measured at the bottom 84 feet 
east and west by 7 feet north and south. The highest point of the 
wall, at the southwest corner, was 4 feet above the bottom of the 
lowest stone; the lowest point was on the west side, where the wall 
was only 18 inches high. 
In the south wall was a doorway, shown on the right (pl. 3), 
31 inches wide at the top and 15 inches wide where the sides most 
nearly approached each other, these dimensions affording evidence 
that the vault had been completed first and the bodies or bones car- 
ried in, rather than that the inclosure had been built up around the 
remains. Further proof of this fact is furnished by the discovery, 
not only here but in other vaults, of fragments of bones crowded into 
crevices by the settling of earth which lay over and around them. 
Two skulls, one having teeth not at all worn, the other having 
some teeth worn down nearly to the roots, lay on the bottom close 
to the north wall. Near the center of the vault, in a small depression 
6 inches deep, were pieces of another skull. Across the east end, reach- 
ing to the wall on each side and separated by a space of 22 inches, 
were placed two large slabs on the south and three on the north, laid 
one on another, as seen in plate 3. Between these and the east 
wall was a space 64 feet north and south by 10 inches east and west. 
Occupying part of the space in the opening between these slabs and 
part of that in the chamber behind them, was found a shallow hole 
containing the remains of an infant only a few months old. 
Unlike that in no. 6, the vault wall in no. 7, from top to bottom, 
consisted of a single thickness of stones held in place by earth piled 
against the outside during the building. There were some stones in 
this earth, but these had been thrown in at random as a part of the 
supporting material, not laid up separately. Rocks were not to be 
had near at hand, and the workmen probably tired of carrying them 
from the adjacent ravine. In a few places the wall did not reach 
down to the natural surface, but rested upon deposited earth, as 
may be observed in the case of the large stone on the far side of the 
doorway, in the illustration. This was especially noticeable at the 
5780—Bull, 37—10——2 
