100 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [bull. 76 



COLE COUNTY 



NATURAL BRIDGE CAVE 



This is at the top of a bluff facing the Osage, one-half mile below 

 the Rock Island bridge. It is only 10 feet wide and the same in 

 height, and extends back 20 feet to a narrow passage which is almost 

 closed by stalagmite. The site is difficult to reach, but disclosed a 

 few fragments of pottery and some shell. The earth of the floor 

 ascends rather steeply to the rear and contains many large rocks. 

 It was only a camping place. 



MORGAN COUNTY 



SPEERS CAVE 



On the Brown property, 7 miles southeast of Stover, is a reported 

 cave, which proved to be a natural tunnel 400 feet long. The drain- 

 age from several farms passes through it from ravines above. The 

 lower entrance is 40 feet wide and 50 feet high, the upper entrance 

 20 feet wide and 10 feet high. 



Natural bridges and tunnels of varying lengths and widths are 

 rather common in this part of the Osage Valley. 



HOUSE MOUNDS (43) 



Southeast of Stover, beginning at the edge of the town, is a group 

 of house mounds extending over an area having a very irregular 

 outline, but fully half a mile across in any direction. They vary 

 from 20 to 35 feet in diameter and are scattered promiscuously at 

 intervals of 25 to 150 feet. The surface on which they are built 

 reaches over a succession of small knolls and ridges with slopes of 

 4 or 5 degrees. Most of them are along the sides of a wide, shallow 

 valley draining northward, and of two or three small tributary 

 depressions coming into it from either side, though a number are 

 also to be found beyond the slight watershed which separates this 

 drainage area from that to the southward. They exist in woods, 

 meadows, and cultivated ground, so that some of them retain their 

 original form, others are flattened and widened, while still others 

 are barely traceable. Probably some have been entirely effaced by 

 plow and harrow. 



