148 



BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY 



[bull. 76 



is nowhere more than a foot deep. A section is presented in fig- 

 ure 34. 



At 100 feet the room came to an end. The space between the 

 walls Mas 7| feet at the floor level and 4 feet at a depth of 4 feet. 

 At 105 feet the nearly vertical walls were only 5 feet apart on the 

 floor; at 112 feet the space increased to 7 feet. A section showed 

 about a foot of loose earth mixed with ashes ; 3 feet of yellow clayey 

 earth, rather compact ; then gravel and sand. The latter was dug 

 into for a foot, at which level the walls were converging and it was 

 useless to go any deeper. Enough was done, however, to verify the 

 supposition that this stratum was due to the action of running water 

 seeking its outlet at the mouth of the cave. 



At 103 feet, at the bottom of the yellow clay and on top of the 

 gravel, was a chalcedony pebble about 2^ inches in diameter. The 

 material is foreign to this locality. It had plainly been used as a 



hammer stone, and is the 

 only object of human origin 

 found anywhere below the 

 dark earth. There was not 

 the slightest evidence of any 

 disturbance of the clay in 

 which it rested. 



At 120 feet the side walls 

 were only 5 feet apart. At 

 125 feet they again diverged 

 slightly, and a recess on the 

 left forms a chamber 12 feet across. At 150 feet they had drawn in 

 to 8 feet at the widest interval. A section showed loose dry earth, 

 some of it cemented b}^ drip from the roof until about as hard as 

 lump chalk; then compact clayey earth, also with travertine in small 

 lumps; below this the gravel and sand. The latter, at this point, 

 seems to have been deposited in the last stages of the formation of the 

 cave. Occasionally, along here, a small patch appeared that seemed 

 to be ashes ; but none of it was more than 6 inches below the top of 

 the ground, and the substance may not have been ast\es at all, but the 

 fine white limestone dust that wears off from the stone. There was 

 nothing in the trench, at any depth, after the chalcedony pebble, 

 that could possibly be due to human intervention, except these small 

 patches of ashes, if ashes they are. 



At 165 feet from the entrance the cave made its fourth turn and 

 expanded into a chamber about 15 feet wide. Along the sides of 

 this and in the various crevices opening from it were great quan- 

 tities of clean ashes, plainly enough thrown there from fires made in 

 the central part. The gravel came to within 3 to 5 feet of the top, 



Fig. 34. 



-Cross section of Fort Deposit Cave 

 at 93 feet. 



