436 ARCHEOLOGICAL INVESTIGATIONS—II [ETH, ANN. 44 
plummet; occasionally one has a slight groove or a small perforation 
near the smaller end. If used as sinkers they must have been en- 
closed in a net or sack. In the same field where these were found 
a steatite pot was struck by a plow; the fragments were gathered 
up and found to weigh 16 pounds. The finder broke it into many 
pieces, and generously distributed them to every person who wanted 
a “sample.” There are also hundreds, or thousands, of small pieces 
of hard-burned clay, usually shapeless, though sometimes an attempt 
seems to have been made to make them resemble something. Doctor 
Hough. of the National Museum, says they are in the nature of 
fetiches or charms, placed in the fields when seeds are planted to 
inform the gods what crop is desired at that spot and to remind 
them that their good offices are invoked to insure a bountiful yield. 
As new offerings would be made every year, we have an explanation 
of their abundance. 
Between this mound group and Delhi are three groups of house 
mounds. One is north and one south of Epps station; in each of 
these only a few are visible from the road, and all of them are small; 
there may be more in the woods. The third group, a mile from the 
flat mounds, numbers probably 100, and some of them are large. 
On another Marston plantation, a mile and a half north of Delhi, 
is an embankment, now partly obliterated by cultivation, forming an 
are of a circle and terminating at each end on the bank of the bayou. 
This connects four mounds, situated at intervals. First, at the north, 
is a flat-topped mound 6 feet high and 150 feet across; next, a round 
mound, nearly destroyed; third, a flat-topped mound 9 by 200 feet, 
with a small conical mound built on one corner of it; finally, another 
nearly obliterated structure; this and the other reduced mound may 
have been flat-topped. There are a few elevations in this field, now 
scarcely visible, which may be artificial. 
From 3 to 7 miles south of Delhi are three or four small groups of 
house mounds; also a few in the south edge of the town. 
Four or 5 miles south of Delhi are two flat-topped mounds, one of 
which has been partially destroyed by caving of the bank of the 
bayou on which it is built; the other, a fourth of a mile from this, 
is a few rods from the stream. 
MOUNDS IN COLBERT COUNTY, ALA., AT THE MOUTH 
OF TOWN CREEK 
Town Creek, flowing in a general northerly direction, forms 
the line between Colbert and Lawrence Counties, Ala. A few rods 
ubove the mouth of the creek, on the lower side, is the beginning 
of a depression or slough which winds across the overflow land, 
then follows the foot of the bluff facing the river, and finally joins 
the main stream about 2 miles below the point where it begins. 
