132 



MOUND EXPLORATIONS. 



The first mounds visited were those on Wood river where it emerges 

 from the highlands and enters the bottom. This bottom, which extends 

 southward from Alton along the Mississippi, is generally known as the 

 "American bottom." Many small mounds are found on the bluffs in 

 this vicinity, as shown in the accompanying map. (Fig. 06.) An oval- 

 shaped one some 5 feet in height, situated on the sloping bluff between 

 the forks of the stream, was of a yellowish clay nuicli more compact 

 and tenacious than the loess of the bluff. At the depth of 5 or feet 

 were the crumbling bones of a human skeleton. The body had evi- 

 dently been buried extended, with the face upward. With the bones 

 were some ashes, but none of the bones showed any indications of 

 having been burned. No relics of stone or other material Avere found. 



Fl<:. G6. — AViiod river mouuds, iladisun coiiuty, Illiiioie. 



An adjoining mound on the west and of nearly the same size was 

 ojiened, but presented nothing materially different from the first. Sub- 

 sequently, however, in a small mound on the bluff above the railroad 

 track, on thewest sideof Wood river, a human skeleton was discovered, 

 at the depth of about 2 feet, much decayed ; the skull, however, was 

 preserved. 



On this bluff there had been, in times not very remote, numerous 

 burials without the erection of mounds. Some of the bones were but a 

 few inches beneath the surface of the ground. 



The next excavation of any importance was made iu a mound on the 

 bluff in St. Clair county, near the line between St, Clair and Madison 



