.HENSHAW.) ELEPHANT PIPES. 155 



artist as a trunk, and thus the bead be made to assume a shape in his 

 sketch not intended by the original maker. As is well known, no task 

 is more difficult for the artist than to transfer to paper au exact copy of 

 such a subject. Especially hard is it for the artist to avoid uncon- 

 sciously magnifying or toning down peculiarities according to his own 

 conceptions of what was originally intended, when, as is often the case, 

 time and the elements have combined to render shape and outlines ob- 

 scure. Archwplogic treatises are full of warning lessons of this kind, 

 and the interpretations given to ancient works of art by the erring pen- 

 cil of the modern artist are responsible for many an ingenious theory 

 which the original would never have suggested. It may well be that 

 future investigations will show that the one peculiarity which distin- 

 guishes the so-called Elephant Mound from its fellows is really suscepti- 

 ble of a much more commonplace explanation than has hitherto beeu 

 given it. 



Even if such explanation be not forthcoming, the "Elephant Mound" 

 of Wisconsin should be supplemented by a very considerable amount of 

 corroborative testimony before being accepted as proof positive of the 

 acquaintance of the Mound-Builders with the mastodon. 



As regards likeness to the mastodon, the pipes before alluded to, 

 copies of which as given in Barber's articles on Mound Pipes in Amer- 

 ican Naturalist for April, 1882, Figs. 17 and 18, are here presented, while 

 not entirely above criticism, are much nearer what they have beeu sup- 

 posed to be than the mound just mentioned. 



Fig. 2S. — Elephant Pipe, Iowa 



Of the two, figure 29 is certainly the most natural in appearance, but, 

 if the pipes are intentional imitations of any animal, neither can be re- 

 garded as having been intended for any other than the mastodon. Yet, 

 as pointed out by Barber and others, it is certaii.ly surprising that if 

 intended for mastodons no attempt was made to indicate the tusks, which 

 with the trunk constitute the most marked external peculiarities of all 

 the elephant kind. The tusks, too, as aflbrding that most important pro- 

 duct in primitive industries, ivory, would naturally be the one peculiarity 

 of all others which the ancient artist would have relied upon to fix the 



