ADMINISTRATIVE REPORT. XLIX 



It may be noted that Mr Holmes is now engaged on elabo- 

 rate studies of the stone and fictile arts of the aborigines, the 

 results of -which are designed for publication iu other reports, 

 and that these researches have been conducted in the same 

 advanced way — i. e., by means of homologic comparison — and 

 have yielded results in comi)lete accord with those flowing 

 from the study of the textiles. 



STONE ART 



In the course of the excavation of the mounds a large num- 

 ber of relics of various kinds were recovered ; and these were 

 carefully preserved and brought to the office of the Bureau 

 for study and comparison, and were afterward placed in the 

 United States National Museum. Partly because of extensive 

 iise, partly because of its imperishable nature, the preA'ailing 

 material of these relics is stone. A large number of the 

 stone implements, weapons, ornaments, etc, were collected 

 from the mounds ; and in many cases these stone articles ^\■ere 

 associated with skeletons or with mortuary vessels and cere- 

 ments in such manner as to jn-ove that they were habitually 

 used bv the builders of the mounds. 



As the archeologic surveys progressed, many articles of 

 stone were found iu the fields, forests, and plains, on the sur- 

 face of the ground, sometimes in the vicinit}^ of, sometimes far 

 removed from, the prehistoric mounds ; others were obtained 

 either directly from living Indians in different parts of the 

 country, or from white men who had received them from 

 Indians or who had at least a definite history of the articles con- 

 necting them with the native makers, and frequently the use 

 of the articles acquired in this way was ascertained through 

 direct observation or through circumstantial account. Many 

 articles picked up at random on the surface or extracted from 

 mounds by farmers and hunters or by skilled archeologists 

 were also added to the collection. 



On assembling the stone art products from the mounds, 

 those picked up on the surface, and those obtained directly 

 from the Indians, it was found that all are essentially alike. 

 It is true that sometimes all of the objects found in a single 



13 ETH IV 



