MORGAN,] * CREMATION BY INDIANS. aled 
was so hard as to resist the blow of a heavy hatchet, the instrument re- 
bounding as if struck upon a rock. The basin, or hollow of the altar, was 
filled up even full with dry ashes, intermingled with which were some frag- 
ments of pottery. * * * One of the vases, taken in fragments from the 
mound, has been very nearly restored. The sketch B presents its outlines 
and the character of its ornaments. Its height is six, and its greatest diam- 
eter eight inches * * * Above the deposit of ashes, and covering the 
entire basin, was a layer of silvery or opaque mica in sheets overlapping 
each other; and immediately over the center of the basin was heaped a 
quantity of human bones, probably the amount of a single skeleton, in 
fragments. The position of these is indicated by O in the section. The 
layer of mica and calcined bones, it should be remarked to prevent mis- 
apprehension, was peculiar to this individual mound, and not found in any 
other of the class.”1 Calcined bones, however, were found in three out 
of some twenty mounds of this class examined.’ 
The question now recurs, what was the use of the basin of clay, and 
? and “mounds of 
what the object of the mound itself? The terms ‘altars’ 
sacrifice,” employed in describing them, imply that human sacrifices were 
offered on these “altars,” “‘upon which glowed the sacrificial fires.”* There 
is no propriety, I respectfully submit, in the use of either of these terms, 
or in the conclusions they would force us to adopt. 
Human sacrifices were unknown in the Lower Status of barbarism; 
but they were introduced in the Middle Status, when the first organized 
priesthood, distinguished by their apparel, appears. In parts of Mexico, 
and, it is claimed, in parts of Central America, these atrocious rites were per- 
formed; but they were unknown in New Mexico, and, without better evi- 
dence than these miscalled altars afford, they cannot be fastened upon the 
Mound-Builders. Moreover, these clay beds were not adapted to the bar- 
barous work. Wherever human sacrifices are known to have oceurred 
among the American aborigines, the place was an elevated mound platform, 
in the nature of a temple, as the Teocalli of Mexico, and the raised altar 
or sacrificial stone stood before the idol in whose worship the rites were 
performed. There is neither a temple nor an idol; but a hollow bed of clay 
1 Observations, ete., Trans. Am. Eth. Soc., ii, p. 161. ?Anc. Mon., etc., pp. 157, 159, 3 Ib., p, 155, 
