153 Finch on the Celtic Antiquities of America. 



A small rocking stone occurs at Ashburnham, in the 

 same State. 



In New-Hampshire there are two ; one at Andover, 

 weighing fifteen or twenty tons, and the other at Durham. 

 This was a short time since a very splendid rocking stone, 

 weighing between fifty and sixty tons, and so exactly pois- 

 ed, that the wind would move it, and its vibrations could be 

 plainly seen at some distance. But, two years ago, a 

 party from Portsmouth visited it, and after several hours of 

 labor succeeded in moving it from its position. A proper 

 feeling on the part of the persons who effected this mischief, 

 would cause them to restore it to its original place. The 

 rock is forty five feet in circumference and seven in thick- 

 ness. 



S. Tumuli or Barrows, are found in every part of the im- 

 mense expanse of American territory, from the Lakes of 

 Canada to the Mexican sea, from the shores of the Atlantic, 

 to the borders of the Pacific ocean, and they may be con- 

 sidered merely a continuation of the same monuments which 

 extend from the icy promontories of Kamschatcka, through 

 the barren steppes of Tartary, the level plains of Russia, and 

 all the northern regions of Europe. 



- These tumuli were the simple repositories of the Celtic 

 dead, the tombs of their warriors, the last resting place of 

 those who were wise in council and valiant in war, and an 

 enlightened people should respect the remains of the former 

 chieftains of North America. 



It is a spot upon the escutcheon of Virginia that a tumu- 

 lus which had belonged to an ancient Indian nation, and 

 been described by the pen of the philosophic Jefferson, 

 should now be nearly destroyed by the encroaching spirit 

 of agriculture, and the bones of Celtic warriors allowed to 

 blanch under a meridian sun, but in the western states this 

 may be said to occur every day, and thus the vestiges of 

 former times are effaced by the advance of the plough, and 

 even Antiquarians have assisted to open and rifle these sanc- 

 tuaries of the dead. Surely the land has been acquired 

 cheap enough from its aboriginal possessors, and humani- 

 ty might dictate that their tumuli, their mounds, their camps, 

 their altars, and the bones of their warriors should be al- 

 lowed to rest in peace. ^ 



