ANCIENT W O K K S NEAR THE ? I S H T A K A RIVER 29 



of ornament or use, indicating any commerce with the white race, were discovered ; 

 and we are led to the conclusion that the mound was erected before the discovery 

 of the country. The position of the skeleton, and other indications, show conclu- 

 sively that no disturbance had taken place since the interment, and that the articles 

 obtained were the original deposits. The skeleton was, without doubt, that of the 

 personage for whom the mound was erected. 



In one of the vases at the head of the skeleton were the remains of a shell, appa- 

 rently the Unio slUquoides, a very common species in the rivers and lakes of Wis- 

 consin. These shells are often used for spoons ; and this vase probably contained 

 a supply of food for the departed while on the journey to the spirit-land. 



It is impossible to estimate, with any degree of precision, the length of time that 

 human bones may have remained when placed two feet in the earth, and covered 

 with a mound still retaining an elevation of four feet ; but it is certain that all traces 

 of them would be gone in a few centuries, unless they were longer preserved by 

 peculiar circumstances. The skeletons found here were, as before stated, very 

 much decayed ; but it is believed that their antiquity could not be very great. 

 Roots of trees had peneti'ated to the bones, and drawn nourishment from their 

 mouldering remains, thus hastening their decay ; and their depth (four and six feet) 

 below the top of the mound, was not so great as to exclude entirely the effects of 

 moisture, especially in wet seasons. It is true, the hard layer of earth and the 

 covering of stone had a preservative influence ; but, upon the whole, it is not pro- 

 bable that these mounds have an antiquity of many hundred years. 



It is clear, then, that this was one of the latest works of the mound-builders ; 

 one that connects them with the present race of Indians ; and yet its origin is, 

 without doubt, anterior to the discovery of America. The pipes, the red paint, 

 and the pottery, are so many circumstances connecting this mound with the recent 

 race; while the tumulus itself is a relic of the more ancient one of the mound- 

 builders. The progress of discovery seems constantly to diminish the distinction 

 Ijetween the ancient and modern races ; and it may not be very wide of the truth 

 to assert that they were the same people. 



It is not strange that changes should, from time to time, take place in the cha- 

 racter and habits of a people so rude and so little advanced in civiHzation. Different 

 tribes have different habits ; and a stronger one may have overrun and swallowed 

 up a weaker, and thus changed its customs and destroyed its institutions. In this 

 way the mode of burial, and even the religious ceremonies, may be altered ; those of 

 the conquerors being substituted for those of the conquered. History records 

 many such events. The inhabitants of Egypt have ceased to build pyramids and 

 sphinxes ; the Greeks have ceased to erect temples : and yet, we have reason to 

 believe that their descendants occupy the same countries. Is it more strange that 

 the ancestors of the present Indians should have erected mounds of earth, than 

 that the aboriginals of any country should have had habits different from their pos- 

 terity ? We need not, therefore, look to Mexico, or any other country, for the 

 descendants of the mound-builders. We probably see them in the present red race 

 of the same or adjacent regions. 



Since the red men liave become known to us, numerous tribes have been ex- 



