130 CERTAIN ABORIGINAL REMAINS OF THE NW. FLORIDA COAST. 



Mound near Wkst Bay Post-Office, Washington County. 



About one-quarter of a mile WNW. from the village known as West Bay 

 post-office, in a field formei'h" under cultivation, on property of Mr. George W. 

 Lee of Point Washington, Florida, was a mound about 8 feet in height and 58 feet 

 through the base. This mound, formerly a truncated cone, had been considerably 

 dug into superficially and to a certain extent in a more serious way, but not suffi- 

 ciently to disturb more than a small portion of the mound. 



The mound was totally demolished by us, including its extreme marginal parts. 



No interments were found until the central parts of the mound were reached 

 and such as were met with were so badly decayed that almost no trace of them 

 remained. Owing to this it was impossible to determine the form of interment, but 

 a small fragment of femur, lying just beneath the crowns of certain teeth, indica- 

 ted a bunched burial in that case at least. 



Over certain burials, as is often seen in Florida mounds, were deposits of char- 

 coal which cannot have been the remains of continued fires since the bones were not 

 calcined nor the sand reddened by heat. 



With one burial was a knife or arrowhead of chert ; with another, a thick sheet 

 of mica. In caved sand was a hone of ferruginous sandstone^ and a large "celt". 



Incidentally, we may say that in this report the rocks from which the " celts " 

 discovered by us were made will not be stated. Apparently no new features were 

 presented and in many cases these implements were given to owners of mounds, 

 who wished souvenirs from them. 



Beginning almost directlj^ at the margin of the NE. part of the mound, on or 

 near the base, as a rule, vessels of earthenware were met with, sometimes singly and 

 again a number together. This deposit, continuing and broadening to the eastward, 

 extended under the slope of the mound almost to the margin of the summit plateau, 

 where the burials began. At times vessels and quantities of fragments of vessels 

 lay together. These fragments, when collected, often failed to furnish full com- 

 plement of the vessels to which they belonged, but as parts were found widely sepa- 

 rated sometimes, it is likely many vessels had been broken first and then scattered 

 through the mound while it was in process of construction, a custom we have noted 

 in the first part of this report. An example of this practice was noticed in the 

 case of a vessel wath five compartments, which had been broken into four parts. 

 One of these parts was met with in digging, several hours before the others 

 which, themselves, were somewhat separated and many feet nearer the center of 

 the mound. 



As we had found the case to be before along the northwest coast, the sand in 

 that part of the mound in which the earthenware deposit lay was much darker in 

 color than that of the rest of the mound. During our investigations the present sea- 



' Our thanks are tendered Messrs. Theodore D. Rand and Lewis Woolman, of our Academy of 

 Natural Sciences, for all determinations of rocks mentioned in this report. As it was not expedient to 

 mutilate specimens for microscopic slides, determinations have not been made with the certainty that 

 otherwise would have been the case. 



