Se Pin SEG eee ae 
H. C. Hovey—Discoveries in Western Caves, 471 
that, and it cannot be much less. 
white stones that have rolled down under the ledges of black 
ation above given. Further search enabled us to discover the 
tools with which the ancient workmen wrought, whoever they 
ened by use as pounders. No manufactured articles were found 
f 
alabaster have been repeatedly exhumed among Indian relics 
in the Southern States; and more careful research may find 
similar objects amid the tumuli of Indiana, though perhaps not 
abundantly. For alabaster, though a very durable material, 
when not exposed to the elements, is fibrous in its nature, and 
would be liable to decay amid the frosts and sunshine of ten 
centuries; as we know from the crumbling specimens found 
outside in the vicinity of the cave. 
* Dr. Binkerd’s estimate of stalagmitic growth in Mammoth Cave fixed it at 
one inch in 7,500 ; which makes Rothrock’s estimate seem yery mode 
indeed! (See Binkerd's Mammoth Cave, p. 54.) 
