50 CERTAIN SAND MOUNDS OF 



The length of the causeway, following its curves, is 392 feet, its average height 

 4 feet ; the average breadth of base 25 feet, and average breadth of summit 15 feet. 



Leaving one end of the bean-shaped shell heap is a less well defined causeway 

 228 feet in length. It skirts a portion of the base of the mound, but its point of 

 union, if it ever existed, has disappeared. 



In addition to numerous shafts, three trenches were made : 

 1. — From the northern margin, 46"5 feet long, 13 feet broad and 9 feet deep at the 



end. 

 2. — From the western margin, 54 feet in length, 8 feet broad, diverging to 14 feet, 



and 10 feet deep at the end. 

 3. — Beginning on the southern slope of the mound, 12 feet from the margin of the 



base, 53 feet broad, converging to 11 feet in breadth, 43 feet from the start. 



These trenches all followed the convex base of shell which attained a height 

 of from 5 to 7 feet at and near the center of the mound. 



HUMAN REMAINS. 



The great Tick Island mound as an ossuary exceeds any other on the St. 

 John's of which we have cognizance ; for while at Ginn's Grove probably, and 

 at Mulberry Mound certainly, more human remains are found on an average in the 

 same area, yet the size of these mounds, in nowise comparing with that of Tick 

 Island, renders much less numerous the total burials contained in them. 



Superficially in the brown sand layer were skeletons in anatomical order, possibly 

 intrusive. Throughout the entire brown sand layer were disconnected bones and 

 portions of skeletons in anatomical order. At one place, for example, lay a pelvis, 

 one humerus, one clavicle, one unbroken femur, one in fragments, a piece of the 

 shaft of a tibia, an os calcis. three cervical vertebrae, a fragment of another 

 humerus and a piece of a radius. The breaks were ancient. Jaw bones lay 

 some feet away from other portions of the skeletons. It was evident 

 that remains taken from the bone house had been interred without any 

 attempt at order. 1 Some skeletons, however, probably original, were found in ana- 

 tomical order in the brown sand, or upper layer. At four feet from the surface, 

 not far from the base of the mound, was the skeleton of a young person, as shown 

 by unattached epiphyses. The skeleton was in anatomical order throughout. One 

 wisdom tooth had made its appearance, while the other three were still embedded 

 in the jaw. The first left lower molar was much worn through the dentine, the 

 second was so in places ; while the right first molar showed dentine in spots. In the 

 upper jaw also dentine was apparent in the first molars. This excessive wear, 

 remarkable in one so young, has been noticed by us previously in the mounds, and 

 is probably attributable to the nature of the food. If the men of Tick Island were 

 identical with the makers of the shell heaps, the worn condition of the teeth can 



: The skeletons from which, after exposure, the flesh had rotted or been stripped were stored in the bone 

 house against the next date for general interment. 



