158 CERTAIN SAND MOUNDS OF 



CONCLUSIONS. 



Of all the important mounds bordering the St. John's or its tributary streams, 

 that on Tick Island was most surely free from all previous investigation, inspired 

 either by scientific motives or by hope of treasure. In swampy ground, hidden by 

 towering palmettos, on an island usually uninhabited and miles from every line of 

 travel, the existence of the mound was known to few. With trivial exceptions, in 

 all probability, the entire contents of this tumulus are in the cases of the Peabody 

 Museum and of the Academy of Natural Sciences. Among all the objects on dis- 

 play there is not one in any way indicating or suggesting European influence. 



We know Florida to have been the first portion of the United States to expe- 

 rience European contact, and that Cape Canaveral and other points of its eastern 

 coast saw many wrecks of vessels bound from the New World to Spain. Indeed, 

 we are told by the Huguenot Laudonniere that, in his time (1564), the Indians 

 acquired various possessions from vessels cast away, and even at this early period, 

 doubtless, many products of European art had a fairly wide distribution in the 

 Peninsula. Tick Island is scarcely ten leagues from the sea and to a certainty, in 

 our opinion, had the mound been in process of construction in post-Columbian 

 times, such objects would, at least to a limited extent, have found their way into 

 the common burial place of the island. 



It is, therefore, our belief that the mound at Tick Island was no longer in use 

 as a place of interment when white influence was first felt in Florida. 



Thursby Mound, Volusia County. 



Wishing to learn the entire contents of a mound which, superficially, had 

 yielded such rich returns on former visits, and having again obtained the cordial 

 permission of Mrs. L. P. Thursby, of Blue Spring, the owner, we devoted nine days 

 of January, 1894, with a force of fourteen men to handle the spades and our usual 

 complement of five to direct and oversee the work. 



The mound was completely demolished. 



Thursby Mound, it will be remembered, was situate on an arm of land between 

 Lake Beresford and the river. Extensive shell deposits on the eastern side of the 

 river where the mound lay, and the great shell bluff, mounds and ridges of Huntoon 

 Island immediately opposite, testify to a numerous Indian population in former times. 



The mound, as our previous work indicated, was largely composed of white 

 sand with thin local layers of shell of considerable extent and occasional pockets 

 of shell, sometimes from one to two feet in thickness. But three or four pockets 

 of sand, artificially colored red, were met with, thus calling to mind the mound at 

 Tick Island, which Thursby Mound greatly resembled in nearly every respect. 



HUMAN REMAINS. 



In the south, southeast, and southwest portions of the mound, beginning at the 



