GKEENE COUNTY. 693 



mineral matter would be provided. There is room enough in the high- 

 lands to the northward for such deposits, but none can now be pointed 

 out. If, on the other hand, the deposit is derived from the bedded rocks 

 we can be sure that cavernous spaces must be left underground by the 

 removal of so much material. 



So generous a fountain could never fail to attract to itself the human 

 occupants of the country. Accordingly, we find that the earliest race of 

 which we have any traces in the Mississippi valley, viz, the Mound- 

 Builders, established themselves here. A symmetrical pile of earth and 

 stone attests their interest and occupancy* 



That the Indians who displaced and succeeded the Mound-Builders set 

 a high value on the spring, is also amply attested. The spring lies 

 about equidistant between two famous settlements of the Miamis, viz, 

 Oldtown, above Xenia, which was one of their most valued corn-fields' 

 and the Mad River Village, below Springfield, where Tecumseh was 

 born. The trail connecting these points passed by the spring, and fifty 

 years ago, according to the testimony of the earlier white settlers, it was 

 worn as deep as a buffalo path. It passed very near the present site of 

 Antioch College, and descended into the glen by a break in its rocky 

 wall, which is still used for a foot-path. 



At a later date this site was selected by the followers of Robert Owen 

 for their socialistic experiment. A phalanstery was built, the chimney 

 of which is still standing, but the location was soon abandoned for some 

 reason, and the organization was transferred to New Harmony, Indiana. 

 For the last forty years the spring has been the most notable place of 

 summer resort in south-western Ohio, and justly so, for there is no other 

 location within this region that unites so many attractions' and advan- 

 tages as this immediate neighborhood. A large hotel, capable of accom- 

 modating several hundred summer guests, now occupies the grounds 

 adjacent to it, and its waters seem certain to dispense health and happi- 

 ness in an increasing ratio for the years to come. 



The main supply of water for human uses in Greene county is, how- 

 ever, as elsewhere, derived from wells. Wherever the Drift beds are 

 heavy enough, they yield an abundant and, on the whole, an excellent 

 supply ; but in points of Cedarville and Miami townships the Drift beds 

 are too shallow to furnish an adequate amount, and it becomes necessary 

 to penetrate the rocky floor in order to secure wells on which reliance 

 be placed. These wells generally obtain water when they strike the 



can 



* The mound is now crowned with a summer-house. It may not be out of place to 

 add that, from the summit of the mound, Daniel Webster and Henry Clay addressed 

 a great audience on the same afternoon in the political campaign of 1840. 



