Or THE OLD AND NEW WOBLD. 327 



The pottery thus found aloug with these diminutive Indian clay 

 pipes, is obviously therefore a relic of former centuries, though 

 exhibiting no such evidence as would necessarily suggest a remote 

 antiquity. Similar examples found to the south of the Great Lakes, 

 are thus described by Mr. Squier, in his Aboriginal Monuments of 

 the State of New York : (< Upon the site of every Indian town, as 

 also within all the ancient enclosures, fragments of pottery occur in 

 great abundance. It is rare, however, that any entire vessels are re- 

 covered. Those which have been found, are for the most part gourd- 

 shaped, with round bottoms, and having little protuberances near the 

 rim, or oftener a deep groove, whereby they could be suspended. A 

 few cases have been known in which this form was modified, and the 

 bottoms made sufficiently flat to sustain the vessel in an upright 

 position. Fragments found in Jefferson County seem to indicate 

 that occasionally the vessels were moulded in forms nearly square, 

 but with rounded angles. The usual size was from one to four 

 quarts ; but some must have contained not less than twelve or four- 

 teen quarts. In general there was no attempt at ornament ; but 

 sometimes the exteriors of the pots and vases were elaborately, if not 

 tastefully ornamented with dots and lines, which seem to have been 

 formed in a very rude manner with a pointed stick or sharpened 

 bone. Bones which appear to have been adapted to this purpose are 

 often found. After the commencement of European intercourse, 

 kettles and vessels of iron, copper, brass, and tin, quickly superseded 

 the productions of the primitive potter, whose art at once fell into 

 disuse."* 



In an able summary of the " Archaeology of the United States," 

 embodying a resume of all that has been previously done, Mr. 

 Samuel I\ Haven remarks: "In order to estimate correctly the 

 degree of skill in handicrafts possessed by the people who were found 

 in occupation of the soil, we must go back to a time antecedent to the 

 decline in all domestic arts which resulted immediately from inter- 

 course with the whites. So soon as more effective implements, more 

 serviceable and durable utensils, and finer ornaments, could be ob- 

 tained in exchange for the products of the chase, their own laborious 

 and imperfect manufactures were abandoned. "f But just as this 

 reasoning must unquestionably prove in many cases, it fails of applica- 

 tion in relation to the absence of the potter's art among the Indians 

 of the North West, for the substitutes found for it are of native 

 manufacture, and present a much greater dissimilarity to the pro- 



* Aboriginal Monuments of the State of New York. Page 75. 

 t Smithsonian Contributions. Vol. VIII. Page 155. 



