ARCHEOLOGY. 7 



decoy and confine wild beasts until such time as it might be convenient 

 or necessary to slaughter them; for such animals as existed here in that 

 period would make scant ceremony of surmounting any walls that could 

 be built of earth. Moreover, such methods are not in accordance with 

 the disposition of people who live even partially by hunting; the love of 

 adventure, the desire to achieve noteworthy exploits, the excitement and 

 emulation of the chase, reacting upon one another, will not be satisfied 

 by so tame a pleasure as may be derived from slaughtering in cold blood 

 a defenceless quarry. At any rate, admitting that our aborigines had 

 become so enervated as to enjoy this form of "sport," they would have 

 accomplished their aim more readily by making palisade traps at the 

 head of some ravine near where the game was to be found, than by the 

 construction of these awkward contrivances, usually placed in a situation 

 as unsuitable as could be found for such a purpose. 



The idea has been advanced, also, that the walls served as founda- 

 tions for houses, the interior space being devoted to cultivation. Calcu- 

 lations have been made showing the exact width of such houses. But 

 the theory takes as its basis that the walls are composed of tough clay 

 which will stand with a very steep slope from top to bottom. None of 

 the embankments are thus constructed, being made of the loam and 

 gravel constituting the soil around them, which will not maintain a 

 greater angle than an ordinary fill made of similar material for a road or 

 railway. To erect on them at their present height a dwelling, except of 

 very contracted width, would require a breadth at the top greater than 

 can be given to any of them with the amount of material used, unless 

 means be taken, as by palisades or a retaining wall of some description, 

 to keep them from crumbling down ; there is no evidence that this was 

 ever done. 



Somewhat akin to the last, is the suggestion that the enclosed space 

 was used for agricultural purposes by the inhabitants of villages at some 

 place outside the walls, who took this method ot checking the encroach- 

 ments of animals destructive to their crops; but, as before mentioned, 

 such animals would find earthen walls a trifling obstacle. This objection 

 is overcome by supposing palisades along the top of the embankment; 

 but if such were used only sufficient earth to hold them in place would 

 be needed. There are no indications of such protection ; logs or posts of 

 the size to be an effectual barrier would leave their traces in charcoal, 

 ashes, decayed wood, or cavities filled with lighter earth, for an indefinite 

 time., as is fully verified by numerous discoveries of the sort in mounds 

 and village sites. 



Another hypothesis is that villages were located within the walls 

 which were erected as a defense against invaders. Some of them may 

 have answered for such purpose; but in most there is one feature that 

 militates against this supposition as it does against all the preceding; — 

 namely, the openings or gateways, which are usually so numerous as to 



