ON THE POTTERY OF THE MOUND-BUILDERS. 101 
sculptures, representing this class of implements, we have the 
highest type of the Mound-builders’ art. The narrow, receding 
forehead, the broad cheek bones, caused by the outward sweep of 
*the zygomatic arches, and the projecting jaws,—characters which 
appertain to the inferior races—are here represented. This is 
about the only instance of an obscene 
figure (the posterior extremities are omit- 
ted) which I have observed. a 
SEPULCHRAL Urns. — These are quite C 
numerous, and are often graceful in form, 
and elaborately decorated. Not unfre- 
quently there is found at the bottom of 
them a dark carbonaceous matter which 
may be the residuum of the food which 
they contained when placed at the head Urn from an Ancient Grave, 
of the corpse. I give three illustrations CTT? Com Ky. =4. 
(Figs. 20, 21 and 22) of this class of utensils, taken from the 
mounds near Laporte, Indiana, by Dr. Higday. In one the mate- 
rial is a finely tempered clay, and the thickness of the walls is so 
uniform, that I have been led almost to the belief that it was 
turned on a potter’s wheel. The other two are of a coarse text- 
ure, and the ornamentation is less skilfully accomplished. The 
Fig. 24, a. Fig. 24, b. curved lines appear to have 
F 3 been traced by a sharp-pointed 
instrument, and the indenta- 
tions to have been punched 
by a square-pointed one, when 
the clay was in a plastic state. 
The urn, represented in fig- 
ure 23 is in Professor Cox’s 
eis 
cient Pottery from Merom, Indiana. 
P 
a, An . 
b, Ancient Pottery from New Mexico (Prof, Collection, and was taken from 
Cox’s Collection), ‘ 
a an ancient grave near the 
mouth of Big Sandy River, Greenup County, Kentucky. It differs 
from the others represented in having handles, and the ornamen- 
tation consists of a series of corrugated lines, vertically disposed. 
Kerrtes. — On the borders of the Saline River, Gallatin Co., 
Illinois, according to the manuscript notes of Professor Cox, 
Director of the Geological Survey of Indiana, and kindly placed 
at my disposal, there issues a salt spring which was resorted to in 
the earliest settlement of the country by those of European de- 
