276 Mound Pipes. [April, 



he wanted to keep it We were, however, unfortunate, or fortu- 

 nate, enough to break it ; that spoiled it for him and that was his 

 chance to make some money out of it. He could have claimed 

 any amount, and we would, as in duty bound, have raised it for 

 him, but he was satisfied with three or four dollars. During 

 the first week in April, this month, Rev. Ad. Blumer, another 

 German Lutheran minister, now of Genesee, Illinois, having for- 

 merly resided in Louisa county, went down there in company 

 with Mr. Gass to open a few mounds, Mr. Blumer being well 

 acquainted there. They carefully explored ten of them, and 

 found nothing but ashes and decayed bones in any, except one. 

 In that one was a layer of red, hard-burned clay, about five feet 

 across and thirteen inches in thickness at the center, which rested 

 upon a bed of ashes one foot in depth in the middle, the ashes 



Fig. 18.— Elephant Pipe, Iowa. 



resting upon the natural undisturbed clay. In the ashes, near the 

 bottom of the layer, they found a part of a broken carved stone 

 pipe representing some bird ; a very small, beautifully formed 

 copper ' axe,' and this last elephant pipe (Fig. 18). This pipe 

 was first discovered by Mr. Blumer, and by him, at our earnest 

 solicitation, turned over to the Academy." 



Mr. J. Duncan Putnam, corresponding secretary of the Acad- 

 emy, writes me that the former pipe " is of a light-colored sand- 

 stone, but has been much greased and smoked, so as to appear of 

 a dark color." The material of the latter is the same. There seems 

 to be no flaw in the history of these pipes, which, coming from 

 sources of unquestioned integrity, is evidence that there has been 

 no attempt at deception on the part of the Davenport Academy. 



