1026 The Peabody Museum's Explorations in Ohio. [December, 
great care to remove the earth from about the bones, and very 
few persons will take the time to do it properly. As soon asa 
bone is uncovered most persons attempt to remove it at once, 
and of course it goes to pieces. Now if a skeleton is in dry earth 
' or gravel, and is very dry and crumbling, the proper mode of 
procedure is to uncover the bones with great care, loosening the 
earth with the point of a small flat trowel and removing it from 
the bones by means of a small broom, or clothes brush, then let 
the moist air come in contact with the bone, or, if the air is 
very dry and hot, sprinkle the bones with water and let them 
absorb all they will. In this way the particles of bone swell and 
interlock, and after a while the bone can be safely taken up by 
avoiding force in removing it from the earth. In case the bones 
are in wet clay or earth the matrix must be removed with great 
care. In such cases the bones are soft and spongy and they must 
be allowed to remain in place until they have dried off; but they 
must not be exposed to the full heat of the sun, otherwise they 
will crack and splinter as they dry. Of course instances often 
occur where we find only minute fragments of a skeleton in a 
grave, all the rest having passed through a chemical change and 
been reduced to its earthly particles; but that every bone found 
in a grave can be preserved by using proper care I know from 
long experience to be the case. I may also call attention to the 
fact that the state of perfection of the skeleton, outside of certain 
limits, is not evidence, by itself, of the antiquity of the bones, as 
the conditions of burial, as well as the character of the bones 
must be taken into account. 
In our exploration of this burial place we found three large 
pits which were covered with gravel and stones, like the grave I 
have just described. These pits had been dug through the com- 
pact iron-cemented gravel below the clay, even to the depth of 
five feet, and all the material taken from them had been carr ied 
away. The pits were then filled with ashes and burned earth, 
= and covered with several inches of gravel and stones, like a 
ee. grave. The sides of the pit were not burned, so it is evident pa 
the ashes were not from fires on the spot. There were seve 
places uncovered by our excavations near these pits or g 
_ where fires had been made on the clay or gravel, but the sent 
had been removed, and hence it is probable that they had a 
it in these carefully marked pits. But what had become of t! 
A 
ETS, O E S Se RE 
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