May 30, 1884.] 
but of a sedentary people, under fixed laws and or- 
ganized society. 
Bishop Madison, in 1803, applied first to the works 
the titles ‘sacred enclosures,’ ‘temple-mounds,’ ‘ sac- 
rificial mounds,’ etc. Few of the successors of this 
writer — Atwater, Squier, Baldwin, etc. — have done 
any thing to lift the veil of mystery which encom- 
passes the subject. Prehistoric America stands 
opposed, in their view, to the historic Indians: a 
cataclysm cut off the mound-builders, and the mod- 
ern aborigines are a new revelation on our soil. In 
anatomy and culture they stood apart. They formed 
dense settlements in the Mississippi valley, organized 
despotic governments, worshipped the sun in holy 
places or on temple-mounds, and offered human 
sacrifices on theiraltars. They practised agriculture, 
handicrafts, and art extensively, amused themselves 
in well-ordered plazas, and buried their dead in 
mounds. Their time reached thousands of years 
back; their origin is unknown; they were driven 
from their homes by savages many centuries before 
Columbus. If any thing remains of their influ- 
ence, it is to be sought in Mexico and Central Amer- 
- jea. 
However unscientific much of the investigation has 
been, we have still material for the classification and 
comparative study of the mounds and earth-works. 
That the ‘ works’ were designed for defence alone, Dr. 
Schmidt thinks there is no doubt; but they certainly 
tell us very little concerning the social organization 
of those who dwelt within them. 
The author, speaking of the animal mounds, says 
they are usually of no specialized form, the particu- 
lar animal typified in any case being unknown. 
There is nothing improbable in the suggestion that 
they are connected with the totemic system of all 
American aborigines. The truncated mounds, cor- 
related by the older archeologists with the Mexican 
teocallis, were undoubtedly the sites of dwellings, ac- 
quiring their great dimensions in many instances by 
years of accretion. 
The altar-mounds prove merely that here corpses 
were burnt, and with their ashes were deposited the 
things of greatest value to the dead. Surely there 
is nothing unique in this, since barbarous nations 
have done the same thing in all places and times. 
Let us, therefore, draw the pen through all the fables 
that have been written upon the civil and religious 
institutions of the mound-builders. Of the sepul- 
chral mounds, Dr. Schmidt tells us that their variety 
and structure can be observed in the old world as 
well as in the new; and as for the fortification and 
signal mounds, they are generally only mounds of 
sepulture. 
The geographical distribution of the various types 
points, not to one race, but to a variety of ethnic 
groups. 
With respect to the art of the mound-builders, 
weaving, pottery, agriculture, metal-working, com- 
merce, and war, there occurs nothing to differentiate 
them from the modern Indians. The attempts to 
connect them with Greeks, Etruscans, Phoenicians, 
SCIENCE. 
659 
or Hittites, through the ‘inscribed tablets,’ are not 
worthy of serious criticism. When we turn to the 
remains of the people themselves, the varied utter- 
ances of those who have studied the matter are a 
sufficient commentary upon their results. Indeed, 
the crania are so distorted that no conclusions can 
be reached; nor are the discussions upon the an- 
tiquity of the mounds of any greater value. 
Dr. Schmidt’s second paper is devoted to an ex- 
amination of authorities to show, that, in each respect 
wherein the mound-builders have been deemed a 
unique people, modern or historic Indians have been 
found to equal or excel them. The author discusses 
systematically, for this purpose, agriculture, fortifica- 
tions, buildings on the upper terraces, house-build- 
ing, effigy-mounds, platform-mounds, deposits with 
the dead, cremation, stone-working, pottery, metal- 
working, ornamentation, textile fabrics, etc. 
So much for the possibilities of the case. That 
the mound-builders were the immediate ancestors of 
any of our historic tribes must rest on language and 
tradition. In the Iroquois and Algonquin traditions, 
the author finds the necessary information concern- 
ing the commencement of that disaster which swept 
away the mound-builders, and, in the traditions of 
the Cherokees and Muskoki, the narrative of their 
extinction. We know their name, Allegéwi; in part, 
their language; we know their conflicts, and their 
last century of defeat and decline. The linguistic 
argument is based on the discussion of Indian migra- 
tions as evidenced by language, by Horatio Hale. 
With the author’s arguments, from traditional and 
linguistic grounds, for the identification of the mound- 
builders with the Allegéwi, many will have little 
sympathy. It is to the first part of the essay that 
especial attention is directed. On general prin- 
ciples, the continuities of human historic evolution 
are everywhere becoming even more apparent than 
those of the natural world. It is difficult to believe, 
therefore, that the erectors of the earth-remains of 
the Mississippi valley were a discrete people. The 
arguments of Dr. Schmidt are strengthened by the 
recent explorations and researches of Professor 
Cyrus Thomas in the mounds; of Mr. W. L. Holmes 
in the shell-carvings and textile work of their build- 
ers; and of Mr. H. W. Henshaw, the ornithologist, 
in the identification of the animals of the mound- 
pipes, ete. ‘‘Itis certain,’’ says Mr. Henshaw, “‘ that, 
of the carvings from the mounds which can be iden- 
tified, there are no representations of birds or animals 
not indigenous to the Mississippi valley. A large 
majority of the carvings are not exact likenesses 
either of animals or men. The state of art-culture 
has been greatly over-estimated.’’ Itis of the utmost 
importance to bear in mind, however, the fact, well 
authenticated, that the arts, complexity of social 
structure, and knowledge, of our modern Indians, 
have been greatly underrated. The vrobabilities of 
consanguinity between them andthe mound-builders 
will be enhanced as well by placing the culture of 
the former on its true basis, as by an unjust depre- 
ciation of the works of the latter. O. T. MASON. 
