TRAVELS Iff 
37® 
two or three days, employed in augmenting thf 
collections of fpecimens, and waiting for Mr. Ga- 
lahan, who was to call on me here, to accompany 
him to Sinica, where he and other traders, we re to 
meet Mr. Cameron, the deputy commiffary, to 
hold a congrefs at that town, with the chiefs of the 
Lower Cherokees, to confult preliminaries intro- 
ductory to a general congrefs and treaty with thefe 
Indians, which was to be convened next June, and 
held in the Overhill towns. 
I obferved in the environs of Keowe, on the bafes 
of the rocky hills, immediately afcending from the 
low grounds near the river bank, a great number of 
very fingular antiquities, the work of the ancients » 
they feem to me to have been altars for facrifice or 
fepulchres : they were conftruCted of four flat ftones, 
two fet on an edge for the Tides, one clofed one 
endj and a very large flat one lay horizontally at 
top, fo that the other end was open ; this fabric was 
four or five feet in length, two feet high, and three 
in width. I inquired of the trader what they were, 
who could not tell me certainly, but fuppofed them 
to be ancient Indian ovens; the Indians can give no 
account of them : they are on the furface of the 
ground and are of different dimenfions. 
I accompanied the traders to Sinica, where we 
found the commiffary and the Indian chiefs con- 
vened in counfel : continued at Sinica fometime, 
employing myfelf in obfervations, and making col- 
lections of every thing worthy of notice : and find- ; 
ing the Indians to be yet unfettled in their determi- 
nation, and not in a good humour, I abandoned 
the projeCt of vifiting the regions beyond the Che»« 
rokee mountains for this feafon ; fet off for my re- 
turn to fort James, Dartmouth, lodged this night, 
in 
