APPENDIX. ^ 381 
with the appearance of capitals, by this substance. That it is the result of a soil 
highly charged with particles of matter, arising from the decay or incineration of 
human bodies, is the only theory by which we m3.y account for the phenomenon. 
Curious and unique it certainly is, and with the faint light of a few candles, it 
would not require much imagination to invest the entire rotunda with sylph-like 
forms of the sheeted dead. 
An old Cherokee chief, who visitqd this scene recently, with his companions, 
on his way to the West, was so excited and indignant at the desecration of the 
tumulus, by this display of bones and relics to the gaze of the white race, that he 
became furious and unmanageable ; his friends and interpreters had to force him 
out, to prevent his assassinating the guide ; and soon after he drowned his senses 
in alcohol. 
That this spot was a very ancient point of settlement by the hunter race in the 
Ohio valley, and that it was inhabited by the present red race of North American 
Indians, on the arrival of whites west of the Alleghanies, are both admitted facts ; 
nor would the historian and antiquary ever have busied themselves further in the 
matter had not the inscribed stone come to light, in the year 1839. I was informed, 
yesterday, that another inscription stone had been found, in one of the smaller 
mounds on these flats, about five years ago, and have obtained data sufficient as to 
its present location to put the Ethnological Society on its trace. If, indeed, these 
inscriptions shall lead us to admit that the Continent was visited by Europeans 
prior to tlie era of Columbus, it is a question of very high antiquarian interest to 
determine who the visitors were, and what they have actually left on record in 
these antique tablets. 
I have only time to add a single additional fact Among the articles found in 
this cluster of mounds, the greater part are commonplace, in our Western mounds 
and town-ruins. I have noticed but one which bears the character of that unique 
type of architecture, found by Mr. Stephens and Mr. Catherwood, in Central 
America and Yucatan. With the valuable monumental standards of comparison 
furnished by these gentlemen before me, it is impossible not to recognize, in an 
ornamental stone, found in one of the lesser mounds here, a specimen of similar 
workmanship. It is in the style of the heavy feather-sculptured ornament of 
Yucatan — the material being a wax yellow sand-stone, darkened by time. I have 
taken such notes and drawings of the objects above referred to, as will enable me, 
I trust, in due time, to give a connected account of them to our incipient society. 
Yours truly, 
HENRY R. COLCRAFT. 
I have been favored with a fac-simile of this stone,- by Mr. Bartlett, the learned 
and indefatigable Secretary of our Ethnological Society, who, in his letter com- 
municating the drawings, observes : 
" I must state a curious fact in regard to the characters on this Tablet I have 
compared them with the old alphabets of Europe, and find they lassimilate strongly 
with the letters of the old Phcsnician and Anglo-Saxon. Many of the characters 
maybe found in the ancient Greek, Etruscan, Phoenician, Cimbric or Welsh, 
Celt-Iberic, Anglo-Saxon, &c. In the Celt-Jberic they predominate, as almost 
every character is to be found in that ancient alphabet. I have racked my brain 
not a little in trying to decipher them, and, though their value is easily ascer- 
tamed, they cannot be combined so as to be rendered into anything intelligible. 
It is probable that we have not a correct fac-simile ; but this will now be remedied, 
as Mr. Colcraft will take an impression in wax of the whole tablet" 
