eighty-eight feet long, one hundred and thirty-two wide, and ten feet high. It has four graded ways, one at the middle of each side. The grades are twenty-five feet wide and sixty feet long. The pyramid next in size, being one hundred and fifty feet long, one hundred and twenty wide, and eight high, has three graded ways, one on the north, one on the west, and another on the east. The third elevation is one hundred and twenty feet long, fifty broad, and six high, and has two graded ascents, one at each end. The enclosure containing these elevations has, on the side next the Muskingum river, a passage, or gateway, one hundred and fifty feet wide. Leading from this gate towards the river is a graded way, of the same width as the gate, extending six hundred and eighty feet, where it terminates on the alluvial banks, whence the descent to the river is slight and easy. At Cahokia, Illinois, is a temple mound, the largest known in the north-west. It is a truncated pyramid, with a rectangular base, seven hundred feet long and five hundred broad. The altitude of the frustum is ninety feet. The top is level, and contains five acres. On one side of the mound is a terrace, three hundred and fifty feet long, and one hundred and sixty wide. There is a graded way to the terrace. As you go south, this class of mounds increases in number, and generally in magnitude. They have generally graded ascents to the summit. Some of them are ascended by spiral pathways, winding around them from the base to the summit.

As to the design of these elevated structures with graded ascents, the most probable opinion is, that they were "high places" of sacrifice. Some of them might have been surmounted by wooden structures serving as temples; but, in the long lapse of ages, every vestige of wood has disappeared. The question of their design may receive some light from the structure and uses of the Pyramids and Teocallis of Mexico. The stupendous mound at Cholula is a truncated pyramid, facing with its four sides the cardinal points, and divided into a number of terraces. Its base is over two thousand feet square, and its altitude is one hundred and seventy-seven feet. On the summit stood a sumptuous temple, in which was the image of the mystic deity, and on whose sanguinary altars palpitated human victims, midst religious rites and superstitious ceremonies. The great temple of Mexico, in the days of Montezuma, stood in a vast enclosure, surrounded by a quadrangular wall, eight feet high, and having four gateways opening on the principal streets of the city. It was a pyramid of earth, with five terraces, and a truncated top. It was ascended by flights of steps from terrace to terrace. The manner of ascent had a most imposing effect during religious ceremonies,

when the pompous procession of priests, with wild minstrelsy, came sweeping round the huge sides of the pyramid, as they rose higher and higher, in the presence of gazing multitudes, towards the summit. All the religious services, and the dismal rites of sacrifice performed on the top of this structure, were visible from the remotest corners of the city. Here the human victim, having wound his way up the long ascent, was received by six priests, whose long and matted locks flowed disorderly over their sable robes, covered with hieroglyphics of mystic import. They led him to the sacrificial stone. Five of the priests secured his head and limbs, while the sixth, with a sharp knife, opened the breast of the wretched victim, tore out the bleeding heart, held it up towards the sun, and then cast it down on the sanguinary altar, while the multitudes below prostrated themselves in humble adoration. The very striking resemblance in structure between the Mexican and the western mounds, would leave little doubt that both were designed for similar purposes.

In addition to the sacrificial, sepulchral, and temple mounds, there are others whose character is not well defined. They are classed as Anomalous. Some of them possess features in common with all the classes, while others are wholly unique. It is, however, probable that some of them were designed as places of observation and sites for signal-fires. Ranges of such mounds extend along the valleys for many miles. Between Chillicothe and Columbus, along the eastern border of the Scioto valley, may be selected several, so placed in relation to each other, that signal-fires might be transmitted in a few minutes along the whole line. On a hill, near Chillicothe, is one which commands a view of the valley for fifteen or twenty miles. Similar mounds are found on the Miami, the Wabash, and the Illinois; all commanding extensive views of the valley. They are so placed as especially to command a perfect view of the enclosures, and to prevent any one from approaching the work in any direction without being seen from the summit of the mound.

Similar mounds, for purposes of observation, were very numerous in Great Britain in ancient times. They were so placed as to enable the sentinels to look through all the windings and recesses of the circuitous dells, which they were intended to protect. They communicated one with the other. Some were placed at the extremities of long valleys, and others at the sides, so as to command a view of the opposite declivity. So systematically were these mounds of observation arranged by the ancient Britons, that a single individual could not proceed twenty yards in any direction without being seen by some one of the sentinels. Nearly as

perfect is the arrangement of those placed along the valleys of our Western rivers. They must have been essential to the safety of a people inhabiting, in a warlike age, a champaign country, whose illimitable level is only broken by the rivers which run through it. By means of sentinels placed on these, aided by signal-fires, notice of the approach of an enemy might be given in a short time to all the villages within the distance of thirty or forty miles.

Were it not for extending this paper beyond due limits, we might describe the Remains of Art found in the mounds. The material of art is chiefly clay, stone, and copper. The art of pottery attained to a considerable degree of skill and perfection among the mound-builders. Some specimens of vases recovered from the mounds, in elegance of model, delicacy, and finish, far exceed anything the modern Indians have ever produced, and are fully equal to the best Peruvian specimens. The interior of the mounds abounds in axes, knives, drills, and various other implements, both of stone and of copper. Ornaments, consisting of bracelets, pendents, beads, rings, dice, and buttons, are found in great abundance. Many of the ornaments are carved with much taste and skill. Sculptured tablets also abound. They are generally heads and figures of animals, true to nature, and highly finished. Human heads, of the general contour and likeness of the great American family, are common. Of animals, we find the beaver, otter, cat, elk, rabbit, and, what is remarkable, since the animal is not found in this latitude, but only in the tropics, the sea-cow. Of birds, we find the heron, eagle, swallow, duck, partridge, and various other specimens; some of them most exquisitely sculptured.

It is a remarkable fact, that nothing, either moulded, sculptured, or engraved, obviously designed for an idol, or object of worship, has been obtained from the mounds. Whatever, therefore, was the religious system of this unknown people, it could not consist in the worship of graven images.

We have thus endeavoured in this paper to condense, and place in a connected form, the principal facts obtainable from all sources accessible to us, respecting the celebrated antiquities of the West. The following are some of the conclusions to which the investigation of the subject has led us :

First. The works are very ancient. Trees of the largest size, and of most venerable age, are growing on them. In one instance a chestnut, twenty-one feet, and an oak, twenty-three, in circumference, were growing on the embankment, while all around were scattered the fallen trunks of immense trees; the whole forest presenting the appearance of the highest antiquity. In another place

was found, in one of the ditches from which the earth was taken for the construction of a mound, an accumulation of vegetable deposit, thirty inches deep. Those only who have observed how slowly vegetable deposits accumulate, even in the luxuriant forests of the West, can form an estimate of the centuries necessary for the collection of such an amount. The decomposed condition of the human remains found in the mounds, is another evidence of great antiquity. Though the superficial skeletons, being of late date, (being the remains generally of the Indians who occupied the country at the time of its discovery,) are well preserved; yet those found at the bottom of the mounds, being evidently the remains of the builders, are in such a state of decay, as to render all attempts to restore the skull, or any part of the skeleton, entirely hopeless. Yet, as we have seen, skeletons may be preserved in the earth, under circumstances less favourable than those in which the mound-builders were placed, for at least eighteen hundred years. We can by this means only approximate an estimate of the age of the mounds. Another evidence of great antiquity is, that the races of Indians inhabiting the country when first visited by Europeans, had, so far as we can ascertain, lost all tradition of the erection of the mounds, or their uses. At least the modern tribes know nothing at all about the matter. They use the mounds for burial-places, as they would any natural elevation, but they have not the slightest trace of an idea of the age or design of the works, or of the people who constructed them.

Secondly. The people who erected the mounds were a numerous, settled, agricultural people. None but an immense multitude, labouring for a long time, could erect so extensive and gigantic works; and none but a settled people could be induced to undergo the necessary toil. No means but agriculture could furnish support for a numerous and settled people. There are comparatively few fish in the western rivers, and no settled population could long be sustained by the chase. The rich bottom-lands of the Scioto and the Miami, and the beautiful prairies of the Wabash, waved with the yellow harvest long before the white man's foot had pressed the soil. But the farms of the mound-builders have since been covered with trees, that must have required centuries to attain such gigantic dimensions.

Thirdly. The mound-builders were far advanced in skill, intelligence, and enterprise, beyond the modern races of Indians. They certainly understood the measurement of distances and angles, otherwise they could not construct a perfect square or circle. It may be easy to lay off a small square, or a small circle; but to extend the sides of a polygon for a mile or more, and keep them regular, or to

draw a circle a thousand feet in diameter, and make it a perfect circle, requires nice instruments and great care. They were, however, inferior to the Mexicans, and the tribes of Central America and Yucatan.

Fourthly. We cannot discover much, if any, evidence of relationship between the builders of the mounds and the modern Indians. The former differed greatly from the latter in religion, so far as we can conjecture, and in their general habits. The modern Indians throw up no embankments, and erect no mounds. The resemblance of the mound-builders to the Mexicans and Peruvians is much more evident than to the modern Indians.

So far as we can see our way, by the dim lights afforded us, into the ancient history of the American Continent, it would seem that the course of emigration has constantly been from the north and north-east, to the south and west. The lines of defensive works, extending from the Alleghany to the Wabash, would indicate that the pressure of attack was from the north-east. The era of the mounds certainly preceded that of the Aztec, or even that of the Toltecan civilization. It is possible, therefore, that the moundbuilders had at last to yield to northern aggression; and retiring before the invaders, proceeded to the south, improving as they went, until they, or their descendants, spread themselves over the valley of Mexico, and the regions of Central America and Yucatan. The mound-builders might, therefore, have been the progenitors of the Toltecs, the Chichemecs, the Aztecs, or the Tezcucans.

But all on this subject is conjecture. The race of the mounds may, for aught we shall ever know, have been utterly exterminated by the races against whom they erected their defences. At any rate, they are now among the things that were, but never can be again. Their works alone remain. Their memory is lost. Their name, their language, and their fate, can never be known to mortal Even their very bones have crumbled to dust, and mingled, undistinguishable, with the same earth from which they built their

man.

mounds.