OF THE MISSISSIPPI VALLEY. 9
bankments of earth and stone, erected with great labor and manifest design. In connection with these, more or less intimate, are found various minor relics of art, consisting of ornaments and implements of many kinds, some of them composed of metal, but most of stone. They spread over a vast extent of country. They are found on the sources of the Alleghany, in the western part of the State of New- York, on the east ; and extend thence westwardly along the southern shore of Lake Erie, and through Michigan and Wisconsin to Iowa and the Nebraska territory, on the west.* We have no record of their occurrence above the lakes, nor higher than the falls of the Mississippi. Carver mentions some on the shores of Lake Pepin; and Lewis and Clarke saw them on the Missouri river, 1000 miles above its junction with the Mississippi. ‘They are found all over the intermediate country, and along the valley of the Mississippi to the Gulf of Mexico. They line the shores of the Gulf from Texas to Florida, and extend, in diminished numbers, into South Carolina. They occur in great numbers in Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, Mis- souri, Arkansas, Kentucky, Tennessee, Louisiana, Missis- sippi, Alabama, Georgia, Florida, and Texas. They are found, in less numbers, in the western portions of New- York, Pennsylvania, and Virginia ; as well as in Michigan,
- It is a fact not generally known, that there is an abundance of tumuli or
mounds in the Territory of Oregon. We are not informed, however, that there are any enclosures or other works of like character with those usually accompanying the mounds of the’Mississippi valley, nor whether the mounds of Oregon are generally disseminated over that territory. The only reference we have to them is contained ina paragraph in the Narrative of the United States Exploring Expedition:
«We soon reached the Bute Prairies, which are extensive and covered with tumuli or small mounds, at regular distances asunder. As far as I can learn, there is no tradition among the natives concerning them. They are conical mounds, thirty feet in diameter, about six or seven feet above the level, and many thousands in number. Being anxious to ascertain if they contained any relics, I subsequently visited these prairies, and opened three of the mounds, but found nothing in them but a pavement of round stones.”— U. S.E. E., Vol. iv. p. 313.
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