OF THE MISSISSIPPI VALLEY. 59
possesses a greater popular interest than any other. These are the sculptures or carvings in stone, of which a great variety occur in the mounds. These display no incon- siderable degree of taste and skill. They exhibit a close observance of nature, and an attention to details, which we are unprepared to look for among a people not considerably advanced in the arts, and to which the elaborate and labo- rious, but usually clumsy and ungraceful productions of the savage, can claim but slight approach. Savage taste in sculpture is oftenest exhibited in monstrosities, carica- tures of things rather than faithful copies. The carvings from the mounds, en the centrary, are remarkable for their truthfulness ; they display not only the general form and features of the objects sought to be represented, but to a surprising degree their characteristic expression and atti- tude. In some instances their very habits are indicated ; the otter is represented. securing a fish, so also is that inveterate fisher, the heron, and the hawk holds a small bird in his talons and tears it with his beak. These re- presentations are so exact as to leave no doubt as to the animals designed to be exhibited. Hardly a beast, bird, or reptile, indigenous to the country, is omitted from the list. We identify the beaver, the otter, elk, bear, wolf, panther, racoon, opossum, and squirrel; the hawk, heron, owl, vulture, raven, swallow, paroquet, duck, goose, and nume- rous other varieties of land and water birds ; the alligator, turtle, toad, frog, rattlesnake, &c. &c. Besides these there are carvings of various animals and birds not indigenous to this latitude ; for instance, the lamantin or manitus. and the tecan. Several carvings, supposed to represent the manitus, hayé been discovered, one of which is shown, of full size, in the following engraving :
Ate
