Page:History of Southeast Missouri 1912 Volume 1.djvu/69

 HISTORY OF SOUTHEAST MISSOURI 9 plements of stone, the vessels of pottery, and the masses of bones found in the mounds of this country, and we see at once how strong is the negative argument against the existence of a great civilized race of people antedating the Indians. It is true that in Central Amer- ica some ruins are found approaching the con- structions unearthed in the East, but such is not the case in North America. We may wonder at the industry that reared the mounds of such great size, we find some things difficult to explain in any way about tliem. but we cannot believe them to have been the work of civilized people. On the other hand there are reasons for be- lieving that they are the work of the Indians. One of these is the fact of their arrangement. The Indian, for many reasons, selected most frequently as a site for his habitation or vil- lage, the bank of a stream or lake. This is the situation of many of the mounds. Another evidence of the Indian origin of the mounds is the fact that the utensils and implements found in some of them are similar to those used by the Indians. Yet another is the fact that the Indians of this country were ac- customed to practice mound burial. They placed the dead body on a scaffold or in a tree until it was denuded of flesh, then gathered up the bones and placed them in a mound. That is evidently what the builders of the mounds did. The age of some of the mounds also indicates their Indian origin. Many of the mounds, it is true, are very old. On the other hand many of them bear unmistakable evidence of having been built in recent times. The mound described by Conant near Bayou St. John in New Madrid county, cannot be very old for within very recent times the pit, from which the earth was taken for the mound, had very steep sides: so steep, in fact. that a ladder was needed to descend into it. This would not have been the case if the mound had not been of recent origin. The natural action of the elements would have I^artly filled it up and reduced the steepness of its sides. In fact this has happened within the memory of those living when Conant wrote. These facts, while not conclusive, point to the Indians as the builders of the mounds. There are other facts pointing in the same direction. Jlany of the mounds contain traces of what seems to be the mud plastering from a wall constructed of canes or sticks. Such w'alls were built by the Indians of the Mississippi valley having been copied, doubt- less, from the Indians of the southwest. It has been objected to this theory that some of the mounds are too old. It is pointed out that man}' of them nuist have been in ex- istence for centuries before the coming of the white men, for at the time when DeSoto was here these mounds had trees growing on them. This objection assumes the Indians to have lived here but a short time. That is not known to be true. On the contrary we have strong reason for believing that they must have lived in North America for many hun- dreds of years. If they have not been here for a long time, it is difficult or even impos- sible to explain how they became scattered over the great continent. They were found to be living in practically every part of this country. No matter how they first reached the continent it required a long period of years for them to people such a vast expanse of territory. It is objected too that the Indians had no reason for building the mounds. We may not understand just why they were built by In- dians, but neither do we know why they were built by ;Mound Builders or anyone else. It