Page:History of the Ojibway Nation.djvu/191

Rh In the vicinity of some of these mounds on Chippeway River, the writer has distinguished gardens and fields regularly laid out, in which even the rows of corn hills were still plainly discernible, clearly proving that the mounds scattered over this portion of country are not of such ancient origin as some speculative writers would have us believe.

The old men of the Ojibways affirm that nearly all the tribes of the red man who lived in an open prairie country, before the introduction of firearms among them, were accustomed to live in earthen wigwams as a protection and defence against the attacks of their enemies.

Truly may it be said of all these Indians tribes, that their hand has been against every one, and every one's hand against them. They have lived in "fear and trembling" of one another, and oft has the sudden midnight attack extinguished for ever the fires of their wigwams. And for greater security against these sudden attacks, and continual state of warfare, first originated the earthen remains, over which now the white man's plow peacefully furrows.

From human bones being occasionally discovered in these mounds, most writers have been led to suppose them as the graves or burial places of distinguished chiefs.

The Indians account for them by saying that these former