more in communication with Europeans than the other. That the mounds of the west could not be of much greater antiquity than their cognate works of the State of New York may be deduced from another fact which Mr. Squier has pointed out with regard to them, though without perceiving the argument which may be deduced from it. At p. 302 of the same volume he says, "To understand clearly the nature of the works last mentioned, it should be remembered that the banks of the western rivers are always steep, and, where these works are located, invariably high. The banks of the various terraces are also steep, ranging from ten to thirty and more feet in height. The rivers are constantly shifting their channels, and frequently cut their way through all the intermediate up to the earliest-formed or highest terrace, presenting bold banks, inaccessibly steep, and from fifty to one hundred feet high. At such points, from which the river has in some instances receded to the distance of half a mile or more, works of this description are oftenest found." He goes on to say, "It is a fact of much importance, and worthy of special note, that within the scope of a pretty extended observation no work of any kind has been found occupying the latest-formed terrace. This terrace alone, except at periods of extraordinary freshets, is subject to overflow. The formation of each terrace constitutes a sort of semi-geological era in the history of the valley, and the fact that none of the works occur upon the lowest or latest-formed of these, while they are found indiscriminately upon all the others, bears directly upon the question of their antiquity."
From this clear statement of a fact of such important bearing on the question, it seems to me that a conclusion quite different from what the talented author would maintain is inevitable. The latest-formed terrace alone being subject to overflow would be a sufficient reason for the builders of those remarkable mounds to avoid erecting their works on them, whether erected for habitations or other purposes: therefore, if still found erected in their vicinity, and out of the reach of places subject to overflow, while the rivers are constantly shifting their channels, it is clear that they have been all erected while the country had the same general character as at present. They shew evidences of skilful design in the choice of places selected for erection; and the latest-formed terrace, therefore, must have existed when they were built, so that no great variation in the course of the rivers can be supposed to have occurred since, though they are so constantly shifting their channels.
As to the character of the mounds themselves, of which
