main purpose of the present paper to examine critically the evidence offered in behalf of the identification of the more important of them. If it shall prove, as is believed to be the case, that serious mistakes of identification have been made, attention will be called to these and the manner pointed out in which certain theories have naturally enough resulted from the premises thus erroneously established.

It may be premised that the writer undertook the examination of the carvings with no theories of his own to propose in place of those hitherto advanced. In fact, their critical examination may almost be said to have been the result of accident. Having made the birds of the United States his study for several years, the writer glanced over the bird carvings in the most cursory manner, being curious to see what species were represented. The inaccurate identification of some of these by the authors of "The Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley" led to the examination of the series as a whole, and subsequently to the discussion they had received at the hands of various authors. The carvings are, therefore, here considered rather from the stand-point of the naturalist than the archæologist. Believing that the question first in importance concerns their actual resemblances, substantially the same kind of critical study is applied to them which they would receive were they from the hands of a modern zoological artist. Such a course has obvious disadvantages, since it places the work of men who were in, at best, but a semi-civilized condition on a much higher plane than other facts would seem to justify. It may be urged, as the writer indeed believes, that the accuracy sufficient for the specific identification of these carvings is not to be expected of men in the state of culture the Mound-Builders are generally supposed to have attained. To which answer may be made that it is precisely on the supposition that the carvings were accurate copies from nature that the theories respecting them have been promulgated by archæologists. On no other supposition could such theories have been advanced. So accurate indeed have they been deemed that they have been directly compared with the work of modern artists, as will be noticed hereafter. Hence the method here adopted in their study seems to be not only the best, but the only one likely to produce definite results.

If it be found that there are good reasons for pronouncing the carvings not to be accurate copies from nature, and of a lower artistic standard than has been supposed, it will remain for the archæologist to determine how far their unlikeness to the animals they have been supposed to represent can be attributed to shortcomings naturally pertaining to barbaric art. If he choose to assume that they were really intended as imitations, although in many particulars unlike the animals he wishes to believe them to represent, and that they are as close copies as can be expected from sculptors not possessed of skill adequate to carry out their rude conceptions, he will practically have abandoned the position taken by many prominent archæologists with respect to the mound sculptors' skill, and will be forced to accord them a position on the plane of art not superior to the one occupied by the North American Indians. If it should prove that but a small minority of the carvings can be specifically identified, owing to inaccuracies and to their general resemblance, he may indeed go even further and conclude that they form a very unsafe basis for deductions that owe their very existence to assumed accurate imitation.

MANATEE.

In 1848 Squier and Davis published their great work on the Mounds of the Mississippi Valley. The skill and zeal with which these gentlemen prosecuted their researches in the field, and the ability and fidelity which mark the presentation of their results to the public are sufficiently attested by the fact that this volume has proved alike the mine from which subsequent writers have drawn their most important facts, and the chief inspiration for the vast amount of work in the same direction since undertaken.

On pages 251 and 252 of the above-mentioned work appear figures of an animal which is there called "Lamantin, Manitus, or Sea Cow," concerning which animal it is stated that "seven sculptured representations have been taken from the mounds." When first discovered, the authors continue, "it was supposed they were monstrous creations of fancy; but subsequent investigations and comparison have shown that they are faithful representations of one of the most singular animal productions of the world."

These authors appear to have been the first to note the supposed likeness of certain of the sculptured forms found in the mounds to animals living in remote regions. That they were not slow to perceive the ethnological interest and value of the discovery is shown by the fact that it was immediately adduced by them as affording a clew to the possible origin of the Mound-Builders. The importance they attached to the discovery and their interpretation of its significance will be apparent from the following quotation (p. 242):

Some of these sculptures have a value, so far as ethnological research is concerned, much higher than they can claim as mere works of art. This value is derived from the fact that they faithfully represent animals and birds peculiar to other latitudes, thus establishing a migration, a very extensive intercommunication or a contemporaneous existence of the same race over a vast extent of country.

The idea thus suggested fell on fruitful ground, and each succeeding writer who has attempted to show that the Mound-Builders were of a race different from the North American Indian, or had other than an autochthonous origin, has not failed to lay especial stress upon the presence in the mounds of sculptures of the manatee, as well as of other strange beasts and birds, carved evidently by the same hands that portrayed many of our native fauna.

Except that the theories based upon the sculptures have by recent writers been annunciated more positively and given a wider range, they have been left almost precisely as set forth by the authors of the "Ancient Monuments," while absolutely nothing appears to have been brought to light since their time in the way of additional sculptured evidence of the same character. It is indeed a little curious to note the perfect unanimity with which most writers fall back upon the above authors as at once the source of the data they adduce in support of the several theories, and as their final, nay, their only, authority. Now and then one will be found to dissent from some particular bit of evidence as announced by Squier and Davis, or to give a somewhat different turn to the conclusions derivable from the testimony offered by them. But in the main the theories first announced by the authors of "Ancient Monuments," as the result of their study of the mound sculptures, are those that pass current to-day. Particular attention may be called to the deep and lasting impression made by the statements of these authors as to the great beauty and high standard of excellence exhibited by the mound sculptures. Since their time writers appear to be well satisfied to express their own admiration in the terms made use of by Squier and Davis. One might, indeed, almost suppose that recent writers have not dared to trust to the evidence afforded by the original carvings or their fac-similes, but have preferred to take the word of the authors of the "Ancient Monuments" for beauties which were perhaps hidden from their own eyes.

Following the lead of the authors of the "Ancient Monuments," also, with respect to theories of origin, these carvings of supposed foreign animals are offered as affording incontestible evidence that the Mound-Builders must have migrated