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Show 1836- 1837] Flagg's Far West lS9 their origin, design, or history which may be attained, and avail themselves of every measure which may give to them perpetuity, and hand them down, undisturbed in form or character, to other generations? The most plausible, and, indeed, the only plausible argument urged by those who deny the artificial [ 132] origin of the ancient mounds, is their immense size. There are, say they, " many mounds in the West that exactly correspond in shape with these supposed antiquities, and yet, from their size, most evidently were not made by man;" and they add that " it would be well to calculate upon the ordinary labour of excavating canals, 1 how many hands, with spades, wheelbarrows, and other necessary implements, it would take to throw up mounds like the largest of these within any given time." "• We are told that in the territory of Wisconsin and in northern Illinois exist mounds to which these are molehills. Of those, Mount Joliet, Mount Charles, Sinsinewa, and the Blue Mounds vary from one to four hundred feet in height; while west of the Arkansas exists a range of earth- heaps ten or twelve miles in extent, and two hundred feet high: there also, it might be added, are the ftfcmelle Mountains, estimated at one thousand feet. 111 -•- > Ui This quotation is from the pen of an exceedingly accurate writer upon the West, and a worthy man; so for its sentiment is deserving of regard. I have canvassed the topic personally with this gentleman, and upon other subjects have frequently availed myself of a superior information, which more than twenty years of residence in the Far West has enabled him to obtain. I refer to the Rev. J. M. Peck, author of'' Guide for Emigrants, 1' & c- FLAOO. m For recent srientifir conclusions respecting the mounds and their builders, see citations in note 33, ante, p. 69. Mount Joliet, on the west bank of the Des Plainea River, in the southwestern portion of Cook County, Illinois; Mount St. Charles, in Jo Daviess County, Illinois; Sinsinawa, in Grant County, Wisconsin, and Blue Mounds, in Dane County, Wisconsin, are unquestionably of natural formation. For descriptions of the artificial mounds of Wisconsin, see I. A. Lapham, " Antiquities of Wisconsin," Smithsonian Institution Contributions, volume vii; Alfred Branson, " Antiquities of Crawford County," and Stephen D. Peet, " Emblematic Mounds in Wisconsin," in Wisconsin Historical Collections, iii and ix, respectively.- ED. |