moothed with
a trowel.

Speaking of the region west of the Mississippi, Biedman says: "We
journeyed two days, and reached a village in the midst of a plain,
surrounded by walls and a ditch filled by water, which had been made
by Indians." This town is supposed to have been situated in the
north-eastern part of Arkansas, and it is interesting to note that
recent investigators find what are probably the remains of these
walled towns, in the shape of inclosures with ditches and mounds,
in North-eastern Arkansas and South-eastern Missouri.<21> The tribes
throughout the entire extent of the Mississippi Valley were accustomed
to palisade their villages--at least, occasionally.<22>

Illustration of Mandan Village. (Bureau of Ethnology.)------

On the Missouri River we find some Indian tribes that have excited a
great deal of interest among archaeologists. It has been surmised that,
if their history could be recovered, it would clear up a great many
difficult questions. They were accustomed to fortify their village's
with ditches, embankments, and palisades. This gives us a cut of one
of their villages. It is to be observed that it has a great likeness to
some of the inclosures ascribed to the Mound Builders.

This has been noted by many writers. Says Brackenridge: "In my voyage
up the Missouri I observed the ruins of several villages which had been
abandoned twenty or thirty years, which in every respect resembled the
vestiges on the Ohio and Mississippi."<23> Lewis and Clark, in their
travels, describe the sites of several of these abandoned villages, the
only remains of which were the walls which had formerly inclosed the
villages, then three or four feet high. The opinion has been advanced
that the inclosures of the Mound Builders were formerly surmounted by
palisades. Mr. Atwater asserts that the round fort which was joined to
a square inclosure at Circleville showed distinctly evidence of having
supported a line of pickets or palisades.<24>

Should it be accepted that the inclosures of the Mound Builders
represent village sites, and that they were probably further protected
by palisades, it would seem, after what we have just observed of the
customs of the Indians in fortifying their villages, to be a simple and
natural explanation of these remains.

We have already referred to the fact that scholars draw a distinction
between the more massive works found in the Ohio Valley and the low,
crumbling ruins occupyin