nd argument to all interested in the
important problem as to where the cradle of ancient American civilization
was situated. But these symbolic gorgets go far towards substantiating
Professor Putnam's oft-expressed conclusions that the ancient peoples of
the central and southern portions of the United States were, to a certain
extent, offshoots of the ancient Mexicans.

[Illustration.]

Figure 23.

Before abandoning the subject of native symbolism and star-emblems I
should like to present, as a curiosity, with an appeal to specialists to
enlighten me as to the astronomical knowledge of the Eskimos, an Eskimo
drawing from Professor Wilson's instructive and useful monograph. It is
said to represent a "flock of birds," but so closely resembles Cassiopeia
and Polaris that I am tempted to view it as an indication that the Eskimos
may also have associated the idea of a celestial bird, or birds, wheeling
around a central point, with the constellation and the pole-star (fig.
23). Having once ventured so far afield, I cannot refrain from presenting
here an interesting set of aboriginal star-symbols, reproduced from
Professor Wilson's comprehensive work (fig. 24), each composed of a cross
combined, with a single exception, with a circle. I draw attention to the
striking resemblance of some of these signs to those painted on the finely
decorated pottery found on the hacienda of Don Jose Luna, in Nicaragua,
and described by J. F. Brandsford, M.D. (Archaeological Researches in
Nicaragua, Smithsonian Inst., 1881, p. 30, B), and suggest that, in both
localities, the symbol may be a rudimentary swastika, and represent
Polaris and circumpolar rotation.

[Illustration.]

Plate III. 1. Shell gorget, Missouri. 2, 5-14. Pottery vessels, Arkansas.
3, 4, 15-17, 19-28. Pottery vessels, Missouri. 18. Pottery vessel,
Kentucky. 6. National Museum. 3, 16, 17, 21, 24, 25. St. Louis Academy.
All others Peabody Museum. Willoughby, "Pottery from the Mississippi
Valley." Journal of American Folk-lore, January-March, 1897.

In conclusion I refer the reader to Mr. C. C. Willoughby's valuable and
most interesting "Analysis of the decorations upon pottery from the
Mississippi Valley" (Journal Amer. Folk-lore, vol. X, 1897), in which he
figures the remarkable specimens preserved in the Peabody Museum,
Cambridge, the designs on which, as he state