e the arrival of
white men in America, and which contain knives and trinkets of European
manufacture. There are many others which are much older, and in which
the genuine remains sometimes indicate a culture like that of Shawnees
or Senecas, and sometimes suggest something perhaps a little higher.
With the progress of research the vast and vague notion of a distinct
race of "Mound-Builders" became narrowed and defined. It began to seem
probable that the builders of the more remarkable mounds were tribes of
Indians who had advanced beyond the average level in horticulture, and
consequently in density of population, and perhaps in political and
priestly organization. Such a conclusion seemed to be supported by the
size of some of the "ancient garden-beds," often covering more than a
hundred acres, filled with the low parallel ridges in which corn was
planted. The mound people were thus supposed to be semi-civilized red
men, like the Aztecs, and some of their elevated earthworks were
explained as places for human sacrifice, like the pyramids of Mexico and
Central America. It was thought that the "civilization" of the
Cordilleran peoples might formerly have extended northward and eastward
into the Mississippi valley, and might after a while have been pushed
back by powerful hordes of more barbarous invaders. A further
modification and reduction of this theory likened the mound-builders to
the pueblo Indians of New Mexico. Such was the opinion of Mr. Morgan,
who offered a very ingenious explanation of the extensive earthworks at
High Bank, in Ross county, Ohio, as the fortified site of a pueblo.[156]
Although there is no reason for supposing that the mound-builders
practised irrigation (which would not be required in the Mississippi
valley) or used adobe-brick, yet Mr. Morgan was inclined to admit them
into his middle status of barbarism because of the copper hatchets and
chisels found in some of the mounds, and because of the apparent
superiority in horticulture and the increased reliance upon it. He
suggested that a people somewhat like the Zunis might have migrated
eastward and modified their building habits to suit the altered
conditions of the Mississippi valley, where they dwelt for several
centuries, until at last, for some unknown reason, they retired to the
Rocky Mountain region. It seems to me that an opinion just the reverse
of Mr. Morgan's would be more easily defensible,--namely, that the
ancestors of the pueblo