ts origin is, without doubt, anterior to the discovery of America. The pipes, the red paint, and the pottery, are so many circumstances connecting this mound with the recent race; while the tumulus itself is a relic of the more ancient one of the mound-builders. The progress of discovery seems constantly to diminish the distinction between the ancient and modern races; and it may not be very wide of the truth to assert that they were the same people.
It is not strange that changes should, from time to time, take place in the character and habits of a people so rude and so little advanced in civilization. Different tribes have different habits; and a stronger one may have overrun and swallowed up a weaker, and thus changed its customs and destroyed its institutions. In this way, the mode of burial, and even the religious ceremonies, may be altered; those of the conquerors being substituted for those of the conquered. History records many such events. The inhabitants of Egypt have ceased to build pyramids and sphinxes; the Greeks have ceased to erect temples: and yet, we have reason to believe that their descendants occupy the same countries. Is it more strange that the ancestors of the present Indians should have erected mounds of earth, than that the aboriginals of any country should have had habits different from their posterity? We need not, therefore, look to Mexico, or any other country, for the descendants of the mound-builders. We probably see them in the present red race of the same or adjacent regions.
Since the red men have become known to us, numerous tribes have been ex- [page 30:] tinguished, with all their peculiar customs and institutions; yet, as a whole, the Indian remains. Many tribes have been overrun by others, and have united with them as one people. Migrations have taken place; one tribe acquiring sufficient power has taken possession of lands belonging to another, and maintained its possession. In the course of these revolutions it is not strange that habits and practices, once prevalent in certain places, with certain tribes, should become extinct and forgotten.
Another fact is important in this connection. The mound-builders occupied the same localities that are now the favorite resort of the present Indians, who still often make use of the mounds for the burial of their dead. They have a kind of veneration for them, which may be the result of a lingering tradition of their sacred origin. The implements and utensils of the mound-builders were the same in many cases as those used by the recent inhabitants before their intercourse with the whites; and, as it has been quite clearly shown that the latter have in former times erected mounds of earth over their dead, we may consider such facts as tending to prove the unity of these people.
A mile and a half above Waukesha, on a very high and commanding position, are three round mounds in front of four lizard-mounds. (Fig. 9.) They are at the crossing of the old Madison road, in the southwest quarter of section twenty-six. A sentinel stationed on them could give warning to the inhabitants of the approach of any hostile force, long before they could reach the village. The lizards, as in most other cases, have their heads towards the south.
On the northwest quarter of the same section are also some small mounds, and one of the lizard shape. They are at the foot of the hill that borders the outlet of Pewaukee Lake. Still further, on the road (S. E. qr. of Sec. 22, T. 7, R. 19), were found the remains of another lizard mound, now nearly destroyed.
But the most remarkable collection of lizards and turtles yet discovered is on the school section, about a mile and a half southeast from the village of Pewaukee. (See Plate XXIII.) This consists of seven turtles, two lizards, four oblong mounds, and one of those remarkable excavations before alluded to. One of the turtle mounds, partially obliterated by the road, has a length of four hundred and fifty [page 31:] feet; being nearly double the usual dimensions. Three of them are remarkable for their curved tails, a 