Such is the extent of our knowledge respecting the monuments of Wisconsin. Carver mentions earthworks in the vicinity of Lake Pepin; and it is reasonable to conclude that they are scattered, in greater or less profusion, over the intervening territory. Of this, however, we are still uninformed. It would be an interesting point to determine the range of the mound effigies, and whether they merge gradually into the works of a lower latitude, or whether they occupy an exclusive field, and possess characteristics sufficiently striking to warrant us in ascribing them to a different race or era. Their purposes, in our present state of information concerning them, do not seem to be satisfactorily settled: it is still a matter of doubt whether they are sepulchral in their origin, connected with the superstitions of their builders, or erected as the monuments and memorials of migrations and events unrecorded by the pen of history. Certain it is that they are now invaded by a busy population, careless alike of their origin and of their future fate, before whose encroachments they are rapidly disappearing. Already the plough has broken in upon the outlines and symmetry of hundreds, and unless the present favorable moment is seized upon to secure their accurate admeasurement and delineation, these embossed illustrations of our ancient history will be obliterated forever. It is impossible to estimate their value in the elucidation of the grand ethnological problems involved in the past history of our country, until their extent and dependencies as well as their general character are better understood.
In the State of Missouri, and especially in the country lying between the Missouri and Arkansas rivers, various singular remains are represented to exist, which differ materially from those that have been noticed in the preceding pages. [p136] These are said to consist of the ruins of towns, sometimes of great size, regularly laid out, in streets and squares. Dr. BECK mentions one of these ruined towns in Gasconade county, (probably now falling within the county of Crawford, erected out of Gasconade,) in which the sites of houses, possessing foundations of stone, are distinctly visible. Stone walls are said to occur in some parts of the area, covered by heaps of earth.[90] The same author describes several works of stone displaying, in his estimation, great architectural skill, which occur on Osage river and Buffalo creek, one of its tributaries. One said to exist on Noyer’s creek, near the town of Louisiana, Pike county, has been particularly noticed. “It presents the dilapidated remains of a building constructed of rough, unhewn stones, fifty-six feet long and twenty-two broad, embracing several divisions and chambers. The walls are from two to five feet high. Eighty rods eastward of this structure is found a smaller one, of similar construction. The narrow apartments are said to be arched with stone, one course overlapping the other, after the manner of the edifices of Central America.”[91] Nothing of this character has been observed elsewhere, and it is extremely probable that there is some mistake in the matter. If works answering to this description really exist, at the points mentioned, they deserve the careful attention of the archæologist. It is suspected that they will not bear a rigid scrutiny, such as is required to a proper substantiation. Our authority observes, that “these remains form a class of antiquities entirely distinct from the walled towns, fortifications, barriers, or mounds; and that the regularity and other peculiarities of structure which they display, favor the conclusion that they are the remains of a race different from those who erected the former, and who were familiar with the rules of architecture, and perhaps with a perfect system of warfare.”[92]