The Columbia herald. [volume] (Columbia, Tenn.) 1850-1873, 1871-07-07

formed since the mounds were built
, Some of them have taken the pains t.
, count the annual layers of the deposit
made by the overflOws the river
7 whose bottoms have been made sine
/ the aborigines constructed these edifi
I ces; and they have, by this sort o
calculation, assign to them an aston
ishing antiquity
THE BLUFF FORMATION.
ssThe bluff formation'' of Mississippi
) is very old. 1t is perhaps as ancicn
as the Niagara bottom near Queens
} town, or the Loess of the Rhine, an,
the whole of it may have been forme'
before the Ark of Noah fioated on tn
. diluvial waters, or even before Adam
: lived or Eden bloomed: But becaus
an arch@Ologist finds an aborigina
: mound upon the top of these bluff
of the Mississippi, it is no evidenc
} that the mound Is as old as the hill
He will find the same sort Of work o
. the mound builders in the recent bot
J tom of the river, made probably sine
, it has been greatly reduced in size b,
, some upheaval which has made ]
I cease to aid in draining the Northern
, Lakes, which is now performed by tn
st. Lawrence alone. When the VALLEY
of the Mississippi was formed, of which
} the ''bluff formation" and the high is
lands of st. Mary's parish are the re
mains, the Mississippi was probably {
much grander river than It is now
and when the waters of Lake Michi
gan flowed to the sea through it.
mouth, it may have rivaled or surpass.
ed the Amazon in volume and mag
nificence. But there is ample evidenct
that the aboriginal ruins upon its bluff
and in its bottom, have been built long
since it received its present form, and
was set to work to make new bottom
several hundred feet lower than The
grand alluvial plain it had finished be-
fore human history received its first
4 record.
MOUNDS IN THE MISSISSIPPI BOTTOM.
In 1889, saw near the little town OF
Commerce, below Memphis, three
large aboriginal mounds undermined
and engulfed by it during that year.
I believe the little city built upon the
ruins, to rival Memphis, has shared
the same fate. But when / saw these
mounds and this new city, and Mem
| phis on the Chickasaw Bluffs, while
! they were on the bottom, the antigua
| rian idea never occurred to me that
Memphis was as ancient as the bluffs,
or that the mounds and Commerce
| were as old as the bottom of the Mis-
sissippi River. There were great trees
growing upon the mounds that might
give a. better record of their antiquity.
The white people, Indians, and their
aboriginal predecessors fixed their
residences upon these spots for the ad-
vantages they afford. 1t is very usual
to find in every part of the valley of
the great river and its tributaries, on
the second bottoms, above overfiows,
the houses of white settlers, built upon
the sites of Indian wigwams, while
the ruins of the wigwams occupy the
same ground with those of the mounds
of the ancient inhabitants ofAmerica.
Each race and generation selected the
same spots for their abodes for the
same reasons. The creeks and rivers
ran then Overflowed their banks as
they do now. They successively sought
their vicinity to use the water for
drinking, angling and navigation, and
to cultivate the rich land deposited
and irrigated by them. They built as
near them as they could safely and il
the ancient men of America settled in
the overflewed bottom of the Mississip-
pi, as they did below Memphis, they
protected their houses and plantations
by levees, as the white people, who oc-
cupy their places, do now. These
mound builders, like the ancient Egyp-
tians, seem to have been wise enough
not only to protect their Improvements
against the inundations of the river.
but to control its current, and to give
fixedness to its channel by wise 81 s.
tenn of engineering. The Indians who
succeeded them had lost their know
ledge or had never acquired it. They
were driven out of the bottom entirely.
Their cornfields were cultivated only
in the uplands. Their successors, the
white men, build ievees; but are not
yet wise enough to protect them
against undermining. They permit
the river, form Cairo to its mouth, to
take its own course, and to do as it
pleases with their works. From Syene
to the Mediterranean Sea the Pha-
raOhs bridled the Nile and made it Obe-
dent to their will; but they never
thought of doing this with slight levees
built upon the surface of its deposits.
BY some mode, perhaps by sub-aque-
Gus jetties, they confined it to its
present bed.
THE AGE OF THE TREES.
l thought that i could ascertain the |
age of the mounds of our country by |
examining that of the trees which
Srrv I'M m fIVxsi
Oldest tree should show a thousand
rings, vas aware that this would not
indicate the date of the construction
of the mound on which might find it
growing; but il would prove that it
was certainly thousand years old
and that the mound builders had ceas-
ed to use the edifice; and probably all
perished or migrated from the cOun-
try, and left it to relapse into wilder
ness, ten centuries ago, But ! was
entirely in my efforts to
obtain correct information from this
source. AS far as / have examined
the ages of the forest trees Of the
United States, east of the Rocky Noun
t:ins, they have been proven TO be
either Comparatively young or short
lived when oldest. had curiosity,
some years ago, to count the rings Oh a
great many trees of different kinds i'm
Texas, Mississippi, Alabama and Vir-
ginia. My object was to ascertain
from the comparative thickness of tie
ANNUAL rings, and their dates, by
counting the past years from the last
formed back to the heart Of the trees,
what great. drOughts and rainey sea-
sons, and periods and duratiOns of the
changes our country has ex-
perienced i'm the last thousand years.
But have never found one whose age
will compare with that attributed to
the chesnuts Of Sicily, the oaks of
the cedars of Lebanon, the
expresses of Mexico, or the sequoias
Of California.
In making this investigation, / was
to find that perhaps the
he half of our country now cultiv . ted
the Cumberland and Alle-
yhany Mountains and the Mississippi
River, and covered with old looking
orests of oak and hickory, three hum
ired years ago was prairie land. men,
,ioned this fact in q paper iead to the
Academy two years since, on The
Prairies-their former extent, and the
causes of their formation" All the
.icher lands. which now produce hick-
Dry and oak, and the various wild
grasses by tie annual fires made by
he Indians, were kept i'm q prairie
except the bottoms and a ,
ew other spots of upland where water
in rro |